Before I can turn around, a familiar voice cries out, “Devani, no!”
Devani? Come to think of it, I did see Devani leaving the complex in a silver car this evening. I resume walking toward the gate, pushing my way through the crowd of sour-smelling men.
And then I see them.
Shakespeare is sitting on the glass-covered street, crying and rocking Devani’s blood-soaked body.
“No, no,” he moans repeatedly.
There’s so much raw pain in his voice and his face that it feels wrong to witness such anguish, but it’s also hard to turn away. My gaze lowers to Devani’s still face and tears burn my eyes as I remember the child she was carrying.
An innocent life…gone.
“Let me through, goddamn it! Let me through!”
Heads swivel toward the hysterical voice to see Devani’s mother shove her way through the crowd. Poor woman.
She collapses next to Shakespeare and pulls her daughter away from him.
I can’t watch anymore. I turn and navigate my way back out of the crowd and return to the apartment.
If Junior wasn’t involved with the shooting then where in the hell is he?
“I told him if he can’t get what he needs from that fat-ass wife of his that he was welcome around my way any damn day of the week.”
Goddamn it. It’s been more than two months and I still can’t get Geneva’s words out of my head. I pick up the cordless phone and dial Junior’s cell phone. With each ring I grow more worried, anxious, and pissed. When Junior’s voice mail comes on, I slam the phone down and backhand the sudden tears streaming down my face.
Where is he?
“Honey chile. Open your eyes and see what’s in front of you.”
I return to bed and empty my tears into the pillowcase. Hours later as my face dries and my head aches, I hear the front door open. I don’t move or even call out. When he creeps into the bedroom, my back is to the door and my eyes are wide open. He doesn’t bother to turn on the light; but I hear the swish of clothing and the rustling of sheets before he slides in behind me.
I want to lash out, interrogate where he’s been — but I also know what will happen. He will leave me…and I’m not sure I can handle that.
Junior inches close until his body spoons me. “Molly, are you up?”
Silence.
He leans forward and plants a kiss against the back of my head and slides his arm around my hip.
For now — it’s enough.
The International House of Pancakes, otherwise known as IHOP, in Woodstock is teeming with customers. Since I didn’t get any sleep last night, I’m a zombie as I walk up to the hostess stand. Before I can inquire whether my party has arrived, I see my mother waving at the back of the restaurant.
“Never mind,” I say to the hostess. “I see her.” Drawing a deep breath, I pray for strength and march toward my mother.
At fifty, my mother is a beautiful, size-two bottle blond with smooth, taut skin she acquired from a talented cosmetic surgeon. Her designer clothes are the epitome of high fashion and her makeup is flawless. I can feel her laser blue eyes scan my round body through her dark shades.
“Good morning, Mother.” I curve on a plastic smile and deliver a quick peck against her cheek.
“You look like crap,” she says, removing her shades.
“I’m doing well. Thank you for asking,” I answer, pretending to be unfazed by her comment.
“Good morning, ladies,” our flaming-hair waitress says in greeting. “What can I get y’all?”
“Coffee,” Mother says.
I know it’s the only thing she’ll order, but I, on the other hand, am starving and I know my mother is picking up the tab. “I’ll have coffee, too. Can you also put in my order for a stack of buttermilk pancakes, two eggs with cheese and a side order of bacon? Thank you.”
My mother waits until we’re alone to say, “You’re never going to get rid of that weight eating like that.”
“I’ve lost twenty pounds, and besides, my husband doesn’t complain.”
“Why should he? You’re his sugar momma, after all. Or should I say: I am?”
Here we go. “Momma, don’t start.”
“Molly, give it up and come home. How much longer are you going be that nigger’s whore?”
I lean back against the chair and fold my arms. I’m really not in the mood for this shit, but unfortunately I need a favor.
“Come home, Molly,” she urges again. “Your father is sick.”
The news stuns me and I sit up straight. “What’s wrong?”
Her gaze lowers as the waitress returns with our coffee. We remain silent until she’s gone.
“Massive heart attack — last week.”
“And you’re just now telling me?”
She doesn’t answer.
“He still doesn’t want to see me.” I guess.
“He doesn’t know what he wants, Molly. But it’s time to end all this foolishness.”
Knowing that even after suffering a massive heart attack that my father still doesn’t want anything to do with me breaks something within me and another rush of tears spill down my face.
“Molly,” my mother snaps in a harsh whisper. “Not here.”
“I changed my mind,” I say, pushing back my chair and climbing to my feet. “I’m not hungry after all.”
“Molly, please sit down.”
I ignore the request and turn on my heel. When my father said I was dead to him, he obviously meant it.
I’m out of the restaurant before I know it and fumbling for my car keys.
“Molly.” My mother is suddenly behind me. “Don’t do this. Both of you are just stubborn as an ox. I want this to end. I want my family back.”
I wheel around to face her. “Junior is my family, Mother. Is he welcomed, too?”
Her horror and repulsion is instant, but in the next second she covers with a smile. “Molly —”
“I have to go, Mother.” I slip the key into the lock and open my door.
“Wait.” She grabs my arm and digs through her purse for an envelope. “Here. I know you need this.”
It’s money. Money Junior and I need — badly.
“Thanks, but no thanks. We’ll manage.” I slip in behind the wheel and start the car.
My mom leans down into the open window. “Don’t be foolish.” She tosses the money into the car. “When you’re ready to come home — alone, we’ll be waiting.” She slips her shades back on and strolls away.
A baby is going to improve my marriage. I’m convinced of this more now than before. I know Junior doesn’t spend too much time with Trey and Danina, but I know that things will be different with our baby.
I’ll make sure of it.
I’ll teach our child how to see beyond color. I’ll shower him or her with unconditional love and support for whatever they decide to be and for whomever they decide to love. I drive around the Atlanta perimeter for a few hours to clear my head and to waste time before my doctor’s appointment.
I had a complete physical last week, but scheduled this follow-up appointment for a referral to Southeastern Fertility Clinic. Medicaid doesn’t cover infertility, but I’m sure I’ll be able to work some angle with my mother for the money. Of course, Junior will have a fit if he finds out what I’m up to.
But that will require him to come home.
The check-in girls at the doctor’s office greet me with smiles and I hand over my Medicaid card for them to make a copy to file my claim. Ten minutes later, a nurse appears and calls my name.
“That’s me,” I say, standing and looping my purse strap over my shoulder. I follow the nurse down a long hallway to an office.
“Dr. Ferguson will be with you in just a moment.”
“Thank you.” I sit down in a leather chair across from a massive mahogany desk and wait. Why are doctors’ offices always so damn cold?
My bored gaze jumps around the room to notice silver-framed pictures of Dr. F
erguson’s picture-perfect family and to the various diplomas covering the walls.
“Sorry to have kept you waiting.” Silver-haired Dr. Ferguson enters the room with a brief smile and then walks around to take his place behind the desk. “You’re here to discuss infertility, right?” He opens my medical chart.
“Yes.” I scoot to the edge of my chair and nervously fold my hands in my lap.
“Alrighty.” He adjusts his wire-framed glasses on the bridge of his nose and reads intently at something in the chart. “Ah, it looks like we got your blood work back from the lab today.” He pauses.
Suddenly I don’t like the change in his expression. “Yeah. Is there a problem?”
Finally his gaze lifts to my own. “I’m sorry, but your test result reads positive for HIV.”
28
Aisha
I haven’t seen or talked to my husband in two weeks. His father called that next day after the scene at the prison and tells me I should be getting my divorce papers soon. Afterward he let me know he’s been eyeing me for a sec and he’d gladly pay for a shot of ass or two. Now ain’t that some shit? Still stuck on stupid, I carry my ass to that prison set on convincing my husband it’s all lies. Desperate to save my marriage. I found out my name was removed from the visitation list.
My marriage is over and I ain’t had nobody to blame but myself. But it also means that when it comes to money I ain’t have nobody to rely on but myself.
I glance over at my moms as I pull my Benz to a stop at the red light. “Wanna go to IHOP when we get finished at the apartment?”
She shrugs her shoulders and didn’t once look away from the window. “I ain’t really hungry.”
I’m headed back to Bentley Manor for the first time since all this shit went down. I been holed up in my momma’s apartment because I know the streets is hot with what they assumed to be my downfall. My momma is disappointed in me, my brothers is fighting damn near every day to keep niggas from talkin’ shit about me, I lost my husband, and my name is dirty as hell, but I still have more money than any of these busted, broke-down bitches can even hope to see. So I’m finally getting the fuck out Bentley Manor. Maleek brought me here and left my ass here. Now he’s gone. His trial is over and he got those ten years just like he feared. I ain’t have no reason to stay in that dirty bitch no more.
I found a nice three-bedroom town house in Kennesaw, Georgia. It was thirty minutes from Atlanta, we didn’t know a soul there (thank God) and the rent is $900 a month, but fuck it. I’m moving my family and me out of low-income housing. We deserve it. Now all we needed was the first and last month’s rent and the security deposit. No problem, but that meant a trip back to Bentley Manor sooner than I first planned. My stash is big enough to float me for a year if I cut back on my shopping. Since I ain’t sure about going back to turning tricks, that gives me plenty of time to figure out just what the hell I’m gone do. Maybe go to college, because I’m just being real when I say I know a five-dollar-an-hour job will run my ass crazy.
One thing I did hope for is to run up on Reema’s skanky ass. I ain’t done with her. She’s still a bold bitch to carry her ass to that prison when I already had to check her about my man. This ain’t even about Maleek. It’s about checking a bitch for stepping out of line with me and trying to play me close.
If Maleek wants a knock-off woman when he had the real thing then that’s his choice. Knowing he is fucking with Reema made it easier for my ass to get over him…well, to at least get closer to the point where I’m over him. Maleek and me spent a lot of years together. Yes, I fucked Junior. Yes, I sold my ass to take of myself and him. But I love that nigga and I hate that I hurt him.
I slow the car to a stop in front of the entrance to Bentley Manor. There’s a nice-ass Porsche parked up the street a bit. “I need to be driving that.”
“You know I wish I had taught you that money and material things ain’t the beginning and the end, Aisha.”
The anger in my momma’s voice surprises me and plenty of smart-mouth comments come to mind but I swallow them all. I will never disrespect my mother. Instead I look out the driver’s window waiting for traffic to lighten up so I can turn.
Blood and broken glass is still on the street. Signs of the murder. I saw on the news this morning that somebody shot up Devani’s car last night. I didn’t really know her or even notice her. She wasn’t on my radar but it’s fucked up to think of anybody dying like that. People are crazy.
I hate to even drive through her blood staining the street like she ain’t shit but a memory.
Being that it was early morning, the parking lot of Bentley Manor is empty. Not even Miz Cleo and Miz Osceola nosy selves have made it downstairs yet. No kids out enjoying another hot summer Georgia day. That’s why I came this time of the day. I’m gonna start packing up my shit and grab my loot so I can kiss this run down motherfucker good-bye.
I pop my trunk and go out. I start lifting out the flattened cardboard boxes and my momma climbs out and holds the door to the building for me.
“This don’t look no better than Hollywood,” Momma says as she walks down the hall behind me.
I just laugh but my laughter stops when I see the word WHORE spray painted on the door to my apartment. I drop my head.
Momma throws her arm around my shoulders. “Aisha, I don’t agree with what you did but you just did what you thought you had to do and everybody makes bad choices. Don’t let nobody knock you down for making a bad choice.”
And that’s why I love my momma and I don’t regret being able to take care of her.
We walk into the apartment and it doesn’t feel like my spot. My home. My place. My space. This is a small piece of the world that me and Maleek carved out together. Now that our world together is over it’s time for my ass to get ghost, too.
“Ma, I left the tape downstairs. I’ll be right back.”
“I’ll start in the kitchen,” she calls back.
“A’ight.” I think about it and go back to the couch to grab my box cutter from my purse. I slide it into the back pocket of the jeans I’m wearing, just in case I run up on Reema’s ass.
As I walk down the hall and into the stairwell I hate how alone I feel. No friends. No man. Besides my mother and brothers it’s just me. I feel kind of stressed with all the shit going on in my life and I ain’t gone lie that it would be a relief to have females my age to talk to, get advice from.
“Diamond.”
I look up into Stuart’s face. He looks all jacked up. His suit is wrinkled. He has a shadow of a beard. His eyes are bloodshot. He looks sweaty. Crazy. Wild.
I turn and try to run back through the door leading to the hall; he lunges and catches me. I cry out as we fall forward.
“Diamond, why are you running from me?” he whispers in my ear. He grinds against my ass and strokes the side of my face.
I cringe at the smell of bad breath and liquor. God, I have to get to my blade.
“I missed you so much.” He kisses my cheek and strokes my hair.
I force myself to relax. “I missed you too,” I lie, hoping he’d give me just enough slack to do what I have to do.
I want to holler out for help but what if that pushes him over the edge and nobody even bothers to answer — or worse yet, my momma comes running and gets hurt instead?
“I’ve been waiting for you. I thought something happened to you.” He strokes his hand up and down the side of my body. “I was going crazy until you finally came home this morning.”
Going crazy? Bitch, you is crazy.
He’s been stalking me. Oh God, this whacko been fucking stalking me.
I hate the tears that well up in my eyes. I swallow them back. “I was locked up. I solicited a cop,” I lie, thinking on my feet. “I just got out this morning.”
He keeps on stroking me and grinding his erection into my ass. I feel nauseous. What the fuck I got myself into?
“Can we get up? You’re crushing me, Stuart.”
He shifts to the side of me but his arms are still around me even as I twist around on my back. “Let me take care of you. I’ll put you up in your own apartment. I’ll buy you all the jewelry and clothes you ever desired, darling. It’ll just be me and you. You’re too good to sell yourself like a whore or live in this filth.”
Darling?
Like a whore?
“How did you know where I lived?” I ask, curiosity kicking my ass.
“That first night we spent together I followed you home.”
Son of a bitch.
“At first I couldn’t believe you lived here. So I followed you the next week, too.”
A chill ran up my spine as I look up into his eyes. They are odd and missing something. I can’t explain it but it scares the shit out of me. I force a smile. “You did all that for me?” I ask, before I lick my lips all nice and slow the way he likes.
His pale blue eyes dip down to my mouth. “God, I missed that tight black pussy. I can’t wait to stick my cock in your sweet little cunt.”
Okay. Uhhg!
He lowers his head and his cool thin lips covered mine.
I let him kiss me. As soon as his tongue slips inside my open mouth I bite down on it hard as hell and draw blood. I spit against the wall as he releases me. I shove my body back to the wall behind me and raise both my sneakered feet to kick him away from me. One of my feet lands straight in his face. The other smashes his fleshy nuts. He howls in pain and bends over, clutching his nuts even as he struggles to stand.
I jump to my feet and dig out my blade as I turn and dash to the outer door of the building.
“You black bitch!” he yells just before he grabs a fistful of my hair.
No the hell he didn’t. I turn and swing my leg to kick his ass in the face again.
He reaches up, catches my foot and yanks me forward.
I grunt as I fall on my back and my head crashes against the step. He steps toward me and I start slashing the air with my blade to keep him back.
Desperate hoodwives: an urban tale Page 18
