Games Women Play

by Zaire Crown

  Tuesday smiled. “Sound like y’all pretty close. I don’t have any brothers or sisters.”

  Jaye nodded. “Yeah I got him by three years but I’ve been basically raising him since I could remember. My moms had always been sick and she finally died when I was fifteen. Now me and him ain’t got nobody but each other.”

  Tuesday thought it was cool learning this little bit about Jaye. She had taken an immediate shine to the girl but liked her more now that she knew she had a dream beyond doing sticks. She could actually see Jaye up on stage doing comedy like Mo’nique and Sommore or one day having her own TV show.

  “So do you think Doll and Bree got any plans for gettin’ out the game?” Tuesday tried to make the question sound as innocent as possible but really wanted to check her temperature about what’s been going on within the crew.

  Jaye let out a dry laugh. “Look, everybody and they momma can see what’s going on between you and Bree and I know you just tryin’ to get my spin on the situation.”

  Tuesday nodded. Jaye had been smart enough to see through that so she respected it. “Okay, just being straight up, why don’t you tell me what you think about the situation.”

  “Look, I ain’t the type of bitch who talk about muthafuckas behind they back but I can tell you my honest opinion on shit without necessarily throwin’ hate on anybody.”

  Tuesday said, “I appreciate that.”

  “Well, anybody with eyes can peep that Bree jealous of you. She see the club, the condo, and the new Caddy and to a bitch like her that mean you got it all.”

  Tuesday’s eyes went wide at that comment. Jaye had just said something that didn’t make sense to her at the time but she filed it away for later.

  Responding to her, she said: “If I had it all, would I still be out here on this bullshit?”

  “Me and you smart enough to see that, but then again we talkin’ ’bout Bree.”

  She continued. “But more than what you got, it’s how you so respected up in here. You Boss Lady, and I’m willing to bet that when she first started here she admired all this stuff about you but we both know how fast admiration can flip to envy.”

  Tuesday nodded.

  “Challenging you at every turn is her little way of trying to convince us that you ain’t really dat Bitch! She thinks she can run shit but you can tell she’s not a leader. Bree can slide up under a mark and reel him in but she ain’t got the game to know which ones to choose or the brains to put together the moves to go get it. She’s not a planner and if you ain’t a planner you damn sure can’t be a leader.”

  Tuesday found herself smiling at Jaye, not in a way of trying to flirt but just because she was so impressed by her insights. She saw a lot of herself in Jaye but Tuesday was honest enough to admit that she wasn’t even that polished at twenty-three.

  Jaye’s analysis of Brianna was so spot-on that Tuesday was eager to hear her take on Baby Doll.

  “So what do you think about her sidekick?”

  “Oh, you talkin’ ’bout li’l Knee-High?” She shook her head. “In my opinion Doll is even more fucked up than Brianna. The reason why she play the little girl role so well is because she basically a kid in real life. She ain’t got no self-control. All she wanna do is fuck and get high—you see how she is around here on the bitches! Out the crew, she the only one who ain’t got her own car and crib. You ever notice that no matter how much we hit a lick for, Doll always broke again in a few weeks?”

  Tuesday did notice this. It was something that she and Tushie had talked about but she didn’t know if anyone else had peeped it.

  “But to me the worst part about Doll,” Jaye continued, “is that she’s a straight-up follower! She just sniffing behind Bree because she’s talking the most shit right now. If Tushie stepped up tomorrow and started speaking out more, Doll would be walking around with her nose between her ass cheeks. Just like a child, she gonna listen to whoever shows the most authority.”

  Tuesday had reached the same conclusions about Doll and for a while they sat there discussing the team, the lick, and a dozen other things until they were interrupted by her phone; actually it was Tabitha’s.

  Tuesday wasn’t sure he would ever call again but definitely wasn’t expecting him to call so soon. She answered it, trying to downplay how relieved she was to him and to Jaye, who was watching with interest.

  “What?” Tuesday answered with a sharp tone.

  “I’m sorry. Did I catch you at a bad time?”

  “Actually you did, but what’s up anyway?”

  His tone was apologetic. “If this isn’t a good time to talk, I can always call back later.”

  She snapped at him. “A good time to talk would’ve been when we were at lunch, but you didn’t seem too interested then.”

  He was quiet for a while. “So that’s what all this attitude is about. You didn’t enjoy lunch?”

  “Lunch was cool. It was the company I didn’t particularly care for.”

  Jaye was giving Tuesday a look that said Bitch, what the fuck are you doing? This was a million-dollar mark that she was flipping on. In Jaye’s mind Tuesday was supposed to kiss his ass until it was raw and tell him that his shit smelled like butterscotch.

  Tuesday responded to her with a Girl, I got this look. She had a plan, and while it could potentially blow up in her face, she had to play it this way if she was going to have any chance of getting him to open up.

  He asked, “Can you at least tell me what I did that’s got you so upset?”

  She fired back, “How about acting like a suspect who was being interrogated?”

  “So you expect me to share my whole life story on the first date?”

  “First off, don’t call it a first date because that implies there will be a second. And no, I don’t want to hear your life story but I don’t wanna catch a headache just trying to learn simple shit like what’s your name or what you do for a living?”

  He laughed. “You know what I think? I think you’re just so used to guys laying down for you and making things easy that the first one who gives you a little bit of a challenge you automatically feel like is on something different.”

  It was her turn to laugh now. “Listen at Dr. Phil! You really don’t know me as well as you think! I don’t have a problem with a man who challenges me, actually I prefer it. What I have a problem with is people treating me like I’m some type of agent when I’m just trying to meet them.”

  “Okay, okay,” he said, trying to calm her. “Maybe I came off a little cautious.”

  “Cautious is a person who sits with their back to a wall. Cautious is a person who parks their car where they can see it. Nigga, you flat-out paranoid, and I think you need a therapist more than you need a friend right now so I’m good. You can lose my number!”

  When Tuesday hung up on him, Jaye’s eyes almost exploded out of her skull. Before she could ask her if she was crazy or leap over the desk at her, Tuesday paused Jaye with a raised hand. “Don’t worry, he’s gonna call right back. Trust me.”

  Jaye nodded, but Tuesday could tell by the way her chest rose and fell that her heart was going a mile a minute; and despite how confident she tried to look, Tuesday figured hers to be going about the same. She had played the whole “lose my number” routine before and usually a mark called back all humble and apologetic, but she couldn’t be sure it would work this time. It was a hell of a risk considering what was at stake. If he took her advice, there was no way to call back, because she had never taken his number. The ball was totally in his court.

  Jaye came and took the seat across from her desk and for a while they just stared at the phone waiting for it to ring. Time stretched out like rubber and with each languid second that passed a bit more doubt crept into them both.

  “I know what I’m doin’,” she said, reading the look of concern on Jaye’s face. “He gone call back!”

  Jaye smiled. “Look, I ain’t trippin’. I just plan on being right there with my marshmallows when the others
roast yo ass for fuckin’ up the lick.”

  After thirty tension-filled seconds that felt like as many minutes, the phone finally rang and Jaye gasped in relief.

  Tuesday winked at her as she picked it up. “Yeah!”

  He said, “Damn, you don’t think that was a little too much.”

  “Look, you seem cool but I’ve already been through so much shit in my life that I just don’t have time for somebody else’s drama.”

  He countered: “You don’t think maybe I am the way I am is because I’ve been through so much drama myself? But anyway, I’m not trying to use that as an excuse. You felt like I treated you rudely and I apologize for that.”

  Jaye didn’t know what was being said on the other end but could tell from the way that Tuesday was beaming that the conversation was going the way she wanted.

  “Why don’t you let me make it up to you. Tonight!”

  “I don’t know.” Tuesday pretended to think it over. “What you talkin’ ’bout?”

  He said, “I’m talking about dinner at one of the finest restaurants in Michigan.”

  “Okay.” She loudly smacked her lips hoodrat style, still fronting like she wasn’t excited. “What time?”

  “How ’bout we meet in the parking lot of that bank at seven and you can follow me from there.”

  Tuesday agreed, and after parting words she hung up the phone, then looked at Jaye. She screamed, “I does this shit, bitch!”

  Chapter Eleven

  Tuesday only had enough time to shoot home, take a quick bath, and change before meeting him.

  She made up her face then squeezed into a tiny black minidress she had bought earlier in the week and had been waiting to use on him. She saw it more as a weapon than a piece of clothing. This was a dinner date, which meant she could break out the big guns. Now that she had him off balance and somewhat at a disadvantage for the first time, she was definitely going to play up the sexy.

  Again, Tuesday tried to beat him to the meeting place, but even when she reached the bank ten minutes early, he was already there. He was leaned against the hood of the Audi playing a white button-up with dark slacks, and she was happy to see that he’d changed clothes too.

  They were alone in the parking lot since the bank was closed. She pulled up nose to nose with him and made her car lunge forward pretending like she was going to run into him.

  She let down the window when he came to her door. He looked in at her tight, hip-hugging mini and shook his head. “Either you got too much body or not enough dress on.”

  She frowned at him. “So whatcha sayin’, you don’t like it?”

  “No, I’m not saying that at all.” He smiled with his eyes glued on it. “And where we’re going, you definitely will be turning heads tonight.”

  He got back in his car and she followed him out of the lot. She rode his bumper for a couple miles as she tried to imagine what type of place they would be dining at. Tuesday had her hopes set on seafood by candlelight, good wine, and maybe a little dancing afterward so she could see how he moved.

  For forty-five minutes she tailed him along the highway in the wake of a westering sun. As the day eased into dusk more of the eastbound commuters were driving with their headlights aglow and just to fuck with him she switched on her brights.

  Tuesday was a little confused when he finally pulled into a shopping complex because the upscale eateries she was used to weren’t stationed between Rite-Aids and Blockbuster videos. She followed him through a maze of cars in the parking lot telling herself that he most likely had to stop and pick up a prescription before leading her to some white-linen establishment where a five-star chef with French training waited to delight their palates with exotic cuisine. His standoffish attitude made lunch tedious, but Gaucho’s had been an excellent choice so at no time did she doubt his taste in restaurants.

  However, when he parked his A8 in front of a Chuck E. Cheese, she actually thought that he had to be joking. She assumed this was a little bit of get-back for annoying him with the glare of her bright headlights, but when he cut off the engine and started to get out, she didn’t think he would take it that far.

  She was in a four-hundred-dollar dress and six-hundred-dollar heels. She had expected Alaskan king crab and a well-aged cabernet, not cheese pizza and sipping cherry cola from a crazy straw. There was a conversion van slotted between them. When Tuesday parked the Honda, she jumped out and stormed toward his Audi, ready to go off on this nigga for making her waste a bomb outfit—which was a clear violation of diva law.

  Gray eyes pinched, lips snarled and nostrils flared, she circled the van with a thousand different curse words on her tongue and was about to let them fly when suddenly she saw him unloading the little girl from the backseat. Her and Tuesday caught sight of each other at the same time and they both seemed to be equally surprised and nervous.

  “Dani, this is my friend who I said would be coming with us tonight. Her name is Tabitha. Do you remember when we met her at the Dairy Queen?”

  She nodded but still clung to his pant leg, being shy the way children were around a stranger. “Hi, Tabitha,” she said, waving a tiny hand.

  “Hi, Dani!” Tuesday said with a big phony smile, still trying to downplay how shocked she was. The girl had been sitting so low in the back of the Audi that Tuesday hadn’t noticed she was in the car. “What’s Dani short for?”

  Tuesday directed the question to him but he looked to the child as if she should answer for herself. She replied in a small mousy voice: “Danielle.”

  “Danielle, that’s a really pretty name.”

  She giggled a “thank you” while covering her mouth with her hands.

  Standing in the glow of a neon sign that featured a cartoon rodent on a skateboard, Tuesday turned on him. “So this is one of the finest restaurants in the state?”

  “Yeah.” He took Tuesday by one hand and Danielle by the other to lead them. “They’ve got great food, nice atmosphere, and reasonable prices.”

  For Tuesday, walking inside was like having an ambush sprung on her senses. The place was decorated in the bright reds and yellows designed to make a child feel hyperactive. There were enough swirling beacons and flashing lights to throw an epileptic into a seizure. Pizza, sweat, and disinfectant thinly masking the pungent stench of vomit assaulted her nose. The owners seemed to have cranked up the thermostat to ten degrees past hell just to make sure they sold plenty of pop. Adding to this was the raucous sound of a hundred screaming children at play, parents and staff in conversation, the noise coming from countless arcade games, and an animated puppet band playing “Wheels on the Bus” to the delight of their toddler audience.

  He smiled at Tuesday. “See, and they got live entertainment,” he said, having to yell over it all to be heard.

  After checking in with the reception desk, they were directed to a booth in the rear, but as they made their way Tuesday noticed that she was drawing a lot of attention from the over-twelve crowd. Mothers gave disapproving frowns and a few of the fathers got checked for staring too long. She was wearing a cocktail dress in a place that specialized in root beer floats. The people were leering as if she were a prostitute who’d just stepped into church and it took everything Tuesday had in her not to show how embarrassed she was.

  He leaned and whispered in her ear: “I told you that dress was going to turn heads.”

  He grabbed her hand and squeezed it in a way that said Fuck these bitches, you with me! and Tuesday felt good to have that little bit of support.

  After reaching their booth, Tuesday studied the girl without openly staring. In the days of watching him pick her up and drop her off Tuesday had seen plenty of Danielle, but it was only in seeing them seated right next to each other that she noticed that they didn’t share much of a resemblance. Dani was more of a peanut butter—in contrast to his chocolate—with a pug nose, slightly protruding ears, and brown eyes that were not the color or shape of his.

  She had an elfish smile that had mo
st likely come from her mother too. Her front two adult incisors had grown in among a row of baby teeth, giving her a cute beaverlike grin.

  It wasn’t long before a waitress showed up with a large pepperoni pizza, garlic sticks with cheese dipping sauce, and a pitcher of cola. Tuesday had her hopes set on something a bit more sophisticated, but she soon found herself reaching for a second slice before either of them had finished their first.

  Tuesday only handled children well in small doses. She could watch an infant for five minutes while a parent left the room or engage a child for a brief conversation, but having to deal with one for an extended period of time was a whole other matter. By nature, children were messy and irrational, and this ran contrary to the obsessions brought on by her OCD. Tuesday couldn’t let them see how uncomfortable she was, which was why she was using the food as a crutch. She figured if she was too busy chewing, she wouldn’t have to do much talking.

  Not wanting to look like a pig either, she forced herself to chat up the girl. “So, Dani, are you in school?”

  Danielle bobbed her head up and down, her cheeks swollen with pizza like a squirrel hoarding nuts. She started to speak, but Marcus stopped her. “Dani, swallow first. You know we don’t talk with our mouths full.”

  She gulped hard. “Yeah, I go to Bishclop Burtstrumm.”

  “It’s called Bishop Burchram,” he said, pronouncing it correctly for Tuesday. “It’s a private school not far from where we live. She’s in kindergarten.”

  Danielle huffed and looked up at him, exasperated. Either she wanted to say these things for herself or felt that he was telling this stranger too much of her business.

  We live! Tuesday keyed in on those two words and asked Marcus another question that she already knew the answer to. “She stays with you?”

  He nodded. “Yeah. I’m actually her legal guardian.”

  “Uncle Marcus?” The girl looked up at him expectantly.

  Without her having to ask, he went into his pocket and passed her a handful of the tokens he purchased at the reception desk. She immediately slid from the booth and raced toward an elaborate play maze with about thirty other children crawling through it. He cried out, “Stay where I can see you!” but no doubt his words were drowned out by the noise.