Project Dreamz

by Natavia

  “It’s not about me moving past anything. Can you move past it?” he asked.

  No, I can’t.

  “Yes, I can.”

  Tryst got up from the couch and went upstairs. Knowing Tryst, I already knew why he was probably in his feelings because I stooped low. If only he knew how many times I went really low. Everyone deserves a second chance, right?

  I need you, Ma. I know I’m grown but I need you. You kept me sane…

  Deerie

  Sebastian’s phone was ringing, waking me out of my sleep. The clock in the bedroom read four o’clock and since it was dark outside, it was four in the morning.

  “Sebastian!”

  “That’s probably my father,” he said half asleep.

  I got out of bed and snatched his phone off the nightstand. He was wide awake at this point. I answered his phone and the person hung up from a blocked number.

  Ohhh so the bitch knows he has a woman.

  “Why do you give me a hard time whenever I come home to visit? This shit is insane!” he said.

  Sebastian got out of bed in all of his amazing glory. “Look all you want,” he said in sarcasm.

  “I can look at whatever belongs to me.”

  He went into the bathroom to relieve himself. Sebastian groggily dragged his feet back to bed afterwards.

  “Keep my phone if you want to. I asked if you wanted to move down to Georgia with me but what did you say? You told me no. So I don’t get where all this insecurity is coming from,” he said.

  “I can’t leave my mother and brothers. I’ll worry about them. And besides, David would’ve wanted us together. Why can’t you transfer?”

  “I will next year but in the meantime, we’ll have to make do,” he said.

  I climbed on top of Sebastian and he gripped my ass. That time my phone rang, and Sebastian gave me the side eye.

  “I don’t have anyone else so you look all you want. Matter of fact, I’m gonna answer it in front of you,” I said.

  The number was an unfamiliar one but I answered anyway. Sebastian was grabbing at my breasts and I tapped his hand.

  “Who is this?” I asked into the phone.

  “Heyyy, sweat pea? Did you miss me?” he asked.

  “Who is this?”

  “Sugar Daddy,” he laughed into the phone.

  “Why are you calling me?”

  “I’m callin’ because I didn’t get a welcome home gift. After all, you owe me for that shit you stole from me. Did you miss me? I’m very hard for you right now,” he breathed into the phone.

  “Who is that?” Sebastian asked when I hung up the phone.

  “June Bug called me.”

  “For what?” Sebastian asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “You haven’t told your brothers about what he did to you? It was rape, Deerie. That man is old enough to be your father and he took advantage of you! I cannot believe he’s callin’ you this late. Is there somethin’ I need to know about?” he asked.

  “No, there isn’t but that call wasn’t a friendly one. He wants something from me because I stole from him. I can’t tell my brothers about how I rebelled when I was sixteen years old. It makes me sick to my stomach when I think about it.”

  Sebastian pulled me onto the bed. “I hate that man, Deerie. He had no business messing with his goddaughter. It’s sick and he needs to pay for it,” Sebastian said.

  “I played a part in it, too, so it has to stay between us. I’ll give him his money back and the gun that way he won’t call me again.”

  “I don’t want you around that pervert,” he said.

  “What do you want me to do? Trell adores June Bug like a father and I’m sure Tryst still cares for him. It has to stay between us.”

  “Why, so you can fuck him again? What if he manipulated other young girls? You have to say something,” he said.

  “I threw myself at him. I know you don’t want to stomach it but that’s the truth. My family would think less of me. Can we move forward?”

  “Not if he’s calling you. I bet one of your brothers gave him your number not knowing he was molesting you. Do you see how messed up that is? You need to tell someone, baby. That man still has a sick thirst for you. Why else would he call this time of night?” he asked.

  “You’re supposed to console me, not treat me like a child! I don’t want to tell anyone because it was my fault!” I yelled.

  “Let’s just go back to bed,” he said.

  Sebastian turned his back towards me. I laid close to him. “I’ll tell them when the time is right.”

  “You’ve been saying that for a long time. I’m beginning to think you still want him,” he said.

  I pulled away from Sebastian and went on the other side of the bed. Since my father’s been gone, I had learned to value life a little more. I told Sebastian I loved him, and he didn’t respond.

  “I’m going over my mother’s house since you’re being a dickhead.”

  “Call me when you get there or shoot me a text to let me know that you’re safe,” he said.

  I got dressed within a minute. Sebastian was making me mad to the point where I wanted to hurt his feelings. I left out of Sebastian’s home wondering how drunk my mother was going to be when I popped up at her house.

  Thirty-five minutes later…

  My mother lived in a one-level home in Severna Park. It was a huge downsize from where we came from, but it fit her well. She didn’t work and was a little secretive of how she got her money. I figured she had a new boyfriend and wasn’t telling anyone.

  The outside light was on and her truck was parked in the driveway. I used my key to unlock the door. Kimberly’s home smelled like roses, she loved flowers. As soon as you walked into her house there was a table by the door with many flower vases. The TV was on in the living room when I walked down the hallway. I turned the TV off. “MA!” I called out but no one answered.

  I went down the other hall to where the bedrooms were. Music was coming from her bedroom. A few times I found my mother passed out in the tub and was afraid she might drown one day. Tryst didn’t deal with her the same way I did so I was taking care of Kimberly on my own.

  “MA!” I called out again.

  I rushed into her bedroom. Kimberly was sucking a man’s dick when I burst into her bedroom. They were listening to LL Cool J’s song, “Doin It.” My mother was still a married woman the way I saw it. She and my father had issues but actually seeing her with another man made me sick especially since she was happy David was dead.

  “MA!” I shouted over the music.

  Kimberly jumped, and the man grabbed a sheet to cover himself. “My father hasn’t been gone that long, who is this man? I hope he doesn’t go to your church because that’d be sinning, isn’t that what you tell me?” I asked.

  “I finally get to meet you,” the man said.

  “If you say anything, I swear I’ll never forgive you. You better not tell her!” Kimberly said to the man.

  “She needs to know!” he said.

  I turned the music off once the stranger said I needed to know about something. My mother was caught off guard and for the first time in a long time she looked really heartbroken.

  “Tell me what?”

  “Don’t you do it. GET OUT!” Kimberly yelled at the man.

  “I’m your father, Deerie. Your real father,” the stranger said.

  My mother sat on the bed with her face buried in her hands. The stranger was waiting for me to respond but I was lost for words. I had to get a good look at the man’s face to see if I had seen him before. He resembled my father around the nose, just lighter in complexion.

  “He’s your father, Deerie,” my mother admitted.

  “Why does he look like David?”

  “He’s his older brother. Same mother, different father,” she said.

  “You have got to be kiddin’ me! What type of shit is this? Me and Tryst didn’t know we had an aunt until David’s funeral! This whole f
amily is filled with a bunch of lies, Ma, and you are, too! You are no different than Daddy. I can’t believe you spent all these years hating Trell when you have done the same thing. Tryst always said you were full of secrets and I never believed him. No wonder why he hates you.”

  “Don’t you ever in your life talk to me that way! He only married me because I got pregnant. David only agreed because he wanted a position in my father’s family. I come from a dysfunctional family and I wanted to keep my kids protected from it, so I lied to you and Tryst. Me and David both lied to you. We were married for the kids and that’s it!”

  “What’s your name since I have a D in my name like my father and aunt? Is it Donald, Dick or Dale?” I asked my supposed father.

  “It’s Connery. I have a different father, so I don’t have a D name,” he said.

  “So, you fucked your brother’s wife with no problem?”

  “Tell Deerie the truth, Kimberly! I’m sick of this shit! If you don’t tell, I will,” Connery said.

  “My father disowned me because I was dating the son of his enemy. Connery’s father raised him, so his other siblings weren’t that close with him. Anyway, I begged my father to let me move in with my grandmother and he did. She lived in that house Tryst lives in now. My father cut me completely off when I moved in with my mother’s mother. After I moved, my father had Connery’s father killed so there was a big beef going on. Connery broke up with me because of it and that was the end of us for a while. David stopped by my grandmother’s house one day to bring money because my father sent him. We hit it off and I got pregnant with Tryst shortly afterwards. My father found out and that’s how David got the spot on the streets. David moved me out of the hood and married me like he promised. I really did love him, but he used me because of who I was connected to,” Kimberly said.

  “And you used me to piss off your father after you found out he sent David in to rub it in my face. Kimberly called me and asked me to meet her at a hotel. I wasn’t going to because she was married but she begged me. You can guess how you ended up. She seduced me then left while I was sleeping. I moved away to get out of that street life. She came to an event my church had in Florida two years ago. I saw a picture of you on the wall that she forgot to hide when I came to visit and knew you were my daughter,” Connery said.

  “You are full of shit just like her. Fuck the both of you!”

  I walked out of the bedroom with Kimberly following me. She begged me not to tell Tryst or anyone else.

  “I’ll tell him myself, but I don’t want anyone to know Connery comes to visit me! My father would kill him,” Kimberly said.

  “I thought your father was dead.”

  “He’s not dead, but he is dead to me,” she replied.

  Kimberly ran outside behind me with no shoes on her feet wearing a see-through negligee. I opened my car door and she closed it.

  “Who is your father? Is his name even Sir?” I asked.

  “It’s Sir Bentley.”

  “Tryst’s connect? Ma, are you serious? What kind of mother are you to let your father drag Tryst into his drug ring? We need to tell him!” I said.

  “There is nothing I can do about that, Deerie! Bentley would have had all of us killed if Tryst didn’t step in. The man is a monster so you can only imagine what I’d be doing if I was born a boy. He was raised in a crime-affiliated family so this is all he knows. Tryst will figure out a way, but I lost my son the day David died. My father hates me just as much as I hate him. He won’t think twice about killing me—us. Connery can get us out of this, but we have to be patient and trust him. ” Kimberly said.

  “I won’t tell him, so I can spare his feelings. He doesn’t need to know how fucked up you really are. What kind of woman has a baby out of revenge? You are cold-hearted just like your father. You just know how to hide it better. I don’t want to see you again.”

  “You will always see me. I’m not perfect but I love my kids!” she said.

  I watched her go into the house before I got inside my car. No wonder why I had different looks than Tryst. It didn’t matter to me anyway; my father was David. He raised me as his own and I had his last name. I will always be a Christianson.

  **********

  Tryst and Dream were packing when I walked into the house. David was heavily on my mind. All the memories I had of him made it hard for me to believe another man was my father.

  “What happened to you?” Dream asked me.

  “I got into an argument with Sebastian,” I halfway lied.

  “About what?” Tryst asked with a raised eyebrow.

  “You already know I’m not tellin’ you my business with Sebastian,” I replied.

  “What he do?” Tryst asked.

  I wonder if this Bentley man turned Tryst into a killer too.

  “We got into an argument.”

  “About what?” Tryst asked.

  “Maybe she doesn’t want to talk to you about it,” Dream said.

  “Did he hit you?” Tryst asked.

  “He would never. We got into an argument because someone I used to talk to called my phone this morning. That was it.”

  “Go upstairs and pack,” Tryst said.

  “Can I live by myself?”

  “After you finish college. We had a deal, Deerie,” Tryst said.

  “You can have the basement for privacy since Tryst is strict on you,” Dream said with sarcasm.

  “I’m talkin’ to my sister,” Tryst said.

  “We’re all family, remember?” Dream asked.

  “Yeah, I almost forgot about that,” Tryst said.

  He picked up the box and took it by the door. There was a little bit of tension in the room. I wondered if they were arguing before I came home.

  “We’re leaving the big things here like the furniture. Just pack your clothes and shoes,” Dream said.

  “Gotcha,” I replied.

  I went upstairs to my bedroom and there were boxes on my bed. The first thing I went through were my drawers. Tryst came into my bedroom and asked me if I needed help.

  “I got it. You have done enough. Can we talk about somethin’?”

  Tryst sat on the chair in the corner of the room.

  “When are you going to quit?”

  “Quit what?” he asked.

  “Come on, Tryst. You know what I’m talking about. The situation with Bentley. How long is it supposed to last? You said David owed him money, but you have been doing this for three years now. I’m sure that debt was paid off.”

  “I already talked to him about it. That’s not how this works. Truth be told, I’m stuck. I don’t even think it’s about David anymore. We’re all eating so that’s what matters,” he said. Tryst got up to leave my bedroom.

  “From now on, don’t mention anything about that. The less you know the better,” he said before he left.

  I wanted to tell Tryst everything I knew but I know him. He would’ve confronted Bentley out of anger. There was a reason why Bentley didn’t tell Tryst he was our grandfather.

  This is crazy. My father’s sister, Deidra married my mother’s father, Bentley. What in the hell were they doing? I thought.

  Three days later…

  “You did a good job finding this place,” I told Dream.

  The house she picked out was bigger than the house by Newtowne. The basement was like an apartment. It had a bathroom and a master bedroom. Before we moved in, the furniture was brought the day before. Dream plopped down onto the couch and fanned herself.

  “I’m gettin’ too fat for this shit. I need to get slim like you,” she said.

  “And here I am trying to gain a little more weight.”

  Naya walked into the basement with a box of cleaning supplies. We were all exhausted.

  “Trell isn’t movin’ in, so why he is here?” Naya asked.

  “He calls himself helping out but he isn’t doing shit,” Dream replied.

  “Trell is lazy,” I said.

  “How are you and Trel
l doing?” Dream asked her sister.

  “He stopped calling me and coming over, so I guess he got the memo,” Naya said.

  “Bitch, please,” I said.

  “I’ll be back. I have to go to the bathroom,” Dream said, rushing to the bathroom. She ran the water and turned on the fan after she closed the door.

  “She’s throwing up again,” Naya said.

  “Is she pregnant? She has been talking about her weight lately and you know she has never cared about that. I noticed the weight gain, too, but I’m not tellin’ her.”

  “Tryst already has a daughter. Two kids will be too much for him right now,” Naya said.

  “Do you think he’ll want Dream to get an abortion? He’ll just have to deal with it. Plus, with our family curse, there is no telling. Our father had three kids in his early twenties. I really thought you and Trell were going to be first.”

  Naya playfully rolled her eyes. “Girllllllll, I’ll never. We use condoms like we use toilet paper,” she said.

  Dream came out of the bathroom ten minutes later. As she came out, Trell, Sebastian and Tryst were coming down the basement stairs. Sebastian wasn’t saying much to me. He came over to help Tryst.

  “What’s up wit’ you?” Tryst asked Dream.

  “I don’t know to be honest. I’m gonna go upstairs and lay down,” Dream said. Tryst followed Dream upstairs to their bedroom.

  “I’ve known Quyntrell longer than those two know each other and he wouldn’t even give me a popsicle,” Naya said.

  “That’s because I was a victim of abuse,” Trell replied.

  “You drove me crazy,” Naya said.

  “And you drove me to cheat. Why are we talkin’ to each other, shorty? We parted ways so don’t start feelin’ yourself by bringin’ up old shit,” Trell said.

  “Fuck you!” Naya said.

  “Fuck you, too! That’s the problem, Naya. You can’t fuck or suck dick!” Trell said.

  “Shut the hell up, Trell! You always got to get foul with it!” I said.

  “Cause she always gotta tell our business in front of everybody,” he said.

  “Maybe you two should go upstairs and talk,” I replied.