The Double Cross

by Anna J.

  “What’s going on with y’all?” Skye asked as she devoured her turkey burger. She was the only girl I knew that could eat any damn thing under the sun and never gained a pound out of place. She was curvy and thick, but definitely not fat. All that horrible food went right where it needed to be. Meanwhile, I was running off of coffee and good dick to keep me stable. I had to do better.

  “I really don’t know. I know I’ve been spending a lot of time with Chase, but I’ve been giving y’all time too. It’s been a while since I’ve had any man, let alone one like him, so you would think she would be happy for me.”

  “Man, fuck her,” Vice said between bites of her burger and shoving fries in her mouth. She did not like my sister for some reason. Like, they really did not get along. Vice always gave her respect, though, and, as far as I could see, never tried to purposely make Sajdah feel any type of way. I just didn’t entertain the shit with either one of them because I refused to choose between them. We would have to learn to coexist.

  “Be nice, Vicerean.” Skye laughed as she enjoyed her food.

  I had a piece of lasagna from the night before, but I was saving it for later when I went to see Chase. He loved my mom’s lasagna. These two already had me feeling better.

  “Maybe she’s jealous. She won’t let anybody close enough to that pussy to loosen her tight ass up. She needs a good dicking.”

  We looked at Vice and fell the hell out. This girl thought dick would solve all the world’s problems. It would be pretty dope if it did, though. As much as I hated to, I kind of agreed with Vice. If Sajdah had a man, she wouldn’t be so worried about what I had going on. She needed a distraction. All the hell she had was work and school. I didn’t even think she hung out with the few friends she did have.

  I wondered if Chase had siblings. He didn’t mention anyone, and that realization just made it to the list of reasons why we weren’t ready to live together. I really didn’t know much about him, even after all this time. I made a mental note to talk to him about that when I saw him again. If I were eventually going to be Mrs. Warren, I needed to know that I wasn’t marrying into the Mob against my will.

  “Well, what do you think may be happening?” Skye asked.

  “I don’t know. She should be happy right now. She just landed a development account with Comcast through her firm. This is maybe her third one in the last six months. She’s a good worker and a very innovative thinker. They pick her for a lot of projects, so her bank account has to be sick as hell right now,” I replied while sharing her good news in the process.

  “The damn flu! I know she got 1 . . . 2 . . . 3 . . . 4 . . . 5 . . . 6 . . . 7 . . . 8 . . . Ms in her bank account,” both girls sang in unison.

  We were out there cracking up. I promise they always made me feel better. I lost it when Vice jumped up from the table and started twerking. Good thing we were in the yard by ourselves!

  “Well, don’t stress yourself. You know how she gets sometimes. I’ll definitely keep a lookout to see if some shit popping off that she ain’t telling. You know I be Inch High Private Eye out this bitch,” Vice assured me as she tore into her fully loaded cheese fries.

  Vice got the scoop on every damn thing, and always only accurate information. I hated to put the team on my sister, but I needed solid facts so that I could handle her properly. She wasn’t making it easy to figure her out, so I had to do what I had to do for my own sanity.

  We finished up our lunch while discussing what we had planned for the week. Skye was currently boo’d up too, so her week was pretty much centered around her man. My crazy ass signed up for another semester, so I had homework on the agenda.

  “I’m digging in pockets and riding on dicks for the next four days,” Vice said with a straight face. We busted out in laughter again. She was dead-ass serious, but it was humorous, something we all needed.

  Going back to work, I set thoughts of my sister to the side and decided to concentrate on what made me happy, and at the moment, Chase was it.

  * * *

  Hey, love, how is your day going?

  Better when I see you, I responded, smiling hard as shit in the process. Do you have time to stop by my job when I get off? I got a piece of my mom’s lasagna for you, but I have to go home. I have homework to do.

  While waiting for him to respond, I worked on my project for school a little so that I wouldn’t have a ton of work to do when it was time for me to turn it in. I was only taking two classes, but I swear the amount of work they gave me was enough for, like, ten people. These classes were supposed to cater to working adults. How did they think we had time for all of this stuff they wanted us to do?

  “You can come feed me the lasagna and do your homework here.”

  Now, he knew that was a damn lie. Chase didn’t know how to be in my presence and not touch me. Vice versa for me as well. This man turned me on in any way you could possibly imagine. If I were going to focus, I couldn’t be around him. I wouldn’t get a damn thing accomplished at his house but multiple orgasms.

  I’ll come by Thursday. You know I can’t focus around you, I texted back as my mind began to wander. I had to stay focused before he had me twisted like a pretzel. Again. Standing firm, I decided I was going home.

  Okay, I’ll stop by and get it. See you shortly.

  I hurried through my work for the rest of the afternoon, begging the clock to keep up. I kept saying to myself that I was going straight home and not letting him persuade me to do anything else. I really lucked up with Chase. He knew what he had in me. Too bad my ex, Kevin, couldn’t see it. I hated that thoughts of him even popped in my head, but at least I didn’t have to worry about him anymore.

  Skye Moore

  Just Can’t Act Right

  “So, how we gonna tell this bitch about this snake-ass nigga?”

  It took everything in me to keep it together during lunch with Selah the other day. I could have died when she asked what was up with Sajdah, and I was hoping Vice’s crazy ass didn’t just spit that shit out. It was going to take more than a blurry picture of his car in front of a chicken joint at night to convince Selah that Chase wasn’t all he pretended to be. We still didn’t even know why they were together. We had to at least figure that part out first. He had my girl floating on cloud nine, and if we were going to yank that cloud from under her, we had to make sure that she could at least land on her feet. This shit could get real messy, so we had to be extra on point this time around. There was no room for mistakes. We didn’t want another Kevin type situation to arise. It was hard to bounce back from that one.

  I was ready to body that fool. How dare he have my sister /friend looking crazy in these streets. I was the chick that would be out in the street with your picture on a T-shirt, hashtagging everything and passing out flyers to find you, knowing the entire time you were clocked in my trunk, bleeding to death, but couldn’t scream because I done cut your damn voice box out. I was the one hugging your momma at the wake like Bishop in Juice, promising to find the one that killed you, knowing I was the one responsible for your demise. I didn’t give a fuck about no nigga when it came to my girls. I was an only child, so these bitches were like my true sisters.

  I didn’t play around when it came to them, and they didn’t play when it came to me. Everyone thought Vice was the loose cannon because she was the loudest, but the quiet ones were always the ones that got shit done for real. Don’t sleep on me, or you’d be sleep for real. Don’t sleep on Vice, either. She was more than willing to back up every loud-ass word that came out of her mouth. Trust me on this one. If you valued your life, you let us be great. Please and thank you.

  “Girl, I’m not sure. I need to really see what’s up with them, though, before we move with that, because this shit is about to be devastating for her.”

  “Tell me about it,” I replied, shaking my damn head. “Well, it’s time we start making moves before it gets too out of hand. Hopefully, it’s not what we are thinking and we can just get past this shit.�
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  “Girl, you know it’s exactly what we think it is. We just gotta prove it. I’ll hit you as soon as I know something more.”

  Damn. I was really hoping that Chase was one of the good ones and just maybe we were finally wrong about some shit. This was not going to end well, and I hated that we couldn’t prevent it from happening, whatever “it” may be. Looking at my guy while he slept beside me, I knew I wouldn’t hesitate to put a bullet right between his eyes if I found out he was playing me. I didn’t take my heart getting tampered with at all, especially since it took so much for me to let people in. Selah was the same way, so if it were some shady shit going on, it wouldn’t end well for those involved.

  Foster care makes you a different person. I’m not going to say I had to fight my way through the system. My struggle wasn’t that hard because I was not weak, but I had to knock a few niggas in they face that thought they were just going to slide up in my bed. I would not be taken advantage of by anyone. I sounded like Sofia in The Color Purple because I swear all my life I had to fight to some degree or the next. I was fighting cousins, uncles, and friends of the family off of me to keep from getting raped and molested. I had to fight my own mom for trying to steal from me to feed a drug habit. I fought bitches in school because I didn’t have a lot and they thought they were going to tease me and play in my face. Ask the last guy that tried to play me. Oh, you can’t because we got rid of his ass. Sorry, not sorry. It never really felt like my struggle was any harder than anyone else. People like me did what we had to do to survive.

  Looking over at my man, my heart fluttered a little. He was the first in a very long time to show me that he cherished me and did not just say whatever to pacify me. He actually got me, who I was, what I stood for, and what I would not tolerate. I gave him that same respect, and I prayed over him and for him daily. Some shit was just too good to believe it was real, and on so many occasions, I had to check myself to keep from self-sabotaging what we had. He was the real deal. I had to give him his props where they were due.

  Deciding that he had slept long enough, I pulled the covers back to get a clear view of what he was working with. Even flaccid, it looked heavy and veiny. I started salivating just thinking about the taste of him. I had just put him to sleep about an hour ago and figured that was enough time for him to rest up. The call I had with Vice took a little longer than expected, but it was required for us to move forward.

  Going down, I lifted him gently and took him into my mouth. I loved how I tasted on him as well, and that shit had me turned all the way on. Slow and steady always won the race with him, so I knew just what to do to get him back ready to go.

  He slowly began to wake up, his hips moving in an up and down motion, letting me know that he liked what he felt. Pretty soon, he began to rub my back, periodically grabbing me by the back of my neck to stop me from making him explode. I took in as much of him as I could, partially gagging. Tears sprang to my eyes as I tried to swallow him whole. That kind of shit turned him on beyond belief.

  Moving my hair out of the way so that he could see me in action, I made sure to make it real sloppy and wet as I sucked him up and down like a lollipop. Every time he closed his eyes, I stopped, only starting again when he looked at me. His fingers found their way to my clit, moving in a slow, circular motion that had me humming up against him as I greedily stuffed his balls into my mouth one at a time.

  “Baby girl, what you tryna to do me?”

  My mouth was too full to answer. I needed him to understand that I was willing to do anything that needed to be done. There was no need for him to search for anything outside of this home. He was the man on these streets, and it was always some bitch in his face trying to link up. He shot they asses down without hesitation because he knew there was nothing out there worth losing what he had here.

  The only people that knew about us were my girls and a few of his friends. We didn’t feel the need to broadcast our shit. It was our business what we had going on. No one else’s opinion really mattered.

  He begged for it, and I finally complied. Lying down next to him, I opened my legs so that he could get in. He crawled up to me on his knees and inserted just the head. We could feel each other pulse as I greedily contracted my walls, trying to pull him in more. I got extra wet for him every time, and that shit drove him crazy.

  I must admit sex with him was pretty damn good. It wasn’t the most mind-blowing sex I’d ever had, but it was close. He brought so much more to the relationship than just good dick, so it was easy to enjoy times like this with him. He actually courted me in the beginning, often saying that we had plenty of time for sex, and he wanted to know me aside from being able to suck his dick good. Not many dudes like that in the street, ya heard? Every man out there was out to bed as many bitches as possible, and then you’d find that one that was the bomb. Lucky me.

  I was a little leery of that shit at first. Who doesn’t want free pussy? I even said something to my girls about it, and of course, Vice had all kinds of answers. He had a small dick, his stroke game was fucked up, he had a girlfriend already, he had a disease—this girl came up with everything under the sun. I was curious, though, so I decided to take a chance on it. It was the best decision I’d ever made.

  By the time he got done spoiling me to death and showing me what it really meant to have someone genuinely care about your well-being, I was begging him to take the pussy. Baby, let me tell you how he killed that shit. He was the silent but deadly type. You never knew what he was going to do, and the mystery surrounding him just added to his appeal.

  Immediately, I was impressed with the size. He wasn’t super long, but he had enough, and it was thick and meaty. That shit made me salivate every time I thought about it. There was nothing like too much dick when the man attached to it had no idea how to use it. That was a super annoying situation and a waste of time for everyone involved. His dick, though . . . lawd! It was pretty to look at, if a dick could be pretty, I mean. I swear I could just stare at it all day as if it were a statue in a museum. More importantly, he knew how to work with what he had. He wasn’t a pound-me-to-death type dude. He knew when to give me just some of it, and when I wanted it all. He knew just when to speed it up or slow down so much I was ready to pull my hair out. He wasn’t afraid to let me be in control sometimes, and when shit felt good to him, I knew it. He wasn’t all loud and dumb, but he was very expressive.

  I fell in love with him long before we were intimate, so I knew he was going to be it for the long haul. I was ready to propose to this nigga, but I wasn’t that bitch. It’d never happen if he were waiting on me.

  I knew he had me when I didn’t have the urge to hit anyone else up. I was a bit of a ho and always kept a heavy rotation just in case someone wasn’t available. He had my undivided attention, and I didn’t need the attention of anyone else. I felt safe with him. I knew he would protect me, and he never disappointed me.

  Selah felt the same way with Chase, so if it were some shit going on, she would be distraught. Hopefully, Vice was just overreacting. Maybe he was still one of the good ones and it wasn’t what we thought it was.

  As I surrendered my body to my man, I just sent a quick prayer up that Chase wasn’t as stupid as he appeared to be. He would not like the outcome if he were.

  Selah

  Flash Back Friday

  I lived and breathed Kevin. He was my first real boyfriend boyfriend, and I loved everything about him. He made me feel so special, and I never would have guessed that the amount of hurt and betrayal I received from him would change me the way it did. Because of him, my trust moving forward was at an all-time low with anyone I dealt with, and if you wanted me, you really had to prove yourself to me like you were trying to get into the pearly gates and I had control of the golden book.

  I caught my first body with him. I hoped he would be the last. I quickly found out I would have to do it again. These dudes knew nothing about loyalty nowadays, and sometimes you just had to do them di
rtier than they could have ever done you. Men couldn’t handle that kind of shit, though, so when you got they ass, you had to be prepared to body them if necessary.

  It was weird how we met. I thought he worked in my building because he was always there. At the time, I was friends with this girl name Shanna. She was the fourth member of our crew, kind of, and I loved her the same way I loved Vice and Skye. She had her own group of friends that were from her neighborhood in Bartram Village, and I had my girls, but sometimes we hung out together. Like, we weren’t best friends, but we were cool as fuck. She was a little instrumental in helping Kevin and I get together, but come to find out snakes sometimes roll in packs. Unfortunately, I had to get her ass too. Vice never liked her. Skye was always neutral about her being around. I just let the chips fall where they may.

  Back to the situation at hand . . .

  There were hundreds of offices and different practices in our location, so all kinds of people came in and out. We weren’t all dressed in suits, etc., so you were liable to see a young man looking like he just stepped right off of Beard Gang, dressed in the signature gray sweats and white tee. I learned a long time ago that clothes don’t make the person. Even millionaires had dress-down days.

  He was nice and dark—that smooth black with a full goatee and juicy lips. I knew for sure he had a million bitches on his ass, but I didn’t care. I wanted to dip into that fountain with everyone else. During those days, I wasn’t looking to give my heart to anyone, I just kept my pussy waxed so that they could put the entire thing in their mouth and not choke on a hairball. I got my nut and bounced on they ass every single time, not calling or returning correspondence until I was ready to. I was a free spirit and definitely not ready to be tied down. In my mind, I had plenty of time for that, and at that moment, the world was my carnival game, and these dudes were all the prizes I had to choose from.