Where Did the Love Go

by Elbie Dee

  The ride back to the apartment me and my ex-girlfriend, Zaiya, shared was silent. I wanted to ask so many questions but chose not to. Refraining from trying to show my anger was best for the both of us. From the way her fist was propped underneath her chin as she stared out of the window allowed me to believe at how embarrassed as she was… or afraid of the outcome.

  She damn near jumped out of the car once we reached our place and jetted for the stairwell. I turned the car key toward me which allowed the ignition to turn off. Slowly, I opened the driver’s side door as I kept the key centered in my palm with my fingers gripping before getting out. With anger still resting inside of my soul, I slammed the door shut before following her lead.

  “Why the fuck would you do this?” I asked in a calm tone, after I entered the apartment and met her in the bedroom.

  “I don’t know,” she lifted the covers from over her head and cried. “You were my first. I guess I just wanted to try something different,” she confessed.

  That night, her and I had a long talk. I told her I understood how she felt even though I had never acted out of curiosity. I confessed to having thoughts about cheating but loved her too much to be able to fall through. She admitted to sleeping with the guy twice but swore to me that it would never happen again.

  She laid on my chest and slowly drifted off to sleep as I ran my fingers through her curly, long black hair. I was hurt and felt betrayed, but I couldn’t let that block me from ever trusting her again. If it would only happen two times throughout our forever relationship, then I could forgive it. After easing my mind, I dozed off to sleep… being sure to squeeze my arms around her body.

  For almost three years after her infidelity, my heart was at ease. Our relationship flourished in more than one way and I was able to see that she had regained her faithfulness. We became best friends like we were for a while before her cheat. Our love was on cloud nine, that is, until she got caught up one more time. This time, it was with my best friend.

  I tried staying, but the fights only got stronger. Truthfully, the way she defended my boy allowed me to think she had fallen in love with him instead of me. Once my mind was made up on leaving her and I broke her the news, her eyes widened, and her body grew limp. She tried pleading for me to stay with her, but I couldn’t do it anymore. I was beating my own body up fighting for a chick who didn’t seem to care about how I felt.

  “I can’t help you anymore, baby girl.” It was the last thing I said to her after grabbing a suitcase full of clothes and leaving the apartment.

  I stayed in a hotel for a few weeks before signing a lease of my own. It was a game changer being alone after almost eight years of being with the same person, but I was ready. Besides, our split would allow her to live her life as well as me. Never once have I stepped out on her and I finally was able to explore… without strings attached.

  ∞∞∞

  I stopped at McDonald’s and grabbed a Big Mac combo before reaching my place. After unlocking the door to my apartment, I walked in and attached the chain after closing the door. From the living room, I turned right to get into the kitchen and begin unpacking my dinner for the night.

  Once my burger and fries were on a paper plate I took from inside of the cabinet, I picked my food plate up with my right hand and held my twenty-ounce Coke with the left before walking into the living room. I rested the plate on the armrest of my grey, Ashley couch and placed the soda on the carpet. After getting my wooden folding table and grabbing the remote from on top of the TV stand, I set the table up in front of the couch before placing my meal on top of it.

  “Oh shit,” I moaned aloud after sinking into the middle cushion of the couch.

  I positioned my body sturdily before turning on the TV. Flipping through the channels, there really wasn’t anything else to watch at ten o’clock at night besides the news. I placed the remote on the couch beside me before diving into my heavily salted fries while keeping my vision directed toward the flatscreen TV.

  “Just in. A young woman identified by the name of Bayleigh Crease is currently being hospitalized after being attacked. Police have a suspect in custody but is currently not releasing the name at this time since the investigation is ongoing. Witnesses are to contact local authorities with any information you may have,” the news anchor relayed.

  “Holy shit! That’s the chick I was looking at earlier!” I yelled aloud as if anyone could hear me.

  Only halfway finished with my food, I picked it up from the table and walked into my kitchen before tossing the rest into the garbage. Without even knowing her, she held a spot in my heart. Nausea sat at the pit of my stomach as I thought about her hurting. Right then, I knew I needed to get up with her… even if she declined my help.

  Neakah

  “I need to see Bayleigh Crease,” I said to the emergency room’s secretary after rushing to the desk without giving her a chance to ask what I needed first.

  “I’m sorry ma’am, but visitation is not allowed at this time,” she replied.

  “What the fuck do you mean not allowed!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, causing everyone in the waiting area to look toward me. “My fuckin’ sister is on her death bed right now and I can’t see her!”

  “Ma’am, she’s currently trying to be stabilized by our staff. You’re more than welcome to sit in the waiting area near the room, but you won’t be able to go into her room right now,” she explained.

  “Give me the fucking visitor pass,” I demanded in a lower tone, but with my eyebrows remaining scrunched over my eyelids.

  After asking for my I.D., the nurse handed me a printed visitor’s pass along with my card. Once the room number was brought to my knowledge, I walked to the elevator down the hall from the emergency waiting area. Impatiently waiting for the elevator to reach my floor, I stood tapping my foot on the floor feeling agitated as hell!

  “Fucking finally,” I said aloud once the doors to the elevator slid open. The damn near eighty-year-old white woman getting off of the elevator looked at me crazy, but I didn’t give a fuck.

  I boarded the elevator and continuously pressed the second-floor button to the right until the doors finally closed. I kept my stare at the light on the buttons until the second floor was reached, and I slid from inside of the elevator.

  “Two-forty-seven, two-forty-seven,” I whispered as I strolled down the hallway looking at the numbers next to the rooms.

  Knock! Knock! Knock!

  I banged on the door before twisting the handle without giving a single damn about what the secretary in the emergency room said. The nursing staff looked my way once they noticed me coming inside of the room.

  “Ma’am, you can’t be in here right now,” one of the nurses said, but I didn’t know which one had spoken.

  “Bayleigh!” I loudly cried after her condition was introduced to me.

  Both of her eyes were black and swollen shut. A cut, which looked to be from a blade, bled from behind her ear and ended before it reached the middle of her throat. Her upper lip was so enlarged that it completely covered her lower lip. Before I was able to notice anything else, I was pushed back out into the hallway by one of the staff members.

  Instantly, I fell to my knees and began to wail. Not too long ago, her and I were fucking up the streets of Miami! I banged the bottom to both of my fists onto the hospital carpet before standing to my feet. I began to walk toward where the hospital wing’s waiting area was located and thought to myself, “When did she allow the streets of Miami to fuck her up?”

  ∞∞∞

  The night of the party was the most memorable experience I ever had. When I met Bayleigh, it felt as if she were my friendship soulmate. Our common interests flourished, and I knew she was the person I needed to stay friends for a lifetime with. Whatever was her weakest was my strongest, and vice versa.

  After our long talk, the evening after the party, we were with each other daily. From getting our nails done together, to setting the same appointment
times for vaginal waxing, there wasn’t a wing after twenty-four hours before we were seen together.

  Our friendship remained intact for a while; almost three years strong. At a time, she even thought about going into the nail business with me. She used to joke and say it would be successful if I put my face on the front of the business since I was pretty and Asian. That comment was the first big laugh we shared together.

  We were known as Yin and Yang around the city. Even Bayleigh’s boyfriend for years never compared to the relationship I had with her. He never had a problem with our bond, so I thought. It wasn’t until Bayleigh found out he cheated on her on multiple occasions when everything went downhill for her.

  She ended their relationship but kept me in her life. After going through his phone and finding explicit text messages and women’s nude photos, she kicked him out of their place the next day. I stayed with her for a week straight until she was comfortable being alone.

  During the week, her and I partied almost every day. If we weren’t at a house party or club, we were sitting at the house drinking shot after shot of Cîroc Vodka. It seemed to help at the time, because she was acted as if she were completely over him by the time I went back to stay at my place. Either she was fronting about her feelings or wanted to live a freer life after him.

  She stayed with a bottle of liquor on hand but picked up a habit of smoking weed. Honestly, I liked to hit a blunt every now and then, so I didn’t see an issue in it… until the weed turned into coke, and ultimately heroin.

  Bayleigh was able to keep up with her job for almost a year after her newborn drug abuse. Every co-worker she had at the gym she worked at seen her physical change. She never allowed her customer service skills to weaken, so the job didn’t see a probable cause of letting her go.

  Upon showing for her shift one day, she was as high as a kite. From the rumors I’ve heard, it wasn’t the mellow and can still function enough to do a job kind of high; paranoia and arm scratching were the only actions she was able to achieve during her shift. The next day, she was sober and went to work… but after receiving a phone call from her, I was informed that the gym thought it was best to give her termination papers.

  “Can you fucking believe them?” she asked on the other end of my line, after explaining in detail of how she was fired.

  “Bayleigh! You were fucking high! Of course I can believe them!” I yelled back. Assuming she didn’t like my response, she hung up on me.

  The automated voicemail system was what I was turned to after trying to repeatedly dial her back. After seventeen rings, I gave up on trying to reach back out to her that day. Denial was probably what she was facing and was shocked at my reply. As long as she had known me, she should have known better than to think I would jump to her defense just because she was my best friend. Wrong is always wrong, just like right is right.

  The day after I didn’t hear from her either. Oddly, when I would call from my phone her line would direct me immediately to her voicemail box. If I called from a different number, I was able to get through, but she still wouldn’t answer. Confirming she had blocked me from calling her, I stopped all contact to give her time to settle her mind.

  A month had gone by with yet to hear from Bayleigh. Of course, I missed her but there wasn’t a thing I could do or say to get her to open up to me again… if there even was a way to contact her. The phone number I had for her eventually got disconnected; she probably didn’t have the funds to pay her bill.

  One day, I was driving in Downtown Miami when a shadow caught the corner of my eye. After glancing out of the passenger’s side window of my metallic colored Audi, I was able to confirm the person to be Bayleigh.

  “Oh shit!” I yelled aloud before slamming on my brakes. With my eyes being focused on Bayleigh, it almost caused me to slam into the back of a Kia Sorento. In a nick of time, I was able to stop my vehicle before a collision occurred.

  She hadn’t noticed me when I noticed her. Sadly, she wandered around the sidewalk and alleyways like she was on a mission. Luckily, there was a gas station to the right of the intersection I passed once traffic was moving again. Thinking it was a good idea to catch up to her on foot from the way she moved around, I parked my vehicle at one of the empty parking spaces.

  The ignition was off before I hopped out of my Audi, and slammed the door shut. Hurriedly, I lightly jogged down the sidewalk from the station without double checking to see if I had my door’s locked… in hopes I would be able to catch up to her before she vanished. Fate must have been on my side that day; the moment I hit the block past the light I almost got into a wreck at, there she was.

  “Bayleigh!” I yelled. Slipping from my eyesight, screaming her name was the only thing that would keep her in view until I was able to catch up.

  “Neakah?” she asked like she barely recognized who I was once I was caught up with her.

  “Well, fucking duh!” I replied while trying to catch a breath in between my words. My racing heart simmered, and I continued. “What the hell are you doing out here?”

  “I lost my job. I lost my place. I lost it all,” she informed me.

  Instantly, I felt heartbroken for her. She made the bed she lied in, but the friend in me couldn’t allow her to live on the streets. Without a reason not to offer, I told her she could stay at my place until she landed a job and was able to get one of her own again. My only requirement for her was to lay off of the hard drugs.

  She accepted my offer, and for the first month of living together, we had a blast. She didn’t seem to be doing hard drugs, although she kept at least a dime bag of weed at all times. Job searching was a daily routine for her, or so, that’s what I thought. It wasn’t until my valuables, over two-hundred dollars’ worth of things, went missing.

  When things began to vanish from my apartment, she was the only one to question. Nobody came to visit my place, so turning to her was the only option. She denied my claims and told me I should seek help for promoting false accusations against a person. A few days after, I had no choice but to release her to the streets again. From jewelry to old cell phones, my things were disappearing by the day.

  Although she couldn’t stay with me any longer, still I kept up with her location. After confirming she was sleeping in an alleyway, I made it my routine to check on her once a day. She became like family to me, and in no way would I completely give her a cold shoulder. The bond we once shared was paused, but I hoped one day I would show, and she would beg for help to get clean.

  ∞∞∞

  “Ma’am,” I heard a voice coming from in front of me, as I kept my eyes closed, and my head leaning on top of the backrest of the chair in the waiting room.

  “Yes?” I asked, after immediately opening my eyes and sprouting upward in the chair.

  “Ms. Crease is stable. You can visit her now if you’d like,” the light-skin woman, who sported a short afro, stated.

  “Thank you,” I replied.

  After getting up from my chair, I jolted down the hall toward the room she was in. Pausing before turning the door handle, I took a deep breath. I knew she wasn’t going to look close to what she looked before the abuse she faced earlier that day.

  It killed my soul to look at her physical form after mounds of drugs being poured into her system. This time, her condition was much worse. A tear fell from my chinked eye before I obtained the courage to walk into her hospital room.

  Chris

  “Bro! Come look at this!” I heard my boy, Xavior, call from the living room.

  Since Bayleigh kicked me out of the place we shared, I had to come up with a quick solution. With no time to spare, asking one of my friends for a roof was the only option for me. Seeing Xavior and I met through our family and had damn near grown up together, he was the first to turn to.

  He had a place of his own and I knew his cheap ass wouldn’t turn down a cut in bills by me moving in. Just as suspected, he instantly agreed to have me as a roommate. I made him aware that I’d be ou
t as soon as I collected enough funds to find a place of my own. Almost a year later, and I was still around. The arrangement worked in each of our favor. Finding a cheap spot in Miami was like finding a needle in a haystack.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, after releasing myself in the bathroom and joining him in the living room of the house.

  “Look at this shit!” he yelled as he pointed in the direction of the sixty-four-inch, flat screen that was mounted to the wall.

  “What the fuck!” I screamed.

  “I know bro. Shit’s crazy,” Xavior added his two cents.

  I left from where I stood beside the couch in the living room and jolted down the hallway to re-enter my bedroom. As soon as I shot through the doorway of the last room to the left, I ran to the dresser. Once I was in front of the chest that rested along the wall opposite to the one where the bed was, I pulled the handle on the middle drawer and yanked out a grey t-shirt with a black Nike sign at the chest area.

  After throwing it over my white tank top, I adjusted my knee-high Nike socks and rushed to the closet to grab my pair of grey, black and white Nike Air Max’s. Without untying the shoelaces, I slid my feet into the size twelve shoe. Once they were on, I grabbed my keys and phone from on top of my unmade bed and shot back down the hallway from the room.

  “Where you going?” Xavior asked me as his eyes kept their glue on the TV screen.

  “Where do you think I’m going?” I asked. He had me fucked up if he thought I wasn’t going to make sure Bayleigh was okay. After all, we spent almost half of our lives together before our split.

  “Do I think your going to the hospital?” he sarcastically asked, but this time, with his eyes directed toward me as I stood in front of the door.