Fictitious Love

by Charmanie Saquea

  I stood there with tears in my eyes as I looked up at my dad for some help. The fact that my sister just told me that I was dead to her hurt more than the slap she gave me. My birth father betrayed me, my sister wants nothing to do with me, and the father of my child hates me. It seemed as if I was slowly losing the people that I loved one by one.

  ___

  I sluggishly walked into my house. It was the last place that I wanted to be but I had nowhere else to go. When I walked into the living room, Tristan was asleep on the couch. I shook my head as I walked past him to my bedroom. I stripped out of my clothes and put on something comfortable as I grabbed my cellphone to call Juanie.

  Just like the last time and every other time I called his phone, it said, “The subscriber you are trying to reach is unavailable.”

  “Dammit, Omega!” I said frustrated.

  “Fuck you yelling for?” Tristan mumbled as he walked in the room.

  “Nothing,” I said as I rolled my eyes.

  Ever since the night that Omega beat the shit out of him, Tristan had been moping around the house without an attitude. The swelling in his nose and lips had gone down, but he was still left with two black eyes. I really thought that Omega was going to kill him that night.

  “Where the fuck is Juanie?” he asked. “He ain’t been home in five days.”

  “He’s still at Omega’s house. He doesn’t want to come home, nor will Omega let him come home,” I informed him.

  “Hold up. What do you mean that nigga won’t let him come home?” he asked as if he couldn’t hear what I just said.

  “Exactly what I said, Tristan. Omega will not let my son come home. He’s trying to take me to court for custody and I just don’t have time for this shit,” I spat.

  As soon as the words left my mouth, I realized I had said too much. Tristan was standing there looking at me like I was crazy. I knew this could possibly cause another problem in the newfound beef between Omega and Tristan.

  Tristan just walked out of the room mumbling stuff under his breath that I couldn’t understand. I didn’t have time to be worrying about Tristan and his issues right now, I had my own problems I had to worry about; like not losing custody of my son.

  16: Moni

  If I didn’t fuck up before, I damn sure fucked up now. I’m sitting here trying to figure out what the hell I’m going to do with this piece of information I just received. If there was ever a hope of me and Tahtiana getting back together, it wasn’t going to be one now.

  “What are you going to do?”

  I looked Shantell right in her eyes and kept it real with her. “You can’t have this baby.”

  “Are you serious?” she asked.

  “I’m serious as a damn heart attack, Shantell,” I told her.

  “Why I can’t keep it, because I’m not Tahtiana?” she questioned.

  “Look, don’t question me. I said you’re not having that baby, and that’s the final word!” I yelled.

  She was pissing me off by the second. I don’t even know how the hell this happened. The only female I’ve ever ran up in raw was Tahti, so this situation had scandalous bitch written all over it. She can try this shit with the average nigga, but a nigga like me is not going for it.

  “No, DeMoni. I am not about to get a damn abortion just because you’re scared to tell a bitch who don’t even want you that you’re going to be having a baby by someone else besides her.”

  Before she could even blink, I had her pinned up against the wall by her throat. “If it’s one thing I hate, it’s a bitch who don’t know when to take orders and shut the fuck up. You’re either going to have the abortion willingly or I’m going to beat it out of you. If you think Tahtiana beat your ass, you don’t wanna see the person who taught her everything she knows,” I said as I squeezed a little tighter before letting her go.

  She slid down to the floor with tears in her eyes. I just looked at her with no emotion. There was only one female in this world that I ever gave a fuck about besides my mama, and she left me so I’m feeling like fuck the world right now.

  I grabbed my keys and headed for the door. “The choice is yours. If I were you, I would choose wisely,” I said before I left out of the house.

  Fucking around with her, I was an hour late meeting up with Omega and Juanie. Ever since my brother beat the shit out of Tristan, he had been keeping Juanie and wouldn’t let him go home. I could try to talk to my brother and make him go another route with this custody thing, but I would be wasting my breath. Once Omega made up his mind about something, there was no deterring him from what he wanted to do. That was a trait he got from our crazy ass daddy. Honestly, Omega got a lot of traits from our crazy ass daddy.

  All three of my daddy’s kids were just like him. All of us ended up falling victim to the streets somehow, except for our baby brother Keylin. As soon as he graduated from high school, I shipped his ass off to college because I wanted him to be something in life.

  When I pulled up to Omega’s house, they were chilling on the porch.

  “It’s about time, nigga!” Omega yelled.

  “Man, you will never believe the BS I got caught up in.” I shook my head. “What’s up, Juanie, with your Omega looking ass,” I laughed.

  “Hey, Uncle Money,” he cracked.

  “Y’all ready to go or are we going to sit here all day?” I asked.

  “Nigga, we’ve been sitting here all day waiting on you,” Omega said as he mushed me when he got off the porch.

  “Juanie, you better tell your dad to keep his hands to himself before I have to lay him out right here on his own front yard,” I told my nephew.

  Omega laughed. “Don’t get it twisted, big brother. You never could beat me, all you knew how to do was run to mama like a little bitch.”

  “Alright, that’s it. Juanie start the car while I beat his ass real quick. I promise it won’t take long,” I said. “Square up, bitch,” I told Omega.

  “I’m trying to save you the embarrassment, DeMoni. You better gone.” Omega waved me off.

  “What? You did seven years in the pen and got swoll for nothing because you still can’t whoop me,” I laughed.

  Before I knew it, me and my brother were slap-boxing right there in his front yard. We used to do this all the time when were little kids to settle our disagreements, but most of the time we did it just for fun. I can’t lie. Omega has always been nice with his hands but me being the big brother, I could never let him beat me.

  “Give up, bitch,” he told me.

  “You know better than that.” I smirked.

  Just as he went down to scoop me up and drop me, gun shots rang out.

  POW POW POW!

  “Oh, shit!” I yelled as Omega fell on top of me.

  I looked to my left just in time to see the window of the car going up and they sped off. Tristan, I thought as I rolled Omega off of me. I checked him out and noticed he was hit in his shoulder.

  “You good?” I asked him.

  “Yea, I’m straight,” he said as he sat up.

  “Man, you—“

  “JUANIE!” he yelled as he got up and took off running by my truck.

  I was stuck, sitting there as I watched my brother put pressure on my nephew’s wounds. I heard him yelling but I couldn’t move. My nephew has just been shot. I kept repeating that to myself over and over as I watched Omega pull out his phone and call somebody.

  Finally finding the strength to get up, I slowly walked over to where Juanie was lying on the ground with tears in his eyes and breathing hard.

  “Don’t let me die, daddy,” he cried.

  “Shh, little man. You’re going to be okay,” Omega said with a shaky voice.

  A few minutes later, I heard the sirens of the ambulance coming up the street just as Juanie’s eyes rolled in the back of his head.

  “Juanie! Don’t do this shit, man!” Omega yelled. “You can’t die on me.”

  I hadn’t even realized I was crying until I felt the moisture o
n my face. The paramedics rushed over to Juanie with a gurney as they asked Omega to back up so they could tend to him. When they realized Omega was shot also, they tried to get him in the ambulance to get checked out.

  “I’m fine. Just worry bout my damn son!” he yelled.

  Finally stepping in, I tried to calm my brother down.

  “Omega, why don’t you just ride to the hospital with Juanie and I’ll follow you there?” I said.

  He just shook his head as he followed behind Juanie’s gurney to the ambulance. My mind was in a damn fog as I got in my truck and sped off to the hospital. I called everyone I could think of, from my mama to Tahani and Tahtiana’s mama. I even called on God and asked him to spare my nephew’s life. He’s only seven years old. I know it can’t be his time to go.

  ___

  Everyone was on pins and needles as we sat in the waiting room waiting to hear Juanie’s results. Even when we got to the hospital, Omega still refused to go get his gunshot wound checked out. It took my mama to calm him down and talk some sense into him for him to get it checked out.

  I was sitting there with my head in my hands when I felt a pair of arms wrap around me. I looked up into Tahtiana’s bloodshot eyes as she cried. I used my thumb to wipe her tears away.

  “He’s going to be okay,” I whispered to her. She just nodded her head and laid it on my shoulder.

  Omega was just coming from the back when Tristan walked in. Just seeing this nigga in here after knowing it was his fault caused me to lose it. I jumped up and ran towards him, punching the shit out of him with all my might. I drew back to punch him again but my mama’s voice stopped me.

  “DeMoni Marcel!” she yelled.

  I stood there with my chest heaving up and down like a mad man as his face wore a look of guilt. Tahani ran over to his side like the clueless bitch she is.

  “It’s not going to be too many more times I’m going to let y’all get away with putting your hands on him,” she spat.

  Before I could even respond, Tahtiana came and stood in front of me.

  “I wish you would call this police on this one. It will be me and you, bitch. I can guarantee it will be mostly me, though. Try me,” Tahtiana dared her.

  “All of you better sit down before I end up being the one showing my ass, and I know y’all don’t want that,” my mama threatened. “It’s about my grandson now, later for your drama.”

  I grabbed Tahti’s hand and walked her back to where we were seated, but not before sending Tristan a silent message that I’m sure he understood very well. To say the tension in that waiting room was thick would be an understatement. I wasn’t going to tell Omega what I knew at that moment because I knew he was going to kill Tristan. I couldn’t have him doing that, especially in front of all these witnesses. But in due time, though, Tristan was definitely going to get his.

  17: Omega

  I don’t think I’ll ever be able to get the image of my son lying on the ground in a pool of his own blood out of my head. Hearing him beg me to not him die literally broke my heart because I was helpless, all I could do was call the ambulance and hope that they got there in time. I’ve only known about Juanie for a month and it would have killed me to have him ripped away from me that fast.

  Two bullets pierced his side and he lost a lot of blood. He had to have a blood transfusion and since Tahani is B positive and he’s an A positive like me, I had to give him blood, which I did gladly. All night long I had to deal with Moni in my ear apologizing because he felt as if it was his fault. He figured had he not been playing so much, we could have been gone and the shooting never would have happened. Of course, I had to reassure him that it wasn’t his fault. I wasn’t blaming him at all.

  I heard the door open and someone come in the room, due to the curtain, I couldn’t tell who it was until they came into view.

  “I thought Moni got rid of you.” I smiled as my baby brother Keylin walked in followed by Tahtiana.

  “He did for a minute, but when I called mama last night and she told me what happened, I was on the first thing smoking,” he said as he hugged me. “How he doing?”

  “They say it’s really touch and go right now. They could only remove one of the bullets last night and they didn’t want to leave his body open since he’s so young and little, so they’re going to try again. He also needed a blood transfusion. They said it’s all on him now,” I said as I stared at the hospital bed my son was sleeping in.

  “Where’s Tahani?” Keylin asked.

  Tahtiana smacked her lips and rolled her eyes. We both just looked at her and she waved us off. I didn’t know what the hell was up with them but I was going to find out.

  “She went home to shower and change clothes and check in with her master because that nigga not allowed here,” I told him.

  “Mama told me you came home shaking shit up,” he laughed. “I believed her but to actually see it in action is crazy.”

  “Man, I had to come home and put a lot of shit in order,” I sighed.

  Just then, my mama and mama Shanice waked in the room with containers followed by Moni.

  “We brought you some food because I know ain’t neither one of y’all ate. Especially you, Tahtiana, and you need to feed my grandbaby,” my mama fussed.

  “I’m not complaining at all,” she said as she sat up to get her food.

  “Here, DeJuan,” Mama Shanice said as she gave me my food before hugging Keylin.

  “I see y’all still bossy as ever and still spoiling folks,” Keylin laughed as he sat in one of the many chairs we had in the room.

  “Yup, now eat, boy,” My mama told him.

  I really wasn’t hungry but I knew I had to eat or I would never be able to hear the end of it. I had other things on my mind, and food wasn’t one of them. I was more concerned with how the hell thought it was okay to shoot at me while I had my son around.

  “Tahti, did I just hear my mama say you need to feed her grandbaby?” Keylin’s slow ass asked five minutes later.

  “Yea,” she sighed.

  Just then Tahani walked in the room.

  “How far along are you?” Key asked her.

  “Four months. It’s crazy though because I was labeled a bitch that would never be able to have a baby,” she said as she cut her eyes at her sister.

  Tahani didn’t say anything but she rolled her eyes.

  “Tahani and Tahtiana, not today. I mean it,” their mother said sternly.

  Keylin looked at me for answers and all I could do was shrug my shoulders to let him know I was just as clueless as him. I looked back over at Tahtiana and she looked as if she was ready to pounce on her sister.

  I guess my mama caught on to it also because she spoke up. “That’s it, it’s too much bullshit going on in this family and it’s causing us to lose focus on what’s really important right now. There will be a meeting at my house tonight at six and you all better have your asses there or it’s going to be a problem. Do you understand?” she asked.

  Everyone, including me, mumbled yes, feeling like kids who just got finished being chastised by their parents. I knew better though; that was nothing compared to how she was going to act or what she was going to do when we got to her house. I bet you we were all going to have our asses there before six though.

  “Daddy,” I faintly heard.

  Everyone else must have heard it to because they turned to look at Juanie. I jumped up and ran to his bed.

  “What’s up, little man?” I smiled as I rubbed his head.

  “You didn’t let me die.” He smiled weakly.

  “I told you I wasn’t going to,” I told him.

  “I’m sorry, Uncle Moni told me to get in the truck but I got out to watch y’all. I should have—”

  “Whoa little man,” I cut him off. “Don’t do that, don’t blame yourself because it’s not your fault,” I explained to him.

  “You’re not mad at me?” he asked.

  “No, I’m not,” I answered.

  Ho
w could I be mad at him? It definitely wasn’t his fault and I had to let him know that.

  ___

  I hated to leave Juanie’s side but when you have a crazy mama like mine and she tells you to do something, you do it. Since Keylin was excluded from the meeting, he said he would stay with Juanie for me. I went home around four to get ready. I took a long ass shower to help clear my mind.

  After changing my bandage and throwing on some basketball shorts and a t-shirt, I was on my way. I had to mentally prepare myself for whatever my mama was about to say because you never knew with her. She didn’t care what she said or how she said it.

  Just as I predicted, everyone showed up early. I was shocked to walk in the house and see my dad, DeMoni Sr. or Alpha, as the streets called him, sitting there. My mama got rid of his ass when Keylin was about two years old. He stayed as active in our lives as our mom would allow him but it had been years since I’d seen him.

  “It must be serious if she allowed you in her house,” I half-joked as I embraced my father.

  “Shut up, boy,” my mama said as she slapped me on the back of the head.

  Just as I sat down and my mama was about to speak, Tahtiana came storming into the house like a mad woman and she was headed right for Moni. “You got that bitch pregnant, DeMoni?” she yelled as she threw her phone at him.

  “W-What?” he asked.

  “Don’t play dumb with me. Your bitch has been playing on my phone all day. I finally answered to see who has been blowing my phone up and she told me that she’s pregnant by your sorry ass. She even sent me a picture of the positive pregnancy test. So what? My baby wasn’t good enough for you so you had to go make another one before mine could even enter the world?”

  Tahtiana was standing there breathing hard with tears in her eyes. Nobody knew what to do because her crying never happened. DeMoni was sitting there looking stupid and all I could do was shake my head. My mama walked over to Tahti and whispered something in her ear before they walked out of the room.

  “Stupid ass,” I mushed DeMoni in his head. “You got her pregnant? You did all that crying to me and mama about losing her for good and this is what you do?” I asked.