by Chunichi
“Aw, come on, you need to get out,” I said. “Not to sound insensitive, but sitting around harping on the situation is not gonna make it any better. I know how hard it must be to cope with something like this, but putting yourself in an upbeat environment may be just what you need. If you don’t feel any better once we get to where we’re going, I’ll have Vegas drop us back off.”
After I finally got her to agree to come along, we all hopped in the truck and headed toward the downtown tunnel.
“Where we headed, baby?” It looked like we were going to Portsmouth, but Vegas hated Portsmouth. He would always warn me to stay out of Portsmouth because that’s where the grimiest niggas lay. “I gotta meet my man real quick at the . . . the . . . umm . . . strip joint,” Vegas said hesitantly.
“The strip joint?”
“Yeah, baby, don’t trip. It’ll only be a minute,” he said as we pulled in the parking lot.
“Whatever! And your ass got exactly one minute too,” I yelled as he was shutting the door.
Ten minutes passed and Vegas still wasn’t back, so I decided I was going in after him.
“I’m going to get his ass, T. You coming?”
“I guess I better go, just in case you start wilding on a bitch.”
We climbed out of the truck and headed in. The club was dark and smoky, the sounds of Luke blasting from the speakers. The DJ announced each girl as she entered the center stage. The girls danced, crawled, and climbed the pole while guys threw dollar after dollar on the stage. I searched and searched, but I didn’t see Vegas anywhere. Since he was so popular, though, I knew all I had to do was ask just one person in the establishment and they would tell me where he was.
“Excuse me, do you know Vegas?” I asked the bartender as I approached the bar.
“Yeah, he was just with Martinez. Hold on, I’ll get Martinez to take you to him.”
Martinez? I remembered hearing Vegas refer to a friend of his by the name of Martinez quite often, but I never met him. I was pretty certain this was the same guy, though.
The bartender finished serving a drink, and then shouted to a guy in the corner who was speaking to a nicely built female.
“Yo, Martinez!”
The guy walked over to the end of the bar and they began to exchange words. As they were speaking, Tionna and I walked toward them. The closer we got the more familiar the guy looked. We caught each other’s eyes.
“Oh, shit. What the hell y’all doing here?” Cash asked nervously.
“I’m looking for Vegas. So, you’re the infamous Martinez, huh? I had no idea. You do know that Vegas is my man, right? So, Cash, why does everyone else call you Martinez?”
“It’s a long story, ma. Follow me. He’s right in here speaking with my man.”
We followed Cash to a room labeled VIP. In no way was I ready for the sight before me when he opened the door and we stepped inside.
“What the hell are you doing?” I yelled.
Tionna’s mouth dropped to the floor as we watched this trick suck dick in front of a group of men. She was oblivious to our presence as she continued to suck and stroke this guy to no end. As she was going down on the one guy, another was smacking her ass from behind. I could not stand there and watch any longer, so I walked over and snatched her by her head.
“What the fuck are you doing, Mickie? Get the fuck up!”
Needless to say, the guys were not pleased by my interruption.
“What the fuck you doing, shortie? We paid for this shit. What the deal? Are you trying to take over?”
Then, one guy actually had the audacity to grab my ass. At that point, Tionna and I both lost it, but before we could react, I heard a sound that resembled the cocking of a gun.
Click . . . click.
The sound was enough to make everyone freeze. It was Vegas and he had his gun to the guy’s head.
“You got a problem with your hands, man?”
I could see fear written all over the guy’s face as he pleaded with Vegas. “Nah, Vegas. Man, I ain’t know that was your girl, man. I’m sorry, man. You know I wouldn’t disrespect you like that.”
“Not only did you disrespect me, but you disrespected my girl. I think you owe her an apology,” Vegas calmly responded.
The guy turned toward me with tears in his eyes. “I’m sorry, miss. I’m sorry. Please forgive me.”
“His life is in your hands, baby,” Vegas turned to me and said. “Do you forgive him? If not, he got to go. So, what’s it going to be?”
I couldn’t just stand there and let Vegas kill the guy simply because he had touched my ass. I mean, what he had done was disrespectful, no doubt, but I would live.
“I forgive him, Vegas. Let him go,” I said while eyeing the nigga up and down as if he wasn’t even worth the bullet.
Vegas lowered the gun. As the guy ran for his life, the front of his pants clearly showed how frightened he really had been. I looked over at Mickie as she grabbed her clothes and ran to the dressing room. Tionna and I followed closely behind.
“Mickie, why are you doing this? You are too good for this. You don’t have to stoop to this level,” I said.
“Yes I do.” Meikell began to cry. “I don’t have it as easy as you, C. I have to do this to maintain. I wish I didn’t, but I do.”
Tionna and I both hugged her as she continued to cry. There was no need to say anything more.
“You ladies ready?” Vegas yelled from the dressing room door.
“Yes, baby, we’ll be right out.”
We told Mickie we loved her and that we were sorry for isolating her. We hoped she would forgive us and that we would hear from her soon.
The ride home was rough. Once again, I had a thousand questions for Vegas.
“Why didn’t you tell me you knew Cash?”
“You never asked,” Vegas responded nonchalantly.
“So why haven’t I ever met him? I mean, you always talk about him, but you never bring him around.
“You know I don’t bring business to the house, Ceazia.”
I could tell by his tone that my many questions were starting to annoy Vegas, but that didn’t stop me.
“So why did you have to meet at the strip club? Do you meet him there all the time?”
“No, I don’t. I meet him wherever he’s at when I call, C.”
“So why when I came in there you weren’t with him? You were in the VIP room and he was out near the bar. If y’all were doing business, shouldn’t y’all have been together?”
Running out of patience for my line of questioning, Vegas became angry. “Ceazia, if I was up to some shit, I would not have even brought y’all along. Damn, I was talking to Red about some shit that didn’t involve Martinez, so we asked the nigga to step out. You don’t know anything about the game, so please stop questioning me about how I run my shit.”
“He’s got a point, C. Cut him a break. Like he said, he was just handling his business,” Tionna said from the back seat.
If I had been smart, I would have taken the advice of my friend and ended the conversation there, but I just couldn’t. I needed more answers.
“Well, why didn’t you tell me Mickie be up there doing shit like that? I’m sure you knew since you’re so close to Cash.”
Vegas’ nose flared and he took a deep breath. “C, you’re getting on my fucking nerves with all these damn questions. I can’t know that man’s hustle. That’ll be like him trying to tell me who to sell my shit to. Shit, Meikell is a grown ass woman. Maybe if you would mind your damn business y’all wouldn’t be beefing now.”
I can’t believe this nigga is actually bucking on me like this. Vegas had truly violated.
He had touched a sensitive spot, and I reacted without thinking.
Smack!
“Who the fuck you talking to?” I yelled at him.
Skuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrr!
The screeching of the truck’s brakes was the last thing I heard before Vegas grabbed me by the back of my neck.
“Okay, Vegas, I think you made your point! Let her go,” Tionna begged while she pulled on his arm, trying to loosen his grip.
When he released his hold, I began to cry hysterically. I couldn’t believe he put his hands on me. Needless to say, we didn’t go out that night and the rest of the ride home was silent.
A few minutes later we arrived at Tionna’s apartment. Still a bit shaken, I stepped out of the truck to give her a hug.
“I love you, girl. Keep your head up,” I told her before kissing her cheek.
“I love you, too, and you do the same. From the looks of things, we’re gonna need a Waiting to Exhale party,” Tionna said with a small grin.
I gave her a slight smile in return as I climbed back into the truck. As we pulled off, I waved to her from the window and watched her disappear inside the house.
When I got home I received a call from Tionna. She briefed me on the events that occurred after we dropped her off. Evidently, her time away was not quite long enough. When Tionna entered her apartment, she immediately noticed that Tonya’s things were cleared out and her room was vacant. However, Shawn was not gone. He met Tionna at the door, his eyes red and filled with tears.
“Could you please leave? Take all your clothes and just leave!” she shouted, and then stood looking at him coldly.
Shawn could see how angry she was, so he did as she asked. He grabbed what he could carry and made a quick exit. After he left, Tionna cleaned the house and threw out anything left behind that was affiliated with Shawn or Tonya. After all she had done for the both of them, she couldn’t believe they would actually do something like that. She took her little sister in because she had no place else to go, and this was the repayment she got.
Not wanting to face all the hurt and betrayal that she was feeling, Tionna took two Vicodins and cried herself to sleep as she thought about all the events of the day. She just wanted the day to end. And what a day it had been.
Chapter 6
Tionna Faces Death
It had been almost a year since the incident with Tonya and Shawn, and Tionna was gradually getting better. She was seeing our therapist and making good progress. Charlotte is the therapist we had all consulted at some point in our lives. She was a young, white girl who knew her shit. It’s unfortunate, but divas need therapy too.
Tionna was looking great. She had gone shopping and purchased new clothes. She got her hair done and her nails and toes, too. She even sported a new style. It was sort of funky, with a video chick swing. It was like old times. I had really missed Tionna during her deep depression. I was glad that my girl was back in the swing of things. That situation had really taken a toll on all of us. One evening, we all gathered at her house to celebrate and have a girls’ night out, which we referred to as therapy outside of therapy. We laughed and joked as we thought about old times. Meikell brought her friend Linda and Linda’s daughter, Shykema. Immediately, everyone noticed how Shykema resembled Asia’s twins. Asia’s daughters are named Shameah and Shakeya, and they are beautiful. They have gray eyes, long legs, and French vanilla skin, just like their father. We found it quite peculiar that Linda’s daughter, whose name is quite similar, had green eyes, long legs and caramel skin. The curiosity was killing us all, so someone had to say something. India, the feistiest of the twins, spoke up.
“Your daughter surely resembles my nieces,” she said in a sarcastic tone. She went on to tell Linda about her nieces and how her daughter’s features were so similar.
“Oh, really?” Linda responded, “Well, Shykema’s father named her. She looks just like him.
“Oh, that’s interesting,” India interrupted.
“My nieces were also named by their father. So where is their father from?”
As Linda spoke, things fell into place and just as we all thought, Asia’s twins and Shykema were sisters. Linda seemed undisturbed by the whole revelation. Asia, on the other hand, had the look of death on her face.
“Where were his standards?” Asia said, looking at Linda with disgust. “I mean, look at you and look at me. I’m a part of corporate America and you are just simply a disgrace to America.”
To everyone’s surprise, Linda responded very calmly. “I understand you’re upset, but you shouldn’t be. My daughter is two years older than your twins are, and besides, I have no contact with her father whatsoever. We didn’t have much of a relationship. I met him at the strip club one night and we ended up having sex. Unfortunately, the condom broke and I ended up with Shykema. He ended up leaving right after her birth. We had some major conflicts of interest, if you know what I mean.”
“No, I don’t know what you mean. Why don’t you elaborate?” Asia insisted.
“Not that it’s any of your business, but I am no longer interested in men, so you really shouldn’t worry.” Linda responded in the same calm manner as before.
We were glad Linda responded the way that she had, because anything else would have been detrimental to her health. We all exhaled as the tension slowly left the room, and we continued to drink and trip out as before.
Asia was not worried that her twins’ father would get with Linda. She was just upset that she didn’t have any idea about his other child. Even though she hadn’t known the twins’ father during the time he conceived this other child, it still made her mad. It shouldn’t have, though, because now he was doing ten years in federal prison. Asia was getting all his money and had a man on the side.
Just as we were leaving to go out, there was a knock at the door, which was quite surprising since all of us were already there. Tionna opened the door and there stood Shawn, looking just as pitiful as the day he left. In his hand he held a folded piece of paper. He handed Tionna the paper and left without saying a word.
Caught off guard by Shawn’s appearance, she was also anxious to know what was contained in the letter. Tionna quickly unfolded the paper and stood silently as she read. Her eyes scanned back and forth across the typed words.
Dear sir/ma’am: We have reason to believe you have come in contact with someone who might be infected with the HIV virus. Please report to your city public health department as soon as possible for testing.
“Nooooo! Oh God, no!” Tionna burst into tears.
As we crowded around and read over her shoulder, we all cried with her. We could not believe this was happening. Things were so perfect, and now this. How could this happen to someone we loved so dearly? It wasn’t fair. Tionna had only been with Shawn. They weren’t using protection because they supposedly had a monogamous relationship. She never worried about getting pregnant because her doctors said she would never have children.
The next day, Tionna headed for the health department. The parking lot was filled with cars as she pulled up. With her head down, she walked in and handed the letter to the receptionist then looked around for a place to sit. There were chairs lined up in rows. The place was noisy and crowded. There were babies crying, mothers yelling, and nurses calling names every five minutes. She found a chair in the corner away from everyone and took a seat. She was afraid to get too close to anyone or touch anything because everyone, even the children, looked as though they were infected with some deadly disease. Tionna cried just at the thought of looking as bad as the people who surrounded her.
After a few minutes, the nurse called out, “Tionna Davis, exam room three.”
Tionna walked into the exam room and the nurse advised her to get undressed. Once the nurse left the room, Tionna pulled off her clothes and put on the paper robe. A few minutes later, the doctor walked in. Exactly what Tionna did not want to happen did happen. The doctor was a man and he was gorgeous. Not exactly who she wanted to see as she was getting checked for HIV.
He explained that he would be doing an exam for STDs as well as taking blood to test for HIV. Tionna hated the pelvic exam. The feeling of that cold metal instrument was so uncomfort
able. She tightened her muscles as the doctor inserted the cold speculum.
“Relax, honey,” the doctor said while patting her knee. “Take some deep breaths and spread your legs.” Ugh. She cringed at his words. Spreading her legs was what had gotten her in this mess in the first place.
She did what the doctor instructed and relaxed. It’s funny how we women are always hollering about a big dick, but when they stick that speculum in us, we tighten our thighs and nearly jump off the table.
“All done,” the doctor announced three minutes later. “I didn’t see any signs of an STD. You will be contacted, though, once the blood results are back. I think I should also explain that just because you received the letter does not mean you are definitely infected.”
Tionna sighed with relief. He actually made her feel a lot better. “Hey doc, if the test comes back negative, let’s have dinner,” she said and giggled to herself as she disappeared behind the curtain to get dressed.
His response was only a smile.
Tionna drove home in a daze as she wondered what the results would be.
A couple of days later, Tionna received another knock at the door. This time it was two detectives. She knew the day would come when they would catch up with India and come knocking at her door in search of answers. Tionna often broke into cold sweats as she played over and over again in her mind the answers she would give to those questions regarding India and her involvement in the drug ring.
Nervously, she opened the door. As she looked the detectives in their faces, she wasn’t sure what to say or what not to say.
“How can I assist you today, detectives?” Tionna asked, her voice shaking.
“Ms. Davis?” one of the detectives asked.
“Yes, I’m Ms. Davis.”
“May we come in?”
“Sure. How can I help you?”
To her surprise, they wanted to speak to her about her sister, Tonya. She hadn’t heard from Tonya or even spoken her name since the day of the incident.
“When was the last time you saw Tonya?”