by Tiana Laveen
“Look.” The crowd burst out into more applause before he could even finish his sentence. He looked down at her, standing so close to her, it seemed as if he were going to maul her to death, right then and there. “All you had to do was be real with me. I want the address of this Marco person. I’d like to pay him a visit.”
“No need to be jealous! He was a good kisser, too.” She winked at him and smirked, rubbing it in, causing the audience to oooooh and awwwww.
“Was he better than me?” Saint’s brow rose while he obviously fought the urge to laugh.
“Well, I don’t really know.” Xenia crossed her arms. “It was so long ago…” She pretended to look down and play with her cuticles.
“Your memory is that short, huh? Well, let me remind you what you have at home, give you a refresher course on what a real kiss feels like.” Grabbing her around the waist, he firmly pulled her body to his. The crowd cheered and got to their feet. He looked into her eyes, then devoured her mouth as if it were breakfast, lunch and dinner, all rolled into one, causing an almost violent explosion of applause. Xenia closed her eyes and melted; he was literally making her weak at the knees.
Oh damn, that was good…
He released her abruptly and turned her loose, making her do a half spin so fast, she almost fell down, which only caused more laughter as she regained her balance in the nick of time.
“Strawberry cookies my ass…” he mumbled, but every damn person in the place heard him. “Taste the Rainbeau, baby.” he flicked his tongue nastily at her, making it wave like a long, loose noodle in such a sexual, obscene way. This brought the crowd into an overwhelming uproar. “I ain’t the flavor of the month, I’m the essence of your life, goddamn it! Marco Polo, mothafucka! Don’t get in the deep end if you can’t swim, baby! I’ll drown his ass…Nevaaaah, learned, tuh swim! Don’t know the meanin’ of tha mothafuckin’ stroke!” Saint sang, pumped his pelvis real hard in the air as if he were fucking, causing the ladies in the crowd to go wild. He snatched his mic off, threw it on the stage like he was mad as fuck and stormed back towards his seat, causing everyone to jump up once again in laughter, whistles and applause. Immediately, a new song belted through the speakers, 30H!3’s, ‘My First Kiss’, featuring Ke$ha. The crowd went crazy as the song aired right on time, as if it had been planned in advance.
Xenia’s face burned with the effort of controlling her laughter. She waited a moment or two while the crowd settled and the music finally waned.
“And on that note, goodnight! Just kidding!” She cackled, causing many others to do the same. She took a deep dramatic breath, peered down at her shoes as if she were about to click them three times, then turned back towards the audience. “…And that is exactly how he acts, all the time. That was not a show, ladies. My husband is a certified nut.”
Traci and Jagger clapped in the front row, causing Saint to leer at them and pockets of laughter to burst through out the vast audience.
“Okay, so anyway, where was I?”
“Cookies!” someone screamed out, causing more commotion.
“Yes.” Xenia nodded proudly. “Strawberry cookies…mmmm, mmmm. No, I was actually speaking of dealing directly with myself, and being truthful with ourselves as women.” She paused, looking reflective. “You see, there is safety in numbers. In the human condition, we seek acknowledgement and protection. I see it every day in the world, in my family, and at my job. It doesn’t matter the gender, the socio-economic status, the religion, race or ethnicity—we all want to fit in, be included on some level, even if it is fitting in with a bunch of outcasts…we want to belong. Once we as women truly love ourselves, we understand that our love is too big to be contained. There isn’t one person or thing that can have all of our attention, because women, we are the mothers of the Earth. We love big! We can have one child or twenty, and that same good mother will not love one over the other. She may enjoy the company of one over the other though,” Xenia said. “But her love? Mmmm hmmm.” She shook her head. “It’s for all of them. I realized after my husband let me know he was interested in getting to know me, that not only did I have a physical attraction to this man, I had a spiritual one, too. It was almost as if my very own soul was saying, ‘Girl, if you don’t want ’im, leave me here and you can go on!” More laughter ensued.
“It’s true, you know?” She paced the stage. “It was a whirlwind. So many people said it wouldn’t last, but here we are, over ten years later, solid as rock!” She stomped her foot, urging more women to follow suit and applaud. “Now, essentially, Saint really was my first. He was my first Rainbeau… A kiss for cookies doesn’t really count,” She smirked and winked at him. “There was just something about him, ladies. He was smooooth.” She chuckled. “But…he was sincere, and that’s a deadly combination. We laugh together. We cry together. We build our lives, brick by brick, around one another. We are independent, yet intertwined. When he hurts, I hurt, too. When he’s excited and happy, so am I. I can say I truly have a wonderful man, but you know what? That doesn’t mean we don’t get challenged. That doesn’t mean we always agree. That doesn’t mean some nights we’d prefer to go to bed not speaking…but we don’t do that, because we know tomorrow is not promised. So through gritted teeth, we’ll bite the bullet and say, ‘I love you.’” Several soft laughs rolled throughout the place.
“And that’s important. I never take one day for granted with him. Once I left the gang, the gang mentality, and stopped fighting the two dueling gangs within me, as well as released myself from the self-imposed curse, I could finally see what I’d been blind to for so long! Just because I love this man,” she said, pointing out towards Saint, “doesn’t mean I’m less black. Just because my father wasn’t there for me doesn’t mean I’m lashing out. Just because I married my husband doesn’t mean I hate black men! You see, that’s the overwhelming pressure that we have on our shoulders! So many of you love Rainbeaus. You read books about Rainbeaus, you watch movies about Rainbeaus, you listen to songs about Rainbeaus and yet, you won’t step a bit farther out into the open, into the light of day, after the storm, look up at the sky and declare to the world, ‘I want one, too!’ Saying you love the brilliant colors of the world doesn’t mean you no longer cherish the shade of black! Where is this tit for tat coming from? One for the other? Where is this fear coming from? It is coming from the gang! The gang out there!” She pointed towards the audience. “And the gang in here!” She pointed towards her heart and skull.
“It’s time to leave…it’s time to let it go and never look back. Black women, we’ve shouldered so much weight of the world, we’re now humpbacked. And you know what we’re told? We still…didn’t…do…enough. We have one foot in, and one foot out. Afraid. Even after I made the decision to be with Saint and forsake all of that, I still had these old tapes in my mind.” She moved her finger in a circular motion by her temple, like an old movie reel, playing the flick. “Sometimes I’d look at my husband, especially after we had a disagreement of some sort and I’d think, ‘He can’t really understand me. We’re from two different worlds.’ This would happen in our first year of marriage, but I never told him. I was still afraid.” She shook her head.
“What’s funny is, we marry black men all the time, and many times our black husbands don’t understand us one iota!” This caused a few chuckles.
“It’s true and you know it. Some of it isn’t a race thing at all; it’s just a woman and man thing. When I dated black men, I cannot tell you how many times I was called strange, odd, or whatever for listening to anything other than R&B and rap. People in our community may call us ‘uppity’ because we want to move out of the hood, get an education. Many of you have heard it!” She noticed many heads nodding in agreement. “Yet, that’s alright, huh? We stick out those destructive friendships. We make those relationships work! Some of us are afraid that, if we cross the street and smell the flowers of another garden, we can never go back to the garden we tended to in the first place. Let me tell you s
omething—that is nothing more than mind games and manipulation.
“Certain people in Blackistan want you to believe that. They scream, and pardon my language, I am not my husband, but I must quote it correctly…” she said, grinning. ‘If you a fuck a white dude, you can never come back to us! We don’t want you!’ Inferring that you’re contaminated…” She shook her head and continued to pace. “That wasn’t a rose that was talking to you, Queen…that was a weed.”
Laughter and applause broke out.
“If you are dating a white man, that relationship does not pan out, then date a black man, you are not contaminated! You are making choices based on the man, not his race! Furthermore, did we tell that same weed that when he went out and gave Becky his magic, midnight stick that he could no longer venture into our side of the universe? No! Those same weeds have been popping up in everyone’s garden since segregation was outlawed! We, black Queens, are the last to travel outside of our comfort zone. We’ve been in our own gardens the very longest, tending to the soil.” She slowly dropped to her knees, pretending to toil and move about dirt on the stage. “We’ve been nurturing the fatherless seeds! We’ve been treating the damn weeds like calla lilies and lotus plants! We allow the weeds to tell us that they are not a dandelion, even though they look and smell like one! We let them convince us that the curse is alive and breathing, not a figment of our imagination!” She looked up from the ground into the audience, her face stiff with pain.
“We let the weeds call us bitches, whores, hoes, sluts, cunts, and we take it while they strangle the daylights out of us! We stay in that garden with the dried up soil, ladies! We stay and keep watering the damn weeds! Why?! You must nourish, cultivate and love those that nourish, cultivate and love you! Weeds don’t love nobody! Weeds do nothing but destroy all that is beautiful and good. This is a simple truth. You don’t have to be a horticulture expert to know this. The turf that you once protected so hard, that little slab of nothing, is all dried up and withered. Your gang affiliation means nothing! If you were jumped in, you better jump your ass back out!”
Saint grinned and broke out in applause.
“If you had to beat someone else down to get in, you better go apologize and make amends. If you had to kill someone to make it through, go make peace with that family because it is time…that you…walk away.
“Weeds are persistent and consistent. So ladies, I’d like to wrap this up by explaining to you how to walk away from the garden of deception… To successfully control the weeds in your garden, that is, the people that try to hold you back from believing that you are wonderfully made and can partake in all that nature has to offer, you must first be able to identify them. Weeds come in all shapes and sizes, but they more times than not, blend into your garden rather nicely until you take a closer look. Some weeds only come out during certain seasons. Usually these seasons are the ones when you are doing better in life. When things are going well for you, and you are getting the strength to fly the coop, they burst forward, declaring all the foolishness they have to say.
“Weeds only grow if they are being fertilized and the soil is at least semi-substantial. That means they need you in order to thrive. Refuse to water them with your constant presence and not sticking up for yourself. In other words, weeds need attention. With no ear to listen to their rhetoric, and no one standing there to manipulate, they will weaken and die. Weeds must be cut short, chopped at the ground level! Once they get started, do not even give them an inch, a moment of your day. Like all things, they get stronger and more radical over time. Do not let them germinate.
“Lastly, once you’ve made peace with the weeds that tried to hold you back, you must turn away and go live your life. Do not regret leaving a garden that gives you nothing but dried up promises. Do not feel guilty for finally taking care of yourself and starting afresh. Do not feel badly for stepping out on faith. Rainbeaus and Queens are the epitome of the true love story of this world in modern day times. You may ask why I say that. Well…” She shrugged. “Because we are fighting against all odds. Did you know, statistically speaking, we have longest lasting marriages, Queens?”
Some surprised faces popped in the crowd.
“It’s because we had to work so damn hard to get here! It’s more difficult to throw in the towel when you’ve worked so hard to get in the shower, clean up and get your fresh start in the first damn place!”
The crowd burst out in applause.
“We are the last to plant our own gardens, but not the weakest! We are the most loyal, but not gluttons for abuse! We are the thickest skinned, but we are still women! We LOVE! We LOVE hard! We love strong! We deserve love back! We demand love back! STAND UP!” She rose from the ground like a phoenix with her arms extended towards the sky. “I said, STAND UP, and say out loud, ‘I will plant my new garden inside hearts of gold, for I am a Queen, I am a Goddess and everyone that breaths and is living is from my womb, the womb of Africa, the cradle of civilization; and everything I love that loves me back all sprouts, grows and rises to the highest of heights, right under the blazing sun that gives us life and the promise of a new day.” She raised her arms up high, her voice rising higher and higher.
“And the rain that falls feeds us all. It is nourishment; it is happy tears of the fresh start you’ve given yourself. Those raindrops, that flood of love, are falling atop your head, blessing and baptizing you as an act of good faith, for a job well done, for no longer being in the gang! You are now your own person; you are a leader, not a follower! You are no longer fighting within yourself for turf that is no longer yours and really never was, and for crossing the street, evicting yourself from Blackistan to see all that our God has to offer. Life is so much bigger than Piru, baby!” Her voice shook as tears fell down her face. “The world is so much larger than the place from which we grew up and the tiny things that we know!
“If you step out, if you move forward and get out of your own damn way, all of that rain that flooded your life, you’d see was no flood at all. It simply washed that fear away, Queens. And for trusting yourself, and believing what God promised you, you WILL be rewarded. Your reward once you look back up into the sky after tending to your garden is a job well done and the opportunity for new experiences! It is the multi-colors of the magnificent Rainbeau that shouts down to you, the words that you need to hear, at just the right time. And those words are, ‘Thank you, Goddess, for loving me back!!!”
The crowd went wild, frenzied, insane. Sparkling, gold confetti stormed from the rafters, coating Xenia in its mist! She drowned in the moment; her eyes swelled with fresh, happy tears. Before she could fully grasp the happiness within her, long, strong arms wrapped around her waist and a familiar pair of lips kissed her hard against the cheek. It was her Beloved. She looked into his eyes, and saw them sparkle. She couldn’t hear a word he said, but he mouthed it real slow so that this time, she could catch it…
“I…LOVE…YOU…SO MUCH, BABY! XENIA, THANK YOU, FOR LOVING ME BACK!”
*
“I know I put that tool kit somewhere in here,” Saint mumbled in frustration as he sorted through mechanical odds and ends in the garage. This was a perfect, quiet time to repair Dakarai’s bike. Despite it being winter, the persistent boy reminded him constantly of its broken brake and looked forward to the pending springtime when he’d promised to remove the training wheels, and let him have a go of it. It didn’t help that a bike shop happened to be near their house, and that they passed by it practically every damn day on his way to school. Such would always jar the boy’s memory, remind him that Daddy had still not fixed the broken part. Saint knew he could fix the damn thing himself, in the peace and quiet, especially since the children were out and about this afternoon. A nice young woman Xenia had befriended at the radio station spoke of a Children’s Musuem event, and Hassani, Dakarai and even Isis had seemed excited to attend. Xenia dropped off the children at the bus pick up, and returned sooner than he had anticipated.
“’Sup, baby
…” He could hear her behind him, simply standing there as he turned over more boxes and raided their contents. “I’m looking for my yellow screw driver. Since we’ve moved, I can’t seem to find anything.”
“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that.” He got a whiff of her perfume, paused, then continued with his search.
“Tryna fix Dakarai’s bike.” He chuckled. “I figured he’d be surprised when he gets back home…damn!” Saint pulled out two shoe boxes filled with more odds and ends, but no screwdriver.
“What would you like to do after I get this finished? I thought maybe we could go get a late lunch or maybe just take a drive around. Maybe even visit my dad and stepmother.”
The woman remained eerily silent, which took him a bit off guard. He slowly rose and took a good look at her, and realized they weren’t on the same page. Hell, not even in the same book. By the look in her eyes, she had other things in mind…
“I want to get dirty…” She slicked her tongue real slow over her lips, then proceeded to remove her damn clothes. He stood there, gripping a musty cardboard box, daring himself to blink and miss any of the action playing out.
“What did you have in mind?” His voice cracked as his dick jerked about in his pants.
“Fuck me next to your toys.”
“Hmmm?” He paused, taking a long gander at her.
“You want to go into the red room? Oh yeah, that’s cool.” He set the damn box down on the workshop bench and proceeded to go back into the house.
“No, your toys…your prized possessions…your cars…”
“You want me to fuck you in the garage?” He couldn’t help but smile, feeling himself float on the damn notion itself.