Crossroads

by Nikita Lynnette Nichols

  “Michelle, you have to pray,” Cookie said.

  Michelle looked across the kitchen table into Cookie’s eyes. “I’ve been doing that. And it seems like the more I pray, the worse she gets. I make her go to church, I watch to make sure she does her homework every night, James and I take her cellular phone and computer away when she breaks a rule. How many times have the three of us sat in front of you and Pastor Graham for counseling because of something she had done? Countless times, Cookie. James won’t let me lay a belt to her butt. And truth be told, that’s really all that Amaris needs. She’s a spoiled brat that has had everything handed to her on a silver platter. I should have pulled her reins years ago. But her latest stunt terrorizes me. My gut tells me that my daughter will have sexual intercourse soon.”

  More tears spilled onto Michelle’s face. Cookie got up from her chair and went to embrace her. “I have a suggestion that you may not like, but I think it’ll help with Amaris.”

  Michelle wiped her tears. “I’ll try anything.”

  “You said that Amaris is living the life of your sister, Amaryllis.”

  “Yes, she is. Everything that Amaryllis has done, Amaris is doing.”

  “Maybe Amaryllis is the one person who can get through to her. Who better than Amaryllis could talk with Amaris and actually relate to the way she’s behaving?”

  “I don’t know about that, Cookie. Amaryllis may be saved and living the straight and narrow now, but when she was a teenager and young adult, she was a pistol. I don’t think that turning Amaris over to her aunt would benefit her.”

  Just then, Amaris walked into the kitchen with her purse on her shoulder and house keys in her hand. She saw Cookie and spoke. “Hello, First Lady.”

  “Hi, sweetheart,” Cookie smiled.

  Michelle and Cookie watched her go to the refrigerator, open it, and take out a can of Pepsi.

  “Why do you have your purse and keys? I know you don’t think you’re leaving this house,” Michelle said.

  “Why not? It’s Friday. There’s no school tomorrow.”

  “Amaris, after what you did today, I don’t understand how you could even fathom the idea of stepping outside of this house.”

  Amaris exhaled loudly. “So, what? You’re gonna hold me captive forever? I’m just going across the street to Rhonda’s house.”

  Michelle stood and snatched the purse off her shoulder and keys from her hand. “You ain’t leaving this house.”

  Amaris looked at Cookie, then back at Michelle. She then slammed the can of Pepsi on the counter and stormed out of the kitchen.

  Michelle sat down at the table, ran her trembling fingers through her hair, and looked at Cookie. “And all you want me to do is pray?”

  Cookie nodded her head toward the cordless telephone on the kitchen wall. “And call your sister.” She got up from the table and grabbed the telephone, then brought it back to Michelle.

  Michelle refused to take it.

  “Listen to me, daughter,” Cookie said, “if anyone can reach that girl, it’s Amaryllis.”

  Michelle slowly took the telephone from Cookie’s hand and dialed her sister’s number.

  In Chicago, Amaryllis answered Michelle’s call. “Hey, twin.”

  “Hey,” Michelle responded.

  Amaryllis could tell from her voice that she was despondent. “Is everything okay?”

  More tears fell onto Michelle’s face. “No. Um, I need you to talk to Amaris. She’s out of control. Today she ditched school again, and I found her at a boy’s house with no underwear on.”

  Amaryllis knew that her niece acted out on occasion. Often Michelle would call her and share the horror stories of things that she had done. Amaryllis had offered to come to Las Vegas and have a heart-to-heart talk with her niece, but Michelle had been against it.

  “What? Did she—?” Amaryllis began.

  “No, she’s still a virgin, but she won’t be for much longer. How soon can you get here?”

  Amaryllis wasted no time. “If there’s a flight to Vegas tonight, I’ll be on it.” She disconnected the call from Michelle and immediately dialed Southwest Airlines. She knew exactly what Amaris was doing because she had done it. But she absolutely refused to let the devil steal her niece. Amaryllis had wanted to speak to the girl about her behavior the first time Michelle confided that she was misbehaving. The good news was that Amaris was still a virgin. Amaryllis was prepared to go to war on her niece’s behalf to keep her pure. She would join forces with her sister and break the curse once and for all.

  Chapter 29

  Later that night after Amaryllis had paid the taxicab driver, she proceeded to walk up the front steps of Michelle’s townhome with her carry-on bag on her shoulder. She figured she didn’t need to bring many changes of clothes, because what she had flown to Las Vegas to do wouldn’t take long.

  She had a lot to think about on the four-hour flight from Chicago. When she had spoken to Michelle earlier that day, she heard desperation mixed with tears in her sister’s voice. Her niece was out of control. Amaris’s life needed to be protected, and her soul needed to be saved. She was a rebellious brat who had become immune to lectures and time-outs. They no longer worked. Amaryllis herself had walked down the path that her look-a-like niece was treading upon. Amaryllis had a plan, a tough plan that would surely prevent Amaris from self-destructing.

  When she reached the top of the steps, she heard yelling coming from inside. “Amaris, the topic of you going to any party at this late hour is not up for discussion,” Michelle stated.

  “You never let me do anything,” Amaris screamed. “I hate you, I hate Daddy, and I hate this crappy house.”

  Amaryllis knocked on the front door. As soon as Michelle opened it, Amaryllis set her carry-on bag on the floor next to the door. She looked at Michelle. Gray strands of hair were visible around her temples. Deep creases ran across her forehead. Amaryllis studied the dark circles beneath her eyes. She would bet money that her sister hadn’t slept in the last seventy-two hours. At forty-nine years old, Michelle looked every bit of sixty-five.

  “Where are your car keys?” Amaryllis asked her sister.

  Michelle looked at her confused. “What do you need my car keys for?” She glanced at the time on her wristwatch. “I thought your flight was landing in another two hours. Why didn’t you call me? Amaris and I would’ve come to the airport to pick you up.”

  “I caught an earlier flight.” Amaryllis repeated her question. “Where are your car keys?”

  Michelle pointed to the cocktail table. “Over there. Why?”

  Amaryllis walked into the living room and grabbed Michelle’s keys from the cocktail table, then turned to her niece. “Let’s go.”

  Amaris didn’t move. Instead, she looked at her mother.

  “Where are you taking her, Amaryllis?” Michelle asked.

  “To a part of Vegas where the lights don’t shine.”

  Michelle didn’t try to stop Amaryllis as she grabbed Amaris firmly by her elbow and walked out of the front door. Michelle didn’t know where her sister was taking Amaris, but this was the reason why she was called. The one thing Michelle did know for sure was that Amaryllis loved her niece. She had spoiled the girl rotten over the years. The sky was the limit, and money was no object where Amaris was concerned. One year ago when Michelle had refused to purchase the newest design of the Fendi purse Amaris had begged her for, it was delivered to the front door two weeks later.

  “I can always count on my auntie,” Amaris had bragged as she modeled the purse on her shoulder. “I know she loves me.”

  After her sister and niece left the house, Michelle walked upstairs to her bedroom and stripped from her clothes. She slipped into a nightgown, sat on the bed, then looked at the telephone on the nightstand and decided to call Cookie.

  “Hi, Michelle,” Cookie greeted her, having seen Michelle’s home number on the caller ID.

  Michelle inhaled deeply, then exhaled. “Well, Amaryllis is in town.
She knocked on the door, asked for my car keys, then took Amaris away.”

  “Just like that?” Cookie asked.

  Michelle chuckled. “Yep. Just like that.”

  “Okay, well, I want you to do something for me.”

  “What might that be, First Lady?”

  “Go to sleep.”

  Michelle chuckled again. “What?”

  “Get some sleep, Michelle. Your sister’s got this.”

  Cookie was right about that as Amaryllis drove Michelle’s BMW twelve blocks south and parked it in a grocery store parking lot. After locking it, she and Amaris walked to the corner and waited for the next bus.

  “Aunt Amaryllis, where are we going?” Amaris had been silent until that point.

  “To a place where people go to get away from their parents when they hate them.”

  A bus drove up, and the two women got on. Amaryllis pulled money from the front pocket of her jeans and paid their fare. Before she and Amaris got in the car back at Michelle’s house, Amaryllis had taken money, photos, and her driver’s license from her purse. She shoved them in her pocket, then put her purse in Michelle’s trunk.

  “Go to the back and sit down,” Amaryllis instructed her niece.

  Amaris wasn’t afraid, but she was nervous. Her aunt was behaving mysteriously. This wasn’t like all the other times when the two of them had spent time together. They’d shopped together, told jokes, and laughed together. This time, Amaris felt like she had been kidnapped by a stranger.

  When they were seated at the back of the bus, Amaryllis pulled some photos from her pocket and handed one to Amaris. “I want you to see this.”

  Amaris took the photo from her aunt and looked at it. “Where did you get this picture of me?” She studied the photo and frowned. “I never wore my hair like that.”

  “That’s me at your age,” Amaryllis informed her.

  The girl’s eyes bucked out of her head. She brought the photo closer to her eyes. “This is you, Auntie?”

  “Uh-huh. I was your age. Sixteen years old.” Amaryllis remembered being a junior in high school and having sexual intercourse for the first time after casting a spell on a boy she had a crush on.

  Amaris couldn’t take her eyes off the photo. “But this is me, Auntie. I mean, this could really be me.”

  Amaryllis gave her another photo.

  Amaris gasped when she saw it. “What happened to you?”

  “That picture was taken when I was admitted to a hospital. I went to a man’s house to have sex with him. But he had other plans for me. Three of his friends were there, and they also wanted to have sex with me.”

  Amaris looked at her aunt with a horrified expression on her face. Then she looked at the picture again. “They beat you up?”

  Amaryllis looked at the picture Amaris was holding. She remembered that day like it was yesterday. The busted lip, swollen black eye, and broken pelvic bone. “Humph, they did more than that. They took turns raping me. When one climbed off me, another climbed on. They held me down until they were done. I got beaten because I fought back. And the guy that I went to see was somebody I really liked. Sometimes I would ditch work to be with him.”

  “Really?” Amaris asked. That was the same thing she had done that day. She ditched school to be with a guy she really liked.

  “He made me laugh, and we could talk about anything. At one point, he had me convinced that he was the only person in the world that understood me. But it was all a lie. He set me up to trust him, and then he betrayed me.”

  Amaris listened closely to her aunt, but she didn’t comment. She kept staring at the photo.

  “I wish somebody had warned me about him,” Amaryllis said. “I wish someone had loved me enough to tell me to stay away from him.” She looked into her niece’s eyes. “But you wanna know what I wish for the most? I wish I had a mother who loved me like your mother loves you. If just one person had been praying for me, I wouldn’t have lost my virginity when I was sixteen.”

  Amaryllis looked out the window and saw that they had arrived at their destination.

  “We’re getting off at the next stop,” she told Amaris.

  The stench of the neighborhood flooded Amaris’s nostrils the moment she and Amaryllis stepped off the bus. Broken glass, empty beer bottles, and scattered sheets of newspaper lay at their feet. Graffiti decorated the front and sides of abandoned buildings. Amaryllis grabbed her niece’s hand and started walking.

  Amaris lived a sheltered life. She never knew this world existed. “Aunt Amaryllis, I’m scared. Where are we?”

  “In hell,” came the reply.

  Amaris saw a lady staggering in their direction. She wore a dirty rag on her head and a filthy trench coat that she held closed with her grimy hands. She was thin, frail, and hunched over. Dingy gym shoes without laces were on her feet. She walked right up to Amaris. “Can you spare a dollar?” She released the coat and held out her hand. Amaris saw that she was completely nude beneath the coat.

  The stench of stale urine jumped off the woman into Amaris’s face. Like a two-year-old does whenever a stranger approached and spoke to them, Amaris stepped behind her aunt and hid. Amaryllis moved out of the way. “What are you hiding for? The lady asked you a question.”

  Amaris looked at the lady like she was a monster. She was afraid to speak.

  “Well?” Amaryllis asked.

  Amaris started to shake. “No. I-I don’t have a dollar.”

  The lady closed her trench coat and moved on.

  Amaryllis grabbed the teen’s hand and started to walk again. “You’re not scared are you, niece? You don’t have to be afraid. Everybody here hates their parents just like you.”

  By now, Amaris was holding on to her aunt’s hand for dear life.

  Amaryllis pointed across the street. “Look over there.”

  For the first time ever, Amaris saw a drug deal taking place. She witnessed a man remove a small, clear plastic bag from the crack of his butt and give it to another man.

  “I wanna go home, Aunt Amaryllis. I don’t wanna be here,” the young girl pleaded.

  “I brought you here to show you what could happen when you don’t obey your parents and when you ditch school.”

  A young boy not much older than Amaris lay on the sidewalk in a fetal position shaking.

  “What’s wrong with him?” Amaris asked.

  “He’s a dope addict. Instead of going to school and making something of himself, this is the way he chooses to live. He probably hates his parents too.”

  “Where’s my money, ho?”

  Amaris and her aunt heard those words and looked over their shoulders, where they saw a man punch a woman in her face before asking her the question again. “*%#@*, you smoked up my ^$#@* money?”

  Amaris let out a small shriek and started to cry when the man punched the woman in her face again.

  “I don’t wanna be here no more, Aunt Amaryllis. I wanna go home. Please. Let’s go home.”

  “You are home. This is it for you. Get used to it. You may as well blend in and get to know everybody here, because these are your peeps. See, this is what happens when girls ditch school and sneak off to smoke cigarettes and joints with their no-good boyfriends. This is where girls end up when they aren’t focused. Girls who wear short skirts with no panties end up here.”

  Amaryllis released Amaris’s hand and looked at her wristwatch. “Well, it’s time for me to go.”

  She started to walk in the direction in which she and Amaris had come from.

  Amaris hurried after her and grabbed her hand again. “No, Auntie. Don’t leave me here.”

  Amaryllis stopped walking. She removed her hand from Amaris’s. “You can’t go with me. This is your home now. You belong here.”

  Amaris became hysterical at the thought of her aunt actually leaving her. She wrapped her arms around her aunt’s waist and cried openly. “I don’t wanna be here. Auntie, please. I promise I’ll be good. I’m sorry, Auntie. I’m so sorry
.”

  Tears began to flood Amaryllis’s eyes. Listening to her niece beg reminded her of the time when she went to Michelle’s church and threw herself at her sister’s feet and begged for forgiveness.

  Amaris tightened her grip around Amaryllis’s waist. “I’ll be good, Auntie. I promise, I’ll be good. I just wanna go home. I wanna go home.”

  It was almost three A.M. when Amaris burst through the front door. She took the stairs two at a time up to her mother’s bedroom. Without knocking, she opened the door, rushed inside, ran to her mother’s bed, and jumped on top of her. “I’m so sorry, Mommy. I’m so sorry, Mommy.”

  Michelle didn’t know what to think. She had been in a deep sleep and was startled when Amaris had dived on her. “What happened?”

  Amaryllis had appeared in the bedroom doorway.

  Amaris hugged Michelle and buried her face in her neck. “I love you, Mommy. I love you and Daddy too. I’ll be good. I promise I’ll be good.”

  Michelle still didn’t know what took place that had caused her daughter to surrender. She saw Amaryllis standing in the doorway with a sure smile on her face.

  “The curse is broken,” Amaryllis said softly. “The curse is broken.”

  Book Club Discussion Questions

  Amaryllis Price was once considered a bad seed, but she completely turned her life around. How difficult was it for her to do that? What was the sin that caused her setbacks?

  Do you think it’s even possible for someone like Amaryllis to stay on the straight and narrow?

  Was it wrong for Amaryllis to torture Tyrone the way she did? Why or why not?

  Charles Walker reemerges from Amaryllis’s past. Is it realistic for the two of them to have a celibate relationship when they were once hot and heavy?

  Bridgette knew that her tongue was out of control. What was the turning point when she realized that she had to make a change?

  Is it believable that both Amaryllis and Michelle didn’t know that they were fraternal twins?

  Was it wrong for Nana to expose their parents’ secret?