A Hood Chick's Story pt. 2

by LaShonda DeVaughn

  "Well if they were hanging off the shower in our bedroom then they are yours."

  I was frustrated. "Do you see a size large over here Tony?" I pointed to my small ass. "Plus you would never catch me wearing this cheap ass lace. Now stop playing dumb, what bitch did you have in here while I was gone, while my daughter was in here with you?"

  Tony’s usual cockiness emerged and he mean mugged me. "I know I'm not going through this shit right now Tiara. I'm tired of all this accusing me bullshit. You're really starting to aggravate me with this shit."

  He headed toward our bedroom to diffuse the situation, he had hoped that I would just let it go but it only angered me more.

  I stood there with my eyes bucked wide, I was actually being ignored so I was about to let this nigga have it.

  How the fuck was I aggravating the nigga who's doing the fuckin’ cheating? I played my part. He was the one coming up short.

  "Oh so you’re tired of it Tony!" I yelled. He kept walking and then slammed the bedroom door behind him. At this point I was truly enraged and fed up, I wanted to kill this dude. I envisioned Ashley’s face in my head and who knows what bitch he done fucked in my house that left her shitty ass drawls that were now in my hands in my bathroom.

  I threw them on my floor not caring where they landed. Whoever the bitch was most likely left them in my crib on purpose for me to find.

  The stress started to hit me collectively and life was now once again confusing for me. Our company on the verge of bankruptcy, my fiancée putting his hands on me more than once and even worse than the beatings was the cheating. His cheating caused him to lose even more of the money that we needed. Fuck being loyal, he wasn’t worth it!

  I blanked out, I been through too much to be hitting a dead end again; I felt like insanity had overcome me. The room began spinning and I lost control of myself, I was vengeful and wanted to hurt Tony more than I ever had before. I stormed toward our bedroom and burst through the door and immediately charged at Tony. I was hitting him, kicking him, digging my nails into his skin and trying to make him hurt like I hurt.

  "I hate you!!!!" I screamed while trying to fight this one hundred and seventy pound man. All it took was one forceful push by Tony and it landed me flat on my back on our bed, he rushed over and pinned me down. I was crying and screaming and just all together lost, I had nothing permanent in this world, my life was fucked up and I was convinced that it would never get better. "Get the fuck off of me, I hate you!"

  He continued to pin me down as I tried to fight my way out.

  "Tiara, how many times I have to keep telling you, you can't beat me." He kept pushing my body into the bed sinking me deeper into the mattress. "Stop doing this stupid shit or I'm gonna fuckin’ leave you!" He hollered and squeezed me so tight, I was in so much pain, all I could do was spit in his face.

  He stood up and then looked at me as if he was about to kill me. He wiped the spit with his hand and while doing so, I got off the bed and ran out of the bedroom. I ran so fast, I don't know if Tony tried to follow me to beat my ass for spitting on him or not but I was out. When I got downstairs, I took my keys and purse and I left. I cried hysterically while I was in my car. I had no destination and all I thought about was how much I've been deceived over the years by Tony. He couldn’t have genuinely loved me. My own damn mother never even genuinely loved me. If it wasn’t for Shayonna, I would probably be dead or in a crazy home.

  Although I never received the love back that I deserved from people, I still loved hard. Loving Tony hard only came with a broken heart. I truly had to let him go. The plan that I had to leave him was actually always contemplated because something inside me always held me back and I felt like I would never be able to really do it. But I didn’t have a choice, he wasn’t good for me. I knew it would hurt me and Shayonna to our soul to depart from Tony but it was the best for us both. Tony was a problem and I had to cut him off. I cried and cringed at the thought of not being with the man whom I would lose my life for. I always thought that he was the only one whom kept my best interest at heart, but that was some bullshit.

  Twenty minutes later, I found myself sneaking into the dark cemetery where my little brother was buried. It was closed but I needed to talk to him so I found a way in.

  Now I know that cemeteries usually scared people, but to me, they were peaceful and harmless. I could never understand why people would be afraid of the dead when it was the living that posed a problem.

  I walked through the damp mud finding my little brother's headstone only using the light from my cell phone. As soon as I located the stone, I sat in front of it.

  "Hey Sharod." Tears stung my eyes as I spoke. "I need to talk to you." I took in a deep breath. "Every time I used to talk to you, you would listen giving me all of your attention, these days, I can't find any one else that really cares about what I have to say." I frowned.

  "Well I still haven't heard from Ma. I know you hear me saying that every time I come up here but I like to keep you updated in staying optimistic that one day she will reach out to me." I wiped the dirt off his picture on his head stone. "Man Sharod, why did you leave me here?" I cried. My tears fell onto his stone. "Why couldn't it have been me that was killed? You had so much more promised to you than I ever did." I sniffed. "You were so smart, so happy and confident. Me? Well go figure, my life hasn't gotten any better. The only one that I have in this world that loves me equally is Shayonna. She is getting so big Sharod, I wish you could see her, I talk about you to her all the time and she still kisses your picture every night." I forced a smile through my tears. "I just wish that you were here you know? I miss you Sharod, I just miss you." I stood there for a moment in silence before blowing a kiss to the picture on his stone and I walked off.

  When I got home that night, Tony was sitting in the dark. He scared the shit out of me because I didn’t see him sitting on the bed when I flicked on the light. I didn’t know what to expect from him so I just stood there looking at him.

  “T, man, I was sitting here thinking. I always apologize to you when I put my hands on you or when I feel like I wronged you. But looking back, you’re a big part of a lot of our problems. I had to do three years in jail over you thinking that I was fuckin’ a girl that had been out of the picture long before you and I met. You did that dumb shit you always do, fighting like it would always solve the problem. Now years later, you out here doing the same shit. You went fighting thinking that I was out here fuckin’ around on you and I really wasn’t. I never blamed you for shit T, but I never got an apology from you from things that you have done to put dents in our relationship.”

  I couldn’t believe this motherfucker had the audacity to blame our problems on me. I never took his dick and stuck it in Ashley and I had no way of knowing that the bitch that snitched on him five years ago wasn’t coming over to fuck him. He’d really outdone himself with this arrogant shit. He was king muthafuckin’ cocky.

  “Tony, I can’t believe you’re sitting here trying to piece together a puzzle that doesn’t fit. That girl came to your house dressed to fuck five years ago and yeah I felt disrespected so I whooped her ass. No one told you to tell that ho where you lived, it wasn’t my fault that she snitched on you. And let’s not get on Ashley; you called me her name while fuckin’ me Tony! You went behind my back for two years fuckin’ the shit out of both of us and I never knew. So I bet if I was to find out who the bitch is that left her panties in our shower and fuck her up you would blame our problems on that too right?” I chuckled, “Man, fuck you Tony.”

  “T, man, I don’t know what to say about us anymore straight up. We just went through all that bullshit today and I lost all that money and you were still on that dumb shit asking me about some damn panties?”

  “You damn right! And if you can't understand where I'm coming from Tony then we really need to end it now.”

  “Fuck this!” He stood up. “All I know is that I gotta get this money. Fuck everything else man, I’m ‘bout to b
e back on my grind. It’s all about paper for me.”

  And with that said, Tony went downstairs to sleep on the couch and I slept in our bed stressed the fuck out. I could already feel that our relationship would never be the same.

  Chapter Ten – Back In The Game

  My eye healed just in time for my next hair appointment. I had become frequent with getting different weave hairstyles, I got hooked. This time my hairdresser put my shit in a hot ass 20-inch long weave ponytail and pushed my bang backwards at the top of my head into a stuffed hump. I had a black Paris Hilton type hairstyle and Tony loved it. He loved all the hairstyles I started getting. I kept switching my shit up to keep him on his toes but he was too worried about getting money to wonder what I was up to.

  I devoted less time at the office since the business was sinking and I put more time and focus into my three family house since I had finally closed on the purchase. I couldn’t help but pat myself on the back for obtaining a piece of property, a piece of the American Dream all by myself. Who would have thought a girl who struggled from the hood would gain the knowledge to obtain a great responsibility at such a young age? I had something to smile about again but even better, something that would stabilize me and my daughter's future.

  I began acquiring numerous contractors to fix up things that needed repairing. There were a few kitchen cabinet doors that needed tightening and just minor plumbing problems, nothing major. I had a bunch of interviews with prospective tenants but found no one who fit the criteria of paying their rent on time during my screenings so the apartments would remain vacant until further notice.

  I was also still successful at keeping my purchase a secret from Tony.

  If I would have told him about it, he would probably ask me to set up drug operations out of the apartments instead of doing the right thing and getting tenants to give me clean money from rent. I couldn’t risk my foundation, this was my ticket out, away from negativity and when I got enough money from it, away from him.

  Tony on the other hand was heavily back in the game and everything was all about money to him once again. He was out at all times of the night reminding me of how things were when he was deep in the game back in the day. He would wear the same clothes for three or four days straight and not get a hair cut or line up for weeks. When he grinded, he grinded with no exceptions. Shayonna and I hardly saw him. He would come in, weigh his drugs, bag it up and leave out to serve the next play. I hated when he cooked up coke in my kitchen. It always fucked up my pots and forks because when the crack get's hard, it stuck to my kitchenware like glue. What pissed me off the most was that he was doing that shit from our house knowing that my daughter lived there and that if we were to get raided, we would all go down and there would be a chance we could lose her. But things like that didn't bother Tony. He was ass backwards when it came to responsibility. All he saw in his world were dollar signs; me and Shayonna were just there and not even acknowledged as much anymore.

  I tried to offer him different alternatives instead of staying in the game such as using his money to invest in some property or another business instead of using it on drugs. I stressed to him that we weren't those kids anymore back when we had no responsibility, we had a daughter now and being in the game wasn't a good look. Of course he was too cocky to take advice from me, he told me that he was done with the real estate shit and that he needed his money quick to re-coop for what he had lost. So I left it alone and let him do his thing.

  I paid a hundred dollars for my gun permit and Susan hooked me up with the classes that I had to take in order to retrieve it. Once I completed the requirements and was approved for my license to carry, I copped myself a pretty little black 9mm. It was just for protection so I kept it locked up in a safe high in my closet far away from Shayonna. Shit, I even changed the lock on the safe so that Tony wouldn’t figure it out. I didn’t want him to try selling it to someone in the hood because I know plenty of niggas that used to get their burners from people with gun licenses and I wasn’t trying to make myself hot.

  Shawn’s presence around my home dissolved quickly after the mission. Tony told me that he didn’t give Shawn a dime of the money they took back from Takia and Ashley. So rightfully Shawn had a reason to be mad, however they shouldn’t have done that stupid shit in the first place. But even Shayonna started asking about her “Uncle Shawn.” He was her Godfather and he had taken a liking to my baby ever since she was born and she quickly grew attached. He used to drive Shayonna and me to see Tony sometimes when he was locked up when she was just a toddler. It was kinda weird not seeing him around as much as before but I didn’t give a fuck, I never really liked him anyway.

  It was early on a Saturday morning and Tony and I were heading to the office to clear out some of the stationary and hardware when I felt my phone vibrating through my purse.

  “Hello,” I answered.

  “T, the ambulance, police and everything was just outside yo! They took Tank on a stretcher to the hospital,” Renee spit out.

  My heart was pounding in my chest and I was hoping that Ken-Ken and his boys hadn’t killed him.

  “Really? Is he straight?”

  “Yeah I think he’s straight, he got fucked up bad though and I think he got shot in the leg.”

  “Are you serious Renee?”

  “Yeah girl, everyone is clearing out outside right now because they just took him away.”

  Tony was smoking a blunt while ear hustling and it apparently affected his driving because the police siren was flashing behind us and we were being pulled over.

  "A’ight Renee keep me posted on that, I gotta go, I'll talk to you later." I quickly hung up the phone with Renee because I knew Tony was riding dirty.

  “T, I got some crack in my ass but I need you to do something with this shit right here.” He flashed me a few small bags of crack and I quickly stuffed them into my weave ponytail and a few of them in the hump on my head, my hairstyle had came in handy.

  Tony put out his blunt and tried to spray some of his car freshener to drown out the weed smell and we waited for the officer to approach the car.

  “License and registration please.”

  We already had the documents ready to give to the officer so that he could just write up a ticket and let us go.

  He took the documents from Tony’s hand, told him that he was speeding, then took a whiff of the odor and asked us to get out of the car. My heart was beating hard and fast. The officer felt he had probable cause to search the car since the smell of Tony’s hydro couldn’t be flooded out by the air freshener.

  “I smell marijuana in this vehicle.” The officer said arrogantly.

  “Well officer, we just picked up this car from my aunt, that smell must’ve been in there before we got the car,” Tony lied.

  The officer looked at him as if he was full of shit and began his search. He was determined to find something inside of Tony’s car and Tony was nervous as shit. He was on parole and had no intentions on going back to jail. He completed three out of the five years he had to do in jail and would have to complete the last two years if he violated his parole in any way.

  Tony stood tall trying to keep his composure and I was just as nervous standing on the curb beside him.

  Back in Tony's hustle days, he had several cars with custom stashes inside for guns or drugs. But this wasn’t back in the day and he was just jumping back in the game so shit was still a bit sloppy right now.

  The police officer finished his non-thorough search and let us go with a warning. His prejudice ass was just mad that he didn’t find any large quantities of drugs inside the car to convict us so he let us go.

  There were a bunch of officers like that in the hood, they would let niggas go even if they had small bags of weed in their cars if they couldn’t find anything harder in the cars to convict them with. But if you had money in your pockets, the officer would keep that shit and you would have to take that loss. Some say it's better than going to jail but no one want
s to get got for their money like that.

  When we drove off, I thanked God that the officer didn’t thoroughly search our person individually and then thanked my angel Sharod for looking out for us. We definitely lucked up.

  We still ended up doing some hot shit after getting pulled over. Tony got a phone call to serve two plays in Mission Hill. The plays were right across the street from each other. Tony asked if I could serve one so that we could hurry up. I used to be heavy into hustling with him but I didn’t want to be hot and I only agreed so that we could hurry up.

  I went into the crib to serve the fiend and when I walked out, this chick was on the porch grilling me hard. She was a young chick around seventeen or eighteen years old. She was looking at me like she wanted to shoot the ones with me. I didn’t know if she was the little sister of someone that I had beef with or what but I was checking her early.

  “You know me?” I said walking up on her.

  Tony walked off the porch on the other side of the street and when he seen my face he yelled out, “Tiara, come on man, we don’t have time for that shit.”