A Hood Chick's Story pt. 2

by LaShonda DeVaughn

  Your granddaughter is five years old now. She’s so beautiful mom and she reminds me of Sharod so much.” I cried so hard that I had to pause until I caught my breath.

  “Right now I’m in the hospital, someone hurt my baby mom, someone took her innocence and I’m hurting so bad right now. I need you to tell me what I’m doing wrong mom, tell me that I’m going to be a good mom and that everything will be okay. You’re the only person whose words would mean something to me right now. Mom, my body is worn down, I don’t know how much more I could take, I need you mommy.” I pleaded like I was six years old again and waited for my mom to make everything okay.

  I heard her sniff and each time she tried to talk she kept crying until she was finally gained her composure. “Well Tiara, if it was in God’s plans to take Sharod, then it was in his plans for whatever happened to your baby. I lost my baby and now you’re feeling the wrath of someone causing pain against yours.”

  I took the phone away from my ear and just stared at it. All the hope that I had in recovering my relationship with my mom one day was buried into that phone call. It was over, once she hung up in my ear, I realized, I didn’t have a mom.

  I felt dizzy exiting that phone booth. My legs felt like they were going to give out on me. My heart had been ripped straight out of my body by my mom. I managed to make my way back to the waiting room where I sat feeling puzzled, lonely and weak. My mind was going a million miles a minute. I sat trying to focus on one thing but I couldn’t focus at all.

  I glanced down at my purse and noticed Trè’s letter sticking out. I picked it up and slowly opened it. His letter started out by telling me how much he had missed me and how he hadn’t been able to get in contact with me by phone in weeks. All the bullshit with my property, dealing with Tony and my fake ass friends forced me to neglect Trè and I felt horrible about it.

  I read on and was crushed even more at his words: ‘My appeal was denied’.

  I glanced away from the letter. I didn’t know why I had my hopes set on Trè getting out in the first place. To be Tiara James and remain optimistic was a joke because everything always failed for me.

  The letter carried good news and bad. The good news was that Trè heard about me going to his block to ask Ken-Ken to get at Tank for Renee. He said that as soon as word got back to him about that, he immediately called it off. He said his niggas wasn’t getting into shit over no slut ass bitch. He clarified that whoever got at Tank and shot him was his own enemies and that it had nothing to do with his block. I placed my hand on my chest and took a deep breath because that was such great news to me.

  Unfortunately the next paragraph displayed some disturbing news that turned my stomach into knots. He asked me if I had heard about Mumbles and Kal getting killed and asked if I attended their funerals. I couldn’t read anymore, I stuffed the letter into my purse and started gagging and then threw up in the empty wastebasket beside me.

  Mumbles and Kal, Sharod’s homeboys, were killed over something that was most likely senseless and I had no idea about it. I wondered if Turk was with them and how everything went down but I was too sick to keep thinking about it or to read anymore of Trè’s letter. That shit hurt me so bad, I couldn’t breathe.

  “Ms. James, you can come see your daughter now.”

  The doctor came out to get me and I looked at her like I was a sad sick child. I was a mess and stumbled when I stood. It felt like the world was sitting on my shoulders and that there was nothing I could do to make the weight any lighter. I stopped walking and stood in place to pull myself together. I had to get myself together in case Shayonna was awake. If she was to see me crying, it would only make her feel worse, so I had to be strong.

  On my way to the hospital room, I occasionally took deep breaths and shut my eyes thinking about Shayonna and then about Trè’s letter. It had to be a sign from God and I got the message loud and clear. It was time to take my daughter and get far, far away from Boston.

  When I walked in the hospital room I immediately burst out in tears. My daughter was asleep and the sight of her innocent face tore me apart. The IV's in her arm, the machines, it wasn't fair, it was too much. How could Shawn hurt such an innocent soul? What kind of devil was he?

  I brushed my hand over my daughters head staring at her as she slept.

  “Mommy’s so sorry I couldn’t help you baby. Mommy is so sorry. Please forgive me Shayonna, you’re all that I have.” I cried my heart out.

  I kissed her on the cheek and just sat at her bedside staring at her sweet face, appreciating everything about her.

  Moments later, she was struggling to open her eyes. They had my baby so drugged up that it was hard for her to stay awake. I quickly wiped my tears so that she wouldn’t see them and I smiled to let her know it was okay.

  “Hi baby.”

  “Hi,” she whispered as she slipped in and out of consciousness.

  “How you feeling sweetness?”

  “It hurts Mommy.” Her eyes rolled back.

  It took everything inside of me not to break down. I tucked in both of my lips and bit down hard. Fighting back my tears at that moment was like fighting a war by myself.

  She tried to open her eyes again but the medicine was so strong that she fell right back to sleep.

  “Just rest beautiful, just rest.”

  Looking at Shayonna officially confirmed what I needed to do. I was taking my baby girl and getting the fuck away from this madness. I knew that if I stayed in Boston, there would just be something new to hold me back. Even moving into the suburbs didn’t keep me away from the hood. There was always some new bullshit that occurred and I wasn’t up for anything else, this was my final blow.

  Tony rushed into the hospital room about three hours later. I stood up when he walked in but he rushed by me and went straight over to the bed that held Shayonna.

  He cried hard. “Baby girl, Daddy’s baby, it’s gonna be okay.” He sniffed rubbing one of her cheeks before turning away. He couldn't keep looking at her on the hospital bed. He started frantically pacing the room like he didn’t know what to do next.

  It crushed him to see our baby on that gurney just as much as it hurt me. Tony kept crying as we held each other. It was the first time in a long time that we had actually connected. We needed each other at that moment and it felt good to know that we had each other’s back. We sat next to Shayonna in the two reclining chairs that the hospital provided.

  “T, I did that, I handled that shit,” Tony said crying and hugging me.

  I knew exactly what he had done but I didn’t want to know the details. I had mixed feelings about it. I wanted Shawn hurt very badly for what he did to my daughter; for taking away her future and her innocence. But I didn’t think I wanted him dead. That only meant his family would hurt too.

  I could tell that Tony felt bad for what he did so I let him continue his confession.

  “He’s gone T, that motherfucker is gone and he deserved that shit." He pointed to Shayonna. "Look at my fuckin’ daughter.”

  He spilled it all out because it weighed on his conscious. He kept looking at Shayonna and getting sick thinking about what happened to her and then thinking about what he had done to Shawn. After all they did used to be best friends.

  “I’m glad I did that shit. You don’t hurt my fuckin’ daughter, she’s my life T, both of y’all man, y’all are my world, I can’t believe this shit!” He stood up and went out in the hallway.

  I sat impatiently in my chair waiting for him to come back in the room. I had to know how deep my involvement was in what he had done. All I could do was hope that Tony wasn’t as stupid as I thought that he was.

  He calmed down just enough to come back into the room but he still sat next to me fidgeting, he just couldn’t keep still.

  I hesitated to ask him at first because I was afraid of his answer. But I had know. “Tony, tell me that you didn’t do that using my shit from the safe?” I had to talk in codes just in case people were listening to us in
the hospital. He knew that I was asking him if he’d used my gun to kill Shawn.

  “T, Shawn kept the two hammers from the time we did that shit at the Holiday Inn so I didn’t have a burner.”

  “Just answer me Tony, does that mean you used mine?”

  He turned to look at me and his eyes had already told me the answer. My ass had a license to carry a weapon that now had a body on it.

  Chapter Sixteen – Recovery

  Life went so quickly the next few weeks.

  Between DSS visits, being investigated for Shawn’s death, and caring for Shayonna, shit was crazy for me. On top of that Tony was still in the game and his responsibilities at home were conveniently put on the backburner.

  DSS was making their final visit to my house at six in the damn morning. They had concluded that Shayonna lived in a safe environment and after that day, they didn’t have to do any further investigations. Thank God she left the moment she did. As soon as I locked the door dismissing the DSS worker, I went upstairs to prepare some clothes for Shayonna since there was a possibility of her coming home from the hospital that day when all of a sudden, I heard people outside chattering. I ran outside and almost knocked down a frail, well-groomed white man wearing a suit that was standing on my lawn.

  “Excuse me, may I help you?”

  “Are you the homeowner?” he asked.

  “Yes I am, who are you and who are all of these people?” I said gazing out at the crowd of people.

  “Ma’am this house is being foreclosed on. We’ve sent several notices. These people are out here to participate in the auction. We are auctioning off this house to the highest bidder.”

  “Oh hell no you ain’t! You can take your auction and bid on the next person’s house.” I looked out at everyone. “Y’all can go home now, this house isn’t for sale.” They all looked at each other confused and the frail man told me that there wasn’t anything that I could do about the auction.

  Me, with my real estate background knew that there wasn’t anything that I could do about the auction but I felt so stupid because I had no idea that Tony wasn’t making any of the payments. As soon as I left that responsibility up to him shit went downhill. I don’t know why I stayed with his ass so long.

  I ran inside.

  “Tony! People are outside bidding on the house. You really haven’t been paying the mortgage?”

  “What Tiara? You’re supposed to handle all that shit!” he said bagging up some crack for a play he was about to serve.

  “Are you serious Tony? I told you when you said that I just sat around looking pretty that I would no longer be responsible for the bills since that’s all you thought of me and I was serious. I can’t believe you haven’t paid the shit since then Tony, that was months ago!”

  “Why the fuck couldn’t you do it Tiara? You were paying the bills on your other house.”

  I was put on the spot, I didn’t know that he even knew about my property.

  He smirked. “Tiara you really didn’t think that Susan would tell me about that? She told me a long time ago when you first started home searching. I was waiting to see when your sneaky ass was going to tell me.”

  “So what!” I confessed. “That was my responsibility and it’s being sold anyway but that’s none of your business. I can’t believe you wasn’t paying the mortgage here Tony, at our residence. Were you just waiting for the bank to put us out on the street?”

  “Man whatever yo, I’m ‘bout to go get this money.”

  His cocky ass took the drugs off the counter, put his scale away and left to serve his play. He didn’t even acknowledge the people auctioning off the house, it was as if he didn’t care.

  I was pissed at him. The house was in his name and he didn't give a fuck about his credit. However if it was in my name I would have continued to make sure the payments went out on time. But since I wasn’t appreciated, I let Tony take over the bills and boy did it bite me in the ass.

  I headed up to the hospital to see Shayonna. Tony was also supposed to meet me there after he served his play.

  I entered the hospital double doors and I spotted my doctor in the hall.

  “Hey Doctor Johnson,” I said forcing a smile.

  “Oh hey Tiara, I’ve been trying to get in touch with you. We sent out your results, do you have time to come into my office?”

  I looked at her puzzled because I didn’t remember receiving anything from the hospital in the mail.

  “Well I was just going to see my daughter but okay I’ll stop in for a second.” I said.

  I walked into Doctor Johnson’s office praying she wouldn’t tell me I was pregnant. I wanted more children but at this particular, unstable point in my life, it would be hard for me to handle the added responsibility.

  She sat at the computer and printed out a few sheets first and as they were printing she turned her chair to face me.

  “Tiara, your pregnancy test came back negative so you’re not pregnant.”

  I exhaled, that shit was a relief.

  “However, you tested positive for gonorrhea. Now I’m going to explain to you what this disease is but in the meantime I’m printing out some literature so that you’ll have a better understanding of how it's contracted and maybe you can even share the information with your partner. It is sexually transmitted. And it is very important that we get this cured because the disease can spread to your ovaries and fallopian tubes, resulting in pelvic inflammatory disease.”

  The room started to spin. I slowly shut my eyes while the doctor continued to explain how the disease is prevented and treated. Tony’s cheating had now affected my health and I was finally about to stop talking about leaving him and being about it. It scared the shit out of me to think he could have easily infected me with something permanent like Herpes or even worse AIDS.

  It could have been Ashley that had infected him or the bitch that left her panties at my house, but whoever the bitch was could have Tony, disease and all, because I was through.

  “Here is your prescription and I suggest that you wear condoms from now on.” Doctor Johnson handed me the prescription for ceftriaxone and asked if I had any questions.

  I shook my head and walked out. I was embarrassed in front of the doctor as if she was one of my friends because that shit tore me up. This nigga really burnt me, the mother of his fuckin’ child!

  It was curtains for his ass.

  I went to see Shayonna and surprisingly Tony was already in there with her.

  He was smiling and hugging on her and I just wanted to knock him the fuck out. I definitely didn’t want to confront him in front of Shayonna, so I was going to have to wait. This was supposed to be a happy day for us since there was a possibility that Shayonna would be discharged, but it was hard to hide my agitation.

  "What's wrong Mommy?" Shayonna asked.

  I shook my head snapping out of my disgust for Tony.

  "Nothing baby. You ready to come home today?"

  "Yes Mommy. I feel better, please can I go home today?"

  I heard a tap on the door and the doctor entered with a smile. "Yes you are going to be discharged today little missy. No more needles and medicine sweetheart, you can go home with your parents today."

  "Yaaay," Shayonna said happily. I knew my baby was tired of the hospital because I was.

  I pulled out her jogging suit and laid it beside her.

  "Put your clothes on baby."

  "Okay mommy."

  The doctor directed Tony and me into the hallway to give us Shayonna's status.

  "Although Shayonna is being discharged today, I'm afraid that we are still unable to give you good news regarding a fully recovered reproductive system. She is still scarred pretty bad. We are however hoping that things will reverse as she gets older but it's not guaranteed. Only time will tell. The severity of this case was so extreme, we almost had to give her a blood transfusion. But we are glad that she's healed enough to come home and resume being a normal five year old."

 
; "Thank you doctor," I said as she handed us the paperwork.

  "You’re very welcome," she said before leaving us.

  Tony's Aunt approached us as the doctor walked off.

  "Are they letting her leave today, can I see her?" she asked. Tony's aunt was in her mid-forty’s, she loved Shayonna to death. She spoiled her rotten and didn't mind watching her for us when we needed her. She was the perfect family baby sitter.