Dead and Stinkin'

by Stephen Hewett

  “Really…?”

  “Yes and even though it was so long ago, I still remember it like it was yesterday.”

  Jasmine started crying slightly and Ed embraced her. He was hoping she wouldn’t stop, but wanted her to tell him more. She did.

  “That’s not all, boo. After we gave him up for adoption, we had terrible regrets and that’s when our life and marriage changed,” Jasmine sighed.

  She had Ed’s full attention and they both slowly stood and got out of the bed. Ed picked up a glass of water and sipped. Jasmine started putting on her clothes, but continued with her story.

  “Baby, I think it was the stress or the guilt that caused my husband to start using drugs. He became a dope addict and eventually ran off to be with one of his mistress. He’s with that bitch heroin. He moved to Manhattan and changed his name to Chance. And I never saw his ass again.”

  Ed dropped the glass of water he was drinking and stared at Jasmine in shock. The disturbed look on Ed’s face made Jasmine move closer to him.

  “Baby, what’s wrong?” She asked with concern.

  Ed was trembling. He tried to open his mouth nothing came out. What was going on in his mind was heavy and held his tongue under duress. Ed was praying it was all just a big coincidence. He heard Jasmine’s voice.

  “Ed, baby, talk to me, what is it?”

  Ed, who never touched alcohol, walked to the liquor cabinet and poured himself a glass of scotch. He sipped the warm liquor to settle his nerves. Staring at Jasmine with wide-eyed amazement, he painfully told her what was troubling him.

  “Remember when we first met and I told you I was on the run for some bullshit? Well, it really was a lot more serious than that,”

  Ed said.

  Jasmine held Ed’s trembling hands. Feeling how scared he was, she tried to console him.

  “Ed, just tell me what it is, baby. It will make you feel better to talk about it. Please my baby, talk to me.”

  He took another drink of the numbing brew before saying, “Baby, I killed a man.”

  There was a shocked expression on Jasmine’s face. Ed held her hand tighter and continued with the story.

  “The man I killed ah, his name was Chance.”

  Jasmine was numb and didn’t say anything at first. She could see by Ed’s expression he thought the murdered man and her husband were the same person. She thought more and more, her denial helped her to arrive at other possibilities. Holding Ed close, Jasmine smiled and said, “Baby, do you know how many Chances there are living in this city? Hell, even in Manhattan alone, there must be a few dozen. It’s so unlikely the man you’re talking about is actually my husband. Besides I always used to dream that one day my husband would come limping back into my life. My dreams usually come true.”

  Ed’s mouth dropped open and gently pushed Jasmine away. He stared into her soft brown eyes.

  “What did you say? What did you mean limp back into your life?”

  Feeling uneasy Jasmine put a smile on her face. She was trying to hide the concern in her heart. Jasmine was doing it more for her sake than Ed’s.

  “It was just a joke, baby. Chance had a slight limp that I used to tease him about. That’s all.”

  “Oh my, fucking God! Oh no, it can’t be,” Ed shouted and started shivering uncontrollably.

  He sat down on a sofa. Jasmine ran over and knelt in front of Ed.

  “Baby, what’s wrong?” she asked.

  Ed put his hands over his head and yelled, “The Chance I killed had a limp, that’s what the fuck is wrong.”

  “Oh…”

  Jasmine almost fainted in Ed’s lap. When Ed looked at her, she was milk white and a look of terror clouded her face. Ed kneeled down next to Jasmine and put his arms around her body.

  “Oh, Jasmine, I’m so sorry, baby. I’d do anything to change what I did. I love you, Jas. Please talk to me, baby.”

  Endless thoughts ran through Jasmine’s mind. Her mind set her back on the boardwalk at Coney Island. It was that accursed night. In her head, she heard the old mystic telling her all about her unborn son. She remembered holding her baby boy, discovering, and kissing his birthmark. Jasmine’s distraught mind envisioned that she was hugging her baby in one hand and embracing Ed her lover in the other.

  “Jasmine, what are you thinking about baby? Do you hear me? Talk to me, please.”

  Slowly Jasmine’s eyes focused on Ed and she cried out.

  “Ed, don’t say a word, just listen. I’m afraid what you did to my husband might be more than just a coincidence,” Jasmine said, holding Ed close. She told him the story of the mystic fortuneteller from Coney Island.

  “That’s crazy. You really believed that old man? Listen, baby, just get control of yourself and hear me out. I agree there are some coincidences, like the adoption and the birthmark. And yes, even the limp. I will give all that, but check this out and this will put everything in the right perspective and then you can stop being so superstitious. Jasmine listen, I went to the adoption agency when I got out of prison and I got the names and address of my real parents. Rest assured that Chance and you are not my parents. So stop it, baby. Please,” Ed said.

  There seemed to be a look of relief on Jasmine’s face. Ed got up and walked to the kitchen. He turned back suddenly and said, “Now, when we get all this drama behind us what you could do is help me locate my real parents. Their names are Larry and Jaqesha Anderson.”

  “Ah-ah-ah…” Jasmine screamed, jumping up off the floor.

  The blood curdling sound made it appeared that her soul was leaving her body. She screamed again, and the terror-filled shrieks chilled Ed’s bone to the marrow. Jasmine pushed Ed away as he tried to grab her. She ran to get her coat and purse.

  “Jasmine, where are you going?” Ed shouted after her.

  At this point, Jasmine’s mind was totally distorted. She ran to the door, opened it, and rushed out into the hallway all the while screaming, “Oh my God, it’s true…! The curse, it’s true!”

  Ed tried chasing her but he slipped on a wallet that fell from her purse. She fled the apartment. Ed twisted his ankle on the fall. He gingerly stood with the wallet in his hand. Ed limped over to the sofa and sat in agonizing pain. He took off his shoes and socks to see if his ankle was swollen.

  Ed opened Jasmine’s wallet. Looking through the contents he saw several sleeves that were filled with credit cards and a library card. Ed searched the back of the wallet where he found a picture of Jasmine and her husband. It was the man he had killed. Ed continued his search and saw a small picture behind the first one. He took it out and examined it closely. It was a picture of a younger looking Jasmine, but unmistakably her. It was an old driver’s license picture.

  Ed looked at the name and address under the photo, Jaqesha Anderson, 4720 Avenue D, Brooklyn, N.Y. Ed’s mind cracked at that moment and he sat there in a catatonic state. All of the events that happened in his life melted his mind. Most of his life he spent having nightmares or wondering about his parents’ and his real identity. His journey was long and sometimes rough, but now his quest was over. Edward Wingate, or Edward Anderson, could now end the search. He found out who he was. What he was, a curse.

  EPILOGUE

  “All we have to do now is fill out your W2 form. Then I’ll take you on a tour of the facilities. We’re very happy to have you on our team,” Mr. Bennett said.

  The director of Happy Acres Psychiatric Hospital was just finishing up the final paperwork with a nurse the facility recently hired. Mr. Bennett took the new staff member on a tour of the grounds and introduced her to the staff and several patients. He then went over her patients’ evaluations and treatment plans.

  “Okay, this gentleman is your last patient. He was found walking aimlessly through the streets of Brooklyn. He was incoherent and apparently recently had a severe psychiatric breakdown, and hasn’t spoken a word since the authorities brought him here. Since then he has been admitted for further test and evaluation.”

 
Before the director and his new employee entered the patient’s room, he stopped her at the door.

  “Here he is. I’ll leave you alone to evaluate his condition for yourself. Then I will meet you back at my office, okay?”

  “That will be fine, sir. I’ll be there shortly.”

  The director walked away, thinking about how it would feel to make love to his sexy new employee. Entering the patient’s room, the nurse stood there for a few seconds looking at him. He was helplessly sitting there and tears started to well up in her eyes.

  In a chair looking out the window with a blank disconnected stare on his face, Edward Anderson-Wingate moved his head slightly after hearing footsteps. The night that his mysterious origin unfolded, Edward found out the real truth about his parents. The shock of being his mother’s lover and father’s murderer hit him hard and caused his hospitalization. He had walked the streets of Brooklyn in a semi-catatonic state for a few days before being confronted by the police for loitering.

  Edward’s nurse walked over to the window and looked at her patient then smiled.

  “Hey, Lover, how have you been? Baby, I’ve been so worried about you. After you got arrested and was sent upstate, no one heard anything about you for years,” the nurse said, sitting down in a chair next to Ed.

  She reached and took his hand in hers. He looked in her direction but the blank, indifferent stare did not change.

  “Ed after I stopped selling my body, I went to nursing school, and graduated with honors. All through those years I never stopped inquiring and looking for you, but I kept coming up empty.”

  The nurse stopped talking and leaned over looking into Ed’s eyes. There was a helpless look on his face and it caused her tears to come down steadily.

  “Ed… Daddy, it’s crazy, but when a nurse friend of mine told me about a new patient and described him to me, I knew it was you. So here I am. Damn I missed you, Ed,” the nurse said, getting up and walking over to the bed to regain her composure.

  Lying on the bed was an old Daily News. The headline caught her attention. She picked up the newspaper and read.

  Woman was found hanging from a tree in Prospect Park. Death ruled to be suicide. Authorities who found the body recognized her as a known prostitute from the Vandeveer projects area in Brooklyn. Although there was no identification found on the body local officers knew her as Jasmine.

  Finding out the predictions she received at Coney Island so long ago were being lived out was too much for Jaqesha Anderson, AKA Jasmine, to bear. She took her own life instead of living with the shame of being, both sexual lover and natural mother to the same man. The nurse went back over to the window. Holding his hands again she put one to her lips and kissed it.

  “Daddy, I’m here and here I’m staying. I got a job as your nurse and I’m going to nurse your fine ass back to health, I promise.”

  Getting excited the nurse added, “Daddy, this facility is a gold mine. I can get paid with these lame ass doctors. You should have seen them drooling over this body when I first walked into the hospital. When they sample this bomb ass pussy and my killer head game a sister’s gonna have to hire an accountant to monitor my cash flow.” Looking at her watch and standing up, the nurse started to laugh. “Daddy, I have to go to work. I’m gonna stop by that cornball director’s office and lighten his load and his pockets for him.” Leaning over to kiss Ed, the nurse squeezed his hand. “I’ll be back later, to check on you, daddy.”

  Walking to the door the nurse stopped short, thinking she heard a sound coming from Ed. Dismissing it, she started to open the door. The low whisper became a little louder but still unrecognizable. The nurse turned around and walked back to Ed’s chair. The low-pitched sounds were coming out of Ed’s partially closed mouth. The nurse’s eyes widened at the realization of his potential breakthrough. Ed was communicating.

  “Yes daddy, it’s me. Talk to me, Ed Lover. You can do it. Please daddy, keep trying.”

  The nurse placed her ear closer to Ed’s lips. At first, the sounds were garbled and meaningless, but as the nurse listened longer, the sounds started to form into recognizable words. The words slowly turned into a phrase that brought a smile to her pretty face.

  Edward Anderson Wingate squeezed his nurse’s hand and whispered, “Yeah bitch, go get my money.”

  Miss Branch threw her hands around her old pimp, Ed Lover. She fervently kissed him repeatedly. She eventually stood up and walked to the door. Before leaving she turned and said, “Okay Daddy, I’ll be back with your trap money. I love you, Ed.”

  Nurse Branch, also known as Princess, went into the hospital to make her rounds. Her rounds however were not the normal rounds that a nurse would make during the course of her shift. Nurse Branch made office rounds, back stairwell rounds, vacant operating room rounds, broom closet rounds, rooftop rounds, and even parking lot rounds.

  Wherever there was a doctor, nurse, male or female, orderly, kitchen worker, janitor or even patients that needed her special services, Nurse Branch was there to do what she did best, fuck for that paper!

  THE END

  Introduction

  In our existence as mortals, we are constantly faced with various tests, and choices that will not only affect our lives, but also the people around us. Most of these tests and choices are usually not life threatening or irreversible. What if there came a time in your life when you are suddenly faced with a choice that could have monumental and even everlasting consequences? Would you choose carefully or be reckless with your life? If you are ever faced with such a choice during your brief lifespan on this temporary plain of existence, please open up your minds and hearts and choose wisely. More than your life may be at stake.

  UNTIL DEATH DO US PART

  Chapter 01

  The summer’s heat was causing the rancid odor from piled up garbage to emanate throughout the city. This was not the fragrance that two people in the midst of lovemaking wanted to smell. Mike was in the process of heartily sexing his vivacious girl, Laura. Suddenly the pungent odor hit them. Mike was the type of man who liked to joke around with his woman and couldn’t let this opportunity pass.

  “Damn, you smelling kinda ripe down there. Let me go get the hose,” Mike said, getting out of bed.

  He felt a blow to the back of the head and turned to see the remote control for the television on the floor next to him.

  “Oh, you got jokes, huh? You know that smell is the damn garbage outside! This sanitation strike is really getting out of hand. But since you think it’s my coochie that smells like that, let’s see when’s the next time you’ll get to hit it,” Laura said, going into the bathroom.

  “Stop playing girl. You know I’m just buggin’ out with my baby. Your stuff could smell like a dead bullfrog, I’m a still stick my tongue up in your fine ass,” Mike said, flickering his tongue like a snake.

  Mike and Laura had been friends and lovers for many years. They were deeply in love most of that time. Laura came out the bathroom smiling. Mike’s comments had her cracking up. She then went back into the bed and cuddled next to her man.

  “A bullfrog huh…? Damn you so nasty,” teased Laura.

  “No, not nasty… Just in love,” Mike smiled.

  Laura planted a kiss on Mike’s forehead and quickly changed the subject.

  “Baby the houses in Soundview are almost on empty and Stephan called from Throgs Neck complaining that the last batch of smoke was kind of weak. We better step our game up,” Laura said to her lover and business partner, while rubbing his back.

  “Okay boo, I’ll bark on those coconuts about the last batch we purchased. And I’ll drop off a few dozen pounds in the ‘View later this evening. Today however, I would like the honor of taking my best girl out to eat.”

  “That’s sweet baby, after you beat up my little kitty cat all morning, it’s only right that you feed a sister. What was up with you anyway? You acted like you were driving a damn truck inside of me, shifting gears and shit,” Laura laughed, fanning her
vagina area with her hand.

  “You don’t call me Big Daddy Love Organ for nothing,” Mike smiled, gently kissing his woman.

  “No matter how many times we come to the Seaport it feels like it’s our first date,” Laura said.

  “I know, baby. It’s so laid back and low key, it’s just what we need to escape the drama of the projects.”

  Mike and Laura often escape from their hustling in the Bronx by going on short excursions to Manhattan. They would spend time alone and enjoy each other without the annoying hassle of street life. After a relaxing evening at the South Street Seaport the couple drove back to the Bronx to check on mutual business ventures. Pulling up to a corner on Randall Avenue, they called out to one of their crew leaders.

  “Yo Old School, what’s up? I see you got the kids with you today.”

  Before Old School walked to Mike’s vehicle he instructed two of his eight kids to wait for him on the benches.

  “There’s gold in them there hills,” Old School shouted, handing Laura a bag full of money he took from his coat pocket. “Yo the block is jumping today but both apartments are almost on empty. A few people complained about the smoke, but it’s still moving well. I hope you get some better material this go round, or else,” Old School said with a fake screw-face.

  “Or else what, cutie…? Are you gonna leave the team and go do your own thing?” Laura asked, pinching Old School’s arm.

  “Imagine that. I’d first stick my hand in a fan than leave my family. But just step up the quality of the product,” Old School replied.

  “Go ahead, open up the trunk and grab the duffle bag. I think your people will be happy,” Mike said to his main man before driving off.

  “Hey, hey, hey, Get Money Crew,” Mike shouted, walking into a stash house.

  The one bedroom place was located inside a project apartment building. Mike walked in to see the remaining bosses in his crew taking care of business. He had dubbed them The Get Money crew. They were mid-level marijuana organization Mike and Laura started years ago.