Disrespectfully Yours

by Raynesha Pittman

  She had been running a fever the entire day and having painful cramps along her lower stomach. When the pain became too much for her to bear, she blacked out, and when she woke up, she was recovering from surgery. She had given birth by C-section at thirty weeks pregnant, and as a result, she had to get an emergency hysterectomy a few weeks shy of turning eighteen. Her midwife told her the chance of her son living at his premature age was slim due to his underdevelopment. To her surprise, her father stood by her side through it all, even when her lover of the past two years stood before her and said he refused to take on the role of the child’s father. Angelo Sr. told her some bullshit line about breaking his mother’s heart and being disowned by his father.

  “You’re worried about hurting your parents because there’s a baby involved? I thought the sin was in the sex, not the baby, pastor’s son? What did you think would happen if you never pulled out?”

  “I thought you might be on the pill or something. You never tried to stop me from . . . well, you know,” a shaky-voiced Angelo yelled back at her.

  “I don’t know shit. What I do know is that you’re older than me and you know how babies are made. You were talking about marrying me, and that’s the only reason why I let you nut in me—”

  “Language, Clara,” he said, cutting her off, but it only fueled her rage.

  “Fuck my language! That’s what it’s called when a grown man fucks some pussy and let’s go inside of it, and that’s what you did. You nutted in me and never tried to pull out, not once. You can use that birth-control shit, but tell me what book of the Bible you found it in, nigga?”

  He hated when she used her words as swords. God didn’t like it, and it wasn’t ladylike, but if it made her feel better to do it, he’d give it a try.

  “You were a ho. I assumed one of your ho duties was to shield and protect yourself from pregnancy. I don’t want to tell my parents I sinned and got a sleazy girl pregnant when I knew I should have protected myself from all the shit you possibly have.”

  Clara’s mouth fell open from shock. She had never heard him cuss, and in spite of the fact that his foul speech was watered down compared to what she could do, it hurt more than anything she’d ever experienced to be disrespected by him.

  “Fuck you, Angelo.”

  “Isn’t that why we are here? I already did that, and now you’re trying to force me to take care of child I don’t want.”

  Although he instantly became sleaze to her, she understood, because she had already decided she wouldn’t be taking on the role of the child’s mother.

  “Well, you better want him, because I can’t take care of him. Remember, I’m a ho.”

  “I know you are, but you pushed him out, so he’s really yours. The Lord made Abraham get rid of the child he had before Sarah got pregnant. Abraham packed her up and sent her away. I’m his descendant, and I know the Lord would want me to give you money to go as far away from me as you can and never come back.”

  Having listened to the arguing fools go back and forth about whose life the child would ruin the most, Clara’s father stepped up and took custody of his grandson and banished both of them from the child. It took Angelo Sr. three years and a lot of prayer to man up to his parents, get his own place, and get custody of his son, while Clara moved on with her life. She began dating William, a man closer to her own age, and he was also a member of the same church. He sang in the choir with Rita. and she enjoyed the fact that dating him was breaking Angelo Sr.’s heart. Thanks to the love she received from William, the life she walked away from became a grayed memory.

  She hadn’t disclosed to William that she had a child, and when he asked her to bear his, she lied about having tumors in her uterus at a young age, the only treatment for which was a hysterectomy. Life with him made her feel like she had walked into a fairy tale, as he accepted the fact that they would never have children. She had been the queen of his heart until Angelo Sr. decided to reveal to their son once he came of age that she was his mother.

  “Angelo, do you notice anything familiar about this woman here?” Senior asked his son as he continued to block the car with his limo and prevent it from backing out of the packing space.

  It was the first time the men had gone grocery shopping as roommates and not as father and son. Junior had finally made it to eighteen, had graduated from high school, and was a month shy of his first day of college. His dad had given him copies of keys to everything he owned and permission to use it all whenever he pleased. He had rent to pay, but his good grades and the work he put in at the church and mortuary would cover it. His monthly allowance was now his weekly pay minus his cost of living. The only reason why he didn’t feel completely grown was that his father didn’t allow his input on the rules that governed the house, and so he couldn’t share the power that came with home ownership.

  The men left the store, comfortable with the day’s take, and drove off. Junior didn’t see the look in his father’s eyes as he passed the Toyota Corolla that was turning in as they turned out. If he had, he would have watched the pain in them turn into anger. That transition was what caused Senior to make four right turns out of the parking lot and drive back into it.

  “Did we forget something?” Junior asked, pulling out the list they had composed together.

  His father didn’t answer. He needed to get a lot off his chest, and today was the day that he would. He boxed the car in and urged his son to climb out and follow him to the car’s driver’s-side window. He asked his son twice if the driver looked familiar.

  “No, Daddy, but I think I might have seen the car before.”

  “You can’t see yourself in her face,” he stated, then addressed the driver. “Clara, roll down your window and meet your son. He’s grown now and deserves to meet you at least once.”

  Junior didn’t see their likeness at first sight, but with both of their jaws dropped at his father’s revelation, he realized they were identical after taking into account the obvious gender differences.

  “What are you doing, Angelo? We talked about this. This isn’t right, nor is this the time or the place,” Clara exclaimed as the shock of this moment settled deeper into her expression. She felt like a deer stuck in headlights.

  “When is the time? He’s eighteen and about to start college at Albany State. Soon he’ll be hunting down a wife and looking to have his own kids. Would you prefer to meet your son and grandchildren at the same time?” he yelled.

  “It’s okay, Dad. She doesn’t ever have to meet me. Let’s go.”

  His father was reluctant to leave, but after staring his first and only love in the face until he broke his own heart, he followed his son back to the limo.

  “Angelo Jr.,” a weak voice yelled. “Come here, son.” Clara made her way out of the car and stood next to Senior, with her arms open wide, yet Junior didn’t make a move. “I do want to meet you. I always have. I don’t know what your father has told you, but I do love you and have thought about you every day since you were born. I’ve prayed for the strength to get my shit together so I could meet you. God must have felt that it was time. Please, son, please come here.”

  Without being asked again, he ran to her and wrapped his arms around her. He hugged his mother tightly and then lifted her off the ground to show her just how happy he was. He forgave her in that moment, but she was hoping that he didn’t. Like any child, Angelo Jr. wanted to build a bond with his mother, but it had never been a desire of hers.

  After Clara met her son, her half-a-pack-a-day cigarette addiction turned into a two- packs-a-day one. His father never told him that his mother had remarried, and Angelo had expected her to, but when Angelo Sr. learned she hadn’t, he left it alone. Clara searched for a way to get her son to leave her alone, and when she tossed her lit cigarette at the puddle, which she assumed was water, she found one. As the car exploded and went up in flames before her best friend could get out of it, Clara realized that faking her own death was the best way to deal with William want
ing to break her heart and to hide again from the son she had never wanted.

  She knew William had filed for divorce, because she had made it her duty to go through all the drawers he’d declared off limits to her. There had to be another woman—this she was sure of—but she wouldn’t learn until years later that the woman was her goddaughter, Meagan. She hid behind the barbershop as the first explosion sent the car across the diner’s parking lot into the brick wall, and when the gas tank exploded, turning the car into nothing more than bent metal and melted rubber, she took off running, with the aim to hide in Savannah with her younger sister.

  Once she learned that Clara Tolliver had been pronounced dead with Rita Glover, Clara Jones was born. She wrote her son a letter telling him she still wasn’t ready to be a mother but promising she’d return when she was ready to be, and when that time came, she’d never leave his side. The letter devastated him, but the one she wrote to his father broke Angelo Sr.’s heart.

  Angelo,

  I couldn’t keep living that lie with William when you are the only man I’ve ever loved, so I died. I died with Rita in that accident at the diner so that one day I can live, and when I do, I want it to be with you. I told our son I wasn’t ready to be a mother just yet, to buy myself some time with this death stuff, but I promise I’m coming back when it has blown over. Don’t tell Junior anything about my life with William, and keep him as far away from that stuff at the diner as possible. Seeing you made me realize what I’ve been missing out on, and I want my family. I’ll be back, and I don’t want my past with William messing up our future. I’m tired of missing you.

  Clara

  The letter was another lie, and she was becoming one of the best at making up truths. She wanted a new life, and that was exactly what Ms. Jones received. She never dated a soul, and if any of the men she slept with got too clingy, she got rid of them. Her years spent in Savannah were peaceful and drama free, but they were coming to an end. Reinventing herself as a new person meant she could take only work that paid under the table and didn’t provide health insurance. When she was diagnosed with lung cancer, the treatments took all the money she had made and then demanded more. As she struggled to pay for the treatments for her lung cancer, she learned that it had spread to the lymph nodes in her neck and she would have to undergo surgery.

  With nowhere to turn and William being remarried and rich, she went back to the family she had never wanted. Angelo Sr. took responsibility for the way her life had turned out, and vowed to take care of her. With her poor health consuming her beauty, they were married under God at his church, and no one knew who she was or had been. The congregation loved their first lady and felt obligated to help her fight her battle with cancer, but even with the collections they took up for her treatments, there wasn’t enough money to help her battle the disease. It was back to playing the underage dash, and her victim this time around was William. Her plan was to threaten him that she would tell the police he had murdered Rita and had attempted to kill her, so she had fled to Savannah to stay alive. However, when she learned he had married Meagan, it dawned on her that threatening to add her to the murder plot would yield a bigger payout, and it did. After pointing out to William how he and Meagan had both had a motive to kill her and her best friend, as it would enable them to be together freely, William vowed to do anything to keep his Georgia Peach out of jail, and it made Clara want to kill him instead.

  Meagan was their goddaughter, for crying out loud, and the only child the two had between them. He needed to have his dick removed and stuck up his ass for abusing the child’s trust. If Clara hadn’t received her boarding pass to leave the flesh, she’d kill him on morals alone, but she needed his money to prolong her life and to make things right with her son. In her mind, making things right with him was the only chance she had left to get into heaven. Her shenanigans had ruined his life. If she couldn’t give him back the time she had taken from him and impart the lessons she had neglected to give him, she’d fix her wrongdoing by letting him spend the rest of his life filthy rich.

  The properties William had bought for her were all Angelo Jr.’s when her number was up, as was all the money she had saved in the bank. She just prayed that his constant show of disrespect and his double-crossing her by getting a job working for William wouldn’t force her to leave it all to a charity for cancer patients. Angelo Jr. didn’t know that his mother knew of his employment. This she was sure of. They had never crossed paths in Atlanta, so she’d go along with his game to keep it that way. She didn’t know what he had up his sleeve, but she knew whatever his reasons were for going behind her back and getting a job with William would lead him to the truth.

  After unlocking her wheelchair, Clara rolled herself to the restroom. She was supposed to be under hospice care or, at the very least, to have a live-in nurse, but she had refused them both. If she had pain and suffering, she accepted it as a part of her punishment. Her feeble sixty-year-old hands barely mustered the strength to turn the wheels a full turn, but she made it to her destination without help. She was now in diapers and didn’t use the toilet, but that wasn’t her reason for entering the restroom. The mirror was.

  She looked in the mirror and didn’t recognize her own reflection. She had turned into a raisin perched on a wheelchair, with two large oxygen tanks supplying air to her lungs through her neck.

  “I’m a fucking neck breather,” she said aloud after placing the handheld voice-amplification device under her jawbone.

  She tried hard to see the pretty pie-faced girl with dimples who used to look back at her when she looked in the mirror. It had been years since she’d seen that face, as it had been erased gradually with each puff of the cigarettes. Now it was memory mist due to the morphine that kept her pain at bay, and all she saw looking back at her was a blur.

  “Excuse me, ma’am. Are you Mrs. Hurley?” asked a manly-looking woman dressed in dark gray, with a hoodie over her head. Clara hadn’t heard the young lady enter the restroom. It was like she materialized out of nowhere.

  * * *

  “Why? Who in the fuck wants to know?” she said, looking the twentysomething-year-old up and down. It was hot as hell outside, yet she was dressed in a sweat suit and had gloves on. Clara was sure that the young bitch was housed upstairs, in the psych ward.

  “I do, ma’am. I have an important message for you.”

  “Stop all that ‘ma’am’ bullshit, psycho, and spill it. I don’t have all day.”

  “You’re right. You don’t.”

  The woman snatched the tubing out of Clara’s neck that allowed the oxygen to flow into her lungs. Moving quickly before someone entered the restroom, she pushed Clara’s wheelchair into the handicap stall. Clara stuck out her arms in an attempt to grab whatever she could around her, but the loss of oxygen was making her weak. With the strength of two men, the hooded women flipped the chair over, causing Clara’s head to hit the toilet. Clara was knocked out cold on impact. Her electrolarynx rolled on the floor and came to rest next to the attacker’s foot, and she kicked it into the next stall. She knew Clara was knocked out and her lungs were in the process of collapsing, but she wanted to make sure she wouldn’t be able to call for help, anyway.

  After staging the scene to look like it was an accident caused by Clara trying to use the restroom without assistance, the manly woman locked the stall’s door. She had to admit that this was the easiest hit she had been paid to do. So far the plan had flowed exactly according to the script she had been given. She had thought it would be hard to kill someone who was already dying, but that was what had made the deed easier. Plus, the old bitch had a smart mouth . . . well, neck.

  “Oh, before I forget,” the woman said as she got on her knees right next to where Clara lay. “The message is, ‘Rest in peace, again.’” She shrugged, not understanding the meaning of the message, then crawled under the locked stall door and fled the scene.

  Chapter Eight

  Back in Atlanta, Meagan couldn’t w
ait to disappear through the spa doors and head into the restroom. She had to make a phone call that she couldn’t afford to put off.

  “Didn’t I tell your young, stupid ass no?” Meagan yelled into her phone once she was inside the spa’s restroom.

  “What are you talking about, baby? You need to calm down and watch what you say.” Devin didn’t have a clue why Meagan was so upset, but she had deposited too many checks with the word young into his bank. There wasn’t many more he would be willing to take before he’d bounce.

  “My husband was shot at today, Devin,” she whispered into the phone, because she realized in her haste that she hadn’t checked the restroom for occupants when she first walked in. She was already paranoid about having the conversation by phone. “And I was with him. I told you not to.”

  “If your husband got shot at, Meagan, that doesn’t have shit to do with me. Didn’t you say he’s fucking with some other bitch too? Maybe she got him popped at.”

  The lie flowed off Devin’s lips with ease because a part of it was the truth. He had confided in J. Seed the conversation he had had with Meagan that morning. Jason Seed was his boy, his partner in crime, and the only man he called big brother, so he wasn’t surprised when J. Seed had volunteered to give him an easy fix to his problem.

  “Off that nigga . . . If he’s standing in your way and plotting against yo’ bitch, hit his ass with the nine. Fuck it. I’ll even do the shit for you,” he’d said.

  “Since when do you sign up to take on other people’s troubles? I thought you said you weren’t feeling Meagan for me?”

  “I’m not,” J. Seed had countered. “But that bitch would be caked up from the bake up if that nigga died. All you have to do is keep tapping it until she falls in love, and then we’ll rob her ass.”