Damaged (14 page)

“Here, girl, smoke this shit,” Shakira said.

I walked over and took the tightly wrapped cigar from her hand. I took a long pull before falling back onto the couch. Shakira
was only sixteen and she was living in an apartment by herself. I couldn’t understand it, but my mind was too full with other
stuff to even worry about it.

“And ain’t your father just got killed, too?” she asked, shaking her head.

“That muthafucka wasn’t my father,” I said, crossing my arms.

“I mean your foster father? I saw it on the news back when it happened. Did they ever find out who did it?”

I kept my mouth closed and waited for her to pass the blunt back to me. It was all too much. I ain’t wanna think about Mr.
Big. Not right now. As soon as the blunt ran out, Shakira rolled another one and we smoked until I was so tired I passed out.

THE DAY AFTER

THE WORST NIGHT EVER

K
nock! Knock! Knock!

“KiKi?!” a girl’s voice yelled from the other side of the door. I wiped the sleep from my eyes and sat up from the couch.
I almost forgot where I was, but I saw the purple beanbag on the floor and remembered that I was over Shakira’s apartment.
I watched a roach crawling on the ceiling, hoping he wasn’t headed my way. Another roach was scaling the wall and headed behind
the big picture of the African woman with the basket on her head.

Knock! Knock! Knock!

“Girl, wake up! You got some eggs in there?” the girl called from the other side of the door.

Shakira came from her room wearing a pink satin robe. “I know this bitch done lost her muthafuckin’ mind. What, Wynika?” she
asked, snatching the door open.

“Tell me you got some eggs I can borrow?”

“Do I look like Safeway, bitch?”

“Look, do you or don’t you?” Wynika said, rolling her eyes and planting her hand on her hip. “Why you always gotta be so nasty?”

“No, I don’t. Now, why you always begging, bitch?”

“Shut up… I ain’t goin’ be too many more of your bitches. Hey, girl,” she said waving at me.

I waved back. They must go through this every day, cuz I just knew a fight was about to take place, but nothing jumped off.

When she left out, Shakira gave me a hand towel that was almost to shreds and a washcloth. “Sorry, girl, this all I got that’s
clean. You can borrow some of my clothes, if you want.”

I said thanks, but I really ain’t wanna wear nothing of hers even though I knew she was really trying hard to be nice. I guess
she never really was a bad person. I just chose not to be friends with her no more.

After I got out the shower, some eggs mysteriously showed up. She also had toast and bacon on a plate for me. I was shocked.

“You know, you can stay here as long as you want. You goin’ through so much right now. I wouldn’t wish that shit on nobody,”
she said, shaking her head. “I’ll even help you get your stuff later, if you want.”

I nodded. I couldn’t even think about what was going to happen the next hour, let alone the next day or two.

For the next week, I slept on Shakira’s couch. Well, I spent most of the time tossing and turning. She was gone most of the
time, mostly at nighttime. A few nights she brought back company, but they went straight to her bedroom. I was half sleep,
but I could hear them laughing and the headboard banging up against the wall.

One night I woke up drenching in a cold sweat from a nightmare. Chu was running and I was chasing behind him, but I could
never catch up. When I woke up, I thought I felt somebody standing over me, but when I strained to see in the dark living
room, wasn’t nobody there.

I had lost my appetite, so Shakira’s empty fridge wasn’t a problem. I never went to get any of my things from Nut’s apartment.
I just couldn’t do it. Peaches called me a couple of times, but I kept the conversation real short. A part of me was jealous
that Nut and Smurf both survived. It hurt to hear her talk, even though she was saying nice stuff. I just ain’t wanna hear
it.

The day of Chu’s funeral, Shakira had to talk me into going. I ain’t wanna remember my baby like that, but she made me realize
that it wasn’t about me. It was about his family and honoring his memory, so I put on a decent dress from her closet and caught
a cab to the funeral home by myself, even though she offered to go with me. Nut was in a wheelchair and he had his arm wrapped
up. For whatever reason, the 666 number was cut in the back of his head again. I shook my head when I saw it. I just thought
it wasn’t appropriate. Not today.

Before the service started, Peaches told me Smurf was still in intensive care at the hospital, but the doctors said they was
about to upgrade his condition at the rate he was going.

I heard a loud shout in the front of the church from a woman. Just when I looked up to see who it was, she shouted, “Chukwuemeka!
My son! Oh, my son!”

Chu’s mother was all to pieces as she stood in front of the casket crying. Two women with big black hats tried to hold on
to Ms. Abani as she slumped to the floor. My stomach knotted up and tears slid down my face watching her. I hadn’t seen her
since the night he died, when she rushed up to the hospital, all hysterical and angry.

Out the blue, Ms. Abani threw her hands up in the air like she was waiting for something to happen, but she was quiet for
a minute and everybody watched her. She called Chu’s name again and then she said it again.

“Oh, Chukwuemeka! My son, why?” she cried until her voice cracked. Other people around me cried aloud, too. An old lady started
singing a song to no music. She was off-key and her voice was cracking, but it only made me cry more.

After the women took Ms. Abani to her seat, Chu’s brother, dressed in orange and shackled around his ankles and wrists, shuffled
up to the casket. There was two guards on both sides of him. He was so close to being released, and he had been doing so good,
that his parole officer must’ve agreed to let him come say his good-byes. Tep stood silent for a long moment. Ms. Abani cried
out loud again and raised her arms in the air. After a few minutes, the guards escorted him back out the door. He couldn’t
even say anything to his mother. It was so sad.

I thought about what Chu said about getting in touch with Tep if something ever happened to him. It was too ironic. Chu had
to know something was about to happen, and I knew it had to do with whatever the hell he had been doing in North Carolina.
When Rob walked by Chu’s casket, he cried just as loud as Ms. Abani was. I wanted to hug him and tell him it was going to
be all right, but I really wasn’t so sure. They had been friends for a long time. Chu had told me how they first started being
friends cuz him and Rob kept getting sent to detention for being late to school every day. Soon, Chu asked him if he wanted
to spark after they got out, and that was how they first started being tight.

I still ain’t wanna see Chu looking like that. It just ain’t feel right. So I stayed in my seat when it was my row’s turn
to view his body. When a man with an all-white embroidered two-piece African outfit, who was sitting in the row in front of
me, came back from viewing the body, my heart jumped. It was Chu, only a lot older. That had to be his father. All the way
here from Africa.

I played with the CHU necklace around my neck and closed my eyes as a soloist sang “Amazing Grace.” The tears kept slipping
from my eyes. All I could think about was the last time we kissed and the last time he held me. No one else knew just how
hard it was to be so close to someone and to have them snatched away just like that. I knew how Chu tasted. I knew how his
body would flinch if I touched him softly in just the right spots. I knew how he was when no one else was looking. He ain’t
have to play a role around me, like he was hard or like he was never scared. He was just him. And now he was gone.

After the service, I walked over to Ms. Abani and gave her a long, tight hug. She wrapped me up with her big arms and squeezed
me. “I know you loved my son,” she whispered. “He loved you, too.”

“He loved you, too, ma’am,” I said as tears streamed down my cheeks. She couldn’t possibly know just how much I was gonna
miss her son. He knew all of my secrets and he still loved me.

“Be strong,” she said before turning to greet other people.

I wiped away tears and put the program in my purse. I was just his girlfriend, and my name wasn’t even in it. But I knew I
meant a lot to him. Hearing her say that meant the world.

I tried to catch up with Rob, but I couldn’t find him anywhere. I waited for a while to see if he was in the bathroom, or
if I would see him smoking outside with the other people huddled around the outdoor ashtray, but he was gone. Peaches caught
me on my way out the door.

“How you doing, girl?”

I shook my head.

“I know. I know. You gotta come by the house soon. Okay?”

I nodded.

“All right, shawty,” Nut said as Peaches rolled him away.

I felt a pinch in my heart watching them together.

I slept for two straight days after they buried Chu. Shakira ain’t bother me, either. I woke up smacking my face cuz I thought
I felt something crawling across it. I sat up and realized that it was only sweat running down my forehead. I exhaled, relieved.
My T-shirt was so sweaty it was stuck on my body.

Shakira was in the bathroom humming a song with the door wide open. I stretched and walked over to see where she was about
to go.

“Hey, you finally up, huh? You hungry?”

“Nah, not really,” I said, yawning. She was styling her hair. “Where you about to go?”

“Girl, I gotta go to work.”

“Work?” I asked, confused. “Where’s that?”

Shakira sucked her teeth and said, “Trust me. You don’t wanna know. Shit, I been working just about every day since you been
here.”

I frowned, cuz I ain’t never seen her in no uniform. “No, tell me. Where you work at?”

“Nah, not yet,” Shakira said, dabbing lip gloss on top of her already pink lips. “What time is it?”

I looked at the time on the microwave in the kitchen. “It’s ten o’clock.”

“Shit, my ride is probably here,” she said, rubbing glitter lotion on her arms and neck real fast.

“You a stripper or something?” I asked.

“I wish… too young for that,” she said, stepping away from the mirror, looking at herself. “All right, girlie, I gotta go.
You gonna be all right?”

I nodded, but I still was confused.

“Okay. Oh, yeah. I got that new Tyler Perry movie on DVD. You should watch it.”

I stared at her slipping into her clear stilettos, before she grabbed her purse and walked out the door. I went to the window
and watched her, Trina Boo, and Wynika climb into a silver Excursion.

I lit a cigarette from a pack that Shakira had on the kitchen table. I never really smoked cigarettes until lately. Shakira
always had them around, more than the weed, so I helped myself to one here or there. I stayed in her room, smoking and drinking
wine coolers as I watched DVDs. I fell asleep in her bed and woke up when Shakira came home. I looked at the digital clock
by her bed: 6:15. I listened to her jump in the shower and then she came back out twenty minutes later and climbed in bed.

“I am so tired,” she said as she pulled the sheet on top of her. “See you in the morning.”

But I laid there thinking that it
was
morning.

SEPTEMBER 2005

S
hakira looked nervous. I saw her chain-smoking cigarettes at the kitchen table and fidgeting with her hair. I noticed when
she came in the house her left jaw looked like it was swollen or like she was sucking on a jawbreaker or something. I knew
it wasn’t food because she was smoking back-to-back cigarettes. Maybe she had a toothache. She started tapping the table with
the lighter over and over again, and it was annoying me.

“Shakira?!” I shouted from the living room.

“Huh?”

“What the heck’s wrong with you?” I asked.

She pulled on the cigarette and blew out a cloud of smoke, then flicked some of the ashes in the tray.

“What’s going on?” I asked, walking over to the table. I pulled out the chair across from her and sat down. “Why you acting
like this?”

She shook her head and said nothing.

“Your jaw swollen?” I asked, looking closely.

She looked away. “Lucifer said he’s coming over here to see you today,” she said. “He wanna talk to you.”

“Who?” I asked, jerking my neck back.

“That’s what I call him,” she said, blowing a puff of smoke across the table.

“What the hell he wanna talk to me about?”

“He seen you a few times, sleeping on the couch,” she said, flicking more ashes in the tray. “He just wanna talk to you.”

I rolled my eyes.

“Just listen, okay? It’s time you find out some things, and he’s on his way, so—”

“So what?”

“Just listen to him,” she said, tapping the table with the lighter again.

I frowned, cuz I was too confused.
Lucifer?
I touched her hand to make her stop tapping the lighter. When she stopped, I went to the kitchen to make me a sandwich. I
kept thinking about the dude’s twisted name and shook my head. After I got the ham and cheese out the fridge, I sat across
from her and waited for the nigga with the scary name to show up.

A couple hours later, I heard someone struggling up the stairs and then a few taps on the door.

“Open the door, bitch. I know you hear me coming!” I heard a familiar voice yelling. But say it ain’t so.

Shakira opened the door and said, “Hey, baby. What’s up?” before she kissed Nut on his lips.

Baby?
I shook my head and leaned back on the couch as he hobbled in the apartment on his cane.

“Camille, Camille, Camille. How you doing, shawty?” he said, limping over to the couch. He plopped down into the seat beside
me. “So I see you like it over here, huh? KiKi hooking you up?”

I was too stunned to talk.

“Oh, you don’t have to say nothing. I already know you like it over here.”