Miss Wayne and the Queens of DC (The Cartel Publications Presents) (21 page)

It’s party night and home for only two days, I already regained control of my house. I acted as if everything was good between Tyrone and me because I wanted my plan to work just right. If he weren’t such a selfish ass fish, one look in my eyes would tell him something was up. But he had one thing on his mind, HIMSELF.

Even though I learned that Tyrone burned the house down instead of Paul, who was my biggest competition, I still wanted to win the ball that was going down in two days. My reasons are personal. So, to win, I consulted the lovely B Scott, a transgender woman, to help prepare us for the night. She’s the best of the best and since we are judged on our walk, costume, and attitude, I knew she’d be great. She worked with us on proper hairstyles, offered makeup suggestions and even gave tips on our performance. I truly felt after talking with her that I was ready.

When the meeting with her was over, I placed an important call to LA that would prove beneficial for me later. It would be the most hateful thing I did in my life and I didn’t even care.

“Miss Wayne, I have a client comin’ over today. Are we still cool with our agreement?”
“Sure,” I say. “I told you, you can have two clients over the night of the party. Remember?”
“I know. I just want to make sure everything still stands,” he smiles.
“Why wouldn’t it?” I imply. “You been real with me, I’m bein’ real with you.”
“Oh…thanks, girl.”
“No problem,” I say slightly touching him on his shoulder. “Nice watch,” I continue spotting a black Toy Watch on his arm that runs in the upper one hundreds. “When did you get it?”
“Oh…this?” he says pointing at it. “I’ve had it for a while now.”
“Well I hope you’re savin’ your money, Tyrone. Remember that was part of the agreement too. You were to save up so you’d have enough money to get a place of your own.”
“I am, Wayne. Don’t worry about me…I’m set up real good.”
I laugh, “Glad to hear that.”
“And Wayne, Garisha is helpin’ me out with my clients tonight. Is that okay?”
“Now wait one fuckin’ minute! What human in their right mind would pay ugly Gary’s ass for anything?”
“Our clients. We found a niche market.”
“A niche market huh?” I laugh. “And what is the market? Men who want to fuck men who look like shit? Literally?”
“You know what they say, there’s somebody out here for everybody,” he says dismissively, “well…let me get ready for work. Thanks again, girl!”
He dipped off into his room and I was really curious about the scheme he was running now. But I also knew everything would be revealed in time and I had to be patient.
Twenty minutes into the party, my phone rang. The number is blocked.
“Hello?”
“Wayne, can we talk about what happened at the airport the other day? I mean, I been by the house and you don’t answer the door, despite your car being out front. I call all the time and you send me to voicemail, what’s up?” Says, Ryan.
“Nothin’s up,” I say, happy he’s been calling me everyday since we split. “I told you I’m done with you and don’t appreciate how you tried to come for a bitch in public. You don’t grandstand on me in front of people. I don’t play that shit.”
“I know, and I’m sorry. But if we can just go out, and grab something to eat, maybe you’ll change your mind about me. I want a chance to show you I can be the one. Just like you made a mistake by going through my phone, I made a mistake by talking to you the way that I did.”
“I doubt going out with you will change my mind. Take care, sweetheart.”
After I hang up the phone with him, a thin young boy knocks on the door. And since he looks to be about seventeen, I figure he was in the wrong place and definitely at the wrong time. He was cute and dainty but looked scared.
“Honey…I believe you wandered on the wrong side of town.”
“No, I think I have the right place.” He says pulling a piece paper from his pocket. “Is Tyrone here?”
“What do you want with Tyrone?”
“I’m not supposed to say.”
“Well I can’t let you in.” I say preparing to close the door.
“Please don’t turn me away,” he says holding it open. “I really need to see him.”
“What is an ugly ass man like that going to offer a cute little thing like you?”
“Like I said, mam, I really can’t say,” he says digging into his pocket again, pulling out cash. “But I have one hundred dollars for you like he said to bring.”
I take the money and look at him again.
“Listen, I don’t proclaim to run a legal operation in here, but I’m still gonna need to see some ID from you. Just for my own personal sake.”
He looks behind me at everyone having a good time and pulls out his wallet. Then he shows me his ID. He wasn’t 21, but he was 18. I guess that’ll have to do.
“Right this way,” I say pointing to Tyrone’s room.
When he disappears inside, I make mental notes to clock him when he comes out. I need to know what the fuck is up now more than ever. I tried to do regular shit but the Capatain Save-a-ho mentality in me wouldn’t allow me to mind my own business. Two hours into the party, the young man did not leave Tyrone’s room. What was going on in there? I was five seconds from knocking on the door when I see Adrian.
“Adrian, did you ever find out what Tyrone’s doin’ for money? ‘Cause the moment he told me ugly Garisha was helping him, I knew sex was not a part of the equation. Ain’t nobody in their right mind fuckin’ him!”
“I’m not
really
sure but somebody did tell me he might be doing silicone injections.” He laughs. “But I don’t hardly believe that shit. Do you?”
“No!”
“I said the same thing, but you remember Miss P from New York Avenue right?”
“Funky bussy, P? The queen who does any freaky thing a trick wants no matter what?”
“Yeah! I saw her come through here for him when you were gone one day. And you know she use to do the silicone injections all the time until a trick stabbed her in the left eye and she couldn’t see straight no more.” He says. “Well maybe the rumors are true. I can’t believe you can learn that quick.”
“That bitch can’t even read!” I say.
“I guess you don’t need to read to stick and push shit into people.”
That was it! There was no way I was allowing this kind of shiftlessness to go on in my home. I couldn’t risk the chance of something ELSE bad happening here.
So I run toward the bedroom and fling open his door. Time felt like it stopped because there on the floor was the young man I let into my home hours earlier. ‘Cept for now, he was out cold. Ugly Gary and Miss Tyrone were standing over him sweating.
“Tyrone…what the fuck is going on?” I say looking at the boy.
“Wayne, we got trouble.” He says walking up to me.
“Bitch
we
had trouble the moment I started dealin’ with your crispy black ass.”
“Wayne, I’m sorry. But I need your help again. I don’t know what else to do.”
“What is wrong with him, Ty?” I say, seeing two small shiny objects peeking from under his bed. When I see what they are, I remain quiet and direct my attention elsewhere.
“He’s dead.” Tyrone says nonchalantly. “The mothafucka up and died on me!”
I know he didn’t just say what I think he did. Still, I walk deeper into the room despite wanting to go the other way. Then I slyly kick the objects I saw earlier further under the bed. In my mind I know I have a house full of guests slash witnesses and here Nurse Betty is, botching up cosmetic procedures.
“What happened?”
“We were doing the silicone injections to increase his breast size, because God knows he only had two bee stings, when he started spazzin’ out.” Garisha offers. “We did this all last week and never had a problem until now.”
“All last week?!” I scream. “Doctors go to school for years to be able to do this kind of shit and you think you can sum it up in a week? There’s a reason this shit is illegal in America! Have you two mothafuckas ever thought of that?”
“But I get it all the time.” Garisha continues.
“Bitch and look at your face! I would not have even told nobody that shit.”
Silence.
“You know what…you two bitches make this shit disappear. I’m not in it and I ain’t see shit.” I say closing the door.
Then I direct my attention to my guests who are going on about their business as if nothing is wrong. They’re having a lot of fun and I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I don’t have a choice.
“Listen up, babies. Unfortunately the party has to be cut short tonight. However I will be sure to refund all of your money for having to leave right now.”
When they don’t move I yell, “Get the fuck out of my house you limp dick bastards!”
That works and when the house is clear, I make a quick back-up phone call before I do anything else. When the call was over, I hope the person I reached out to will do what needs to be done. Truly I was counting on it. Then I grab Adrian and Dayshawn and we head to the Hilton Hotel because I don’t want us anywhere around this shit.
While sitting in the hotel room, Dayshawn asks, “Can you please tell me what happened back there? I kinda liked the trade I was keeping time wit’ tonight.”
“I don’t think you want to know because then you’ll be involved.”
“But can you tell us if we’re going to be in trouble? ‘Cause it looks like somethin’ happened to that boy who came in but didn’t leave out.” Asks Adrian.
“As of now no, we aren’t in trouble, but I can’t make any promises.” I say as we all lie face up on the king size bed in the room.
As I’m thinking about the way the young man looked on the floor, I look over at Adrian and then Dayshawn. Why am I always in life or death situations? I remember dealing with this guy who was big on law of attraction awhile back. He told me that the Law of attraction says, ‘that which is likened to itself is drawn’. In other words, if all I see and talk about is drama, then by law the universe has to bring me more drama to see. It makes sense. I can’t be happy if everything I do is to the contrary.
I look at Dayshawn again and think about Tyrone. I always thought he was a saint for dealing with him for so long. The two of them just don’t seem like they’d be that close.
“I need to know something from you, Day. And I need you to keep it real with me.”
“I always do.”
“Good…’cause I need to know how is it that you befriended Tyrone as long as you have? He’s sneaky, untrustworthy and trouble. I mean, we were also cool but we maintained our friendship from a far. I could never deal with him on a regular like you do. He certainly doesn’t match your fly so what does he have on you, baby?”
“He told you didn’t he?” he asks sitting up straight in the bed. “He told you my business?”
I’m even more curious because it’s obvious that whatever secret he’s about to let out of the bag, will more than answer my questions.
“Yes,” I lie. “But I’d rather hear it from you instead.”
Dayshawn gets up, stands at the foot of the bed and looks down at Adrian and me.
Taking a deep breath he says, “When I was younger, just finding out who I was, I felt alone. My mother pretty much told me that any gay son of hers was not her son at all. So I didn’t have anybody I could identify myself with and then I met Tyrone who had a rack of friends and knew a lot of people. He was living with his father and was going through some family shit too. Just like me.
“Even though Tyrone was popular, for some reason, he gravitated towards me more than his other friends and we became closer. I think he saw a weakness in me and wanted to capitalize on that shit. Anyway, we were pretty much all we had. My mother worked at least 14 hours a day and his father stayed in the streets. The more different we were from everybody, the tighter our bond became.
“Well one day, my mother was entertaining friends at her mother’s house up the block from the Manor. So she sent me to get some charcoal lighter fluid and some matches. Tyrone went with me, but on our way back from the store, we saw a man lying on an old mattress in between two apartment buildings. We thought he was a bum and that was the night everything changed…
“Oooh look, we should stick that pole over there up his ass or somethin’,” laughed Tyrone as they crept slowly up to him.
“That’s some gross ass shit! His hot wet ass probably stank and everything.” Dayshawn laughed. “You know he ain’t washin’ shit livin’ out here.”
“Come on man…why you always act so scary? That’s why I don’t like hangin’ out with you sometimes. The rest of my friends are fun and do wild shit…but you act older than my father.”
“I’m not scary.”
“I can’t tell.”
Dayshawn, worried about losing a friend said, “Okay…what you want me to do? ‘Cause you got me fucked up if you think I don’t have heart.”
Tyrone’s sinister mind went into overdrive. Removing the lighter fluid from Dayshawn’s brown paper bag, he said, “Let’s burn him.”
“What is wrong with you? I ain’t burnin’ nobody! You trippin’ now!”
“Please!” Tyrone whined as if they were talking about burning anything other than a human. “Nobody will know we did it. Hardly anybody ever come down this alley anyway.” He smiled. “Let’s have some fun!”
“What’s the purpose, Tyrone?”
The smile was removed from his face and he said, “I’m not fuckin’ wit’ you no more, and I’ma tell all my friends not to fuck with you either.” He shoved the fluid into Dayshawn’s chest. “You’re probably the snitchin’ type anyway and I’m glad I found out before we did this shit.” He said, as he began to walk away.
When he took a few steps Dayshawn said, “Do we have to burn him?”
“Bye, young!”
Dayshawn remained quiet for a moment and yelled, “Okay. I’ll do it!”
“For real?” he said turning around.
“Yeah.”
Dayshawn opened the spout and doused the man with the liquid. Then he struck the match, considered the consequences and paused.
“Go head…throw it.” Tyrone cohearsed. “I promise I’ll never tell anybody you did this. But I’ll also know that you got my back just like I got yours. Go ‘head, his life is over anyway, look at him.”
Dayshawn’s heart beat out of his chest. Taking one last look at the fire on the stick, which was very close to burning his fingers, he tossed it in the air and it landed on the stranger’s dingy grey coat. His entire body erupted in flames and they ran from the scene, Tyrone laughing the entire way and Dayshawn crying inside.
Little did he know, Tyrone would forever hold the murder over his head to keep him in line. It was Dayshawn’s single most costly mistake and one he always regretted.
What Dayshawn just said blows me away and I wonder…who are these people I have around me? Just when you think you know somebody you don’t.
“You didn’t know....did you?” Day asks me.
“Naw…I ain’t know shit, girl. But I did know ya’ll relationship was unnatural.”
“Damn, Wayne! You tricked me,” he says flopping down on the edge of the bed.
“Wow, Dayshawn. You told me so freely…it was almost like you been wanting me to know.”
“Maybe I just wanted to tell somebody else that shit. When I heard that man had a family but because he lost his job got put out by his wife for only one night, I never forgave myself. I wanted to take my own life.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“The next day, we became friends. You remember? The day of the block party. Just bein’ around you made me feel better…so I never got around to doin’ it.”
I smile and say, “Well I’m glad you ain’t do no shit like that. If anybody should’ve killed themselves, it needed to be Tyrone’s fat ass.”
“Hey, Day…what happened on that case?” Asks Adrian.
“Nothin’. His wife stayed on the news trying to find justice, but it never came. Pretty soon the press stopped caring and stopped talking about it.”
“I remember that case too.” I say.
“I’m sure a lot of people from around the way remembered that shit.”
“Let me ask you somethin’, is this the real reason you let Tyrone talk you into letting Dell leave?”