Mr. Wrong After All (3 page)

Chapter 5

Nicolette

Basketball was a big deal at Georgetown
.
It seemed that until the season was over in March, the campus stood still. Nobody talked about anything else. I’ve never really been into sports that much probably because my father wasn’t the type to spend his weekends watching sports of any kind. He was too busy cutting the grass or visiting one of the so-called “sick” members of his church. No one in the house was allowed to watch television at all on Sundays. After church, we would sit around our small home with our thumbs up our asses, listening to our hair grow.

“Television is a tool that the devil uses to control your mind and get you away from the things of God,” my father said.

And if anybody was able to recognize the devil and his tools, it would definitely be you.

I have a list as long as the Nile River containing all of the cruel and terrible things that I had to endure as a child. I kept this list to remind myself of what not to do as a parent.

“C’mon, Nikki. This is the game of the season. We are playing North Carolina and you know what that means? You know who is coming to town and I can’t wait to watch that chocolate drop jump twenty feet into the air,” Sabrina said.

Sabrina Jackson was my soror and roommate this year. She was from Raleigh, North Carolina, which partly explained her fascination with their basketball team. But mainly, she was in love with the talented and beautiful star of the team. She constantly talked about him. Her side of the room was practically wallpapered with posters of him. She defied Georgetown’s school spirit and wore North Carolina paraphernalia all of the time. Sabrina even had the number 23 on the personalized license plate of her silver Hyundai.

“That’s exactly why I don’t want to go to this game with you, Sabrina. How are you going to sit at a Georgetown basketball game and root for the opposing team? The place will be packed solid and you’ll embarrass me with all of your loud screaming. Anyway, too many people in one place make me nervous. I’m just going to stay here and study,” I explained.

Sabrina was annoyed by the fact that I could sometimes be a hermit. I just didn’t like crowds. At the end of the day, I was still a sheltered shy girl from Alabama.

“That’s some ignorant bullshit, Nic. Did you hear yourself? You can’t fool me ‘cause I know how you like watching those fine and delicious looking brothers run around the basketball court in their short shorts, getting all sweaty and—”

“Okay! I’ll go. No more descriptions, please! You are a trip, Sabrina.”

“Miss Jackson, if you’re nasty.”

I was right. The Capital Centre was packed to the brim with a roaring crowd of fans. It was hard to tell if all of the groundswell was for Georgetown’s
number 33 or North Carolina’s
number 23. Whatever the reason, it was apparent that this game was serious.

Sabrina was loud, as usual. She yelled out her favorite player’s name every time he was air bound.

One player caught my attention. Although he was not as flamboyant of a player as the other two, he was indeed a powerful force on our team. He was a mad hustler, scrapping for every rebound and assist. I’d seen him somewhere before but I just couldn’t remember where. His long legs and tight ass made my heart skip a beat or two. When he went to the line to shoot free throws, the way he bent over and grabbed the leg of his shorts made my heart pound.

Look at him!

“Who are you starring at?”

I was busted. I was so busy eyeballing Mr. Free Throw that I forgot there was anyone else in the entire arena.

“Umm…”

“Yeah, umm is right.”

“The guy who just made the shot, what’s his name?” I asked, hoping to sound a little disinterested.

“Oh girl, that’s Ahmad Jacobs,” Sabrina answered as she loudly slurped her Dr. Pepper.

“And?”

“And what?”

“Sabrina, stop playing. You know the low down on everybody, especially the basketball players. What’s up with him?”

“J. Edgar Hoover was not my daddy and I ain’t the fuckin’ FBI,” she said, rolling her large dark eyes and popping her chewing gum. “I mind my own business.”

I stared at her for a minute until we both burst into an uncontrollable laughter. Sabrina knew everything about everybody on campus. I never understood how one person could have the 4-1-1 on so many people and maintain a stellar grade point average. The funny thing is that whatever Sabrina ever told me about other people’s business was never just a meaningless rumor. It was the gospel truth.

“Okay, Okay. Ahmad is from Bed-Stuy.”

“Where?”

“Oh damn, I forgot you’re from Alabama. Bedford-Stuyvesant is a neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York. A predominately

Black neighborhood.”

“So, why don’t they just call it Brooklyn and be done with it?”

“Look here, Nic. I ain’t got time to sit here and give you a goddamn history lesson on why they do what they do in New York City. Okay? I am trying to watch the fuckin’ game. Now, do you want the Cliff’s Notes scoop on Ahmad or not?”

“Well, you don’t have to get an attitude. Yes, tell me about Ahmad.”

“Like I said, he’s from Bed…Brooklyn. He went to some private high school and came here, on scholarship, of course. He’s not a frat and from what I hear, he’s a true playa from the Himalayas.”

Number 23 scored, again, and the Capital Centre went crazy and so did Sabrina. It was a good thing we were not in New Orleans because I truly believe she would have lifted her shirt and showed her titties to him every time he made a shot.

A player? He was so fine and so talented. What a waste.

“How do you know that he’s a player?”

“‘Cause he is! When he goes to bed alone, it ain’t because he has to. He’s probably screwed every girl between here and New York City.”

“What about you?” I asked, curiously.

“What? How you gonna sit there and ask me some bullshit like that, Nikki? I thought we were girls.”

“Well…”

“No, I haven’t slept with him.”

“Why not?”

“‘Cause he hasn’t asked me, bitch.”

We both laughed again, louder this time. Sabrina was funny and I could always trust her to tell me the truth about anything.

“So, have you ever met him?”

“Why are you being so damn nosey, Nikki?”

“I’m just curious.”

“Yeah, I met him a few times. Actually, he comes to the house to party every now and again.”

Sabrina stopped watching the game and began staring at me suspiciously. I knew what she was thinking and hoped she wouldn’t say anything out loud but deep down inside, I knew better. I couldn’t make eye contact with her.

“You want to meet him, don’t you?”

I couldn’t hold my smile, no matter how hard I tried. Yes, I wanted to meet Ahmad. The way he moved on the court made me warm in strange places.

“Girl, I don’t know if your goodie-two-shoes ass is ready for somebody like Ahmad Jacobs,” Sabrina warned. “You may need to start with somebody mild. Somebody like Kobe Ayo.” “Who?” I asked, confused.

Sabrina pointed to the short round South African student wearing horned-rimmed glasses and pocket protectors sitting across the aisle from us.

Chapter 6

Shannon Evans

I wasn’t sure about a lot of things in my life but there was one thing I knew without a doubt. I was happy to get away from my father’s house and his rules. If I live a million years, I will never understand how my mother put up with all of his bullshit and never said a word about it. It wasn’t like her ass didn’t know what he was doing. She knew. She knew because we tried to tell her what was going on and she would not even pretend to listen. She just sat quietly by the wayside in her own little world and let him do whatever the hell he wanted to do to her and to us.

I couldn’t wait to leave because I hated my parents and I knew that if I stayed one day longer, I would have probably killed one if not both of them.

In my eyes, my father was a miserable tyrant. The only thing that mattered to him was him. No one else in the household was allowed to do anything that would take our focus away from his needs. If my mother failed to do the simplest thing for him, he would say that it was because she had put something above the needs and desires of her husband. He would loudly continue to quote Bible verses about the role of the wife before finishing his speech with an open-handed slap across her pitiful face.

I watched him humiliate my mother by bringing home his “friends” and ordering my mother to cook for these women and wash their clothes while he openly had sex with them in the next room. This same man would get in the pulpit on Sunday mornings and preach to other folks about repenting for their sins.

We were not allowed to date nor were we to have boys call us on the telephone because our father was convinced that dating would lead to sex and we would end up pregnant and alone in the streets.

“I will not allow you to bring shame on me by showing up on my doorstep with a bastard child in your arms.”

I certainly couldn’t vouch for my sisters but I knew that the real reason my father didn’t want me to date boys was because he wanted to be the only one who fucked me. He wanted to be my one and only lover.

I have no memory of a time when my father was not molesting me. The innocent kisses exchanged between a father and his daughter turned into a vulgar robbery by a pedophile to his victim. As a child, I was powerless against him. When I turned to the one person in the whole world who should have helped me, she didn’t believe a word I said. I was too ashamed to talk to my sisters because I wasn’t sure if they would believe me either.

“You can’t tell your sisters. They will be jealous of the fact that I give you more attention than I give to them and they will want to kill you. Remember the story in the Bible about Joseph and his jealous brothers and what they did to him?”

My father was a sick man who treacherously twisted the Bible to promote his own agenda.

Once, I even threatened to call the police on my father after he came into my room one night and raped me. The look he gave me sent chills of horror down my spine.

“You call the cracker police on me and I will kill you with my bare hands.”

When I was a freshman in high school, I began to rebel by sneaking out of the house whenever my father was asleep. I hung out with what most people would consider the wrong crowd. I drank, smoked weed, consumed stolen prescription medications by the handful, and had sex with anybody that would have me. I desperately needed something to dull the ache of what was happening to me at home and I used anything I could get my hands on. I knew this behavior was destructive but I was powerless to stop it as long as I lived in that house.

By the time I was sixteen, I’d already had three abortions. To this day, I cannot say, with any amount of certainty, that those babies were not the result of my father’s blatant violation of me.

By the grace of God, I didn’t flunk out of school. School was the only thing that I seemed to do right. Although I wasn’t a National Merit Scholar like my sister, Nikki, I managed to graduate with a decent grade point average. I was thrilled to be accepted to Howard University
.

Nikki came home less and less and, although I really missed my big sister, I understood why she stayed away. I was very excited that soon we would be just across town from each other.

On the train ride to DC, I thought a lot about Nikki.

Has being away from home for so long made Nikki more outgoing or is she still the colored Little Miss Muffet?

After seeing her at a party at her sorority house, I knew she was still as shy and as introverted as ever. I, on the other hand, was there to let my hair down and party like my life depended on it.

“Girl, this is your sorority’s party and you’re sitting there looking like you are scared to death. You need to get your ass up and dance,” I said.

“You know I am not a good dancer. By the way, where did you learn to dance like that, Shannon?”

“Please. It’s not hard. Just let your body respond to what feels good.”

I couldn’t believe I had just repeated the same words my father said almost every time he wanted to have sex with me.

A group of tall fine brothers walked into the house just as my song came on and I grabbed one and pulled his ass on the dance floor. He looked nervous at first. I could tell that he was probably used to being the one to make the first move. After I rolled my body against his, he relaxed and we danced all over the place. I knew he wanted to fuck me when I felt his hard dick against my stomach. Truth be told, I wanted to sex him crazy, too. He was a pretty, light-skinned basketball player with an ass as tight as a fat man’s pants.

Hmm, a basketball player has a lot of potential.

We went back to his apartment. Although it was dark, I could tell his place was in the hood. Inside, there were boxes and plastic bags everywhere and it looked as if this brother had no clue of how to use a vacuum. The mess didn’t really bother me

because, after all, I was there for one thing and one thing only.

To be fucked.

“Who’s the cute kid?” I asked, noticing the snapshot of a fat faced toddler on the otherwise bare mantel.

“That’s my little girl.”

“You have a kid? She’s cute.”

“Yeah, thanks.”

Ahmad didn’t seem to want to talk much about the child and, frankly, neither did I.

“Do you have a roommate?” I asked, as I sat on the old looking couch that reeked of aged piss and Lysol, and removed my shoes.

“Naw, it’s just me.”

Hmm, he has an apartment of his own. He must have some money.

“Wow, your own place. It must be exciting.”

“It’s cool,” Ahmad answered from across the room. He acted as if he was scared to come over and give me what he knew I was obviously there to get.

You know you want me.

I decided I would have to make the first move, again, so I

invited him to come and sit next to me.

Once he was closer, I didn’t waste any time taking the evening to another level. My pussy was calling Ahmad’s name loud and clear.

You are an okay fuck. I’ve definitely had better but you have so much potential. I think I’ll keep you around. A basketball player for Georgetown University has a good chance of playing ball in the NBA. If I play my cards right, some of that big time money could be mine.

After I had fucked him blind, he started tripping and spouting some bullshit about forgetting condoms. Funny thing is, he didn’t think about covering his dick while he was fucking me all up in my stomach.

“So what? You think I got something?”

“I hope not. But I don’t need no more babies either, Shannon.”

I got tired of listening to this nonsense so I put his mind at ease with the first lie that came to mind. I told him I was a virgin.

I can’t believe I got that lie out with a straight face.

Between my father and numerous fuck buddies, I hadn’t been a virgin in a really long time. Frankly, I was surprised I hadn’t contracted some dreadful disease by now. There was no telling what kind of nasty shit all of the people I had slept with had been doing. It was a chance I took every time I opened my legs to welcome someone new.

I knew that my behavior was bad and maybe even destructible but I did it anyway. I just needed to be able to have fun and forget all of the bullshit. Any attention, however inappropriate, was better than no attention at all.