Cartier Cartel (31 page)

If there was one thing Cartier knew for sure, it was that Monya would
definitely open the door when she knocked. She knew Monya wouldn't play
the punk, so she'd open up the door popping shit. And just as if she wrote the
words to her own book, Monya opened the door.

"What the fuck you wa-"

The solid left hook was strong enough to knock out a bull. Monya almost
dropped to her knees, but Cartier grabbed the bony bitch by her hair and
pulled her back up. She continued to assault her face with a closed fist.
Monya's screams could be heard for blocks. She was so dazed she couldn't properly defend herself. Blow after blow had weakened the sassy bitch, and
Cartier never said one word. She tossed Monya around like a ragdoll, and
then body slammed her onto her marble tiled floor. It felt like Monya's ribs
broke in several places. Before she could fully scream from that blow, she was
face-to-face with the bottom of Cartier's Nike's Air Trainers. Monya tasted
and swallowed blood, and only prayed the abuse would be over soon. Inside
her mind she was looking for where she could find a weapon. She wanted to
stab Cartier for whipping her ass.

Winded and sweating freely, Cartier began to wind down. She was tired
and her arms were weak. She needed to catch her breath and leaned against a
nearby wall. She watched as Monya squirmed around on the floor in pain like
the dog she was. Her face was unrecognizable, and although Cartier wanted
to continue beating her ass after she caught her breath, suddenly she was
afraid she might actually commit murder. Monya looked in bad shape. Her
hair was soaked in blood and she was whimpering from pain.

"S-s-s-stop ... I had the a-a-a-abortion," Monya stammered in agony.
"... I s-s-swear."

Inexplicably, Cartier felt an overwhelming sense of remorse, mixed with
a longing for the past. What had happened to their friendship? They were
once close as sisters and now time had erased all the fond memories and
replaced them with arguments, fights, revenge, anger, hatred, and dissention.
She walked toward her archenemy, but not to deliver more blows. As she
got closer, Monya slid away and cowered in the corner, unaware that Cartier
actually wanted to help her this time.

"What happened to us, Monya?" Cartier began. "You were my sister and
look at us. Why?"

Cartier didn't even realize she was crying. The tears were coming down
at a rapid rate, almost blinding her. Suddenly, she slid down and collapsed on
the floor and began balling her eyes out.

"Look at us," Cartier said. "I'm here trying to kill you. You're doing everything in your power to hurt me. It wasn't supposed to be like this...."
The tears continued to fall. She was a woman hurting and didn't understand
why. Besides petty envy and jealousy, her beef was never with Monya. She
went to prison for Monya, to save her from being destroyed, and the very
person she was trying to save had been trying to destroy her ever since.

"We were supposed to be in each other's weddings," Cartier continued.
"Godparents to each other's children. Go on family vacations and be soccer
moms ... that's what I always wanted. I loved you! I loved you more than
my own freedom and you betrayed me. What did I ever do to make you
hate me?"

"I w-w-was always your sidekick," Monya shot back through the pain.
"Y-y-you never treated me as your equal"

"I always respected you," Cartier responded.

"You always loved me. You never respected me!" Monya countered.

"But what does that have to do with your actions?" Cartier argued. "Isn't
it better to be loved than respected?"

Monya tried in vain to sit up straight, but the pain was unbearable. Tears
continued to roll down her smooth cheeks. "This isn't a mob movie. Why did
I have to choose?"

"I did respect you. I did seven years out of respect!"

"I never asked you to. That was your choice. You'd made that decision.
You never consulted me on how I felt about the situation."

"And you never stopped me," Cartier snapped back.

"Come on now, you knew it was already too late. You'd already pled to the
case. What was I supposed to do? Stand up and say I did it and take twentyfive years? You would have forced my hand and that wasn't fair. They didn't
h-h-have shit whatsoever."

"You were killing yourself with your hunger strike. The cops played you
and you were too weak to believe in us, to believe in our friendship."

"Then you should have let me die ... I wasn't asking you to fix m-m m-me.

"As your friend I thought that's what we did for each other. We held each
other down."

This was the first talk the two women had had in over eight years. In
that time they'd grown apart and ultimately despised each other. The other
alternative was that they could have expressed their true feelings and not held
in the resentment that burdened their souls.

Cartier went and ran Monya a bath to clean her up. She was a bloody
mess. Since she could barely walk, she had to lean on Cartier to help her get
inside the warm tub. Cartier grabbed a cup from the kitchen and began to
wash Monya's hair. As her strong fingers kneaded through Monya's soft hair,
they shifted their conversation from bad times to good.

"Remember when Shorty Dip came on,the block to fuck us up and our
mothers were out there thumping with us? Trina beat fire out of Dip, didn't
she?" Monya said, reminiscing on good times.

"My moms was so gangsta. I wonder if I'll be that way with Christian?"

"You could if you wanted to, but I don't think you'd want to," Monya
replied.

"You're right. I've changed so much over the years. Prison softened me
up.

"You ain't that soft," Monya chuckled. "You just whipped my ass."

"Yeah, I did, didn't I?" Cartier laughed as well.

After Cartier washed Monya's back and body, she wrapped a towel
around her and led her to her bedroom. Both women crawled inside the
plush comfortable bed and continued their talk.

"Remember when we were in the third grade and we would beat up all
the girls and make them give us their milk and cookies?" Cartier asked.

"What do you mean we? You did all that by yourself," Monya corrected.

"But your greedy ass was eating the cookies with me."

"Hell yeah! Those chocolate chip cookies were the shit, weren't they?"

Both women fell asleep in Monya's bed after talking until the sun came
up. The next day Monya was still sore from her severe beat-down, so Cartier
agreed to stay over and help her with Jason Junior. Meanwhile, Christian
was over Trina's. As the two women rediscovered their friendship they both
realized they'd been on an emotional rollercoaster for nearly a decade. From
boosting, to selling drugs, to cohorts in a murder, to archenemies, and now
back to friends. They'd both come full circle and it was like old times.

After Cartier helped Monya bathe, she sat down and began to braid her
hair into two plaits. The house was still and was inviting more conversation,
and both women felt talking through their differences was therapeutic.

"I don't know why I wanted to get with Jason so badly when I knew how
he felt about you," Monya admitted. "Truly that was the lowest thing I could
have done in my life . . " Monya paused, almost afraid to go further, "besides,
you know... Donnie."

Cartier shook her head. "Neither one of us are angels, but we shouldn't
keep beating ourselves up about it. All we can do is make better decisions and
try to be better people for our children"

"I know, but I was relentless in pursuing-'

"Look, it takes two. Jason could have easily resisted your advances. To
me he had more of a duty to me than you"

"We're such horrible people, Cartier. Could you ever forgive us? Will
you forgive me? I'm sorry ... I'm truly sorry for hurting you. I truly must
have bumped my fucking head."

"It's all good, Monya. It's the past, and I think I can get past it."

"You're more of a woman than I'll ever be," Monya concluded.

As the night progressed, the women grew close again as they reminisced
on their past. When Cartier reached over and planted a soft kiss on Monya's
lips, she didn't resist. Instead, she parted her mouth and welcomed the soft
tongue of her former best friend. As their kisses got more intense, Cartier
inched closer to Monya and began to remove her towel. As the towel feel to the bed, Cartier's hands began to explore Monya's battered body. Her strong
hands began to massage every inch of Monya's body from her outer thighs to
her small breasts.

Monya relaxed and welcomed the feelings as Cartier replaced her hand
with her tongue. Soft, wet kisses traced Monya's outer legs to inner thighs
until ultimately reaching her neatly manicured pussy. Hesitating only
momentarily, Cartier parted Monya's nether lips and began to suck on her
clitoris with steady, firm movement.

Monya moaned her pleasure as she gently rocked her hips back and forth.
Both women wondered what they were doing making love to each other,
but the feeling was too intense to stop. Cartier stuck her finger in Monya's
inflamed pussy and hot juices seeped out. Cartier continued to finger fuck
Monya until she pulled Cartier up and they began grinding on each other.

Monya then wanted to please Cartier and went down on her and began
to taste her pussy. The two women were bent on pleasing one another as they
experienced feelings that only a woman could invoke. Monya then took the
lead and positioned herself on top of Cartier in the sixty-nine position. This
took their pleasure to the next level and each woman experienced a mindbending orgasm. They both lay there still, unwilling to talk.

Monya was trying to come up with words and then decided that actions
would better represent any words. She jumped out of bed and went into her
top drawer and pulled out her secret stash of sex toys. She had a massive, dark
chocolate colored dildo that would enhance their lovemaking. Cartier smiled
a devilish grin and Monya sauntered back toward the bed.

"I thought you'd like this," Monya smiled.

The two women brought each other to multiple orgasms until they were
physically depleted. Within moments they both drifted off into a light sleep.
Cartier awoke first a few hours later and tried to quietly leave, but Monya felt
her rumbling in the bed.

"Don't go," Monya asked softly.

"I gotta go and get Christian."

"Who has her?"

"My mother."

"Then you can definitely stay," Monya shot back. "You know Trina won't
trip."

"What about Jason? I know his ass will start calling soon. I've been
missing for days:"

Monya tossed her eyes up in the air at the mere mention of Jason's name.
She didn't know if she should tell Cartier that he just left, before she arrived
the other day. Although they didn't fuck, Jason did his favorite thing: ate her
pussy like a champ and gave her some cash. She pushed that thought out of
her head. That situation would have ruined what they both just shared, which
Monya wasn't sure how to define.

"Can I ask you a question?" Monya asked.

"Maybe," Cartier replied, hesitantly. "It depends.. "

"I mean it ain't that serious. I just wanted to know if you still loved Jason.
I mean after everything he's put you through."

"Everything yall put me through?"

"I'm not innocent in this, I know. But all I kept asking myself through
all of our drama was why would you stay with him? You're too good for that
motherfucker."

"And what about you?" Cartier came back. "You don't think that you're
too good for him? Or is this your way of getting me to back off of Jason so you
can have him exclusively?"

Again, Monya weighed her words and thought before she spoke. The
hood in her wanted to snap and curse Cartier out, even after she just got her
ass kicked. But after what they just shared she wanted to speak frankly and
honestly.

"Even if you backed off I wouldn't have Jason exclusively," Monya
replied. "He has way too many bitches to ever be faithful. Secondly, out of all his bitches-and I'm including myself, he loves you the most. I've done
everything in my power to get him to leave you and he won't budge. But even
though he won't leave you, that doesn't mean you can't leave him. I mean, look
at me, I done fucked our whole borough, and you and I are competing over
the same dude. Got babies by him and the whole nine. But what's fucked up is
that you're a good girl and I ain't shit, now you tell me what's really good?"

"Monya, I feel you, but he's the father of my daughter."

"And?"

"And I don't want to break up our household even though I keep telling
myself I would ... that I should," Cartier explained. "I don't want Christian
raised in a broken home as I did."

Monya shook her head. She really didn't get what Cartier was saying, but
she decided not to push.

"Well, I'm not gonna fuck with him no more," Monya exclaimed.

"Stop lying, bitch," Cartier said, jokingly.

"I'm serious. He don't know how to fuck anyway and as you know his
dick is so little and always want somebody to suck it."

Laughing, Cartier replied, "You too?"

"Hell yeah!" Monya began. "And after y'all fuck, do he be asking you, 'Was
I enough for you?' I be wanting to say so badly, `Hell motherfucking no!'"

At this point, both women burst out laughing. They were both tickled
clowning Jason and his little dick.

"But all jokes aside, Jason is a good man," Cartier said. "I mean, he has a
good heart, he's just a dog."

Monya couldn't understand how Cartier was coming to his defense,
especially when she'd put up with all of his infidelities.

"I guess my definition of a good man is way different than yours. A good
man in my book doesn't have numerous affairs and he certainly wouldn't
sleep with my best friend and impregnate her. You have to see him for who
he is."

Cartier thought about Jason, her marriage, Monya, and their children,
and was confused. She wanted to block out Monya, but she couldn't. Monya
began telling Cartier things she didn't want to hear, and no matter how she
tried to put on a tough exterior, she was deeply hurt by Monya's words.