Damaged (21 page)

LATER THAT NIGHT

N
ut leaned up against his horn for a long time, even though he was early as hell. I could tell he was pissed. He kept blowing
the horn every two seconds. Me, Shakira, and Trina Boo rushed outside. I hadn’t even put all my makeup on yet or had a chance
to pack my bag. Shakira had her wig and her heels in her hand. Trina Boo was pulling the straps up on her dress.

As soon as we got settled in the truck, he said, “Where the fuck Peaches at?”

We shrugged our shoulders and waited for what was next, since it was clear Nut was livid.

“Nobody know where she at, huh?” he asked, turning his body all the way around and staring at us. He was so hot, I could see
the anger in his eyes. “Ain’t none of y’all heard from her today?”

I got scared, cuz I thought he knew she had come by, but I wasn’t gonna volunteer no information.

“All right,” he said, nodding his head. “Bitches wanna play dumb tonight!”

Nut mashed on the gas and went straight to pick Marcha up. As soon as she got in, he told her she was moving in Wynika’s old
apartment, starting tomorrow.

“I don’t wanna live over there,” Marcha whined. “That nasty-ass apartment building, unh-unh.”

But she had no idea that Nut was already pissed off, so she ain’t even see his fist coming in time to duck. She screamed as
he hit her over and over. We was petrified, sitting in the back of the truck. I grabbed Shakira’s leg and squeezed it. I could
hear his punches punishing Marcha, and I wanted to get the hell out of the truck. She started crying and begging him to stop.
We was too scared to say anything. I just looked out the window and tried to block everything out.

Nut calmed down long enough to pull away from the curb and to drive us to Fourteenth Street. As soon as I jumped out the truck,
I lit a cigarette and walked as far away from the rest of them as I could. I ain’t wanna see Marcha’s face or hear her sniffling.
I walked to the bus stop and sat down to put on the rest of my makeup and to try and forget about what had happened. I felt
so guilty.

I could hear music coming from around the corner. I looked up to see Joe’s Denali pulling to a stop in front of me. T.I.’s
“Rubberband Man” was coming from his speakers.

“Hey, sexy,” he said, smiling.

I tried to smile back and walk over to his truck, but tears came to my eyes just as I was about to say hello.

“You all right? What’s wrong?” he asked, looking sexy and worried at the same time. I guess he could tell I was shaken. I
shook my head and started crying.

“Hey, don’t cry, beautiful,” Joe said. “Get in. I’m going to take you away from here.”

A real smile spread across my face. That’s exactly what I wanted. To disappear. To forget. To start over. I opened the door
and climbed in. I let him drive and I ain’t even ask him where he was going. I ain’t tell him how much it was gonna cost,
and I ain’t tell Nut that I was leaving.

Joe drove across the Fourteenth Street Bridge into Arlington, Virginia. He passed me the blunt he had been smoking and I hit
it a couple of times until I stopped crying. Then I leaned my head back on the headrest to sleep, listening to the music.

When I woke up, I was staring at a beach. I rubbed my eyes and turned around to look at Joe. He was asleep in the driver’s
seat. I had his suit jacket laid across me like a blanket. I cleared my throat and then nudged him until he woke up.

“Hey,” he said and then cleared his throat.

“Where the hell are we?” I asked, getting scared.

“Virginia Beach.”

“Where?”

“Virginia Beach. You was asleep and I just kept going,” he said, yawning.

“Oh, my God. Are you lunching?” I said, shaking my head and then rubbing my temples. I could feel a headache coming on. “I’m
gonna get in some serious trouble.”

“What you mean?” he asked.

All I could think about was how Nut was beating on Marcha and the sound of her crying and begging for him to stop. “I can’t
be all the way out here without even telling Nut where the hell I’m at. Oh, my God, you have to take me back.”

“You said you wanted to get away. I did what I said. That’s the kind of person I am. Ain’t no in-betweens.”

“Listen, Joe, I have to get back to D.C. This is crazy.”

“Just relax, Nectar,” he said, squeezing my thigh.

But I couldn’t relax. I ain’t know nothing about this place. I looked around, and we was the only ones out there. I could
see the sun slowly coming up in the distance.

“Let’s just watch the sun rise, and then we’ll go back. I promise nothing’s going to happen to you.” Joe said it so calmly
that I wanted to believe him. But I couldn’t help looking at my cell phone. Six missed calls. Three from Nut, two from Shakira,
and one from Peaches. I shook my head.

“How far away are we? I need to get back, like ASAP.”

“It’s going to take us around four hours to get back.”

“Four hours! Nigga, are you crazy bringing me all the way down here?!”

He laughed. “Listen to you. It’s going to be all right. I promise. Just chill.”

“You have no idea!” This nigga was playing with my life, and he really thought this shit was funny.

Joe started rolling another blunt. I watched him picking seeds out and then twisting and licking it up. Soon he was lighting
up, and then he changed the music that had been playing real low to another song.

“Listen to this song. It’s my favorite. Mos Def. ‘Umi Says.’” He turned the volume up until the music filled the truck.

“Umi?” I asked, confused.

“I think it means mother or grandmother,” Joe said, and then he hit the blunt and passed it to me.

A voice came over the speakers. It was a slow hip-hop song, with pianos and soft drum beats. Almost like a rap-jazz joint.
Mos Def kept saying “Shine your light on the world.” I hit the Bob and blew the smoke out.

“I ain’t no perfect man,” Joe sang along with Mos, closing his eyes. “I be feeling like this all the time.”

I closed my eyes and listened to what the rapper was saying. I wondered what my mother and grandmother would think about how
I was living now. Would they be mad that I wasn’t shining my light on the world? It was a cool song, but it was real long.
By the time it was over, I opened my eyes and the sun was just about all the way up.

“It’s beautiful, ain’t it?” Joe said, looking mesmerized.

I wasn’t sure if he was talking about the song or the sunrise, but they both was beautiful, so I nodded. I had never watched
the sun rise on the beach before, only from the streets or after leaving a motel room. The sun was about to shine its light
on the world.

“All right. Let’s get you back,” he said, throwing the car in reverse and then pulling onto the street.

“Good,” I mumbled, relieved.

“Let me ask you something,” he said, merging onto 264 West. It was a lot of people on the road, but it was the middle of the
workweek and a little before rush hour.

I rolled my eyes cuz I already knew what he was gonna say.

“How you get into this?”

“Don’t even ask that… please,” I said, throwing my hand up. I ran my fingers through my weave with my other hand and stared
at the cars in front of us.

“Well, do you want to get out?”

“Joe,” I said, annoyed. Why he keep pushing it?

“I’m just saying. You are a beautiful girl. Ain’t there something else you want to do with your life?”

“How you gonna ask me that? I could turn right around and ask you the same thing. Why you paying for pussy?” I covered my
mouth, cuz I ain’t mean to actually ask the question, but it just fell out.

He rolled his eyes and got quiet. “We ain’t never had sex. So don’t even try it.”

“Oh, so eating pussy not having sex?” I asked, sarcastically. “Since when?”

“There’s no penetration.”

“Whatever, Joe,” I said, rolling my eyes. “What? You wanna save me or something? Is that it?”

The car got quiet. We drove for an hour without saying anything, and then Joe pulled off the highway and stopped at a Cracker
Barrel restaurant.

“You hungry, right?”

I started to say no, so we could hurry up and get back, but I was already really late. Nut was gonna be mad, one way or the
other. I ain’t think it was such a thing as making him madder. “Yeah, I’m hungry.”

My cell phone kept vibrating the whole time we ate breakfast. After I went to the bathroom, I decided to call Peaches first.
She just wanted to know if Nut was looking for her. Of course he was. But I told her not to worry about it and to just let
me know how everything goes from time to time. After we got off the phone, I called Shakira.

“Bitch, where the hell are you?” Shakira shouted in the phone. “You know that nigga is going berserk!”

“I’m on my way home.”

“You better hurry the hell up. He talking about holding me and Trina Boo hostage and shit, since you and Peaches gone!”

“Where you at?” I asked.

“At the house, but he’s downstairs with Trina Boo. That nigga talking real crazy.”

I shook my head and walked a few feet to see what Joe was doing. “Oh, my God.”

“You with a trick?”

“Yeah.”

“Girl, just hurry the hell up and get here. I hope that nigga paying your ass a lot of cash, cuz Nut is going fucking crazy!”

“Okay, okay. I’m on my way,” I said and then hung up. My heart started racing. I knew Nut was gonna whip my ass when I came
back unless I had enough money that would make him shut the hell up. I had saved almost two thousand dollars from charging
double. If I couldn’t talk Joe into giving me a lot, I ain’t know what I was gonna do. I walked back over to the table, twisting
my hands.

“What’s wrong, Nectar?”

I shook my head from left to right. “I told you he’s gonna trip.”

“Who?”

“Nut! Ain’t you listening to anything I’ve been saying?”

“Listen, how much you need?”

“Two thousand,” I said, pouting.

“For real?” he said, rubbing his chin. He looked at his plate and then said, “I’ll have to go to the bank, but okay.”

Okay?
He had it like that? I relaxed. I would give Nut $1,500 and keep the other five for me. That was a lot more than I ever gave
him in one night, so he’d definitely be satisfied.

When we was back in the truck and on the road, I couldn’t resist asking Joe what he did for money.

He shook his head and said, “I’ll tell you, if you tell me what’s the one thing you’d do if you wasn’t doing this.”

I snorted. “You think you so slick.”

“What? Just tell me, slim,” he said, smiling.

That was something I never even thought about seriously. Hair school was Peaches’ dream, not mine. I just said that cuz that’s
what she said. I did like dancing, but not all like that. I thought about helping kids, but wasn’t sure how.

“I don’t know, really,” I said.

“You have to know. Any ideas?”

“I don’t know. Maybe work with kids.”

“Teach?”

“Nah, not teaching.”

“Maybe a pediatrician?”

“What’s that?”

“A doctor for children.”

“Nah, I don’t think I’m smart enough to be nobody’s doctor.”

“How can you say that?” Joe asked, looking over at me seriously.

“It’s true.”

“Please, sweetheart. You are a survivor. If you can do what you do, then you can do anything you want.”

I raised my eyebrows, cuz I never thought about it like that. “Well, I guess since I used to be in foster care, I think I
wouldn’t mind helping other foster care kids.”

He looked shocked but said, “There isn’t anything wrong with that. Yeah, you should give back. Maybe a social worker or counselor
or something.”

I nodded. “There was this lady named Ms. Lewis, she was my caseworker. A big lady like Queen Latifah, but she was real fly,
though. I used to like her up until she ain’t wanna believe something I told her that happened at the house.”

“Oh, for real?” Joe said, changing lanes. “What was that?”

“I told her that my foster parents put my sister out for no reason, and she told me to make sure I don’t be stealing like
my sister was. But my sister wasn’t stealing. Me and my sister was getting raped by my foster father and then my sister got
pregnant and had his baby,” I said, wiping a tear that surprised me by slipping from my eye. “And all of a sudden my foster
mother ain’t want her at the house no more.”

“Damn,” Joe said, shaking his head. “You know where she at now?”

I shook my head. “I haven’t seen her since that day they sent her away. I liked to think that her and her real family finally
got back together,” I said, wiping away another tear. “That would be nice. But anyway… what about you? What you do?”

“Oh, I work in finance.”

“Oh?” I said, trying not to show how impressed I was. He was so young. “How old are you?”

“I just turned twenty-seven last month.”

“Oh.”

“What happened to your foster father?” he asked. “Did he ever get in trouble for what he was doing?”

I cocked my head, not sure how to answer that question. “It depends on how you look at it.”

“What you mean?”

“He got murked this summer.”

“For real?” he asked, looking over at me.

“Yeah, robbery or something.”

“Damn, son. I guess that’s karma,” he said, shaking his head.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“I’m sorry you had a life like that,” Joe said. “I wish you didn’t have to go through any of that. But I guess that sounds
strange coming from me.”

I looked out the window and watched the cars and trees passing by us blur into one another. Yeah, cuz if I hadn’t gone through
that I probably wouldn’t be sitting with him right now.

“I hope you do go back to school and maybe one day college. You could get a sociology degree, I bet,” he said.

My phone vibrated and I looked down to see Nut’s picture flashing across the screen.

“You should probably answer that,” Joe said.

I took a deep breath and then said, “Hello?”

“Where the fuck your little ass at?” Nut yelled into the phone. “I been calling you all fucking night and all goddamn morning.”