Karma's a Bitch (17 page)

“What hurts?”

“My stomach, I feel like I wanna throw upppp,” he complained and tried to get up. Jenny helped him up and then followed him into the bathroom where almostly instantly, Tony started throwing up violently into the cold white bowl. The force behind the food that was flying out of his mouth was so strong that he felt as if his eyes were going to bug out of his head.

“Oh my goodness Tony, what did you eat?”

“Nothin’… just that hospital food,” he answered as he took a pause between spewing his guts.
It must have been that beef
, he thought to himself. He knew something didn’t taste quite right in those plates of food.

“I think you got food poisoning. I’ve got to talk to the cafeteria,” she said, nodding her head as she rubbed his back. Tony burped in response and another long round of food came flying out of his mouth into the toilet as Jenny turned her head and scrunched up her nose in disgust.

* * *

Quanisha was in a daze as she stood at her register swiping item after item to close out a customer. She was supposed to be working the Express Lane that night, ten items or less. But of course the lady she was ringing up either didn’t read or didn’t care, because she was still piling stuff up on the conveyor belt. Quanisha would have normally told the lady about herself, but she was too caught up in her own thoughts.

Why hadn’t the guy she met at the club called her yet? It had been almost a week now, and Quanisha still didn’t see an unfamiliar number pop up on her phone. No messages, no missed calls, nothing. She was discouraged, because she had honestly thought that this guy was her opportunity to break free from Tony for good. He must have just been playing with her, just to get another number that night and look good in front of his boys. She wished she could go back to that night and take back her number. He deserved to be the one that got played.

One thing was for sure, Quanisha didn’t want to be at work that night. It had been her day off, but she ended up having to not only come in, but do a double shift that night. She was pissed, tired, and feeling down on herself; a bad combination for someone like Quanisha who had a temper like a killer bee.

“Wait, that rang up wrong,” the 40ish woman in her line said all of a sudden as she examined the screen.

Quanisha sighed, rolled her eyes, and kept ringing up the items.

“Excuseee me,” the woman said obnoxiously as she rolled her head. “Did you hear me? I said that bag of Fritos rang up wrong. It’s supposed to be $1.99, it rang at $2.29.”

“Far as I know, there ain’t no sale on the Fritos. You probably got the wrong size bag,” Quanisha said lazily. She really didn’t feel like doing a price check.

“No, I know what size I got. Get somebody to do a price check,” the woman insisted.

Quanisha was put off by the woman’s demanding tone. “I just said, I saw the aisle earlier today and there wasn’t no sale on Fritos.”

The woman looked at Quanisha menacingly and put her hand on her hip. “Girl if you don’t get on that little phone and call somebody to do a price check Imma get ghetto up in here.”

“Lady, you half past ghetto crying over 30 cents that’s gonna go on some damn food stamps. You betta get out my face with that,” Quanisha said loudly, as she continued to ring up the lady’s order as if nothing had happened. The people standing in line behind the lady were amused, and they covered their mouths to hide their smiles. One older black man threw his head back and laughed, not even attempting to cover his amusement.

“Oh shit,” he said when he finally recovered from his laughter.

The woman gasped. Now she was embarrassed. “Come from behind that register and I’ll show you just how ghetto my black ass can really get,” she threatened. Quanisha stopped ringing up the items and squared up behind the register.

“Bitch, if I have to come from behind this register you gonna be coughin’ up those Fritos. You don’t want none of this,” Quanisha responded, as serious as a heart attack. Nothing could have made her feel better at that moment more than beating this woman’s ass.

The two women argued back and forth for some time before Quanisha’s assistant manager came over and broke it up.

“What the hell is going on Quanisha?” she asked. The assistant manager, Sharon, was a young sister, only a few years older than Quanisha. Sharon was going to school at Temple University in North Philadelphia part time to get her degree. Everybody at the job knew that Sharon was a lesbian, and she didn’t do much to hide that fact – she was glad they knew. Sharon and Quanisha usually got along, and she was a big reason why Quanisha still had her job. Quanisha respected Sharon’s confidence and drive to succeed, and aspired to be like her in a lot of ways.

“This chick just threatened me, talkin’ bout she gonna get ghetto on somebody,” Quanisha answered without hesitation.

“This girl got too much attitude! Everytime I come in here she throwin’ nasty looks at everybody. I asked her to do a damn price check and she won’t do it!” the lady screamed.

“You ain’t even supposed to be in my line, don’t you read? It says ‘Express’ E X P R E S S, ten items or less. You got like 50 things in your cart!” Quanisha said angrily.

“Yes I read, you little bitch. I can read the ‘Thriftway’ stamped on your shirt. You working at a damn supermarket and tryin’ to get cute with folks,” the woman scoffed, trying to get back at Quanisha for her earlier comment. But her comeback was no match for Quanisha’s sharp tongue.

“At least I work for a living instead of living on welfare you stupid stamp-swiping bitch!” Quanisha shot back.

“Quanisha!” the assistant manager Sharon called out to stop the back and forth. She called one of the people working the floor up front to handle Quanisha’s register and took her to the back room. When they got there, Sharon grabbed her by the arms and laid into her.

“Quanisha you can’t talk to the customers like that. I know some of them are annoying as hell, but you still can’t talk to them that way!” she exclaimed.

“Sharon I ain’t about to let some tired old raggedy bitch talk to me however she want!” Quanisha cried out, trying to regain her composure. Her blood was surging through her veins with a vengeance. She knew she had to calm down; she had had problems in the past with high blood pressure and mild heart palpitations.

“Nish, I don’t know what is wrong with you, but you are going to have to adjust your attitude. I can’t keep covering for you! One of these days these incidents are going to get to Roger, and you know he ain’t having it.”

Quanisha opened her mouth to say something, but instead put her hands up to her face and rubbed her temples. “I know, I know. I’m just having a bad day. I wasn’t even supposed to be here today Sharon! I’m just… I don’t know I’m just tired. I’m sorry girl, I just…”

“I get it Nish, but you can’t do this anymore babe. You know what?” Sharon said looking up at the clock on the wall. “Go ahead and finish out this shift on the floor, I think you got another 40 minutes, then go ahead home. I’ll cover your second shift, alright? Go home and get your head straight.”

Quanisha sighed and looked at her assistant manager. “Thanks Sharon.”

“You’re welcome girl, I just want you to be alright,” Sharon replied and pulled Quanisha into a warm embrace. She was a good friend and Quanisha really needed one of those at that time in her life.

When Quanisha got back out into the store, the rude lady was long gone. She was relieved that for the rest of the night she could just stay in the aisles and help stock the shelves because she didn’t feel like dealing with people. For some reason she thought about Tony for the whole 40 minutes she remained at her job.

On her ride home, Quanisha listened to the Hot Boys on Power 99 talking about the party at Palmer’s that was being thrown that next night. She considered giving Trina a call to see if she wanted to go to the party again for Round Two. Just as she was turning at a major intersection, her cellphone started ringing in her pocketbook. She nearly ran over the curb trying to see who it was. A 267 number flashed across her screen and her eyes lit up.

“Hello?” she asked, trying not to sound desperate.

“Yea, who dis?” the voice asked.

“Uh, you callin’ me right, so who dis?” Quanisha said, twisting up her face.

“This Randy, who this? Quanisha?”

“Yea, how do I know you?” Quanisha asked, already having an idea of where he knew her from.

“I met you up at… up what’s that club name…” Rob said, trying to recall.

“Up at Palmer’s?”

“Yea, up there. What’s goin’ on?” Rob asked, settling into the conversation.

Quanisha had butterflies fluttering in her stomach as she drove down her street towards her apartment building. “Not much, what about you.”

“I’m trynna see you. Where you at?” Randy said urgently. Quanisha could hear a lot of people talking in the background.

“I’m just getting home from work,” Quanisha said as she got out of her car and slammed the door. “Why?”

“I was gonna come scoop you. But if you busy…” Randy said, leaving his sentence open ended.

Quanisha sensed that he was trying to bait her. As badly as she wanted him to come over, she resisted. She had already given him the advantage that night at the club, she didn’t want him thinking she was easy. “Yea, I’m tired. I need to go lay down.”

“Lay down?” Randy asked, surprised that she was turning him down. “You’d rather lay down then go sit down at
Fridays
?”

Quanisha smirked at his comment. He was doing exactly what she wanted. “I don’t know, I gotta get up early tomorrow for work…”

“Girl come on and stop playin’. I wanna see you tonight. It’ll be worth your while.”

“Uh, hold on.” Quanisha pretended to think as she pulled the phone away from her face and walked up the stairs to her apartment slowly. Her whole attitude had changed since leaving her job, and she was now floating on air. “I guess I can come out for a couple hours.”

Randy and Quanisha sat across from each other at the booth in
Fridays
. Randy had been staring at Quanisha, for more than a few minutes, as if he had never seen a woman before. But it wasn’t really flattering; it just made Quanisha uncomfortable. But Quanisha continued to be her usual boisterous self, and was trying at the same time to be as reserved and proper as possible. She didn’t want this guy to think she was just another chick that he could get quick sex from. She wanted him to know that she was the relationship type. And she wanted him to replace Tony.

“You don’t talk a lot,” Quanisha said to Randy as they ate.

“That’s cuz I got a lot to think about instead, yah mean?” Randy answered.

“Like what?”

“Like… private shit,” Randy said seriously.

“Oh. Well my bad. I thought you might have been thinking about me or somethin’,” Quanisha said as she twirled one of her braids around her finger. She was trying to make the conversation fun and light, but it wasn’t working out that way.

Randy just looked at her and lifted his head to acknowledge her comment before digging back into his food.

“So where you live at?” Quanisha asked innocently.

“Damn you nosey,” Randy said rudely. “I stay down North, but I be out West too.”

“Asking you where you live is nosey? I ain’t gonna ask you nothin’ else then, damn.” Quanisha was becoming annoyed at his arrogance. What bothered her even more was that he balanced it off just enough to make it seem as if she was overreacting when she called him out about it.

“Naw, I’m just cautious about who I let into my B-I baby,” he said cocking his head to the side briefly. “You know, like how you cautious about ‘some of these niggas out here’.”