Live and Learn (17 page)

One Month Later

W
ith extensive physical therapy, maybe you’ll dance again like you used to.

Maybe. Maybe? Maybe if I won the lottery, I’d be rich. Maybe if I was a fifth, I’d be drunk. Life wasn’t built on fucking maybes.

A shattered thighbone and dislocated knee. Two surgeries. A metal rod through the center of my bone, a leg cast, and no one could promise me I’d be one hundred percent again.

Dancing was
everything
to me.

When my parents split I found my joy in dancing. When my first boyfriend dumped me one week after I gave him my virginity, I tapped his sorry ass out my heart. When my grandmother died, I jazzed away the ache in my soul.

So many times dancing had come to my rescue and served as my savior.

What the fuck was I going to do now?

“Monica?”

I looked up from where I sat propped up on pillows in the middle of my bed at home. My mother was standing in the doorway looking more like me than I wanted to admit.

“Danielle’s here to see you. And your daddy called earlier but you were sleeping.”

“I’ll call him,” I told her.

My mom smiled that sweet smile only a mother had for her child before she left my room.

Cristal walked in looking like the celebrity wife she was going to be in just five months. Everything was perfectly in place: her streaked hair long and curly, the faint scent of signature Glamorous perfume surrounded her, her MAC makeup perfectly set, the Burberry silk blouse and tan slacks she wore were all classic Cristal.

The diamond on her finger twinkled almost as bright as her eyes as she smiled down at me. “Hey, lady,” she said, setting her crocodile purse on my nightstand.

I eyed it. “Longchamp.”

“Nope. Frenchy.”

“Oooh, I’m scared of you,” I teased. “How’s Sahad and the wedding plans?”

“He’s fine. Everything is fine,” she answered vaguely, diverting her eyes. “But I came here to talk to you about something else.”

“What’s up?”

“It’s about Dom.”

My eyes snapped with anger. That treacherous, slick-ass, no-good ex-friend of mine. Fuck that bitch. “Don’t mention her name to me,” I said, cold as hell.

That bastard Rah broke my leg, but Dom broke a bond that could never be repaired as far as I was concerned. He was on the run from the police, and her ass was trying to get off dope. Fuck ’em both.

Cris sat down on the foot of the bed, and I could tell she was choosing her next words carefully. “I know Dom—
she
—was wrong for messing with Rah, but—”

“But?” I shrieked, looking at my friend like she was crazy.

“Dom overdosed. She is addicted to drugs, and she needs our help to stay clean. We have got to stick together—”

I felt so angry with Cris. How could she even dare ask me to care about Dom? “I’m just supposed to forget that she stabbed me in the back, huh, Cris? Why I gotta be the bigger person?” I shouted. Tears of frustration and hurt filled my eyes. Yes, Dom’s betrayal hurt like hell. She had been more than my friend. She was my sistah.

Cris reached out for my hand. “Because—”

“Because hell. Could you—shit—
would
you forgive her if she fucked Sahad?” I challenged her ’cause I felt like” don’t judge me ’til you walked in my stilettos.”

“Rah is not Sahad,” she countered quickly.

I sucked my air between my teeth. “Answer the question.”

Cris lowered her head, licking her glossy lips as she tucked her hair behind her ear. “I do not know. Okay? I do not know,” she answered mildly. “But this was not
our
Dom. This was a…a…a junkie.”

“Dom is a nasty-ass, strippin’ project ho, and I don’t want shit to do with that bitch,” I said with venom.

Cris flinched at my words. “Dom is
our
friend,” she insisted with emotion. “The four of us have been through a lot together. No man should come between y’all. Especially not a short-dick fool like Rah.”

“It’s not about Rah.”

Cris stood and picked up her purse. There were tears in her eyes that I knew she wouldn’t let fall. “You are right. It is about you dancing and walking without a limp again. It is about Mo being raped. It is about Dom getting clean. It is about our
friendship
. To hell with everything else.”

I turned my head and looked out the window. “I’m sorry, Cris, but Dom ain’t my problem ’cause the trick ain’t my friend.”

“I am not going to desert her, Alizé,” she said with finality.

“That’s you,” I told her with just as much finality.

“I hope I’m not interrupting.”

I turned my head and found Cameron standing in the doorway. The tension in the air was thick as hell, and he looked a little uncomfortable. “Your mother was on the phone and told me to come up.”

Cris smiled, the cool facade back in place. “I was just leaving. Cameron, right?”

He smiled broadly and extended his hand. “Yeah. And you’re Danielle, a.k.a. Cristal, right?”

She nodded, looking over her shoulder at me with an approving double wink before she faced him again. I could tell from the once-over she gave him that Cris was identifying the designer of his charcoal tailored suit, silk tie, and leather shoes.

“You wear Gucci very well,” she told him before leaving the room.

Cam laughed. “I see you described her very well,” he said, folding his frame into the chair beside my bed—his usual seat when he visited me.

Not a day had yet to pass that Cam didn’t come to visit me, whether for twenty minutes or an hour. My mother adored him, and my father admired him—one of the few things they agreed on.

I watched him as he removed his blazer, loosened his tie, and rolled the sleeves of his shirt up on his strong, muscular arms. He was handsome with his high cheekbones, sensuous mouth, and strong chin. When he smiled his twin dimples became prominent.

I knew he wanted more from me than just a platonic friendship, but we had nothing in common outside of our careers. Cam offered no excitement, no thrill. He just didn’t make my pulse race.

So for now he was the William to my Joan like on my favorite show
Girlfriends
.

“Guess what?”

I turned my head to look into his handsome square face. “What?” I asked softly.

“I dreamed you were dancing again.” His eyes were smiling as he leaned forward to look at me deeply, taking my hand in both of his. “Promise me a front row seat to your next recital.”

Cameron was the kind of man I needed, but I just didn’t want him.

Question was, why?

“I
’m pregnant, y’all.”

I dropped the bomb on them just like that. I was expecting to see surprise on both Cristal and Alizé’s faces, but it was the doubt in Cristal’s eyes that
surprised
me.

It made me wish like hell that I kept my mouth shut.

“Are we sad, happy…or what?” Alizé asked softly from her position on her bed.

My eyes were locked on Cristal, and hers were locked on me.

“What? What’s wrong?” Alizé asked, looking between Cristal and me where we sat on opposite sides of her bed.

This was the first time I’d seen her since that night at Bones’s. “Why are you looking at me like that, Cris? You got something you want to say to me?”

The doubt on her face increased tenfold, and she shook her head sadly. “I did not say one word.”

“What the hell is up?” Alizé asked, her voice louder and more demanding as her head swung from Cristal to me.

“Don’t judge me, Cris, until you walk a mile in my fucking shoes!”

Cristal’s face became incredulous. “No…you…did…not…Mo,” she said succinctly.

Alizé banged the bed with her fist in frustration. “Didn’t what?” she wailed dramatically.

The room became quiet.

Cristal eyed me in disbelief. “You lied about Bones raping you.” Her whispered words echoed in the silence like gunfire.

A single tear raced down my cheek like hot wax.

Alizé winced visibly before she, too, looked at me in disbelief…and sadness. “Is that true, Mo?” she asked.

I could tell she was hoping to hear it wasn’t true.

“I stood up for you, Mo,” Cristal said softly.

I said nothing. I wanted to deny her accusations, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.

“Sahad said that Bones said you were mad because he didn’t want the baby, and I stood up for you.” Cristal’s voice and the look in her eyes was condemning as she rose from the chair to point her finger down at me. “You never told us you were pregnant, so I thought he lied.”

“Well, guess what, Cristal? My business is my business,” I shouted, rising to knock her hand down.

“Whoa…whoa,” Alizé yelled out, grabbing one of her crutches to slide between us like an extension of her arm. “Sit down and relax y’all.”

“Your ass is wrong, Mo,” Cris told her.

I felt guilty and angry and scared and pained and betrayed all at once. My chest burned like it was on fire as one of my best friends judged me. “Why? Why am
I
wrong? Was I supposed to kill another baby?” I screamed, shocked by the anger I felt fill my chest.

“Sit the fuck down, y’all,” Alizé yelled out, her face frustrated that she couldn’t move.

“I’m not hanging around for this drama,” I said, gathering my purse from the floor.

“You started the drama.”

“Don’t go, Mo,” Alizé pleaded.

I walked to the door, ready to run. Before I left them I turned and faced Cristal. “Are you going to tell your man?” I challenged her.

“Are you going to tell the truth?” Cris countered, crossing her arms over her chest.

I left the room and closed the door behind me.

They didn’t understand. I did what I had to do.

My parents would’ve disowned me for being pregnant, so I told them I was raped. When they called the police, I had to follow through with my lie and make a report. They did a rape kit which proved I had sex with Bones. Surprise, surprise.

Now I didn’t have to worry about being thrown out of the house: penniless, jobless, and hopeless.

And Bones?

I hadn’t heard from him. I didn’t know if it was because he never knew where I lived and my cell phone was disconnected, or if he’d rather be called a rapist than step up to the plate and do right by me and this baby.

He deserved whatever he got—plus some. To hell with him.

I hated him. I wanted revenge. I wanted him and every bastard like him—including Reverend DeMark—to pay.

Pay for the lies.

Pay for the hurt.

Pay for my dead baby.

Pay for telling me they loved me when they only loved themselves.

I walked out of the house and down the stairs just as a green-and-white taxi headed up the street toward me. Deciding not to catch the bus, I hailed the cab and was glad to slide inside onto the cracked leather seat. “Five-eighty Eighteenth Street off of Sixteenth Avenue, please,” I told the cabbie, letting my head fall back against the seat as I shut my eyes.

My life was a roller coaster, and now I felt drained, tired, and sleepy.

“Are you okay, dear?”

I opened one eye to see the slender, brown-skinned man turn in his seat, looking at me with concerned eyes. “I’m fine, but thanks for asking.”

“Okay.” He turned back around. “Mind if I play the radio?”

“It’s your cab,” I said with a yawn, closing my eyes. I wanted to crawl into a ball on my bed and cry myself to sleep.

“I just love this song. How ’bout you?” the cabbie asked as the car came to a complete stop.

I recognized Donnie McClurkin’s 2001 gospel hit “We Fall Down.” It was my mother’s favorite song. That song hit home with me. I listened to the words in silence, surprised by the tears that welled up in my eyes. Quickly, I blinked them away.

I hated my life. The only good thing in it was this baby.

Some emotion rose inside of me, and I felt the tears falling. There was nothing I could do to stop them. I squeezed my eyes shut and wiped them with my fingers.

“Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.”

My eyes shot open at the cabbie’s words. I looked through my fingers to find him turned in his seat again and looking at me with concern.

“It must be a heavy load you’re carrying, child. Do you want to talk about it? I’m Reverend Hampton.”

I stiffened. What was he going to do now, try and get in my panties like the oh-so-great Revered Reverend DeMark? Please. “If you’re a minister, why are you driving a cab?” I asked with attitude, not in the mood for another man’s lies.

He smiled and laughed at the question. “Our church, the Holiness Church of Christ, is very small, and I don’t want to rely on the congregation to pay me a salary. I minister for the Lord not for the wealth.”

That
surprised me. Was this guy for real?

The light turned green and he faced forward to accelerate ahead.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked.

“Why? So you can tell me I’m gonna burn in hell, too?” My tone was sullen as he steered through the busy Newark streets.

Our eyes met in the rearview mirror, and I saw nothing but concern. More concern than I’d ever seen in my own father’s eyes. Damn shame when a stranger appeared to care more about you than your own father.

Still….

“I’m pregnant and not married,” I told him, being flagrant and cocky, wanting to shock him.

He nodded solemnly. “Do you attend church?”

A fluke of a church led by the devil himself, but a church nonetheless. “Yes.”

“That’s good. It’s during trying times that you need fellowship.”

I snorted in derision as I shifted my eyes to look out the window. “These days you can get a whole lot more than just fellowship at church.”

I felt his eyes on me.

“You have something troubling you. Share your burden. You can’t carry it alone.”

That was easy for him to say. I had no one to help me shoulder my burdens. Cristal was mad at me. Ze and Dom had their own problems. My parents were so judgmental. My minister was a fraud. Bones had already fucked me over big-time.

Who did that leave? Just me, myself, and I.

The cab stopped, and I turned my head to the right and looked out at my parents’ home. “How much do I owe you?” I asked, opening my purse as I felt myself slipping into an emotional abyss.

“Nothing but a promise that you’ll talk to someone.”

I looked up at him just as he placed a business card in the money tray of the bulletproof divider.

“If you have no one else to talk to, then you can call on me.”

I took the card, not wanting to be rude and planning to throw it away as soon as I was out of his eyesight. “Thanks.”

It was a funny thing, though. As I stood on the sidewalk watching his green-and-white taxi pull away, I couldn’t bring myself to tear up that card.