My Mans Best Friend (9781622860241) (21 page)

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Authors: Tresser Henderson

BOOK: My Mans Best Friend (9781622860241)
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Kea
As soon as I got home, I knocked at his door waiting for him to open it. I knew it was late, but I didn't care. I had to speak with him. I was excited and saddened. Mr. Hanks was a wonderful man from what I could see, but to know I was a product of him raping my mother was a bit hard for me to swallow. I knocked and knocked, but he never came to answer the door so I went home. I figured I would wait until morning to speak with him.
Secrets from my mother's past continued to destroy me. Derrick was my brother. He was my brother. How was that? I mean, out of all the men I had to get involved with, I had to choose the one who was my blood sibling. I guess that was my punishment for stooping to the level everyone else did.
And to think the man I had been talking and drinking coffee with and living in the same building with was my father.
A knock at my door scared me half to death. It was the way the knuckles thudded against the door. It was urgent. I knew it was a matter of time before the police would come to arrest me. Beating Zacariah like I did, I knew she was going to press charges on me for aggravated assault. No matter how you looked at the situation, she was in the hospital and I was the one who put her there.
The knocks persisted. The person on the other side of the door was not going to go away, even though I wished they would leave me alone.
“Who is it?” I screamed.
“It's your neighbor.”
Great. It was Freak-a-Leak from across the way.
“Go away!”
She knocked again saying, “Girl, you better open this door. I'm not going anywhere.”
“I'm coming,” I shouted wishing she would leave me the hell alone. I peeped to make sure it was her, and sure enough, it was. Blowing all the air out of my lungs, I unlocked the door and swung it open. I know she could tell by my facial expression I was not pleased to see her.
“Ew, why you looking like that for?” she asked, smacking and popping her gum. For a change, she actually looked decent. Decent in the sense of having on more clothes than I was used to seeing her in. Her hair was dyed a darker blond and cut into layers, making her look like she had some sophistication.
“What do you want, Fr—” Catching myself, I said, “I mean, Shelia.”
Holding a cup in her hand, she said, “Can I get some sugar? I was getting ready to make me some red Kool-Aid when I saw I didn't have any. I can't eat my chicken wings until I have some Kool-Aid, unless you got some already made. If so, you can pour me a glass and I'll bring your glass back later.”
Was she serious? She banged on my door like she was the police all because she wanted some damn sugar? I was even more pissed off. Not long ago my night had been ruined; now, she's going to come over and disturb me for a no good reason. I almost slammed the door in her face.
“You okay, because you staring at me like you want to hurt me? Did I catch you at a bad time? I ain't disturbed nothing, did I?” she asked looking around me, I guess, to see who I was with. I was by myself.
My body language shouted, “Hell, yeah,” but my mouth said, “No, Sheila.”
“It don't matter what you give me. Sugar or a tall glass of Kool-Aid would do. I would appreciate it.”
I thought any glass I would let her use would be kept once it crossed her door into her place.
“I can give you some sugar, Sheila,” I replied, grabbing the cup and walking into my kitchen. She came in and shut the door behind her. I went into the cabinet and pulled out the bag of sugar located on the top shelf. I poured it into her glass with her popping gum behind me.
“Girl, did you hear what happened to Mr. Hanks earlier?”
I turned abruptly spilling sugar all over my counter, asking, “No, what happened?”
“He got himself shot. Some young boy shot him in the head. You weren't here when all those ambulances and cops were out here acting like they were doing their job.”
“Is he okay?” I asked, thinking this really couldn't be happening to me right now.
“Did you not hear me say he was shot in the head? Don't nobody come back from that. They pronounced him dead at the scene,” she said unfazed, like she had seen plenty of homicides in her life. Knowing Freak-a-Leak, she probably had.
I couldn't say anything. Could this day get any worse? I tried to pick up the glass of sugar, but my hands wouldn't stop shaking.
“You didn't see all that blood on the stoop?”
“No, I didn't notice,” I said glumly trying not to cry.
“Well, they must have sprayed if off then. Girl, blood was everywhere. His brains were splattered against the building and everything. And all because the boy thought Mr. Hanks had a lot of money on him. He even took the man's keys and ransacked his place searching for this mysterious hidden stash he won in the lottery.”
“He was shot over money?”
“Isn't that usually the reason why people get shot? Especially around here. Either it's over money, over a relationship, or over a drug deal gone bad.”
I finally picked the sugar off the counter and handed it to her.
“I can pay you for this if you want. I got a dollar.”
“That's okay, Sheila,” I said, walking her to the door trying to get her out of my place. You could hear a guy yelling as soon as we opened the door. The voice was coming from the other side of her door.
“I'm coming!” she screamed. “The nerve of some people. He's calling me like he ain't got any sense. And he better not have eaten all my wings up too or you might be calling 911 on his behind. This will be a relationship gone bad. Girl, you welcome to some. I got thirty of them things. I haven't even put hot sauce on them yet.”
“No, thank you, Sheila,” I said still trying to hold back the tears aching to escape my eyes.
“Suit yourself. More for me and Junebug. Thanks again for the sugar,” Sheila said, swishing away, entering her place of freakiness.
I shut the door and let the tears fall as I leaned my back against it. Mr. Hanks was gone. All of the questions I wanted to ask him would never get answered. He wouldn't ever know that I was his daughter. He wouldn't know that one of his children did care about him, regardless of his past. The man I came to know as Mr. Hanks was a great man in my eyes, and he was my biological father. I just wished he didn't have to die alone.
Derrick
Mama was stroking the back of my head as I looked at the floor. Ever since Zacariah told me Kea was my sister, I had been mentally destroyed. My running joke of asking a female who her father was ended up being a joke turned on me in the end. I told Mama everything. I relinquished this catastrophe that had unfolded before my own eyes. Mama said nothing. She just looked at me with pained eyes. And part of me wanted her to feel the agony I was feeling. Why hadn't she told me about keeping in touch with my real father? I wanted to question her too, but I couldn't do this right now. All I could do was soak in the misery as my mind tried to piece together this uncertainty. My biological father's whoring created children none of us knew about, and the one woman I fell for ended up being my sister. I still couldn't believe it. And to make matters worse, Kea called to inform me he had been killed. Just hearing her voice broke me down, but to hear this man that was supposedly my father had been shot was icing on top of an already rotten cake.
“Baby, it's okay,” Mama said.
“Mama, it's not okay. I was with my ...” I paused, not able to bring myself to say those words. It was bad enough with it replaying over and over again in my mind.
“You didn't know.”
“But I should have known,” I said sadly.
“How? Is there some type of sign indicating brother and sister status?” Mother argued.
“No, Mama, but it still doesn't help me in knowing what I've done. And now with him dying on me, I'll never get a chance to confront him. I'll never get a chance to approach him as a man and let him have it. I can't yell at him and ask him why he wasn't there for me. Why he left me. Why he thought it was okay to use women and create all of these children he had no intention of taking care of. I want to know if he ever considered us in this process of him scamming and whoring around. I want to know if he ever loved me.”
“I truly believed he loved you and all his children, Derrick. I feel as though in his last days he knew he had done a lot of bad things in his life. I believe he was also ashamed of those things.”
“And I guess that's why he got shot in the head. Payback, huh?”
“Derrick!”
“Mama, I'm sorry. I'm just so ... so ... angry right now,” I said gripping my hands tightly.
“It's okay to be angry, but don't let this anger consume you.”
I chuckled, saying, “And the father who raised me is sitting in the living room right now smoking on his cancer sticks.”
Mama laughed.
“Have you spoken with Kea since she called about your father?”
“No. When she called to tell me about
him,
I couldn't find any words to say to her. I still don't know what to say. I can't even imagine myself looking into her face again.”
“Son, you need to talk to her.”
“About what?”
“Don't you think she's feeling the same way you are?”
My cell phone began to vibrate in my pocket. I pulled it out and looked at the caller ID screen to see it was Kea. I sat up and turned to Mama.
“Well, who is it?” she asked.
“It's Kea,” I said, not flipping my phone open. I just watched it buzz in my hand.
“Answer it, Derrick.”
“But what—”
“Answer the phone,” she said sternly getting up and exiting the room.
I opened the phone, put it to my ear, and hesitated to speak.
“Derrick,” she called out.
“Yes, Kea,” I said nervously.
“How have you been doing?”
“Not too good.”
Kea
Derrick's and my last conversation was so awkward, even though I loved hearing his voice. His tone let me know he was not doing well at all, and I was in the same boat with him. Not wanting to face the world, I stayed locked in my apartment until the day came I had to pay my last respects to Mr. Hanks.
It was so hard seeing Derrick again. I wanted to go over and put my arms around him, but I held myself back. As he and I stood by the casket at the graveside, I looked around at the mere handful of individuals who decided to show. Derrick stood by his mother's side in a black suit and shades shielding his eyes as he clasped his mother's hand. In that moment, I wished I had my mother here with me too. Even though she was one of the most evil women I have ever known, she was still my mother. But I was lucky to have the support of my father whose hand embraced mine.
I looked at the ground that was wet from the rain earlier. I guess the old folks' saying was true, because the clouds did open up and shed a bucket of tears for Mr. Hanks. I just hoped his soul was right and that he asked for forgiveness for all his wrongdoings so his soul could be accepted into heaven.
I turned and looked at the pile of dirt that would cover Mr. Hanks in a little while, which represented the end of his life. Even though he had been gone for four days, it never seemed final for me until I saw the newly dug dirt in front of the tombstone.
When it was over, I was unsure of whether I should approach Derrick. What would I say? How would I act? Do I now treat him like a stranger? Will my heart still feel the love I have for him? This was too hard, but I felt like I was handling it well. I didn't understand why. He was my brother. A man I loved deeply but not in the brotherly sense. It was in the sense of me living my life forever with him. I got the courage and approached him and his mother.
“It's good seeing you again, Ms. Shirley,” I said giving her a hug.
“Good to see you too, Kea,” she said.
“This is my father,” I said pointing to the man standing behind me.
“I know who he is. We went to school together. It's been a long time, Joseph.”
“Yes, it has. You looking good though,” my father said, smiling. If I didn't know any better, I could have sworn he was trying to flirt with her.
“Thank you. You don't look too bad yourself,” she replied.
While they carried on their conversation, I gripped Derrick around the arm and pulled him to the side. I could feel him tense up with my touch and quickly let go.
“How are you doing?” I asked.
“Not good. You know ...” he said still shielding his eyes from me. I couldn't tell if he was looking at me.
“So, is this how it's going to be from now on? Both of us are going to walk around like we never met?”
“Kea, it's hard for me to look at you, let alone have a conversation and pretend like everything's okay,” he said sincerely.
“I understand, but we can't just leave it like this. How do we even know if Zacariah is telling the truth? We can't go on her words alone. We were hit with devastating information that can ruin us if we let it.”
“I know. What do you suggest we do, because right now, I don't have the answers?”
“I think to be sure if all of this is true, maybe we need to have a blood test done to see if we are indeed brother and sister.”
“Are you serious?” Derrick asked.
“Yes, I am,” I said nodding.
“And if it comes back that we are blood related, then what? I don't want to get my hopes up on something as serious as this, Kea. If you are my sister—”
“Then don't get your hopes up. Let's just have the test done and worry about crossing that bridge when we get to it, okay?”
“When do you want to do this?”
“I can call tomorrow and see about scheduling the test,” I told him.
“Are you sure you want to do this?”
“We have to know for sure, or we're going to drive ourselves crazy wondering.”

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