Authors: Nikki Turner
Yarni wanted to join in, but she couldn't, she thought. She had been out partying the night before. Was God going to approve of her? She listened to the music and observed the people. She couldn't stop the tears from rolling down her eyes. She asked God for forgiveness for all her sins. She listened attentively to every word that the minister spoke. She realized at that moment, that whatever church she went to, it would have to definitely be a teaching church. It felt as though the pastor was talking directly to her. Everything he said pertained to Yarni. When church was over, the members embraced her with hugs and love. She could feel the annoitance over her.
Yarni attended church every Sunday. She would run into the people from her old church. They would make comments, as if her previous church was the only church in Richmond. They would make the assumption that she was off in the world, simply because they didn't see her at their church. She would make it clear, "Oh, I go to The Holy Ghost Deliverance Church,"
"Oh, well it's O.K. to visit, but it's nothing like your home church," they would say in doubt. Why can't people be content for me that I am attending church somewhere?" One Sunday after Yarni got in from church, she received a call from Levi. Months had passed since she last spoke to him.
He apologized and asked for forgiveness. He informed Yarni that he had her money. He was going to send it the next day. Yarni thought that was her blessing. What Yarni didn't realize is sometimes the devil can disguise things as blessings.
Levi called everyday until Thursday, he simply said to Yarni,
"Yarni I need you to do me that favor." Yarni thought about, how Levi had done her wrong before. She reflected on what Gloria used to say to her in reference to Yarni's girlfriends.
"If the snake bites you one time, it's the snake's fault. But if you allow that snake to come in and bite you the second time, it's your fault!"
She fully took Gloria's quote into consideration, but she also thought about the stuff that she had put down payments on that she needed to pay off. She ended up going anyway under the conditions of : Levi would send her the money he owed her, as well as half the money up front he was going to pay her. Levi followed instructions as she explained to him. The next day she received the money. She contemplated back and forth if she should just buck on the money he sent and not go. But, she reminded herself that her word was her bond. She'd given him her word, and she couldn't go back on it.
Yarni took a red eye flight to L.A She usually would sleep on the flight over, this particular night, she couldn't sleep. She listened to her Sanyo CD Walkman. She listened to the newly released Mobb Deep CD, "Murda Muzik" Track number 2, and
"The Streets Raised Me." It was one of her favorite songs on the CD. As she listened to the words of the song, Street life, why you have to raise me this way, I'm surprised we're alive today...But who am I to say...Forever you're a part of me... Street life. Tears filled her eyes. They began to roll down the side of her face. She felt doomed. She was at the point of no return. This was the first time that it had actually registered in Yarni's head how enormous the risk was she was taking. Yarni realized that she could loose everything for $10,000. Her freedom, her life, her job, everything she'd fought so hard to have and established. She knew that there was no turning back. There wasn't a way she could get out of this.
She only called upon God. She started with the Psalm 23:4,
"Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff, they will comfort me." She began to pray, she promised God, "Lord, if you spare me this one time, I promise you, I will never attempt to do this again."
Yarni made the trip back from L.A. safely. Levi pulled the same stunt. He told her he'd send her the balance of the money.
She knew in her heart, he wouldn't until the next time he needed her. She was certain that there would be no next time for her.
See, not only did she promise herself; she made an oath to God, and she knew the repercussions. The $5,000 that Levi owed her, she never called him to ask him about it. She counted the money as a loss.
She knew that no matter how bad things got for her, she could never go back to trafficking drugs anywhere. Every time she reflected over the ordeal, she thanked God for keeping her in His care because had she ever gotten caught, Yarni would be under the jail. Some people would say she was lucky. But Yarni would simply say she was blessed.
FAITHFUL MOMMY DEAREST
Yarni continued to go to church every Sunday.
She thought, "If I can give this job five days a week, the least I can do is give God one day a week. She began to look at church the same way she looked at her job. She was on time to work, so therefore, she never stepped into church a second late. When she was at work, she participated in work to the fullest. At church, she just didn't sit in her seat. She involved herself in the ministry. She also included herself in church functions. She dressed herself neatly for church as she did work.
Yarni continued to visit Des faithfully every week. Des could see a change in Yarni. Des saw a sense of maturity within her. He wasn't into religion. He had studied different religions and didn't agree with all the facts of each religion. Whenever Yarni spoke on her religion, he listened to her attentively, simply because he was interested in anything she had to say. Yarni sent Des tapes from Sunday's services. She would also send verses and any kind of propaganda she came across.
Yarni was very proud that Des had taken a bad situation and made the best of it. He used it as a growing experience. He read and studied everything. He taught himself different languages, took college courses, and acquired two different degrees and was pursuing his Masters, when in 1994 the governor of the state of Virginia cut out college courses in the prison systems.
Yarni expressed to Des that the only kind of man she knew she could be happy with, was a man of God. She came to grips that a man, who is of God, is going to live upright. He is not going to intentionally do anything to disappoint God. So, if this man of God thinks so highly of God, she knew he would treat her as she needed and longed to be treated. She then told Des that she wanted him to go to his Bible and look up Proverbs 31:10-31. She informed him of the fact that she felt she was growing into a virtuous woman. That was one of her strong qualities she brought to the table. She told him she wasn't going to settle for a man who wasn't equally yoked.
Des thought long and hard about what Yarni said. She also told him that she wasn't going to pressure him to commit his life to God. She never did. She always spoke the word to Des and continued to give him scriptures to encourage him to want to develop a personal relationship with God. Before she knew it, Des was quoting her scriptures and speaking the word to her. He graciously thanked Yarni for introducing him to God.
Yarni also began getting in touch with her inner spirit. She read and studied inspirational books by Iyanla Vanzant, along with other daily devotionals and prayers. She learned to meditate. She participated in yoga. She kept a gratitude journal, in which each day, she diligently wrote in it, three things that she was grateful for that day. She fasted for spiritual breakthroughs.
Yarni and Castro grew distant because Yarni had explained to Castro that she wanted no parts of that lifestyle any more. He said he respected her wishes. Castro and Yarni spoke on occasion. He felt that Yarni didn't care about him any more.
Yarni called Castro's cell phone one day to check on him because she hadn't heard from him, but his mother told her he was in the states. She also wanted to invite him to "church in the park" that her church was sponsoring. She wasn't going to write Castro off as a lost cause, because Andrea never gave up on her.
As the phone rung, she got a knot in her stomach, "Hello," said a woman.
"I must have the wrong number," Yarni said hanging up. She called right back. The woman answered again.
"Hello?" Yarni said "Is this 777-9111?"
"Yes," said the woman.
"Who is this?" Yarni asked.
"This is the FBI if you're calling for Castro, Castro's handcuffed. Don't call him. He'll call you, collect that is!" The lady said in a joking way.
Yarni called Gloria.
"Mommy's Castro been arrested, I just called his house and the Feds picked him up." Gloria never heard this type of terror in Yarni's voice. Gloria knew something was wrong and it wasn't the fact that Castro was in jail either. Gloria knew they were close friends, but not this tight that she would get so terrified over Castro getting locked up. Yarni was uncertain that she too wouldn't be arrested. Automatically, she thought the worse.
Gloria told Yarni a few days later, "Castro called and told me to distinctly to tell you that everything is O.K." Gloria never asked Yarni where she'd gotten the money to buy all that exquisite furniture on a $35,000 a year salary. The tanning salon was breaking even and profiting a very minimum. Her mother was well aware of the fact that Yarni had been doing something she had no business.
Yarni loved her job at the law firm. She worked for a lawyer named Jack Do Right. This was his given name. His name alone was a wonderful asset for any attorney. His name alone brought in a great deal of business. Jack was a very prominent attorney.
He had practiced criminal law for ten years.
He dressed sharp and he always smelled good. He was especially crazy about Yarni. He liked the way Yarni could be as soft spoken and look like a rose, but could sting like a thorn. He liked Yarni's eagerness and her drive. She was very intelligent and dedicated to her job and the clients, as well. She was t.
more assertive than the average attorneys he knew. He could never figure out why Yarni never entered law school. Jack knew the very minimum of Yarni's personal life. He just assumed she had no personal life, because she worked such long hours throwing herself into her work at the firm.
Yarni thought highly of Jack. Jack acted as though he had Yarni's best interest at heart. She was his paralegal, and they worked as a team. She developed the utmost respect for him.
Jack never took Yarni for granted and Yarni never took Jack for granted.
Jack was a permanent reminder to Yarni of the attorney she could have become. Yarni was out to lunch one afternoon when a call came in for her supervisor. It was Cara. Cara informed one of the other partner's of the firm of Yarni's background and personal life. She mentioned to the partner that Yarni had been convicted of a felony, and how she should be fired. She also expressed that Yarni was in a relationship with a convicted murderer who's in prison on death row. She added lies and exagger-ated the truth.
When Yarni returned from lunch, Jack asked to speak to her in his office. He presented Yarni with the information he'd received. Yarni wanted to cry. This was definitely a part of her checkered past catching up with her. She reflected on what a quote her mother used to warn her about. "What you do in the dark will always come to light." Then she took a deep breath, and for the first time in her life, she explained everything to Jack.
She knew she was fired. She left out the trafficking, but she explained the whole scenario with Bengee and the gun charge.
She also told him about the expungement of her record. She explained that was the reason why she never entered law school.
Jack sat looking at Yarni in amazement. He couldn't believe Yarni had such a strong drive.
He was speechless for a few seconds and then he plainly said, "There comes a time when girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do. And it looks to me like, it's just remarkable, how you managed to pick up the pieces under the unbalanced conditions.
That alone, says a lot about you, Yarnise. It would have been so easy for you to just say oh, forget about this and have a pity party for yourself, but you didn't." Jack didn't fire her under the provi-sions that she'd enroll into law school.
Yarni's feelings were extremely hurt when she thought of Cara. She began to hear a lot of hurtful things that Cara had been saying about her. She never understood why Cara would go around talking about her. Yarni thought of all the ways she could hurt Cara. For every one thing Cara knew on Yarni, Yarni knew ten things on her.
When people asked Yarni, had she seen Cara, she would simply say, "no". Why couldn't Cara do the same thing? Why couldn't Cara just be mature about the whole situation? After Cara's latest stunt, Yarni began to think of all the ways she could get in touch with Cara's man, who she'd heard was locked up, and tell him some trifling things about her. But she simply told herself, she'd never tell him any of those things when her and Cara were friends, and she wasn't going to stoop to Cara's level.
While praying on Yarni's downfall, Cara had done Yarni a favor because Yarni had lost sight of her dream of becoming a lawyer.
Yarni recollected on the service the pastor taught on Sunday morning. How you reap what you sow. It's like a farmer. He sows into good ground so he can reap a plentiful harvest. The more you give the more you get in return. She met a single mom, Sister Kenya, at her church who was struggling to make ends met.
Kenya was a faithful mother and a person with good character.
She approached Yarni and asked her if she needed help in her tanning salon? She explained to Yarni that she could only work between 11a.m. until 2p.m. Her youngest child was in kinder-garten and went to school only a half day. She stressed that she would have to leave work no later than 2p.m. because she had no one who could get her children off of the bus.