Chapter Three
T
here were twenty-six students in my dance class, including me. I didn’t socialize with most of them because I didn’t want them asking questions about my life. I could tell we were different. They lived in the dorms and went to campus parties at night. I had a Samoan driver named Pacho who dropped me off at school and picked me up after my last class. Then I hung out with strippers and hoes until the sun came up.
I liked school and would have been a better student if G would let me stay home and study sometimes. I was failing my science class. I could not get the hang of chemistry with all those symbols because I did not study. When I told G he said not to worry about getting an F in the class. Just take it again next semester.
There was a guy in my dance class named Vincent. We got paired up together a lot because we were both so good with our bodies. G said men who danced in tights were all gay, but I thought he was wrong. Vincent had a strong body and nice eyes. He smiled a lot and I liked the way his hands felt when he held my waist or lifted me up in the air. Sometimes it seemed like we moved so good together it was almost like we were only one body.
For our dance midterm we were giving an evening performance on the school stage. I wanted G to come because I wanted him to be proud of what I had learned. But I should have known better. G had a front row seat, and waiting in the wings I could see him sitting there twirling his onyx ring.
The lights were shining on me and Vincent as we danced to Latino beats, then brought the tempo down easy with a few jazz routines. For the finale Vincent lifted me in the air and slid my body down against his until I reached the floor. We had been practicing this move for weeks and each time I slid down his front I felt his erection.
At the end of the dance I put my leg up on his shoulder and bent my back until my head almost touched my ass. We stayed like this with our crotches touching as the audience clapped and the music faded. When I turned around to take my bow, G’s seat was empty.
I didn’t bother changing my clothes after the show. I just grabbed my bag and ran outside but there was no car waiting for me. No G, no Pacho, no ride home. I wanted to cry as I walked slowly back inside. I didn’t have any money to call a cab so I would have to change clothes and jump the turnstile to catch the downtown train to the G-Spot. This was the first time G had ever let me go home alone, and I knew it meant something bad.
Vincent walked out of the men’s locker room as I was going in the door.
“Good job, Juicy,” he told me. “You felt good out there.”
I corrected him. “You mean I looked good out there.”
“No, Juicy. I meant just what I said. You
felt
good. Your body always feels good to me.”
I didn’t know what to say. But I knew what the look on Vincent’s face meant. I had been seeing it in men’s eyes from the time I was twelve. Back then it used to make me feel nasty. Grandmother told me I didn’t have no control over how I was shaped. She didn’t know where I got all my titties, but said hips and ass ran on her side of the family.
At twelve a stare like that from a man could make me run and hide in shame. At nineteen it made me feel hot.
“Are you going home?” Vincent wanted to know.
“Yeah, I have to take the train because my ride left.”
“Oh!” He looked at me with those eyes of his. “That was your father sitting out there, right? I saw him watching you. He looks like one of those back-in-the-day brothers. Sharp dresser for an old head. He didn’t wait for you?”
I was so embarrassed. “Yeah, that was him. He had to leave. He had to check on his business.”
“Then can I walk you to the train?”
“Okay, let me change my clothes first.”
I walked with Vincent to the station. I told him I had lost my wallet and he gave me his MetroCard.
Although we had danced together I still felt shy with him. It also felt nice to be with a man my own age who was interested in the same things as me. We got to the train station far too quickly, and when Vincent said good-bye he kissed me on my cheek with soft lips.
I didn’t know how to act. I ran down the stairs and jumped on the first train that came. Good thing it was the local instead of the express because that gave me enough time to cross my legs and have three silent orgasms before I reached my stop.
All I had to do was think about how Vincent’s hands felt on my body and the touch of his lips on my cheek.
W
hen I walked into the G-Spot Pacho was sitting at the bar. He gave me a funny look as if to say, Beats the hell out of me what just went down. Moonie was behind the bar drying glasses. To those who didn’t know, Moonie looked like the average bartender. He was a short narrow-faced brother with eyes that saw everything that moved, and a lot of stuff that didn’t move, too. But I knew the scoop. Moonie was G’s right-hand man. His position behind the bar was just a front. He took care of security for G’s entire operation, and even in the middle of a big crowd, Moonie knew exactly who was in the Spot and what they were doing at any given moment.
“Hey Moonie. You know where G is?” Of course he knew. He was real soft-spoken and looked downright harmless. But Moonie kept his shit understated on purpose. That’s why so many niggers slept on him. They usually didn’t even see his Glock until it was pressed against their foreheads.
He grinned at me with all them big-ass teeth. “What’s up, Juicy. I think he went back to his office a minute ago.”
I walked to the back of the club to where G’s office was located. I passed by the Jacuzzi, the sauna, and the cinema room where they showed skin flicks all night long. On the far side of G’s office was a stairwell that led down to the Dungeon, two words I’d been warned never to even whisper. I don’t know what all went on down in that basement, but I’d heard it was soundproof.
Right next to G’s office was a large storage room where the cleaning people kept their supplies. Two maids were standing inside gathering paper towels and toilet tissue, and I nodded hi to both of them before knocking on G’s door.
“Come in,” he said in a deep voice.
G was sitting at his desk with his hands behind his head. A lit cigar was in his ashtray and Barry White was playing on his stereo. There was a baby picture of his son Gino on the wall.
Another picture was facedown on G’s desk. One time I had picked it up and looked and saw that it was his ex-wife. She was pretty as hell. I wondered why he kept it facedown like that.
“Hi. I looked for you after the show. I didn’t see the car so I took the train home.”
“Sit down.”
I sat down and my hands and knees were shaking. I didn’t know what the look on G’s face meant but I knew it wasn’t good.
“Dig, girl. You looked trifling out there tonight. If that’s what you’re doing all day I might as well keep my money instead of throwing it away on you and that school.”
“I was just dancing, G. I thought you said you wanted me to study dance.”
“That wasn’t no motherfucking dancing! If you wanna dance like that you can get your ass in one of the back rooms and stand over some nigger’s lap and make me some goddamn money!”
I didn’t say anything because I was nervous and didn’t know what to say. Whenever I did something wrong G said things like that, things about turning me out, and it terrified me.
“Pacho is gonna take you home. Make sure you clean all three bathrooms before I get there.”
I was scared half to death. We had two maids for the apartment. One for the weekdays and one for weekends. One time G had caught me sweeping the floor and he snatched the broom from me and broke it over his leg screaming, “My woman don’t have to push no broom! That’s what I pay these damn maids for. You just concentrate on looking good and keeping your man happy.”
And now he wanted me to scrub the toilets? I knew he was punishing me and I guess I deserved it. G was slick and smart. Game recognized game. He had sensed the throb between me and Vincent, and he was sending me a serious message.
W
hen Pacho dropped me off at the apartment, Thomas, one of the five doormen, let me in. Jimmy was in his room listening to his music loud and playing another damn video game. I opened his door and waved at him and he nodded and kept on playing.
Jimmy was happy here and it made me feel good to know that I was taking care of him. I thought my grandmother and my mother would be proud of me for looking out for my baby brother and for hooking up with G so that we could live like this. I really believed Grandmother would understand about me being G’s woman, but she would frown at all the sexual thoughts I had and the way I was dying to get satisfied. She would tell me the devil was in me and I needed to pray harder.
I was in the bathroom cleaning the toilet and missing my grandmother when Jimmy came in. “Why you doing that?
Ain’t that what Constantina is supposed to do?”
“
Isn’t
that what Constantina is supposed to do,” I corrected him. I wanted to distract him from what I was doing. I didn’t want him to think anything was wrong between me and G. He was doing so good in school and taking his medicine without me telling him to. I couldn’t risk him backsliding and falling back into his old ways.
“I’m just helping Constantina out,” I lied. “You know I can clean a bathroom just as good as anyone else. Grandmother made sure of that.”
Jimmy looked like he believed me.
“I’m getting me a job, Juice,” he said. “G said since I’m almost eighteen I can come work down at the Spot.”
I stood up so fast I dropped the rag in the toilet. Hell no. I didn’t want my baby brother down there. I didn’t care what G said. Jimmy was supposed to go to college and be smart. Not hang around playas and drugs and naked women every night.
“Jimmy, you should just concentrate on school. There is nothing at the G-Spot for you. Plus you don’t need to be all up in that environment. That’s why G keeps his own son out of there.”
“That’s how much you know. Gino is about to graduate from college and G said he’s coming back to Harlem and I’m gonna be working for him.”
I turned away because I didn’t want my brother to see the worry in my eyes. I didn’t know what G was planning, but Jimmy didn’t need to be involved in any of it. I didn’t say anything else though because Jimmy had a big mouth and could blab it off, too. Sometimes he took G’s side against me but I knew that was because he had never had a father until G came along.
“We’ll see,” I told him. “College is gonna be here before you know it.”
“I ain’t going to no college, Juicy. I ain’t trying to be educated like you are. I can make more than enough money by just doing whatever G tells me to do. Hanging with G, I can be set for life.”
I got the rag out the toilet and finished cleaning the bathroom. I didn’t like the way Jimmy was talking and I wondered what else G had been pumping into my little brother’s head. I made sure every bathroom in the house was spotless. I even cleaned the kitchen. Then I went in our bedroom and got on my knees and rubbed glass cleaner on all the mirrors on the floor. I changed the sheets and took a bath.
I was sleeping when G came home and got in the bed.
“What’s that faggot’s name?”
He was right in my ear and I woke up in a hurry.
“Huh?”
“You heard me. What was that faggot’s name who had his hands on you.”
“Vincent.”
G grunted then rolled me over on my stomach and got on top of me. This was something he had never done before. I had always wanted to try it doggy style but after my first night with G I knew he only liked it if I was on my back and he was on top.
I wanted to make up for earlier. I moved my ass real slow so he didn’t think I was taking over, but enough to try and turn him on. I felt his big dick pressing behind me. G yanked at my panties and ripped one side of them off.
A strange feeling went through me. I wanted him to do the same thing to my bra. His hands were rough on me and I liked it. He pushed one of my knees up and yanked me back until my ass was in the air. I was getting excited and felt myself throbbing and wet.
G hauled off and slapped me on my ass and my pussy quivered.
Yes, yes, yes,
it was saying. He slapped my ass again. Harder. Then he slapped the other side. My ass was burning but my pussy was begging him to keep the fire going. I bit into the pillow and whimpered as I pushed my ass out for more.
“You like this shit, huh?”
I nodded as he whipped me. I felt his dick on me. He pushed it against my wet pussy but didn’t go all the way inside. He dipped it in just a little bit until the head was wet, and then without warning he rammed it straight up my ass.
I screamed holy hell. I tried to throw him off of me but he was all muscle weight. He held me down and ass-fucked me until I thought I would die.
All the while he was dicking me he was whispering that I better not never let another man put his hands on me, faggot or not. I felt his balls slapping against my pussy but it was completely dry. I cried into the pillow and begged him to stop. For the first time G didn’t come in thirty seconds. He went at it until I couldn’t scream anymore. I thought I was dying. My voice went hoarse and I was exhausted from fighting against him. When he finally did come I was crying loud like a baby.
“Sssh. You all right, girl,” he said. He put his arms around me and smoothed my hair. I felt G’s hands stroking my back and even though my asshole was on fire I was grateful for his touch. “Don’t make me do you like this, Juicy. You mine, girl. Don’t make me hurt you this way.”
He even got up and got a warm towel and cleaned me up. I fell asleep crying but loving the feel of his hands caring for me. The next morning my ass was still bleeding. I went to my guidance counselor at school and got my major changed from dance to business.
Chapter Four
T
he scuffling sounds coming from the window awakened her. She pulled her thumb from her mouth and stuck her hand into the panties she’d peed in for the third night in a row, scratching between her legs. Shivering and half-awake, the little girl scooted closer to her brother on the wet mattress they shared. Surrounded by old shoes and bags of dirty clothes, the mattress lay on the floor of the alcove that was part closet and part bedroom.
A thud resounded near the window and she opened her eyes wide. It was just Uncle Cliff, she told herself. Outside guarding the window with his gun. Moans drifted through the apartment and a headboard banged rhythmically against the wall. She closed her eyes in the darkness and tried to go back to sleep, but the wetness soaking her panties sent her climbing over her younger brother, her feet noiseless on the cold tile as she sidestepped the bags of rotting garbage and headed toward the moaning sounds coming from her mother’s bedroom.
The little girl opened the bedroom door and squinted into the semi-darkness. Cara, her mother, was naked, her stunning, milky body moving like a storm as she bucked up and down on top of the strange man stretched out beneath her. In the filtered light streaming in from the window the girl saw her aunt Ree, as beautiful as her mother but darker, straddling the man’s face, rolling her privates all over his lips and chin. Her mother reached out and grabbed both of her own full breasts and squeezed her cherry nipples, her hair falling down her back in silky curls, a wicked smile on her face.
The child hated her mother’s bed, but somehow she felt safe there, too, so she crept into the room and slipped beneath the sheets at the foot of the bed, pulling the covers over her head. Lulled by the familiar rhythm, scents, and fuck-sounds, she stuck her finger in her mouth and drifted back to sleep.
The tinkling of shattered glass broke into her dreams and scared her so badly she almost sat up. She lifted the edge of the blanket and saw that the window had been kicked straight in; splinters of sharp glass were like a moustache around an open mouth as the wind swept into the room. Peeking from under the sheets the girl saw a tall muscular man coming in through the window. He was dressed in black and his head was smooth. Forcing herself to remain still, she squeezed her thighs together and bit into her thumb as a stream of hot urine slipped from her and pooled into the bed. She’d get her ass whipped good now. That was for sure. Mama would call her a stinking little piss-pot and then tear her ass up.
“What the fuck you doin?” Her mother cursed and jumped off the man in mid-stroke. “Niggah, you must be outta your fuckin mind!”
“Where’s my money, you trick-ass bitch?”
“Cliff!” aunt Ree screamed toward the window. “Get your black ass in here! This motherfucker got a gun!”
“Yo, niggah!” The man in the bed sat up against the headboard and fumbled around for his pants. “What’s up wit this shit? I put out my money for this pussy and I wanna finish getting mine—”
Fire flashed from the slice of metal in the tall man’s hand and the room exploded in thunder. The man on the bed slumped over slowly, leaving a puddle of blood, hair, and shattered bone sliding down the headboard. The girl’s mother stared at the corpse she’d just finished riding. The odor of shit and brains filled the room as his lifeless penis curved and shrank.
“How long you bitches thought you could run this fuckin game? Who’s got the tool this time? Me or that simple nigger who was standing outside your window with his dick in his hand?” The man laughed. “I just put that nigger dead to sleep.” He looked at aunt Ree, then aimed the gun again. “But since you want him so bad, no problem, bitch. I’ll send you out to meet him halfway.”
The gun boomed and the little girl’s right ear went deaf.
Aunt Ree fell back, her head cracking into the girl’s shin. The child yelped in pain and fought back the covers to sit upright. The cold air chilled her and she shivered in her tattered Wonder Woman T-shirt.
Looking right through her, the little girl’s mother scampered on her knees and clamped her hands over the hole in her sister-in-law’s chest. “Ree! Lord no, Ree!” Dark blood bubbled up breaking through the slits in her fingers, then gradually lessened to a steady trickle as Ree shuddered and took her final breath.
The man moved again. “I said”—he aimed the gun between Cara’s eyes—”I want my fuckin money. That was Big Sonny’s dope you lifted, you skank ass ho, and I want it back.”
Cara babbled incoherently, her creamy skin turning gray with fear, her eyes darting around the room as she clutched the sheets in fear.
“I’ll get it! I swear to God, I’ll get it.” She nodded and licked her lips as she begged for her life. “I didn’t know how important you was! Didn’t know you was working for Sonny! Just gimme a few days, Mistah. Please! Just a few days.”
The man swung wildly and the pistol slammed into her mouth, whipping her head back and breaking her jaw. Cara screamed as blood flew from her nose and her lower jaw swung back and forth, completely sprung.
“Mistah, noooo.” She moaned and spit out blood. She jumped from the bed and yanked open a nightstand drawer. Bags of weed, vials, pipes, and a tube of Vagisil fell to the floor. She reached deeply inside and came out with a fistful of bills. “Dis all I got tonight.” She pointed to the man’s corpse. “This square ain’t had no more’n dis is his pockets. Just gimme a few days and I swear on my mother I’ll get you the rest. I swear!!”
“Bitch.” The man slapped the bills to the floor. “You ain’t got a few days. You ain’t got a few minutes unless you can come up with my dope or my fucking money.” He aimed again and the little girl cringed. “Big Sonny might kill me, but I can guarantee your ass is gonna get to hell first—”
“Wait!” Cara screamed in desperation. “I got jewelry! expensive shit! and a fur. I can turn that shit over in a few hours. I can sell pussy. Suck dick. Cut crack. Please . . . just gimme a little time,” she cried, blood streaming from her nose and mouth.
The next time the man spoke his voice was so cold the little girl almost peed again. “You got ten seconds to come up with something that I can take to Sonny right now.”
Cara whimpered, her eyes scanning the room crazily, skimming over the bodies of Ree and the naked man before coming to rest on her seven-year-old child.
“Ten, nine, eight . . .”
Cara looked down at her daughter with a inconsolable expression on her face.
“. . . seven, six, five . . .”
Cara’s whole body shook as she glanced at the blood seeping all over her bed.
“. . . four, three . . .”
Cara’s fear smothered her. She reached out and snatched her daughter from the tangle of sheets and thrust her toward the gunman. “Here!” She stared into the man’s eyes and made one last attempt to save her own life. “Please . . .” she whispered. “Take Juicy.”
The gun belched, and Cara flew backward, landing atop the dead man, her arm circling his neck. The strange man stared down at the little girl, then muttered something under his breath and stroked the side of her face with the hot muzzle of the gun. “You look just like that ho-bitch,” he said thickly as he circled her jaw with the barrel and began unbuttoning his pants. The child held still as he ran his rough hand over her plump arms and already shapely legs before pulling the crotch of her wet panties aside.
He pressed his fingers to his nose and laughed. “You smell like that ho-bitch, too.” He pushed her back on the bed and put the tip of the gun to her mouth. The child closed her eyes as he yanked off her panties and straddled her small body. The gun was pressed against her lips as he fumbled with his penis, and suddenly that dreadful noise rang out again as the boom of a pistol exploded in the air.
The breath was knocked from her lungs as the man fell upon her, his forehead bursting apart like a Chinese apple. She sputtered through the spray of blood that covered her face and slid into her mouth, and then wriggling from beneath the dead weight and gasping for air, Juicy looked toward the door and into the eyes of her savior.
“I love you, Juicy-Mo,” her baby brother said, the pistol in his hand dangling at his side. “Jimmy-Jo loves his Juicy.”
I
woke up fighting the sheets. It was still dark outside and G was asleep with his back to me. The powder blue nightgown I had on was soaked with sweat, and so was the mattress on my side of the bed. I struggled to catch my breath, gulping air through my mouth and hoping G didn’t hear me. I rolled over onto my stomach and pressed my face into the pillow.
A scream was trying to come out of me and I squeezed my eyes shut and bit down on my lip. But the fear still gripped me, had a tight hold on me, and I crawled from the bed and tried to stand, my knees weak, my entire body shaking.
“Girl, what’s wrong with you?”
My legs nearly gave out at the sound of his voice. There were a million reflections of me in the mirrors as I did my best to calm my breathing. “Nothing, G.” I pulled the wet nightgown over my head and let it drop to the floor. I stood there naked. Shivering. “I had a nightmare, that’s all. Hag musta rode me.”
G snorted, then turned over and squinted at me. “I done told you about all that mojo and superstitious bullshit. Your grandmomma done fucked your head up with all that mess. Next thing I know you’ll be sprinkling salt across that goddamn threshold to keep the evil spirits counting until the sun comes up.” He snorted again, then dug himself deeper into the softness of the bed.
I kept quiet. G mighta been right if it had a’ been a hag riding my back. But the spirit world didn’t have nothing to do with what I had just experienced. This was pure-dee prophecy.
Warning before destruction
was something Grandmother swore by, and sure enough bells were ringing dead in my ear. Our nightmare wasn’t over. Somebody was gonna catch a bad one, and that somebody was either Jimmy or me.