Mesmerized By A Street King 2 Page 2

  She was supposed to be studying but the husky ass textbook she had on my bed was open on the same page for the past thirty minutes, and I laid back puffing on my blunt waiting for her to open her mouth and let me know what was on her mind.

  “I’m just wondering if you and your brothers are ok. Johan wasn’t happy at all, and Zayne… I never seen him so distraught and helpless…”

  I nodded my head completely understanding where she was coming from. I took one last puff of the blunt and ashed it before I sat up on the bed some.

  “We’re good, that’s just how we are, anyone involved with us we take seriously.”

  “Even if it’s her own mother doing dumb shit?”

  “Even that bitch,” I spat in a serious tone. Qwinae was wrong and I knew she was going to be dealt with sooner or later.

  “Zayne kept saying he was going to kill her.”

  “He was upset. Would he do it, maybe,” I shrugged. “Which is why we kept him far away from her. Za’naa is his life. He will go to hell and back for her. On top of that she’s the only niece.”

  “I understand. I can tell he loves her. Shoot, all of of yall love her.”

  I can’t even front and say that shit she said wasn’t bothering me. I wanted to tell Zayne bad as shit but it wasn’t more important than him easing the tension of thinking his daughter got snatched up from school.

  One thing about Za’naa was that she was a smart girl. The only female growing up amongst young men we taught her to always speak her mind and to be fearless. If Za’naa had a question she was going to ask and if you gave her an answer she wasn’t willing to accept she was going to keep on asking until she felt she had the truth. Shit, as far as we knew Qwinae was with Zayne, she got pregnant and they had a baby. It was simple right? No foul play was thought of until now and if you asked me, if that was the fucking case she should’ve kept that shit to her damn self.

  WE had Za’naa since she was born. Man, I was the one who taught that once chubby little baby how to walk when she really wanted a piece of my watermelon, so there was no way she thought she can take my baby girl from us. I don’t care who blood ran through her veins at this point Za’naa was a Moseley.

  “I’m glad she’s back. I admire you and your brothers bond. Sometimes I wish I had siblings. KeKe was the closest thing I had but that was in middle school up until now.”

  “We a’ight,”I responded knowing that the connection we had ran deep as fuck. We may have gotten on each others nerves at one point but good or bad we were rocking with each other front and center, no questions asked. We had that mentality way before Unc came into the picture and once he came into our life it only gotten stronger.

  “What’s your peoples like?”

  “Nothing exciting. My mom and dad married young, they had me and he owns a shop in here in Philly. I grew up in Wynnefield most of my life. Pretty much boring.”

  “Ain’t nothing wrong with that.”

  “Well, what about you?”

  “What about me?”

  Camille moved the laptop off her lap and shut her textbook staring at me intently.

  “I have an idea about you and your brothers, but what’s your family like?”

  “They’re regular.”

  Camille giggled and rolled her damn eyes. “Ain’t nothing regular about a Moseley.”

  “How you figure?”

  “The streets talk.”

  “Them middle-class streets?” I asked back, and she sucked her teeth and lifted a pillow trying to hit me with it.

  “I’m talking about your family outside your brothers.”

  “I have an aunt and uncle.”

  “And…”

  “Shouldn’t you be studying?” I asked back.

  “I don’t really need to study. I was trying to busy myself from not being nosey, but I can’t help it. It’s not fair you know so much about me, and I barely know you. I want to know the Asahd Moseley that’s apart from the streets.”

  “Ain’t much,” I shrugged not really wanting to get into that part of me. For years that part of my life was unspoken of for a long time. I shared with Shirley and Unc how much I didn’t like my mom, but after I got that off my chest I was good, or at least I thought I was.

  “You came from somewhere, and I know it wasn’t from your aunt and uncle. What about your mom?”

  “She’s dead. She died, when I was four.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be, because I’m not,” I responded taking back the dutch and relighting it. I needed something to ease the memories I had growing up. It was one thing to think about it, I can easily occupy myself, so my mind wouldn’t wander back to them short torturous years.

  It wasn’t just the filth and hunger pains, but I was stuck in that house when Zayne and Johan went to go get food watching that bitch get high. It was weird. Sometimes she would bring niggas all in the crib and fuck them right in front of me just to get a hit. The first time I was young and thought she was getting hurt. I didn’t think moans were a satisfying sound at that young age, so I called myself trying to defend her smoker ass which resulted in her trick being mad, she couldn’t get high, and she then beat my ass.

  I was thankful she decided to drop the entire conversation because my entire demeanor shifted and I didn’t want to take out my anger for my mom on her. Like Jay said, we don’t heal if we don’t reveal but that wasn’t something I wasn’t ready to dig up just yet.

  TABITHA

  My heart was pounding in my chest as I raced back and forth from the closet to my Louis Vuitton luggage, stuffing anything that was of value to me into the bag.

  He knows!

  Fear, guilt, and shame invaded my body causing me to go into panic mode. Every time I heard a car ride past, I almost fainted thinking he had returned to kill me.

  I kept telling myself to put more pep in my step to dodge the bullet that may have had my name written on it. I had to go far and lugging around a bunch of clothes and shoes wasn’t going to help me get away. I decided to stop packing, raced straight back to the closet, and drew back the clothes to reveal the wall where the safe was. I keyed in the code which was all of our birth months in order, and it opened up revealing the stacks of neatly packed 100s which were only for emergencies. We had money in our bank accounts, a huge amount but I couldn't risk getting hunted down by him or anyone he decided to hire.

  I began to transfer stacks and stacks of money from the safe to my bag until I realized my bag wasn’t going to zip. I threw out a few pairs of heels to make the adjustment and snatched it up off the bed.

  How do you tell a man you grew to love that you just weren’t happy? Yes, we had an amazing love story that any woman dreamed about having; a bad boy turned good, married and making heavy moves legally but that wasn’t what I wanted. I loved Johan, but I wasn’t in love and it’s been that way for a while. I just went with the flow because it worked. First, there was one kid, he popped the question, I said yes, and then came two more babies and I dug myself deeper into this facade.

  It was way too late to make changes or amends. If he knew what I was up to he would definitely kill me. Johan leaving made me believe he didn’t know the full story which gave me time to spare my life. I wasn’t sitting around and explaining a thing to him, not in the midst of his rage.

  As soon as I hit the garage door, my thoughts were to at least tell the boys goodbye because I wasn’t sure if I was going to return. Thinking it was best that I just left; I continued to my car and sat my luggage in the back seat. I backed out of the garage and hit the road traveling to Center City. I parked the car on a back block that was almost a half mile from the train station. I left the keys in the console and locked the doors from the inside before I made my way to the station. Good thing I was in sneakers and sweats because the journey to New York was going to be a long one.

  With my luggage in tow, I hiked it constantly looking over my shoulders eager to catch that next Trenton train to transfer over to the
New York train. I felt like I was being followed, but it was just my nerves and guilt killing me. Just as I reached the train station, my phone went off and I saw it was a call from the prison. At the moment I wasn’t in the mood to talk and this conversation was one I didn’t need at the moment.

  After silencing the call, I purchased a newspaper and pack of gum to break the hundred I had and then purchased my ticket from the kiosk. My mind was rattled and as I waited for my ticket to dispense, I wondered if all that I left behind was worth this secret.

  ***

  “What the fuck is going on Tab?” my sister Taleena said after I opened up the hotel room door. I rolled my eyes and huffed as I made my way back to the bed and plopped down on it.

  “Leena, I didn’t call you down here to hear your mouth. I just need your help.”

  “How can I help you if you don’t tell me what’s going on?” she questioned me. I dug my head deeper into the pillow, upset that I have been settled for almost five hours and I couldn’t find rest. I threw my phone in the trash knowing that it could be a way Johan could track me down. The first thing I was going to do when I mustered up enough strength to leave the room was to get a new phone and transfer the number so I can receive my phone calls from the prison.

  “I know you hear me talking to you, Tabitha. What the hell is going on?”

  Taleena was my older sister. She was four years older than I was and still resided in New York where our mother took us after she fell in love with her boyfriend. All of our family was in Philly, which is why I didn’t like the city. It was cool to visit and shop, but living here was a nightmare to me. New York was way too big and crowded. Driving or catching public transportation isn't necessarily a break because it took you forever to get where you needed to go compared to Philly, where you can go from one part of the city to the next in less than an hour depending on where you were going. Just two main trains and buses compared to New York transit line that switched tracks and had express buses that rarely ran on schedule.

  Taleena hated the fact that I was with Johan. She said he was no good to me and all he was going to do was hurt me. Trust me, we had our share of bad times in the past when we were younger, but now, I was ashamed to say I was the only one ruining what we had.

  I peeled myself up off the bed and sucked in a deep breath of air gathering up the courage to let her in on what was going on. I wasn’t honest with anyone except for one person and I needed someone to know the full story.

  “I’m leaving Johan…”

  “Well good… it’s been long overdue, so are the boys here?”

  My head dropped to my chest and I moved it from side to side. My heart felt tight realizing that I really may not see my boys again. Even if I lived, I was pretty sure Johan was not going to let me get close to them.

  “They’re still in Philly.”

  “You left your fucking kids!” Taleena shouted at me, and I snatched my head up to glare at her.

  “I had no fucking choice! Why would I snatch my kids up from our home to live in a goddamn hotel?!”

  “I don’t want to hear your excuses. Mommy always told us if we needed somewhere to stay we always had a home.”

  “I wouldn’t dare go back there. You are living your life with mommy’s man. I’m sure she’s rolling in her grave.” I shouted back and we remained in an intense stare.

  Yes, Taleena hated me for leaving them to live my life with Johan because he was a drug dealer, but she wasn’t no saint.

  My mother was desperate for love and found it in with some young nigga she found on a pen pal sight for inmates. At the time, she was 36 and he was 25, only nine years Taleena’s senior. Imagine how traumatized I was at fourteen years old finding my sister having sex with him. She was sixteen and still a child no matter how developed her body was. She put a grown woman to shame with all the curves and dips she had. I was young and thought he was raping her, so I told my mother. They both denied it and made me seem like I was crazy. At that moment, it felt like I lost my best friend because she didn’t say shit to me for a while. My mom was also against me because she thought I was trying to break her relationship apart knowing that she shouldn’t have been with him to begin with. He wasn’t shit and brought nothing to the table and he was fucking her damn daughter.

  All this chaos in my life led me to go to Philly often, at least there, I had family that loved me and knew I wasn’t insane. Everyone always said Taleena was too fucking grown and I could agree wholeheartedly she was. That’s when I met Johan, and everything went on from there. Every time I came back home I had new clothes, jewelry and shoes and Taleena wondered where I got it from. I told her about Johan, and she was pissed. She was fucking mom’s boyfriend and was only getting dick, and my man was a few years older than I was and was giving me the world. Back then I hated to think my only sister was envious of me, so I ignored it just like I ignored the scandalous things that were transpiring in that house.

  “How long will you hold that over my head?”

  “It’s facts Taleena. You say Johan selling drugs is wrong, but what you’re doing isn’t any better.”

  “Enough,” she responded holding up her hand. “I didn’t come here to hear a lecture about my love life. What’s done is done, and we both know he didn’t love mommy.”

  “Yeah, the pervert loved little girls,” I snapped with an eye roll. I don’t care how she viewed it, she was a fucking child when he had sex with her.

  “Why are you leaving Johan?” she sighed rolling her eyes.

  “I’m with someone else and I’ve been having the affair for a while now. I think he found out.”

  “And he wants to kill you,” she cut me off giving me a hard glare. “I told you he was no good! You see what mess you’re in now? Johan will kill you and that nigga.”

  “Me and her,” I said lowly.

  Taleena’s eyebrows furrowed, and she placed her hands on her hips. “Her?”

  I nodded my head. “It’s a long story.”

  “Well I have all night,” she responded. “When did you start liking females? How the fuck did that happen? You were with Johan all this time.”

  I placed my elbows on my knees and cradled my hands in my head. For years, I’ve been battling these feelings. I thought it was a phase, but here I was 28 years old and felt more sexually and emotionally attracted to a female than a male.

  Yes, I was very much attracted to Johan, but with a female, the intensity felt different.

  “I met her one day shopping. She was giving me advice on clothes, and we ended up eating at a restaurant. We clicked from there, and I convinced myself it was only a friendship.” I thought about the times I hugged her, and my entire body lit up, and when she rubbed on my ass and kissed my lips, my pussy gushed with excitement. It did the same thing for Johan which was why I was so confused. Was I gay or bisexual?

  “You are married, Tabitha. There’s no way you can just go run off with a damn woman. I just don’t get it.”

  “And just because you don’t get it doesn’t mean it isn’t valid. I’m entitled to love and like who I want. Man or woman.”

  “God created women for men. Not men for men, or women for women.”

  “He damn sure ain’t create a man to sleep with his girlfriend’s young daughters either,” I shot back. Who did she thinks she was trying to preach to me? At the end of the day who knows what God really intended for any of us. My family was full blown Christians, but the way I saw it, I’m sure the scriptures we read in church weren’t written by God. “I don’t have to answer to anyone as far as who I chose to be with. Yes, I am married which is why I’m conflicted. I love Johan, and I love her.”

  Taleena sighed heavily and sat next to me on the bed. “Well, who is she?”

  “They call her Easy, or E-Money…”

  “Wait… E-money? Ern’s twin sister?”

  My head dropped again to my chest, and I moved it to confirm I was sleeping with Johan’s uncle’s sister. Everyone in Philadelphia k
new who Ernest and Ernestine were. They were the dynamic duo that ran this huge drug organization before Ernestine ran into some trouble and got locked up and Ern passed it down to the boys. I was 21 when I met her, and I never recalled seeing her with the family, so I thought my guilty pleasure was a secret. By then feelings were heavily involved, and she was introduced to me at a family gathering.

  I was livid. I felt like she knew who I was the entire time and set me up. I was expecting her to tell my secret then, but she didn’t. Easy somehow convinced me it was all fate and that she wasn’t telling anyone about us until I was ready. She made it clear though that I eventually had a decision to make because she didn’t want to share me with Johan.

  Fast forward years later, she was locked up for a charge of possession of weed which was only five years. Ern let Johan and his brothers be a part of the organization and hated him for choosing them over her. She felt it rightfully belonged to her since she was there with him every step of the way. I didn’t understand the feud, and I tried my best to stay out of it, but years in this emotional tug of war landed me smack dab in the middle of it. She wanted me to find out as much information as I could about the organization so that when she came out, she could take over. One thing Johan did, was keep our family life separate from his street life. I had an idea, but I had no real clue what was going on which had me dropping pieces of information that I was sure led to nothing.

  “What kind of shit have you gotten yourself into?” she asked.

  “I don’t even know. Everything happened so fast, and now he knows, and if he doesn’t, he will find out sooner than later.”

  “Well, he can’t be too upset because he used to cheat on you. I’m sure if you beg him to forgive you he will. Easy is a damn woman, and you know some men wouldn’t care about their wife being into females with their freaky nasty asses.”

  “Johan isn’t one of them men. Trust me.”

  “Well, it’s karma and he has no choice but to forgive you. You forgave him.”