Chapter 19 #3
Once Sunjiya confided her identity, detailed her escape, and explained who Akeem was to her perceived friend, things shifted.
Their two-year friendship dissipated and Honey only saw a means to get herself and her son out of her mother’s house.
She wanted money to keep her from showing up to meet them and exposing Sunjiya.
At that time, Sunjiya was in deep. She wanted to believe Akeem was actually helping her and wouldn’t hurt her but she was leery.
She had also convinced Akeem she wasn’t Tanjaya and revealing the truth to him then was risky, too risky.
He was a killer after all. So to play it safe, she had her sister send Honey twenty-five grand for her silence.
She paid Honey another five to make the call about Marcelin having Tanjaya when they were with Aunt Pri.
Aunt Pri was truly not part of the plan.
That damn postcard. As soon as Akeem found it, a pit formed in Sunjiya’s stomach.
If there was one person she couldn’t fool, it was her Aunt Pri.
The woman who’d taken her in during the first months of her life, loved her like her own, and kept up with her over the years could not be fooled.
No matter how many times Sunjiya insisted she wasn’t Tanjaya, it was clear Aunt Pri didn’t accept it.
Pri merely went along because she loved Tanjaya.
The problem was, Sunjiya wasn’t sure how long Aunt Pri would; so she’d reached out and paid Honey to make the call.
That was the last time though. Honey wasn’t getting another penny from her.
“How much did you send her and why?” Sunjiya snaps.
“Five grand. She threatened to call Marcelin.”
“He’s dead.”
“What! Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?” she screeches.
“Because it wasn’t something to say or even text over the phone,” Sunjiya admits.
“Oh my God. When? How?”
“I killed his ass,” Sunjiya says with so much satisfaction. “I slayed my dragon.”
“And still got the prince I see,” her sister says. “You’re living our fairytale finally and I can’t wait to feel his love.”
And that’s why I’m here, Sunjiya thinks.
Swapping lives, sharing men, and playing games is their dynamic that Sunjiya desperately wants to break. The little swaps that happened when they were teenagers escalated when they became adults.
“Not this time,” Sunjiya announces.
“What the fuck does that mean?” her sister fires back as she sits all the way up.
“It means I’m done. We are done. This swapping lives shit has to stop. I love him and he loves me. This is real, real life, and I’m not swapping,” Sunjiya reveals, intentionally keeping Akeem’s name to herself. She wants to keep all of him from her sister.
“You don’t get to make that decision on your own.
We have been doing this together. We came up with the terms. We promised to always do everything together.
Fifteen years we were apart, fifteen. We promised the rest of our lives together,” her sister insists, repeating the oath they’d made as lost, unwanted, teenage girls.
“But I do, sis. I do. I’m the one who ended up with Marcelin and went through hell.
Me! He locked me up. He beat my ass, broke my bones, and bruised every inch of my fucking body.
I lived that hell by my damn self. No swapping, no switching, just me, Tanjaya, living a fucking nightmare while you flew around the world living fancy free.
Some days he would starve me then beat the shit out of me when I lost weight.
What kind of shit is that?” Sunjiya asks, not wanting or waiting for an answer.
She doesn’t need it because she lived it, all alone.
Tears fill her eyes as she relives the words she speaks.
“He forced me to dance and be manhandled at that rundown, country ass club Lazy. That was me, not you. We didn’t swap or switch then and we aren’t now. He is mine. He loves me, me.”
“And what does he call you?” her sister fires back.
“What?” Sunjiya snaps.
“You heard me. What does he call you? Who does he think you are? Honey told me that you’re me now. I know. So it looks like we switched and I didn’t even know, Sun-ji-ya! Or does he call you my nickname, Sun?” she says with bite and Sunjiya sits up too.
“I guess now I don’t have to say. You already know.
Yes, he calls me Sunjiya. When he grabbed me I had to think of something.
So I did what we have always done. I said I was you.
Just like you said you were me when they caught you burning that trash can at Welcome Home Kids.
Remember that? Or how about when you were me and you got that six hundred dollar speeding ticket and I got a boot when you didn’t pay.
We have each other’s licenses. I did exactly what you would have done,” Sunjiya reminds her.
“Twin, I like how you conveniently left off how you came to Tallahassee my junior year and fucked my man!”
“Because you begged me too. You called me crying hysterically. You needed me to take that accounting class for you that summer and I came. I was you, Sunjiya, the college student that entire Summer A term while you lived my single life in Miami. I went to class, did your assignments, took your damn tests, and was you.”
“And you fucked my man.”
“Because you told me to!” Sunjiya yells then stands, frustrated as hell.
“You have to be me in every way. Please. I don’t want to lose Deon.
He’ll leave me if you don’t act right,” Sunjiya mocks, repeating her sister’s exact words from years ago.
They could go back and forth like this for hours and it’d be pointless.
Tallahassee was the first time they’d switched lives and men but not the last. They did it several times after that and had done so for years but Sunjiya wants it to stop now.
“It doesn’t matter. I’m not sharing this time, not him.
I won’t and I can’t,” Sunjiya says before marching back into the cabana.
Her sister is right on her heels though, not even two steps behind. Emotions are high and they stifle the cabana as soon as they enter.
“You don’t get to decide that shit on your own.
We are a team. We are basically the same damn person.
Shit, I don’t know if I’m Sunjiya or Tanjaya most days and it doesn’t fucking matter either.
It never has. We switch; that’s what the fuck we do and we’ve mastered this shit. He won’t even know the difference.”
“I’ll know and it fucking matters to me.
You will never understand this because you didn’t live in hell like I did.
You got out of Welcome Home Kids. The Daniels adopted you.
You had a family, people who loved you. No one came for me.
I stayed in the system until my eighteenth birthday and all I had when I walked out was a duffle bag.
My entire existence fit in one bag. I managed.
I survived, barely, but you got to live.
Sunjiya got a real life, and me, unwanted Tanjaya got shit, hurt, and misery.
The only times I had a taste of something good was when I was pretending to be you.
So, yeah, he knows me as Sunjiya because that’s who I am.
I’m Sunjiya because Tanjaya died the night I killed Marcelin. There was nothing left for her anyway.”
“You had me,” her sister utters, feeling the sting and truth in her twin’s words.
She knows what it was like for her twin and it was horrific.
However, she was indeed lucky. For her sixteenth birthday, her foster family, Patrice and William Daniels, adopted her and made her part of their family.
She was loved and they took care of her, even after their deaths.
William died three years after they adopted her and cancer took Patrice four years later.
As their only child, she’d received the family home in Conyers, Georgia and a hundred thousand dollars from life insurance.
They are twins, identical in every way, but her life was admittedly better. However, she’s not willing to stop switching. She loves it and it adds excitement to her normally boring life.
“I have you now, and as my twin sister, I need you to hear me and understand what I’m saying,” Sunjiya pleads.
“I’ve changed. The shit I went through with Marcelin twisted me up.
You know what I went through and what I had to do to get out of that shit.
The plotting, planning, leaving with nothing, moving and hiding money, and running.
That shit was a lot, too fucking much. But it’s over.
Done. And I’m done with all bullshit, even the switching bullshit. We’ve outgrown that.”
“Speak for yourself,” her sister huffs.
While nodding, Sunjiya says, “You’re right.
I am speaking for myself and I’m done. For once in my entire life, a man loves me, really loves me, and I love him back.
I’m in a place where I can or at least try to love him back with all that I am.
Can’t you see I’m happy? I’m sleeping so good and not looking over my shoulder.
I’m at peace and feel safe.” She shakes her head then adds, “I will not share him with anybody, not even you.”
For a moment, there’s just a loud silence because they are at an impasse.
Sunjiya waits for her sister to fully process her words and hopefully understand them while her sister stands frozen, dumbfounded.
Never in a million years did she see them stopping this, never.
This is them. This is what they do. They are one, bonded forever, womb sharers, and that’s how it’s been since they discovered each other.
Changing their dynamic is a hard no for her.
“And what if I don’t want to stop?” she finally asks, breaking the muteness.
“You don’t have that option. I have to be a willing participant for you to continue and that’s not happening,” Sunjiya says plainly, meaning that shit with every fiber of her soul.
She loves her twin but the reality is she loves herself more and is finally in a space where she knows how to love herself.
“Look, I’m going to transfer half of the money here to you.
Take it and do what you want. I’m catching the next flight I can find,” she adds before heading to her room. No more words are needed.
“Keep the money and good luck keeping him. I would hate for him to find out the truth,” her twin snaps before sucking her teeth.
The moment she’s in her room, Sunjiya falls defeatedly on the bed. Although she knew she would get push back from her sister, Sunjiya had hoped she would understand and accept her decision but she was wrong, dead ass wrong.
With tears threatening to fall from her eyes, she inhales slowly then exhales even slower. Things have officially changed with her twin sister and the feeling is disappointing and heartbreaking.
“I gotta get out of here,” she mumbles as she pulls out her phone to search flights and taxi services.