Chapter 5
five
Nyna
“Don’t you have somewhere to be?” Nyna asked coming back down the hall in sweats and a graphic tee. “You’ve eaten, changed the light bulb, I’m sure got changed recently, moved her dresser. You do this every Sunday?”
“Nah, typically we watch football, talk shit and bet on drag races,” DJ announced.
“You take my granny to drag races?” Nyna asked narrowing her eyes.
“Baby, he lets me drive,” Big Mama stated walked out of her room in a new dress.
“Where you going?” they asked in unison.
“Out. I figured you two need some space. And while I love you DJ you can only do some much for an old woman,” Big Mama announced. “Don’t wait up for me. I’ll be back in the morning.”
“The morning,” Nyna screeched. “I thought we were going to watch a movie or-”
“Nyna baby, listen to your Big Mama. The way you’re going to get over one is getting on top or under another one. Preferably that one.”
“Big Mama!” Nyna screeched again clutching the collar of her shirt.
“Nyna. You aren’t even twenty-seven yet. You should be popping pussy and enjoying youth. Youth comes with strong young men just like that one who don’t need pills to get it up,” Big Mama spoke pointing to DJ and grabbing her purse.
“He can hear you,” Nyna spoke embarrassment flooding her being because she wanted to remain in a place where Big Mama thought she was still innocent, enough.
DJ sat between the two, a smirk of amusement on his face.
“I’m trying to understand the point. You act like I haven’t raised you. Or that, I know you. Don’t play innocent for me baby. The time for that is over. It’s time to get real.”
“They aren’t teaching you anything in church are they?” Nyna grumbled.
“Teaching me that time isn’t to be wasted. Stop wasting your time. I’ll be back by breakfast or lunch,” Big Mama said opening the door exposing Deacon Morris. “Maybe by dinner.”
Nyna and DJ watched as she handed him her overnight bag and followed him down the steps.
“How long has that been going on?” Nyna asked.
“I’m guessing for a while. I typically leave here around ten and check back in with her late Monday,” DJ spoke amusement in her voice.
Nyna looked at the clock on the wall. “Well it’s six you can go. Let’s not and tell her we did.”
DJ laughed and stood up. “Get your shoes.”
“Where we going?” Nyna asked.
“You don’t wanna ride with me no more?” DJ countered making Nyna bite her lip. “Doing all the fronting yesterday like you didn’t like when I spun the block. I remember the first time you got in my shit. Thighs out acting like you didn’t need a ride home.”
“I didn’t,” Nyna replied. “I was going to get home the same way I got there.”
“In them short ass shorts? Had them niggas on the block plotting on your ass and I wasn’t fuckin’ having it.”
Nyna rolled her eyes. “And in your car I was so safe. You hit eighty on Husten.”
DJ grinned. “I was flexing. Showing them niggas I had you and that was that. Marked your ass right on up. Let me do it again.”
Nyna rolled her eyes. “I’m going to sleep.”
“Sleep later. Grab your shoes.”
This time Nyna bit her bottom lip and retrieved her shoes. “Could we not do eighty down Husten?”
“I was thinking one-forty-five on the 701.”
“Not with me in the car. Ninety or I’m taking my ass to bed. This time difference has me fucked up.”
“You taking your ass to Lavendale after putting it on my face had me fucked up but I wasn’t complaining,” he stated making her throw a throw pillow at him. He laughed. “Aight, aight. Come on.”
Nyna followed him out of the house and watched as he secured the house.
Him and Big Mama were really locked in and she loved it.
She wouldn’t say it, at least not right now.
Back in her seat as passenger princess she crossed her legs and looked out the window.
She was taking it all in, listening to El Jefe’s new female artist play in the background and occasionally looking over at DJ.
“You know you can say you missed me,” he spoke pulling off the freeway toward Jupiter Beach.
“Jupiter Beach? What are we going to do hang out in the parking lot and pass the bottle?” Nyna sassed.
“Nah that shit is a no go now. Might be my fault too,” DJ stated pulling into the empty parking lot.
Nyna turned and squinted at him. “You shot it up didn’t you?”
“I was on the hunt for a few months, Nyna. I didn’t have no one to talk sense into me. My guide was across the country taking pictures on the field and shit.”
“You know that’s not how that started. Like the man didn’t slide in my DM’s or nothing like that.
I was at a management firm. I was a paper pusher with a degree.
I thought that if I could finesse niggas out their cars I could make the firm see me as an asset.
I ended up getting hustled. It wasn’t a visible fuck you. ”
“I know,” DJ shared. “I know you and your heart. And the shit we were going through. I wasn’t the easiest to deal with. I got distant thinking I could fix everything myself and then one day I woke up and I was alone.”
“That shit sucks.”
“It does. I really missed you, Nyna. Not just because we were almost something but because you were my friend and you knew me. You covered me and then life changed.”
“I missed you, too. Every day,” Nyna shared looking down at her hands. “I almost told him no…when he asked me…to be his wife.”
“You knew this right here was forever,” DJ stated pointing his finger between the two of them. “I’ve been upset with myself for a long time. I should’ve told you I loved you then, kept your ass at home.”
“Telling me you loved me then would’ve turned to me resenting you now. We weren’t ready. It was too much going on. Too much to fight through. I would’ve placed my healing on you and you on me and when fell short we would’ve been left with nothing.”
DJ turned face her. “What about now?”
“You could love me the same after all of that?” Nyna asked truly curious.
“Nyna, I’m not trying to sound arrogant or nothing,” he started.
“But you’re going to.”
“I don’t give a fuck about that, nigga. He didn’t even know what he was holding for real. Why am I going to look at you different because a nigga mishandled you. You gotta at least pretend you know who I am. What kind of fabric I’m cut from.”
“The fabric is discontinued. They don’t make it anymore,” Nyna muttered.
“Not unless I’m recreating it with you. You’re the only one who gets to have me like that,” DJ announced.
“Boy stop acting like you been out here playing it safe. No need to lie to me,” Nyna replied.
“I’ve never lied to you a day in my life. I wasn’t fuckin’ up and have a kid that wasn’t yours too.”
She chuckled to herself. “Wow.”
“What?”
She took him in. “I thought I was tripping. Over thinking every move I made. But humor me, if I would’ve popped up yesterday with a kid?”
“Call me Daddy DJ. I would’ve changed the little niggas name and all. Why you playing, Nyna? You’ve been gone three years and some months and I’m still fucked up behind you. You’re mine and that’s that.”
“You’re mine and that’s that, is a wild way of getting this back on track.”
“Nah, what would’ve been wild was if I walked into you shit yesterday snatched your ass up and moved you in. I gave you a day. See a nigga calmed down,” DJ said jokingly.
Nyna laughed and shook her head. “Nah, you’re still crazy. Because you could’ve given me a week.”
“Baby, I gave you three years.”
“So I could say I gave you three years too,” she countered before pulling a deep sigh. “Regardless of how it turned out we both needed that space. At least for me I needed to learn to how to keep my backbone and not cave in when a nigga didn’t get his way.”
“You right,” DJ admitted. “I had to leave the streets alone. You wanna know what my biggest fear is?”
“Me burying you before we’ve lived for real,” she rambled off like it was second nature. “And you having to bury me.”
DJ took her hand and laced his fingers through hers. “I’m sorry I didn’t come get you or make you stay. I’m sorry you had hell I couldn’t protect you from.”
Nyna blinked tears away. “I’m sorry too. For letting grief shape my ability to see that you were going through it too. Deeper than me because…”
“Gang shit.”
“Gang shit,” she buzzed. “Where are you with that now?”
“Is that going to make a difference how we move forward?” he posed wanting nothing more than to see where you head was. It’d determine how he’d set his timeline up.
“Yeah,” Nyna answered honestly. “We could be together or not but my greatest fear is not having you in any capacity. I’d rather than tension linger between us than wrestle with your ghost. And if you’re serious about wanting me you can’t have both anymore.
While I want love externally I know that comes within.
But you’re my security. If I can’t have that one hundred percent I might as well be back in Lavendale on my own. ”
“I’m out. In whatever sense of being out really means. You know once you put on this chain and take that flag you’re in it. But I’m legit. The money is legit. The moves are legit.”
“Why are you still in that house?”
DJ pulled in a deep breath. “’Cause in my mind he’s still there. We’re still that group on the porch. Pieces of you are still there and Big Mama’s spot is block away and she refuses to move.”
“You tried to move her?”
“I try moving that lady every year and she won’t go. She says she still needs to be able to be found.”
Nyna smirked bitterly and looked into the distance. “She’s still waiting for my mother to pop back up. And then there’s her garden, reminds her of Veya. She’s not going to leave.”
“I honestly can’t stay another night in that house,” DJ shard.
His admission heavy. “Big Mama fills up most of my days if I’m not at the shop or handling shit.
And when everything goes quiet all I got is fuckin’ memories.
Nothing new. Just what it used to be. And then beating myself up for what it could’ve been. ”
“We can’t live in that cycle anymore. It’s going to drive me crazy if I don’t get off of the ride.”
“I’m all in. Tell me one thing you wanted to do for the last three years?”
Nyna released his hand and opened the door. “You trust me?”
“I’ll follow you off a cliff if we being real,” he spoke killing the engine.
“Good.” Nyna started off toward the water taking off clothes every step closer to the waves coming in. By the time DJ reached her she was in her bra and panties running into the water.
DJ still with his gun tucked in the back of his pants, chain tucked under his dress shirt and flag stuffed into his back pocket watched as she let the water crash against her body. There wasn’t any fear in her being and the woman he missed was appearing again.
These were the moments Nyna longed for. The moments where DJ offered her stillness and protection as she grounded herself.
Nyna allowed each gentle push of the waves flow over her to wash away all the weight she’d been carrying.
Grief, guilt, sorrow, depression, fear and anxiety could not come out of this water with her.
Not if she wanted to start living. Though they experienced death together, there was so much life to be lived and it was meant to be lived side by side.