68. Corinthians #2
I turned my face to look at Uri. His eyes were locked on me, red and full of regret. “I’m okay,” I said softly. “I’m okay.”
“I-I-I-I didn’t m-m-m-mean i-i-i-it,” he stuttered. “I-I-I-I- d-d-d-d-didn’t mean i-i-i-i-i-it.” He tried to pull away from Nine, but he wouldn’t let him go. His stutter was back, and my eyes filled with tears.
“Give her a minute,” Nine said.
Cross helped me up and stepped in front of me to keep us apart. “She needs more than a minute,” she said, shaking her head. “He needs to stay away from her.”
“Cross,” Nine said, looking at his wife. I could see the conflict in his eyes. Uri was his cousin, his blood, but Cross was his wife. He would do anything for her, including breaking his own heart if it meant she was good. “He didn’t mean to.”
“I don’t care,” she replied. “He choked her, Mecca. For the second fucking time! What if we hadn’t gotten in here in time? He could’ve killed her.”
“He wouldn’t have killed her,” Kenbral said.
“Kenbral!” Nine yelled. “Shut the fuck up!”
“Why?” he questioned, walking further into the room.
The punk-ass security guard took that moment to leave the room.
“It’s the truth, and you know it. He wouldn’t have killed her, but she’s the reason he’s like this!
From the very beginning, she’s been the fucking problem!
The reason he’s so fucked up! It’s all her damn fault! ” He pointed at me.
I took a deep breath, trying to keep my temper under control. Me getting upset wouldn’t do anything but make Uri snap again.
“I really should’ve let Psalms kill you,” Cross said, shaking her head.
“I am so fucking tired of hearing your damn voice. Every fucking time I turn around, you’re there.
Saying the same bullshit. It’s always Corinthians' fault, how she fucked everything up, how she should be dead.” Cross laughed humorlessly.
“You sound like a jealous bitch! Your brother has always been in love with my cousin. Get the fuck over it.”
“You don’t know what the fuck you are talking about,” Kenbral said, mugging Cross. “You weren’t even around. You were chasing behind your crackhead ass parents, trying to hold in a secret that nobody gave a fuck about.”
“Kenbral,” Nine said in a warning tone. “That’s my fucking wife, my nigga. I’ll kill you over her.”
“Then you’re just as weak as Four is,” Kenbral said, waving Nine off. “You’ll kill over a bi-“
“Enough!” I yelled, stepping around Cross.
She reached for my arm, but I pulled away before she could.
“You want the truth, Kenbral? Fine! You’re right, it’s my fucking fault!
I’m the cause of all of this! But it didn’t start with Uri, did it?
” I pointed at Uri without looking at him.
I couldn’t. If I did, I would punk out and not say what I needed to.
“Oh, nothing to say, huh?” I smirked. “If we’re going to tell the truth, then start from the beginning.
Tell them how I got these fuckin’ scars! ”
“Corinthians,” I heard Cross call my name, but I didn’t care. I was about to get this shit off my chest once and for all. “Corinthians.”
I lifted my shirt to show him my stomach.
My most enormous scar, the one that hurt the most, yet I could never get the courage to cover up.
It was my reminder of all the fucked-up shit that happened to me.
It was my reminder that no matter how hard I tried to forget it all and be normal, I would never be.
“Tell them how I was branded with your family's crest,” I said, holding his gaze.
His eyes darkened, and I laughed. He looked so much like his daddy in this moment that it almost made me stumble as I approached him, but I kept my composure.
I let go of my shirt and pushed him. “Tell him what you told me, Kenbral!” I pushed him again. “Tell him!”
“Corinthians.” Uri wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me away from his brother.
“Tell him who Judah’s daddy is!” I yelled, not caring. “Tell him EVERYTHING OR DON’T TELL HIM SHIT!” I pulled out of Uri’s hold and turned to face him. “Stop holding on to me!” I started tapping my thigh. “Let me go, Uri.”
“I can’t,” he said, shaking his head. His eyes watered as he looked at me. “I can’t let you go. I tried.” He wiped his hands up and down his face. He dropped his hands, and a tear fell from his right eye. “I-I-I-I c-c-c-can’t-t-t-t.”
“Tell him, Kenbral!” I yelled, not letting Uri get caught up in his own thoughts. Yes, he’d choked me again, but this wasn’t the time for that. His brother had pissed me off. “Tell him or I will!”
“Corinthians, come on,” Cross said, trying to pull me away. “Come on.”
“Tell him!” I yelled, pushing away from Cross. “Tell him!”
“Tell me what?” Uri said, looking between us.
“Judah is your son,” Kenbral answered. His jaw was set, the muscles jumping as he watched me. “Robert isn’t his father. You are. That night Robert thought he had the doctor inseminate Corinthians with his sperm, but it wasn’t his. It was yours.”
Uri closed the space between him and Kenbral, grabbed him by the collar of his shirt, and slammed him into the wall. “What the fuck are you talking about?” he yelled.
“He did it because he wanted to make the perfect kid,” Kenbral answered. He looked at me, then at his brother. “He said if the baby couldn’t feel pain and were a fighter like you both, it would be perfect.”
Uri slammed him against the wall again. “Why?”
“Because that’s what big brothers do,” he answered with a humorless chuckle. “I protected you and Corinthians. I told y’all I knew y’all were in love even back then. Her having your baby was the only peace I could give y’all.”
“Then why did you let her think it was Roberts?”
“Robert doesn’t know that Judah is yours,” he told Uri. “He thinks the sperm that was used was his.”
“Why doesn’t he know?”
“I switched it at the last minute,” he said. “Melissa got the sperm from when y’all fucked. I told her Robert wanted it, so of course she did it. I switched it at the last minute. The doctor doesn’t even know.”
***
"I'm sorry," Uri said from his corner of the room.
I looked up to see him sitting in a chair.
Head down, shoulders tense. His leg bounced in either annoyance or fear; he probably felt both.
Dressed in black sweats and a tank top. Gone were the tubes, IVs, and monitors.
He looked like himself except when he lifted his head, and his eyes locked on mine. That's when I realized he wasn't okay.
"Uri-"
"Don’t say it's okay," he cut me off, shaking his head. "It’s not okay. What I did will never be okay. Twice Cori." He held up two fingers. "Twice, I've put my hands on you. I've blacked out over something stupid and hurt you. That shit ain't okay. Something is wrong with me."
"There's nothing wrong with you."
"Yes, the fuck there is," Krude yelled. He stood in the middle of the room glaring at Uri. "It's definitely something wrong with your ass."
"Krude."
"Nah, nope," he said, turning to face me. "It's something wrong with that nigga, and I ain't saying that shit to be funny. I'm telling y'all the truth. I get y'all had some fucked-up shit happen to y'all, but that nigga is right. Something is wrong. He shouldn't be putting his hands on you."
"And you shouldn't be forgiving him," Ex said.
He stood leaning against the wall across from Krude.
After everything calmed down, Cross called our cousins, and Psalms told them what had happened and they'd shown up.
No one was letting Uri get close to me. "I know you love that nigga, but when is enough going to be enough?
What if someone isn't around to stop him and he kills you or Judah? "
"I wouldn't hurt Judah," Uri said, shaking his head. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his legs. "I shouldn't have even touched Cori. Either time, I know that. I feel like shit because of it."
"You should be dead," Krude told him. "Right now, we shouldn't even be having this conversation. We should be burying the parts of your body that the meat grinder didn't crush well enough."
"Krude."
"Stop fucking saying my name, Corinthians!
" He yelled. "Stop making fucking excuses for this nigga and admit that y'all are bad for each other!
That y'all got too much damn trauma, that y'all being together ain't a good idea! Y'all are each other's triggers! You don’t think we see that shit?! You don’t think we haven’t talked about it?
That we aren't secretly scared that we are going to wake up to a murder suicide because he's going to snap and kill you, then feel so much guilt he's going to kill himself, and Judah will be an orphan?
Huh? You think we ain't thought about that shit?
Because we fucking have! We have, and that shit ain't a thought we want. "
"She gets it," Psalms said from beside me. Her hands interlaced with mine. I could feel her shaking. "She gets it."
"Then she needs to make a decision," Ex said. "Right here, right now. She needs to decide what she's going to do." He turned to me. "Are you going to let this nigga eventually kill you, or are you going to pick you and Judah?"
"I’m not in an abusive relationship."
"Aren't you?!" Krude questioned. "Because the bruises around your neck say otherwise."
"I’m not in an abusive relationship!" I yelled, glaring at him. Was Uri perfect? No, but nothing he did to hurt me was intentional. It wasn’t anger directed at me.
They were moments of fear, from our childhood manifesting into actions he couldn't control. He wasn’t choking me.
He was choking his past so that he could be in the present.
"He didn’t mean it! Either time! Y'all saw it! Y'all saw him! How he reacted! That wasn’t anger or hatred. It was fear both times, and it wasn’t even directed at me!
I was just there. Through it all, I was there. As a kid and now. Me! Not y'all!"
"Then admit that this shit ain't safe for you!" Ex yelled. "Admit that he needs help! That you can’t help him! Admit it!"