Chapter 60 Crystal
Crystal
I stood with my hands on my hips, waiting for Neville to answer me. “How much?” I screamed again.
Neville looked at me and tilted his head to the side and said, “Nothing. I never cashed the check.”
I was stunned. “What? I don’t understand,” I said, completely confused now. “Isn’t this what you do? I mean, you charge women to…to—”
“Yes. But not you, Crystal. You were one of my best friends growing up. You were the only one who made me feel like I was okay when I wasn’t.” He laughed a little then. “You never made fun of my jug head or big feet. I know I wasn’t the most attractive child.
“And besides,” he continued, “you’re a beautiful, sexy woman. What man wouldn’t want to make love to you? I know I would have paid you , if the roles were reversed.”
I just stood there with my mouth open.
“Most of the women I, um, service are wealthy white women who come down for their slave poundings—”
“Slave poundings?”
Neville snickered. “Yeah, that’s what we call it. White women who feel bad about slavery and the continued oppression of black people. They feel so bad that they want to help us ‘help’ them , if you know what I mean.”
I was starting to.
“But it’s different for us with our own women. We may fuck for money, but when it comes to black women, we make love to them—it’s impossible to do it any other way—at least it is for me.”
I didn’t know if he’d just made a beautiful statement about black women or a degrading statement about black men.
“But you want me to leave and I will,” he said, turning and walking away.
***
Now, I was lying alone in my bed, replaying the whole scene, I wondered if I’d made the right decision.
I had overreacted. I knew that I had. Didn’t I have a good time? Hadn’t I had the best sex of my life? What the fuck was I so upset about anyway? Okay, that whole scene at the swingers’ club was certainly not something I would ever want to do again.
But it had been something, hadn’t it?
I laughed out loud at the memory, and then slapped my hands over my mouth.
Little Miss Goody Two-Shoes Crystal had fucked a strange man.
A few strange men! No one would believe it!
I rolled over onto my side. Well, I had gotten what I wished for, right?
I mean I had been pining for a good piece of dick since Kendrick left, and I’d gotten just that, hadn’t I?
So what was all the fuss about?
Well, Mama being involved still left a bad taste in my mouth, but I guess she really thought she was helping me out. And hadn’t she done just that? Yeah, she had. I pulled myself out of bed. A mother’s love is something else, I thought, as I started down the hallway toward Neville’s room.