Rah

Chapter 22 Solae

SOLAE

When Essence finally came out of the house, I hurriedly wiped my face and put on the facade as if Mommy was okay. But as she trudged through the dirty, wet snow, I knew that I wasn’t.

How had my life turned into all this?

This was all too much. Since getting out of jail, I hadn’t had the time to even think. If I wasn’t obsessed with beating this case, I was obsessed with making sure that Essence was okay.

The day after I got out on bail, I shot right up to that home where the state had kept Essence and Elijah.

I acted a fool. To save their own asses, they tried to act like Essence was lying.

It took my father holding me back to keep from tearing that place up.

When I literally tried to rush through my father to get that bitch ass administrator, I saw myself killing her.

That was when I knew the depth of fighting for your children.

That was when I knew what had happened the night I stabbed Rah.

I had snapped and was in fight mode for my kids.

But my father reminded me that I had to keep fighting for them, which meant not being behind bars again.

So, I forced myself to swallow the urge to kill that bitch.

My father convinced me to walk away and go to the cops.

But Essence didn’t want to go to the police.

She was scared of telling the story again and hated the presence of the police after they had come and taken her and her brother away, and after knowing that they had taken me away.

I didn’t want to force her either. If that administrator could look me in my face and accuse her of lying, I could only imagine what the police would say to my daughter while questioning her.

I imagined the additional pain that it would cause her and decided to let it go, since that’s what she wanted to do.

But I was going to be sure that she got some counseling. Elijah too.

Luckily, there was a ray of sunshine in this day.

Kahlani had been sentenced to probation after taking the deal.

I was so happy for her, and she was so relieved.

She would have a record now, but at least that ordeal was done.

But mine was just beginning. I had a long road ahead of me fighting this.

It had only been a month, but during the preliminary hearing, I saw how much of an idiot my public defender was.

He had no passion to fight for me. The prosecutor had eaten his ass up when he attempted to get the charges dropped.

Now, we were going to trial, and I prayed that I would come out of this with probation.

Considering how Rah was painting me as such a terrible person, I doubted it.

But I couldn’t be mad at anyone, except myself. I had done this.

As Essence climbed into my car, my cell rang.

When I saw that it was Priest, I ignored it.

I was so embarrassed about the things happening in my life that I couldn’t face him.

Over the past month, we had been talking less and less, and I hadn’t seen him.

Sometimes I answered his calls, and he would just be checking on me.

Sometimes, I didn’t, when I had other shit to deal with, which was all the time as of late, like right now.

“What are they going to do to me?”

As I put the car in reverse, I sighed and answered Essence. “They are going to test you for STDs.”

“STDs?” she asked in her immature voice.

“Sexually transmitted diseases, baby.” I backed out of the driveway, hating that I even had to put my child through this.

The bastard hadn’t even worn a condom when he forced my baby to have sex with him. It had been my intent to take her to the doctor as soon as I found out about the assault, but I ended up in jail.

“Is it going to hurt?”

I quickly looked at her, feeling my heart cringe as I saw the fear in her eyes, and put my focus back on the street. “You may feel some pressure, but you’re going to be okay. I’m going to hold your hand the entire time. All right?”

“Okay,” she said, bravely.

“Are you okay?’

She shrugged her shoulders. “I guess.”

“Are you sure?” I pressed.

She sucked her teeth in that irritated, teenager away. “Yeah, Ma.”

“I’m just making sure,” I replied. Then I put a hand on her shoulder, driving with the other.

“What happened to you is scary, even for a grown woman. So, I want to make sure that you’re okay.

Don’t let what he did make you feel like you aren’t pretty enough or worthy of a boy treating you right.

He tried to take something from you, but you still have it.

You did not have sex. You are still a virgin.

You still wait for the right man that loves you and treats you right and never hurts you. ..”

I had to stop. The tears made it impossible to say anything else. Approaching a stop sign, I wiped the tears, trying to stop them so that I could be brave for Essence. But my own words had made me feel like the hurt little girl I was trying to keep Essence from turning into.

I hadn’t waited for the right man. I hadn’t ensured that the man I gave my heart to would never hurt me.

My tears made Essence’s appear as well. The tears started to roll down her cheeks as she reached over and threw her arms around me. We were in the middle of the street at a stop sign, but I didn’t care. She needed this hug, and so did I.

“Not right now, Priest.” I ignored his call again and returned my cell back to my pocket. Then, I left my hand there to keep it warm. I didn’t care how cold it was outside. I needed the air.

The entire time that I sat in that examination room and held Essence’s hand, I managed to hold myself together. I wanted to fall apart and cry along with her as she cringed and squeezed my hand during the exam. The entire time, I blamed myself for what had happened to her.

Luckily, the gynecologist didn’t see any signs of any obvious STDs, but we still had to wait for the results to come back to be completely sure.

During the ride to my parents’ house, Essence was quiet, and so was I. My mind was going a hundred miles an hour. I could have only imagined what she was thinking.

Once at my parents’ house, I fed her and Elijah. Once they were full and deep into their tablets and phones, I snuck out of the house to get some air.

“Shit.” My phone was ringing again. I groaned as I pulled it out of my pocket and saw that it was Priest again.

I went ahead and answered because clearly, he wasn’t going to stop calling until I did. “Hello?”

“Soooo…You tried to kill your ex-boyfriend?”

Fuck. I cringed as my face fell into my hand.

“How did you find out?” I asked.

“I saw it online. Someone posted about it from the hood that I know.”

I shook my head, realizing again that everybody was talking about what I had done. “Shit.”

“Is that the real reason you’ve been avoiding me?”

“Yes,” I whined.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

Though he couldn’t see me, I frowned at his question. “Because I was embarrassed!”

“So. You could have told me.”

I frowned, not believing he thought I owed him all my business. “Why would I tell you something like that? It’s embarrassing. We aren’t best friends, and we weren’t in a relationship. We just hung out a few times–”

“What?” he spat.

The offense was so evident in his voice that I quieted.

“Where are you?”

“At my parents’ house.”

“Text me the address.”

“Why?”

“Man, text me the fucking address,” he ordered through gritted teeth.

My eyes bucked at his sudden aggression. Priest had always been an easy-going guy when he came into the bank. He was a jokester. Even the times that we had gone out, he was playful. But now, he was displaying aggression that was so sexy.

“O-okay,” I stuttered.

“And hurry up.”

“All right.”

Then there was dead air on the other end. He had hung up. I couldn’t believe his sudden aggression. It was subtle and sexy, so I didn’t fear it.

I reluctantly sent him the address and then stuffed the phone back into my coat pocket.

I contemplated going back into the house to make myself look like something.

My dark brown face was bare. I probably looked as young as Essence with my ponytail that was now hanging down my back.

I was wearing a pair of joggers, a leather bomber, and Nikes.

I hadn’t put any thought into how I looked that day because of what I’d had to do.

Hell, I hadn’t cared how I looked since the day I got arrested.

I just didn’t care anymore. Looks didn’t matter.

How I looked had been the furthest thing from my mind.

But knowing that Priest was pulling up at any moment, I suddenly wanted to look like something.

However, once I decided to go into the house and spruce myself up, he was already pulling up in a shiny, silver Audi.

Watching him get out of the car, I suddenly felt like I looked like some naive, stupid girl that had tried to kill her boyfriend, in comparison to his Pele, True Religion Jeans, Timberlands, and jewelry that shined amongst the darkness that was starting to fall around us.

“So, we just hung out a few times?” Priest asked as he marched towards me. “That’s all we were doing?”

His aggression was humbling the hell out of me. His aggression was oddly making me feel a tingling feeling that I hadn’t felt in weeks. He stood in front of me with obvious offense all over his face. He was looking down at me as I sat on the step as if how dare I.

“Huh? What are you talking about?” I was completely confused.

“Don’t act like you didn’t see that I was feeling you.

I didn’t push up on you when you worked at the bank, but that was because it was obvious that you were committed to your guy.

But once you told me that you left him, I was on you.

We were doing more than just ‘hanging out’.

What nigga you know makes New Year’s Eve plans with a chick he’s just ‘hanging out’ with? ”