9. Keyshawn St. James #4
“Hey ma,” Riot said, coming over to me, sitting the bags down, and then she kissed me on my cheek. I thought that her ass was going to hold a grudge from the conversation that we had earlier on the phone, but she’d dropped it.
“What’s up? You grabbed all the stuff that I texted you to get?” I asked her, and she laughed at the question while playfully rolling her eyes.
“Yeah. You was talking to me crazy over the phone. I should have left all that stuff there,” she went on to say.
“Which would have resulted in me making your ass go back and get it. You know not to even try me like that,” I snapped.
“Okay. Okay. Leave my grandbaby alone now,” my mama fussed, walking over, showing right there why I always said that Riot had her grandma wrapped around her finger and that she couldn’t do any wrong.
Riot knew that too because she smirked at me, and she went over to her grandmother, wrapping her arms around her, and she placed kisses all over her cheek. My mama loved that because she stood there with a smile on her face, as she held Riot by her hips, just happy to be around her grandbaby.
“Look at you. Girl, you look more like your mama every time that I see you. You gotta put some weight on you baby,” my mama was going to call it out to Riot every time.
“Please get on her grandma. I told her that she going to disappear on all of us,” Ari chimed in.
I stopped with the seafood salad, so that I could turn my head, and look at my mom, and my daughter.
The love that the two of them had for each other was so special.
My mom was just a few inches taller than Riot.
I would forever scream that I had the prettiest daughter in the world, no matter how old she got.
Riot’s never been the type to wear a lot of revealing clothing, so I wasn’t surprised with the look that she had going on this evening.
She had her own personal style, and most of her looks were tomboyish, but she would add hints of girly in the mix, so it always worked for her.
Today, she was in a fitted green crop top, so it had her stomach out.
Over the crop top, you could see a colorful knit shrug, that hung off her shoulders.
The kind of pants she wore were a loose fit olive-green cargo style that hung off her hips just a little bit.
Her sneakers were from this brand Veja, and with her hair, she just had a middle part, and her curls looked so beautiful and healthy this morning, proving that her ass had been listening to me on the hair care routines that I was giving her.
“And we can’t wait to meet your man. I hope you warned him about us because we coming at him hard,” Rasheeda said to Riot, once her and my mom let each other go.
“Dolo not going to run from no smoke with ya’ll. I hate that we even have to do this. Why ya’ll gotta meet who I’m in a relationship with?” Riot asked, rounding the corner, so that she could take a seat down on one of the stools that faced the island.
“When you have children one day, it’ll make sense to you why you have to do this,” I said to her, and she grunted.
“Ma please. You of all people know that I’m not having kids,” she shot.
“Oh, you got a nigga now. You going to have kids,” Rasheed chimed in, making me, and Ari laugh.
“A nigga that understands that I don’t want to have children, either.
He doesn’t want kids himself, so it works.
Auntie, I haven’t been here but five minutes.
Please don’t make me fall out with you,” Riot said to her auntie.
The two of them went at it like they always did, just having playful banter with each other.
Riot eventually walked over in the living room, where her pop- pop was dozing off on the couch. She loved on him for a little bit, talked with him, and then came back into the kitchen area where we still were.
“Come upstairs Riot. I want to talk to you about something,” I said, removing the apron that I had on, prepared to go upstairs.
She stood up from the chair that she was sitting down on, and she led the way.
She knew how I was about going upstairs with shoes on, so she removed her sneakers, left them by the stairs, and she jogged up.
I was in my house shoes, so I was able to follow her up, and she went in the direction of my room.
She opened the door, going in first, and once inside, I wasn’t surprised that she went over by the window nook.
Typically, that’s where she would sit whenever she came in the room with me.
She leaned with her back against the wall, extended her legs, and she put her hands in her lap, while looking up at me, as I walked over.
“You about to bring up what happened with us over the phone earlier? I’m not mad about that.
I was just asking if Major was going to be here.
I ain’t the best of friends with him, but I ain’t his enemy either.
You know that if I had it my way, my daddy would still be here, and that’s who you would be with.
That’s something that I gotta slowly come to terms with as far as you and him.
It’s no bad blood for him though. I can tell that he makes you happy, and to me, that’s really all that matters,” she said, as I took a spot on the nook with her.
“No. That’s not what I wanted to talk to you about. I’m not rushing your relationship with Major. I’ve accepted a while ago that you’ll build a relationship with him whenever you’re ready. I can’t make you like him,” I went on to say.
“Oh okay. What you wanted to talk to me about then? Dolo?” she asked, not having a clue.
“Who is Cam, Riot?” I asked, and the second I said that name, you could tell that all her energy just immediately shifted.
I wouldn’t say that she was smiling prior to me bringing up Cam’s name, but she did look much calmer. Now, that natural mug that I felt she was always walking around with had appeared on her face, and I hated that I took it there, but I wanted to know.
“Why you asking me about Cam? How you even know her?” she wanted to know.
“I don’t know her. That’s why I’m asking you,” I said.
“But you not going to just randomly ask me about someone that you don’t know. What happened? Somebody told you something?” she wanted to know, firing off question after question.
“I’m not going to tell you her name because I don’t want you creating an issue with her, but one of my clients that was locked up with you asked me how you were doing while I was servicing her.
I told her that you were good. That’s when she started saying things to me, telling me that she was just happy that you made it out of jail alive.
I didn’t know what she was talking about, so I made her explain.
She didn’t want to tell me, but she eventually broke down and spilled it.
You was getting jumped in there Riot? Tied down, while a bitch was beating on you?
What about the food poisoning? She told me that too,” I said, eyes on her, wishing to God that she would tell me that Ariel was lying, and that none of those things happened for real.
“Nobody that I was locked up with is someone that I was friends with. I didn’t know none of them bitches personally.
I just knew of a few of them. Made small relationships with a couple of the girls there, but I know that they don’t go to you to get their hair done.
Why the fuck bitches that I don’t even know coming to you, speaking on me?
” she asked, the anger all in her eyes as she stood up from the window nook, and she looked over at me.
“Just answer the fuckin question Riot!” I screamed, just as upset as she was because I was desperate for answers.
I watched her as she picked her hand up, and she scratched her scalp. You could tell that she didn’t want to answer what I was asking her, but she sighed, prepared to do it anyways.
“Yeah,” was all she said to me, and when she said it, I broke down again the same way that I’d done in my office. She came over to me, and she sat next to me on the nook.
“Ma, what you crying for? That shit is old,” she said, not understanding the reason for my tears. I wiped my eyes, looking at her like she was crazy.
“I don’t care how old it is Riot! I didn’t know anything about it.
You are my child. My daughter. You went through something traumatic in jail, and you were hiding that shit from me.
Poison? Them bitches poisoned you. You could have died.
That explains why you came home, and you won’t eat.
Then, she told me that they were tying you down, and the Cam bitch was beating on you.
I’m thinking about all the times that you didn’t want to video call us.
The times you didn’t want us coming down to the jail to see you.
You gotta know that this shit is hurting me, Bean,” I cried to her, looking her in her eyes, as she sat there, with her hands in her lap, looking helpless, as if she didn’t know what to say.
She leaned her back against the wall, and she pulled her legs up, crossing them.
“I don’t know that girl, ma. She got it made up in her mind that Roman killed her brother.
You know we never really got the answers on who killed Roman.
All we ever knew was that it was a drive by shooting, and it’s like nobody in Miami knew who killed him.
After my time being locked up, I really don’t know if she was just trying to get a rise out of me, but she would often make comments telling me that she slid for her brother.
Basically, that just means that she got her get back for her brother on Roman.
She was in jail taking that shit out on me.
I didn’t know that girl prior to coming to that jail,” she told me the truth.
“What about the guards and stuff though? They knew that girl was going in your cell, doing that shit to you, and they didn’t do anything about it?” I asked, not understanding.
“Them guards turn their heads to a bunch of shit. Then, you already know that I’m not the most likeable person, so they didn’t give a damn.
Shit, they probably were telling Cam to get a few licks in for them too.
The only officer that didn’t play that shit was officer Randall.
An older guy that’s been there for a while.
They didn’t come in there messing with me while he was on duty.
Even when he would come back, and see me all bruised up, he would try to get me to tell him who was doing it, but of course I wouldn’t say anything.
You can’t be snitching in jail ma. That’s like the easiest way to get your ass killed in there.
I had to keep quiet and endure it. I’m fine though ma.
I did my time, and I made it out alive. That bitch gotta come home though, and she gotta have her day with me.
You think Ima let a bitch live that poisoned me, and beat me like that?
You know I believe that I can go to war with a giant, but ma it was one of me in there, while it was her, and damn near every other bitch in there that she had running with her.
I couldn’t take on all that shit on my own,” she finished.
I didn’t say anything else. I just used this time to keep quiet, wipe my eyes, and to process all the things that she finished saying to me.
I eventually got it together, and I leaned back against the wall, just like she was doing, and I pulled my legs up as well.
Riot had her moments where she could be mean, and standoffish as hell, but then she had her moments where she could be sweet.
Right now, she chose to be sweet, as she scooted over, grabbed my hand in hers, and she placed multiple kisses on my cheek.
“Ma, I’m good. I ain’t going to lie, I’m a little fucked up in the head from that shit, but physically, I’m straight,” she said.
I turned to look her in her eyes. My beautiful daughter.
Looking at her beautiful face, I could just see the images of someone beating on her, and that’s what kept fuckin with me.
“You would have never told me any of this stuff, huh?” I asked her.
“Probably not. I knew how you would take it. Look how you crying. You shed enough tears mama. You cried tears for daddy, and Roman. I didn’t need you crying tears for me either,” she responded.
“It ain’t your job to protect me, Riot. It’s the other way around. It’s my job to protect you,” I told her, and she smiled at that.
“It’s our job to protect each other. We don’t always see eye to eye, but your my mother.
You carried me for nine months, and you raised me.
I know raising me wasn’t easy, either. I’ll forever go out of my way to protect you.
I don’t like seeing you cry. I don’t like the cards that you were dealt in life, losing people like that.
I just try not to bring more pain to your life, and that’s why I had to silently go through that shit in jail on my own.
I’m good though mama. Stop crying,” she said, reaching her hand over to wipe away more tears that had fallen
I was going to let this child of mine drive me the fuck crazy. Whatever Rasheeda was down there mixing up, I needed a few of them. A good drink was the only thing that was going to help me forget about Riot, and the things that she endured in jail.