Pride (11 page)

Monique looked around and nodded. Now this was more like it. She’d seen a couple of nut-houses in city hospitals and most of them were just like this: run down, dark, and low-budget.

“For years Mrs. McKay stayed in one of the finest suites on the property,” the attendant went on. “But about a month ago they waited until it got real late at night, then they packed her things up and stuck her way back here where the real broke patients stay. I wasn’t here, but I heard they had to drag the poor thing out of her room kicking and hollering. She’d been living there so long her suite was the only home she really knew.”

The attendant stopped outside of room 126 and knocked three times on the door. When there was no answer she swiped her key-card through the slot and Monique heard the lock click open.

“Don’t worry,” the attendant whispered behind her hand. “She’s been getting her medication every single day. It’s against the law for us to withhold anti-psychotic drugs just because the family can’t pay.”

Monique nodded. She had no fuckin’ idea what kinda fool she was gonna see when the door swung open, but she wasn’t prepared for what was waiting on the other side.

Salida McKay sat in a metal folding chair by the window. Her hair was piled on her head in a mass of soft, natural curls and she was dressed to slay in a slinky maroon designer dress. Her legs were crossed elegantly at the knee and a pair of bammin’ chic silver stilettos with a six-inch heel were on her slender feet.

“Mrs. McKay!” the attendant called out brightly. “You have a visitor. It’s your niece, Monique! She’s come to take you home!”

Salida took her time turning to face them, and when she did Monique saw exactly why she had been the only bitch that G had ever wifed.

She was beautiful. She was more than beautiful. She had some shit about her that screamed,
“Royalty!”
Like she deserved to be bathed and oiled and fanned by servants.

But gorgeous or not, Salida had some crazy shit going on with her too. Monique had seen that buggy look in the eyes of sickos around Harlem her whole life. She wasn’t sure if Salida was gonna bust her out and get stupid because she’d never seen her before, or if she was sane enough to use this opportunity to get the fuck outta jail while she had the chance. She found out real quick.

“Monique, huh?” Salida smirked, looking Monique slowly up and down.

Watching her cunning eyes, Monique could tell there were still a few slick cylinders clicking in the old bird’s brain.

“Yes,” she answered sweetly. “I came to get you, Aunty. Uncle Granite sent me.”

“Where is he?”

Monique didn’t know what the hell to say. “Um, he couldn’t make it so I came instead.”

Salida stared at her real hard for a second and then uncrossed her legs and stood up, displaying her full, magnificent splendor.

Goddamn
, Monique thought, begrudgingly giving up mad appreciation for what she saw. Salida was an older version of Juicy. Her body was succulent and luscious. Her slick maroon gown fit her curves like a tailored glove. Simply put, she was a prime stunna. She looked delicious. In fact, she looked damned delicious, and even as jealous of other chicks as Monique was, she had to give the bitch that.

She watched as Salida swung her sweet round hips across the room like she was a bikini model on somebody’s fashion runway.

“It’s about time you got your ass here,” Salida said crisply, like she had been expecting Monique for months. “Grab my things from the closet, and don’t forget my minks.”

She sat back down and crossed her legs daintily as Monique and the attendant scurried to throw her personal items into two large designer suitcases that were stored under the bed.

“She don’t mean no harm bossing you around like that,” the old Black attendant whispered as her and Monique packed Salida’s gear. There was expensive jewelry, silk dresses, lingerie, and top-label designer shoes out the ass. “Mrs. McKay just has terrible mood swings. Up one day, and down the next. You never know what you’re gonna get out of her. It’s part of her mental condition, so be sure she stays on her medication at all times.”

As they were on the way out the door Salida spoke to Monique over her shoulder.

“I don’t know where you’re going, Monique, but I’m from New York. New York City, in the United States. Do you know where that is?”

“Oh yes, ma’am,” Monique said sweetly. I know New York City like the back of my hand.”

Salida nodded. “Good. Take me there.” And then she added, “You got a cigarette?”

Monique, with her arm full of Salida’s shoes, clothes, and all the other random shit the older lady had accumulated over the years, nodded yes.

Salida looked satisfied.

“Good,” she said dryly. “Light me one.”

CHAPTER 12

It wasn’t Harlem they were heading for as Monique re-crossed the border with Salida riding shotgun in G’s luxury whip. Instead, they were Brooklyn bound. But first, they had to make a quick stop.

“Why are you stopping here?” Salida asked as Monique pulled into the mall parking lot where she had left the two main men in her life. “You taking me shopping or something?”

“No, we’re not going shopping but I’m picking up some people who really wanna see you, Mizz Salida,” Monique said. “They gonna roll with us the rest of the way to the city.”

She texted Pluto and let him know they were waiting outside, and when him and Ace walked out the mall and headed toward the car it was all Monique could do not to bust out laughing.

“What…the…
fuck?
” Salida said slowly, narrowing her insane eyes and blowing smoke from her nose as she watched the two fat men waddle their way over to the car. Salida was smoking up all her damn cigarettes, but Monique didn’t care. This trick was funny!

“Who are those two clowns coming to see?”

Monique giggled as she climbed out the driver’s seat so Ace could get in. “You. They coming to see you.”

Salida sat right where she was as the two men approached. Ace came straight over to her window wearing a big smile on his face. He had been with G the longest and had known Salida very well back in the day.

“Sup, Mizz Salida,” the big man said. Seeing her brought back memories of the good old days with G and he took her hand in his and kissed it respectfully. “It’s Ace. Remember me?”

“Hello, Arnold,” Salida replied calmly. “Yes, it has certainly been a long time.”

Ace walked around the car and climbed into the driver’s seat, and Pluto stepped up to her window next.

“How you doing, Mizz Salida? I’m Pluto. G was my dawg. Me and you met a long time ago but you prolly don’t remember me.” He opened her door and held out his hand like he was gonna help her get out.

“Oh, I remember you,” Salida said, and there was no mistaking the coldness in her voice. “I remember you very well.”

Perched in her seat like a goddess, Salida reached out and pulled her door shut, leaving Pluto standing out there with his hand still held out.

Monique giggled her ass off in the back seat, happy to see Pluto get dissed.

“Take me home.” Salida glanced at Ace, then turned and looked out the window at the dumbfounded Pluto. She blew some more smoke out her nose. “What you standing there looking stupid for? Climb your big ass in the backseat and let’s go.”

$$$$$

The ride back to the city was interesting. Monique was fascinated by Salida. Mama was a boss! She was still sexy at damn near forty-five, and even though she had been doped up and locked away for years, the stress of it didn’t hardly show on her at all.

“Where’s Granite?” Salida asked about ten minutes into their journey. Pluto had climbed angrily into the backseat next to Monique. He kept looking over at her all crazy-like. Monique knew he was daring her to grin so he could bust her one. It was all she could do to hold her giggles in too. It wasn’t everyday that big bad Pluto got bitch-checked by a female.

“Is he at that club?”

“Umm, which club, Mizz Salida?” Ace played dumb. “You talking about the G-Spot?”

“Yeah,” she said. “The G-Spot. I know all about that place. Who you think told him to buy it and how to set it up? Is he still running it?”

Ace swallowed hard. “Yeah, the Spot is still pretty hot. It’s not all it could be, but it’s still generating.”

“I didn’t ask you all that,” Salida replied, irritated. “I said is Granite still running his club?”

Monique almost felt bad for Ace when she heard how hard he sighed.

“I don’t know how to tell you this, Mizz Salida, but G is dead. We buried him six months ago. I can take you to see his grave if you want me to, and I’m sorry you gotta find out like this, but that’s what it is. G is dead.”

Salida kept right on puffing on her cigarette. “How’d he die?”

“Somebody killed him. He got shot.”

Salida got real quiet for a while. And then she scared the shit outta all of them when she threw her head back and bust out laughing.

“I knew it! I knew it! I
knew
that black bastard was dead! That’s why they let me outta that hell-hole! He always said the only way I would ever see the streets again would be over his dead body!”

Smiling, she blew a long trail of smoke out of her nose. “So who did it?
Good
for that mothafucka!” She laughed. “Who did it? Huh? Who did it?”

Ace was too shocked. “Mizz Salida! That ain’t right! Laughing at ya man like that! I just told you he’s dead!”

 Salida bucked and came hard out of Brooklyn. “Oh,
fuck you, Arnold!
What ain’t right is what that niggah did to
me!
Telling my little boy I was crazy! Separating a mother from her damn child!
That’s
what ain’t right! And where’s my damn son? Where’s my Gino?”

Ace raised his hand in the air and shook his head. “Look, I’m sorry but I’on’t know where the fuck Gino’s at, and I’on’t know shit about nothin’ personal between you and G! Word. I’m just saying…it ain’t right to be laughing because the man got killed.”

Salida laughed again and her voice sounded like a whole bucket of ice cubes clinking together.

“That niggah
better
be dead,” she said, coldly. “Taking my baby away from me. I wish whoever shot him would have shot him twice. Once for whatever he did to them, and once for all the shitty little things he did to me.”

They rode in silence after that. When they finally arrived in Brooklyn Ace passed Salida a fat envelope stuffed with money.

“This is just a lil sumpthin’ to hold you for a minute,” he told her. “It ain’t a whole lot considering how long you been gone, but you should be able to get you an apartment or a lil car or whatever you want.”

Monique could tell by the look on Ace’s face that he was mad as fuck, but he told her to go ahead and take Salida upstairs while him and Pluto waited in the car.

Salida’s sister lived on the fifth floor of a big apartment building. They were a large family of Puerto Ricans, and some of them looked like they were mixed with Black. After dragging Salida’s suitcases up the steps, Monique niggah-knocked on the door. When it opened she saw a room filled with people who were sitting around eating, playing dominos, and talking shit in both Spanish and English real loud.

They rushed the door when they saw Salida standing there, and everyone started wailing and crying like crazy. Monique elbowed her way inside and stood in the middle of the living room looking and feeling out of place. She had never been all that fond of Brooklyn. It was so big and crazy compared to Harlem, and in her opinion Brooklyn tricks were grimier and more cut-throat than those in any other borough.