Synergy (35 page)

Dee knew
her mom wasn’t all bad, and truth be told, deep down, she loved her
more than words, but she often told people what a terrible mother
she was. Sometimes, she was, and memories of childhood had been
ruined because of it. Dee was nine years old when her 13-year old
brother was killed. It was a shock to everyone, something no-one
expected; something no-one could have predicted. Dee would never
forget that day, because it scarred her for the rest of her life.
Sometimes she still saw her brother, lifeless, cold and bloody. She
remembered Jarrell carrying his twin brother in his arms and
placing him on the sofa. Mario’s head lolled to the side, he was
dead, just like that.

When
Monique heard her son’s yelling, she immediately made her way to
him, wondering what all the noise was about. As soon as she saw her
teenage son’s bloody body limp on the sofa, she let out a shrill
scream. It was like no noise she’d ever made before. Her mixed
emotion of shock, panic, fear and utter devastation had her lying
across his body sobbing, knowing he was gone. Everything in her
told her he was gone, and though she called an ambulance, she told
them her son was dead.  The words stuck with her for the rest
of her life, and Monique never truly got over it. She searched for
anything and everything to make that hole in her heart disappear,
but nothing did. Not even her own children could make her see the
better side of life. Most days she wished she would have died
instead of her son, or at least died with him, because she felt her
heart did.

Her sons
hadn’t stepped a foot out of line the day Mario died. They had
spent the day walking around the town and seeing friends, and
unfortunately, a gang member walked past them in the street the
second a rival car passed. The gun was stuck out of the window and
shot aimlessly, Mario didn’t stand a chance.

Later,
Monique had found out that a bullet had hit Mario straight through
the lung, causing it to puncture. He fought to breathe and
eventually collapsed, most likely dying before he reached the
house. Being the only adult in his life, Monique had to identify
his lifeless body. That image haunted her for nights on end, and
she stopped sleeping. Initially, she just wanted to sleep, so she
got some pills from a friend, but she enjoyed the drowsy feeling
and soon she wanted something more, something to lift her mood when
she didn’t want to get out of bed in the morning. She still had
three other children to feed and she needed to work, so she kept
dabbling until she tried heroin, and the rest was history. At first
she didn’t like the idea of sticking herself with a needle, so she
got a friend to help her out, but once she was a true fiend, she
didn’t care anymore, all she wanted was that feeling
back.

Dee
remembered seeing a change in her mother, it was almost instant.
She stopped being the loud mouth mother she was used to, and she
would sit around the house miserably, hardly speaking, just
drinking and smoking endlessly, trapped in her own thoughts. No-one
spoke about Mario very much, and Dee felt like he never existed at
times. She never even spoke to her own brother about it, because
she knew he was finding it hard to cope with, and she didn’t want
to upset him. Kiki was only three at the time, and she never spoke
about him either. She mentioned him maybe once or twice after his
death but by then, she’d practically forgotten about him. Dee
couldn’t blame her, after all, she was so young, but in a way she
was mad at her for forgetting him – that was their brother. No-one
ever spoke about their feelings, and they never cried in front of
each other, it was an unwritten rule. Today, Dee still never cried
in front of people. She saw it as an embarrassing thing, something
to keep to yourself, and she’d never seen her family cry since that
day either. It was just the way they were.

As she
carried her precious boy home and put him to bed, she thought about
everything that had taken place over the last few days. The fact
that J had hurt her sister, the fact he no longer had a home to go
to, the fact that her sister had gotten pregnant when she still had
her life ahead of her. Dee thought about Jason and the baby and the
lifestyle she had allowed herself to get involved with. She didn’t
want her private life aired for anybody to see, and the fact she’d
already seen magazines talking about Jason’s pregnant stripper was
unsettling. What if those reporters soon found out other things,
like her turbulent relationship with Trey, her drug dealing, her
brother’s stint in prison, or her dead brother? She wanted none of
it to be public knowledge, it was her family’s right to privacy and
she may have ruined it all for a man. While she felt angry towards
Jason for it, she also wanted nothing more than to call him and
hear his voice. 

Chapter 32 – Proposition

When
Jason picked up the phone, Dee reacted differently to what she
thought she would. While she planned to just speak to him calmly
and casually ask if he wanted to come over, instead she found
herself emotional.

“
Hey, what
happened? Is everything ok
?” Jason asked,
a concerned tone to his voice. That was when Dee remembered she’d
hung up on him to punch J and she hadn’t called him back. It was
now 11pm and though it was late, Dee could tell he was wide
awake.

“
I’ve had a really
bad night
” Dee answered, finding her voice
cracking in between her sentence.

“
Are you
crying
?” Jason asked, sounding more
concerned than before.

“
No
” she said, though her voice gave
it away that she wasn’t far from it.

“
What
happened
?”

“
I had a fight
with J and my mom so I took Tushaun out of bed to bring him
home
”

“
Is Tushaun
okay
?”

“
Yeah, he’s
asleep
”

“
Do you want me to
come over
?” he asked, and while Dee would
usually play it off and tell a guy no, she knew Jason was
different. He would never hold this against her, she could tell
he’d never bring it up in an argument ‘that time she needed him’ or
any bullshit that others could. She did want him to come over, so
she said she did, and with that, Jason ended the call and told her
he’d be straight over.

Dee
found herself pacing around the room as she waited for Jason to
arrive. Every few minutes she would look out of the window to see
if she could see a car’s headlights, but she’d pull herself away
again and continue pacing. She wasn’t sure why she couldn’t just
sit down and relax but her mind was in overdrive, and she was ready
to have a conversation, something she was going over in her head.
After a while, Dee pulled herself away from the window and decided
to make them a drink. Seeing the half empty bottle of Patron in the
cupboard, she wished she could pour herself one but instead she
poured herself a herbal tea, knowing it was good for her. She
poured Jason one too, and finally, she sat down at the sofa. A few
minutes later there was a quiet knock at the door, which was
difficult to do on her hollow door, so Dee knew Jason must have
been aware of not waking Tushaun up. As soon as she closed the door
behind him he took one look at her and she made her way into his
arms. It felt good to not say anything for a minute and just take
in his warm body. His muscular frame felt firm and comforting
against her and for a moment she closed her eyes and just took in
the feeling, forgetting everything for just a moment.

“
What
happened
?” Jason asked, following Dee to
sit down on the sofa where she told him about the tea she’d made.
Dee sighed, trying to think how to start.

“
Basically after you called I got
pissed and confronted J about what you said, but, I kinda punched
him first”

“
Dee
” Jason scolded, sounding like a
disapproving parent almost.

“
You tol’ me he
hurt my sister so I defended her
”

“
So what
happened
?” Jason asked, ignoring the fact
he didn’t agree with her aggression.

“
We fought, and
then mom made us go outside to sort it out. But while we was
outside she phoned J’s mom and tol’ her everything. So his bitch
mom fucking kicked him out and now he got nowhere to
go.
”

“
Shit
” Jason muttered.
“
What’s he gonna do
?”

“
Well he’s gonna
live at my mom’s, she don’t really have any other choice, and it
was her fucking fault telling his psycho mom
anyway
”

“
Is his mom really
that bad
?”

Dee
rolled her eyes dramatically.

“
You have no
idea
” she told him. “
She well known round here
”

“
Shit Dee, I feel
so bad
” Jason sighed, rubbing his
face.

“
Why
?”

“
If I hadn’t told
you, you wouldn’t have acted like that and then your mom wouldn’t
have made the call. It’s all just escalated
.”

”
So you’re
basically saying it’s my fault
” Dee
repeated, and Jason blinked once looking at her, wondering if he’d
heard her right.

“
What
?” he asked.

“
You’re saying
it’s my fault
” she
repeated.

“
How did I say
that
?”

“
If I hadn’t
reacted like that. That’s what you just said
.”
“
No. I said it’s my fault for telling you
like that
.”

“
Which made me act
like that, and it escalated from there
”

Suddenly
the lip pout was on Dee’s face and Jason paced himself. He’d seen
the look before, and nothing good had ever come from it.

“
You don’t need to
fucking sugar coat it, I know what you’re saying. I can’t be
trusted to act normal when you tell me something. You think I’m
fucking aggressive or some shit
.”

“
Dee. I never said
that
”

“
You implied
it
”

“
Well, I don’t
think I did
” He told her, his brow
furrowed in confusion. He found it extremely confusing how she
could twist his words to make him feel like he’d said something
completely different, and it was quite scary in a way. If she could
do it with this serious conversation, what else could she
twist.

Jason
sipped his tea awkwardly, hoping she would restart the
conversation, because at the moment he didn’t want to say anything
else to her that she would deem out of turn. It was moments like
these he felt he didn’t know this woman at all. She was a
completely different person to the fun, interesting woman he’d
started to date. She had an angry side, a side he felt he didn’t
know and couldn’t predict. He didn’t know where that side of her
came from, but he just wanted to understand the woman he was
falling in love with. In all fairness, he’d been saying he was
‘falling in love’ with her for a while now, and he was starting to
believe he was actually in love with her, though so far they hadn’t
reached that stage in their relationship and he didn’t want to
scare her off. They still had a lot to learn about each other and a
lot of details to figure out.

“
So why’d you take
Tushaun
?” Jason finally piped up, deciding
Dee’s silence was probably there to stay.

“
He heard me and
mom arguing and I just didn’t want him there in that
atmosphere
”

“
Is he okay
though
?”

“
Yeah, he was just
tired. I felt horrible having to pull him outta bed and put his
coat on and everything, carrying him round in the cold in his
PJs
”

“
He should live
with you
” Jason said, verbalising his
thoughts.

“
I know that, but
it was too hard. I can’t pay bills and feed and clothe him. I don’t
know what to do
”

At that
moment, Dee put her hand into her hands, rubbing her forehead, and
Jason could see the stress she was feeling over everything. He
could see how much she loved her son and how bad she felt for not
living with him, how bad she felt over her actions with J. Jason
never agreed with violence or aggression, but he couldn’t say
anything to Dee about it. She obviously had a reason for the way
she was and he wasn’t in her head. Seeing her slumped into her
hands, he thought about what he’d been up to that day, why he
didn’t call her back until the evening, and how he never had a
chance to tell her what he’d been up to because the guilt of Kiki’s
situation had made him go for that conversation first.