When Jayda made it back home that Saturday morning, she was surprised to see that her apartment door was unlocked. But when she pushed the door open, to see who had entered her apartment, she wasn’t surprised at all. Kenny and Makela were making out on her living room sofa.
Angry, she barged on in. “What do you think you’re doing?”
Kenny jumped up, pulling up his pants, and Makela got up, closing up her blouse.
Jayda slammed the door shut. “Where do you get off coming in my apartment like this?”
“It’s mine too. I paid my rent.”
“But where your half for next month? You moved out,” Jayda said angrily.
But then she knew he fed on drama. He knew how to push her buttons. “Why did you come here anyway? And why did you have to bring that bitch with you?”
“Who you calling a bitch?” Makela said. “I’m just helping him out, that’s all I’m doing.”
“Yeah, you’re helping him out. I saw what kind of help you were giving him on my sofa! Just get out of my house, Makela. And you too,” she added, to Kenny.
Kenny began picking up the piles of papers he had on the coffee table. He began stuffing them in the trash bag he had with him.
“Will you hurry up and leave? I can call the cops on your ass.”
“Call’em. Who gives a damn about cops? All they gonna say is that I live here too.”
“But you left, remember? And your name ain’t on this lease. So your ass trespassing. That’s what they’re gonna say.”
“Whatever,” Kenny said as he looked at the time on his Apple watch, and knew he had to go. “I wanted to be sure to get my papers out of here. The landlord told me the day I left that he’s evicting you if you don’t have the full rent next month, which I’m sure you don’t have. I’m gonna make sure I have everything I own out of here before next month. They aren’t putting anything of mine out to the curb. They aren’t embarrassing me.”
“How could anybody embarrass you when you do a bang-up job of it all by yourself?”
But Kenny noticed something else. “Since when you been staying out all night?”
Jayda suddenly looked defensive. “That’s none of your damn business.”
“She got her a new man already, Kenny,” said Makela, laughing. “She been with her rich man. I’ll bet he paid her rent for her. I told you it was true.”
“That shit ain’t true,” Kenny said.
“Where she been then? Raymond told me all about how this rich white man took a shine to her. That’s where she been. With him.”
Kenny stared at Jayda. “That true? You gonna betray the race with some white dude?”
Jayda looked at him like he was crazy. “Man, if you don’t get out of my face with that nonsense.” She began walking to the front door. “Just leave,” she said, holding the door open. “And give me my key back!”
He gladly gave her that key. He wanted no parts of the new month’s rent responsibility. “If you throw me out now,”he said at the door, “then I’ll have to come back next week sometime to get the rest of my shit. I still got more to get. I can’t come sooner than that so you’ll have to be here to let me in.”
“Nope. I’ll be out of town next week. So you can forget coming back here. Just tell me what you left and I’ll gather it together and leave it with the landlord.”
But Kenny was stuck on what she’d said first. “You’ll be out of town? Since when? You’re always in town. Your ass don’t go nowhere.” Then he looked at her suspiciously. “Where your ass going?”
Jayda was rather proud of it. Or at least proud of who she was going with. “I’ll be in Kennebunkport for a few days.”
Both Kenny and Makela were floored. “Kennebunkport?” asked Makela. “Ain’t that’s where them rich folks live? See I told you, Kenny. She already hooked up with him.”
“Girl bye!” Jayda knew she had said too much, but she wanted both of them to realize they weren’t hurting her.
It didn’t work on Makela. She didn’t care who she dated just as long as it wasn’t Kenny.
But it worked on Kenny. “Wait in the car, ‘Kela,” he said.
