Page 50 of Stand on That

“Damn shorty. You look like you’re going through it.”

Mya cut her eyes at me and if I didn’t know any better, I’d say she wanted to slap the taste out of my mouth. That made me laugh. I laughed to the point where her brows furrowed. Mya was no doubt confused about what I found funny. If she had the audacity to be mad, then the dumb bitch could put on a cape and be super mad. Fuck was she mad for?

“You looking like you got something to say.” The laughter stopped immediately, and my eyes bore into her face. “Get it off your chest.” I was serious as a heart attack. If at any time she felt like she wanted to try me, I’d put her miserable ass in the dirt.

“Here’s your money,” she extended the envelope she was holding through the open window. “That’s $100,000.”

“How much you get for the house?” I inquired.

“A little over $200,000,” she mumbled in a tone that was barely audible. Her body weight shifted, and I could tell she was nervous that I was going to demand that she give it to me.

“Even if you don’t deserve it. I have a heart. Since I got some bread for the car, you can keep the rest of the money, but on my mama, I should take that shit just because. Get the fuck out my face,” I snarled. Lowkey, I was kind of pissed with myself for extending her any kind of grace.

Mya turned and walked off faster than a crackhead going to find a stem to smoke out of. After placing the gear in drive, I pulled out of the parking space that I had backed into. I wasn’t getting any more coke. The money I got from Mya’s house and her car were going in my stash. Along with what I already had, it would hold me over until I was out of college and working for Kyle.

I ran inside the house and put the money away. As soon as that was done, I headed back out to the car, so I could run and pick up some money that was owed to me, and I would be officially done with all things related to selling drugs. There was no doubt in my mind that I would miss the fast money. There was no money like dope money. It was time to put that shit to rest though. My eyes drifted toward the sky because even though I wasn’t the most religious person in the world, I could admit that God had spared me many times. The fact that Vani had been to prison and I hadn’t was mind blowing to me.

A car pulled up in front of my crib, and my eyes narrowed as I took in the black Honda. I didn’t know anybody with a black Honda, and I damn sure didn’t have any company ever stop by that had a black Honda. I decided not to react too soon because I lived in a nice quiet neighborhood full of upper-class Black people, White, Indian, Asian, African. Gunshots and gangsta shit weren’t the norm in my neighborhood. I was always surprised when I walked outside and smelled weed, but marijuana was Universal. Everyone from teens to senior citizens smoked weed. One of my college professors stopped me one day after class and asked me where he could get some of what I had because he could tell one day when he walked by my car that I had the good shit.

I turned him on to my plug, and we’d been cool ever since. And he was a thirty-three-year-old white man from Ohio. Maybe whoever was inside the car had the wrong address. I stood there staring and just when I decided to walk up to the car and see what was good since the tinted windows were keeping me from peering inside, the passenger door opened.

My vision was 20/20 so even from a distance, there was no missing Mario’s gruesome face. The majority of the skin was badly scarred. There was one small area on the right side that appeared untouched. Nigga looked like something out of a horror movie. I had spent so much time calling Mya dumb, and I had been so preoccupied with all that I had going on, it never dawned on me that she hadn’t learned her lesson. That fuck nigga followed me. I had to chuckle at my damn self even though there wasn’t one thing funny.

My burner was in the car, so I made a dash for it, but Mario already had his gun drawn and aimed in my direction. I ducked as a loud pop pierced the air. From a crouched position on the ground, I reached for the handle to try and open the door, and a searing pain ripped through my back. The pain was so brutal, it dropped me. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t feel shit. I was on my side, and Mario used his foot to push my body over, so that I was on my back. He looked down at me with a snarl on his ugly ass face.

“You should have killed me pussy.”

Before he could pull the trigger, another deafening shot sounded off, and his body fell almost instantly. He landed beside me with a thud, and all I could hear before I blacked out was my lady screaming.

Incomplete. Meaning there are still neural pathways that remain intact. Paraplegia. Meaning paralysis in the lower limbs. Recovery is possible. Intense physical therapy and determination are the keys. The doctor’s words ran through my mind like someone was talking into a bullhorn. I heard the words loud and clear, but I still cried while Darius laid in the hospital bed. Thank God, Dymand was young. Neither one of her parents were capable of taking care of her at the moment.

When I wasn’t replaying the doctor’s words, it kept hitting me like a ton of bricks that I had taken a man’s life. It was in Darius’ defense. I didn’t know what was going on but when I approached the house and saw a man shooting at Darius everything that occurred after was like an out of body experience. I was moving off muscle memory. There were a few moments that drew small blanks. Twenty-four hours after the shootings, I still didn’t have answers because Darius was rushed right into a surgery that lasted four hours.

The doctors had to be extremely careful removing the bullet from his spine because it would have been very easy to turn an incomplete spinal cord injury into a complete one. Making recovery much harder and unlikely. When Darius got out of surgery, it took him about an hour to wake up from the anesthesia. And when he did, he was in so much pain, the nurse gave him morphine, and he was out like a light.

He had been in and out of sleep, talking to doctors and nurses, and there was so much going on that we couldn’t find a moment to spare to talk about what happened. I told the police exactly what happened on my end and gave them access to the security footage from the house. I had been giving Darius a sponge bath when he woke up. Every time it dawned on him that he couldn’t feel his legs and he couldn’t walk, he shut down. He refused to talk. I was watching him stare at the wall wondering if I’d ever find out what happened.

“You should have let that nigga kill me.” Darius’ voice was low, but the anger in his tone was loud. Confusion made me draw back and stare at him like he was crazy.

“Do the nurses need to slow down on giving you pain medication? What is that to say?”

“You want to be laid up in a bed and can’t feel your legs?” he turned his head in my direction, and his bloodshot eyes only added to the negative energy filling the room. Darius almost looked possessed. “I can’t fucking walk. You think that’s better than being dead?”

“Yeah, I do,” I shot back. “You have a right to be upset. But you think Dymand would rather have a father in a wheelchair or no father at all?”

He didn’t respond with words. He simply sucked his teeth and went back to staring at the ceiling.

I closed my eyes and tried to find the right words to say. I was exhausted. But I didn’t want to leave him. Not yet. When I was incarcerated, my depression came out in many forms. I was angry some days and sad the others. Of course, being paralyzed would make a person angry. It would make them depressed, resentful, all that. When I was locked up and shut people out, I wasn’t doing it to hurt them. Thinking back on that time was a great reminder not to take anything that Darius did or said personal.

“You want to tell me what happened?” I asked softly.

“I’m a fuckin’ dummy. I messed up. First, I messed up by trusting Mya’s hoe ass to keep my dope. Then, I messed up by listening to you and not killing the muhfuckas. The nigga that shot me was the one that robbed me. I had Azarius toss boiling hot water on him. He was disfigured, but he was alive. And that was a mistake.”

“You messed up by listening to me?” I asked slowly. “Are you saying it’s my fault?”

“I’m not saying shit,” Darius sighed. “You can call the engagement off. I wouldn’t even be mad at you. Nobody wants a nigga that can’t walk. You’re free to leave. Go find a nigga with two working legs.”

A range of emotions poured through me as I stared at Darius. It was very hard not to take what he was saying personal. I’d never heard him throw pity parties or act like he wanted to give up. I’d never call off the engagement, but the way that he was thinking made me sad.