The Diamond Syndicate
“OK. So did you talk to her about it yet?”
“Nope, but I’m gonna call her and take her out. Then I’m gonna talk to her about it. I know she gonna go for it. So, do you want in or not?” Diamond looked at Tammy.
“I don’t know. Let me think about it for a few.”
“Well, don’t take too long, because I’m rolling with it, with or without you.”
Tammy already knew she wasn’t going to do what Diamond was asking her to do, but Diamond was such a demanding person, she didn’t want to say anything right away. She had to think of an excuse why she wasn’t going to participate in the illegal action.
“Let me ask you something, Diamond.”
“What?”
“You don’t think that y’all could go to jail for welfare fraud?”
“How? I got the best inside connect to getting paid.”
“Getting paid? How much do you think you gonna get from welfare?”
“Enough to start me off. Shit!”
“Start you off to do what?”
“What do you mean, do what? Girl, I ain’t tryna live in this hellhole no more. I want my own castle. I can’t find me no princes to get it for me, so I got to get it for myself.”
“And you think by pimping these young boys and the welfare system you gonna get it?” Tammy looked at her sideways.
“And you know this,” Diamond said with confidence.
Tammy shook her head at her crazy friend and her crazy schemes.
***
After sitting with Tammy and finishing off the bottle of wine, Diamond walked into her apartment and set her keys on top of the stereo by the door. She kicked off her shoes and walked into the kitchen.
“Ma,” Dante called out to her.
Diamond jumped. “Boy, you scared the hell outta me! What you want?” She turned on the light and saw Dante sitting
at the table. “Why you sitting here in the dark?”
“I got something I need to ask you, and I want you to be honest with me.”
“What are you talking about, Dante?” Diamond opened the refrigerator door and peered inside.
“Word out on the street is that you letting niggas run up in you.”
Diamond stopped what she was doing. She stood upright and turned slowly to face Dante. She slammed the refrigerator door and put her hands on her hips. “Excuse me?” she asked, a frown on her face.
“Word out—”
“I heard what you said! What I’m tryna figure out is, who the hell do you think you’re talking to? I’m a grown-ass woman, and what I do is my business.”
“Ma, do you know how that makes me feel to hear niggas talking about they running up in my moms?”
“I don’t give a shit how it makes you feel. How the hell do you think I was able to raise you by myself? How you think you was able to get whatever you wanted growing up? By any means necessary, Dante. I had to do what I had to do as a mother, and yes, that meant I let niggas run up in me, as you put it. I raised you by myself. I’m the one who pushed you outta my pussy! No one else!”
Diamond walked closer to Dante, who had grown to be taller than her, so she had to look up at him. When Dante started to develop into a young man, she knew she was gonna have to make sure she still had a hold on him by getting up in his grill at times, even if that meant slapping him upside the head.