Afterburn

The sarcasm reeked in her voice when she replied, “I remember the night you denied losing your virginity and then finally confessed.”

I rolled my eyes at her. “It was Ruiz, Momma.”

“Ruiz!” Momma damn near screamed. “That no-good bastard! He’s just like his father! Fuckin’ pussy hound!”

She needed to calm the hell down.

“Momma, do you want to hear this or not?”

Momma must’ve realized that I’d clam up if she didn’t regain some composure. She did that and then sat down beside me. “Yes, I’m sorry. Go ahead, baby.”

For some reason, I felt she needed to be familiar with the fact that, “Chance doesn’t even know about this.”

“Why not? You tell Chance everything.”

“Well, I’ve never told her this. I’m sure she suspects that he and I have hooked at some point; especially recently.”

“What happened recently? Isn’t that fool married?” Momma asked with much disdain.

“He’s divorced and he was supposed to get remarried, but he’s not.”

“And?”

“I’ll get to the present, but first let me tell you about the past.”

Momma sighed. “Okay.”

“Chance and I had planned to go to the drive-in movies with Ruiz, but she got strep throat.”

“I remember that. Wasn’t that when she was kissing numerous boys at school?”

I was surprised Momma even knew about Chance getting caught ass out with those boys. She stayed drunk most of the time and didn’t know if she was coming or going. “Yeah, that’s what happened,” I said.

“So you and Ruiz went alone?”

“Yeah. I’ll never forget it. The movie was New Jack City.”

Momma couldn’t have cared less about the movie title. “And then you all did the nasty?”

“Yeah,” I replied softly.

“In his car?”

“No, he took me over one of his friends’ houses.”

“I see.”

She grew quiet, like she was waiting for me to continue. I did.

“When I gave myself to him that night, I thought it would be special to him. I thought we’d be together from that point on. I was so stupid.”

She started rubbing my back again. “Rayne, everyone makes mistakes. If I had a nickel for every one I’ve made, I’d be richer than Oprah.”

I buried my face in my hands. “Momma, you’ve always drilled in my head how men only care about pussy and money. Somewhere along the way, it started making sense to me.”

“Well, I stick by my word on that. Most men are like that but now I realize that there are exceptions. Exceptions like Yardley.”

Yardley! What a mess I’d created!