Part One
In the midst of all the hustle and bustle of life; all the unexpected turns and lengthy weekdays. I don’t know how I seem to make it to the end of the week! But it is, what I have come to call, “Sat’s” that I look forward to! This is when me and my closest friends gather over food and drinks. By the end of the week it’s mostly drinks for me! Me and my friends are all over worked, over stressed, under paid and all of this equals to being full of many frustrations. But I always thank God to make it to the weekends. By the time I drop my daughter to her friend’s house and do the weekly food shopping, I only have enough energy to throw a few drinks down my throat. It seems like ever since I moved out to Jersey my car has been shitty on gas. As soon as I fill it up, its right back on E and Deb takes the train into the city early on Saturday to teach a class at Columbia University. So that leaves me with no other choice but to drive into the city on Saturdays, but I usually get Deb to drive back across the water. Some weekends I would just stay in the city, depending on what was going on with my daughter. And I think I will stay this weekend, being there’s no school on Monday and my daughter is staying over her best friend’s house for the weekend. My he/she bestie Gerard has an extra bedroom in his Brownstone and I have been crashing there since our teenage years. Shit, his house was like my second home when his parents were alive. He lost his parents in a car crash a few years ago and everything was left to him, including the Brownstone.
I was racing to the restaurant and my cell phone was ringing off the hook. Finally I answered, I couldn’t take it no more.
“I already parked, I’m walking up the block now.”
“Wait!! I’m calling to see if you spoke to Gee?” Deb asked on the other end.
I had to think for a second, cause it wasn’t until that moment I realized I hadn’t spoken to him either.
“It’s crazy cause I hadn’t realized, I didn’t speak to him until you mentioned it. Did you call Sharon and see if she spoke to him?
“Yes and she hadn’t either.”
I sat still for a few seconds, this was NOT like Gerald. He’s the one who’s always on the phone line a hundred times a day.
I snapped out of it. “Listen, go get the table and I’m gonna swing past the brownstone.”
“Okay cool, keep me posted.”
I pulled out of my parking space and headed towards Gerald’s brownstone. God must have been looking after me cause I found a parking space a couple of houses in down from his. I dug out my key and went straight upstairs to his room. I see a body silhouette of a body.
“Gee? Hey Gee is that you?”
I walked slowly over to the bed& pulled the covers back. Through the tears and dried blood laid my BFF.
“What the fuck?! What…”
I was lost for words. I mean there were no words for a situation like this. So I did what any friend would do…. Held my friend, cried with my friend and listened. Listened while he tried making logic out of why he was laying in his bed beat the fuck up, while all of our friends were less than a mile away waiting for us.
I reached for my cell and dialed Sharon, when she didn’t answer I tried everyone’s cell. Much against Gee wishes, but i didn’t give a fuck! This wasn’t no shit to be negotiating! I text Sharon telling her to call me and it was 911! I forwarded the message to everybody’s phone and continued to clean Gee up. You could tell, just by eye he needed his lip stitched, a few stitches three or four maybe. Dee called back, very tipsy.
“Hey girl! where the fuck ya’ll at? Gurlllll this spot off the chain, drink list sick! What’s taking ya’ll so long!” Dee screamed through the phone. It was loud and people talking in the background.
I walked downstairs before answering. “Look ya’ll guys pay the bill and come over to Gee’s. Some serious shit went down!”
Dee was confused, but she relayed the message to the rest of the group and they did just what was told. They jumped out the cab, within 10 minutes they were there. The entourage ran up the stairs, I was there waiting at the top to let them in. Gee laid on his recliner with the covers over his head.
Dee demanded to know what was going on.
“Oh my God, what’s going on!
“Come up stairs. I got over here and found him in bed under the covers. I pulled the cover back and his lip was bloody and busted and his face was very bruised.” I explained as we walked slowly up the stairs. The groups faces where blank and confused.
“Well what happened… Who did it”? Sharon whispered.
I just shrugged my shoulders, he hadn’t told me what happened. He just made it clear he didn’t want me to call the rest of the crew, which he knew was not gonna happen.
All mouths dropped when they saw Gee and the tears started falling. The questions followed, but Gee wouldn’t give any straight answers. Like who did this to him. All we got was pieces. Obviously he and some man he’s seeing got into a really big fight and he’s insisting he cannot tell us the whole story and how we wouldn’t understand, but at the same time we found ourselves in the emergency room within the next hour and Gee was admitted with three broken ribs, a broken wrist, a fractured jaw and he’s diabetic. Not to mention his sugar was 410.
Everyone left worn out and still with no answers. I decided to stay over night in his room with him. I stared at him as he slept, trying to figure out how he’d let something like this happen. Because he is not the type to deal with a man who is capable of doing something like this. It was almost scary, cause a lot of his changes didn’t come to head until tonight. For a minute he wasn’t being himself but I didn’t feed into it too much. I fell asleep trying to piece the pieces of this puzzle together. It was the strong scent of cologne lingering in the air that broke my sleep.
I looked over at Gee, he was still sound to sleep. But the scent of the cologne told me someone else was in the room while I was sleep. Gee cleared his throat and opened his eyes, as far as his injuries would allow him.
He cracked a smirk and mumbled. “He was here. He came to check on me.” He said with a groggy voice.
I stood over him and stroked his forehead. “Who was here Baby?” He closed his eyes and struggled to take a deep breath.
“You smell that? Yeah he was here, he came to check on me. I knew he would feel bad.”
He slipped back into a slumber before I could ask any questions. But only took a few minutes to put two and two together. “He” must have been the beast who had done this to my friend. But what I couldn’t understand was the security Gee felt knowing he came to His hospital room after viciously beating him t he way he did. I thick feeling of anger took over my body! I wished his mother fucking ass came back while I was woke!
