PE$O... (A$AP ROCKY)

Get into it

   I lifted my left hand to my neck, and though it seems impossible, felt the soreness.  I could see the raw-skinned places in my mind.  'Thank god for the simultaneous wardrobe winterization that comes with the holiday season,' I thought while rubbing the area I imagined red and sore.  Lifting my head up slightly and using my hands as support for my frame into a kneeling then standing position, I used a bit of the energy to close the window Gerald had apparently opened early.  The breeze that was giving me chills earlier, was now stinging the raw skin that I was almost certain now comprised most of my neck.

   Shit, all of Gerald’s beating and the uncertainty that went along with the violence had me confused on another level. I'm I lost sense of time; It felt like February was just here, but I got out of the hospital when November was creeping along, with the marathon runners pacing by my windows - as my apartment had front row viewing to the route.  It’s probably not the same for anyone else, I can’t imagine it would be, but, for me, it’s one thing to be getting my ass beat, it’s another for everyone to know that my ass was getting beat.  So, I for one,was grateful for the change of weather offering me an opportunity to change my clothing into something that would allow me to hide the raw wound that I was sure was evident.  I was also grateful that the noise from the marathon, and it’s viewers, would mask any unseemly sounds and keep the police from visiting my apartment about what had just transpired.

   I walked swiftly to the bathroom, closing the door behind me, more out of habit than with the reasoning of needing privacy.   In the yellowed light I turned my head side to side, assuring myself of the skin damage.  'Damn, it’s raw, turning more red, and less brown, by the second it seems,' I said aloud.  I peered more deeply into the mirror, until the loud buzzing sound of the intercom startled me into hitting my head on the mirror.  Momentarily stunned until the buzzer rang again, for a much longer time period than the first, I moved purposely toward the buzzer, interrupting the next ring by pressing the ‘talk’ button and screaming ‘who is it?’  My annoyance audible.  I figured it was the police, called by some annoying, and untimely neighbor.  They should have called when he was here to account for the mess he had made of my neck, and the mess, smaller than before, but still a huge problem for me to clean up, he had made of my living space.  However, at this moment, considering the experience I had had earlier in the year, I refused to deal with anymore police.  "It’s me,” struggled the voice on the other end.  "No, it’s not," I replied, pressing the talk button.  "No, it isn’t," I repeated, pressing "listen" again to be sure.

   “Look, I need you to…”  He was unable to finish because I let go of the listen button.

A few minutes later, I heard a knocking at the my door: “Listen, just give me my phone so I can go home!  Give me my FUCKING phone Ryndra!  Stop playing before I make a fucking scene!  You want me to make a fucking scene,” he screamed bounding down the stairs so quickly, that I moved into my bathroom, not knowing whether to expect a grenade or rock or something through my window.  I wasn’t leaving my house, that would be silly; for all I knew he could be waiting at the top - of the top flight of stairs - to attack me as soon as I exited my apartment.  The best thing to do was to stay, as safe as possible, hidden from view in my apartment, I decided.  Maybe I should call someone, I thought fleetingly, “No…no, better not to get anyone else involved in this drama I created, especially since it’s proven itself to be extremely volatile in nature.  Better to handle this one, on my own.”  Then the buzzer again interrupted my thought process.  I was prepared to ignore it, but it sounded like that motherfucker was leaning on the buzzer.

   Luckily for me, in times of high stress I would loose fifty percent of my hearing, so I could barely hear it.  However, with my walls being so thin, I knew my neighbours could hear the buzzing, so consistent, that it sounded like the white noise that used to crackle on the television - back in the day - in its continuity.  I felt extremely embarrassed, and was almost at a loss of what to do until jerking my head to the next onslaught of noise.  I saw his phone located midway, under the bed.  Leaning under and moving things around until I jimmied the it and launched it, spinning, out into the open floor - I grabbed it.  I automatically dialled his password-3-6-6-6, then I paused - waiting for an interruption in the buzzing - pressed talk: "Listen, if you don’t stop with the buzzing harassment, I will call the police on you!"  I figured it was only right to give him fair warning. 

   Lord knows that I really didn’t want to call the police on him or anyone else.  Regardless of what had happened, only minutes before, I didn’t think it was worth any time in a cell, filled with criminals, where anything; most likely something violent, was possible.  As much as he had hurt me, the idea of Gerald going to jail only filled me with the prospect of being stalked forever or even killed.  I know if I went to jail for the first time, on a domestic violence charge, with no therapeutic intervention, for at least 18 months -which is what he would be facing if I followed through with the two ones after the nine - I would come out ready to kill whomever I felt had put me there.  I was hoping he wouldn’t make me press those buttons.  Then I felt the whole apartment vibrate.

  Opening the bathroom door, I saw that my front door was moving inwardly, like it was bowing in because the hallway was filled with water, ready to burst it in; it took me a minute to process that this motherfucker was kicking my door.  “Don’t you kick my door,” I yelled from the bathroom. When another kick followed, I said “Don’t you fucking kick my door Gerald!  Stop it right now,” sounding even more like my mother - but not getting the result, I am sure, she would have gotten in this moment.  Instead of stopping or becoming uncertain, he kicked the door again; causing me to jump and shudder in uncertainty, to the beat of his kicks.  I was scared, but I knew that was the impact he had hoped to have.  He wanted to scare me into doing what he wanted me to do, give him his phone; but, in my mind, he left it behind, I didn’t steal it; therefore, I didn’t owe it to him.  'If he wanted it, he should have secured it before slamming my door when he left,' I thought.  Also, he was being erratic and unthinking.  After all he was kicking my door, damaging my building's property, engaging in criminal activity in full direct view of a camera that was trained on my door.  A camera that only recorded his comings and goings up until now.  A camera that didn’t have X-ray vision to see through the door, and record him beating on me, biting on me, screaming on me, threatening me and the ones I loved. 

  “Fuck you,” I screamed through the door.  Belligerent or not, he wasn’t going to stop kicking until the police came knocking.  “Listen, if you don’t get the fuck away from my door - you - YOU are going to force me to call the police on you.”  I took a moment, and it seemed he registered that I was finally - dead-to-the-serious - about calling the ‘popo’ on his black ass.  I crept up to the peep hole, so I could get a sense of what he was doing; was he gearing up to play Bruce Lee with my door again?  Was he using his own phone to call for police assistance, was he retreating?  I needed to know what he was doing before I made an unnecessary move and called the police on him. 

   Considering the prior charges, my call, or that of anyone else, would surely send him to jail; I didn’t want that.  I didn’t want to continue to be involved for the time it would take for him to pay for the damage I was sure he did to my door, let alone the medical bills, furniture destruction and fees for the handyman staff, I had to contract, to do repairs to my apartment with the 50 cents an hour they pay the inmates at Rikers.  Also, who knew how easily he would find finding work with a misdemeanor or felony on his record?  I have never been to jail, or even arrested, mainly because I heard it’s quite difficult to get on your feet after a jail experience.  I heard Tamar Braxton’s voice  in my head saying matter of factley, “Ain't nobody got time for that,” and that was exactly how I felt; I had about as much time for a bid’ as I did for the hissy fit Gerald was throwing outside my door.  That would be zero seconds.  I was trying to process my thoughts over the rhythm of this negro’s boots, ones I purchased, crashing into the metal and making it look to give way.

   I had to take a deep breath, and think smart.  It felt like I always had to actively remind myself that this required chess thoughts, and prematurely calling ‘the boys’ would hurt way more than it would help.  I read all these forums on domestic violence and I knew he wouldn’t be in for long.  Shit, he wasn’t even 'in' for twenty four hours before they released his ass the first time, calling me three days, after the fact, as a courtesy - to let me know.  "New York’s finest,"  well, the ‘The Bold, the inefficient’ is what should be on all of their badges and plaquards, instead.   Jailing wouldn’t do shit for my swollen eye, bruised ribs, all of the triggered stress attacks I was suffering whenever I heard someone - anyone - yell outside my window.  ‘My side of Harlem is too loud for people living with any semblance of Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome,’ I thought, which I felt more and more like I had.

  I thought about how the jury’s sympathy would probably evaporate when I recounted how I seemingly brazenly cheated on Chimeze with Gerald for months prior to all of this.  No matter

How I put it. That's what it would sound like.  Telling the very personal story of how I went from being fiercely loyal to one man, to being torn between two, was not anything I was interested in doing.  And there probably wouldn't be enough time to start from the very beginning, nor would the person who needed to hear the story most be there.  So...my mind was preoccupied with the thought of how all twelve might become more interested in teaching me a lesson about mistreating people, than handing down justice.  Thinking about how they, as a group, might not believe the testimony the ADA had now fake subpoenaed me to make, scared me.  Even when I was talking to the ADA's supervisor, the content of what I had initially said, dried up.  There was less detail, less emotional truth; I didn't feel comfortable because it wasn't a simple case of cheating.  It was a complicated case of forgiveness:

***

February 2014.

   "Omg, the steak was so good. Chimeze.  Do you think they grill it?  I need to know.  I'm going to try it out - when I get a place, my own place, with a kitchen," I said softly.  

"I don't know what they do to it, but it was good," he said, looking over the armrest, at me, "You will have your own place soon enough - with a kitchen better equipped to cook in."

Looking into my eyes, after placing two hands on both sides of my head, and adjusting them, so he could see them clearly, "Don't worry.  You are smart and I think you will figure this out," I broke his intense stare.  And it was really intense - too intense for what he claimed we had and even considering how we started.    

   I wasn't all that sure what it meant - or if it meant anything at all. I really liked the support he was showing me, looking out the passenger seat window, I thought about how much I had changed since we met.  He never really said it, but I think he was attracted to me; we went out to eat at least twice a week and he was always there to help me with everything.  I don't know how I could have managed the loss of my apartment without him.  This other guy I was seeing had helped carry boxes and moved a few things into storage, but I really found that I liked Chimeze's style.  I just didn't think I would ever let go of how much he hurt me initially, people rarely change in a way I can see myself trusting.

We had first met in the fall of 2012, through an online dating application, and he was so distant, I didn't feel comfortable and I really wished we had never met.  It was really uncomfortable: THEN, he had the nerve to not want to pay the bill.  Like we had an actual discussion about it, going dutch.  I put off dating for years because I dreaded that someone would one day 'play' like my company wasn't worth a 13 dollar plate of fish - but I stood my ground.  When it was all said and done, he ended up taking care of things, but I KNEW that was the grand opening, grand closing.  If you didn't want to do it, why ask me out?  

Half a year later, he sauntered back into the picture, calling me:

"Hello?"  

Me: "Hello?"

"Hey, Patria? (referring to the name I used on the website, where I had met him).
I didn't recognize his voice, and I had been dating a lot in that period, so tired of not being clear about 'to whom' I was speaking, I said,"Who is this?"  He replied, "It's me, Chimeze....Chimeze Chindu."

  There was a long pause on his end, like, you really don't remember me...  Then he took his time recounting how we had met and our connection.  When he finished, I honestly didn't even feel badly about not recognizing his voice.  Why would I recognize his voice?  Not being bitter, but to keep it real, I replied:

"Oh, now I remember you.  So...how can I help you?"

I had to give it up, customer service style, because when I thought about how things were done, I figured - with my eyebrows raised - that there must be an emergency of some type, and only because he later relented and paid for dinner that night, six months ago, did I give him space to speak.  If he'd have done anything else, I would have hung up on his ass, as soon as he was identified.  He really wasn't cute enough for me to have a headache about anything having to do with him.

"Well, you know...,"he began.

"Yes..." I responded - already bored with this, with him and just totally ready to not be having this conversation.  I had just gotten home from a long hospital stay, and I was genuinely tired; like - my chest felt like it was going to collapse upon itself - tired.  I didn't have time for this.

"Well, just please let me get it out... I was unfair to you when we first connected."

"Oh?"  I interjected, because I couldn't hold back from using this opportunity to be an asshole.  When I am sick, it can really be, 'fuck you and your humility,' and I refuse to give a damn.  Ray J said "he hit it first," well this negro was "hit the rude first," so I was determined to make it hard for him, by attempting to drown him in venomous rude.

"Yes," he continued.  "Yes.  I was unfair to you and I have been thinking about you a lot, more than I normally would - considering we had one date..."

"One horrible and uncomfortable date," I stated, because he had softened me - a little - but he needed to be accountable.  By this conversation's end, he would be accountable and probably as uncomfortable as I felt in Johnny's on City Island.  That was my only goal: 'feel the burn, and don't act like you don't deserve too either'
 "Well, I know that.  I know it was bad...and you didn't deserve that, so I wanted to make it up to you and to talk to you a little about why things were 'the way they were'..." he stated, matter of factly.  Though I had promised to remain untouched by his humility, I was.  It takes a big man to apologize when they are wrong - a bigger man still to apologize to me.

"Yeah, so I would really like to take you to dinner at some point - maybe later in the week, if you are open to it?""What about tonight," I countered.  Since getting out of the hospital, I had been up under my mom - in her house - with her rules and an abundance of stairs.  I was starting to get annoyed and I wanted to get home to my apartment.  I figured he and I could go to dinner, eat, talk, and I could effectively see if he was full of crap or not and move accordingly.

"Ok," he replied.

After he picked me up we drove to City Island and were seated in a much better restaurant than the first time.  He quickly grabbed my hand, just when I was scooting over to go wash my hands in the restroom.  "Thank you for stepping out with me.  I appreciate it.  I didn't think you'd be open to this."

Again, his humility touched me.  "It's cool.  I appreciate your apology," I stated, looking around.  "This is nice, thank you for bringing me.  And thank you for being open to driving me home - back to my apartment - after."

"Yeah, sure," he replied to my back, as I headed to the bathroom.

After sharing some shrimp cocktail and honestly quite mediocre pasta dishes, that had my mind screaming, "I can do better than this," he started to talk:

"So, the reason we had a hard time on our first 'date' - we can call it that right, I mean I paid, so it was a date, right?"

"Reluctantly paid," I interjected.  Then looking at his sad eyes, I relented, "Fine...it was a date, because you paid."  Focusing on the table while sipping my drink, I kept thinking 'grand opening, grand closing, and a possible close of the curtain on this encore.'  I hoped he would 'get to it " - this thing he had to say - sooner than later.

"Well, when I saw you, you didn't look like your pictures and so..."

"Didn't look like my pictures?  Didn't look like my pictures - so are you trying to say I'm ugly?  Unattractive?  YOU MOTHERFUCK--"  I started  to say, through clenched teeth.  Then I stopped.  "Listen, are you still going to take me home?  Because if you are - let's just hop to that part of THIS."

I thought I was done, but then I continued, "You know, no one has ever thought about me being unattractive.  The nerve of YOU, OF YOU, to drag me out to say some ole bullshit to me...how dare you?  YOU - out here looking like you forgot which lane you were assigned.  Why are you even in my lane." I whispered, so as not to cause a scene - but anyone who could see my face would've probably called the police - for Chimeze's sake.

If I didn't need a ride, if there was a bus this late, I would have beat his ass - right in that restaurant.  AND STILL expected him to handle the tab.  "Ok...Ok...it's just," he faltered looking at me-looking at him, with a glare that could cut a diamond.

"You mentioned your illness and I'm a nurse.  I work with sick people all day; I just couldn't see myself coming home to that."  I lost my breath when he said that.  I didn't want to think about being referred to as "that sickly women" by him.  He didn't even know me.  This sickly women had a home - of her own and all the accouterments that came with it, a degree - respected from coast to coast, good credit - all things I found out later, he didn’t have.  I had something to say, but his observation - of the unobservable -planted a seed of insecurity.

  ‘Do men really feel that way?  I've never had this issue come up before, but the scenario had me questioning myself , in my head , like: 'Does my illness make me less? Is it going to be a problem romantically?This 'wbhole new thing to think about, really had me feeling sick, down to the pit of my stomach, but I refused to show it.  "I’m ready to go,” I said while walking toward the restaurant's exit, giving his ass no choice but to hurry  to pay the bill and follow behind me.

MOOD