Nate

Nate

Nate lay on his back, smoking a cigarette while watching the
young woman quickly getting dressed. She was fine…although not
as fine as she had appeared some twelve hours before when they
were at the club. As he watched her zip up the hip hugging red
dress, he thought that he didnʼt remember her ass being quite as
big as it was. She looked great the night before; a sweet, darkskinned
beauty in a tight red dress with legs that seemed to go on
forever and a cleavage that wouldnʼt quit. He had found himself
getting lost in the promises that her cleavage held for him.

Approaching her hadnʼt been difficult. He never had a problem
approaching women. They were commodities that he could afford
without sacrifice. She had been sitting at the bar, her luscious legs
crossed invitingly; drink in handwith what he assumed to be
girlfriends on either side of her. He sipped his cognac between
sentences, not remembering exactly what their conversation had
been about, only knowing that the flow had been smooth. It had to
have been. Why else would she have come back to the apartment
to lay down with him? Surely it wasnʼt based completely on his
sexy bald head, dangerously dark brown eyes and seductive smile.
They had danced that night, mostly towards the end of the
evening when the club was about to close. The last couple of
songs had been slow and for that, he assumed that she had been
grateful because it had given her the chance to savor how good his
chiseled body felt. He had pressed against her deliberately,
allowing himself to lengthen and expand freely in the silk boxers
that he had worn under his two-piece Italian cut suit. She
responded by holding him tighter. He vaguely remembered
thinking that this was going to be easy.

Sometime between the club closing and their arrival to his
apartment, he found time to do a few hits of cocaine. This woman,
whoever she was, had no knowledge of this and it made no
difference to him one way or the other. This was his night, as every
night at the club had been in the years before. The car ride back to
the apartment had been brief. He set the Sirius Satellite station to
his favorite Hip Hop station and let it play at a near-deafening level
while they cruised up the nearly empty Schuylkill Expressway
towards Bala Cynwyd.

Once at the apartment, he wasted no time getting her into bed.
He gave her a drink that was clearly out of obligation…something
that he thought he should do if he wanted to get what he wanted.
He remembered thinking that she seemed tense at first, but she
came around. He entered her without thought. Between the
cocaine and the alcohol, all he could think of was immersing
himself as deeply into her as humanly possible. It was as if the
cocaine took all of his emotions and put them into the tip of his dick,
inflaming it to the point where he had to extinguish it by any means
possible. She had stopped being a woman at that point. Once
inside of her, she was only a means to an end. He thought at one
point, that she had wanted the sex to stop and was trying to signal
him to get off her. It didnʼt seem to matter…he wasnʼt finished. He
moved like a machine, pistoning in and out of her without thought
or intention. He only needed to put out the flame that seemed to
engulf his loins. It seemed as if he had her locked in a vice grip
against the sheets, pinning her down, holding her in place, almost
forcing her legs to remain wrapped around his hips. He fucked her
for what felt like two hours but in reality, it was only fifteen minutes.
Once he exploded with a savage moan, sweat streaming down the
sides of his face and chest, he simply rolled off her, asked her if
she wanted anything, lit a cigarette, smoked it and went to sleep.
The cocaine in his system didnʼt stop him from doing that.

Now he was watching her with something that could be only
construed as disdain. She had applied her lipstick, brushed her
short, Dutch-cut hair into place and was preparing to walk out the
door.

“I suppose Iʼll see you some time at the club, huh?” she said
.
Nate took a long drag of his cigarette and gave her face and
body a look. She definitely didnʼt look as good as the night before.
Her lips were just a bit too large for her face and earlier, he had
thought that her eyes were beautiful. Now, he could see nothing
that would set them apart from any other womanʼs eyes.

“I guess.” He mumbled. “Leave your number on the living-room
table if you want.”
She shook her head slowly.
“Iʼll just see you at the club.” She slung her purse over her right
shoulder. “See you around sometime.”
“Leave your number.” He called.

She nodded, waved her hand absently and continued her walk
out the front door. He chuckled to himself. He knew he wouldnʼt be
seeing her again, even if she crossed his path at the club….what
was her name? He couldnʼt think of it. Was it Deirdre, Donna? He
couldnʼt recall and it didnʼt matter. He took another drag of the
cigarette. But she was good in bed, wasnʼt she?
His cell phone rang, he picked it up.
“Yeah?”
“Why havenʼt you called me?” The female voice was stern.
“Momma?”
“And who else would be calling you this afternoon?
Never mind! I donʼt want to know.”
Nate sat up in his king sized bed and extinguished his
cigarette in the ashtray. Thandi didnʼt sound happy and he knew
why.
“Momma, Iʼm sorry that I didnʼt call you but Iʼve been busy.”
“Doing what?”
“Just stuff Momma.”
“You say ʻstuffʼ like youʼre nine years old. I got news for you,
youʼre considerably older.”
“Well you must want to know if I went for the job on Friday and
yes, I did.” He paused. “I donʼt think I got that job. I think some
white boy got it.”
“And you think that why?”
“Because I was the only black up in there.” He responded with
a slight twinge of anger.
“And that means what?”
“It means that companies ainʼt hiring for us.”
“What did I tell you about thinking that way?”
“I know what you told me, but that ainʼt reality. Donʼt worry
though; I got other things going on.”
“Why donʼt you just talk to Jai to see what he can do for you?”
“No Momma! Thereʼs nothinʼ that Jai can do for me. I got this.”
“You got this? Nate, I donʼt want to see you make any foolish
decisions.”
“Decisions like what?” He felt the anger inside of him
beginning to rise.
Thandi paused and took a breath.
“Okay, here we go.” He said inaudibly. He thought that his
mother was getting ready to launch into the tirade of mistakes that
he had made several years ago.

“Iʼm not going to go into your past. You know what you did,
and you know how you get. I just wanted to know if you went on
the job interview because sometimes you have a tendency to say
ʻto hellʼ with everything when things donʼt go your way.”
He reached for the pack of cigarettes and promptly lit one. He
didnʼt feel like another lecture from Thandi and thought maybe he
could avoid it if he just kept his mouth shut.
“Your Aunt Winnie asked about you today.” She continued.
“We were a little concerned.”
“Yeah, I know. Well, Iʼm fine. I can handle it Momma. Youʼre
gonna have to trust me on this.”
“Youʼre right.” She sighed. God, how he hated it when she
sighed. “I canʼt protect you…not like I used to.”
“I donʼt need you to protect me.” He glanced at the clock on
the nightstand. “Besides, I gotta go. I got some things I got to do.”
“Fine. Are you coming to Sunday dinner at your Aunt Winnieʼs
next week? And, if so, are you bringing anyone?”
“Iʼll be there. I donʼt know if Iʼm bringing anyone though. Can I
get back to you on that?”
“Tomorrow. Get back to me tomorrow.”
“Okay Momma.” He mumbled.
“I love you Nate.”
“Yeah, I know you do.”
“Good bye.”
“See ya.” He clicked the ʻEndʼ button.

Sometimes, he hated talking to Thandi. It always seemed as if
she were putting pressure on him to do something. If it wasnʼt
finding a job, it was finding a place to live and if it wasnʼt that, it was
settling down with a nice girl instead of messing around with the
whores that he had become accustomed to. His mother wasnʼt
happy about him using the apartment that was rented under the
name of a friend but Hamilton let him stay there from time to time
and this weekend he was out of town. Thandi always said that he
should have his own place and not be reliant on anyone else. She
didnʼt understand that this was temporary until he found the type of
apartment that he wanted. As far as finding a suitable job, he knew
that wasnʼt going to happen because he wasnʼt interested in finding
one. He was making money. In fact, he was making more money
than his older brothers, Jai and Ryan combined! If he had been
privy to the conversation that Thandi and Winnie had earlier that
day, he wouldʼve agreed whole-heartedly that he had a head for
numbers. He was good at calculations, figuring out the odds of any
situation and managing to play it so that he always came out on
top. He wasnʼt afraid of taking risks. No odds seemed to be too
great for him. One of his uncles pulled him aside years ago and
had a talk with him. The talk had occurred at one of the family
dinners.

It was a Sunday dinner. Louis had been drinking all evening
and all of the family was present, eating, laughing and eating some
more. Louis called him out into the backyard to have a man-to-man
talk. Initially, Nate didnʼt want to talk to him, wanting instead to be
upstairs watching the game on ESPN but once outside, Louis
pulled him close so that no one else could hear. He told Nate that
he had heart and that to make it in this world heart was all that was
going to carry him through. Louis had bathed him in liquor fumes
during the conversation. He told him what he thought being a man
truly meant and that it wasnʼt about the formal education that
Thandi had insisted he should have and it wasnʼt about being a
sell-out like his lawyer brother, Jai and it certainly wasnʼt about
being a faggot like his other older brother, Ryan. Being a man
meant taking control of every situation and making it his. If he were
going to make it, then he had to control everything from his women
to his income. Anything less would be unacceptable. It was a
conversation that he never forgot.

The cell phone rang again. Nate snatched it up.
“Yeah.”
“Yo Nigga!! Where you at?” the voice was familiar, but he
didnʼt recognize it at first.
“Chillinʼ. Whoʼs this?”
“Amir man, what, you slippinʼ? Canʼt even recognize your
boyʼs voice?”
“Oh man!” Nate sat up. “Sorry Amir. Whatʼs up?”
“Money came in but it ainʼt right man. Better get it down here.”
“What are we talkinʼ?”
“We short by a five bills. Mook may be skimminʼ off the top.
Maybe itʼs time we show him a thing or two about fuckinʼ with
money that ainʼt his.”
Nate took his last quick hit off his cigarette. “Alright man.”
He glanced at the clock. “Iʼll be down in a half.”
He heard Amir chuckle. Nate pictured him, all dreadlocks and
teeth, sitting at the dining-room table in his two-bedroom home in
Germantown.
“Yo man, did you hit that ass last night?” Amir asked, sounding
as if he had taken a deep breath while talking.
Nate knew that he was smoking on a blunt.
“Bitch just left man.”
Amir laughed.
“Fuck it. Iʼll see you when you get here, Nigga!”
“Later.” He flipped the cell phone shut. Swinging his legs over
the side of the bed, he swore silently to himself. He did not feel like
killing anyone on a Sunday.