Choosing Sides Read online

  “Malek Johnson.”

  The officer didn’t even need to finish typing in the name. The jail had been a circus ever since the young man had arrived. “We can’t allow anyone else in to see Mr. Johnson,” he stated firmly. “The next person that sees Mr. Johnson better have bail money.”

  “No! I need to get him out of here,” she pleaded.

  “Malek Johnson can’t go anywhere until he sees a judge, which ain’t gonna be until Monday morning. And I wouldn’t be surprised if the judge sets his bail at a million dollars for the little stunt he pulled. Just imagine all those kids from the projects that looked up to “the pull.” And this is how their role model pays them back.” The officer shook his head. “Crying shame, crying shame.” The officer began shuffling papers, dismissing Halleigh as if she wasn’t important.

  Halleigh put her hands over her face and sighed deeply as she tried to keep her composure.

  The officer looked up and saw she was still standing in front of him. He frowned in concern. “Young lady, how old are you anyway? Why are you up here like this by yourself?”

  She lied as she walked away from the desk, “I’m grown.” With nowhere to go, she found a seat in the waiting area.

  “Seems to me someone as grown as yourself would at least be able to afford a pair of shoes then,” he called out.

  Halleigh didn’t respond. She just sat there thinking, I’ll just stay here until Monday if I have to. I have to see Malek. I want to be here when he gets out. In her heart she knew that she had no other place to go.

  Taking pity on her, the officer approached her. “Here,” he said, extending her a pair of jail-issued flip-flops, “at least put something on your feet.”

  “I’m tired of y’all pig mu’fuckas always locking a bitch up! Damn! Get on my nerves. Got me in this musty mu’fucka.”

  Halleigh had been leaned up against the precinct wall, trying to ease her mind, when the loud voice snapped her out of her restless sleep.

  “Give me my shit!” The girl snatched her belongings from the officer sitting behind the desk. She sat down and pulled a pair of stilettos and some cheap jewelry out of the bag that the officer had given her. She put the shoes on her feet, applied her bracelets to her arm, and sashayed out the door. “Fuck y’all!” she yelled, slamming the door closed behind her.

  After all the commotion died down, a female officer, the one who had just been handling the screaming woman, walked over to Halleigh. She had noticed that Halleigh had been there for quite a while now. “Excuse me, young lady, but can we help you with something?”

  “I’m just waiting for Malek Johnson.” Halleigh tried to sound grown-up and undaunted by authority.

  “Well, you can’t wait here . . . unless you want to get arrested for loitering.”

  Now she could see why that woman had been going off. These cops were jerks. As bad as Halleigh wanted to show her ass, the only words that came out of her mouth were, “Whatever.” She sighed under her breath as she got up and left the station.

  The late winter air was colder than normal. The weather had shifted from a slight drizzle, to a downpour, to a thunderous shower with lightning and everything. Heavy rain drops pelted against Halleigh’s skin so hard, she felt like she was lost in a hailstorm. Here she was, standing outside wearing nothing, but the flimsy T-shirt. And the flip-flops on her feet were soaked and didn’t keep her toes warm. She was freezing and didn’t know where she could possibly go until Monday morning.

  Then she heard a familiar voice say, “Damn, Tash! Come the fuck on!”

  When she looked up, it was that same girl who had caused the commotion earlier in the police precinct. She was pacing, switching her hips back and forth as if she were trying to create some type of friction between her legs. She was fidgeting just to stay warm.

  “Come on, Tash. It’s cold out here,” she complained to herself out loud. Just then she noticed Halleigh walking by. She held up her hand and halted her as if she were hailing a taxi cab. “Ay, yo, you got a light?” she asked Halleigh.

  Halleigh shook her head.

  “Fuck,” the girl snapped.

  Just then, Halleigh watched as the girl walked to a car that was parked on the side of the street, looked around to make sure no one was coming, and then tried the door, which opened. Halleigh peeped her surroundings nervously. I know this girl is not breaking into a car right in front of the police station.

  The girl popped in the car lighter and stood outside the car waiting a couple minutes for it to heat up. She lit her cigarette and then quickly closed the door and took her place back on the street to wait for her ride.

  The girl looked Halleigh up and down and noticed her disheveled appearance. “Damn, girl, what happened to you?”

  “You don’t even want to know,” Halleigh replied, blowing hot air from her mouth into her hands.

  “You waiting for a ride or something?” The girl puffed her cigarette.

  “No. I don’t know what I’m doing. My boyfriend is locked up. They talking about he has to wait until Monday to get a bail set.” Halleigh looked defeated. “Even then, I don’t know how I’m going to come up with that. He’s in all of this mess because of me, trying to look out for me. I don’t know what to do.” Halleigh’s hands dropped to her sides as the rain washed her tears away.

  “Where you stay?”

  Halleigh looked around. “Right now, where I stand. I just need a place to think. I have to figure out what I’m gon’ do.”

  “Well, it’s colder then a bitch out here,” the girl commented. “You ain’t gon’ figure nothing out waiting outside, especially in this cold-ass rain.” She sucked her teeth. “What’s your name?”

  “Halleigh.”

  “I’m Mimi.” She noticed that Halleigh was shivering and took pity on the girl. “Look, girl, you can crash at my spot if you need to. At least for the night. My daddy will probably be able to help you out too. He can help you get your boy out of jail if you want him to.”

  Halleigh didn’t know Mimi from the man on the moon, but as of now, she had officially run out of options. She figured that anything would be better than being on the streets, so she decided to accept Mimi’s offer. “You sure your daddy won’t mind?”

  Mimi smirked and looked Halleigh up and down and then licked her lips. “Nah, he won’t mind, trust me.”

  Halleigh stood next to Mimi on the street as they waited for Mimi’s ride to pick them up. She didn’t want to seem like a charity case, but she didn’t have anywhere else to go. For a moment she thought about going to Nikki’s house. Nikki had a single mother too, but her mother was more strict on Nikki than Halleigh’s mother was on her. Nikki had the type of mother who made phone calls to make sure a situation was kosher. Halleigh couldn’t go and stay for two nights at Nikki’s without raising suspicion. Besides, she didn’t want Nikki to know about the disasters that had happened to her and to Malek. She knew that, underneath, Nikki had envied their relationship, and she would be glad to know all their plans had been shipwrecked.

  Malek was locked up, so of course, staying with him wasn’t an option. And her mother was so strung-out that she had sacrificed her relationship with her daughter just to get high. Halleigh knew that she would never walk into her mother’s house again. There was no repairing their relationship. I hate her, Halleigh thought, feeling bombarded with mixed emotions of hatred, anger, and disgust for her mother.

  Mimi paced up and down Saginaw Street puffing on her cigarette. She kept looking up and down the block to see if her ride was nearing. She looked down at the girl that she had befriended and could tell that she was carrying a large burden on her shoulders. “Here, hit this. It’ll calm your nerves.” Mimi offered Halleigh a drag of her Newport.

  Halleigh shook her head. “I don’t smoke.”

  Mimi shrugged her shoulders and took a long pull of the nicotine as she continued to pace back and forth, her silver stilettos that laced up her slim legs clicking back and forth. She wore a short silver
halter dress, and her hair was braided straight to the back, her extensions causing it to fall right above her butt. Baby hair rested along her edges.

  “Where the hell is this girl at?” Mimi muttered impatiently.

  “Are you sure this is all right? Your daddy won’t mind it if I stay the night?” Halleigh furrowed her eyebrows together in worry. She pondered over her situation. Who was this woman whose father would allow her to bring a stranger home? He must be a nice man, or why would Mimi even offer to allow this?

  Mimi looked her up and down again and smirked. “Nah, like I said before, he won’t mind. My daddy will be happy to have you. He’ll help you figure everything out.” Mimi’s last sentence was said in a sing-song tone.

  Just as Halleigh was about to reply, a caramel-colored girl with long layered hair pulled up in a Toyota and honked the horn. “Mimi, get in!” she yelled.

  Halleigh anxiously waited near the curb while Mimi strolled over to the car. “Come on, Hal,” Mimi called.

  Instantly Halleigh picked up on the fact that Mimi had already used her nickname, as if they were friends. As if she’d known her forever. A sense of security swept over Halleigh, like everything would be okay. She began taking steps toward the car.

  “Mimi, get your ass in the car!” the girl shouted from inside the car just as she noticed Halleigh making her way over to the car too. “And where the fuck she think she going?”

  Halleigh stopped in her tracks as she looked helplessly at Mimi.

  “Tasha, chill! She needs our help. She needs to meet Daddy.” Mimi spoke through clenched teeth.

  Tasha peered out at the girl who was standing beside her car. It was obvious that the girl had been crying. Her eyes were red and puffy. She was shivering, and her arms were wrapped around herself as if she were afraid. “Tell her to get in,” Tasha said with an attitude. Heaving a sigh of resignation, she put the car in drive.

  “See, I told you everything would be cool. Get in,” Mimi said to Halleigh as she opened the back door for her.

  Halleigh got into the car and rode silently as she watched the city streets pass her by. She could feel Tasha’s eyes on her as she glared at her from the rearview mirror. She kept feeling her stare and started feeling uncomfortable in the confinement of the car.

  “You know Manolo about to trip on you, right?” Tasha asked as they pulled into the driveway of a ranch-style home on the city’s South Side.

  “He’ll be cool once he sees what I got for him.” Mimi shuffled dollars together from inside her purse.

  The three girls exited the car and entered the house. There were several girls scattered throughout the house. Some were lounging in the large living room, others were getting dressed and rushing about as they prepared to leave, still others walked freely throughout the house wearing nothing but their underclothes. Most of them had high-perched breasts, smooth thighs without cellulite, and round cantaloupe-shaped hips. There appeared to be about five women in all.

  “This your daddy’s crib?” Halleigh asked, scanning the large rooms with wonder.

  “Yeah, he probably in the back,” Mimi replied.

  Halleigh noticed Tasha roll her eyes as she followed them down a long hallway in the five-bedroom house. They entered the room, and Halleigh saw a tall, well-built man sitting in a recliner in the corner of the room and puffing on a blunt. The first thing that she noticed was his long, perfectly manicured fingernails.

  “How did you get locked up?” was his first question as he stared directly at Mimi.

  “It was all a misunderstanding, Daddy. I promise it will never happen again,” Mimi replied. She didn’t give him a chance to respond. She just rambled right into her next sentence. “This is my friend, Halleigh. I met her outside of the jail when I was waiting on slow-ass Tasha to come pick me up.” Mimi stroked a piece of Halleigh’s hair and then pushed it behind her ear. “She is in a bind right now, and I told her that you might be able to help her out.”

  The man didn’t even look Halleigh’s way. Instead, he looked at Tasha. “What do you think?”

  She looked over at Halleigh and, once again, rolled her eyes. “I don’t know.” She shrugged. “But I guess it could be a good move.” Tasha made her way over to the man and began to massage his defined shoulders. “What do you think?”

  Mimi noticed the way he was now looking at Halleigh. It was the same look he gave her when she’d first met him, so she knew that it was a done deal. She had done good.

  Slowly, without Halleigh even noticing, Mimi backed up and began to ease out of the room. Just as she was about to close the door, the man called out to her, “Mimi, you gon’ work double to pay me back that bail money,” never taking his eyes off Halleigh.

  Damn, this mu’fucka could’ve let me slide since I brought his ass some fresh pussy. Niggas don’t appreciate shit, I swear. Mimi walked out of the room without responding, and Tasha followed, leaving Halleigh in the room alone.

  Now completely alone with this stranger and under his steely gaze, Halleigh pulled at the T-shirt that she wore, feeling uncomfortable in her own skin. She felt goose bumps rise on her arms. The room was smoky from the weed, and Halleigh could tell that he was as high as a kite.

  “What did you say your name was?” he asked as he continued to smoke on his blunt.

  “Halleigh,” she replied, then took a gulp, trying to swallow the huge knot in her throat.

  “Halleigh. Your name fits you.” He looked at her high-yellow skin tone and licked his lips as if he could taste her. Yeah, Mimi had done good.

  Being in the pimping game for over ten years Manolo knew a lost soul when he saw one. Halleigh’s eyes revealed her sadness. He didn’t know what path she had followed that brought her to his doorstep, but he knew that he was about to lead her in a new direction. His eyes admired the proportioned curves of her young body, and he had to mentally tame his dick down when he noticed her hard nipples poking through her T-shirt.

  “So why do you need Manolo’s help?” he asked, referring to himself in third person.

  Her thoughts instantly went back to Malek, and tears came to her eyes.

  Manolo nodded his head toward his bed. “Take your time, baby girl. Have a seat. I won’t bite you, I promise.”

  Halleigh sat on the bed near his chair. “It’s my boyfriend, Malek. He was arrested, and I need money to get him out.”

  “What they holding him for?” Manolo tapped the blunt against an ashtray that sat on a glass table beside him.

  Although hesitant at first because she didn’t just want to be telling this stranger all of her business, she knew that if she was going to get him to help her, that she needed to tell him everything. “He robbed a store ... but he’s not like that. He only did it because I needed the money.” Halleigh even told Manolo about the awful attack that took place at her mother’s house and why she couldn’t go back there. In fact, she revealed everything that had occurred, up to the point of stepping foot in his house.

  “Sounds to me like your boyfriend ain’t gon’ want nothing to do with you when he gets out.” Manolo knew to begin planting the seeds of doubt into this fresh soil. “Sitting in jail has a way of making people think about things. He’s probably thinking about you right now and how you’ve probably fucked things up for him.”

  Manolo’s words were harsh, but Halleigh wasn’t about to kid herself. She knew there was plenty of truth to them, and that Malek probably was sitting in jail right now thinking how none of this would be happening had he never met her.

  “Now I want to help you,” Manolo continued, “but I’ve got to be truthful. I’m not a liar, so I’m gon’ keep it gully with you.”

  Halleigh nodded eagerly, wondering what he would say next. Here she was traumatized, perhaps expecting a little empathy, but Manolo dished out anything but.

  “I know you believe your man is probably just thinking it, but I’m going to tell you straight up—this is all your fault. If it wasn’t for you, your man wouldn’t be locked up right
now.”

  Flabbergasted, Halleigh’s mouth flew open. Manolo’s words shocked her as sharply as an unexpected slap. With his harsh words, she began to let her tears flow freely. Believing it was all her fault was one thing, but hearing it was another.

  Halleigh stood there doing what it seemed she’d been doing for the last twenty-four hours, crying. She was tired of crying though. Those tears weren’t getting her anywhere. It was time to do something about the messy bed that was made.

  “What do I do?” she asked, wiping her tears away roughly, as if she was angry at them for even falling from her eyes. But as quickly as she wiped them, more would fall.

  Manolo stood up and began to help her wipe her tears away. He knew that he had her in the palm of his hand. His main agenda was to get a woman to become and remain his ho. He called that “the pimp’s creed.” Having taken advantage of some of the toughest bitches that Flint had ever bred, he knew this was going to be a piece of cake. He knew how to break a grown-ass woman down, so he knew it wouldn’t be any problem with such a naïve teen.

  “It’s your fault that this happened, so you have to fix it,” he told her. “How you fix it is up to you.”

  “But how can I fix it? Even when they set bail, I don’t have the money to get him out. His parents work hard and everything, but it’s not their fault he’s in there, it’s mine.” Halleigh knew that if Malek’s parents had to come up off that bail money, Mrs. Johnson would do everything in her power to see to it that Malek never saw her again, and she couldn’t let that happen. Manolo was right. It was her fault. She had to come up with the bail money.

  Manolo questioned Halleigh the same way Satan had questioned Eve in the garden. “You don’t have any money?”

  “I don’t even have a roof over my head right now.”

  Manolo put his index finger to his chin and thought for a minute. “He’s in for robbery, did you say?”

  Halleigh nodded.

  “Is this his first offense ever?”

  Once again, Halleigh nodded.

  “Let me see . . .” Manolo, with his street wisdom, figured out how much Malek’s bail would probably be for a first-time offender. “Ten stacks,” he finally said.