Red Light Wives (3 page)

“I don't own any clothes like that,” I said quickly. “All of my stuff is tame.”

“I hope it ain't too tame. I don't want you goin' to my clients lookin' like no old maid librarian. That frock you got on now, that'll work just fine. Men go for that college-girl look.”

I nodded.

“Good,” Clyde said, grunting. “Now that we on the same page, let's get that waiter over here so we can get us some of that lasagna before them greedy tourists eat everything up.”

“I
feel like a five-dollar streetwalker,” I mumbled, struggling to sit up in the hospital bed I'd been confined to for the past two days. My hair was long, but so tangled and matted, it looked and felt like a skullcap. My lips were dry and my eyes so red and puffy, putting on makeup had been a waste of my time. I frowned at the lipstick and compact on the stand next to my bed. I had never been in a hospital before in my life.

The grim-faced doctors and stern nurses swishing in and out of the room dressed in white from head to shoes, looked like sheep. I had given birth to a huge baby, almost ten pounds. Delivering him had been rough, almost splitting my crack in two. I'd been stitched up so tight, I felt like a virgin. And a dumb one, at that.

“And you look like one of them five-dollar wenches, too.” Agreeing with me was Odessa Hawkins, my best friend for the past six years and my stepsister Verna's lover. “I told you to leave that lowlife motherfucker alone last year when he disappeared on you for two months. Not to mention all the money he borrowed from you.”

A lot of people thought that Odessa and I were related, and the way my daddy got around, that was a strong possibility. She and I had the same dark brown skin with a few black freckles across the nose, thin lips, and large slanted brown eyes. Cute, maybe even pretty to some people, but not without a little help from our friends at the cosmetics counter. Every time I looked in Odessa's face, it was like looking in a mirror.

“Larry always paid me back—”

“Girl, don't you be defendin' that cheesy-ass bastard to me, 'less you wanna spend another few days stretched out in this hospital bed. I won't be as gentle with your black ass as Mrs. Larry was. Me and Verna both tried to tell you that that young-ass punk wasn't good for nothin' but a good fuck. And if that's all he was, you didn't need him. All the money you loaned him, you could have invested in a good vibrator until you found yourself a real man,” Odessa said, growling, hovering over me like a vulture.

I sighed and glanced around the long, narrow room, looking from one bed to the other. There were ten beds, ten women—five beds, five women on each side of the room facing each other. It was hard to have a private conversation, but none of the other women seemed to be interested in anything Odessa and I had to say. They were too busy nursing their newborn babies and bragging on the telephone about how happy they were.

As far as I knew, there was only one other Black woman in the maternity ward, and that was Larry's wife. That bitch from hell. I found out a few hours after our scuffle in the department store parking lot, that her name was Belinda. Odessa knew her from her old neighborhood and had tangled with one of her older sisters over a man. But that was during Odessa's teen years before she realized women lovers were more to her liking.

Belinda Holmes was in a private room across the hall. I think that if we both hadn't been so weak, we probably would have duked it out some more right in the hospital. I had a feeling that she wanted to kick my ass some more, the way she glared at me every time I ran into her in the hallway. But I was through with that weak drama. Larry was not worth it. He had not even checked to see how I was doing, ask about his son, or even acknowledge my presence when I encountered him in the waiting room. After all I'd gone through with that man, this was my reward.

“A twenty-eight-year-old man ain't out for nothin' but a good time. A thirty-three-year-old woman ought to know that,” Odessa said with a smirk, giving me a stern look and adjusting a pillow under my head. She had on a man's shirt, unbuttoned over a T-shirt and a pair of baggy flannel pants.

“Since when do you know so much about men?” I teased my best friend about being a lesbian as often as she teased me about being a fool.

Odessa rolled her eyes and tugged at the limp ponytail hanging off the side of her head. “I know more than you think, Lula. I've had more than a few dicks in my life to know they ain't all they cracked up to be. And, you don't grow up in a house with six brothers and not learn everything else you need to know about men. Shit.” We both laughed.

“I should have known somethin' wasn't right when Larry tried so hard to make me get an abortion,” I said lamely, sipping cold water from a plastic cup. My throat was so dry, it hurt when I swallowed. I felt like I hadn't eaten in days. The hospital food tasted like paper, but Odessa had smuggled me in some fried chicken. I couldn't wait to gnaw on it. I was anxious for things to get back to normal, but I knew that was something I wouldn't experience for a long time.

“Well, was that all you was suspicious of? What about him not lettin' you know where he lived?” Odessa snapped. With a grunt, she rolled up the sleeves of her plaid shirt and folded her arms.

I sighed. “I didn't need to know. I know where he works. I've called him there dozens of times. He likes havin' his space as much as I like havin' mine. I was the one with an apartment all to myself. He lives way across town somewhere, and he has four roommates—”

Odessa gave me a stern look, shaking her finger in my face as she talked. “Four roommates that turned out to be a wife and three kids. Don't you defend that punk because he ain't worth it.” She had nosed around like Shaft, gathering more incriminating evidence than I needed to get Larry out of my system. “He played you like a piano, girl. Oh, that nigger had him a good thing goin'.”

“I know, I know. You don't have to rub it in. Anyway, I'm glad this is all over,” I said sadly, rubbing my stomach. “Givin' birth sure ain't what it's cracked up to be. I feel like holy shit between my legs.”

Odessa lowered her head and leaned closer toward me, looking at me through narrowed eyes. “Uh, you seen his other newborn? The nursery is right around the corner if you want to take a peek.”

“I don't want to,” I said, sniffing so hard the insides of my nostrils burned.

“Well, I peeped in the nursery. You had the cuter baby. That other one looks like a Peking duck. And bein' a girl, she goin' to catch hell the rest of her life.”

“But that other baby lived, mine didn't.” A dark shadow slid across my face and my chest started aching. My son who had looked just like Larry had lived only two hours. A congenital heart defect had returned him to God.

Odessa touched my forehead and said in a soothing voice, “I know, sugar. I know. But the sooner you get over that, the better. If he was goin' to die anyway, it's better that it happened now, before you got too attached to him. You still young enough. You got a few more years to have babies. But first, we got to find you a new man. A real man.”

“Don't you start up that mess about me hookin' up with one of your recently divorced brothers.” Another man was the last thing on my mind. My life needed a complete makeover. A new location was what I needed. I just didn't know where to go, and even if I did, I didn't have the money to go too far.

Odessa shook her head. “Bo, my brother that's here from San Francisco, he ain't never even married.”

I had never met Odessa's middle-aged brother, Bo. But she talked about him so often, I felt like I had. He was an independent musician who roamed around the world blowing a saxophone with whatever band would have him. He had performed with some of the most famous people in the business. I had seen pictures of Bo. Not only was he plain, but he was cross-eyed, too. It was no surprise to me that the man had never been married.

I certainly had no interest in Odessa's brother. He was a sorry specimen of a man compared to Larry. Then she said something that did peak my interest, and that same cross-eyed brother suddenly sounded like the man I'd been looking for all of my life.

“Bo's goin' to be movin' back to San Francisco in a few weeks to find work with another band. If I was still into men and Bo wasn't my brother, I'd go after him myself,” Odessa said smugly, giving me a sideways glance.

I perked up right away. It was like a lightbulb lit up inside my head.

“Your brother is movin' back to California?” I asked.

“Uh-huh. Next month. Me and Verna goin' to give him a little goin' away party, and you better come.”

“I will,” I said, so tired and confused I said the first thing I could think of.

“If y'all do hit it off, maybe he'll ask you to go back with him. I hear San Francisco is one happy town.”

I looked at the wall behind Odessa, all kinds of thoughts going through my head. “And I just might go with him,” I said.

“W
here you goin' this time, Miss Rocky?”

“Uh, just to visit a sick friend.”

“The same one you went to visit last night?”

“Uh-huh.”

“What's wrong with your sick friend?”

“Look, Helen, I'm in a hurry, and I don't have time to stand here talking a lot of nonsense. Where are the kids?”

“Oh, you don't have to worry about them little dudes. I tucked 'em all in the bed, and they are sleeping like logs. Can I go watch music videos on BET now?”

“Yeah, yeah, go on,” I ordered, snapping my fingers. “There's soda and chips in the kitchen. And you stay away from my beer! Your mama would have a cow if she knew about you drinking over here.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

I closed my bathroom door as soon as Helen stumbled out, pouting like she usually did when I hollered at her. Helen Daniels was a good friend to have. She came in real handy. A lot of it had to do with the fact that she was mildly retarded. At nineteen, she was more like ten or twelve. But she was mature enough to run errands for me and babysit when I didn't have to be away from my house for too long.

It was convenient having Helen living right next door. Her elderly parents eagerly allowed Helen to help me with the kids. Even before Joe took off with that bitch of his, Helen spent a lot of time at our house. In addition to keeping an eye on my three little monsters, she loved doing the things around the house that I didn't want to do.

One of the few good things I could say about Joe was, he liked to live well. We had rented a nice big house in a safe, quiet neighborhood. He'd let me spend as much money as I wanted to decorate the house. I'd spent a fortune on black leather couches, smoked-glass coffee tables, an entertainment center, and carpets so thick and shaggy, it felt like walking on cotton. My house on Joost Street was a long way from the cheap, gummy walls and linoleum floors in the run-down Bayview neighborhood I'd escaped from. I was willing to do whatever I had to do to keep some distance between myself and that jungle.

Now that I was “escorting” lonely men who Clyde Brooks had set me up with, I needed Helen more than ever.

Just a few dates. Just until I get my bills caught up
. I'd told myself that at least a dozen times since my meeting with Clyde at that Fisherman's Wharf restaurant a week ago. But what I said and what I did were two different things.

It would take more than a few dates to get me out of the hole that Joe had left me in. I'd been hiding my Honda two blocks and one street over from my house, because I was three payments behind. And a damn repo man had already come banging on my door, twice in one week. I didn't know how long I could hold him off with the lie about my brother taking the car to L.A.

Right after Joe's disappearance, I'd applied for welfare, planning to stay on it only until I found a job. But anybody who knows anything about welfare knows that money is not enough to live on and live the way you should. It covered my rent, and we got food stamps, but I couldn't handle other necessary expenses like utilities, clothing, gas, and maintenance for my three-year-old Honda. Without a decent job, or a generous man in my life, my only other option was to move back to that run-down ghetto that I'd married Joe to get away from! My welfare check could cover me and my three kids there, but living in the rough areas meant other necessary expenses. That included things like bullet-proofing and putting bars on your windows, replacing items in your house that some bold thief had helped himself to, and worst of all, unexpected funeral expenses. I hoped that life was behind me for good.

Tonight's date, Mr. Bob, lived in Marin County. It was my second date in two days. My first date, with a nervous little man from Philly, had only involved dinner and a little fondling on the bed in his hotel room. After admitting that he was slightly impotent and had just wanted some female company, that trick had dismissed me after stuffing three hundred dollars into my bra.

“Mr. Bob's an older man, so you'll be out of there in ten minutes if you treat him real good. I been hookin' him up for years. He's one of my best clients,” Clyde told me over the telephone. Clyde was a very “private” person or so he claimed. He only dealt with his “business associates” in person when he had to. The regular clients would call him up and put in an order for a woman, just like they would for a pizza. Like a secretary, Clyde called up a woman and rattled off a list of instructions. After each date, he'd meet the woman in a designated spot to collect his fee.

Clyde went on with relish. “And my girls just love Mr. Bob. He'll want a few drinks before anything else. And if you get him good and drunk, that's all you'll have to put up with. You behave yourself now. Don't steal nothin' from his house, flush your condoms down the toilet, and don't leave no other mess—like rank panties or cum-soaked tissue. If you do, I'll hear about it,” Clyde informed me, talking in a fast, eager voice. I felt like a teenager being groomed for my first date.

 

It was the easiest money I ever made in my life. I had no trouble getting Mr. Bob to drink three shots of bourbon to my one. Within an hour of my arrival, he was so drunk he couldn't even stand or sit up, let alone do much of anything physical with me. He passed out on top of me. When he came to, I told him how great he'd been and how much I'd enjoyed his lovemaking, and how sorry I was to have to charge him for my services. My lies backfired. Mr. Bob wanted me to stay a little longer so that he could make me feel even better.

After it was over the second time, while sitting on Mr. Bob's living room couch with his head on my shoulder, I did something I should not have done: I told him all about Joe running out on me and the kids, draining our bank accounts, and leaving me with a ton of bills. After a few more drinks, he felt so sorry for me, he gave me an extra three hundred dollars.

“This is just to show you how much I appreciate you gals,” Mr. Bob croaked. His limp gray hair slapped against the side of my face and his hot, foul breath almost melted my ear. Somehow I was still able to smile through the entire ordeal.

I didn't know what kind of arrangements the other women who worked for Clyde had with him. As a matter of fact, I hadn't even met any of them in person yet. When I'd returned a call to Clyde's apartment to get the details for my first date last night, a woman with a young, high-pitched voice named Ester answered the telephone. She introduced herself, with a Spanish accent, as Clyde's “first wife.” She didn't explain her role any more than that, and I didn't ask her. And when I tried to pry more information about Ester out of Clyde, he told me the same thing that this Ester woman had told me, “She's my
first
wife.”

Since I didn't plan to be involved with Clyde and his shadowy business too long, his relationships with the other women he dealt with didn't mean a thing to me. The main thing on my agenda was getting paid.

When I got home from my date with Mr. Bob, Clyde was sitting in his shiny black Range Rover in front of my house. I crawled into the passenger seat and handed him a hundred dollars, a third of what he'd told me that Mr. Bob was good for. For every date Clyde arranged for me, I agreed to give him a third of everything I earned.

“How'd it go?” he asked, giving me a mysterious look, a toothpick dangling from his lip, a baseball cap turned sideways on his head. He looked nothing like he did when I'd first met him. His
GQ
look was gone. He had on a denim jacket and denim pants, and a T-shirt. I could smell marijuana smoke on his breath, despite the huge wad of gum on which he was chewing.

“Just like you said it would. I didn't have to do much of anything after he got drunk.” I looked toward my house, annoyed to see my ten-year-old daughter, Juliet, and my babysitter peeping out the window.

“See there. I told you. On a dull night, all he'll ever want to do is lick your pussy.”

“Well, tonight was a dull night,” I said, sighing.

“Why that old dog.” Clyde laughed, making a slurping noise with his tongue. “That old peckerwood ain't got no shame.”

It embarrassed me to think about what Mr. Bob had done to me. For five minutes I'd sat splayed on a plush red sofa, watching his head bob up and down between my legs. “Yeah, that was all he did,” I mumbled, my face burning. My husband, Joe, was the only other man who had ever touched me in such an intimate way on such an intimate part of my body. I couldn't help thinking about him while I was with Mr. Bob. As hard as it was for me to believe, I missed Joe. If he had returned to me that night, I would have accepted him with open arms. And open legs, too, for that matter.

Clyde leaned back and narrowed his eyes. “Now where's the rest of my money?” he asked, cracking his gum.

“I thought we agreed on you getting a third?” I wailed, my eyes still on my house.

“We did. What you gave me ain't no third of what Mr. Bob gave you,” Clyde grumbled, his lips snapping brutally over each word.

I turned to face Clyde. The angry look on his face made me nervous. “How do you know what Mr. Bob gave me?”

Clyde removed his cap and scratched the side of his face and shook his head. I didn't have to ask to know that he'd spoken to Mr. Bob after I'd left Mr. Bob's house.

“If you think for one minute you goin' to play me, you better get out of this business right now. You came to me, girl, I didn't come to you.”

I handed Clyde another hundred dollar bill.

 

My date tonight was with a grumpy old man in Pacific Heights. According to Clyde, this old goat had more old money than he'd ever be able to spend in his lifetime. He sent for a woman a few times a month just so he wouldn't forget what fucking felt like. He called himself Prince Harry. He had a wife who was just as old as he was, and the last thing she wanted to do was fuck.

“Dude's wife goes to bed at the same time every night. And once her head hits her pillow, she could sleep through the eye of a hurricane,” Clyde told me. “But that don't mean you can go out there and act like you ain't got no class. Be a lady.”

Unlike Mr. Bob, and the impotent man from Philly, old Prince Harry had as much stamina as a teenager. His body resembled a prune, and his breath smelled like a hog trough. He was so disgusting that I was having second thoughts already about going on any more dates. But another date with Mr. Bob the same night made me change my mind. And if that wasn't enough to seal my fate, Clyde let me keep the five hundred dollars that Prince Harry had paid me.

“I seen that sucker naked at the gym, so I know what a trauma it was to do him. You deserve to keep every penny…this time,” Clyde told me with a mysterious gleam in his eyes. “Now give
me
some sugar.” Clyde hauled off and kissed me so hard I trembled. I knew then that Clyde Brooks was a man who knew how to work a woman's mind.

Like with that first date, and with any others I planned to go on, I wanted everything to be over with as soon as possible. I wanted my life to be back to normal, the way it was before Joe left. If I had known that night that my life would never be the same again, I probably would have cut myself off from Clyde right then and there.

But I didn't.