Black Widow (5 page)

“But they gonna want to get paid, and I don’t have no money to pay for a funeral right now.”

“We’ll figure out something. Remember, one thing at a time.” Phoebe thought for a moment. “Maybe we should call Scott’s Funeral Home; they are the ones that my momma called for Daddy.”

“That’s a thought,” Isis said, feeling even more melancholy than before.

Phoebe made the call for her sister, asked for the owner, and pleaded their case. A meeting was set up with the funeral home for 1
PM
the next day to discuss payment. For now, Scott’s Funeral Home was on the way to the Medical College of Virginia to pick up the body.

Later that night, exhausted after such a stressful day, Isis decided to open the letter that she had received from Dave.

My dearest Isis,

By the time you read this, the day would have come and gone, the day that we both have been dreading yet anticipating. The day that we both knew was inevitable, the day that my death will be carried out by the State of Virginia.

You’ve been everything to me since the first time that I laid eyes on you, when you were only 15 years old. You were the most beautiful girl I’d ever met, seen, or read about. I knew that we could never be together for long. Girls like you grow into the kind of women who don’t have guys like me show up on their radar. So the day that we would grow apart was also inevitable. It had nothing to do with the execution.

I’m not writing this letter in an attempt to make you feel bad or guilty for anything; you have nothing to feel guilty about. You’ve been great to me. Better than any of my so-called friends, better than my family, better than my own mother. You’ve given me everything and asked for nothing in return. For that, I just want to say thank you and I love you for it. But now I must say, “No more.”

During our last visit together, when I looked into your eyes, I saw the future. I saw your future and I wasn’t in it; and that’s the way it should be. You’ve wasted enough time on me. You were my wifey, girlfriend, sister, and best friend when everyone else got ghost (including my mother), before the ink even dried on the death warrant. Now it’s time for you to move on. From this point on, I want you to forget that I ever existed.

I want you to give the same love and dedication that you have given me for all these years and put it toward your future and career. Live for yourself for a change. Let someone serve and wait on you. You deserve it. But always remember this one thing: No one’s going to give you anything in this life without a price. It may cost a little, it may cost a lot—but it will cost you.

Dave
BKA The Phoenix

P.S. Just so that you know, those crackers are going to have to bring the noise, because I’m not going to just roll over and die for them. Mu’fuckas best pack a lunch.

See ya in the next life!

Isis was standing with a blank look on her face, staring at the letter she held in her hand, when Phoebe walked into the living room carrying the house phone with the mute button activated. “It’s Bam,” she said. But after looking at her sister’s bloodshot eyes and vacant stare, she asked, “Do you want me to tell the nigga you busy and to get at you another time?”

Bam was an old acquaintance of Dave’s. They had gone to school together, and he always called Isis to check on Dave or just to see if she needed anything.

Isis wiped her eyes. “Nah, he might need information on Dave or something,” she said, reaching for the phone. “Give me the damn thing.” Isis shut off the mute function. “This is Isis,” she said, slowly wiping her eyes, chasing the tears that were trickling down her face.

“Hey, gorgeous, how’re you feelin’?” Bam said cheerfully, trying to lift her spirits.

“Not so good, but I’ve been done worse by better.” She tried to sound confident. “What about you?”

“You know me—fine as wine, all the time. But I didn’t call to bore you with shit that you should already know,” Bam boasted. “Fill me in on what’s been going on in your world today, and let me know how I can help to make it better.” Bam had a pretty good idea as to what was going on. A moment passed, and Isis hadn’t responded. “You know our boy wouldn’t want you teary-eyed. That nigga was a soldier; probably went out like Scarface. He would want you to be a soldier too, not sad with watery eyes.”

“What makes you think that you know what’s in my eyes?”

“I can hear it in your voice. Plus, your mute button must be broke, and Phoebe can’t whisper worth shit.”

“No, you got ears the size of an elephant, that’s all.”

“That’s not all I got that’s like an elephant, but that’s another story. Now who do I need to fuck up for my good friend?”

“Nobody,” she answered. “I just had a really horrible day.”

“Now we’re gettin’ somewhere.”

“I don’t want to get more worked up than I already am. Shit has just been fucked up ever since they executed Dave last night. It was awful.”

“I know. I heard them talking about it on the news,” Bam said.

“I was there.”

“You were what?” he said, not believing what he had heard.

“I was there,” she repeated. “I watched it all go down, and I haven’t been able to sleep since,” she confessed. “But that wasn’t the half of it. This morning the people from the prison called to tell me that since I was listed as Dave’s next of kin, I would have to come and get his body if I wanted to give him a proper burial.”

“You gotta go get the body?” Bam questioned, surprised.

“Yes. And I don’t have any money for a funeral. Then to top it off,” she continued, “that mother of his…I don’t even want to talk about it.”

Bam let out a small chuckle. “What she do now?”

“Why you laughing?”

“Because Ms. Davis is a fool, and I don’t even want to imagine what her latest stunt might be.”

Her sister handed her some juice, and Isis took a sip before continuing. “Don’t you know that she had a fat-ass insurance policy on Dave, and she could give a flying fuck how he gets buried?”

“Is that all?” Bam said consolingly. “Fuck her. Don’t let her miserable ass get to you. She ain’t never gave a fuck about nobody but herself.”

“I know, but how could a mother literally leave her son for dead?”

“I’m telling you, it’s not even worth the stress trying to figure the old bitch out. Just tell me: How much do you need to send my man off in style?”

“Me and my sister are supposed to meet with the man at the funeral home tomorrow. I won’t know until then.”

“Well, let me know as soon as you know. Whatever it is, I got it. It’s gonna be okay,” Bam assured her. “Now how about I carry you out to dinner tonight?”

“I’m going to have to pass on dinner,” she said. “But I know Dave would’ve been pleased to know that one of his old friends came through for him.”

Bam brushed off her comment. “Well, call me tomorrow and let me know how much it is.”

“Okay,” she said. “Thanks a bunch. I’ll call you then.”

As soon as Isis put the phone down, Phoebe looked at her sister and said, “He gonna pay for it, ain’t he?”

A look of relief appeared over Isis’s face. “Yes,” she said, nodding her head. “How did you know?”

“Because that nigga has been in love with you from day one. He’s always wanted to find a way to get next to you, even before Dave.” Phoebe paused for a moment and then mumbled under her breath, “I guess he’s finally figured out a way how.”

Chapter 3

R. I. P.

Bam came through with the money needed for the funeral just as he promised, and it could never be said that Isis did not put Dave away in style. Although Isis had never planned a funeral before, she made do with the information learned from her Aunt Samantha, who’d practically raised her after her mother was sent to prison for killing her father.

Always dripping in fabulousity and ultraglamorous, Samantha stood five feet nine inches and was model thin. She wore only the best push-up bras that money could buy to make the small breasts God probably considered a blessing look like a B cup. Dressed, as always, as if going to a
Vogue
photo spread, she was at the funeral in a fierce black dress that complemented her small waist. Her long black hair was always kept up to par, and she was never caught without her makeup. Samantha was blessed with the beautiful eyes that Isis and Sandy shared, but the difference was that Samantha was never without long false eyelashes to enhance them.

After the funeral, Isis was walking out of the funeral home toward the limo when, out of nowhere, she was greeted by an unwelcome guest whom she saw walking from a red limo.

“Let me ask you one question.” Ms. Davis approached, wearing candy-apple red from head to toe. The two-piece skirt set was matched by stockings and pumps that were both the same shade of red. She was wearing a big-brimmed red hat with a lace veil, with red-and-white drop earrings, a red pearl necklace, and a wristful of gaudy red bracelets.

Before Isis could regain her composure, or her vision, from the shock of Ms. Davis having taken things too far both by showing up for the funeral and by sporting such a hideous
coordinated
ensemble, Dave’s mother was in her face, nose to nose, as if they were professional boxers posing for a pay-per-view fight advertisement.

“How da fuck you gonna have a motherfucking funeral for
my
son,” Ms. Davis said to Isis, “and not invite his momma, bitch?” She was moving her shoulders and neck from side to side like she was doing a stiff version of that dance, the snake.

It took everything in Isis’s power not to dropkick the woman. She answered with all the decorum she could muster. “Ms. Davis, you don’t send invites to a funeral.” Isis flashed a fake smile. “And besides, I thought you didn’t care if he was left in a cardboard box. Why should I go out of my way to make sure you were here to see that he wasn’t?” Isis had no intention of punking out to Ms. Davis ever again.

“It don’t make no motherfucking difference what I said, you little bitch. I am still his mother!”

Isis’s face twisted ever so slightly. She wasn’t going to be called a bitch too many more times by this hag. “Surely a real mother would have
never
collected the insurance money from her son’s death and not taken care of the burial of her son, would she?” Isis took a step back so she wouldn’t be in arm’s reach of Ms. Davis before continuing. “Not any mother that was worth a damn anyway.”

“Listen, you little bitch! I will beat yo’ young ass.”

“Whatever, lady.” Isis brushed off the threat. “Don’t come at me sideways just because you feel guilty that you’ve always been a piss-poor mother to your offspring.”

Aunt Samantha wasn’t far away and had overheard the conversation. Samantha, who was a little taller than Isis and about the same height as Ms. Davis—but much prettier—got right into Ms. Davis’s face. “My niece ain’t gon’ be called nan nother bitch from yo’ stank ass.” Samantha, like always, wanted to protect Isis from the unnecessary madness around her. “You want to put your hands on someone, honey, take it up with me.”

Ms. Davis looked Samantha up and down, observing every inch and detail, right down to her bone structure. “You must be crazy if you think I am going to stand here and fight a
man
.”

That statement got Isis worked up. “Oh, no you didn’t,” Isis said to Ms. Davis before hauling off and spitting at her. The spit landed right on her red pointed toe pumps. “Don’t you ever call my Aunt Samantha a man.”

Ms. Davis put her hands on her hips. “Shit, why not? Sa
man
tha.
Man
tha.
Man
! Take away the ‘Sa’ and the ‘tha’ and what you got?
Man
. The only somebody who might not be able to tell that your
aunt
Samantha is a man is Eddie Murphy.”

Aunt Samantha was actually Isis’s mother’s only
brother
—Sam Jones. He was living proof that God sometimes makes mistakes, just like the rest of us, because God had definitely given Sam the wrong body at birth. Sam had been getting shots to make her butt bigger and rounder and was taking the necessary steps to get a full sex change. For over twenty years, Sam had been dressing in drag, living the life of a woman.

When Isis’s mother had gone to prison, Sam had been forced to take on the responsibility of caring for his niece. His crazy, reckless lifestyle, the unprotected sex with various men, the casual drugging and drinking—all were reduced to a minimum when Isis had come to live with him. Isis was probably the best thing that had ever happened to Sam, because the AIDS epidemic swept through the gay community during that time. Most of Sam’s friends didn’t have a lifesaver like Isis to pull them away from the unhealthy lifestyle that they were living. Unfortunately, many of them battled the deadly disease to a losing end.

Missing her original target, Isis spat at Ms. Davis again, this time making her mark. Ms. Davis was caught off guard but still managed to swing and hit Isis with an open-handed smack to the face. That was the beginning of the end.

Aunt Samantha balled up her manicured fist and commenced to whip up on Ms. Davis as if the woman was a bitch who had just tried to steal her man. A few people were watching from inside the funeral home, but no one dared to break it up.

After a couple of well-placed blows by Samantha, Ms. Davis hit the ground. She should’ve stayed on her feet, because Samantha used her fall as an opportunity to stomp a young mudhole in her ungrateful butt. The only thing that made Samantha stop was looking down and noticing that she’d run her panty hose to the point that they were starting to look like large-holed fishnet stockings.

After leaving the imprint of her pointed-toe pump on Ms. Davis’s behind, Samantha warned, “Think about that the next time you want to call my child a bitch,” and followed that with another kick. “Bitch!”

Ms. Davis was balled up in a fetal position, afraid to move, afraid that another blow was on its way, when Samantha stepped over her to get to Isis and give her a hug. “I’m sorry, honey,” Aunt Samantha said, “but don’t let this affect today any more than it already has.”

“I won’t,” Isis assured Samantha. “You always told me that sometimes a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.” They pulled themselves together and made their way to the burial ground to finish what they had intended to do from the start: put David in the ground in style.