The Greatest Story Never Told

Chapter 18 - My Southern Belle

During my two years in the nursing program a woman came into my life, a very sweet Southern Belle out of Meridian Mississippi. How we came to be comes right out of a romantic novel. I was still deep into the nursing program when Peter and I started going out to the clubs. It was 1993. Hip Hop was big and I fell in love with it. On weekends we'd gear up and get fly and hit clubs in Yonkers and Spring Valley New York. We would hit the dance floors and get our two step on hard! At this point, I was in and out of recovery not sure if I wanted to be sober all the time. I reverted to drinking on weekends, and the weed soon followed. I became a party animal all over again. We established a post-party ritual me and my party crew, hitting a local diner in Spring Valley after dancing all night. On one such occassion, I saw one of the prettiest women of my life.

We were sitting at our table, a group of us, buzzed and tired from all the club hopping. The sound of Grand Puba's 360 Degrees What Goes Around still ringing in my ears. As we gorged ourselves on pancakes, sausages and eggs, another post-party trio entered the dinner. It consisted of two women and a male, all were black. As they entered, I was knee deep into my pancakes. After they were seated, and I hadn't actully seen any of their faces yet, I happened to look up with a fork full of pancakes inches from my mouth. I froze. I was looking into the biggest pair of Southern Gypsy eyes I'd ever seen!

I put my fork down in silence. My table's conversations were in full swing but I had stopped talking, being lost in her eyes. Our eyes locked, and she quickly and shyly looked away. It became a silent battle between her and I as we tried not to look at each other and eat. Soon, the guy in her entourage took notice and scowled hard at me. I couldn't help it. I had never seen anyone as beautiful as her. I couldn't eat anmore, I gave up, so much so that I left my table and walked outside to breathe and look back at her. I lost myself in thought, thinking 'she's probably just passing through New York and is probably from Florida, you'll never see her again. I was wrong...

As I stood outside, I realized that it was better if I didn't go back in. I would wait for her and her people to leave, and get one final look at her. Sure enough, she exited. I stepped aside, as she began to walk away, my heart rended. She climbed in the passenger side of the car and it slowly pulled off with her taking my heart with her. After they were gone, I just stood there. When I got back to the table Peter said, 'You okay,' and started laughing. He then said, 'Yeah, I know. They were fine!' Everyone was done eating by then so we decided to bail with me riding shotgun with Peter. This is where fate and destiny made themselves manifest. As Peter and I were coming down Main Street in Spring Valley, with me still thinking of her, he suddenly said,' Yo! Aint that them getting out of the car? The two women were being dropped of by the guy they were with. And, as he pulled off I yelled, 'Pull over Pete! The tires screeched to a halt.

Just before the two women were about to enter the apartment building I called out to one of them saying, 'He,y weren't you just at the diner?' The younger dark skinned woman walked over to the car and said, 'Yeah, who are you?' I told her my name was Dave, that's what named I morphed into dropping Ace out of existence and then Peter introduced himself with a huge ass grin. She then said, 'Hi, I'm Vandy.' I went out on a limb and said, 'Tell your friend I think she's beautiful.' She said, 'Friend? Thats's my Aunt Shirley.' Now I had the name of all of that loveliness... Shirley. Vandy went on to say that she was visiting her aunt and that she was from Georgia. I said, 'Would you do me a favor? Would you give your aunt my phone number? Meanwhile, Shirley was still holding the door open and looking at us. I was loving what I seen. She was all dressed up in skin tight black jeans with a black halter top, gold chains hug from her golden neck, she was 'that chick.' I would later find out that Shirley came from a strong Gypsy bloodline and that she, along with her mother and 8 sisters all had these huge dreamy eyes.

Vandy, said, 'I'll give it to her, but she might not night call you 'cause she's married. My heart dropped! I gave Vandy my number after Shirley called out to her, 'Girl, come on, we gotta go,' with a litte smile, she didn't want to be rude. I waved at the both of them and even Shirley waved back. We took off and talked about Shirley and Vandy the whole ride back. I fell for Shirley and Peter fell for Vandy, who was going to be in town for awhile.  Peter dropped me off at my place and I went upstairs to take a shower. I put my sleeping rags on and my phone rang. I thought it was Peter, but it wasn't. It was Vandy laughing her ass off! She said, 'Wait, somebody wants to say hello.' Shirley got on the phone and said, 'Hey mister man.' and we both started laughing. I couldn't believe it. She said, 'I can't talk long. Why didn't you let me eat in peace, you were looking all in my mouth! I apologized saying, 'I thought I would never see you again after you left the diner.' She then said something that really touched my heart. She said, 'You looked so sad when I was leaving.' We talked for a few more minutes before she said, 'I gotta go, tell your friend Vandy is gonna call him,' before saying goodnight to me. It would develop into a torrid love affair that would cost me in blood!