Memphis Streets 3: Revenge

Chapter 14-Le'Shelle

There's an endless stream of voices floating around my head. I try to concentrate on what they're saying, but it's too hard and I just give up and drift among the memories swirling around. . . .

The room was pitch black. Not even the moon bothered to shine through the open window. I hated that house. It smelled like old cat piss and Newport Menthol cigarettes. The tiny twin-size beds we had to sleep on were as hard as rocks and the pillows were as flat as pancakes. It was our fourth foster home in three months and the drill was pretty much the same.

The woman of the house, Ms. Ruthie, didn't want us to be seen or heard and she damn sure didn't want our asses eating too much. In the first two weeks of our moving in, soap and water never hit her ass. She was planted in a La-Z-Boy in front of the television and would only get up to eat and shit—and she did a whole lot of both. Her face reminded me of Aunt Esther from Sanford and Son and she kept her hair in braids except in patches of bald spots. Her man was a white nigga who insisted that his name was Abdul and he was at least ten years older.

He didn't smell no better. But he would get up every fucking morning like he had a W-2 to get to, but in reality, that muthafucka never went farther than the front porch. He sat out there and talked a lot of shit about how niggas was ruinin' the neighborhood. I wasn't in that house two seconds before figuring his ass out. Hell, I knew a pedophile when I saw one.

When he got the right amount of alcohol in him, he didn't even hide the lust in his eyes and would do it in front of his bitch, too. "Get me a beer," he'd always say when he wanted a close inspection.

I wanted to bark that I wasn't nobody's trained dog, but a few foster homes back I got busted in the mouth for that smart remark so I knew better than popping off. Each time I handed him a beer, he'd make me stand there with the bottle held out while his gaze dragged over me. "You sure are a pretty lil thing," he'd say. "I betcha your pussy is just as pretty." I never responded.

"How old did you say you were again?" Silence. "What's the matter? Cat's got your tongue?" Silence. "That's all right." He'd reached for the bottle. "I like a bitch who knows how to keep her mouth shut."

It was a matter of time. I knew it—and he knew it. Which was why on the night shit went down I was laying there in that eerie darkness with my ears strained for the slightest sound. For a long time, all I could hear was Brielle slow-breathing in the bed next to me. "Bri?" There was a long silence and then, "Yeah?"

"Let's run away," I blurted out, sitting up. We'd done that before but this time I was determined we wouldn't get caught.

"Where would we go?"

"I don't care. Anywhere." She didn't say anything.

"Don't tell me that you rather stay here."

"God, no. It's just . . . it's so dark and scary outside." I huffed out a breath, remembering that during the last escape, Brielle cried every time she saw a crackhead shaking down the sidewalk.

"I don't know, Le'Shelle." My hands balled at my sides. Why did she always make things difficult? Five minutes passed before I tried it again. "Bri? Are you still awake?" She hesitated.

"Yeah."

"Well, do you want to?"

"I—" SQUEEEAAK.

My head whipped around to the door. There was somebody coming up the hallway. Not wanting to take any chances, I grabbed the blanket and pulled it up over my head. I don't remember ever praying so hard in my life.