Don’t Speak On Fresh Cutz Part Two: Slow Fade

(If you haven’t read Part One of “Don’t Speak on Fresh Cutz” yet, read it here!)

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DON’T SPEAK ON FRESH CUTZ
PART Two: Slow Fade

The flashing lights of the hookah lounge that me, Big P, and Stassia sat in was giving me a headache and making me sick. I chugged my amaretto sour like it was a remedy, and asked a bottle girl for another. Big P and Stassia stared at me like I was an alien. Or maybe a clown.

“Slow down, likkle girl,” Stassia laughed in a thick island accent. “Amaretto not fixing your problems.”

I just told Stassia and Big P about what happened this morning at the shop, and about how Ryan and I were supposed to link up tonight before he ghosted me. I assume he’s just busy doing his little investigation, but it still stings to not hear from him.

“Our problems,” I corrected her. “I mean how long is it gonna take to fix y’all stations?”

“Right, our stations,” Big P sneered, “since yours the only one left untouched. You sure you ain’t the one who robbed him?”

I rolled my eyes. Big P play too much.

“I only braid there Tuesday and Thursday, anyway,” Stassia said. “I don’t mind taking clients in my apartment for a while. Fresh Cutz not all that like you make it out to be.”

“It’s not all that but it’s a job,” I said, a little more defensive than I intended. “I just really need the bread.”

“No, you really want that DICK.” Stassia slammed her bottle of Beck’s beer onto the table and both her and Big P burst out laughing.

I mean, they’re not totally wrong. I’m all about my money. I know how to hustle and make a way, and I usually have more than one stream of money coming in at a time. Especially now that I needed to save up money fast. The shop was a regular check but it wasn’t the best I could be making. Between working at the shop and fucking Ryan on the low, I didn’t have much free time left over.

Maybe I was a little dickmatized. Maybe I was losing my edge. But hustling so long makes a bitch tired. Sometimes you just want to settle into a regular job and play the role of a fake-wife.

Stassia and Big P don’t like Ryan. At all. And trust me, I get it. He’s a corny boss and a corny ass nigga and stay doing light skinned antics. So when I asked them if they wanted to go out for hookah tonight, they jumped at the chance to drink, smoke, and stage a mock intervention for me. I got dressed up in a cute short and tight leather dress with off-the-shoulder long sleeves and matching black leather knee high boots. Stassia’s deep dark skin glowed in her strappy and tight orange and turquoise maxi dress, with a glittering Cuban link necklace that rested just on top of her cleavage. Big P wore his smedium Black polo shirt and plaid slacks that accentuated his football player booty. Our thangs were thanging and we planned on getting chose tonight.

“Real talk Nyah, you need to invest your time in other places. Look at me for example,” Big P said, putting his tatted hands to his chest. “I didn’t even show up for my shift today and I made a stack. Just off my delivery service.” He gestured as if he was flipping his hair, even though his plaits were flat on top of his head and his shaved sides didn’t provide him with anything to flip.

Big P is full of mysteries, but his delivery service isn’t one of them. He sells tree and mushrooms and has built up a pretty consistent and wealthy clientele in the college town nearby. Those students and professors have money to spend and lives they want to escape from, and they’re willing to pay top dollar for a reliable service like the one Big P provides.

I get wanting to escape from life from time to time. Ryan’s my habit and escape, even though I can’t afford to be distracted right now.

“Once upon a time Nyah was the most enterprising of us,” Stassia said, grabbing Big P’s shoulder in a show of fake sorrow. “Now, all she care about is Mr. Skinny Dick who don’t even trick.”

“Okay y’all need to chill,” I said, annoyed. “He do spend on me. He got me that huge bed.”

“You mean the bed he got so he ain’t have to fuck on your air mattress?” Big P asked. “He got that big ass nice ass bed for himself, if it was for you he woulda started by getting you out that rundown apartment.” Big P paused. “No shade.”

“Right, no shade,” I said with air quotes.

The bottlegirl came by again with my amaretto sour, and I thanked her and asked for another in advance. It might be a wobbly walk home in my heels and leather dress, but I might be able to pick up a trick or two during my stroll.

It’s true that Ryan don’t really trick on me like he should. Things were different when we first started seeing each other. I didn’t know he was married the first day I started working at the shop. All I saw was a moderately wealthy and fine man in his mid—to-late-thirties. I caught him staring a few times when I’d be working on someone’s cut. At first I thought he wanted to make sure I knew what I was doing and that I was a good hire, but it didn’t take long for me to realize he was staring at my titties.

He texted me to ask me to go out for drinks with him for a ‘business’ meeting during the first week I was on the job. I ordered a bottle of Casamigos and the steak and lobster, ate much less than half and took the rest home. He covered the tab and begged to taste me that night. He slid me $300 for spending money the next morning, and promised there was more where that came from.

The first couple of weeks? I’m talking roses delivered to me on the regular. Watches. A pair of diamond earrings. A new bed. Now? He says he’s so busy finalizing his divorce that he can’t spend as much as he used to. I want to be angry, but I also want to keep fucking him.

And as far as my anger, am I angrier at him or myself? I’m not new to the game and never fall for the bait and switch. But even though I know he playing with me, even though I know he’s corny as fuck, I don’t want to stop fucking him. It feels too good.

So yes, maybe I’m a little dickmatized.

“Nyah, with that face and that ass you could be pulling ballers and you know it. And Lord knows you need that.” Stassia took a big swig of her Beck’s and patted the corners of her red-lipped mouth with a napkin. “Ryan never gonna leave his wife and he’s stingy. Who has their mistress living in the Ps?”

Big P nodded. “And I been watching Snapped, you know the show where the wives go on killing sprees? Have you thought about how Ryan wife could be behind the robbery? I mean who else would slash every chair but yours?” Big P’s eyes widened. “Could be a message.”

“Would be a clearer message if mine was the only chair fucked up, but thanks.” I was still annoyed and tried to brush the potential threat off, but it did make me a little nervous. How could Ryan’s wife know who I am? We’re pretty discreet. I doubt my real name is even saved in his phone.

But a woman scorned is one of the best detectives in existence. Stranger things have happened than a wife terrorizing her husband’s mistress. But why would she even care if they’re getting a divorce?

Stassia shot Big P an angry look, then turned to me. “You know, I heard Ryan keeps some money hidden in the shop. I wouldn’t be surprised if somebody came to collect,” Stassia said. “It might not be the wife, don’t stress too hard about that.” She squeezed my hand and made eye contact with me, giving my heart a little flutter. Under her long beautiful lashes, her brown eyes showed more sympathy than her earlier teasing displayed.

“Let’s just stop talking about that nigga,” I squeezed Stassia’s hand back and took a long draw of hookah, closing my eyes and savoring the flavor of mint on the smoke.

I love my friends, I really do, even when they get on my damn nerves, and I know they love me even when I get on theirs.

We smoked and drank, and Stassia and Big P walked me home. I got a number from a moderately cute person who was walking down the busy street in front of the hookah lounge. I hoped they’d be a good trick. I desperately needed the money, and only had a few more weeks to save up enough to do what I needed to do.

I got home a little after midnight, and crashed down on the bed that Ryan got me. I was restless, and despite myself, I called him.

And despite my expectations, he answered.

“Hey baby,” he said in a low volume into the phone. I didn’t say anything, but felt my body tighten with anticipation and longing.

My nipples got hard, wishing for his tongue to swirl around them and his lips to suck and nibble on them. I told him so. He said he wished he could touch me. I heard his breaths grow louder and quicker through the phone, heard the familiar sound of him jerking off.

I told him that I was wearing green panties, his favorite color, that I could feel how wet they were between my legs, and that I could take them off if he wanted me to. Ryan told me what to do, where to touch myself, where to put my fingers. He told me what he wanted to do with my throat, to call out his name as I came.

I did as I was told and squirted all over my new bed. I did as I was told, so questions about his wife and the robbery would have to wait until another time.

Was the shop robbery the first of many messages Ryan’s wife is sending to Nyah? Will Nyah end the affair and learn how to watch her back? And do Big P and Stassia know more about Ryan than they let on?

Tune in the second weekend of July to see part three of “Don’t Speak on Fresh Cutz.”