The girl that she rushed toward had tears streaking her face. P’Nee’s arms engulfed her. “Are you okay? Did he touch you, Christy?”What the fuck does she mean did he touch her?
Christy cried into P’Nee’s chest. “No, not today.”
My head bucked back a little.Not today?I slowly approached. “Hey, Christy. What do you mean by not today? How does he touch you?”
Her eyes fell on me for a beat before she glanced up at P’Nee. With a soft half smile, P’Nee said, “It’s alright, Christy. He did it to me when I was thirteen. You can tell us.”
My mind was all over the place. This was a lot of information to grasp, and I hadn’t gotten any significant information yet. Tears continued to fall from Christy’s eyes as her words came outlike word vomit. I stood frozen as this little girl told us that Jacob messed with her mother. On the nights that he spent the night at their house, he came into her room and violated her.
“Wow, I guess he’s graduated to all out rape. I hope he dies. Sick bastard,” P’Nee quipped.
I took a step closer. “He did that shit to you too? That’s why you stopped visiting, Nee?”
She gave me a simple head nod. My eyes scanned the yard. Jacob was now toward the front of the yard sitting in a seat with what looked like a towel on his lip. Pop Jordan sat next to him, and Joshua stood close by. Joshua’s eyes continued to cut between me and his uncle. He was confused. but now that I wasn’t, it was time for me to get off the leash.
I felt my feet move in their direction. When I got closer, I caught Jacob’s attention. “Yo, Bolt! What the fuck is wrong with your bit?—”
My fist interrupted his sentence. I showed no mercy as I dented his face. “Nigga, you got my girl and Christy fucked up!”
I heard my mama and grandma screaming. I felt hands on me, trying to pull me off Jacob’s bitch ass. This nigga was out here doing the unthinkable to females but going to call my woman crazy. I wasn’t sure how long it was before Joshua, Pop Jordan, and two other niggas pulled me off him. There was no need to calm Jacob down because his ass was snoozing on the grass.
“Bolt, calm your ass down! What the fuck is wrong with you?” Pop Jordan asked after he pushed me hard in my chest. His jaw was tight.
When I pushed his ass back, he stumbled a little bit. “Nigga, ask what’s wrong with that bitch!” Like a train, a thought entered my mind. I remembered how weird he was in the kitchen when they just arrived and Nee didn’t want to be nearJacob’s pedophile ass. “Wait, you knew that nigga touched your daughter?”
Joshua’s face contorted. “What the fuck you on, bro? Pops, what the fuck is going on?”
Pop Jordan stood there in a daze. That was all the answers I needed, but I still wanted him to verbally answer the damn question. He snapped out of his frozen state after Joshua restated his question. “Nah, nah! I don’t know what the fuck is going on.”
A sharp, cold laugh sounded from behind me before P’Nee stepped forward. “Jordan, you don’t know what the fuck is going on? Are you sure about that, or is this just a dream? That’s what you asked me when I told you that your brother came into my room and violated me. You wanted me to make sure that I wasn’t having a bad dream when that man put his fingers inside of me against my will.”
“What the fuck!” Joshua’s tone was hard, and his voice was loud. “Pops, did she tell you that shit?” His gaze landed on his sister. “Is that why you stopped coming here during the summers?”
When P’Nee nodded, Joshua started pacing. That was never a good sign. “Nah, there ain’t no way a nigga touched my baby sister and he’s still out here breathing freshly polluted air. That can’t be what this is.”
Jacob started to groan on the ground in pain, and he rolled. I started to go over to put him back to sleep, but there was no need. Joshua walked over and smoothly kicked him in his face. A foot to the face was one of the greatest sleeping pills.
“Now it makes sense.” My grandma’s voice broke through. She stood next to P’Nee with her arm wrapped around her. “Nobody understood why Margie flipped the hell out all those years ago and lit you and that boy over there asses up. Now it makes sense. You were over there trying to protect your nastyass brother, Jordan. Shit, Margie better than me because I woulda put that lead in ya head.”
Pop Jordan looked guilty as fuck. By this time, the DJ had stopped deejaying. All the attention was on us. He kept looking around like there was a way out of this shit. There was no way out. “It only happened once. I talked to him, and he swore he was drunk. He said that he would never do it again.”
What the hell?Did he really say that ignorant shit? Before I could confirm in my own mind that he did in fact say it, I was pushed out of the way. In the blink of an eye, Joshua and his father were in a hardcore fist fight.
Someone moved in to break them up. “Don’t fuckin’ touch them. Let them niggas fight that shit out. Better fists than bullets.”
Pop Jordan deserved this beat down that Joshua was giving him. For years, Joshua asked his dad what was up with P’Nee not coming for the summer anymore. Pop Jordan lied every time. When Margie shot him and his brother, he lied once again. Yeah, my bro deserved to be the one to deliver this beat down.
I moved to P’Nee who was still wrapped in my grandma’s arms. When I got close, she passed her to me. The second that my baby was in my arms, she broke down. I repeatedly kissed her temple. “Tell me what you want me to do. Just tell me what you need, baby, and I’ll do it.”
She sniffed a few times before she lifted her head to gaze into my eyes. “I want to go home. Can you take me home?”
The Aftermath . . .
A Short Time Later . . .
Clover, South Carolina, had been turned on its head. One of the top Black farming families had a predator in its ranks. It took no time at all for what happened at the cookout to get around. Hell, there were people streaming the fight and shit live on their social media accounts.
My baby’s student, Christy’s, mother wasn’t at the cookout because she had to work. That didn’t matter, because by the time that Nee and I were about to leave, she rolled up almost on two wheels. She came in and went to Jacob’s ass. It was clear that she had no idea what happened under her roof between her daughter and the man she was dating.
