“I sure do. And there are some snacks in the front if you want something to munch on. In the meantime, I’ll bring you a bottle of water and a cup of ice. I’ll be right back.”
Giavanna was grateful for the friendly staff in the oncologist unit because when she was anxious, the last thing she wanted to deal with was assholes.
Brazil’s eyes roamed over the floor as if he was looking for something. “You didn’t bring a chemo bag?”
His question made Giavanna’s brows hike. “Chemo bag?”
“Yeah. Since you have to be here for a few hours, you should have brought a bag with essentials in it. Chargers, Chapstick, lotion, snacks, books, socks, all the girly shit women like. That kind of thing.”
“Ummmm.” If Brazil was good at anything it was rendering her speechless. “That’s a great idea, but I didn’t even think about it. I’ve been the most scatterbrained person since I got the news. Even common-sense things don’t come to me easily. How are you such an expert in all things chemo?”
Brazil chuckled. “I’m not an expert, but the C word is all too common. I hate it. I’ve seen what it can do to some people.” His gaze shifted, and her heart sank.
Giavanna knew the reality of the situation, but it still hurt to think about it.
“Yeah, I know right.” Her tone was low, voice barely audible.
“Don’t worry,” Brazil attempted to lighten the mood. “I got you.”
Removing his phone from its resting place on his lap, Brazil unlocked the phone while Giavanna eyed him with confusion. Quickly, it dawned on her that he was going to get her a chemo bag. Giavanna’s lips parted. She was prepared to tell him that he didn’t have to get her a bag. She was capable of getting her own, but something stopped her from speaking the words.
He would just do it anyway and if she was being completely honest with herself, Giavanna had to admit that it felt good to actually have someone give a damn about her during such a difficult time. So, she sat back and let Brazil do his thing.
CHAPTER 3
Irritated wasn’t the word.Khrome was beyond annoyed. She was furious. She’d been holding her urine for far too long because she didn’t feel like leaving the comfort of her bed. The moment she decided to finally get up and relieve her bladder, she discovered that Keyonna was already in the bathroom. Keyonna was Cam’s girlfriend, and Khrome despised her because Keyonna didn’t like her, and she made it no secret. In the entire nine months that she’d been dealing with Cam, she swore that he and Khrome were sneaky and up to no good and they had to be sleeping together. After the third slick remark, Khrome stopped talking and simply started glaring at Keyonna when she’d say something dumb. Cam could’ve explained himself until he was blue in the face, but Khrome wasn’t about to keep explaining herself to a person she didn’t give a damn about.
The situation was odd, indeed, but Keyonna didn’t truly understand how trapped Khrome was. She didn’t have steady income, her record was tainted, and she didn’t have a car. Just where the hell was she going to go? More than once, buying a CPN number so she could get a place to live crossed her mind, but Khrome already had enough charges. One more charge for fraud, and she might have actually had to do some time.Currently, she was on probation for two years. If she got in any trouble during those two years, she had to serve the remainder of the time left on probation in jail, which was six months. That didn’t include whatever time she might get for the new charge.
Each and every time Khrome thought about the terrible hand that life had dealt her, she got upset. It was clear as day that God had favorites, and she wasn’t one of them. From the time she was old enough to know how different she was, Khrome questioned her looks. She had never seen another person whose entire face was covered in freckles like hers and each and every time someone called her ugly, tears filled her eyes. People called her ugly so much that any time someone called her pretty, she chalked it up to them lying to make her feel better.
It wasn’t until she got older, around middle school age, that Khrome began to appreciate just how different she was. When she stared at herself in the mirror and got past the marks on her skin, shewaspretty. She was also pretty when she put foundation on and completely hid her freckles. The strangest thing occurred after the first time she applied makeup and looked in the mirror. She liked it, but she didn’t. Khrome had the opportunity to go out without people staring at her, but she didn’t feel like herself without seeing freckles staring back at her. In that moment, she decided to wear makeup sometimes but not every day. As much as she used to hate it, the freckles were a part of her, and she had grown to like them.
It didn’t even bother her anymore when people got mad with her and called her a freckle face bitch. A spotted face bitch. Her ex used to call her an ugly-ass bitch, but every time she tried to leave him, he lost his mind. Right around the time she began to feel comfortable in her freckle-ridden skin, her home life went to shit. Khrome’s mother had been a teen mom. When Liz got pregnant at fourteen, her super religious mother almost had a heart attack.
She held a grudge against Liz for the entire pregnancy and refused to help her. Khrome’s father, Kevin, was sixteen at the time, and his mother felt bad for Liz. When Khrome was born, Kevin’s mother told Liz that her and the baby could come stay with them. In the beginning, Liz liked playing house. She was young and able to lay up with her man every night, but things got real fast. Kevin’s mother helped when she could, but she had a job. Having a child and a live-in girlfriend was too much for Kevin at such a young age, and he began avoiding being home just so he wouldn’t have to hear Liz nag or help out with Khrome. The relationship quickly turned toxic, but his mother refused to put Liz and the baby out on the street, so Kevin left home.
When Khrome was a year old, Liz found out Kevin had another girlfriend who was pregnant, and she almost lost her mind. She wouldn’t eat, she wouldn’t sleep, and all she did was cry. After a few months, she finally got over it. When Liz was almost seventeen, she met an older drug dealer and after two months of knowing her, he moved her and Khrome into a townhouse. Liz had so many pictures of Khrome after she got with Face, and Khrome used to be fly as hell. As a toddler, she had jewelry, name brand clothes, more sneakers than she could wear, and Face kept Liz fly too. She was nineteen pushing a BMW, taking trips out of the country, and living the life of a rich housewife.
That all came to a halt when she was twenty-two, and Khrome was eight. Face was robbed and murdered. His mother came for everything in the house that belonged to him and the cars that were in her name. Liz didn’t have a job, but she did manage to get the $75,000 out of Face’s safe before his mother got to it. With no job, she was forced to get a place in the projects. Her rent was only fifty dollars a month and that included utilities. Liz got nice furniture, bought herself a reliable car, applied for government assistance, and stretchedthat money for as long as she could. In her grieving stage, she didn’t want to look for work, go to school, or do anything to better herself. Her spark died with Face, and she became a totally different person. She was that person who woke up each day, got fly, and sat out on the porch hoping to catch the eye of a baller.
Liz was a pretty woman, so she got attention, but she never managed to catch another fish as big as Face. The most she got out of a man at one time was around $500, but she didn’t mind because she didn’t really have any bills. Liz began to pass her time by drinking, smoking weed, and rotating men. When you didn’t have a job, every day was a party. Liz wasn’t physically or verbally abusive, but she wasn’t as present as she should have been. If Khrome made bad grades, she didn’t get in trouble. She didn’t have to ask permission to leave the yard or to even stay at her friend’s house past a certain time. Liz was there, physically but mentally, she was checked out.
Khrome didn’t really care. In fact, all her friends thought it was cool that she had a mother who let her do whatever. What confused Khrome was when she was in middle school and older teenage boys began to ogle her. The first time she heard Liz tell a young man, “You like my daughter, you gon’ have to pay like you weigh. Ain’t no fucking for free around here,” she was confused.
Khrome had no interest infucking, and what did she mean he couldn’t fuck for free? The older she got and started talking to boys, Liz began hounding her about what the boys were buying her and telling her to make them do things for her. Khrome realized that the men that were in and out of her mother’s bedroom gave her money for small things like weed and alcohol, but they didn’t do anything for her worth bragging about. Even as a teen, Khrome knew she didn’t want to constantly sleep with different men only to get pennies from each one. As she began to watch music videos and movies and see how drug dealers’girlfriends really lived, how Face used to have her mother living, Khrome realized maybe that was just how things went.
When she met Vick at the age of sixteen, her mother was elated. He bought Khrome’s school clothes, kept her hair and nails done, and even gave Liz money here and there. Liz didn’t even blink when he wanted Khrome to move in with him. It only took about three months for his true colors to begin to show. Vick was possessive, jealous, and controlling. He picked Khrome up from school every day and if any of her male classmates so much as smiled at her, Vick flew into a rage. Despite being young, Khrome knew she didn’t want to keep living like that, so after six months, she tried to go back to her mother’s house. Not only did her mother encourage her to go back to Vick and deal with it, but when he came to get Khrome, Liz let him in the apartment.
Her only advice to her daughter was to get pregnant, and then maybe he wouldn’t hit her. For the first time ever, Khrome was utterly disgusted by the woman who birthed her and the mindset that she possessed. Khrome’s life turned into a torturous cycle of abuse, toxicity, and affection. Vick beat and berated her, showered her with gifts, apologized, then sexed her brains out. When she met Cam at a gas station and he tried to talk to her, she wasted no time telling him she had a man. Cam eyed the scratches on her neck and face and knew what it was. His smooth talking and charm made Khrome play with fire and take his number. She’d call him whenever she was upset with Vick. She just wanted to vent, and Vick didn’t let her have friends.
When Cam put a bullet in Vick’s head, Khrome was dizzy with relief. That relief was short-lived, however, and another viscous cycle began. Tears streaming down her cheeks brought Khrome back to reality. Being pregnant and super emotional was exhausting as hell. Angrily, she swiped the tears off herface and snatched her bedroom door open with a scowl. She wasn’t sure how long Keyonna had been out of the bathroom, but the woman exited the master bedroom and walked past her in the short hallway. They didn’t acknowledge one another, and Khrome shut the bathroom door while rolling her eyes.
If she had just one friend—one person in her life that was worth a damn—she might have been able to break free easier, but she didn’t have anyone. Khrome used the bathroom, washed her face, and brushed her teeth. When she opened the bathroom door, her first reaction was to jump when she almost ran into Keyonna. The five-foot-four woman stood directly across from the bathroom, waiting on Khrome to exit. They’d exchanged a few snide remarks in the past, but they had never come close to throwing blows. If Keyonna chose the time she was pregnant to try her, Khrome was going to show her ass no mercy. She was quite tired of people fucking with her. Khrome glared at Keyonna, waiting on her to speak.
Seeing the darkness in her eyes, Keyonna lifted her hands in surrender. “I come in peace.” Angling her head to the left, she studied Khrome. “How much do you really hate Cam?”
“What?” Khrome drew back, caught off guard by the question.
