Page 37 of Roulette: The Madam

Blackness surrounded me. I grew numb and his screams were so far in the distance that I couldn’t hear them anymore. I couldn’t hear anything buther.

The soundless tears that sounded like bombs dropping on my heart. The exhaustion in her voice from staying up at night, worrying her mother wouldn’t be alive to see the next sunrise. The stress. The depression. The lack of mobility simply because life was too hard to manage some days.

Pretty baby.

George had played on Yara’s fragility and that hurt me to the core. Her heart was gold. Everyone she’d ever encountered knew it. To have her spirit broken, her innocence revoked, and her choice to lead a healthy life taken away from her was unacceptable.

Yara barely touched meat. Ate clean. Floated through nursing school while pregnant and dealing with a newborn at home. Meditated. Visited the Pilates studio three times a week. Consumed more fruit than an island-dweller. And, knew her patients better than most of their close relatives.

She was love. In the dictionary, right underneath the word should’ve been her name. The love she gave was the reason I couldn’t let her drown in the mess this nigga had created for her. I’d throw her a life vest and bring her onto the raft whenever she was ready. I just needed her to be ready. She wasn’t yet, and that was alright. She would be soon.

Our daughter was the driving force behind her journey to treatment. I was confident in her ability to fight her demons. Malaya made the battle worthwhile. She loved our daughter with everything inside of her and her absence was killing her.

“El– El. EL!”Samson yelled, snapping me out of the trance I’d fallen victim to.

I paused, eyes feeling twice their size. My body had stiffened. My grip had tightened around the knife. The beast had been awakened.

“He’s dead, man. He’s been dead.”

My vision cleared slightly. A lifeless George leaned against the back of the chair. His neck no longer supported the weight of his head. His body was covered in stab wounds. From the top of his head to his ankles, he was hit.

Blood dripped from my knife. I could feel the splatters all over my face and hands. My black shoes had been victimized too.

“Hmph,” I breathed out.

My heart punched my chest. I could feel every beat. As they began to slow down, I began to gather myself.

“You one sick motherfucker, El, but that nigga deserved that shit. With his bitch a–”

Samson’s words trailed off. My bag was already in my hand and my knife was back where it belonged. I pushed the door of the coop open and made my way to the car. Once inside, I didn’t waste a second agitating the engine.

I’m on my way home, pretty girl.

It had only beenthirty minutes since George’s demise, and the world felt like a better place already. I’d waited six months for the opportunity to gut him like the worthless piece of shit he was. He’d been hiding, but I knew that at some point his addiction would lead me right to him. I wasn’t wrong. I was hardly ever wrong.

The same threads covered my body as I stepped out of my home and onto the deck. I was in the mountains of Clarke. Their beauty was something to behold. The view was the main reason I’d chosen this home. It was my greatest escape. Not physically, but mentally. There were no boundaries of my brain when I stepped foot out here.

I sighed. Weights that had parts of me imprisoned were lifted immediately. Life felt more manageable now. So did Yara’s addiction. In the last month, she’d made great strides to cut back on the drugs in hopes that I’d return Malaya.

It wasn’t happening. We both knew it, but the hope she held for our daughter’s return gave her something to fight with. That was fine by me. She needed all the weapons she could obtain for the battle ahead. It wouldn’t be an easy one but she wouldn’t be alone.

I placed the clipped cigar up to my lips and put the open flame up to it. I puffed, inhaling the thick smoke and then blowing it out almost immediately. The weight of my body was transferred to the railing that faced the lake that ran between my home and three others. With so much land in between us, houses were few and far apart.

Water clashed against the grooves of the mountains, making a splash. The sound was alleviating. It kneaded the stress away, virtually massaging my temples and luring my heart to a safer, quieter place.

I closed my eyes as I puffed on the cigar. Life was good but it could get better. Itwouldbe better if there was an equal half of me to share the weight of my world with. However, I’d tried and I’d learned that women were no good in my care.

Not because I couldn’t maintain them, but because I couldn’t contain myself. I had the ability to change lives and that wasn’t a good thing in my opinion. Changing lives meant changing identities and expectations. Soon, entitlement became a bigger issue than it needed to be and was the catalyst of my agony.

I didn’t mind an outstretched hand. In fact, I preferred it. But, I wanted to add to what was already in the upright palm, not become the sole source of its supply.

The majority of women in the world were liabilities in my realm. I desired an asset. An equal. Someone I could count on if shit went left for me. Because, though I had an insane amount of the shit, money came and went.

A hustler.

That’s who I craved some nights but there weren’t enough of those nights to go hunting. My appetite wasn’t potent enough. My time wasn’t predictable enough. And, my heart wasn’t big enough.

A sharp pain rested in my chest. I rubbed it out with my right hand.

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