The Price We Pay by Nikki T. Anthony

Author:Nikki T. Anthony [Anthony, Nikki T.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Path To Publishing
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 15

“It’s time for you to get on up here, Zenetta. You not gon’ make me late for this here funeral service, lil girl!” Momma called from her room.

I lay there staring at the ceiling, something I had been doing for the past couple of days. I hadn’t moved from that spot once, except to use the bathroom and grab a drink. After I had done my business, I was right back where I started. I tried hard to understand how anyone could call losing Tootsie a homegoing celebration. Saying good-bye to Tootsie wasn’t a celebratory occasion. Instead, I saw it as clarity that Tootsie had abandoned me. I saw it as a realization that someone stole her vibrant life just to advance their own. In my eyes, Tootsie was the best, despite her flaws. She was someone who understood me, even when Reyna and Shannon abandoned our friendship. Tootsie taught me how to walk tall, even when the world around me had beat me down. Tootsie was the best to ever do it, and I found it hard to say good-bye to her.

“I said get up.” Momma graduated from shouting from the next room to storming into mine and snatching the covers off me.

“I’m not going,” I barked back. I pulled the blanket back up to my chin and stared off into the ceiling yet again.

“What did you say?” Momma looked like she couldn’t understand me.

The last time I checked, Momma didn’t have a hearing problem, so I knew she understood me clearly. It was also hardly the first time I’d said no to her in recent history. Just in case she hadn’t heard me, though, I decided to say it again, but this time only a little louder.

“I said I’m not going.”

“I must be losing my mind,” Momma grumbled before she snatched the covers off me again, and I was prepared to lock horns with her.

I held on tighter to my blanket, but that only made her grip my wrist and twist my skin in the opposite direction. I ignored the sting and held onto the comforter as long as I could, but as usual, Momma won the battle.

“Get your behind up now before I tear it up!” she threatened with fire in her eyes. By this time, Daddy made his way into the room, trying to investigate what was going on between us.

“I said I’m not going!” I fired back once more, not afraid of what she might do to me if I continued to disobey her. Momma’s face turned to stone before her head bounced back like a shuttlecock.

“Are you gonna stand there and let her talk to me like that, Hershel?” Momma shifted her anger toward Daddy.

“If the girl don’t wanna go to the funeral, you can’t make her go,” Daddy said as he adjusted his necktie.

“I can make her do whatever I want. You better believe the day she doesn’t will be the day you bury her!” Momma grabbed me by the lobe of my ear and gave it an excruciating twist.

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