RIPPED & READY (PART 77)

RIPPED & READY (PART LXXVII) 

          I braced myself for Collin’s arrival while Joseph was getting he and little Joe-Joe dressed.  With the center of my assets still pulsating in pain, I took a shower to rinse off any of the remaining bodily fluids left by Lance-O-Clot.  The rape was one thing, but the possibility of being infected with some venereal disease was in an entirely different category.  I couldn’t help but imagine my body covered with cancerous soars and how gaunt I would look weighing seventy-five pounds – the reality of HIV and AIDS was buzzing loudly in my mind, flashing erratically like the red numbers of the digital alarm clock sitting beside our bed.

          The movies “Long Time Companion” and “Philadelphia” which depicted the harshness of the disease and how quickly it attacks and devours the immune system are no longer cinematic images foreign to me, the stories they told could perhaps be the same one I’d have to tell and the mere thought of it stirred up a panic in me that overloaded my senses provoking an anxiety attack. 

          It felt like I was suffocating. 

          When I started gagging and coughing Joseph rushed from the room and pulled me into him with a fervor that calmed me down in minutes.  Instead of pulling out of my panic state using words, he shushed me tenderly, rubbing my head gently with his hands, cupping my face periodically. 

          “Shhh..” he said numerous times until I had finally calmed down. 

          The love and strength in his eyes were working on me like a powerful valium and my body went limp in his embrace.  The thought of not being able to make love to him sent a surge of sadness throughout my entire body.  My soul was crying out loud.  Inside I was as broken as that vinyl record I snapped in two over my knee for being scratched years ago.  My life was under attack and I searched within, hoping I could regain composure; however, I was doing a lousy job. 

          “Joseph, please, take little man home, this is not the place for him to be right now,” I weakly suggested. 

          “Yes, Marco, I’m going to do that, but I when I return you will tell me what is going on with you, because it’s scaring me, baby,” he said, brushing his lips across mine. 

          I tucked my lips inside of my mouth, not wanting to pass on any infection I might have. 

          He pulled away from me, hurt in his eyes. 

          It hurt me to see that I had hurt him.

          I wanted to tell him that I was only trying to protect him.

          I wanted to share with him how I had been raped by his so called friend.

          I wanted to strike him in his chest because he had brought that nigga into our home…

          The dude who took me and ravaged my insides and spit his lethal contents inside the walls of my assets…

          …the mutherfucker who most likely destroyed our future…

          …my future

          He walked away from me, and when he reached the entrance of the hallway, he turned around, looking towards me with a look of bewilderment on his face, most likely, trying to figure out what had just happened.

          I had never not responded to his kiss.  

          He had been in the back room for not more than a minute when there was a knock at the door.  My heart sunk – I knew it was Collin. 

          I started to feel anxiety seep up into the walls of my esophagus. 

          Instead of opening the door, I went and sat on the long sofa that I had been raped on.  There was no way I could stand up facing Collin.  My legs felt like a bowl of JELLO –wobbly and wiggly. 

          I was engaged in a silent warfare, being driven insane by what had happened, and what was yet to come. 

          When Collin entered the door he looked over towards where I sat as he gave Joseph a tight hug.  Gone was the sickly looking person I last saw at the hospital with tubes running out of him and a oxygen piece stuck in his nose.  He looked wonderfully vibrant and strong.  Missing was that God awful, tacky ass, cheap gold chain that he used to wear around his neck.  I could see the 6 of the M6 tattoo peaking out from beneath his white wife beater on his left pectoral. 

          Joseph called out to little man, jangling his keys, ushering him out the front door, palming him gently on the head.  Before closing the door behind him he mouthed to me, “Be ready to talk when I get back.”

          “Oh, don’t worry, Joseph, this nigga is gonna talk or I’m going to beat his ass myself,” Collin assured him, pulling me into the warmth of his ripped & ready masculine body.

          Sometimes you had to man up and be the man you are meant to be by facing your fears and fighting to stay relevant in a chaotic world where everything and everyone seemed to not care about anything or anyone except for what they can get and who they can get it from.  I know that there are a lot of good people in the world because I had them in my life; however, under the circumstances, it was hard to know who to believe anymore. 

          D’Andre’s comment still had me in shock and Peewee’s overtly physical sex-less assault still loomed without answers.  One thing I knew is that once I admitted to Collin and Joseph what went down, the wheels were going to start spinning rapidly and I wasn’t sure who was going to be left standing.

          All I knew is that it was about to get real ugly. 

          “M-6 my nigga…M-6,” Collin said, beating his chest like Tarzan. 

          Where is a good vine when you needed one?