Rod Cornelius's Blog

Hi All!  I know I released this cover about 3 years ago on my official facebook page but I wanted to post it up on my official website.

Yes, it’s been super delayed but He Beats Me will be released next month, March 2017.  It will also be included in a novella compilation that I will release the cover and name very soon.

The compilation will include Diggin’ Gold, The Trusted, Whatever It Takes & He Beats Me.  All 4 novellas will be released in this compilation for only 2.99 ebook and 14.95 Paperback.

In the Beginning…

A wise man once told me that a man needs a woman in his life like a turtle needs the shell on his back.  Well, he wasn’t all too wise.  As a matter of fact, he was this old, drunk guy that I met at this bar a couple years ago, weeping about his wife leaving him with nothing but the shirt on his back.  At the time, I couldn’t understand what in the world would make him come up with such a weird comparison – turtles and relationships. I just took it as the alcohol talking.  Besides, that was when I was in the prime of my mac-daddy days.  Relationship jargon was just that – jargon!  And in reference to what my Uncle Jim once told me, I was young, dumb and always trying to find some.  By no means was I trying to feel any kind of a relationship, or more blatantly, anything lasting longer than a one night stand.  So at the time, I didn’t know what that guy meant, why he was saying it, or why in the hell he was saying it to me.

But like I stated earlier, that was back in the prime of my player days, which virtually ended when I met Brandi Brown.  Brandi, by far, was the woman of my dreams.  Never in my life had I met a lady like her.  To me, she was all that a man could want in a woman.  But out of all the places in the world I could’ve met her, I met her at a club.  I first laid eyes on her in the midst of celebrating my boy Rex’s birthday at this little club we hit frequently called the Hot Spot.  We walked in, chillin’, like we normally did, and unexpectedly, we both spotted her at the same time.

“Man, look ‘a here!” yelled Rex as his eyes zeroed in on her in the middle of the dance floor.  “You ever saw her in here before?”

“Hell nah,” I quickly replied.

She was dancing all by herself wearing this tight, black body skirt that revealed every perfectly placed curve on her body.  She had long, thick, black hair that dangled down to her shoulders, a lightly tanned complexion, and luscious, plump lips.  She freely swayed to the jazzy tunes that played as if she was the only soul in the joint.  This chick was so hot, not a guy in the club had the nerve to approach her.  You could literally look around and view every guy in the house sneaking peaks at her when their women turned their heads, or if they were by themselves, they just lustfully stared.  I even caught a glimpse of a couple of envious females looking her way with frowns on their faces.

“Damn!”  I grunted under my breath.

“Now that’s dangerous,” proclaimed Rex.

“You gonna holla’, birthday boy?”

“Hell nah, she’s too damn scandalous!” he replied.  “You holla’.”

I grinned, “My game’s good, but I don’t know about that.”

“Just do it for me.  Show me what I taught you.”

“What you taught me?”

“Yeah, you know I taught you everything you know about the opposite sex.”

He was just scared his ego was going to get hurt.  “Whatever, Rex.”  As I continued to stare at her, something overwhelmed my body, perhaps just hormones, but I became strangely determined to meet this lady.  Not just that, but something was telling me that I had to say something to her as if it was my destiny.  Suddenly, I became transfixed on kissing those luscious, full lips of hers while sliding my hands up and down her slender back, drawing her firm, naked body against mine.  Yes indeed, I was going to approach this precious victim of Godly beauty.  I truly felt it would’ve been an opportunity missed if  I’d done otherwise.  “You know what?”  I took a deep breath.  “I’m gonna do it.”

He smiled, “Do that thang, pimp-a-licious.”

“Pimp-a-licious, gonna do that thang, man!”  If only I was as confident as I sounded.  But I had to do it.  I had to meet this lady.  So I loaded all of the mental weapons that my brain harbored, and I strolled to my destiny.

I began bobbing my head to the music, trying to look as hip and slick as I possibly could.  I’d bagged many fine females in the past but not as gorgeous as this one.  As I drew near, she noticed me approaching her.  “Hi!” I nervously blurted out.

She gave me a slight nod, still grooving to the tunes.  I quickly realized she was going to be an arrogant one.  “So, are you dancing by yourself?”  Sometimes the obvious should never be put into question form.  Again she said nothing.  I looked back at Rex.  He had grabbed himself a chair in the corner, steadily observing my actions like a gospel stage play.  Man, I couldn’t let him see this woman get the best of me.  I would never hear the end of it from him.  I quickly turned to her.  “Do you mind if I dance with you?”

She stopped dancing and examined me from head to toe.  A petite smile appeared upon her face.  Nervous and dumbfounded, I smiled right back at her.  And that’s when she approached me.  Before I knew it, her lips were against mine.  Instantly, my mind went haywire.

“I don’t feel like dancing anymore,” she softly replied into my ear.  Her sweet voice had a hint of an English accent in it.

With my mind on sabbatical,  I could only come back with, “Well, what do you wanna do?”

She grabbed me by my hand.  “Come on, love.”

I looked over to Rex whose mouth had virtually fell in his lap as my feet mindlessly followed this woman off of the dance floor.  I didn’t know what to do next as I simply followed her lead.  In a matter of seconds, we were outside in the middle of the parking lot.

“I hope your friend drove tonight,” she threw a set of keys into my hands as we walked down a row of cars.

“He did,” I said.  Really it didn’t matter who drove, because if I did, he was gonna be out of luck this night.  And I knew he’d do the same to me.  If he were me in the same situation and he was walking out of the club with such a beautiful lady and I was going to need a ride home, he would just leave my ass hitchhiking.  But fortunately for him, he drove because I would gladly return the hypothetical favor.

We stopped at a red convertible with the top down.  I opened the passenger door for her, and I anxiously jumped in on the driver side.  Never had something so spontaneous happened to me with such a beautiful lady.  I just wanted to get to wherever she wanted us to go, however quickly we could get there and see where things would go from there.

She gently placed her hand on my thigh.  “Go straight down Main, take a left on Brenton, and pull into the driveway of the third house on the right.”

Straight and direct, just what I liked.  As I pulled out of the parking lot, I realized I didn’t even know what this woman’s name was.  She just stared out of the window like she didn’t even care.  I could’ve been Charles Manson for all she knew, but even worse than that, she could’ve been.

“Hey, do you have a name?”  She didn’t answer.  She blatantly ignored me, just like she did when I first approached her in the club.  Now see, it’s things like that, that makes a man think with his brain and not his jimmy all of the time.  But then I took another glance at her body and quickly realized how much more powerful a man’s jimmy is than his brain.  As a matter of fact, it is his brain.  Besides, this chick was a perfect ten.  A ten, then some.  And those are just too hard to come by at times.

Her directions led me straight to a two-story brick house smack-dab in the middle of Brenton Avenue.  “Keys,” she chillingly requested.  A brief thought of being stranded in the middle of nowhere swiftly raced through my mind.  I gave her the keys.  “Come on,” she said.  Thank you, Jesus.  I couldn’t bare the thought of walking all the way back to that club and trying to quickly compose a lie to Rex as to why I was perspiring so badly.

I jumped out of the car and shadowed her tracks like a starving dog sniffing for a meaty bone.  She opened the door to the house and flicked on the lights beside the entrance.  As I stepped into her crib, I began to instantly think that this experience had to be some kind of cruel joke sponsored by my subconscious and somehow, I was sleeping and couldn’t wake up.  And the way it was beginning to feel, this was gonna be a wet one.

She glanced back at me, “Close the door.”  I shut the door and followed her up the stairs.  The house really didn’t have much in it.  In fact, it looked unlived in altogether.  The walls were neatly entangled with an assortment of oil paintings but not much furniture consumed the home.  Nonetheless, my primary concern rested on just one piece of furniture in particular – the bed!

We walked into what had to have been the master bedroom.  It was humongous.  An exquisite Persian rug laced the floor.  There was a huge floor-length window open, and the nightly breeze blew her finely-silk draperies into the room.  Most significantly of all, she had this massive king-sized bed in the center of the room.

I looked around, not trying to seem overly-amazed.  “So this is yours?”

“Nope!” she said as she walked alongside her bed, slowly sliding her fingers across the satin sheets.

Damn!  I knew she had to have a man, somewhere.

“Well, it is for now.  My agency is leasing this place for me until I find some place to live down here,” she said.

“Oh,” I said relieved that there was no sign of any manly presence in her life so far.  “All this for you, huh?”

She grinned.  “Yeap.”

I walked over to the window and gazed down at the dimly lit street.  I didn’t want to seem too anxious for what she had to offer.  “Nice view.”

“I’ll say,” she replied.

I could almost feel her eyes cutting through my back.  I turned around, thinking maybe I could slip a little bit of my own arrogance in there.  “I was referring to the street.”

“I was, too.  What else would I be referring to?”

Ooh, low blow, and can’t say that I didn’t deserve it.  As she took a seat on the bed, I just stared at her, not having a clue to where things were headed.  But if I knew anything, I definitely had to have them go the direction I wanted them to.

“So,” I took a deep breath.  “Why did you bring me here?”

“Why did you come?” she quickly combated.

“What?  You grabbed my hand and led the way.”

“You’re a grown man.  I’m quite sure you could’ve stopped me.”

“I could’ve, but why would I want to stop you?”

“Uh, because you have respect for yourself and you wouldn’t want to become victim to a one night stand.”

Playing it witty, I quickly turned my head acting as if I was surprised, “Is that what this is, a one night stand?  Well, I have never…”

“This is not a one night stand,” she said, really surprising me.

“It isn’t?”

“No.”

“Really?”  I threw my hands up, looking side to side.  “Then what is this?”

She grinned.  “It’s a show!”

“What, you talking about like Candid Camera, or something?” I began looking around, searching for any hidden cameras I hadn’t noticed.  I knew the whole get-up was too good to be true.

“No, silly,” she laughed.

I was severely intrigued.  “Then what type of show are you talking about?”

“A strip-show.”

Suddenly I had a smile the size of Texas on my face.  “Oh, for real?”  I quickly planted myself onto a chair next to the window.  “Go ahead.”

“You don’t get it, do you?” she walked to me and stood in front of me.

I looked up at her like a little boy, waiting for his mother’s response to a request to go outside and play.  “What am I not getting?”

She pulled me up on my feet.  “I’m not stripping, silly.  You are.”

“You must be outta’ your mind!”

A blank look posted upon her face.

“How can I just take my clothes off in front of you?  I don’t even know your name.  I mean, don’t get me wrong, you do look good and all, but…”

She placed her finger on my lips.  “My name is Brandi Brown.  I am a model for the Black Friday Modeling Agency.  I was born in Long Beach, California.  I spent a majority of my childhood in London with my mother.  I’m twenty-four years old, and I picked you out of a club full of yearning men to be my private entertainment for tonight.  Now you can either do as I request or you won’t have to worry about getting any more of these ever again.”

She gently removed her finger and pressed her lips against mine.  I just stood there, frozen, enjoying the unbelievable softness of her lips.  After a few moments of her allowing me to sample heaven, she backed away.  I took a deep breath, wondering what was it that I had gotten myself into.  I was always accustomed to being the one in charge, but that just wasn’t the case this night.

“The choice is yours.”  She walked to the bed and spread out on her side with her face resting in the palm of her hand.

Her eyes stayed glued on me.  She knew that she blatantly left the ball in my court.  By no means did I have a problem with how my body looked.  I was a fairly fit brother although I could stand to do just a few extra sit-ups every now and then.

“My name is Darrel, by the way.  I just thought I’d throw that at you.”  She knew she had all the cards in her hands, and that’s what was killing me.  I had never been the pupil, always the teacher.  But this lady was teaching me something new.  Something I was very unfamiliar with.  And even though I was down in unfamiliar territory, I remained intrigued.  Very intrigued.  “So let me get this straight.  You just want me to take all my clothes off for you with no questions asked?  Might I ask what’s in it for me?  I know it’s got to be more than a kiss.  I mean, I got that from you just by asking for a dance.”

“Me.  Your prize will be me.”

Being ever so clever, I asked, “What part of you?  The neck, the rib, the thigh – what?  You can’t leave a brotha’ in suspense like that ‘cause I gotta know what I’m getting.  I don’t know about you.”

“Your prize will be all of me that you’d like.”

I smiled, “Well if that’s the case…,” I turned to the window to close the curtains.

“With the curtains open.”

I immediately turned around.  “Say what?”

“I don’t want you to close the curtains.  Don’t you like the breeze it brings into the room?”

“Yeah, but there’s like, peeping-toms and stuff like that out there!  I can undress just fine without the wind coming in and strange folks staring at my rear end.”

She nods her head.  “You are a confident black man, aren’t you?”

“Hell yeah!”  I announced.  “But that doesn’t have anything to do with having my ass being exposed to all of the Atlanta night life.

“Well, love, I only get involved with confident men,” she explained.  “And the way I see it, if you want someone as precious as I am, then you can’t be bashful about it.  Because once you’ve gone Brandi Brown, you never come back.”

For a moment, I thought my penis had ears.  Instantly my manhood rose to the occasion – literally.  Speaking on behalf of most men, we just love it when a woman talks dirty to us.  “Alright, Brandi, I guess I’ll just have to give you what your little demented eyes have been dying to see.  The Darrel Walker show, brought to you live from Brenton Avenue.  Get ready, baby!”

Quickly, I submerged into her little strip-tease game.  I started by sliding my belt off, slowly, while giving her this calm, demanding stare.  Hell, if I was going to make a total fool out of myself I decided I might as well have fun doing it.  Next, I unbuttoned my shirt.

“Now that’s what I’m talking about, love,” she yelled as she fanned herself.

I never stripped before, but obviously I was doing something right – I hoped.  In a matter of moments, my shirt was off and I was unzipping my slacks.  “You ready for the main event, baby?”

“Yeah, love, momma’s ready for the main event.”  she responded while licking her lips.

I was beginning to get off on the little show.  I pulled off my slacks and threw them against the wall.

“Take it off.  Take it off,” she demanded.

I blew her a kiss .  “You don’t wanna see this.”

“Oh, yes I do.  Yes, I do.”

Then I did it.  I stripped off the boxers.

“Oh, yes!” she yelled.  “Yes!”

I knew I was straight, but ole’ girl was blowing it out of proportion.  But I loved it.  I heard a car cruising by, and someone yelled, “Nice ass, buddy!”  Yeah, it was embarrassing, but I was about to get something that nosey passerby wasn’t – laid.

“You ready for some of this?” I asked, knowing that she had to be ready to feel the total Darrel Walker experience.

“No, baby,” she groaned, “Not quite yet.”

“What?” I was totally baffled.

“You can have all of this, love,” she said as she rolled over on her back and divided her legs while holding herself up on her elbows.  Her beautiful brown eyes tastefully observed my every motion.  “But I want you to do one other thing for me.”

“What?  What else do you want me to do?”

“Boo, I want you to do…‘The Bird’,” she quickly blurted out.

“Say what?”

“I want you to do ‘The Bird’ for me.”

Suddenly my manhood began to sink.  “Oh, hell nah!  Butt-naked?”  I shook my head, positively final with my decision.

Then she rose.  “Oh, you’re gonna do it.”

“Baby girl, it’s been fun, but I ain’t doing no shit like that,” I commanded.  I looked towards the corner of the room trying to catch a glimpse of where I threw my pants.

“Darrel,” she purred.  In an instance she regained my attention.  “Can you really say no to this?”   She pulled off her blouse, slid off her skirt and held her hands out like ‘what?’  My mouth dropped like a full sack of potatoes.  “The bra and the panties will definitely be next.  Only if you’re man enough to earn them.”

With no mind control needed at this point, my brain played the beat to the Morris Day classic, and my feet and hands did the rest.  My God, I was doing ‘The Bird’!  I even did a spin.  My eyes pleasantly rested on her beautifully tanned body as the song repeated itself within my mind.  She playfully nodded her head as she hummed out the beat of the song while she sat on the edge of the bed.

“You fuckin’ pervert!” yelled someone in another car passing by.

She fingered me over.  “Come over here, love.”

I danced all the way to her, still in rhythm.  She got up, put her arms around my neck and kissed me.  That’s when I stopped.  It was time for me to do my thing, and I couldn’t say that it wasn’t well deserved.  I had literally made an ass out of myself, but I knew what laid ahead of me was a night of passion with the sexiest woman I had ever laid eyes on.

“Take me, love,” she whispered into my ear.

I picked her up, placed her on the center of the bed, and the love making began.

By far, that was the most outrageous night of my life, and it certainly was the best sex I’d ever had.  It was so good that my way of thinking completely changed.  And after a few weeks of exclusively dating Miss Brandi Brown and having her move into my crib, she easily became the butter to my bread, the cool to my breeze, and the slickness in my step.  And to the surprise of all the great players before me, all bets were off.  I got whipped!

Now for folks who don’t know, there ain’t nothing worse than a player that suddenly gets whipped.  He starts doing stupid shit like waiting by the phone all night, asking dumb questions like, “Do you think about me when I’m away, baby?” or “I know you love me – do you love me, girl?”  I was doing all of the above and much, much more.  That lady just messed me all up.  But I didn’t fall into critical status until that night I decided to finally hang up the jersey and asked her to marry me.  I got all on my knees and did it.  And the story didn’t stop there.  Uh-uh, the story was just beginning.

After four months of being in a relationship with Brandi, I popped the question and asked her to marry me.  We were the definition of hot and heavy.  There wasn’t a moment when we were together that we weren’t in each other’s face, either about to have sex or doing everything we could to get ‘bout it.  And I think the one thing that veered me towards thinking that I wanted to be with this woman forever was the simple fact that she was everything I thought I ever wanted in a wife.  She was sexy, hard-working, and had a good head on her shoulders.  And of course, she was sexy again.  So against everybody’s who was close to me wishes that actually knew about the situation, I popped the question and at a small reception in Las Vegas, I married her.

And the aftermath….  I think it was the great R&B artist, Percy Sledge, who sang that song, ‘Take Time To Know Her’.  How stupid we men are when we let our penis do all of our thinking.  Just like that song Mr. Sledge sang, Momma didn’t like her, was totally against the marriage, and about two months after our wedding, I caught this dread-headed bastard on top of my woman in my very own king-sized bed.  And one of the many things that I’ve learned from being whipped is, you just don’t have any damn sense whatsoever.  When I stumbled into that bedroom, she looked towards me while the Rasta-man was all on top of her, huffin’ and puffin’.

“Darrel, you wanna join in?” she asked with her nails gripped into his ashy-ass back.

The dude looked over to me, smiled and said, “You can have her next, mon.  I’ll only be another minute, dear boy.”

And I just stood there, dumb-witted, with my mouth wide open like I just missed the ice cream truck.  I couldn’t conjure up enough intelligence to say not one damn thing.  I just froze as they just kept on doing it as if I wasn’t even there.  Then suddenly, I finally broke out of that suspension of disbelief and yelled, “Get the fuck off my wife!”

And the brotha’ paused and looked at me.  He eased up off of her and said, “I wasn’t finished yet, but you know the shit’s good, you can go ‘head, mon.  I’ll join in after I get a breather.”

Now at that moment, I do believe that’s when all realization of being an ass-kickin’ black man overwhelmed my body because I blacked out for a moment, and when I came back to reality, the police had me in cuffs, sitting on my living room sofa, and they were wheeling the brotha out on a stretcher.  He wasn’t dead or nothing, but I demandingly kicked his ass and unfortunately couldn’t recall any memory of it.  Wasn’t that a bitch?  Then Brandi walked out of the bedroom, fully-clothed, with one of the officers.  She looked at me and couldn’t say a word.

The officer approached me.  “Mr. Walker, would you please stand up and turn around?”  He relived me of the handcuffs.  “I’m going to ask you to leave here when we leave.”  He looked over to Brandi.  “In some states, he could’ve killed Mr. Williams and got off like a fat rat.  He wouldn’t have served not a day in jail.”

I tried to hold back my tears as I stared at her.   She looked as if she wanted to cry, but didn’t have enough nerve to do so.

“Mr. Walker, you’re free to get a change of clothing,” he said.

I walked towards the bedroom.

“No,” she yelled.  “I’ll go.”  She rushed into the bedroom.

“Well, vice-versa, it makes me no difference,” the cop nonchalantly replied.  “As long as one of you leave.  I don’t wanna have to make another trip here tonight.  Adultery and fornication tends to bring the worst out of couples.  Especially when some stuff like what happened here tonight goes down.”

Unfortunately, all I could do was look at her.  I was too damn dumb to say anything and too damn whipped to tell her she needed to get the hell out and never come back.  I had it bad.  She returned to the den and to my surprise she had her things packed already.  Bags in hand, she gave me one last stare and proceeded to the door.  But before she left, she turned around and said, “Darrel… I wish I could say I was sorry, but I was only being me, love.”

I turned my eyes towards the ceiling, not wanting to hear anything she had to say.  She hurt me badly, and I was afraid that if I looked into her face I would’ve done something stupid like break down.  It was bad enough she played me for a fool.  There was no way in the world I was gonna let her see a tear drop from my eyes.  I was content with the idea of crying behind closed doors, but definitely not in front of her.  I wouldn’t give her the courtesy.  So after she stood there for a moment, waiting for me to reply, which obviously wasn’t going to happen, she sighed and walked out.

Honestly, I wish I knew what the hell she meant by what she said.  I thought I knew her.  I thought she loved me.  I knew I loved her.  Why’d she do it, I kept thinking.  Was I not doing something right?  For the life of me, I couldn’t understand what went wrong.

Within a few weeks I was able to get an annulment.  That process went by fairly quickly, since she didn’t deny the fact that she was the one that actually committed the adulterous act.  We set up a meeting to sign the necessary paperwork and that was the last time I saw Brandi Brown.  I told myself I would be through with women for a very long time.  Something inside of me, I felt, was irreplaceably lost.  And to my sudden surprise, I had become single again.

SINGLE AGAIN is currently available in all popular eBook formats and via Paperback Direct from Amazon.com & B&N.com

Available on KINDLE – NOOK – iTunes – KOBO – PAPERBACK

Mirika Cornelius is an absolute workhorse has just released another entry into her ever growing library.  Currently it’s only available on amazon via Kindle Unlimited and will be release on other ebook platforms later this year.  Check out the cover and blurb below.

From the outside looking in, China Daniels lives the life every woman dreams of – nice home, lovely daughter, and a wonderful marriage. But in reality, things could not be further from the truth.

At the discovery of a secret that her loving husband has desperately tried to conceal, the truth unleashes a series of events that could not only destroy her family and livelihood, but will make China Daniels a MOST WANTED FELON!

There are many ugly things in this world, but Julius Graves is considered one of the ugliest of those things.  His Big Lips, Big Nose and Jet Black Skin have always been the perfect recipe for nasty stares, cold shuns, and violent beat downs his entire life.

Once Julius moves to a new neighborhood, the torment he thought he escaped gets far worse when he becomes targeted by a menacing crew that’s led by an egomaniac that’s determined to make Julius’ life a living hell.

Julius finds refuge in an unlikely ally that sends his life spiraling even more out of control at the cost of losing someone he loves the most.

Chapter 1

He stood in front of the mirror with his head hanging down as he hovered over the bathroom sink with both arms stretched out against the wall. He had been positioned that way for a little bit over a half hour.  He was fully dressed in his usual attire-black hoodie, baggie blue jeans and boots. It was another first day and another new school with a brand new group of potential tormentors.  Julius had been dreading this day for months-three to be exact-ever since the day him, his mother, and his good for nothing stepfather moved into this new place.

Although his mom provided her best efforts to talk up the new school, there was no hiding the fact that Washington High was known for being one of the worst schools in the entire district, and possibly the whole state.  But the rent here was good and his mother was hopeful that this school would be different for him than all the rest.

The neighbors told her many positive changes had come to the troubled institution near the end of the previous school year resulting from the successful basketball program there.  They also told her that the school board had brought in a mostly new staff and a hardnosed veteran principal that didn’t take any shit and that he was calling all the shots.

It made Julius no difference because he didn’t play any sports, and he did his best to stay out of people’s way, more specifically school staff.  This was his senior year, and as with every school year, he was determined to do what he had to do to make it go by as quickly and as smoothly as possible.  Of course, with his looks, he often found that task extremely difficult to accomplish.

He slowly lifted his head and gazed into the mirror.  He had hoped when his eyes returned to the reflection in that spotty old bathroom mirror another face would appear.  A handsome face.  A likeable face.  Any face but his.

Big nose, huge lips, jet black skin and a bumpy forehead.  He knew he was stuck with three out of four of those features for life, but even a complete surrender on drinking sodas and eating sweets did nothing to smoothen out his rough skin.

He swiped a towel hanging from the shower rack and began dampening it.  He gently applied the cloth to his face and then began to violently scrub his face with it.  His intention was to wipe his face completely off of his head, but he was unsuccessful again.  He tossed the towel across the shower rack and sorrowfully stared at himself in the mirror once more.  Why me?

*************

Vince sat at the table with his legs crossed and a newspaper hanging over his lap in the center of the small kitchen.  The hair on his bronzed colored head and face looked like an army of buck shots was etched onto it as he hadn’t done anything with himself in the past two weeks.  Most days he didn’t even make an effort to slip out of his wife-beater and jogging pants-his normal around the house attire.

“They say Michael Jordan is gonna redeem himself this season.  His ass shouldn’t have left in the first place,” he said as he flipped to the next page in the sports section of the paper.  “Talkin’ about he wanna go play baseball.  I guess he found out quick that shit wasn’t for him.”

“You know he was going through some things with his father’s death and all.  He just needed some time to sort things out,” Felicia said.  She was posted at the sink, scrubbing a frying pan amongst the pile of unwashed dishes that were spread out across the counter.  It wasn’t unusual for her to be the last one to get to bed and the first one up in the morning, just in time to have Vince his morning ham and cheese omelet ready so he could stretch out and read his morning newspaper.

In addition to making Vince his breakfast every morning, the middle aged, brown skinned woman was responsible for doing the previous night’s dishes and all the housekeeping duties also.  Despite Vince being home all day, every day, he did absolutely nothing but wait for her to come home and get supper ready.

The petite woman was clearly a fox in her day, with her slanted eyes, full lips and flawless brown skin, but working a full time job and taking care of the house was beginning to take its tiresome toll on her.  A few days ago she began noticing small clumps of her hair falling out.  She simply blew it off as a result of aging and the stress from the extra burden of having to take care of all the bills while Vince was out of work.

“Hell, I need some time to sort things out,” he said while closing the paper and slinging it across the table.  “Like what am I gonna do if these people don’t call me back for some more hours on this damn job?  Tucker nor none of them niggas called me about working any routes since we moved here.”

“They’ll call.  They always do.”

“How the hell they gonna call if the phone get cut off?  We keep going this direction they gonna get cut off any day now.  You asked them people for some more hours yet?”

“I’ve been asking for weeks now, but everybody is in the same crunch we’re in, and they ain’t trying to get up off their hours.  I may be able to fill in for Rita today, but Lance has to call me and let me know something first.”

“Well, something needs to give. Shit!”

Julius walked into the kitchen toting his notebook.  His notebook was like an extra arm to him, and he rarely went anywhere without it.  He strolled to his mother and gave her a quick peck on her cheek.  “Good morning, Ma.”

“Hey, baby,” she replied as she leaned into his kiss, not removing her hands from the sudsy dish water.

Vince’s face transformed into one of disgust the very second Julius walked in.  His eyes zeroed in on the boy as he moved from his mother to the refrigerator.  Julius grabbed a carton of milk and poured himself the remaining portion from the carton.  He could feel Vince’s beady eyes cutting through his back as they did every morning.  He made certain not to make any eye contact with the old grouch, but it didn’t matter because Vince had all eyes on him.

“I saw kids walking to school about twenty minutes ago,” Vince griped.  “It’s not gonna be the same shit you pulled at Hampton down here.  That’s a good ten minute walk to that school, so I suggest you be there on time, every morning.  Ain’t nobody got time be talking to no teachers and no counselors this year.  Your momma ain’t gonna do it, and I’m damn sholl ain’t gonna do it.”

Julius simply guzzled down his milk as if Vince wasn’t even there.  He knew the guy wanted a fight, but he decided it was best not to even follow the old man up.  An argument with him would only lead to a bigger squabble between him and his mother in her efforts to keep peace between the two.  He understood his mother had enough on her plate with working a full time job and cleaning up behind practically two grown men, than to have to go through another unnecessary war of words with Vince again.

“You can act like you don’t see me.  You can even act like you don’t hear me.  But you better damn well remember what I say goes around this here place.”

Julius sat his glass in the sink as he cut his eye at Vince.  The temptation to spit fire back at his common law stepdad was there, but he reneged.  “Later, Ma.”

As Julius made his way towards the side door to leave, Vince shot across the room and grabbed him by his arm.  “Boy!”

“Vince,” Felicia called out, wanting the dispute to end as fast as it started.  She grabbed a towel from off the counter to dry her hands and approached the two.

“Man, what’s wrong with you?” Julius questioned.

“Don’t you ask me what’s wrong with me,” Vince grunted.  “It’s gonna be a lot wrong with you, you keep on playing with me, acting like you don’t hear me.  You gonna make me stomp a mudhole in your deformed looking ass.”

“Vince, leave him alone.  Please!” Felicia begged.

Vince looked over to Felicia with a scowl as he continued to place his firm clutch on the boy’s arm.  He looked back at Julius and gave him an inviting smirk, practically daring him to do something as he tightened his grip.

“Get off me!” Julius yelled as he snatched his arm away.

“Oh, I ain’t on your ass, yet,” Vince warned him, his eyes piercing through the young man like a savage lion on the brink of attacking some unexpected prey in the wilderness.  Even though Vince hovered over Julius by an entire foot, the old bully was ready for certain victory.  He yearned for the day that Julius would swing back at him.  That would be the same day he would unleash severe pain on the teen, the day he’d been attempting to trigger for years.  Fortunately for Julius, he never bit.

“Go ahead and head off to school, Julius,” Felicia said as she gave her son a small pat on his back directing him towards the door.

Julius stood firm, contemplating smashing Vince in his grungy face a few good times with his notebook, but the chance of him swinging and missing frightened him.  Vince’s smirk transformed into a chuckle.  He knew Julius didn’t have enough nerve to make a move, and he rejoiced in that knowledge.  Julius pulled his hood over his head and reluctantly left the house, slamming the door behind himself.  Vince happily looked on as Felicia stood before him infuriated.

“I thought I told you to leave him alone in the morning.”

“Ah, I ain’t did nothing to the boy,” he said as he waved her off and reclaimed his seat at the table.  “He needs to be toughened up a bit anyway.  Won’t have to be crying about what them people at that school got to say about him all the time.”

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FIRST DEGREE SINSThings go terribly wrong after Lisa Caldwell, a not so well taken care of housewife, returns home to a vicious blood bath, her floors drenched throughout the hall to the living room. Then, she suddenly realizes that the pools of blood were carved out by her own hands! From there, she loses control of her life as she ends up involved in some of the worst criminal activity known to man!

From drug trafficking, identity theft and more, Lisa becomes trapped in a multitude of wrongs while trying to create her own versions of rights…even when faced with a betrayal from her past that she thought was buried with her mother! Will she find her way out, or will she be held captive by her sins?

FIRST DEGREE SINS brings: Suspense Action Drama — and most of all — SINS in the FIRST DEGREE!

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Good Times, The Jefferson’s and let’s not forget Different Strokes–

Just a few of the scarce outlets for us po folks.

EBT cards, food stamps, and bey bey kids roaming the block,

And that big wooden fork and spoon in the kitchen hanging by the clock.

Welcome to the ghetto, where every month has a holiday on the fifteenth and the first,

And no one complains about missing a meal, ‘cause things could be a whole lot worse.

Something like Junebug going too far and overdosing on some crack,

Or the police harassing and arresting you just because you’re black,

Or getting an old fashion beat-down because the neighborhood bully thinks you’re wack.

Welcome to the ghetto, a luxury in its own way.

Free cable, free food, and juicy gossip all in one day.

Black-eye peas, collard greens, pork chops, and don’t dare forget fried chicken,

And that greedy relative coming unannounced wondering what y’all fixin’.

Welcome to the ghetto, no place like it in the world,

Where life seems so simple, but love is just as precious as a pearl.

And the good times may be overshadowed by the moments that make us sad,

But the meaning the ghetto gives to living certainly outweighs all the bad.

This Poem and 38 others is currently available wherever E-books are sold and via Paperback Direct from Amazon.com & B&N.Com.

In the Beginning…

A wise man once told me that a man needs a woman in his life like a turtle needs the shell on his back.  Well, he wasn’t all too wise.  As a matter of fact, he was this old, drunk guy that I met at this bar a couple years ago, weeping about his wife leaving him with nothing but the shirt on his back.  At the time, I couldn’t understand what in the world would make him come up with such a weird comparison – turtles and relationships. I just took it as the alcohol talking.  Besides, that was when I was in the prime of my mac-daddy days.  Relationship jargon was just that – jargon!  And in reference to what my Uncle Jim once told me, I was young, dumb and always trying to find some.  By no means was I trying to feel any kind of a relationship, or more blatantly, anything lasting longer than a one night stand.  So at the time, I didn’t know what that guy meant, why he was saying it, or why in the hell he was saying it to me.

But like I stated earlier, that was back in the prime of my player days, which virtually ended when I met Brandi Brown.  Brandi, by far, was the woman of my dreams.  Never in my life had I met a lady like her.  To me, she was all that a man could want in a woman.  But out of all the places in the world I could’ve met her, I met her at a club.  I first laid eyes on her in the midst of celebrating my boy Rex’s birthday at this little club we hit frequently called the Hot Spot.  We walked in, chillin’, like we normally did, and unexpectedly, we both spotted her at the same time.

“Man, look ‘a here!” yelled Rex as his eyes zeroed in on her in the middle of the dance floor.  “You ever saw her in here before?”

“Hell nah,” I quickly replied.

She was dancing all by herself wearing this tight, black body skirt that revealed every perfectly placed curve on her body.  She had long, thick, black hair that dangled down to her shoulders, a lightly tanned complexion, and luscious, plump lips.  She freely swayed to the jazzy tunes that played as if she was the only soul in the joint.  This chick was so hot, not a guy in the club had the nerve to approach her.  You could literally look around and view every guy in the house sneaking peaks at her when their women turned their heads, or if they were by themselves, they just lustfully stared.  I even caught a glimpse of a couple of envious females looking her way with frowns on their faces.

“Damn!”  I grunted under my breath.

“Now that’s dangerous,” proclaimed Rex.

“You gonna holla’, birthday boy?”

“Hell nah, she’s too damn scandalous!” he replied.  “You holla’.”

I grinned, “My game’s good, but I don’t know about that.”

“Just do it for me.  Show me what I taught you.”

“What you taught me?”

“Yeah, you know I taught you everything you know about the opposite sex.”

He was just scared his ego was going to get hurt.  “Whatever, Rex.”  As I continued to stare at her, something overwhelmed my body, perhaps just hormones, but I became strangely determined to meet this lady.  Not just that, but something was telling me that I had to say something to her as if it was my destiny.  Suddenly, I became transfixed on kissing those luscious, full lips of hers while sliding my hands up and down her slender back, drawing her firm, naked body against mine.  Yes indeed, I was going to approach this precious victim of Godly beauty.  I truly felt it would’ve been an opportunity missed if  I’d done otherwise.  “You know what?”  I took a deep breath.  “I’m gonna do it.”

He smiled, “Do that thang, pimp-a-licious.”

“Pimp-a-licious, gonna do that thang, man!”  If only I was as confident as I sounded.  But I had to do it.  I had to meet this lady.  So I loaded all of the mental weapons that my brain harbored, and I strolled to my destiny.

I began bobbing my head to the music, trying to look as hip and slick as I possibly could.  I’d bagged many fine females in the past but not as gorgeous as this one.  As I drew near, she noticed me approaching her.  “Hi!” I nervously blurted out.

She gave me a slight nod, still grooving to the tunes.  I quickly realized she was going to be an arrogant one.  “So, are you dancing by yourself?”  Sometimes the obvious should never be put into question form.  Again she said nothing.  I looked back at Rex.  He had grabbed himself a chair in the corner, steadily observing my actions like a gospel stage play.  Man, I couldn’t let him see this woman get the best of me.  I would never hear the end of it from him.  I quickly turned to her.  “Do you mind if I dance with you?”

She stopped dancing and examined me from head to toe.  A petite smile appeared upon her face.  Nervous and dumbfounded, I smiled right back at her.  And that’s when she approached me.  Before I knew it, her lips were against mine.  Instantly, my mind went haywire.

“I don’t feel like dancing anymore,” she softly replied into my ear.  Her sweet voice had a hint of an English accent in it.

With my mind on sabbatical,  I could only come back with, “Well, what do you wanna do?”

She grabbed me by my hand.  “Come on, love.”

I looked over to Rex whose mouth had virtually fell in his lap as my feet mindlessly followed this woman off of the dance floor.  I didn’t know what to do next as I simply followed her lead.  In a matter of seconds, we were outside in the middle of the parking lot.

“I hope your friend drove tonight,” she threw a set of keys into my hands as we walked down a row of cars.

“He did,” I said.  Really it didn’t matter who drove, because if I did, he was gonna be out of luck this night.  And I knew he’d do the same to me.  If he were me in the same situation and he was walking out of the club with such a beautiful lady and I was going to need a ride home, he would just leave my ass hitchhiking.  But fortunately for him, he drove because I would gladly return the hypothetical favor.

We stopped at a red convertible with the top down.  I opened the passenger door for her, and I anxiously jumped in on the driver side.  Never had something so spontaneous happened to me with such a beautiful lady.  I just wanted to get to wherever she wanted us to go, however quickly we could get there and see where things would go from there.

She gently placed her hand on my thigh.  “Go straight down Main, take a left on Brenton, and pull into the driveway of the third house on the right.”

Straight and direct, just what I liked.  As I pulled out of the parking lot, I realized I didn’t even know what this woman’s name was.  She just stared out of the window like she didn’t even care.  I could’ve been Charles Manson for all she knew, but even worse than that, she could’ve been.

“Hey, do you have a name?”  She didn’t answer.  She blatantly ignored me, just like she did when I first approached her in the club.  Now see, it’s things like that, that makes a man think with his brain and not his jimmy all of the time.  But then I took another glance at her body and quickly realized how much more powerful a man’s jimmy is than his brain.  As a matter of fact, it is his brain.  Besides, this chick was a perfect ten.  A ten, then some.  And those are just too hard to come by at times.

Her directions led me straight to a two-story brick house smack-dab in the middle of Brenton Avenue.  “Keys,” she chillingly requested.  A brief thought of being stranded in the middle of nowhere swiftly raced through my mind.  I gave her the keys.  “Come on,” she said.  Thank you, Jesus.  I couldn’t bare the thought of walking all the way back to that club and trying to quickly compose a lie to Rex as to why I was perspiring so badly.

I jumped out of the car and shadowed her tracks like a starving dog sniffing for a meaty bone.  She opened the door to the house and flicked on the lights beside the entrance.  As I stepped into her crib, I began to instantly think that this experience had to be some kind of cruel joke sponsored by my subconscious and somehow, I was sleeping and couldn’t wake up.  And the way it was beginning to feel, this was gonna be a wet one.

She glanced back at me, “Close the door.”  I shut the door and followed her up the stairs.  The house really didn’t have much in it.  In fact, it looked unlived in altogether.  The walls were neatly entangled with an assortment of oil paintings but not much furniture consumed the home.  Nonetheless, my primary concern rested on just one piece of furniture in particular – the bed!

We walked into what had to have been the master bedroom.  It was humongous.  An exquisite Persian rug laced the floor.  There was a huge floor-length window open, and the nightly breeze blew her finely-silk draperies into the room.  Most significantly of all, she had this massive king-sized bed in the center of the room.

I looked around, not trying to seem overly-amazed.  “So this is yours?”

“Nope!” she said as she walked alongside her bed, slowly sliding her fingers across the satin sheets.

Damn!  I knew she had to have a man, somewhere.

“Well, it is for now.  My agency is leasing this place for me until I find some place to live down here,” she said.

“Oh,” I said relieved that there was no sign of any manly presence in her life so far.  “All this for you, huh?”

She grinned.  “Yeap.”

I walked over to the window and gazed down at the dimly lit street.  I didn’t want to seem too anxious for what she had to offer.  “Nice view.”

“I’ll say,” she replied.

I could almost feel her eyes cutting through my back.  I turned around, thinking maybe I could slip a little bit of my own arrogance in there.  “I was referring to the street.”

“I was, too.  What else would I be referring to?”

Ooh, low blow, and can’t say that I didn’t deserve it.  As she took a seat on the bed, I just stared at her, not having a clue to where things were headed.  But if I knew anything, I definitely had to have them go the direction I wanted them to.

“So,” I took a deep breath.  “Why did you bring me here?”

“Why did you come?” she quickly combated.

“What?  You grabbed my hand and led the way.”

“You’re a grown man.  I’m quite sure you could’ve stopped me.”

“I could’ve, but why would I want to stop you?”

“Uh, because you have respect for yourself and you wouldn’t want to become victim to a one night stand.”

Playing it witty, I quickly turned my head acting as if I was surprised, “Is that what this is, a one night stand?  Well, I have never…”

“This is not a one night stand,” she said, really surprising me.

“It isn’t?”

“No.”

“Really?”  I threw my hands up, looking side to side.  “Then what is this?”

She grinned.  “It’s a show!”

“What, you talking about like Candid Camera, or something?” I began looking around, searching for any hidden cameras I hadn’t noticed.  I knew the whole get-up was too good to be true.

“No, silly,” she laughed.

I was severely intrigued.  “Then what type of show are you talking about?”

“A strip-show.”

Suddenly I had a smile the size of Texas on my face.  “Oh, for real?”  I quickly planted myself onto a chair next to the window.  “Go ahead.”

“You don’t get it, do you?” she walked to me and stood in front of me.

I looked up at her like a little boy, waiting for his mother’s response to a request to go outside and play.  “What am I not getting?”

She pulled me up on my feet.  “I’m not stripping, silly.  You are.”

“You must be outta’ your mind!”

A blank look posted upon her face.

“How can I just take my clothes off in front of you?  I don’t even know your name.  I mean, don’t get me wrong, you do look good and all, but…”

She placed her finger on my lips.  “My name is Brandi Brown.  I am a model for the Black Friday Modeling Agency.  I was born in Long Beach, California.  I spent a majority of my childhood in London with my mother.  I’m twenty-four years old, and I picked you out of a club full of yearning men to be my private entertainment for tonight.  Now you can either do as I request or you won’t have to worry about getting any more of these ever again.”

She gently removed her finger and pressed her lips against mine.  I just stood there, frozen, enjoying the unbelievable softness of her lips.  After a few moments of her allowing me to sample heaven, she backed away.  I took a deep breath, wondering what was it that I had gotten myself into.  I was always accustomed to being the one in charge, but that just wasn’t the case this night.

“The choice is yours.”  She walked to the bed and spread out on her side with her face resting in the palm of her hand.

Her eyes stayed glued on me.  She knew that she blatantly left the ball in my court.  By no means did I have a problem with how my body looked.  I was a fairly fit brother although I could stand to do just a few extra sit-ups every now and then.

“My name is Darrel, by the way.  I just thought I’d throw that at you.”  She knew she had all the cards in her hands, and that’s what was killing me.  I had never been the pupil, always the teacher.  But this lady was teaching me something new.  Something I was very unfamiliar with.  And even though I was down in unfamiliar territory, I remained intrigued.  Very intrigued.  “So let me get this straight.  You just want me to take all my clothes off for you with no questions asked?  Might I ask what’s in it for me?  I know it’s got to be more than a kiss.  I mean, I got that from you just by asking for a dance.”

“Me.  Your prize will be me.”

Being ever so clever, I asked, “What part of you?  The neck, the rib, the thigh – what?  You can’t leave a brotha’ in suspense like that ‘cause I gotta know what I’m getting.  I don’t know about you.”

“Your prize will be all of me that you’d like.”

I smiled, “Well if that’s the case…,” I turned to the window to close the curtains.

“With the curtains open.”

I immediately turned around.  “Say what?”

“I don’t want you to close the curtains.  Don’t you like the breeze it brings into the room?”

“Yeah, but there’s like, peeping-toms and stuff like that out there!  I can undress just fine without the wind coming in and strange folks staring at my rear end.”

She nods her head.  “You are a confident black man, aren’t you?”

“Hell yeah!”  I announced.  “But that doesn’t have anything to do with having my ass being exposed to all of the Atlanta night life.

“Well, love, I only get involved with confident men,” she explained.  “And the way I see it, if you want someone as precious as I am, then you can’t be bashful about it.  Because once you’ve gone Brandi Brown, you never come back.”

For a moment, I thought my penis had ears.  Instantly my manhood rose to the occasion – literally.  Speaking on behalf of most men, we just love it when a woman talks dirty to us.  “Alright, Brandi, I guess I’ll just have to give you what your little demented eyes have been dying to see.  The Darrel Walker show, brought to you live from Brenton Avenue.  Get ready, baby!”

Quickly, I submerged into her little strip-tease game.  I started by sliding my belt off, slowly, while giving her this calm, demanding stare.  Hell, if I was going to make a total fool out of myself I decided I might as well have fun doing it.  Next, I unbuttoned my shirt.

“Now that’s what I’m talking about, love,” she yelled as she fanned herself.

I never stripped before, but obviously I was doing something right – I hoped.  In a matter of moments, my shirt was off and I was unzipping my slacks.  “You ready for the main event, baby?”

“Yeah, love, momma’s ready for the main event.”  she responded while licking her lips.

I was beginning to get off on the little show.  I pulled off my slacks and threw them against the wall.

“Take it off.  Take it off,” she demanded.

I blew her a kiss .  “You don’t wanna see this.”

“Oh, yes I do.  Yes, I do.”

Then I did it.  I stripped off the boxers.

“Oh, yes!” she yelled.  “Yes!”

I knew I was straight, but ole’ girl was blowing it out of proportion.  But I loved it.  I heard a car cruising by, and someone yelled, “Nice ass, buddy!”  Yeah, it was embarrassing, but I was about to get something that nosey passerby wasn’t – laid.

“You ready for some of this?” I asked, knowing that she had to be ready to feel the total Darrel Walker experience.

“No, baby,” she groaned, “Not quite yet.”

“What?” I was totally baffled.

“You can have all of this, love,” she said as she rolled over on her back and divided her legs while holding herself up on her elbows.  Her beautiful brown eyes tastefully observed my every motion.  “But I want you to do one other thing for me.”

“What?  What else do you want me to do?”

“Boo, I want you to do…‘The Bird’,” she quickly blurted out.

“Say what?”

“I want you to do ‘The Bird’ for me.”

Suddenly my manhood began to sink.  “Oh, hell nah!  Butt-naked?”  I shook my head, positively final with my decision.

Then she rose.  “Oh, you’re gonna do it.”

“Baby girl, it’s been fun, but I ain’t doing no shit like that,” I commanded.  I looked towards the corner of the room trying to catch a glimpse of where I threw my pants.

“Darrel,” she purred.  In an instance she regained my attention.  “Can you really say no to this?”   She pulled off her blouse, slid off her skirt and held her hands out like ‘what?’  My mouth dropped like a full sack of potatoes.  “The bra and the panties will definitely be next.  Only if you’re man enough to earn them.”

With no mind control needed at this point, my brain played the beat to the Morris Day classic, and my feet and hands did the rest.  My God, I was doing ‘The Bird’!  I even did a spin.  My eyes pleasantly rested on her beautifully tanned body as the song repeated itself within my mind.  She playfully nodded her head as she hummed out the beat of the song while she sat on the edge of the bed.

“You fuckin’ pervert!” yelled someone in another car passing by.

She fingered me over.  “Come over here, love.”

I danced all the way to her, still in rhythm.  She got up, put her arms around my neck and kissed me.  That’s when I stopped.  It was time for me to do my thing, and I couldn’t say that it wasn’t well deserved.  I had literally made an ass out of myself, but I knew what laid ahead of me was a night of passion with the sexiest woman I had ever laid eyes on.

“Take me, love,” she whispered into my ear.

I picked her up, placed her on the center of the bed, and the love making began.

By far, that was the most outrageous night of my life, and it certainly was the best sex I’d ever had.  It was so good that my way of thinking completely changed.  And after a few weeks of exclusively dating Miss Brandi Brown and having her move into my crib, she easily became the butter to my bread, the cool to my breeze, and the slickness in my step.  And to the surprise of all the great players before me, all bets were off.  I got whipped!

Now for folks who don’t know, there ain’t nothing worse than a player that suddenly gets whipped.  He starts doing stupid shit like waiting by the phone all night, asking dumb questions like, “Do you think about me when I’m away, baby?” or “I know you love me – do you love me, girl?”  I was doing all of the above and much, much more.  That lady just messed me all up.  But I didn’t fall into critical status until that night I decided to finally hang up the jersey and asked her to marry me.  I got all on my knees and did it.  And the story didn’t stop there.  Uh-uh, the story was just beginning.

After four months of being in a relationship with Brandi, I popped the question and asked her to marry me.  We were the definition of hot and heavy.  There wasn’t a moment when we were together that we weren’t in each other’s face, either about to have sex or doing everything we could to get ‘bout it.  And I think the one thing that veered me towards thinking that I wanted to be with this woman forever was the simple fact that she was everything I thought I ever wanted in a wife.  She was sexy, hard-working, and had a good head on her shoulders.  And of course, she was sexy again.  So against everybody’s who was close to me wishes that actually knew about the situation, I popped the question and at a small reception in Las Vegas, I married her.

And the aftermath….  I think it was the great R&B artist, Percy Sledge, who sang that song, ‘Take Time To Know Her’.  How stupid we men are when we let our penis do all of our thinking.  Just like that song Mr. Sledge sang, Momma didn’t like her, was totally against the marriage, and about two months after our wedding, I caught this dread-headed bastard on top of my woman in my very own king-sized bed.  And one of the many things that I’ve learned from being whipped is, you just don’t have any damn sense whatsoever.  When I stumbled into that bedroom, she looked towards me while the Rasta-man was all on top of her, huffin’ and puffin’.

“Darrel, you wanna join in?” she asked with her nails gripped into his ashy-ass back.

The dude looked over to me, smiled and said, “You can have her next, mon.  I’ll only be another minute, dear boy.”

And I just stood there, dumb-witted, with my mouth wide open like I just missed the ice cream truck.  I couldn’t conjure up enough intelligence to say not one damn thing.  I just froze as they just kept on doing it as if I wasn’t even there.  Then suddenly, I finally broke out of that suspension of disbelief and yelled, “Get the fuck off my wife!”

And the brotha’ paused and looked at me.  He eased up off of her and said, “I wasn’t finished yet, but you know the shit’s good, you can go ‘head, mon.  I’ll join in after I get a breather.”

Now at that moment, I do believe that’s when all realization of being an ass-kickin’ black man overwhelmed my body because I blacked out for a moment, and when I came back to reality, the police had me in cuffs, sitting on my living room sofa, and they were wheeling the brotha out on a stretcher.  He wasn’t dead or nothing, but I demandingly kicked his ass and unfortunately couldn’t recall any memory of it.  Wasn’t that a bitch?  Then Brandi walked out of the bedroom, fully-clothed, with one of the officers.  She looked at me and couldn’t say a word.

The officer approached me.  “Mr. Walker, would you please stand up and turn around?”  He relived me of the handcuffs.  “I’m going to ask you to leave here when we leave.”  He looked over to Brandi.  “In some states, he could’ve killed Mr. Williams and got off like a fat rat.  He wouldn’t have served not a day in jail.”

I tried to hold back my tears as I stared at her.   She looked as if she wanted to cry, but didn’t have enough nerve to do so.

“Mr. Walker, you’re free to get a change of clothing,” he said.

I walked towards the bedroom.

“No,” she yelled.  “I’ll go.”  She rushed into the bedroom.

“Well, vice-versa, it makes me no difference,” the cop nonchalantly replied.  “As long as one of you leave.  I don’t wanna have to make another trip here tonight.  Adultery and fornication tends to bring the worst out of couples.  Especially when some stuff like what happened here tonight goes down.”

Unfortunately, all I could do was look at her.  I was too damn dumb to say anything and too damn whipped to tell her she needed to get the hell out and never come back.  I had it bad.  She returned to the den and to my surprise she had her things packed already.  Bags in hand, she gave me one last stare and proceeded to the door.  But before she left, she turned around and said, “Darrel… I wish I could say I was sorry, but I was only being me, love.”

I turned my eyes towards the ceiling, not wanting to hear anything she had to say.  She hurt me badly, and I was afraid that if I looked into her face I would’ve done something stupid like break down.  It was bad enough she played me for a fool.  There was no way in the world I was gonna let her see a tear drop from my eyes.  I was content with the idea of crying behind closed doors, but definitely not in front of her.  I wouldn’t give her the courtesy.  So after she stood there for a moment, waiting for me to reply, which obviously wasn’t going to happen, she sighed and walked out.

Honestly, I wish I knew what the hell she meant by what she said.  I thought I knew her.  I thought she loved me.  I knew I loved her.  Why’d she do it, I kept thinking.  Was I not doing something right?  For the life of me, I couldn’t understand what went wrong.

Within a few weeks I was able to get an annulment.  That process went by fairly quickly, since she didn’t deny the fact that she was the one that actually committed the adulterous act.  We set up a meeting to sign the necessary paperwork and that was the last time I saw Brandi Brown.  I told myself I would be through with women for a very long time.  Something inside of me, I felt, was irreplaceably lost.  And to my sudden surprise, I had become single again.

SINGLE AGAIN is currently available in all popular eBook formats and via Paperback Direct from Amazon.com & B&N.com

Available on KINDLE – NOOK – iTunes – KOBO – PAPERBACK

The pimp, the ho, the consumer.

She better have my money, and it best be tonight.

She come here with another excuse, I’m just not gonna do right.

Gave her so many chances, put her at the top of my squad.

But she couldn’t even go through her first job, like that was so hard.

Why my mother was a ho, and all her sisters led the way,

So she better bring me my money, and she best bring it today!

–The Pimp

The pimp, the ho, the consumer.

I don’t know how I ended up in this world that’s so crazy.

First it was just dancing, now it’s this, just to feed my baby.

But at least I’m getting paid; most girls give it up and later on get played.

And I used protection every time, so I know I don’t have AIDS.

But sometimes, when they’re on top of me, and I’m fading everything out,

I think about my past, the mistakes I’ve made, knowing I should try another route.

And some nights, I don’t feel much like living,

Like there’s another part of me dying from this thing that I’m giving.

–The Ho

The pimp, the ho, the consumer.

I’ll teach her, acting all stingy with the nappy.

Sometimes I think she had that kid just to trap me.

Well, I guess I have nobody to blame but me.

But she don’t have to give it up, I’ll find someone else to satisfy me.

And to hell with it, if I should catch some kind of disease.

You win some, you lose some; I’m just out to be pleased.

–The Consumer

This Poem and 38 others is currently available wherever E-books are sold and via Paperback Direct from Amazon.com & B&N.Com.

Ever since his first time on the court, he was called the man.

When it came down to the wire, it was up to him to make his game expand.

Killer cross-over with a nasty jump-shot;

No one else dared get the rock when Jo Jo was hot!

But after the arena lights went dim,

Something very sad happened to him.

No longer was he handling that orange rock with those black stripes.

He had enough of playing games once he started tooting on that pipe.

But every day in the hood, this is getting to be no surprise;

Just a little glimpse of this world through my ghetto eyes.

She was nice and thick, the baddest of any red bone ever seen.

Oh how Levi’s complimented her when she wore those skin-tight jeans.

But in eighth-grade she had no intentions on learning from any books,

Just lying on her back, low-riding with all them older crooks.

By the tenth, she was pregnant with her second baby.

Her mother raised her and her kids, the whole neighborhood called her crazy.

And as time progressed, she discovered she had full blown AIDS,

And all that trickin’ she did ran constantly through her mind during her final days.

But every day in the hood, this is getting to be no surprise,

Just a little glimpse of this world through my ghetto eyes.

Ricky graduated valedictorian, the highest spot in high school.

While everyone was out partying, Ricky’s home studying, he wasn’t no fool.

He studied and studied, got himself a full scholarship,

Went to college, continued to do well, even got involved in a relationship.

The love of his life, taught him all about love, and brought sex to his doorstep.

In his bed, on campus, is where they had relations and where they both slept.

But one night, around three, standing over his bed was this cat named Jerry.

He blew both their brains out; poor Ricky didn’t know she was married.

But every day in the hood, this is getting to be no surprise;

Just a little glimpse of this world through my ghetto eyes.

This Poem and 38 others is currently available wherever E-books are sold and via Paperback Direct from Amazon.com & B&N.Com.

After much thought and consideration I decided to update the covers to Single Again and Ghetto Eyes for their release on Kindle.

I don’t think I will be updating the covers to the softback because I love them so much, but who knows.  Never say never.

It wasn’t too long ago that I was really firm on not releasing my books in eBook format because of piracy concerns, but we live in a brave new world now and if you desire to reach the masses you have to change with the times.

Check out the new covers below and I hope you like them!