Red Light Wives. Mary Monroe

sit on any of my chairs without covering the seats with some newspaper first. And I didn’t appreciate the fact that she wouldn’t even sit on my toilet seat. She would hover to do her business at my place. And as big as she was, that was a sight to behold. I didn’t care enough about her attitude to put her in her place. She was the one with the problem, not me. But I knew that I could always count on her when I needed her, and that was enough of a reason for her to be my girl.

      I could afford to decorate my place like it belonged to a princess, a real one, if I wanted to. Even though I hated having sex with a bunch of strange men, it was hard to turn my back on three hundred dollars to suck dick for a few minutes, or to do whatever else I had to do to get paid. As an escort, I made more money in a week than I used to make in a month at that cashier’s job I had in Detroit. I’d moved there after leaving Georgia. I got homesick all the time for both places, but I preferred to keep those thoughts to myself. I needed to focus my attention on my present situation.

      I didn’t rush to go pick up Ester. That hussy was a spoiled-ass bitch and expected too much from everybody. But she was the “baby” of my new “family” so to speak. She expected everybody to cater to her, and everybody usually did.

      In some ways, I used to be just like her. But that was a long time ago and a long way from the mean streets of San Francisco.

      Chapter 9

      LULA HAWKINS

      I couldn’t figure out why I was feeling so light-headed and paranoid. The women I’d just met had all been very nice to me, so far. Ester’s friends Rockelle and Rosalee seemed just as nice as Ester. Besides, I’d already lost my husband and almost been raped. What more could happen to me?

      We left that damn motel with the suitcases containing everything I owned in the world, including Bo’s clothes and the beloved saxophone he’d never play again, in the trunk of Rockelle’s Honda. During the tense ride to Rosalee’s apartment, the women listened as I poured out my whole story. And I left out nothing. They groaned when I told them about me coming home from school to a dead mama. They cussed when I told them how Larry had played me and agreed that he was a “hound from hell.” They didn’t say anything, but they shook their heads and moaned when I told them about my son dying and me hooking up with Bo then losing him, too, so fast and in such an awful way.

      “It seems like a black cloud’s been followin’ me around all my life,” I complained. I glanced out the backseat window, wondering how I could be feeling so miserable in a place as beautiful as San Francisco. We drove through the downtown area. The huge office buildings scraping the sky looked like big toys. But San Francisco was no toy box, and I was not Alice in Wonderland. However, I did believe that things had to get better for me. I was praying that my new “friends” would help make that happen. I just couldn’t bring myself to return to Mississippi. “Things have got to be better for me out here.”

      “Honey child, you got to make things get better,” Rosalee said, turning around to look at me from the front passenger seat. “If you can’t do that in this city, you can’t do it nowhere. That thing that happened to your husband, that could have happened to anybody anywhere. This is a nice city as long as you watch your step.”

      “I sure hope so,” I muttered. “I sure hope so.”

      The first thing I noticed when we entered Rosalee’s living room on the third floor of the cold brick building she lived in, was how cheap everything looked. In the center of a hardwood floor was a faded plaid couch with a brick holding up one leg. There was a matching love seat facing the couch that was just as faded. A coffee table lined with cigarette burns and cluttered with old issues of Cosmopolitan magazine had two end tables that didn’t match. A small television set was on top of a wooden orange crate. There was a hole big enough for a horse’s head to fit through in the wall next to the door. It was hard to believe that a woman like Rosalee, who claimed she made hundreds of dollars per date, lived in such a shabby place.

      “Sister, you been in the storm too long,” Rosalee told me. “You need somebody to fall back on…”

      There was something conspiratorial about the way the women looked at one another and nodded in agreement.

      “Well, I tried that and look how I ended up. I thought Larry Holmes was my soul mate. I don’t want to go back home because if I see his face again too soon, I won’t be responsible. A job and my own place is what I need now,” I said, sharing the couch with Ester and Rockelle.

      “How much money you got?” Rosalee asked, handing me a bottle of ice-cold beer. She stood in front of me with her arms folded. She was tall and thin, but she had curves in all the right places. Her body looked better than all the other women’s in the room, including mine. And, she was the prettiest. Her big brown eyes and full lips took the attention away from her long, narrow face.

      I clutched my purse. “Uh, maybe enough to last me about a month. A little over a thousand. I sold my car before I left home and Bo had a little money,” I told her. I drank the beer, wishing it was something stronger.

      Ester groaned. Rockelle and Rosalee looked at each other then back to me.

      “A thousand dollars ain’t gonna get you nowhere in San Francisco,” Ester hollered, waving her hand. “That wouldn’t pay half of my rent.”

      “Well, I don’t need a fancy place. And I do plan to get a job,” I said defensively.

      “What kind of work can you do?” Rockelle asked in a steely voice. She looked at her watch then gave Ester and Rosalee a mysterious shrug.

      “Whatever I can find, I guess. I was workin’ on the counter at the Department of Motor Vehicles back home.” I shook my head and laughed. “It was the job from hell.” I looked from one woman to another and said, “I want a job now that pays big money, is easy, and involves dealin’ with some fun people.”

      Rosalee clicked her teeth and snorted. “Other than a hit man, a star, or a gangster, ain’t too many jobs like that.”

      “A pretty woman like you can make a lot of money,” Ester advised, tapping her fingers on the battered coffee table, giving me a strange look. Her eyes were wide and shiny, making her look like a Spanish doll. And she was as pretty as one with her apple cheeks, upturned nose, and long dark hair. She couldn’t have been more than five feet tall, but she had a tight, round little body that jiggled when she walked. “I bet you—”

      “Shhhh,” Rockelle cut Ester off. Rising and buttoning her jacket, she looked at her watch again. “Uh, you look tired, Lula,” she noticed. “Ester and I’ll haul ass before you pass out.” Rockelle beckoned for Ester to follow, and they strutted out the door.

      Rosalee gave me another beer, a blanket, and two flat pillows.

      “Try to get some sleep. You’ll feel better in the mornin’,” she predicted, squeezing my shoulder. “You got somethin’ to sleep in?”

      “Yeah.” I nodded toward my suitcases sitting on the floor by the door. “I’ll sleep in my clothes tonight, if you don’t mind,” I said, sliding off my shoes. “I appreciate you lettin’ me stay here. I won’t give you no trouble,” I mumbled as I stretched out on the couch.

      “Oh, I ain’t worried about you givin’ me no trouble,” Rosalee told me, heading out of the room. “I’ll leave the light on. You can turn it off when you want to.”

      I glanced at the suitcases Bo and I had brought with us. Tears rolled down the side of my face. I didn’t sleep at all that night.