Around The Way Girls 11

by Treasure Hernandez, Clifford "Spud" Johnson, India Johnson-Williams

Genres: African American Urban

Synopsis

There's a saying that if you come from my part of town, you're from around the way. Around the Way Girls 11 is a fast-paced look at the lives of some street-smart women who think they know it all, but are about to get the lessons of their lives.

"Meal Ticket" by Treasure Hernandez: From the outside looking in, Yanna Banks lives what most would consider a perfect life; however, after the tragic death of her husband at the home of his longtime mistress, Yanna's teenage son is forced to step up and fill his father's shoes. Doing everything he can to help his mother make ends meet, the straight-laced student soon links up with an unlikely partner in crime. The two of them, both under the heavy-handed guidance of their mothers, become their households' sole meal tickets. They have no problem dealing with anyone that gets in the way, including one another.

"Party Girls" by Clifford "Spud" Johnson: Tammy and Debbie grew up in the projects on Oklahoma's wicked northeast side. Feeling hopeless, they chose to use their bodies to get what they wanted—until a frightening encounter inspires them to focus on schooling instead of the streets. Now Tammy is the youngest federal judge in the state of Oklahoma, while Debbie is a well-respected accountant. Deep down, though, they are still the same around the way girls from back in the day, and they sometimes still feel the urge to "get freaky with it." Of course, what's done in the dark—or in their case, under the sheets—will always come to light, causing complete and utter chaos.

"Do or Die" by India Johnson-Williams: After a big indictment comes down on some of Detroit's major drug players, their women are left behind to keep the hustle afloat. Overnight their lives change for the worse. In Detroit, it's sink or swim, and eat or you starve; in the dope game, it's kill or be killed. The streets don't care who you are or where you come from. Will Kali, Hope, and Jamaica beat the odds with their quick wit and hustle-hard mentality, or will the game catch them slippin'?

Release date: February 27, 2018

Publisher: Urban Books

Print pages: 288

Sample

“How in the fuck could this shit have happened? My son really never did anything to anyone and this done popped off. I can’t believe it. That fool who shot him is gonna pay. If he and his mother think I’m just gonna sit here and not give a shit about this, they wrong. I swear on my life, the streets gonna run red with their blood when I get done!”

En route to the hospital, Yanna Patrice Banks was enraged. She was trembling with every deliberate word she spoke. Her lip quivered, and her heart was pounding. The Hennessy buzz the mother of two had no less than twenty minutes before was now completely gone. Keeping one hand firmly placed on the steering wheel, she used the other to search the contents of her purse. After removing a knife she kept just in case someone needed some act right, she tossed it on the dashboard. “I mean it. My baby is a good boy. He didn’t deserve this. Motherfuckers gonna pay. I swear I’ma cut me a bitch tonight.”

“Yanna, please stop all that cussing and drive like you got some sense. You gonna mess around and get us both killed. And, for God’s sake, stop talking about who you wanna cut.”

“Auntie, right about now I don’t give a fuck.” Yanna swerved around several cars that she felt were moving too slow. Repeatedly she honked her horn and flashed her high beams at a few more.

“Well, you should. What good are you or, for that matter, am I gonna be to that boy if we both dead and gone? Now, like I said, slow down.”

Refusing to take her auntie’s cautionary advice, Yanna did the complete opposite, in fact, speeding up. She had run every red light as soon as she got the frantic call from her neighbor. Her maternal mindset was reckless.

With the hospital finally in sight, she roared up toward the entrance in her truck. Just a few hours ago, she would have never been so hard on her brand-new truck, but right now she couldn’t care less if somebody hit, scratched, or towed it. Not caring about the uniformed security guard pointing to the NO STANDING sign, she barely slowed down. Defiant, she blocked the emergency trauma room entrance of the hospital anyway.

Yanna turned the engine off and illegally parked. Hysterical, she abandoned her auntie, jumping down from the vehicle and bolting through the door, just as her injured son was being unloaded from the back of an ambulance. She couldn’t stop her tears from falling, and she felt her heart racing as she strained to catch a glimpse of her son. When she finally saw him, it was as if the wind had been knocked out of her. His shirt was drenched with blood, and an oxygen mask covered his face. Yanna wanted to see his eyes. The streetwise mother wanted him to know she was here and everything was going to be all right. However, things were moving at a swift pace, much too fast for affirmations or emotions.

“Quick, hurry, bring him into trauma room four.” The emergency unit nurse motioned to the paramedics. With a stethoscope around her neck, she ran alongside the stretcher. Yanna was, of course, trailing close behind as the nurse took charge. “A team of doctors is already waiting. Hurry for the patient! He appears to be going into shock.”

“His pulse is dropping rapidly, and we can’t get a heartbeat,” one of the paramedics responded with extreme urgency. As he struggled to get the heartbeat, he realized the boy was bleeding heavier than before. He immediately knew there was something seriously wrong. Though he’d worked at the high-anxiety job for years, seeing these types of serious wounds still made him extremely nervous. Knowing their young gunshot victim was clinging to life, he started to sweat. “It’s getting worse! This isn’t looking too good. He’s bleeding out. He’s bleeding out! We need to hurry and get the bleeding under control. I need some help over here!”

JoJo had regained consciousness. He was moaning out in sheer pain. The pit of his stomach was burning, and the teen couldn’t open his eyes. He couldn’t seem to breathe. He couldn’t move his legs. He tried, but he just couldn’t. Suddenly his arm went limp and fell to the side of the stretcher, causing everyone to panic even more, especially Yanna.

“Oh, naw! Oh my God.” Yanna’s diamond tennis bracelet, which JoJo had just blessed her with a few days before, sparkled underneath the bright emergency room lights. It was as if this were an awful nightmare she was having, as she screamed out in painful denial. “Oh my God! Why, God? Why me?” It was almost more than she could take, watching her teenage son seem to be losing his battle to see another sunrise. “Please help him! Please! Please! He’s just a baby! Come on, y’all, help him! Help him! Do something,” she demanded in an ear-splitting voice, with tears pouring out of her eyes.

“Wait a minute, miss. I’m sorry, but you can’t go back there.” Though her tone was sympathetic, the gray-haired nurse held up both hands.

“But that’s my son. I need to be back there. I need to let him know I’m here.”

The nurse stopped the anguished Yanna dead in her tracks at the swinging metal double doors that led to the triage area. “Don’t worry, miss. He’s in good hands. The team back there is the best in the city. And I promise you, just as soon as we know something, one of the doctors will be right out to speak with you,” she assured the boy’s mother.

“Aw, fuck. Why did this bullshit happen in the first damn place?” Yanna hyperventilated as her sobs echoed loudly throughout the walls of the crowded hospital. Holding her chest, Yanna panted in an attempt to catch her breath. It felt as if someone had their hands wrapped around her throat, pressing on her windpipe. The bright overhead lights started to make her swollen eyes sting. The mild, temperature-controlled waiting area suddenly felt as if the heat were on “hell.”

Yanna was emotionally drained. JoJo was her only son, her heartbeat, her rock. Now her child was on the other side of the door fighting to stay alive. The thought of that was almost too much to endure.

The frenzied mother collapsed into the arms of her auntie who, out of nowhere, had just come inside the building. Dressed in tight jeans and stiletto pumps, Yanna was close to blacking out entirely. “Why? Why is this happening to my baby? It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It wasn’t part of the plan,” Yanna cried repeatedly, wishing she’d never let JoJo sell drugs to pay the bills and help feed the family.

“Yanna, stop it. Hush! You’re making a scene.”

“You think I give a fuck about any of these niggas in here? My baby is back there with blood coming from every-damn-where. I’ma say what I wanna say.”

“Yanna, I understand that, but you still can’t carry on like this. Now, come over here with me and let’s sit down. Let’s allow the doctors to help my great nephew.”

As she snatched away from her auntie’s grip, the anguish Yanna was feeling was apparent to everyone within earshot. “Naw, Auntie, I swear, if I could turn back the hands of time, I would. I’d trade in all the shopping sprees, the trips to the casino, and this jewelry I’m rocking.” She snatched her gold chain off her neck, throwing it to the ground in desperation. “And that new Range Rover I’m driving; that too. I’d give all that bullshit back if I could only have my baby boy in one piece, not lying back there with two big bullet holes in his body!”

“Listen, Yanna, stop this. Keep your voice down, child.” Auntie Grace sat in the dreary and drably decorated hospital waiting room, clutching her Bible. After opening her purse, she wiped away her distraught niece’s tears with an old, tattered handkerchief she kept tucked in the side pocket. After somewhat calming her, she suggested she try taking it down a notch or two. “Everyone’s looking at you over here performing. I know you worried, but please!”

“What?” Yanna shouted. She poked out her lips and sucked her teeth. “I don’t care if they look at me ’til their eyes fall out their head. I’ma shut up when I want to, point blank and period! That’s my son back there all shot up fighting for his life, not theirs.” She gave real fever mean-mugging everyone sitting near her, including her auntie. Judging by her tone and facial expression, no one wanted to risk tangling with the agitated mother bear.

The longer her impromptu rant continued, the more she cried out in regret. Yanna resembled a raccoon as her eyeliner dripped down her face along with her tears. Normally she would never be out in public looking such a hot mess, but this night was definitely not normal. “JoJo ain’t deserve none of what he’s going through, not none of it. I wish I could see that no-good bitch and her son. It’s both they fault my baby back there fighting for his life.”

“You know what, niece? I’m going to, as you young people like to say, keep it real. Even at my age,” Auntie Grace quietly reflected, handing Yanna her Bible, “it’s simply amazing to me how things can go plum berserk so quickly. I mean, one minute you’re riding sky-high on top of your game; and then, within a momentary blink of the eye, your soul is practically scraping the ungodly rock bottom of this wretched earth.”

“Dang, will you please stop with all that church talk?” The weeping Yanna shoved the black leather book back into her aunt’s hands. As she anxiously awaited any news about her oldest child, who was just yards away with two gunshot holes the size of golf balls in his chest, she was not in the mood for any lectures. “JoJo might die back there and you out here trying to take me to church! Old woman, bye! Kick rocks!” Yanna stopped crying long enough to give her auntie the hand.

“Now stop all that hand mess y’all young folk be doing and all that noise! Just stop it. And you can’t really be sitting here blaming what happened to that boy on them.” Auntie Grace hated that she was getting so frustrated with her niece’s showing out. She couldn’t believe that Yanna was in such denial about the role she played in her son’s current predicament. It was no big secret that JoJo had gotten caught up in the streets just so he could help his mom. It was obvious to all what had played out over the past year or so. Plain and simple, Auntie Grace blamed her niece, and so would everyone else in the family. “You can’t be serious right now. I love you and the kids, but come on, Yanna.”

“‘Come on, Yanna,’ what?” Without shame, she turned her head to face her auntie.

“Now tell me, sweetie, was all that rotten, blood-soiled drug money your firstborn showered you with worth it? You running around town buying this and that, acting like a ghetto princess. Was it all worth it? That truck, that jewelry, those expensive purses and clothes?”

Yanna wanted to lash out at her auntie for what she had just said. She wanted to deny the insinuation that was made. After a few brief seconds, the red-faced mother sniffed, reaching for some tissue from her bag. Wiping her face, Yanna didn’t hesitate to respond, as others in the waiting room area ear-hustled on the low. “No, of course not. Why in the hell would I think any of those things were worth my son’s life? Are you trying to be funny or some shit like that? Because this ain’t the time. JoJo is back there messed the fuck up, and that nigga who shot him is alive and breathing out running in them streets.”

Auntie Grace shook her head, realizing that Yanna was still missing the point. “First of all, that other boy has been arrested. Secondly, you need to take some responsibility for what you had to do with this, and have a long talk with God.”

“Talk to God. That’s some real bullshit. If God gave two fucks about me and mines why in the world did he let this happen to my baby? Making him be back there suffering?” Yanna questioned, looking up at the ceiling, arms folded as she rocked back and forth. “I know I was wrong to keep letting him sling those pills, but the money he was making day after day was so good, so he did what he had to do.”

“Did what he had to do? Is that what you call making that innocent child your meal ticket?”

Yanna wiped her face yet again. She was not moved by her auntie’s speech. “Look, the family needed it when your so-called God you love so much took my kid’s daddy away from us. So, while you busy talking that shit about a Higher Power, we was in full struggle mode and JoJo stepped up.” Yanna’s tone was cynical as she moved her long blond-streaked sew-in weave out of her face, twisting it into a ponytail.

“God let all that happen, did He?” Auntie Grace sarcastically questioned.

“Here the hell we go. Yeah, He did. If you wanna keep it a hundred and wanna blame someone so bad for what my boy and me done suffered through the last few years, you can blame God. Or, better yet, maybe that no-good Tyrus and his crackhead mother, Dawn! JoJo’s daddy got murdered messing around with them lowlifes so, yeah, that’s about right.” She focused on the entrance to the room where they were working on JoJo. “I should have known better than to let that troublemaking hooligan in my house! This shit is so fucked up. Fuck them and fuck God!”

“Yanna! You best hush up that mouth of yours, questioning the Lord and speaking ill of His name! Don’t you dare blame Him for this awful tragedy.” Auntie Grace jumped to her feet shaking her finger at her disrespectful niece. “This is entirely your fault, Yanna Banks, not the Man Upstairs or those folk JoJo was running these Detroit streets dealing drugs with! Now, what you need to do, instead of flapping that smart mouth of yours, is think back to the role you done played in JoJo turning out the way he is.” The old woman let her have it raw and uncut as the other people in the waiting room listened, shaking their heads. “Truth be told, you might as well have pulled the trigger of that gun yourself! Now, Miss I’m The Stuff, how’s about that for keeping it real and, as you say, a hundred?”

Pissed, wanting nothing more than to curse out her old, sassy-talking auntie, Yanna sat speechless at her hurtful words and accusations. Yet, as her mind wondered back over the past couple of years, she couldn’t help but question whether her auntie’s words might hold some truth. Maybe she did put too much pressure on JoJo to step up to the plate after his daddy got killed.

Closing her eyes tightly and scratching her head, Yanna got chills as she thought back to where she might’ve gone wrong raising JoJo. Things were once so perfect in her life. She and her children used to be an entirely different family before drugs became the apparent head of their household. When JoJo started selling, things changed for the better so fast that it was hard to tell him to stop. Yanna had been struggling for so long. Easy street was a much-needed break. Was I that selfish? Did I make my son sell drugs so I could live good? Dang, what did I do? Maybe it was my fault he got shot. What did I do?

Five Short Years Earlier

“JoJo, call your father. Tell him dinner will be ready in about twenty minutes or so,” Yanna ordered her son while wiping her hands on a dish towel. “Oh, and tell him I cooked his favorite: fried chicken, sweet corn, collards, biscuits, and gravy.”

“Okay, Ma, I will,” the elder of Yanna Banks’s two children answered, and sighed. As he stood over his little sister, Jania, making sure she washed her face and hands before sitting down at the dinner table, he frowned.

“Oh, and please tell him to try to not be too late, either.”

Joseph Lamar Banks Jr. was only twelve years old, but he shouldered a great deal of responsibility for a boy his age. Being the namesake of a stern but fair father was sometimes more than the rambunctious youngster could handle. Yet, he never wanted to disappoint the man he deemed as his time-to-time hero. Unlike most of his classmates, JoJo’s parents were still married and living under the same roof. Even with the arguments and disagreements about anything and everything, they stuck it out. Although, truth be told, making the usual shameful call night after night was terrible. Summoning his dad home for his mother, supposedly from his “boy’s house,” was fast becoming a habit that was growing old with the youth.

“Hello, Daddy?”

“Hey, now, JoJo. Is your mom’s dinner ready yet?”

“Yes, Daddy, and she said don’t be late.”

“Okay, I’ll be there in a few. Tell her I said to keep the food hot.”

“Okay, but she said don’t be late,” JoJo smartly repeated much to his father’s dislike.

“Look, boy, I don’t know who in the hell you talking to in that tone. But I said tell her to keep my damn food hot no matter what time I get there. Now go run and tell her that.”

“Yes, sir.” JoJo knew it was in his best interest to shut up and stop while he was ahead.

Each evening before JoJo went to sleep, he prayed his mother would get the courage to stand up for herself. He wanted her to stop being his father’s constant doormat. He knew she deserved much better than how his overbearing father was playing her. However, if she didn’t speak up, he knew he sure as hell couldn’t. God, please give my momma strength to stop Daddy from going over to that nasty, stank-looking lady’s house all the time. I hate her and her dumb-dumb son Tyrus who gets to see him as much as me and Jania do. Amen!

The man of the house, Joseph Sr., worked the early morning shift at General Motors on the line. He was a tall, muscular man in stature. Everyone on his close-knit block on the west side of Detroit knew him. Highly regarded wherever he went, whether it was out of fear of his quick-fire temper or just plain respect, the father of two was a force to be reckoned with.

Migrating from Alabama in the early eighties, Joseph Sr. had true swagger. He had Southern charm that made him the perfect gentleman to most. For those strangers who didn’t know any better, from the outside looking in, Yanna was indeed blessed with a perfect man. It was true, and common knowledge to those living near the couple, that he was involved in an ongoing affair with Dawn Jackson. Ms. Jackson, a single mother of one, had recently moved into the area. Quickly known as the neighborhood good-time girl who slept with just about anyone who hopped, skipped, or jumped as long as they paid her, she currently had her claws in Yanna’s husband.

Taking that one negative and outrageous factor out of the equation, Joseph Sr., head of the household, rarely missed a meal with his own family. A good paymaster, never late on one bill that crossed the modest threshold of their brick-framed bungalow home, he was a good provider. Since he didn’t cause his wife to worry about the high mortgage, or about food in the cabinets or clothes on the kids’ backs, he felt his shit didn’t stink. Arrogantly, he felt his blatant indiscretions and the sideway glances of pity his spouse endured from neighbors were somehow allowable. Whenever his wife came in the house embarrassed and ashamed of what people would say out loud, as well as whisper, about his cheating ways, Joseph Sr. shrugged his shoulders. He would buy her a dozen roses or maybe treat Yanna to a brand-new dress to soothe her mental pain.

“Did you call him?” Yanna asked her son a few minutes later.

“Yes, Ma, I called.” JoJo secretly rolled his eyes at her stupidity of dealing with his daddy and all his madness.

“And is he on his way?” Yanna wondered. She’d set the table and now rinsed out a few glasses. “I don’t want his dinner to get cold.”

“Instead of asking me all these questions, do you want me to go and get him from around the corner? I can.” Receiving a cold, hard stare from his mother, JoJo instantly regretted asking her that million-dollar question. However, he couldn’t help himself as he headed toward the front door. “I know what house she stays in. It’s not a problem. I can go right now.”

“What did you just say to me?” Yanna, with wet hands, slowly approached her son with a look of venom in her eyes. Jania watched like she was scared that her brother was seconds away from getting popped right in the mouth.

“Nothing, Ma.” He wisely backed down, treading on dangerous ground, wanting to avoid trouble. “I didn’t say nothing.”

“I thought not.” She angrily wiped her hands down her apron. In just those few seconds, her blood had boiled just enough to form a bead of sweat on her forehead. Embarrassed that now even her own children were mocking what she was putting up with, she fought back tears. “You ain’t so big that you can’t get a whooping. Now, go sit your wannabe-grown behind on that front porch and let me know the minute that man pulls up. You understand me?”

“Yes, Ma. I understand.” JoJo twisted his lip up as he thought about how his father was disrespecting his mom every single day. I wish he’d go away and never come back! I used to think he was everything. How could he do this to her? JoJo looked at his mother and admired how pretty she was.

Yanna stood five foot three, with a sugar brown skin tone and shoulder-length, naturally curly hair. She had piercing brown eyes and a smile that could melt an iceberg. She took pride in being a good person. The thirty-four-year-old mother stayed immersed in helping the kids with their homework, keeping the house clean, and spending time with her kids every chance she had. For Yanna, her family was her life. She knew her husband was unfaithful, but she didn’t want to be the one to rock the boat and break her family apart. Keeping busy, she hid from the reality that her husband was having an affair.

What didn’t help the situation were the nosey women in her neighborhood, who always offered up their opinions about her husband’s extramarital dealings. It was like they had a personal vendetta, and made it their purpose to give Yanna daily updates on her husband’s actions. Although most claimed they were just trying to help her or put her up on game, Yanna was by no means a fool. The loyal wife knew they were just trying to be all up in her business, and she refused to give them the satisfaction of knowing how hurt she truly was.

Yanna was determined to stay strong. She had convinced herself that this was just a bad season in her marriage and things would get better. She had come too far from her rough upbringing, and she refused to let anyone see her beak. She’d grown up in the projects and had no problem letting any female know, but she had long since outgrown street brawling.

Night after night it was getting harder and harder for her keep ignoring the truth, though. It took everything in her power not to march around the block and knock on Dawn’s door. There had been countless times that Yanna had to stop herself from taking her good butcher knife out of the kitchen drawer and running up on Dawn. She’d thought about how great it would feel to shove the shiny and sharp blade directly into Dawn’s black heart. The only thing that stopped her was the thought of going to jail if she got caught. She knew her children needed her. “For better or worse, richer or poorer,” was Yanna’s constant response to the women, while trying to hold her head up and keep her dignity intact. One day, Dawn Jackson gonna get hers, y’all will see! That bitch can’t just keep sleeping with the next woman’s man and it be all good.

Unfortunately, Yanna Banks wasn’t the only one who suffered shame from her husband’s constant cheating. JoJo would catch it going to the corner store, or at the playground, or even in the lunchroom line. Ridiculed by his classmates for having a “play stepbrother,” Tyrus Jackson, JoJo tried his best to ignore the taunts. As much as he tried, though, the jokes and slick comments would eventually get to him, and he stayed in detention as a result of physical retaliation, disappointing his parents. His mother knew he was only taking up for her. And his father couldn’t say much because JoJo’s reason for fighting was something he refused to acknowledge. JoJo couldn’t help but try to beat down the other kids for talking smack about how dumb his mother was for staying married to his no-good daddy. JoJo didn’t want to fight, but he had to on principle even though deep down inside he knew his classmates were right: his mother was a fool.

JoJo did as he was told by his clearly agitated mother. Sitting silently on the wood steps looking back and forth up the block for more than twenty minutes, he grew inpatient awaiting any sign of his father. Just when he thought he’d die from hunger, Joseph Sr.’s two-tone pickup truck turned the corner and roared into the driveway.

“Hey, Pops. You know you’re late,” JoJo sarcastically pointed out to his father as he hopped out of the truck and made his way to the porch.

“What did I tell you about that mouth of yours?”

“I know, Pops. I was just saying.” JoJo hoped he wouldn’t receive a smack to his lips as he devilishly grinned.

“Yeah, okay, so just come on and let’s eat,” Joseph Sr. stated nonchalantly as he rested his hand on his son’s shoulder and they entered the house.

They both walked into the dining room at the same time. “I’m starving, Yanna. I could eat a damn horse.” Joseph Sr. smiled as the smell of the delicious foods assaulted his nose.

“I thought I told you to tell me when he pulled up.” Yanna tugged her son’s earlobe.

“Sorry, Ma. I forgot.” JoJo quickly slid into his spot at the table across from Jania.

“What’s the big deal, Yanna?” Joseph Sr. quizzed after witnessing his son’s upbeat demeanor take a dismal change. “Just relax. Chill out.”

“He’s always forgetting something lately.” Yanna judgmentally raised her eyebrow. It was obvious that she was more disappointed in her husband’s tardiness than in her son’s forgetfulness. Caught in her emotions, her eyes dared her husb. . .