Saturday, August 06, 2005

Kitten heels and prayer candles, part 2

Nichelle walked fast down the street, gripping her shopping bag. Enough of Pedro, enough of both Pedros, she thought, hanging with him was like hanging with a prince or something. Everyone looked at him, knew him, talked to him - he was so pretty - Nichelle, just for being with him, would get the leftovers, people's faces all soft after talking to him, she'd get the last part of a smile, the second half of a How's it going, and that wasn't so bad.

But two of them, Nichelle would disappear completely, like falling into a hole.

Two Pedros. Nichelle wondered if she was cracking up, like her aunt up in Pomona who just sat in her living room all day, her hair going everywhere, talking about how God would tell her when to move.

Or should she feel bad, leaving her man alone with something scary like that? Hell, they'd probably make friends, the whole world can revolve around the both of them, just like it always did around Pedro, maybe sometimes he got lonely, the whole world looking in at him and nobody to look out with. Maybe it would be good for him to share a little.

Nichelle put on the brakes all of a sudden, if she'd been a car, her tires would've squealed.

No way Pedro would share. One of them would kill the other one, and then where would he be. The cops sure as hell wouldn't get it - Nichelle didn't even get it herself.

But she knew this for sure - Pedro was her man, and she couldn't just leave him. She turned around fast, shopping bag banging against her legs, and ran back to the prayer candle stand.

3 comments:

Saturday Night Takeout said...

Ok, now I'm intrigued. Could you possibly write a part 3 and reach a conclusion to this?

[Rubs hands and waits eagerly]

Daniel Heath said...

I love it when you take a premise and veer in a totally unexpected direction with it that nevertheless makes perfect sense once you do it. She could live in the shadow of one shiner, but two? Never.

Chemical Billy said...

Saturday Night, your wish is my command.

monkey 0, more right than you know.