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  She had no intention of going home. It seemed to her that no matter how good their lovemaking was, something would always happen to spoil their reunion.

  Not bothering to cover herself, Sterling left the bed and retrieved the package that Bennie had on the dresser. Determined to make their time together a success, she inflected a gay tone in her voice. “Get this ready while I make us a drink.” She tossed him the package and exited the bedroom, slowly. She loved for Bennie to look at her body.

  When she returned from the living room with two tumblers of cognac, she could tell from Bennie’s serene smile he was already one snort ahead of her. She sat the drinks on the nightstand and snorted the heroin that he offered her.

  “Mercy!” Sterling shouted. She giggled for no reason in particular and felt as light as a feather, falling back into the comfort of ten fluffy white pillows. “Wow!” She exhaled and closed, then opened, her eyes. “Mmmm.” She crossed her arms behind her head, closed her eyes. “You’ve been holding out on me, Bennie.” Reaching over to massage his penis, she added, “This is not the same shit Jamie brought me last week. Mmmm,” she repeated, marveling in the exquisiteness of the drug. “I want some more.” She licked her tongue over the top of her lip, unsure if the drug was turning her on or if it was Bennie’s hardening member.

  Tapping her hand back, Bennie scolded, “Not yet. We’ve got business to discuss.”

  Sterling opened her eyes. “What?”

  “I need a favor.”

  “Anything.” She placed her hand on top of Bennie’s and guided it over her breasts, her thighs, and then the opening of her vagina.

  “Stop it, baby,” he said, pulling his hand from hers, “this is serious.” He lit another cigarette, then walked over to the closets and opened one. He came back to the bed with two neatly taped and tied packages the size of a shoebox.

  “What’s that?” Sterling asked, sitting up in bed.

  “A million dollars in cash.” Bennie set the box of cash on the bed beside Sterling. He didn’t bother to open the other package, just shifted the box from one hand to another. “This package is filled with heroin. It’s worth, I’d say . . . about a quarter of a million.” Sterling had been around heroin enough to know that one kilo ran about $150,000.

  The phone rang and Sterling answered it, grateful for the intrusion. She could tell from the look on Bennie’s face that he didn’t appreciate her answering his phone. “It’s Sandy,” she said, walking toward Bennie and handing him the cordless phone. She rolled her eyes as Bennie talked to the mother of his son. She could tell from their conversation that something was wrong with the baby.

  B.J. Jr. was Bennie’s twenty-two-month-old son. He’d impregnated Sandy almost three years earlier, when Bennie and Sterling had called off their third try at an engagement. The whole situation tried her patience, but she knew she had to convince Bennie that she liked children.

  The call reminded her of the time last year when Bennie had slapped her.

  “You lying son of a bitch, you promised to take me—” she had been complaining.

  “Sandy said that little Bennie isn’t getting any better. The pneumonia has spread to both lungs.”

  “That’s the lyingest bitch I’ve seen in my life,” Sterling had shouted, wild with jealousy.

  Bennie had slapped her so hard, her head spun halfway around to her back. “Don’t you call the mother of my son a bitch!” he’d screamed.

  When Sterling had raised her hand to slap him back, Bennie had stopped her. “Don’t ever try no shit like that again. I don’t want to hurt you, Sterling.”

  That was a year ago. And while he’d never struck her again, he had hurt her with words over and over. But the problem with B.J. and Sandy went even further back than last year. Sterling remembered right after B.J. was born the bitter conversation that she and Bennie had had.

  “I think you should get a blood test, Bennie.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t think it’s yours.”

  Bennie was furious. “Just because he resembles Sandy’s side of the family doesn’t mean that he’s not mine.”

  Sterling was so upset when she saw the hurt look on his face. But it was too late, the damage had already been done. “I’m sorry.”

  “Listen, I make a good living at the post office. Just because I won’t marry his mother doesn’t mean that my own son is going to do without.”

  To top everything off, Bennie had given Sterling syphilis. She’d felt humiliated when the doctor had asked her to name every man she’d had sex with in the past year. Even though she’d told the doctor that Bennie was the only man she’d slept with at the time, she still felt like a whore when the doctor looked as though he didn’t believe her story.

  Bennie had given Sterling a tearful apology and then made love to her all night long. In the morning, he had suggested that Sterling try something. It was then that he’d introduced her to heroin. When they’d made love that morning, sex was better than it had ever been.

  Within two months Sterling was strung out. But getting the drug was never a problem; Bennie was a dealer. He’d sold Sterling on the idea that drugs couldn’t hurt her if she didn’t overdo them.

  Now, Sterling left the room to take a shower. When she returned Bennie was still on the telephone, talking to Sandy. He’d turned on the lights and was writing down a series of numbers on the message pad. “I’ll be by the hospital in a half hour. Don’t cry, Sandy, B.J.’s been through this before.”

  “How is the little tyke?” Sterling asked, forcing a smile. Several of B.J.’s pictures were tucked in the seams of the dresser’s mirror. Personally, Sterling thought B.J. looked just like one of the Ewoks from Star Wars. No way could a man as good-looking as Bennie have fathered such an ugly child. It couldn’t possibly be his, she thought, and not for the first time.

  “Is it his asthma again?” Last year, just five days before Christmas, Sandy had played the same scenario with B.J.

  “I’m sure she’s making it sound worse than it is.” Bennie turned on the shower. “Anyway, I’ve got next weekend off, and I thought the three of us—”

  Dammit, not this bonding shit again! Sterling half listened to Bennie’s plans as he talked over the glass shower stall. I’ve told him I’m not changing nobody’s shitty diapers. Why is he doing this? Doesn’t he realize that I love him and not that damn baby?

  “Is that cool with you, Sterling?” Bennie asked as he dried himself off.

  “Mm-hm.”

  Watching Bennie now as he dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, she saw his mouth moving but didn’t hear a word that he said. She tried to focus. “Do you think you can do it?” Bennie asked for the third time. “Sterling?”

  “Sure. I can do it.” Sterling thought he meant changing B.J.’s diapers; she was willing to give it another try. Hell, if it took being a surrogate stepmother to tie Bennie to her, she’d play the role. Temporarily.

  Bennie walked through every room in the all white apartment, opening all the drapes and letting in the dull morning light. “The first pickup is in Texas.” He stopped. “Are you sure you can pull it off ?”

  Sterling was shocked. What was he talking about? No way did she want to run drugs. What else did she have to do to prove how much she loved him? “Maybe. But what’s in it for me?”

  “Cash, and an unlimited supply of drugs. I’ll deposit the money in your account.”

  Suddenly all Sterling saw was green: the assorted green silk plants that were perfectly placed in every corner, the meadow green carpet that her toes had sunk into, the army green T-shirt that Bennie now wore. The box of green money on the bed.

  Like a jaundiced eye, something in the corruption transferred its color onto all the objects she beheld. Everything around her, including the pristine white sheets, seemed stained green and impure. Sterling stood next to Bennie with her hands on her hips. “Exactly how much cash?”

  “Oh, that’s negotiable. I’ve got pickups in Arizona and Texas. The fed
s have been getting closer to our shipping the stuff through FedEx and the postal service. That’s all I need—I’d be right on the front line. So now we’re back to using runners. I knew I could count on you.”

  “No problem,” she said, and died a little.

  * * *

  The sky was dull gray as she exited the Harbortown apartment complex. Throughout the quiet night a light snow had fallen and lay twinkling at dawn. The engine purred like a well-fed kitten as she let her car warm up, using the time to brush the snow from the entire surface of her Viper.

  As she drove west on Jefferson Avenue toward the John C. Lodge Freeway, the deserted streets intimidated her. At any minute she thought a dirty crack addict might jump out and stick her up. There were pieces of newspaper, empty bottles, and crushed paper cups along the sides of the streets. The potholes were so large and black, they looked like moon craters.

  Most of the city’s streetlights weren’t operational. Sterling hated Detroit. She couldn’t understand why anyone in their right mind would want to live in the city. The taxes were exorbitant, and the services were terrible. Sterling had thanked her mother many a day for having the foresight to know she needed to raise her daughters outside the city.

  Fifteen miles and twenty-two minutes later she pulled into the almost vacant parking lot of the Kmart on Ford Road in Dearborn.

  The first item on her list was a douche bag. Although Sterling loved Nieman Marcus and Lord & Taylor, any woman in her right mind wouldn’t shop for a douche bag at any other place than Katiejoe’s.

  Knowing a Comerica Bank was a few miles away, Sterling pulled off the Southfield Freeway on Nine Mile Road. She checked her balance; it was less than $1,000 thanks to Spice’s embargo. Pissed, she withdrew $400 from the twenty-four-hour teller and sped off. After taking a snort from the stash that she’d stolen from Bennie, she took a deep breath, rubbed her nose with the back of her hand, and then smiled.

  Just in case Bennie did another disappearing act with no calls or visits to her place, she thought, looking inside her purse at the packets of heroin, I’m set for a while.

  Back on the freeway, Sterling flew on wings as she turned east on Interstate 696 to I-75 north to Rochester. Home.

  Less than a mile from her condo, she pulled into a car wash, yawning. It was now seven-thirty in the morning. There wasn’t a piece of trash on the road or addicts to jump out at her. She felt safe. But just as she gave the attendant her keys, she spotted trouble. Travis was a few feet behind her.

  “Sterling?” He walked up beside her and placed a hand on her shoulder. “Are you okay?”

  Sterling snatched her shoulder away. “Excuse me.”

  “I was a little concerned. You seem—”

  Straightening her body, she paid the $7.50 charge and dropped the change inside her purse. “I’d like my tires, rims, and carpet done, please.”

  “That’ll be five dollars more, miss.”

  “Why don’t you let me follow you home?” Travis offered.

  “Are you crazy?” Sterling looked him up and down and frowned, then walked through the next set of glass doors. She didn’t like Travis’s patronizing attitude. She didn’t need his help!

  She sat at the triple set of plastic chairs, waiting for the work to be completed on her car. Through the glass windows, she watched Travis pay his bill. He turned, and his eyes met hers.

  The drugs were fast, and her mind wasn’t functioning too clearly. She couldn’t remember how much she’d snorted on the freeway. She smiled at Travis and then left the world behind.

  * * *

  Sterling woke up in her apartment that Sunday evening around eleven o’clock in velvet black darkness. Where am I?

  Travis. Travis, was all she could remember.

  Sterling dialed his home.

  “It’s Sterling. Did you bring me home?”

  “Yes. I drove your car home, put you to bed, and caught a taxi back to the car wash. I can’t talk now, Sterling. I’ve got company.” He lowered his voice to a whisper, though his voice still seemed louder than a yell. “I just have one thing to say to you—stop the drugs. They’re a total turnoff. You could be so much better than most women your age. You could be better than just someone’s occasional plaything. You could be better than just a druggie.” He stopped. “Don’t you know that?”

  The hum from the dead line seemed to pulsate through her veins. Through her fog, Sterling tried to make sense of what Travis had just said. Better? She could be better than the rest?

  No one had ever told her that. Well, no one but Spice, and she’d never sounded convinced.

  Sterling took a long bath, changed into a pair of pink sweats, and took out her sketches.

  Her mind filled with images of the perfect shelter for a perfect childhood, she spent the next three hours working on the multilevel floor plans for a dream home that she’d begun two years earlier.

  “This is the home that I’m going to live in one day.” But as she said the words, she knew that she would never live in this house. Every room, every detail, spelled love. Spelled Spice.

  During the days that followed, Sterling thought about Bennie’s drug run. She was almost broke, but she’d work something out, and maybe it served Spice right. But deep down, Sterling knew that was about as mature as wetting her bed. As far as money went, she would work something out. She didn’t need drug money. Maybe Otis could get her a job in another architectural firm? With that thought in mind, she worked on the sketches of residential and commercial designs that she’d thought up in her head.

  From the beginning, Sterling took to architecture the way some people got religion—through a series of epiphanies. After “designing” her first structure in a class she’d taken freshman year at Columbia (the semester before she got kicked out), she experienced something akin to Emerson’s perfect exhilaration—gladness to the point of fear.

  She missed school. Missed networking with other students, energized by the power of creating a structure, which was like an infant, a baby, that one molded from inception. It was a rush to bring a design to perfection; what one imagined as perfect sometimes turned out to be just that—perfect. Where else was life like that?

  Never mind the suspensions and dismissals—through it all, she continued to sharpen her design skills. As she did so, she felt another strange experience. Mind, body, and building connected, became singular. This year, at Crown, when Patrick Wynn, one of her teachers at the architectural department, complimented her broad intelligence and comprehensive talent, Sterling was amazed by his recommendation to put her on an accelerated track.

  Then, as always, as she got into the groove of her work, she’d begin to spiral out of control. She’d start missing classes, self-destructing with sex, and doing more drugs. She was told by the dean to clean up her act, so she seduced him. Nevertheless, four months later she was gone from Crown.

  Sterling didn’t want to think of that now.

  When she wasn’t drawing, Sterling did her nails. Every two days she changed the design, composing and creating something more spectacular than the last. A graphics workstation with a heavy-duty magnifying lamp was in the center of her study, which was also lighted by a large picture window. Dozens of sharpened pencils, paints, and brushes filled a Rover caddy she could easily roll from wall to wall. Two El Greco French easels flanked the opposite ends of the room; one she used for drawing and one for nails.

  Often, like today, she would be surprised herself by the clarity of her designs. Each seemed more elaborate and yet more integrated than the last.

  And when Bennie kept calling, she didn’t return his calls. For once she had the upper hand. The amount of heroin she’d stolen from Bennie was enough to last her for about a month. When that ran out, she had another source, Horacio, she could call. True, he was a scuzzball and his dope was shit, but he would do in an emergency. She’d be a damned fool if she let herself believe that she could depend totally on Bennie for her every need, especially her growing drug n
eeds. And the more she thought about him asking her to run drugs, the angrier she became. She was done with Bennie, she told herself, once and for all.

  * * *

  During their estrangement, Bennie sent Sterling a dozen white roses daily. A total romantic when the situation demanded it, Bennie obviously remembered that white roses were Sterling’s favorite. After a week, he started to penetrate her crustaceous soul.

  Getting high alone wasn’t fun anymore. Even though Bennie wasn’t perfect, the only thing he ever demanded from her was easy—just sex. He never got into her head and needed to know the reasons why he hurt her. Their relationship was simple. It was like Snuggle fabric softener: it fluffed up pretty, smelled good, never had any static electricity. This was why Sterling continued to believe she would win his love—and him—from Sandy in the end. Their relationship was entangled, messy, and though Bennie loved B.J., his romantic side, the lover and free spirit in him, belonged to Sterling—she was sure of it.

  She missed Bennie. He tugged at something inside of her that seemed to be made of pure love, innocence, need. She could never explain, or understand, the attraction, other than knowing that she needed to be needed by him.

  On Friday a huge gift basket of lotions, soap, and bath salts arrived, along with three dozen buttery soft yellow roses—yellow for please come home. Mindful of the prickly thorns, Sterling pulled back the green foliage, brushed the velvety softness of the petals against her cheek, and inhaled the heady scent of the rose before pressing it against her heart.

  She picked up the telephone, then quickly hung it back up. She did this twice more before going to bed. It was too soon.

  The following week, Sterling was tapped out on designs. Without assignments or that one commission from Spice that she had blown, it was hard to work. She needed a goal. Bored with changing her nail color, she picked up a few books from a small bookcase in her study and flipped through the pages. She selected one by Erica Jong, Any Woman’s Blues. Just as she plopped down on the white sofa, the once beautiful yellow roses seemed to hang their withered heads in shame, their dying scent permeating her senses.