Jordan Belcher - Status

With the tap of her thumb, Quita Wheeler loaded up one of her favorite websites, a social media page called The Site. She scanned through her news feed until she saw a status update that brought a huge smile to her face.

“Rodrick!” she called out from her bed.

He didn’t answer.

“Rodrick! Come here! Look at this!”

He still didn’t respond, so she threw the covers back and scurried through her apartment in the nude. She found him in the living room on his knees, facing the window. He wasn’t fully dressed either. All he’d thrown on was his 501 Levi denims, and they were a little baggy, exposing the top of his butt crack. The first time she saw him in this position she thought he was sick. But she knew now that he was praying. And she knew not to interrupt him. He had grabbed her by the throat and cursed her out the last time she did that.

“Amen,” he finished, standing up.

“Why do you always do that?” Quita asked him.

“Do what? Pray?”

“Yeah. Every time after we have sex, you come in here and pray. Why?”

“Because I’ve sinned.”

Quita followed him as he walked back into the bedroom and got his clothes on. He was one of the handsomest men she had ever slept with. She didn’t just think he was handsome because he had money either. His arms had hints of muscle, but his gut was semi-small and beetled; he was beautifully flawed. From the amount of time he’d spent behind bars, she expected him to be covered in prison tats. But he had not a one. He shook his neatly done dreads after he slipped on his T-shirt. Then he capped his dreads with a Louis Vuitton beanie hat.

“What did I tell you about interrupting my prayer?”

Her eyes shifted nervously. “I thought you were in the bathroom. I didn’t know you were praying.”

“But you just said you knew that after every time we have sex, I pray. Why would this time be any different?”

“I… my mind wasn’t—” she stammered. “I’m sorry, Rodrick.”

“So what was so important?”

“This.” She handed him her phone. “I thought you were playing when you said you loved me. But this confirms it. You would rather be here with me than over there.”

Rodrick’s eyes flicked back and forth as he read the sentences on her small screen. Then he suddenly thrust the phone back to her and shoved her out his way, rushing out of the apartment.

Quita Wheeler sighed and flopped down on the bed. Damn , she thought. Maybe I shouldn’t have showed his ass that status after all.

Tyesha816:Thank you to everybody that showed up to my baby girl’s fourth birthday party! She had a great time! Just about everybody she wanted to show up, showed up. Thank you guys!— at Great Wolf Lodge .

August 13 th, 6:45 p.m.

One of Rodrick’s closest friends, Gideon Byers, helped me and my best friend, Deja Michelle, put all the gifts in the trunk of my Pontiac G6. I gave them both hugs.

“Thank you, guys,” I said.

“No problem,” said Gideon. “I’ll follow you to the crib and help you unload if you want me to.”

“I think I got it.”

Deja was holding my daughter, Kylie, on her thick hips. She said, “You should let him help you since you-know-who isn’t here to do it.”

Gideon added, “I don’t mind at all.”

It was funny to me how two people that hung together could be so different. Gideon was kindhearted and treated people with respect. Rodrick was an arrogant asshole who cared more about hoes in the streets than his own daughter. I never would have thought he would have missed his daughter’s first birthday since he’d been out of prison.

“I’ll give you gas money for going out of your way,” I said to Gideon.

“Gas money?” He laughed me off.

He shut the trunk of my car for me, and when Deja let my daughter down I thought I heard her whisper something to Gideon. I always wondered about them two. They claimed they weren’t seeing each other but it always seemed like they were conspiring every time they got around each other. And they both were very beautiful people, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they were creeping. Gideon and Deja both had light complexions—about the same tone as me, I guess—and their bodies were banging! Deja came a long way since high school; I’m talking at least a 100 pounds. Looking at her now in her tiny red bikini, she was thick in the right places, and the loss of weight brought out the cheek bones that had been hiding. As far as Gideon’s looks, this was actually the first time I had seen him with his shirt off. He was tall and medium built with real defined abs. His eyes were a light gray—and no they weren’t contacts; I checked. When I saw them playing with Kylie together in the pool, I thought, Aww, what a cute couple. It probably was only a matter of time before they had their own baby.

Deja told me she’d talk to me later. Gideon held my door open for me and I thanked him as I slid in the driver’s seat.

“You remember how to get to my house?” I asked.

“Yeah. I get off on 63 rd, right?”

“Uh-huh. Just follow me. I don’t drive fast.”

Suddenly, a Dodge Challenger with custom blue lights pulled up in front of my car and stopped with a screech . Rodrick got out, and the first person he said something to was Gideon. He gave him dap and joked that Gideon was dressed like a surfer in his board shorts and thong sandals.

“Glad you’re in a good mood,” I said to him. “Why’d you finally decide to show up? You saw my status update?”

Rodrick played dumb. “What status update? I came to wish my daughter a happy birthday.”

“Daddy!” Kylie cheered from the backseat.

He opened the back door and left her buckled in as he tickled her neck and gave her a kiss on the cheek. Then he reached in his pocket and pulled out a stack of twenties—with the currency band still attached—and handed it to her. I looked at him like he was crazy. What was a four-year-old supposed to do with a thousand dollars cash?

“Happy Birthday,” he said to her.

“Thank you, Daddy.”

He pulled out his phone and snapped a picture of her holding the cash. Then he looked at me as if he expected a “thank you” from me too.

“Seriously?” I said to him in disbelief. “You forgot about her birthday, didn’t buy her a gift, so you give her a stack of money? How thoughtful.”

“I didn’t forget about her birthday. You didn’t call me and tell me you changed the venue.”

“I shouldn’t have had to call you,” I shot back. “I posted it on my events page last week. How come Gideon knew where and when it was and you didn’t, and he doesn’t even have a Site page?”

“I don’t be on it like that.”

“Shut up, you make more posts in a day than me.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Yes, you do. And all yo little ho friends always leave a comment. You was probably over that Angela youngandfly Serrano’s house. Or probably one of the other many hoes that Likes yo statuses all the time.”

“This is what I gotta deal wit’,” Rodrick said to Gideon. “I need to be like you and go without having a Site page.”

“No, you need to be like him and show up to yo daughter’s party,” I countered. “She was asking where you were the whole time.”

Rodrick was playing me off again. I heard him ask Gideon why he didn’t call him. Gideon shrugged and said he would have but he left his phone in his pocket when he jumped in the pool. That was half true; Gideon was actually about to call him before he got his phone wet. I took the phone from him so he couldn’t call, told him if Rodrick couldn’t remember to show up on his own, then he didn’t deserve to come.