someone stagger down the corridor and push open the door that Skye hadn’t bothered to latch.
‘Why didn’t you stop me?’ Jada moaned.
Jada looked like hell. She was wearing the jacket of her favourite Victoria’s Secret flannel pyjamas, lime green printed with pink strawberries, and her long shapely legs, emerging from the short jacket hem, were as stunning as ever. At the neck, it was a different story: the bright green, which usually suited her rich dark skin, was a scary contrast with the ashy grey tint of her face. The whites of her eyes were red and inflamed, and the bags under her eyes were puffed out like a frog’s.
She slumped against the chipped paint of the door jamb, staring reproachfully at Skye.
‘Why didn’t you stop me ?’ Skye retorted.
‘At least you don’t have to see yours again!’ Jada complained. ‘I just keep pulling the same old shit, over and over. It’s like a dog going back to its own vomit.’
Skye’s stomach churned ominously. ‘Could you please not use that word?’ she begged, pressing both her hands to her stomach as if that would somehow keep her from puking.
‘I need to pee,’ Jada said. ‘You’re going to have to move.’
Staggering to the side of the bath as Jada sat on the toilet, Skye began to replay the events of the night before. She and Jada had got through plenty of blow at the Midnight Lounge – of course they had, that was the trouble with blow. They’d partied and danced till four a.m., closing time, and then, naturally, they’d been all ramped up and no way ready to crash, so they’d had a few more drinks and lines at the Lounge with DeVaughan, and then they’d—
‘Oh, no .’
Skye had just realized what Jada was talking about. Not the blow, though they’d said they were cutting back on that too. No, Jada meant DeVaughan. He’d come back to their apartment, picking up a bottle of tequila on the way, and that only meant one thing. Well, two, if you counted the tequila shots with champagne floats. But basically, it meant that Jada and DeVaughan had hooked up again.
‘You did DeVaughan?’
Jada nodded gloomily. ‘It’s not going anywhere, so what the hell am I doing?’ she sighed. ‘The man’s a damn bouncer ! That’s never going to get me out of this dump!’
It was a dump, no question about it. The irony was, a lot of people would have killed for their midtown apartment. It was rent-stabilized, which meant the landlord couldn’t raise the rent more than four per cent a year, and it was a proper two-bedroom, which meant that both Skye and Jada had their own rooms with doors that closed – neither of them had to sleep in a walk-through corridor in a railroad-style apartment.
But it was still a dump. Because the whole building was rent-stabilized, the landlord, resentful at not making a market rent off his tenants, did the bare minimum of repairs. The plaster ceilings were crumbling so badly that sometimes chunks would fall on them while they were sleeping. They had to throw bottlefuls of Liquid-Plumr down the bath and sink every week to get them to drain. The Formica of the kitchen worktops was patterned with mould. Jada and Skye’s bedrooms were barely large enough for a bed and a cupboard, and they’d only managed to turn the kitchen into a sitting room by disconnecting the cooker and putting a piece of plywood over it to use it as a table instead. They lived off takeout food, which they reheated in the microwave.
The kicker was, they paid eight hundred dollars a month each for the privilege of living there, and they could have sublet it instantly for double that sum. Girls at the Lounge commuted in from Bay Ridge, Forest Hills, Harlem, and Bushwick: Jada and Skye were envied by everyone for having had the luck to snag this place a few years ago through a friend of Skye’s mom, who knew the building super.
And sometimes, they’d get drunk and do blow to stay out as long as possible, just to avoid having to come back to
‘Why didn’t you stop me?’ Jada moaned.
Jada looked like hell. She was wearing the jacket of her favourite Victoria’s Secret flannel pyjamas, lime green printed with pink strawberries, and her long shapely legs, emerging from the short jacket hem, were as stunning as ever. At the neck, it was a different story: the bright green, which usually suited her rich dark skin, was a scary contrast with the ashy grey tint of her face. The whites of her eyes were red and inflamed, and the bags under her eyes were puffed out like a frog’s.
She slumped against the chipped paint of the door jamb, staring reproachfully at Skye.
‘Why didn’t you stop me ?’ Skye retorted.
‘At least you don’t have to see yours again!’ Jada complained. ‘I just keep pulling the same old shit, over and over. It’s like a dog going back to its own vomit.’
Skye’s stomach churned ominously. ‘Could you please not use that word?’ she begged, pressing both her hands to her stomach as if that would somehow keep her from puking.
‘I need to pee,’ Jada said. ‘You’re going to have to move.’
Staggering to the side of the bath as Jada sat on the toilet, Skye began to replay the events of the night before. She and Jada had got through plenty of blow at the Midnight Lounge – of course they had, that was the trouble with blow. They’d partied and danced till four a.m., closing time, and then, naturally, they’d been all ramped up and no way ready to crash, so they’d had a few more drinks and lines at the Lounge with DeVaughan, and then they’d—
‘Oh, no .’
Skye had just realized what Jada was talking about. Not the blow, though they’d said they were cutting back on that too. No, Jada meant DeVaughan. He’d come back to their apartment, picking up a bottle of tequila on the way, and that only meant one thing. Well, two, if you counted the tequila shots with champagne floats. But basically, it meant that Jada and DeVaughan had hooked up again.
‘You did DeVaughan?’
Jada nodded gloomily. ‘It’s not going anywhere, so what the hell am I doing?’ she sighed. ‘The man’s a damn bouncer ! That’s never going to get me out of this dump!’
It was a dump, no question about it. The irony was, a lot of people would have killed for their midtown apartment. It was rent-stabilized, which meant the landlord couldn’t raise the rent more than four per cent a year, and it was a proper two-bedroom, which meant that both Skye and Jada had their own rooms with doors that closed – neither of them had to sleep in a walk-through corridor in a railroad-style apartment.
But it was still a dump. Because the whole building was rent-stabilized, the landlord, resentful at not making a market rent off his tenants, did the bare minimum of repairs. The plaster ceilings were crumbling so badly that sometimes chunks would fall on them while they were sleeping. They had to throw bottlefuls of Liquid-Plumr down the bath and sink every week to get them to drain. The Formica of the kitchen worktops was patterned with mould. Jada and Skye’s bedrooms were barely large enough for a bed and a cupboard, and they’d only managed to turn the kitchen into a sitting room by disconnecting the cooker and putting a piece of plywood over it to use it as a table instead. They lived off takeout food, which they reheated in the microwave.
The kicker was, they paid eight hundred dollars a month each for the privilege of living there, and they could have sublet it instantly for double that sum. Girls at the Lounge commuted in from Bay Ridge, Forest Hills, Harlem, and Bushwick: Jada and Skye were envied by everyone for having had the luck to snag this place a few years ago through a friend of Skye’s mom, who knew the building super.
And sometimes, they’d get drunk and do blow to stay out as long as possible, just to avoid having to come back to
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