Page 4 of Queen of the Pole

I sat here, feeling like I was looking back at my own human sized barbie doll. Although we were sisters, Nori and I didn’t look anything alike. Nori looked like her dad, and I looked like my mom. Crazy because I was the child that my mama acted as if she hated, yet I came out with her entire face.

Nori’s skin complexion was a beautiful chocolate complexion. She had perfect skin. I can tell you right now that she only washed her face with water, yet her skin was to die for. She had a bunch of fine, jet-black hair. She washed it tonight, so she was sitting before me with her hair in two plaits. Her big eyes looked so sad. Here she was, just a baby herself, and she was raising a baby on her own. She didn’t have much of a childhood right now because her days consisted of going to school and then coming to get Nico from me or our grandma, so she could tend to him for the rest of the day.

“Nothing in particular. Deja, I just want to get out of the fuckin house. I know that this is all my fault, but I feel like I’m suffering every fuckin day. I have no life. I don’t get to hang out with any of my friends. I’m depressed. I hate how Juvie gets to live life, do whatever the fuck he wants to do, while I’m stuck at home, raising our son,” she expressed, and as soon as she finished, she burst into tears.

I sighed, listening to my sister have her moment. She was speaking on all the things that I tried to tell her ass in the beginning of her pregnancy. All the things that I didn’t want her to have to go through on her own.

“Call auntie Twan and ask her if she can watch Nico for you this weekend. I can’t do it. I’m doing this music video in Atlanta this weekend. I leave Friday and won’t be back until Monday. What about next weekend? If Twan can’t watch him for you, I can do it next weekend because I’ll be off,” I said. Still crying, she shook her head no at me.

At the same time, Lyric was walking over. Lyric was my girl. We met at the club. She danced with me. Her stage name was Honey. We had a bond with each other outside of this club shit. I looked at her as a big sister. She was four years older than me.

I took my eyes off the facetime call, so that I could cut them over at Lyric. I watched her mouth to me, asking me who I was talking to, and I mouthed right back, letting her know that it was Nori on the phone. She could hear Nori crying, so Lyric snatched the phone up, and she held it in her hand.

“What the fuck is wrong with you Nori?” Lyric asked, getting right to the point.

This is how you knew that we were family for real because she didn’t mind snapping on Nori whenever she needed to. She played that big sister role with Nori as well. Nori knew that Lyric was getting ready to get in her ass, so she quickly hung the phone up. I was about four shots in, I smoked a blunt before I got here, so I didn’t have the mental capacity to deal with my sister right now. I loved my sister like I carried her for nine months and pushed her out of me, but I was allowing her to stress me out.

I would just pull up on her tomorrow morning, so that we could finish this conversation off.

“What’s wrong with her?” Lyric wanted to know, tossing my phone down onto the vanity.

“Girl, same shit. Juvie won’t get the baby. Now she’s talking about how depressed she is. She’s missing out on having a life. Repeating back all the things that I told her when she found out that she was pregnant. I feel bad for her though. I told her that I would get Nico next weekend, so that she could go out. Lyric, she going to drive me fuckin crazy,” I spat, standing up for a second, just so I could stretch.

When I stood up, Lyric slapped me on the ass, and she took the seat down next to my station. She crossed her right leg over her left, placed her hands in her lap, and just looked at me.

“Every feeling she’s experiencing, I know how it is. I had my daughter when I was eighteen. I know how that shit feels for life to go on for everyone else, while you have to be in the house, raising a baby on your own. Luckily, I had a mama that didn’t allow me to go through that shit on my own though. She helped me, so I didn’t have to drown in it alone. She’ll shake out of it though. Nico only four months. That first year is always the hardest,” she said to me.

Before I could respond back to her, my phone started ringing on the table. Since it was facing upwards, we were both able to look down and see who was calling me. It was Hitta. That was my lil shit. He wasn’t my man, but we both carried on like we were together. As much as we both knew that we weren’t together, I’ll still get in my feelings when I find out that he fucked someone that I knew. Let him find out that I was grinning in another man’s face, and he’ll be ready to air the entire building out.

I wasn’t fuckin with Hitta right now. Word got back to me that he fucked one of the strippers here that he knew I was at odds with. I’ve been dodging his ass for days now.

“That’s why I came back here. To tell you that he just walked in with a few of his home boys. I’m sure that’s why he’s calling. He saw me, and asked me if you were here, but you know I ignored his ass,” she said.

Because Lyric and I were so close, she knew everything that took place in my personal life, including this toxic ass relationship that I had going on with Hitta. I wanted to leave the nigga alone. I swear to God I did, but I couldn’t shake him. Every time I would tell him that I was done with his ass and go on these long rants about how I was going to stop letting him fuck me, he’ll pull up on me, drop dick inside me, eat my pussy until I faint, and then I’ll forget about whatever beef that we had going on. You would think that with all the free game that my auntie gave me over the years, that I would have been strong enough to kick his ass to the curb, and entertain the millions of other niggas that are lined up to talk to me, but foolishly, I continued to deal with him and continued to get my heart broken every other week.

“Ima walk past him like I don’t even see him. Lyric, you know me. You know how I feel about niggas. I personally feel like they all fuck around. What Hitta does on his free time doesn’t have shit to do with me, but at the same time, don’t fuck a bitch that you know I don’t get along with. I don’t like that. The nigga would have been ready to kill me for doing that,” I vented, flopping back down in the chair because I needed to finish with my hair.

“I just don’t get why you continue to deal with him. Yes, Hitta is fine, and the nigga is paid, but bitch, you’re fine, and paid. Deja, you can have any nigga you want. The face on you is out of this world. Your body is to die for. Bitches go and lay on the table and tell the doctor that they want a Deja body. You let him try you every other fuckin week. One would really assume that you were one of these average bitches, judging by the way you continue to let him skate!” Lyric fussed at me like I knew she would do.

She hated Hitta for me. She thought I deserved better. I would agree, and say that I deserved better as well, but did I?

“Deja, what you doing, baby? It’s hundreds of people out there waiting to see you. You told me to give you ten, and it’s been fifteen. What’s up?” Blue, the club owner asked, making his way inside of the locker room.

“Blue, don’t start with me. Let me get my shit together,” I fussed at him.

When I said that to him, he laughed and walked further into the locker room. As he was making his way over to me, Lyric stood up. She took the curling iron out of my hands, so that she could speed it up, finishing the job for me. While she did that, I tended to my makeup, touching it up again.

Blue came over to my station, posting up, and folding his arms. I’ve been dancing for Blue since I graduated high school. That’s how long his club has been in business. Literally, the day after I graduated high school, he had his grand opening. My auntie told me about the club, telling me how she believed it would be a good fit for me. Honestly, I think she only hyped it up the way that she did because she already didn’t want me dancing, plus she didn’t want me dancing at the exact club that she worked at. She had nothing but good things to say about Blue’s club, and that’s really what sold me.

Before this became one of the hottest spots in Miami, Blue was a street nigga. He was heavy in the drug game, running an entire operation with plenty of men working beneath him. From what’s been told to me, he ran up millions being in the streets. With those millions, he was able to invest in this club. Just from the setup of this club, you could tell that he didn’t spare any expenses. All you had to do was take one step into this club, see the expensive marble floors, and you’ll know that that drug money was long. The lighting throughout this club was unlike any other lighting from the other clubs that I’ve been. Sound system was amazing. When you get into those VIP sections, they look like mini penthouse suites.

Blue had a vision of how he wanted his club to look, and the way he wanted it to be ran. Because everyone knew that Blue was this hustling, get money nigga, girls from all around the world came out to audition to dance here. For the first time in my life, I was nervous that my face and my body wouldn’t seal the deal for me. I was fresh meat, fresh out of high school, going against bitches that flew from Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, all over the world to try to get a spot here. I could dance, the body was tea, but my pole dancing skills weren’t the best. I was pretty much a rookie.

Out of the thousands that auditioned, only forty girls were chosen. Blue saw something in me. I know this because he told me that five years ago. He looked me in my eyes and told me that I was going to be a beast with this shit. I got my ass in the gym because I wanted to maintain the sickening body that I already had, and I would go to a dance studio with my aunt, where she taught me everything that I needed to know.

When I say that these hoes weren’t fuckin with me, I truly mean that. I could talk back to Blue and tell him to wait, even though I’d told him earlier that I only needed ten minutes. If any of these other bitches would have told Blue to wait, I’m sure he would have snapped on them, telling them to take their ass home for the night. Blue wasn’t going to do that to me though. I made this club a shit load of money, so he treated me as such.

“The Bennett brother’s just pulled up. You and Honey can take that section. Ima put like two other girls in there with ya’ll. Hitta here. You think that nigga going to be tripping about me putting you in the section with the Bennett brothers?” Blue asked me.