THE BOOK CLUB PROLOGUE

THE SHOE QUEEN QUAGMIRE

THE TEXT MESSAGES

I was half asleep lying in my bed. I’m in a place I really didn’t wanna be physically and in spirit. I never sleep soundly. I’m usually up within the darkness of the wee hours thinking and sometimes I open up my laptop and work on these novels I can never seem to finish.

Just a couple of years ago I was able to type all day. Once I finished up a novel in three months and it was 100,000 words. Now I struggle to get 3000 words a day out of my brain. I’m not happy and I know it. You wouldn’t notice it though because I hide my feelings behind sarcasm and wit. I’m not as witty or as sarcastic as people think, I’m actually a very melancholy individual. I am writing this because once again I have found myself alone. You are not reading a piece of fiction right now. You are reading therapy and you are reading the memoirs of a man who has lost a bit of himself. This tale is more than me losing a woman.

What is happiness? I often think about that shit. Sometimes it’s writing and sometimes its sitting back and reading a good book after a nicely rolled blunt, at least for me. But I don’t read as much as I used to because I’m to busy typing my own books to concentrate on any other authors work. I think this is a part of the problem because I was an adamant reader and now that bit of joy has been ripped from me. Now I have to write and cannot read.

So as I lay pondering my worth in this world I receive a text message from a woman who I thought I knew. And this is the story of my life. I have always had difficulties with women. I don’t know why I pick the wrong ones or why they pick me, but it has always been like this. Once I narrowed it down to being my fault alone but I know otherwise now. I used to be a real asshole towards women. So when a female does something wrong to me I usually take it as karma. Like I’m getting from the current women what I’ve given to some other woman in my past. Thus I’ve grown a bit of tolerance toward females. Just a few years ago I hadn’t any tolerance. I would have jumped out of this situation I’m in just as soon as I caught wind of the bullshit.

I’m in a stage of my existence where I can honestly be honest with myself. For most of my life I wasn’t aware of who I was, and being so unaware of me in the past prevent the people around me from understanding who I truly was. Who was I and who am I now? One experience with a woman has allowed me to understand myself. Ironically enough she was the first woman who actually experienced the real me. Now I’m faced with trying to situate whether or not the actually me is worth anything at all. It seems I was worth more as the lie.

The text message I received should have had me going crazy but oddly enough it didn’t. I was very calm. It was like I expected it to arrive at the ungodly hour it did. The message I received became a series of messages and things just built up but I still felt little emotion from it. All those text messages just made me begin to write this and really think about all the females I’ve been with in my life since as far back as junior high school.

When I got this text message at 3:18 in the a.m. asking me are you awake. I knew some more drama was about to go down. This woman has been causing me problems since I met her thus I am here writing about her to you. I know a text asking whether or not I’m awake or not is simple enough but it isn’t. I knew it wasn’t. That text was followed up by I can’t talk on the phone because once I got the text I called her. I don’t like text messaging. I prefer phone conversing because I don’t have the patience to type out sentences on a fucking cell phone.

So she didn’t pick up the phone and left another text message that said I cannot talk on the phone. This is something I’ve gotten from her since I’ve been involved with her so it wasn’t anything to really think about. But then I received another message saying that she had to ask me something important. I don’t like to get asked shit through text messaging. But I was curious and I was in love so I typed; ask the question and she did. She asked me if she could stay with me. But before I could ask why she followed it up with he raped me and just rolled over and went to sleep.

I was like whoa! Now listen, you don’t know the whole story yet. This is just one situation amongst many that I’m gonna talk about as we scroll through this portion of my existence. I just wanted to begin with the end because as I write this it’s happening.
A friend called me in the middle of this series of text messages. He asked me what was I doing. I told him that I was going through some bullshit right now. He was a bit concerned. I didn’t tell him about the text messages or anything because I didn’t want him to give me good advice. He would have told me to leave this woman alone. And I guess I didn’t wanna do that, maybe because I was stupid…

So he raped her. All I could think is: did he truly rape her. Why hasn’t she called the cops? Why did she lie and tell me she had moved out when she hadn’t. Why is she contacting me with this bullshit now? Why doesn’t she just stay with that asshole, obviously she likes assholes since she’s been with him for like 10 years and he has never been the best nigga from what I’ve been told?
Nevertheless I respond back in text and got a bit more information. Now all the while I’m calm and simply responding back with you lied to me; which she obviously did from what the text entailed. And I text why don’t you leave now because she types I’m gonna leave in the morning and pack cloths and come over to your place after work.

Wow, a man rapes you and you stay in the damn building, I’m thinking. Once I give you a bit more of the situation you are gonna have a different opinion of this woman I call the Shoe Queen. But at that particular point in time I was riding with my own feelings because at the time the only information I was receiving was through text messages from her cell phone and at the time it was what it was.
So she types I’m still waiting for an answer, you know, whether she can stay with me or not. I type I'm not saying no but I aint answering you through a text.
I guess I’m feeling bad for her but to be honest I was feeling a bit disgusted and bad for myself. I was tired of all the bullshit. My life seems to be one huge concentration of shit produced by bulls. I had two book deadlines and I just finished a book that I was obligated to hand over to a publisher who I’ve been having a conflict of interest with. But by handing that book over I in turn sever dealing with this person ever again. When you just hand a person over 90,000 words and you know it’s for nothing, it hurts. So this woman who might have quite possibly hurt me with these text messages didn’t dent a portion of my armor.

I was already hurt and in the dark thinking about shit and feeling a bit miserable before I received the first text. So the last two text messages I got from her that morning went something along the lines of he wants more, I gotta say something quick. Yo that really fucked me up but what fucked me up more was the fact that she followed that up with see you later, my husband.

Husband!? I’m thinking; your husband just raped you because if he wasn’t your husband he would be arrested right now. But he aint her husband, they have a child together but he aint get engaged to her or marry her and they have been together for 10 years. He’s done nothing but use her so I’ve been told, yet here I am typing about this shit while he wants more, and she gotta say something quick. Aint that some bullshit.
So now I’m here writing about this shit. I was talking to this other author, a good friend of mine and I candidly gave her a few stories about me and females, but mostly about the problems I‘ve been having with the infamous Shoe Queen. She said that I should write a book about it.
I thought about writing a book about my relationships with women in general on many occasions and well now I figured fuck it. This last situation was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
He wants more, I gotta say something quick.

I was thinking he raped you, why haven’t you left yet? That’s all I thought but then why think, let this bitch come over later and explain things when there is no need for explanation. And let me explain to her why I don’t even wanna touch her anymore.
She is the only women who I ever considered dishonest. Every other women I’ve ever been with I could quite honestly say was very honest. And upon us getting together both uninvolved or within a quagmire. All the others hadn’t a whole lot of luggage or problems that dealt with another person, specifically another man. And we both were initially honest or at least they were.

I was usually the one who caused the problems and the one who lied. It had never been the other way around till now. I commend myself for handling things as smoothly as I did. I felt no hostility towards this woman and I could have cared less about her at that particular moment.
I said at that particular moment. In a couple of hours all of this would be explained and I was able to breath easier. But because of the drama I had been experiencing I think I was just properly prepared for the bullshit.

I never trusted her. And why would I trust any woman besides my mother at that particular point in my life. And more importantly why would I trust the Shoe Queen. That early morning series of text messages showed me that I shouldn’t have anyway. Many hours passed until I began to see things any other way. And many days went by with no incidents but then like always something else would spawn. Keep reading, you’ll see.

To be honest it was me not trusting her intelligence than actually trusting her. I know is doesn’t sound right but its how I felt because then I could only think the Shoe Queen was stupid. Now it realize I was stupid. The text messaging incident should have been the incident that completely severed me from this woman. It didn’t. Sometimes I wonder why? Was it some perverse love I felt or was it the drama that kept me still entangled with this person I call the Shoe Queen.
Maybe we both were stupid. But the guy, the one why rolled over and went to sleep after supposedly raping her, her baby’s father, well he was a genius, and still is and we shall call him the Genius because of his intellect. I’m gonna explain why he was and still is a genius later on. Right now I wanna get into why she hadn’t called the cops after he raped her. If what she text messaged me was the truth?

Maybe she thinks she got raped, I was thinking directly after the messages stopped coming. First off she said that she had already moved out. If she did move out why was she at his place sending me text messages about getting raped and packing her things. Now if that wasn’t the truth then what was? These messages were coming from her phone. I have her name on my cell’s caller id. Those text messages were the truth at that point if nothing else wasn’t.
And besides that, at one point she was still living with this dude, her baby’s father and dealing with me. How could this Shoe Queen live in a house with a man and expect me to believe that he wasn’t fucking her. Better still, how could I believe that shit when the Shoe Queen tells me this? I’m gonna really get into this later on in this book but let me give you a few details just to keep the suspense going. I call these details the six factors because these were the only facts I had, the only things that I knew were genuine truths.

One: she had been living with this guy for ten years, and she told me after we get acquainted that she wasn’t in love with him anymore. Yet she was still living in the same apartment with him.

Two: he is the father of her daughter and that is her excuse for still being with him and for supporting him for a large portion of their living situation, though he never asked for her hand in marriage nor made her his fiancé.

Three: she claimed they hadn’t had sex two months prior to me getting involved with her. But she is a very sexual being. This is the toughest part, the hardest factor to believe and except, thinking that I was what she wanted or thinking that she just wanted dick… whether mine or the baby’s fathers or any other niggas…?

Four: he tried to get some sex from her during his birthday and she claimed she prevented it and told him about me that day. But she never told me exactly what she said about me…? And that was the night she left the house. Did she truly leave because of some faithfulness towards me? Or was this just apart of the lie and he simply found out that she was cheating and kicked her ass out!

Five: he stole her cell phone and got my number from it that same night and called me that morning and has been calling me ever since, motherfucking stalking me!

Six: he calls me every other day now, sometimes more than 10-15 times. He leaves messages talking about how he had just finished fucking ‘my girl’ last night and we are both with a dirty bitch. He also says that this isn’t the first time he has caught her cheating and that her family and friends will lie to protect her and that we both are victims. He also told me that he got about four other niggas numbers from her phone when he stole it the first time, meaning that he has taken the phone from her before. Two of the numbers being other authors that he suspects she has fucked or was planning on fucking.

I can go on but I felt six factors were sufficient. And besides that I didn’t wanna spoil the fun for you since this things gets even more interesting. Actually, sometimes I really wonder whether or not this Shoe Queen is or was just some book groupie or just some psychological case because quite frankly I still haven’t figured her out yet.

After I break down some of the details not only will you understand why I shall never frolic with a book club again but you will also understand why I was so confused within this interesting relationship. She fits quite a few categories and more than a few things tempted me to stay away from her since the beginning, since out first encounter, but for some strange reason, I fell in love with this woman.

But before I fell in love, while I was simply fucking the hell out of her after a nice meal at a great restaurant or after seeing a movie matinee, I used to ask myself why would she still wanna be around someone she claims she doesn’t love anymore? That no good baby’s father.
What was so good about this nigga or what was so good about me? He hardly ever worked or showed her any true affection as far as I was told. Yet before she met me she said she slept in the same bed with him. Was I stupid enough to believe that she stopped once she began sleeping with me? Like they slept in the same bed and for two months he had never fucked her. I will attempt to resolve all of these things but bear in mind as I write this, a lot of these things are still transpiring. I have edited this introduction portion of The Book Club many times based upon how my life has been altered, how I’ve been handling myself with the Shoe Queen.

This book begins and ends with the Shoe Queen more or less. You be the judge of whether or not she was a book club hoe, a straight psycho bitch, a victim of a demented baby’s father, though I feel more the victim than she in more ways than one, or if she was completely and utterly honest and I didn’t give her enough time and space. Though she had nothing but space and time, as you read you will understand. She is a part of a book club, a founding member of a book club at that, and most of those women within those book clubs are groupies. But they will not admit it but I assure you they are. Just like Trekkers are Star Trek groupies these book club women are groupies. I’m gonna explain exactly why they are and why they refuse to accept it.

One unwritten rule in our urban and street fiction genre is that you should never fuck around with groupies. Fuck them yes, but never fuck around. Don’t get attached to one and above all don’t fall in love with one. But what if you thought a woman wasn’t a groupie and she winds up being one. Or what if this is just the sort of shit that happens in general when a woman has a horrible baby’s father. And I can’t blame the end results completely on this guy, the Genius because I’ve spoken to dozens of people about this.

I conversed with quite a few women about their experiences with baby’s fathers and moving on. This has bothered me a bit and I really wanted to gather as much information as I could. Whether from first and second generation hoochie mamas and chicken heads or from very stable, educated and working class women, I got so many good stories. My story is just one of many. I’m just on the other side of the coin.
Keep reading.

He wants more, I gotta say something quick.
What the fuck was she gonna say to him? How do you want it? I mean did she honestly expect me to believe all of this and how dumb did she think I was. And even if all of this was true, wouldn’t I be stupid to deal with her. Why would I want a woman with this much drama? A woman who didn’t know how to handle herself in a situation that she got herself in, and I got myself right in the middle of this shit also. I should have never slept with her that day, yes I’m gonna walk you through my existence with the Shoe Queen. Our first sexual encounter was one of the most enjoyable feelings I’ve ever had. She was such a breath of fresh air, or her pussy was, and well I guess I can blame the last woman I was with before her because that woman was the worst sexual partner I ever had.

What made me think the Shoe Queen was gonna honestly truly leave this nigga when she hadn’t been able to leave him before or didn’t initiate it till she met me. Did she enjoy misery that much or did she simply enjoy him and me at the same time. And maybe she was never gonna leave that nigga. And what should I have done, share this woman or just kicked her to the curb. And this curb wasn’t to far from the sidewalk because she’s gonna always have this guy in her life, her baby’s father. These were my thoughts as I sat upon my bed within the darkness of the early morning. I had nothing else to do but ponder; that and roll some weed up in a Dutch Master cigar and smoke…

Baby’s fathers are some horrible niggas. We are gonna examine them later on. Right now I just want you to vibe with me. Feel what this book is about because it’s more than just me venting and more than the text messaging incident having a very unusual twist.
It’s about this relationship I had with the Shoe Queen and my philosophical views on women. A lot of you women are gonna be mad at me but you gotta feel my side a bit and understand me. So I’m gonna explain myself starting at the beginning with my first encounter with this Shoe Queen so you’ll know that I’m not such a bad dude.

And neither is the Shoe Queen if she was actually telling the truth. Let us suppose she was and think about how she handled the situation or how she didn’t handle it. At times I simply didn’t want anything to do with her, but other times I longed to be inside her or simply to share a moment with her. I fell in love with her on so many levels and often enough I thought that she was in a bad situation and her bad situation simply migrated towards me.

And like I said, either she was stupid or I was or maybe we both were but her baby’s father was a genius and he’s the one with no formal education, shit he aint even a citizen of the damn country. And here I was with a degree from a university. Here I was the established author. And here I was with so many book groupies and so many women within my past and present still dangling from puppet strings and I found myself preferring to amuse myself with this book club woman, this Shoe Queen.

How about them apples…