Free My Bestfriend's Man by P. Dotson, Latarsha Banks Page A

handsome prince. I thought that the handsome prince would have been Brandon.
    A sense of sadness washed over me
as I thought about what could have been between us. We could have had a good
life, but he just had to go and fuck it up. I could feel the tears starting to
surface. I shook my head and tried to think about something else.
    “Since you’re here baby girl I
thought it would be nice if we all went down to visit your sister Gabby.”
    I looked from my mother to my
father. They remained silent waiting for me to respond. I haven’t been to visit
my sister in a long time. I couldn’t bring myself to do it.
      “Come on Savannah. I think it would do us all
some good. We haven’t been down to see her in a while.”
    I really didn’t want to, but I
could see it in my father’s eyes that this is something he really wanted us all
to do. Reluctantly, I nodded my head yes.
    *    *    *
    The sun was out and the summer
air of July was a bit musty. As we all walked towards our destination, I found
myself constantly swatting and ducking honey bees. It could have been my
Burberry perfume, whatever it was they were attracted to me and wouldn’t leave
me the hell alone. I hate bugs with a passion and these sons of guns were extra
aggressive today.
    My mom shook her head at me. She
kept trying to tell me if I left the bees alone they would leave me alone.
That’s bullshit because I wasn’t bothering them. Those little suckers kept
coming for me.
    “Girl, if you don’t stop. If I
didn’t know any better I would have sworn you were a city girl,” my mother
chastised.
    I didn’t respond back because
we’d finally reached our destination. I could feel my heart starting to pound
against my chest. I could feel my emotions about to take over. My father must
have sensed this because he wrapped his arms around me. I gladly laid my head
on his shoulder.
    We both stood back and watched as
my mother placed a fresh bouquet of flowers on my sister’s grave. My beautiful
baby sister died over ten years ago. She was just eight and I was twelve. As I
stood there staring at her tombstone the memories came flooding back.
    I remember the sirens, because
they were so loud. They scared the shit out of me. It was around eight o’ clock in the morning when the police banged on
our front door. I jumped at the sound of my mother’s screams. Out of instinct,
I jumped up and looked over towards my sister Gabby’s bed.
    At the time. I thought nothing of
it when it was empty. I put on my robe, slipped my feet in a pair of slippers
and walked out into the living room. My mother was hysterical and my father did
all he could do to console her. He tried to get me to go back to bed, but I
wouldn’t. I wanted to know what was wrong with mommy and where was Gabby.
    Later on that morning after the
police had finally left and my father tucked my mother into bed, he told both
me and Roxie the devastating news. Gabby’s lifeless body was found in the pond
we use to play in just a few blocks away from our house.
    Her death was ruled as an
accidental drowning. The cops claimed she snuck out of bed and walked to the
pond, went in too deep and drowned. I didn’t believe that bullshit and my
parents didn’t either, but our opinion really didn’t matter, they made the
decision and there wasn’t much we could do about it.
    “Let us pray,” my father said
removing his arm from around my shoulder.
    He held out his hands. My mother
took one hand and I took the other. As my father began to pray, I couldn’t hold back my tears any longer.
They came gushing out like a broken faucet. I lived with the guilt of my
sister’s death every day of my life.
    “Shhh,” my father said as he did
his best to console me. “Come on Karen,” he said to my mother.
    I watched her blow a kiss towards
Gabby’s headstone before helping him walk me to the car. The entire drive back
my mother and father did their best to console me. They told me over and over
again that