Free Thong on Fire by Noire Page A

home?
    I was still sitting there looking for Dip and rubbing my freezing arms and squeezing my legs together when the waitress came back with our food.
    “Here you go,” she said, setting the platters on the table. “You need some ketchup?”
    I nodded, and as soon as she walked away Dip came back and slid across from me with a grin.
    “Where was you?” I whispered, looking around. “You scared the shit outta me! I thought you left me!”
    He looked calm and relaxed. “Leave you? Baby, please. A nigga would have to be outta his mind to do some crazy shit like that.”
    The waitress was back again, this time with the ketchup. She put it down in front of me, but as soon as I picked it up Dip slid her his whole plate.
    “Yo lemme get a doggie bag,” he said, picking up a fry and biting it. “She’ll take hers to go too.”
    Minutes later I followed him out the door and down the steps to the row of cars parked out front. He was carrying a brown take-out bag in each hand and I was about to pee on myself for real.
    “Wait,” I said, shivering as he clicked open the SUV door. “I gotta pee, Dip. Real bad, and I can’t hold it neither.”
    He glanced around, then got in and stuck the bags up under the middle console. Them niggas was still loitering a few cars down. My man Tommy Danger was blasting from their stereo and mad traffic was shooting past up and down the avenue.
    “Just get in, Saucy. I’ll take you up the block to McDonald’s.”
    I shook my head and shuddered. Already I could feel the hot sting of pee trying to force its way from between my legs. “I ain’t gonna make it,” I said, then jetted back up the diner steps trying to keep my legs pressed together.
    And I almost didn’t. I got in that bathroom and barely got my thong aside as I squatted and let go and pee splashed all over the toilet seat. I couldn’t have been in there more than five minutes or so, and when I got back outside the parking lot was quiet, them niggas with the Escalade were gone, and Dip was still sitting in the driver’s seat where I’d left him.
    “Goddamn!” I said, opening the door to climb in. “I almost didn’t ma—” My words froze in my mouth. Dip was looking at me and breathing real hard. His eyes were wide and desperate and both his hands were pressed against his throat.
    Bright red blood was soaking his shirt and running down into his lap. Little red drops were on his lips, and some was even coming out his nose.
    “Oh my God.” I reached for him, then caught myself. I heard a siren in the distance and the street survival skills Dip himself had drilled into me kicked in hard. Dope. Cheese. Bullets. Cops. Outtie.
    “I’ll be right back, baby,” I told him. I reached under the center console, my hand sweeping from side to side. Dip’s eyes was begging me the whole time I was trying to find those take-out bags full of doe. When my hands came up empty, I cursed and backed away from the whip. Whoever had popped Dip had gotten what they came for. Damn. There went my riding bonus and those cherry-red Giuseppe shoes too.
    “Just hold on, Dip,” I lied dead in his face. “I’m coming right back, baby. I’m ’bout to go get you some help.”
    With one last look over my shoulder, I slammed the door shut and bounced.

Chapter 4
    Y OU NEED TO chill on all that drinking and getting high,” Tai told me the next morning. “You ain’t scared of doing all them crazy drugs? I mean, you got liquor fumes coming all out your pores, out your hair…”
    I was laying in her bed exhausted and with sore feet. I stuck my head under a pillow and gave her the finger as she opened the curtains, sending sunlight streaking into the room.
    “If your uncle coulda seen how fucked up and raggedy you was last night…your shit was wide open girl.”
    “I know,” I mumbled, digging deeper into her bed. “That’s why I called you instead of him, remember?”
    I heard her sigh.
    “I ain’t gonna be stealing my momma’s car in