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watched you do plenty of things that you shouldn’t have, been places where you seriously had no business being and all I could do was shake my head and hope for the best.”
“Am I that bad?” Barbara asked and then she thought about being Barbie, the pampered princess who has it all, and how that feeling of power and entitlement was what left her unprepared. “Yeah, I am that bad.”
“Like I said, Barbara, the biggest mistake you make, is that you don’t pay enough attention to your environment or the people you come in contact with. You believe that all people are good and that everyone has good intentions for you, because that’s how you are.”
“It is my fault,” Barbara said feeling naïve and stupid as Black tapped on the door and walked in.
“Hello, Barbara.”
“Hi, Uncle Mike,” Barbara said and got up from her bed to hug her uncle.
“You all right?” he asked and kissed her forehead.
“I’m okay.”
“You sure?”
“No.” Barbara laughed. “But I’ll be all right, Uncle Mike,” Barbara said as Bobby came in the room.
Barbara rushed into her father’s arms and she finally broke down in tears.
“Tahanee,” Black said and extended his hand to her.
“Yes.”
“Thank you for saving her.” Black glanced at Barbara crying in her father’s arms. “Barbara is very special to me. Now come on, we need to talk,” he said, and she followed him out of Barbara’s room. “You need to tell me everything, and don’t leave anything out.”
“I’m sorry, daddy,” Barbara said as soon as the door closed. Now she was safe. There in her father’s protective arms, arms that had always been there to love and protect her for as long as she could remember. Barbara cried harder. “I’m sorry, daddy.”
“It’s okay, baby,” Bobby said and held Barbara tight. Tighter than he had ever held her. Barbara felt it too. “It’s okay, baby. You’re safe now and that’s all that matters.”
“This was my fault,” Barbara cried.
“Don’t say that,” Bobby said and led her to the bed to sit down. “This was not your fault, it’s mine. Me and your mother should have told you the truth a long time ago.”
“No. It’s my fault,” Barbara insisted. “Even though I knew, I still let this happen to me.”
“Stop that. This happened to you because of me and who I am. You had nothing to do with it.”
“I should never have come outside. I knew it was wrong,” Barbara cried. “I feel so stupid.”
Bobby sat holding Barbara tightly. Kissing her forehead while she cried. He waited until she had calmed down a little before he spoke again.
“Tell me what happened, baby. I need to know who this guy is and how you met him?”
“His name is Ram, he sells weed.” Barbara paused to see his reaction. “I met him one day when me and Destiny got some from him.”
Bobby let out a little laugh. “We’ll talk about you smokin’ weed later. “I need to know everything that you know about Ram,” Bobby said, and Barbara told her father everything that she could think of, everything he said about himself, everything that she had seen and heard during the brief time she spent either with or talking to Ram.
Bobby stayed with Barbara and held her for a half hour before Barbara took a deep breath and looked at her father.
“I’m all right, Daddy.” Barbara broke their embrace. “I know you and Uncle Mike gotta go.”
Bobby looked at his daughter for a while and then he stood up. What he saw wasn’t a little girl anymore. There was a sense of sadness that briefly washed over him at the loss of her innocence. Sure, she would always be his baby, but he had to recognize her maturity. Barbara was becoming a woman. She’s been looking like one for years.
He left Barbara’s room and went downstairs. Black was in the living room with Tahanee, Pam, Wanda, Rain and Tenikka, who had just arrived. He came in the room carrying his pump shotgun and Rain smile because she knew that he was coming with them to handle their business.
“Let’s go,” Bobby said. Black and Rain got up and followed Bobby out the house.