Page 6 of His Obsession Her Cure
Pepper
FIVE YEARS LATER: PRESENT
T he smell of stale body odor and portable toilets infiltrated my nose as I sat in the greyhound bus station with my ticket and a small bag of essentials; including the vital documents that I would need to start my life over, like my new ID, social security card and my birth certificate, turning me from Pepper Leila Mckinney to Leila Pepper Anderson.
Anderson being my mother’s maiden name. Tyron had somehow been able to get these for me along with a few hundred dollars.
He had been there for me in a way he hadn’t for a while now.
It was like old times, but who am I kidding?
It was probably to relieve some of the guilt he felt from introducing me to Taye’s crazy ass that day at the BBQ.
He watched in shame from the sideline as his brother manipulated, abused me and played with my heart.
For five years I let him fool me into believing that he was everything I needed and that he would take care of me.
But like Nyx told me he would, he hurt us more times than I could count, just to feed his sick need to control me.
At first, he told me that my differences made me special and he didn’t mind that I wasn’t like everyone else.
But then he started trying to change me into someone I didn’t recognize, someone that Nyx refused to talk to anymore.
He was smart and when his mask started to crack, he switched to using the same tactics as my aunt to keep me under his thumb, constantly threatening to have me involuntarily committed.
I spent the last five years being groomed by Taye to be the woman he told me he always dreamed of but when I couldn’t live up to those dreams, he punished me.
His punishments usually consisted of causing me pain until the point of collapse before he fucked me whether I was conscious of not.
I wouldn’t be subjected to anymore of his mental and physical torture.
Last night put an end to the hell I had been living since the day I told Taye I was his.
“This is it?” I asked, looking at the only person I had left that I thought would keep me safe.
“It is,” he said. “And so, you know I’m not mad. You did what you had to do. You deserve so much better than this life.” Tyron said with tears in his eyes.
At this point in my life I couldn’t care less if he was okay with what I had to do to protect myself.
I believed he truly loved me, and I knew that he didn’t know what his brother was capable of when it came to me.
But he wasn’t blind to the year of torment his mother caused me before I was handed off to his brother for his turn and that couldn’t be undone with tears and a couple hundred dollars.
“I love you, cousin,” he said before he left.
The intercom announced my bus was boarding and I hurried to the doors with my ticket in hand.
I was one of the first few people to get on, so I chose a window seat right behind the driver on his right side.
I wanted to be close to the front since it felt safer.
I had learned to listen to my instincts instead of traipsing through the world with rose colored glasses on anymore.
That kind of thinking got me into the last mess.
“All you had to do was listen to me in the first place and none of this would be necessary. But I won’t keep beating a dead horse.
” Nyx giggled. “Nah, seriously let this be the last time you disregard my help. Neither one of us can make it without the other Pepper, remember that.” She hissed before going quiet.
I got comfortable, letting her words sink in.
She was right, but I would never tell her arrogant ass that.
Reclining the seat, I put in my earbuds and started an audiobook for the long ride ahead.
It took fourteen hours to get to Brookview, after a two-hour layover in the city of Timberline.
By the time I arrived at 1:15 PM, I was tired and smelled like a bus bathroom, but it didn’t matter because I was ready to start this new journey.
As soon as my feet touched the ground I headed over to the desk at the back of the station.
There was a pretty girl behind the computer who looked to be about my age, maybe a little older.
She was holding a phone up, having an animated conversation like she was talking to someone on Facetime.
“Girl, let me call you back. I got people at my counter.” She said with a grimace like she smelled something foul.
“This bitch ain't about to let you use her phone, Pep.” Nyx whispered like anyone could hear her but me.
“Have faith. People can surprise you.” I mumbled under my breath.
“Yeah right.” She huffed.
“What you need?" the girl said, looking me over.
“Um, could I use your phone to call a ride please?” I asked her as sweetly as I could.
She sighed dramatically like I just asked her for one of her kidneys. “Does this look like the Apple store to you? What I look like letting you use my phone? It’s a corner store down the block. You can buy a burner there.” She snapped and went back to her phone.
“I told you. I told you. That hoe was gon’ play in our face. You always trying to be so nice and normal, tryin’ to fit in and shit. Bitches like this don’t know how to respond to kindness. All they understand is violence. But by all means try again boo boo.” She laughed.
I took a long sigh trying to get my emotions under control, deciding to use a different approach.
“I’m sure I could get a phone at the corner store but unfortunately, I don’t have money for that right now.
It doesn’t even have to be your phone. I could use your office phone if you have one.
” I said sweetly with a smile. My mother always said to remain calm in instances when my instincts were telling me to lash out.
The girl behind the desk looked at me like I was shit on the bottom of her shoes before rolling her eyes.
“Look, I got shit to do and it ain’t to run a phone service for every homeless broad that walks in here.
So again no, company policy. No helping the homeless and as a matter of fact if you ain’t got no money ya broke ass need to go this ain’t no rest stop. ”
“See this is why I don’t ask people for shit. Muthafucka want to act like they better than everybody. Now if I make you jump behind that desk and beat the breaks off her bird brain ass, I’d be wrong, right.” Nyx grumbled in my head.
My hand twitched against my thigh. I could almost feel my hand reaching across the desk and grabbing the wrist of the hand she was using to hold her phone, bending it back until it broke, making that clean snapping sound Nyx loved.
“You catch more flies with honey than vinegar,” I whispered to no one, having heard the saying before.
“Yeah, well I’m not tryin’ to catch no damn flies and I burn hives, I don't feed them. Plus, she would look so much better with a few broken bones. All you have to do is reach over annnd…Snap!”
“No, I’ll ask someone else.” I said to Nyx, giving the girl an unsuccessful attempt at a smile. She grimaced and went back to her phone.
I turned on my heels and headed the other way towards the waiting area near the door I came in by the buses.
There was an elderly man with kind eyes standing at the lockers near the seating area with an old flip phone in his hand.
I walked up to him and smiled just enough to look innocent and harmless.
“Hello sir, sorry to bother you, but my phone went dead, and I really need to call my ride. Could I use your phone for just a second?”
“Here you go darlin’.” He said with no hesitation.
It was so easy to manipulate people, that was why my parents taught me that it was wrong. But right now, I’m sure they would rather I manipulate this gentleman with kindness than to beat the attendant to death with her own phone and hide her body in a closet.
“It would make me feel better.” Nyx cackled.
“Hush,” I said dialing the number I had burned into memory from years of study sessions and secret conversations. When my only friend answered, her voice was kind and warm, I smiled but for real this time.
“Hello.” Char said.
“Char, it’s me. I’m here.”
“Pepper? Girl, what? Where are you?” She said damn near yelling in my ear.
“Why is she always so fucking loud?” Nyx groaned.
I rolled my eyes and then said. “I finally got away. I’m at the bus station here in Brookview.” I told her. “Can you come pick me up before I do something unpleasant to the rude attendant here?”
“Of course, Pep. I’m on the way. Tell Nyx to behave until I get there,” she said before hanging up.
Charlotte or Char as she liked to be called was the only person in my life that knew everything about me including my inner voice Nyx.
From the moment we met she just got me and never judged me for my quirks.
After hearing me talk to myself a time or two she asked about it, and I was truthful and amazingly she didn’t treat me any differently or stop talking to me all together.
“Here you are,” I said, giving the phone back to the nice man. “And thank you for being so kind.”
“No problem, Suga. Take care.” He said, walking away.
I went over to the seats and sat down, ignoring the sharp gaze of the attendant behind her desk as I waited for my only friend.
Char and I met in a future med student group online the year before I got with Taye.
She was super sweet, funny, loved to read, watch scary movies and had big dreams as a surgeon.
Charlotte was someone that I cliqued with immediately.
We both bonded over our goals and aspirations but more so over the fact that both our parents weren’t here to see us make it in life.