*
After that night, she started looking forward to Saturday nights, when the house would be full of strangers, and then somebody would crush a rock beneath a glass and roll up the powder with leaves inside a cigarette paper. When the house cleared, she would be waiting for Dante in their room, wet and ready. And after, she would curl up on his chest while he caught his breath. She was wearing him out, he told her, and he didn’t mind one bit. And she would smile, all of the worries and shame and sadness gone in those moments.
She told herself smoking primos was different than sucking on a crack pipe. She just needed to relax, that was all. She just had pressures: she had a test and she hadn’t studied hard enough. Or she hadn’t yet gotten over her pregnancy scare. Or she felt sad about keeping her marriage from her family. She wanted to share her joy, but she couldn’t. She started to become impatient for Saturday nights, waiting for the primo. She had to wait, though, because she didn’t want to ask and have one of Dante’s friends think she was needy. But there came a day when she didn’t want to wait anymore until the following Saturday. She wanted more now, though she told herself her want wasn’t truly a need. She wanted to smoke a primo before the seven days were through. So one Saturday, after she had loved Dante into an exhausted sleep, she went to his drawer and pulled it open. There were the little cellophane packets. She looked back to make sure that Dante was asleep before slipping a rock from a packet. She carefully closed the drawer, then went into the kitchen and retrieved a glass and a plate. In the bathroom, she crushed the rock into powder, and distributed it into four joints.
When Lydia drove back to campus Sunday night, she waited until dark to smoke half a primo in her car in the student parking lot, but then she quickly wanted the other half in the morning, and she crouched down in her car in the early morning while she sucked in the smoke. On the fifth day, she ran out of primos and couldn’t concentrate in classes. She felt sad for no reason, and sick, and she didn’t wait until the next day to drive to Atlanta. She skipped Friday classes and surprised Dante at the apartment. When his pager went off, and he left her, she went to his drawer. She stole two more rocks so she could make it through the entire next week.
She thought she had fooled him, that he hadn’t noticed she was borrowing from his supply, but the following Saturday morning, he told her he wanted them to take a drive. She thought he’d pull onto the highway, but he only turned onto several streets, and they stopped in front of the convenience store where he worked.
Dante pointed out a guy who stood in front. His name was Marcus. Nigger used to be the one the girls chased, back in high school. An offensive guard and rope-a-dope like a motherfucker. When Marcus had walked through the halls, he hadn’t looked left or right. He’d known everybody would give him room, and he’d dressed sharp, too.
It was winter, and Marcus wore filthy sweatpants and a T-shirt with no jacket. In front of the convenience store, his smile was a shade of dun as he held out his hand to customers, pleading. Those who were polite only shook their heads. The flesh had been stolen from his bones, but his broad chest spoke of laureled days.
“Him?” Lydia asked.
“Yeah, that nigger,” Dante said.
“You sell to him?”
“He gone get it someplace. Might as well be me. But that nigger is too far gone to ever come back, Lydia. And that’s why I’m cutting you off.”
She pretended she didn’t know what he was talking about. She kept her face immobile, but he told her he knew she had been slipping rocks from his supply to make her primos. And that was gone stop, right now, because crack was dangerous. Even when you put it in weed, it could sneak up on you. And Dante wasn’t going to be married to a crack fiend.
That night, when the house crowded, Lydia sat by Dante. She was timid and didn’t say much. When the primo came her way, she quickly said no, she was cool. And Dante patted her knee: he was proud of her. After everyone left, he came to their room, ready for loving, and she had to pretend she still liked him to get wild with her. She didn’t want him to know he had provided only half of her pleasure. She faked her moans, urging him to go deep in her, to go hard, while she gritted her teeth at the pain. In the morning, she was sore, and she looked at him sleep. So content, like the baby he had been prepared to force her to have.
That Monday, after Dante left, she called Tim’s pager number and asked him, could he come by the apartment? When he knocked, she made his sandwich and poured his special Kool-Aid. She asked, could she buy something from him? He couldn’t tell Dante, though. Sure, he told her. She didn’t care that he smirked and lidded his eyes. When he told her he’d give her the pipe for free, she said she didn’t need it. She only smoked primos, but he still put the pipe on the counter.