CATS & DOGS

Destinee Fontaine tries to navigate a relationship in which she is lied to, cheated on, and physically abused...

Ever wonder why cats and dogs are natural enemies. The obvious answer is that they are direct opposites, as far as pets go.  Cats stay in the house.  Dogs stay outside.  Cats are smaller and weaker. Dogs are bigger and stronger.  Cats purr.  Dogs bark.  To me, there seems to be a much deeper reason.

        The relationships between cats and dogs reminds me of the relationships between men and women.  Women are supposed to be the smaller, weaker sex, or kat; while men are the bigger, stronger dawg.  Women are supposed to keep a clean house, and take care of the inside; while men roam the neighborhood freely, marking their territory.  Instead of lifting their legs, they use lawn mowers, weed eaters, and leaf blowers.                    

        I’ve always had a love for dawgs…until that love nearly destroyed me.  Now kats are my thang. 

        “Destiny, wake up.  You’re gonna be okay.  You’re gonna make it.”  That’s the voice I heard as I was losing my third child.  Two miscarriages in three years, after aborting my first child because I thought I wasn’t ready.   “Where’s Jimmy”, I remembered saying.  Jimmy was my two miscarriaged and one abortioned baby daddy…and the dawg that I still loved.    Only this day, like too many others before it, he wasn’t there for me. 

        Jimmy was about six feet tall, and weighed about two hundred pounds. He was very muscular because he had played college football.  His hair was full of waves because he always wore this black wave cap, and he had dimples on each side of his cheek.  He and I were together for three years before I realized that I deserved better.  I fell in love with his dimples.  They were the deepest dimples that I had ever seen, and they could send chills through my body quicker than any winter day.  When we first met, he was the sweetest person ever.  He would always comment on how pretty my toes were.  Although they weren’t always cute, he would still compliment them in some way.  So, I began making weekly pedicure appointments.  If Jimmy thought so much of my toes, I wanted to make sure I kept them looking good.  It was at this point that I realized how powerful a person’s words could be.  Words can ‘cause’ a person to become President of the United States.  Words can also ‘cause’ a person to become a fraction of what their full potential is. 

        I was young, and Jimmy was determined to mold me into his idea of the perfect woman; someone who would lie down when he wanted her to; someone who wouldn’t ask questions, or talk back, when he cursed her out for something that he did wrong.  I was very naive.  I just didn’t get it.  Until one day it hit me… literally.

        The first six months that Jimmy and I were together, we didn’t argue, ever.  No raised voices, no nothing.  I really did think I was in Heaven.  It was my first serious relationship and I didn’t know what to expect.  My other friends always complained about how their men always tried to change them, and here I had a man who was so sensitive and attentive towards me.  I was the envy of all my girlfriends.  I can still here them now; “You so lucky girl”…”That Jimmy a good man girl”…”You better hold on to him girl”.  It’s been five years since Jimmy and I broke up, and I still crave those feelings; those feelings of having all my girlfriends envy me.  Those feelings of knowing I one-upped my girls.  All these years later, my girlfriends have moved onward and upward… and I still crave those feelings.  I truly believe……that Jimmy broke me. 

        Jimmy and I had our first argument because I wouldn’t have sex with him.  I just had the abortion and was supposed to wait four days before having sex again.  Well, it was three days, two hours, and by Jimmy’s count ten minutes; and he couldn’t wait any longer.  “It’ll be okay baby, it’s only a few hours away”, Jimmy said, trying his best to pry my legs apart.  I just couldn’t do it; not even one hour sooner than I was supposed to.  That’s just the perfectionist in me.  I needed everything to be done by the book, right down to the very last detail.  Well, Jimmy jumped up…”mumble, mumble, damn b***h”..…”mumble, mumble, damn hoe”.  I looked at Jimmy.  “What did you say?”  “You just like all the other hoe’s, thinking you can control me with what’s between your legs”.  “Well, you can’t control me, I aint the one”.  I said, “Jimmy, you’re being ridiculous. You know what the doctor said”.  “Oh, I forgot, you weren’t there.”  Jimmy said, “You know I don’t like clinics, they creep me out”.  “Besides, a few minutes won’t hurt nothing.  You just trying to control a brotha, that’s all”.  “A few minutes, it’s almost a full day too soon!” I found myself screaming at the top of my lungs at this simple-minded brotha.  Jimmy said “If you loved me, you’d do it”.  “What.”  “You know I love you.  But I still don’t feel right down there”.  “Girl, that’s all in your mind.  It’s been long enough”.  Then he said something that changed my life forever…”Damn Destinee, be a woman for once in your life”.  I don’t know why, but that hurt me more than the ‘b*****s’ and ‘hoes’ ever did.  After he said that to me, I gave in.  I just let him have his way, and I can never take it back.  We had sex that night, and the next night, and the next.  Other than a little discomfort, I felt okay.  At the time, I thought it was a good decision.  I mean, I had my man back, we weren’t arguing, and sex every night.  I actually felt like a woman. 

        There’s one thing that I can honestly say about Jimmy now, that I didn’t want to see back then; Jimmy sure loved the ladies.  I use to rationalize it by saying that he was just a nice guy.  You see, all women are attracted to nice guys.  However, he was my man, and I just wished he would act like it. Growing up mama always used to tell me to be careful what you wish for…

        Jimmy told me that he was going to the store one afternoon.  He came back at 2:30 in the morning.  His excuse was that he saw one of his boys there, so they went to hang out and he just lost track of time.  I was just happy that he was okay, so I believed him.  Jimmy would do things like that more and more frequently.  I was always worried about him.  I even got an ulcer from worrying about that man so much.  The more the excuses came, the less my girls envied me.  The more I went to social functions by myself, the less special Jimmy and I became in my girlfriends’ eyes.  My girls would say things like, “Where’s Jimmy”?  Or, “I just saw Jimmy on the south side, did you know he was there”? Although none of them had said it, I knew that their envy had turned to sympathy.  They knew I was being played. Hell, I knew I was being played. But; I was blinded by this smooth talking brotha, and my love for him. 

        I remember seeing him at her house.  After all the excuses, I decided to listen to my gut; so I followed him.  It was about midnight, and he told me that he was meeting his pat’nas at the pool hall.  I so wanted to believe him.  I was gonna give him the benefit of the doubt too; but her house didn’t look like no pool hall.  It was a blue house with white trim, and there was a red minivan in the yard. I must have been out there for a couple of hours before I finally looked through the window, and I’ll be damned; there was my man all hugged up with a white girl. She wasn’t just white, she was pale looking, and pudgy; she looked a little doughy; like how you make white bread.  So, from that point on, I always referred to her as white bread.   There was a little mixed baby crawling around on the floor too.  I’m like, “What the f**k”.  I let out a little laugh, mainly because this is the last thing that I expected to see.  This n***a has another family on the side.  I started to think back on all the excuses, questioning myself…”How does he find the time”?  “He’s always with me”.  Then I got angry.  Not at Jimmy, but, at this white bread b***h.  “How dare she try and steal my man”.  I resisted the urge to go and knock on her door.  I thought to myself, I’ll catch her alone, and then it’s on.  As I backed away from the window, I could hear Jimmy in his fatherly voice…”how’s daddy’s little boy”.  At that moment, I felt nauseous.  I began throwing up.  I ran back to my car and drove home.  I still felt sick the next morning so I called one of my girls to come and take me to the doctor.  I didn’t know what to expect. But, after a few tests, the doctor came back with some news…I was pregnant.  I was gonna have Jimmy’s baby.  The worst night of my life, has somehow turned into the best.  I didn’t realize how much I wanted Jimmy’s baby until I was actually pregnant again.  Somehow, word had gotten to Jimmy that I was in the hospital, because he came up there.  He acted all worried about me.  I still couldn’t get white bread out of my head.  All this was a lot to deal with in one night.  I had all these thoughts in my head that I wanted to tell Jimmy. “How dare you cheat on me”…”How could you have a baby by someone else, and still claim that you love me”… “What am I not giving you that you need to go somewhere else and find”?  I wanted to tell him that I knew, and that white bread wasn’t cute.  All these things danced around in my mind.  Yet, when he walked into my room, I never said a word.  I let him make it.  His touch, his smell, brought everything that I loved about him back.  I figured that if I had Jimmy’s baby, that would keep him around.  Surely he’d choose me over her, right.          

        I told Jimmy the news about the baby and he was really excited.  I was happy to see him so happy.  It almost made me forget about his other family…almost.  After the abortion, Jimmy was real worried about whether I was gonna have this baby or not.  I assured him that I would.  A few weeks passed and we were enjoying each other and the pregnancy.  We were deciding on baby names.  I would pick the name if it was a boy, and he would pick the name if it were a girl. We wanted to switch it up a bit.  Of course, Jimmy wanted a boy. He was with me so much that I really thought that I had won. I figured he couldn’t possibly be kicking it with white bread anymore, when he was with me every minute that he wasn’t at work.  So, while there was another child involved, I really only cared about me and mine. 

        Jimmy and I settled on a couple of biblical names.  Genesis if it was a girl and Isaiah if it was a boy.  I really loved the way our relationship seemed to grow with this change.  I hadn’t thought about white bread in weeks, and Jimmy had returned to his sensitive, attentive self.  But, the more things changed, the more they stayed the same. 

        One weekend, around my 11^th or 12^th week of pregnancy, Jimmy was a no show for dinner plans that we had made.  Now, up until that point, he had really been by my side during the whole pregnancy. But, when he didn’t show and didn’t call, you can guess where my mind went; white bread.  I just new Jimmy was with her. I got so mad that I just started crying.  I couldn’t help it. People began to stare at me, but I continued to cry.  Looking back on our relationship, I know now that that day changed everything…..for me…and for Jimmy. 

        I found myself crying so uncontrollably that people started to come over to me and ask me if I was all right. I did nothing but nod and cry, nod and cry.  Finally, someone who recognized that I was in no position to drive home called me a cab.   I stayed at that restaurant for four hours waiting on Jimmy, the last two, crying.  On the way home I was thinking of all the things I would tell him.  I was gonna bust his a*s about white bread.  I was gonna kick him out the house.  I was gonna leave him this time for sure.  This baby I was carrying, I was gonna raise by myself.  I didn’t need Jimmy…I just wanted him. 

        I drifted to sleep on the cab ride home.  When I woke up, I was in the hospital.  Tubes were coming out of my arms and nose.  I didn’t know what was happening.  I looked over, and the cab driver was there.  I thought maybe we had been in a wreck, and this was Heaven.  My mouth felt dry and my body ached, so I’m thinking maybe this is Hell.  The cab driver explained to me how when he pulled up to my house, I was non responsive.  How, when he got out and opened the back door to check on me, I was sitting in blood.  He said that I was breathing, but I wouldn’t wake up.  So, he rushed me here.  One glance at the clock on the wall, and I quickly figured out that I had been away from the restaurant for roughly five hours.  I could be dead if I had tried to drive home myself.  Plus, the quick reactions of this thoughtful cab driver probably saved my life. 

        But, why am I here? What happened to make me fall unconscious in that cab in the first place; the doctors don’t know.  But, they did tell me that whatever it was, it caused me to lose the baby.  I was heart broken; all the plans that Jimmy and I had made, and now, nothing.  I was told that something caused my uterus to not be able to hold the baby any longer.  They gave me a bunch of reasons: possibly the ulcer, or stress.  They said sometimes these things just happen.  I knew better.  My body never felt like it got back right after the abortion.  That was the first time that I actually thought that Jimmy and I weren’t meant to be together.  Maybe GOD was trying to tell me something.  At this point, my girls began comparing Jimmy to all of their men.  I finally agreed with them; Jimmy was ‘No Good’. So, I had to listen to a higher power on this one.  It was time to kick Jimmy to the curb.   

        The morning came, and when I woke up, my girls were still by my side.  When I can’t count on anyone, I can count on my girls.  At this point, I knew that I would be alright without Jimmy….because I had my girls. My girls took me home, and kept me company for most of the day.  I just rested.  We cried a little because there would be no baby, but we just laughed mainly. Jimmy never showed up or called.  In my mind we were through.  About 5 minutes after my girls left, Jimmy came over.  It turns out that he had been out there waiting for my girls to leave before he came in.  Apparently, he thought a house full of women would gang up on a brotha….  Ya think.  I didn’t want to throw his s**t in the street just yet; I wanted to hear his excuse for last night first.  He left me hanging.  I wanted to know why, and if he was sorry. That’s one of our biggest problems as women; we always give men an out, a chance to explain.  We give them the opportunity to lie to us.  And some brothas can lie good…real good.  

        Jimmy started by telling me that he was sorry.  He knows he should have called, but he was helping out a friend.  I was thinking, ‘I bet you were, and I know all about it’.  But, this excuse was unlike all the other excuses in that he wasn’t the calm, cool, and collected Jimmy; his voice was cracking, and he was sweating.  I didn’t know this Jimmy.  This Jimmy was nothing like the cool under pressure brotha that I was used to.  This guy was vulnerable; almost sad.  He began by telling me the story about him being on his way to the restaurant.  As he was walking out the door, he got a call from one of his pat’nas.  Well, his pat’na was about to jump off the building where they had both worked.  He was trying to say his last good byes.  I was like ‘Jimmy, I don’t know who you think I am, but my name aint boo boo tha fool’.  He was like, ‘Please, just listen’; with his lips all quivering and s**t…so I listened.

         It turns out that his pat’na had recently purchased a home…a very expensive home. They were having cutbacks at his job, so he was laid off.  He and his fiancé had lived in the house together and they were sharing all the bills.  When he lost his job, she stayed all of two minutes.  She left him before he could get his first unemployment check.  He couldn’t make the payments on the house, so he lost it.  He had to move in with his parents. Apparently, when a man loses his job, his house, and his woman all in the same month, it’s enough to make him want to commit suicide.  How convenient for Jimmy that on the night that he and I had plans, his best friend would try to commit suicide.   Jimmy was saying things like, ‘there was a crowd of people there’, and ‘news cameras were there’.  He said that he was lifted up to the top of the building by a crane on a fire truck.   He wanted me to believe that he had to stay on that building all night to console his friend.  I wasn’t buying it.  “Jimmy, we’re through”.  “This is the last strike”.  “You are no good”.  When I told Jimmy that, I felt better than I had felt in a long time.  I was proud of myself.  Jimmy’s face dropped.  It was as if he expected me to believe him.  After all the lies that I had believed before tonight, he expected me to believe this; almost as if he was actually telling the truth.  I said, “Jimmy, you are a liar.  I want you gone”…and he left.  I didn’t even get to tell him about the baby.  As I was getting ready for bed, I flipped on the TV.  Right there on the 10’oclock news, was Jimmy; helping his friend down from the building where they worked.  The bottom of the screen read…”Local man, Jimmy Brice saves friends life”…

        That was the end of Jimmy and me.  I mean as far as a meaningful relationship goes, it was over.  I might have been wrong about that night, but I was right about Jimmy.  He was no good. So, why did I love him so?  I never apologized for not believing him that night, and he never asked me to.  I didn’t talk to him for a week after that.  I finally talked to him when he called to see if I had been to my 3-month checkup.  I had to tell him about the baby.  Now, that was one of the toughest things I have ever had to do in my life.  He had a lot of questions that I couldn’t answer.  I could tell he was distraught. He tried to hide it, but I could feel it in my bones; and I missed him.  So, I invited him over that night to talk.  When he got there, he told me he missed me.  I told him, I missed him too.  Then we made love.  This would be our new thing.  I didn’t want a dawg for a man, but the sex was great.  I figured we’d be sex buddies.  Hell, everybody else does it, why not Destinee. 

        Jimmy would come by every weekend or so and we wouldn’t even have that much to say to each other.  We knew what each other wanted….the booty.  He wanted mine, and I wanted his.  This arrangement seemed to work.  It went on for about a year; until one weekend, I received a surprise visitor…

        I called Jimmy to come through, and he had to make a pit stop.  Well, while Jimmy was running late, his white bread paid me a little visit.  Apparently she had been following Jimmy to my house for the last couple of months. This home wrecker had the nerve to tell me to stay away from Jimmy.  I’m like, b***h, you broke us up.  Then, she starts bringing her little son in it, like just cause she had Jimmy’s baby, she not wrong.  I said, I’m glad you stopped by, because I been meaning to pay you a visit anyway.  She didn’t know that I knew about them, but she was about to find out… the hard way. I said, “Hold up! Let me take my earrings off”.  Right when I placed my earrings on the table, Jimmy walked in.  

        He said, “Precious, what are you doing”.  I said, “I’m about to stomp your tramp”.  The look they both gave me let me know that I wasn’t ‘Precious’.  He ran to her like she was Miss f*****g America or somebody.  He said let’s get you and the baby out of here.  Now, as she didn’t have a baby with her, I assumed he meant that she was pregnant.  I’m like, what the f**k!  Oh hell naw.   I ran over to her and snatched her back in by her hair. “You dirty hoe”.  I threw her down on the floor.  As I was aiming to kick the s**t out of her, and the baby that should be mine, Jimmy yelled at me, “B***h, don’t do it”.  It was very ironic that he would use ‘Precious’, when calling her, and ‘B***h’, when calling me; as if I was the dog.  I kicked the hell out of Jimmy’s white bread; and I’ve regretted it ever since.  Jimmy jumped on me and beat me unconscious that night.  I woke up in an ambulance with people over me telling me that I was gonna make it.  It wasn’t till later that I realized that Jimmy was the one who called the ambulance; and if he hadn’t, I would have died.    I also didn’t know that I was pregnant until doctors told me I had lost the baby. 

        I chose not to reveal who did this to me to the authorities, and I did not press charges.  I never saw Jimmy again; but I’ve felt him many times.  How can you still have feelings for someone that almost killed you; and how can you despise someone who saved your life.  This is the relationship that Jimmy and I had.  I loved him with one half my heart, and hated him with the other.  Yeah, I’d say the relationship that Jimmy and I had is parallel to that of a cat and a dog.  There was a lot of barking, and a lot of hissing; a lot of humping, and a lot of dissing; at the end of the day, a dog’s gonna be a dog; and a cat still needs love. 

 

         

Author's Note

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