Caught up in the Midst of Pain

By Venus Evans

When six childhood friends from an inner city neighborhood in Kansas City, Missouri from all different backgrounds are caught up in the midst of pain, find out what path their choices lead them down. Individually, they face imprisonment, and natural disaster to include a homicide investigation, guns and drug smuggling, professional boxing and finding true love.

After multiple tragedies, Danielle Stevens struggles to regain her sanity. Other than her faith in God, her support comes from her one true love, Tyreek. Tyreek Duff aspires to be a middleweight boxing champion in spite of his childhood obstacles. Katrina Woo heads down the wrong path that ends in her demise. Lorenzo and Kevin are like brothers. Their hustle game introduces them to a whole new world of disappointments and forces them both to question their loyalty.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Feb 20, 2015
• ISBN: 9781503541153

Venus Evans

Venus Evans grew up most of her life in Denver, Colorado. She has always enjoyed writing short stories, song lyrics and poems. She attended Denver Technical College in Denver, Colorado and took writing courses that enabled her to further advance her writing skills. She later attended Anthem College in Aurora, Colorado where she successfully obtained a Medical Assistant Diploma with honors. She decided to embark on a journey to write a Urban Fictional Novel of this nature, because she is a reader herself. She wanted to create a Novel that included characters that would be complex, interesting, and relatable. This Novel will keep you guessing of the outcome, offer suspense, and romance. The ultimate goal of this Author is that the readers will be able to take with them a positive message as well as be entertained. She believes that everyone has their own path and you choose the outcome of your circumstances.

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

B oom! All Danny felt was wet liquid pouring down her back. It felt like candle wax—at first a quick sensation of burning and then almost drying instantly—but in larger amounts; then, slow pulsating pain began to overcome her as she lay there on the street, seeming like the only human being present. Before she realized that she had been shot, she lost all consciousness and blacked out.

It was a warm summer evening in Kansas City, Missouri, and she had just come from a house party that her friends Trina and Martha had convinced her to go to and see what honeys they could come across. Danielle (or better known as Danny as all her friends called her) was only eighteen and just becoming a woman. Or so she thought. She had tan skin (thanks to her African American and Mexican heritage), a round face, and naturally curly hair. She was very curvy and had a bubbly personality. Her friends considered her to be the life-of-the-party type. When Danny showed up, it was time to get it cracking. She wasn’t afraid to get what she wanted, and that caused the brothers to be turned on—not to mention, she had a big butt, breasts, and a pretty face to match. All the young ladies had on their minds tonight was losing their virginity and feeling like they had crossed the bridge toward their womanhood. It was very uncommon to find a group of females who were saving themselves and hoping to find love first.

Katrina (or Trina as her friends called her) had to see Lorenzo. Martha was interested in Kevin, and Danny had her eyes on Tyreek since they were small. A girl named Tanya was throwing the party; and everybody knew that she was giving it up, so her parties were always fun. Everyone who was anyone from around the way would attend. Tanya lived with her father; and he was a truck driver, so he was hardly ever home. It was easy for her to get action, because she was one of the girls who was definitely not considered to be a tease. The three of them met up at Martha’s house, and told their parents they were sleeping over at her house since she came across as the most honest out of the three; besides Martha was a straight-A student, and she hadn’t quite filled out yet; so she still had that really innocent look that parents love. Martha was Hispanic and she had long, wavy, black hair. She had pretty green eyes and an oval face. She was of a fair complexion, and if you didn’t know she was Hispanic, you might mistake her for white at first glance. Trina’s mom dropped her off on her way to work. Trina’s mom was a nurse and barely let her out of the house, so this was a real treat to have our girl be able to kick it for a change. Trina was a cocoa beauty, and she always kept her hair in the cutest short haircuts—close to the neck with her natural hairline and messy, wet look. Since she had naturally curly hair and since she was also mixed (black and Asian), it went well with her chinky, dark brown eyes. She was very reserved, except for when she was around her girls: she became wild like someone let an animal out of a cage. She was always game to try anything because she was always under lock and key.

They all were dressed to impress: Danny showed up in a multicolored silk sleeveless, summer dress with black leather open-toed sandals and her hair in a curly bob; Trina had on jean shorts with a silk button-down blouse and white Keds; Martha had on jean overalls with a cutoff T-shirt and Nike Jordans. They were ready to go.

The party was two blocks away, and they still needed to get going if they wanted to get there before all the other little sistas showed up with the same agenda. Wanting to be there first was important so they could get first pick and be the first to catch the eyes of Tyreek, Kevin, and Lorenzo. The young ladies started on their journey and remembered forgetting to buy gum or mints, just in case they got lucky; so they stopped at the corner store at the end of Martha’s block named Pit Pat. It was frequented by all the neighborhood youngsters. As they walked in, Danny noticed that Tyreek was opening the cooler and grabbing himself some orange juice (probably to go with the gin he was toting around in his pocket). Tyreek liked to drink at that time, and that was his drink.

Danny walked up to him and said, Hey, Ty, what’s up?

Hey, Danny, what’s up?

Are you going to Tanya’s party?

Yeah. Are you?

Yeah. We’re just stopping by really quick to buy some things.

I will walk with y’all then. Let me just pay for my juice.

Cool. I will wait.

Danny was smiling from ear to ear, and just the thought of walking with Tyreek made her moist.

When they got to the party, it was already off the chain. It was hard to believe that so many people fit in Tanya’s three-bedroom house. There were people in every room. Some were getting their freak on; some were grinding to the H-Town’s Knockin’ da Boots pounding out of the fifteen-inch house speakers. There were guys in the kitchen playing dominos, and there were females all gathered around cheering for their favorite player. There were females passing around a blunt and playing a card game of spades in the basement. The females at the card table were catching up on all the latest gossip from around the way. As we moved from room to room, checking out the scenery, Martha and Trina noticed Lorenzo and Kevin. They were chilling on the sofa with a blunt, nodding to the music, admiring different females as they got their groove on and bounced their bodies to an up-tempo The Click song. The more E-40 raced through his lyrics, the faster the gyrating and the more accented the movement got.

Lorenzo and Kevin, who were best friends since they were in elementary school, had just arrived. If you had beef with one, then you definitely had beef with the other. Lorenzo was tall with spiked black hair. He spoke with a Hispanic accent, but he was considered a brother from the hood. He had grown up with Black people all his life and was no stranger to smoking weed. Lorenzo was raised by his single mother, who later got into a fatal car crash. He was sent to live with his grandmother, who later died of natural causes. Lorenzo was left to raise his self. He smoked so much marijuana that his eyes were always low, and the whites of his eyes looked pink. Kevin was a dark-skinned brotha with whips. He wore a wave cap with a baseball cap most of the time, but when he was spotted without it, his hair laid with a perfect circular wave pattern. He lived with his aunt on the east side of town and hadn’t seen his parents since he was young. They were both on crack cocaine and didn’t care about the responsibility of being parents anymore because they were so far gone. Kevin remembered one summer when he was about six that his mother and father left him at home for days without food, but luckily for him, there was at least water. When they returned, they had a bag filled with snacks from 7-Eleven. They slept all day before remembering that he had been there all alone. Lorenzo and Kevin felt like all they had was each other, so they claimed that they were brothers. Both of them were fine and had a hell of a lot of women chasing them. They both sported bling and had plenty of money (at least for young men their age with limited responsibilities). They were always together. They sold cocaine in the neighborhood and several blocks in their neighborhood that were locked down. At some point or another, they all attended school in Kansas City. The schools that were located directly in the hood integrated some of the upper middle class youngsters with the less fortunate by utilizing the busing system.

Lorenzo looked up first and saw Martha and Katrina admiring them from across the room. He nudged Kevin to get his attention off the dance floor and to look in the two young women’s direction. Martha and Trina made their way over to say hello. Trina was the first to make her way over to the guys, and normally that would have been out of her character. Again she is down for whatever when she is around her girlfriends. Hey, Lorenzo, she said with a little sass in her voice. Lorenzo nodded at her in a very relaxed way (it was his way of saying What’s up). Lorenzo had always been attracted to sistas. Hi, Kevin, Martha said with a little señorita in her voice. What’s up, baby, Kevin replied as he reached over to the ashtray and put out what once was a fat blunt. Just wanted to see if you guys wanted to dance, Trina said as she smiled and tried to put on her come-hither face—the one wherein she squinted her eyes and pouted her lips a little thinking that made her look sexier. Yeah, we could do that, but wait until one of our cuts come on. This shit they playing right now is whack! Kevin said as he looked over at Lorenzo, and they both laughed. They were so high by this time that it was amazing that they even knew what song was playing. Okay, well, what are you, guys, up to tonight? We are about getting our money, and we are on some shit like that tonight, sounding extra mannish. Why? What you, females, got in mind? Trina and Martha looked at each other and knew that neither of them had an apartment or a private place to take them to; so they suggested they all go to the park after, smoke one, and hang out.

Cool. We down.

Ooh, this is my shit right here! said Trina and Martha chimed in.

Spice 1’s 187 Proof pounded out of the speakers, and most of the people at the party who were sitting on the sidelines even got up to bounce to that joint.

Meanwhile, Danny never left Tyreek’s side; and they seemed to really be feeling each other. When Tyreek was ten and Danny was eight, Danny’s mom, Gloria, babysat Tyreek while his mom, Barbara, worked during the day at the post office when school was out for the summer. Their moms became friends and, from time to time, still hooked up to go play bingo together. Danny’s mom was a stay-at-home mom; and Danny’s dad, Richard, worked as a foreman at one of the largest distribution companies in the city. He had child support to pay because he had a child from a previous relationship that he never saw. It was a brief relationship, and Richard didn’t have a good relationship with his child’s mother once he met and married Gloria. It made more sense for Danny’s mom to stay at home with Danny and her little brother, Michael, who was five years younger than Danielle, to avoid paying childcare costs; besides financially they made out all right, and someone was at home full-time to make sure the house ran smoothly. They lived in a small three-bedroom house. At least they had their main necessities and a little money saved in the bank.

Danny knew she had a crush on him even back then. He would share his candy that his mother would pack in his lunch with her, and they would sit on the porch and call out their favorite cars as they passed by. That’s mine—no, that’s mine, they sang while smiling at each other.

It wasn’t until she got old enough to date that Danny started showing Tyreek that she felt an attraction to him and that she wanted to become more than friends. Guy’s Goodbye Love came on, and Tyreek asked Danny to dance. They danced slow and close. Each step they took was in sync, and before she knew it, Tyreek had slid his hand over her butt grabbing a handful and rubbing it slowly but steadily. It felt so good to know that Ty (as she called him) was starting to show a mutual attraction that she held on tighter to his neck as they swayed back and forth. When the song was over, they caught each other’s eyes; and he leaned in for a kiss. His lips were soft, and his tongue moved in a slow rotation. She liked the way he tasted, and they kissed so long that it felt like they were the only ones in the room. When they stopped and came up for air, people were starting to leave the party; and they hadn’t even noticed they were leaning up against the wall. Danielle started to look for her friends