The Quarter - Chapter Four

Chapter IV: The Other Side (Syriah’s perspective)


Twin tears drop down to the tile floor beneath Pedro’s face. Across town, a desperate and angry scream is heard inside a room. It’s Syriah realizing that she had just engaged in the road of no return she had been down so many times before. She had just lost Pedro. But for the first time she feels that there is something different about this relationship, and she is not willing to just let go.

[3 weeks ago]

Syriah sits in the car with Imraan, and they fight heavily as he weaves through traffic. Imraan is one of the wrong types that views women as an object and believes that life is to be lived on the “very fast” lane. He does not care for what Syriah thinks and needs. He believes only his needs exist.

- You are the worst kind of punk there is Imraan, good at talking, but you never put on the shoes and walk in them.

- Whatever bitch… I can’t wait to just drop you off and “drop you off” for good.

- (…) – She looks at him, surprise in her face, soul broken.

Syriah turns back to her original seated position, keeping her eyes on the road ahead and avoiding eye contact with Imraan and remains silent for the duration of the car trip. Imraan stops at a gas pump a few blocks from Syriah’s house. He exits the car, walks around it very fast, opens the door to her and aggressively says:

- Since you like to talk so much about how I walk, - he gestures with his arm pointing in the direction of her house – YOU do some of that walkin! See ya. It was good, until you decided to open your mouth for something different than moaning when I took you from the back.

He pauses his talk for a split second, as he pays for the gas he put into the car and turns to face her again. Now looking completely arrogant he screams at her.

- Still here? Get the hell up off my leather seats and GET TO WALKING!

Syriah stands up, collects her belongings and starts walking home. She begins to hate the idea of respecting any man.

[2 weeks ago]

Syriah sits in her room, it’s already late Thursday night and she is getting ready to go out with her friends to have a girls night out, although she is the only single girl in the group. She knows that her friends will eventually move along and be with their better halves. This vexes her, but it also gives her a new hope. Things are waiting to happen, and she feels positive, although she doesn’t know why. After driving to the Aqua Room, they are immediately invited in, because they are regulars, and club owners enjoy having beautiful women inside. Once inside, they sit at the lounge area and order some cocktails, margheritas being the choice for this night. They drink them and decide to do some hip moving on the dance floor. Ashley, Syriahs friend, thinks differently and heads to the bar and proceeds to down shot glass after shot glass of straight tequilas. The result is obvious: after five minutes of intense alcohol consumption, her liver gives up on her and she becomes to drunk to stand straight.

Syriah and the rest of the group realize this and head to the bar to stand by her and keep her from ridiculing herself. That’s when she is approached by a completely “new face”. He is slick with his words as many before him have been, although he gives off such a confidence in his actions that she can’t help but be dazzled.

That night they share a connection. They end up kissing in the club and Syriah sleeps at his house. Of all the men she has had sex with, no one took more care at the craft of pleasuring her and making her feel special than this “new face”. She falls asleep with her head in his chest, listening to his heartbeat, arms around his torso. She grips him tight; she does not want this moment to end. She does not want to lose him.

Syriah wakes up to a doorbell ringing. She looks around, seeing a new place. It is not her room. And then it hits her. She’s in his room. She approaches the cupboard and reaches in to get a t-shirt. She puts it on and walks out the door. Before her eyes it’s him and a girl that she has never seen before. They seem to have a lot of tension between them. After a few harsh words, this girl notices that Syriah stands at the end of the hallway, only wearing a shirt that she once put on herself. That’s when she decides to back off. She hugs him and leaves.

Syriah could not be any more puzzled. Who is she? Why such tension? Why the hug? Was she trying to show to Syriah that she still has some power over this man? She couldn’t care less, because at this moment this girl was the one leaving and not Syriah. She felt weak at the sight of this man. He embodied her dreams. And she was now daydreaming.

[1 week ago]

All began to go wrong when he realized certain aspects of her lifestyle. The respect that Syriah vowed not to have for men was stronger than the feelings she had for him at that stage, although it was hurting her more to lose him than it ever felt to lose a man before. The have fight after fight. And the affection that had been built over the last week was now virtually depleted. It was now a latent form of aggression from her side and pain on his side.

[Present]

After sitting at home for a few hours contemplating her previous actions in life and with this specific man, she picks her phone up and decides to call him. They fight once again and this time Syriah cannot handle her anger and hangs up on his face. She can’t cry any tear because her anger supersedes her sadness. In an explosion she screams from the top of her lungs.

[End of chapter four]