Belonging to Lust

Zaiyia sat in the hotel bathtub wishing she had a gun to shoot herself in the head with. She couldn’t believe it’s almost been two months of her mother’s ridiculous bullshit games and she still hadn’t found a stapled home for them. Zaiyia couldn’t stress how much she hated this part of her mother’s plan. It was sometimes too much for her to bear, but she always made sure to keep herself together in case she ended up doing something stupid as a retaliation. It wasn’t her fault that Yovela has been M.I.A for the last three weeks and it’s been getting on Zaiyia’s nerves. There’s been no phone calls or appearances since then. The last update Zaiyia got from Yovela was that she was with her 7th victim, and was currently spinning a web of lies to the poor man’s ears, just like the others before him, but that felt like thousands of years ago.

Zaiyia didn’t know where to begin to explain the last month and a half of the crazy drama and the broken hearts Yovela had caused in such a short time. It all started on the second night they’d moved into the hotel, and Yovela had abandoned her daughter to go to the clubs. From what little information Zaiyia could gather at the time, Yovela had met some college guy named Joseph Cooper who worked at the casino table downtown. Yovela didn’t say much about him other than he had short black hair and looked Hispanic. Zaiyia figured that he was her mother’s choice and expected her to go out with him and work her charms on him. Imagine her surprise when her mother returned the next night with a different guy on her mind. His name was Daniel Baker, and he was a well-respected doctor at the local hospital. She had entered the club with Joseph Cooper, but had left with Daniel Baker. They were both completely drunk and had ended up at his workplace where they ‘accidently had sex in a room shared with a stroke victim. Zaiyia thought she couldn’t have been more disgusted with Yovela when she heard about that, but was proven wrong when she was given a handheld gaming console. At first Zaiyia thought, ‘finally, something to past the time’, but then started question where Yovela got it from. When she asked her mother and received an answer, she wished she’d never asked. Yovela took it off a little girl dying with Leukemia. Dr. Daniel told Yovela the little girl wasn’t responding well to her medicine and things were looking grim. Yovela didn’t really care about what the child was going through until she saw the game console in the little girl’s cold hand. She made sure Dr. Daniel wasn’t looking when she snatched the device away without rousing the child from her sleep. Yovela figured Zaiyia needed it more than her, but after telling Zaiyia the story; her daughter wouldn’t touch her gift until after a few days of boredom had caught up to her and made her accept defeat.

A few days after that, Dr. Daniel had asked Yovela to move in with him, and she graciously accepted. Of course, Yovela still had to tell Dr. Daniel that she had a 16 year old daughter. When the time came for her to reveal the truth to him, however, the story came out as a complete and utter lie. Zaiyia was upset when she found out that Yovela told Dr. Daniel that Zaiyia had an untreatable form of cancer and was dying. She even had to dress and act the part in order to fool him. Zaiyia didn’t feel like she had much of a choice, and had somehow miraculously was able to trick Dr. Daniel into believing that she was indeed a 16 year old terminally dying of cancer. The every time Zaiyia opened her mouth to add to her mother’s lie, her stomach would turn and make her feel nauseous.

Dr. Daniel had set up Zaiyia’s room pretty much like a personal hospital and had left her alone to her privacy majority of the time. After a week, he began to try and get involved into Zaiyia’s cancer situation by going badgering Yovela. He was blatantly in love with Yovela and felt terrible that her daughter was eventually going to die from her disease and leave her mother heartbroken. Dr. Daniel didn’t want Yovela going through that without a fight. Several nights in a row, he would plead for Yovela to accept his professional help in treating her daughter’s cancer. Yovela denied him each time, saying she and her daughter had come to terms with the short time they have left together, but Dr. Daniel was incredibly stubborn. Unfortunately, his persistence resulted in Yovela sleeping with his brother, Fred and his neighbor, Matthew in order to get out all of her pent up rage that he caused.

After three weeks, Yovela had finally had enough of Daniel’s pestering and stubbornness. She packed her bags, and dragged her daughter out of the doctor’s house for good. Zaiyia thought they were heading back to the hotel, but instead her mother parked in the driveway of another person’s house. It turned out the house belonged to Terrence Williams, who was some laid back drug dealer who was known to be a notorious womanizer. After three days of him boldly flirting with her daughter, Yovela threw Zaiyia back into the hotel and left her there once again. Zaiyia was pissed off but also extremely grateful. She didn’t like how Terrence always looked at her, and it made her skin crawl.

Yovela stayed behind with Terrence despite his wandering eyes and got a chance to meet his best friend TJ. TJ worked at a thrift store down the street and liked to claim he made bank there even though he didn’t. When Terrence was forced to leave for a few days to go to his grandmother’s funeral, Yovela invited TJ over for company and ended up having sex with him on the kitchen counter. It took that moment for Yovela to make up her mind.

By the time Terrence came home, everything that belonged to Yovela’s was gone. All that was left was the dried cum on his kitchen counter. Terrence was beyond mad, and eventually tracked Yovela down outside of a bar after she had just dumped TJ. She was drunk, and he was drunk. They end up getting into a full blown shouting match right in front of a construction site. Ultimately, Terrence got so mad at her that he ended up smacking Yovela in the face with the back of his hand, before he was flung up against a random car. A construction worker gave Terrence a scare of a lifetime before letting him scramble away in fear back to his car. When he was gone, the worker stuck around to help Yovela. They went to the bar afterwards and he ended up buying her a drink to calm her nerves. Yovela told him she wasn’t comfortable being left alone and so her savior offered to let her stay in his guest house out back. Yovela had feeling this new guy was going to be something different. At least that’s what she said in her five second phone call before hanging up. She also informed Zaiyia that she was coming over for a little visit and to be ready for her arrival.

When Yovela finally appeared, Zaiyia was waiting for her on her bed. Yovela immediately burst into a rant about the new guy. Zaiyia only pretended to listen, because she didn’t believe her mother was gonna stick around for the information to matter to her anyway.

“So, what’s your plan?” Zaiyia asked Yovela after she finished her rant.

Yovela shrugged. “I’m not sure yet, but I know you’ll love his guesthouse. It’s fucking incredible. There’s no other word to describe it.” Yovela bragged with excitement.

“Can I see it yet?” Zaiyia dared to ask, watching her mother’s excitement fade away into a frown.

“Yeah, about that…it might take me a bit longer than the other guys to get him to loosen up. He’s not as easily manipulative and gullible like the others.” Yovela explained, rubbing her hands together. Zaiyia hid her disappointment and instead nodded her head in acceptance.

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Zaiyia woke up from her nap in the tub to someone calling her name. Quickly she scrambled out of the tub and grabbed a pair of sharp scissors from the medicine cabinet, in case the person calling her was a stalker. She cracked the door open and was relieved to see it was Yovela standing in the next room. Zaiyia swung the door opened and stepped out of the bathroom with her hand on her hip.

“Damnit Yovela, you scared the shit out of me. I thought you were someone else.” Zaiyia cursed.

Yovela stared at her daughter like she was a lunatic. “Like who? I’m the only one with the damn key.”

Zaiyia shrugged and sat on her bed. “You never know. Don’t you watch you those murder shows. Anyone can easily get in here if they tried. Between you and me, I don’t think it would take much effort.”

Yovela rolled her eyes and discarded that information. “Whatever. I have good news for you!”

Zaiyia’s eyes widen in hope but she refused to say anything in case she jinxes herself.

“Aren’t you gonna ask me what it is?” Yovela asked, with a look of disappointment at her daughter’s lack of excitement.

“I’m too scared to. Just tell me.” Zaiyia urged her, wanting to know.

“He’s letting us move in!” Yovela squealed, jumping up, hoping to surprise her.

Zaiyia’s eyes widen. “Are you serious?”

“Of course I’m serious, girl! Can you believe it!? After two long months you can finally get on out of here!”

Zaiyia stood up on her bed feeling more jubilant than she’s ever felt before. Finally, after so long, Zaiyia was finally going to have a home again. A sudden thought came to Zaiyia that had her stop jumping on her bed. Yovela frowned at her daughter’s downward expression. “What it is? Why aren’t you happy about this, Zaiyia? It’s a big deal for you. You can finally get out of this shitty hotel room.”

Zaiyia looked down at her mother with a scowl on her face. “How long?”

Yovela raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean ‘how long’? How long what?”

Zaiyia jumped off the bed and walked over to stand in front of her mother with her arms crossed. “How long until you screw up this chance by looking for another man to fuck, Yovela.”

“What did I tell you about watching that mouth of yours?” Yovela warned with a stern finger.

“Just tell me!” Zaiyia exclaimed, her fists clenched at her sides.

“I don’t know! I have no idea how long until I get bored and look for another man to entertain me. When it happens, it’ll happen, and you will learn to deal with just as you always have, Zaiyia. So, if I were you, I’d be thankful that I’m getting out of this stinking rat’s nest to live in a wonderful home. Enjoy the time in his house while you can, Zaiyia. It’s never going to be forever, you know that as well as I do.”