Unzipped: An Urban Erotic Tale Read Online Free Page B

twin.
    “I’m so sorry, Pearl. Please believe me. I can change. I swear to
God
I can. If you would just forgive me, Pearl, I can
change!”
    Pearl was straight disgusted with Diamond. Her sister had gotten down just like a regular Harlem chickenhead, just like the kind of gutter chicks that Pearl had grown to despise and had sworn she would never be. It was hard but Pearl went ahead and gave her sister the forgiveness she needed, but even after Irish Baines had seen to it that Scotch was dealt with in the proper street fashion, the knowledge of what her sister had done behind her back was still embarrassing and painful for Pearl.
    But even through all of that, Pearl still loved Diamond. And while there was no doubt that her sister could be low-down and grimy, she knew Diamond loved her too. When they were younger they used to sing a poem of love and affection together every night before they went to bed, and over the years their feelings had remained strong. They had continued to sing their love words out loud, even as teens.
    Diamond and Pearl, two hearts, one world.
I love you my Diamond.
I love you my Pearl
.
    There was nobody in the world who knew Pearl better than her twin, and even though their personalities were very different, their hearts had always moved to the same beat. But that didn’t mean Pearl got down with everything Diamond did, or co-signed the way her sister shit on their parents, disrespected relationships, or cocked her legs open to strange men.
    It had been late on a snowy Christmas Eve when Irish got a call that his youngest daughter had been dropped off in the lobby of a hospital because she was in labor. He hadn’t laid eyes on Diamond in over a month, and both him and Zeta were worried about what she was doing out there on those mean streets. Prenatal care was just a joke to Diamond. Doing the right thing for the sake of her unborn child had never even occurred to her. Even though her sperm donor Scotch had been chased out of Harlem months ago, Irish had gotten word on the streets that Diamond had hooked up with some cat from the other side of town who was ten times worse than Scotch had ever been. Diamond had been seen dancing and drinking in all kinds of strip joints and clubs, wildin’ like she wasn’t even pregnant.
    But regardless, it was too early for her to be having that baby anyway. Pearl was the one due to give birth any day, and as far as Irish and Zeta could tell, Diamond was only around seven months pregnant.
    Worried by the call, Irish had woken up Zeta and Pearl, then bundled his wife and daughter into his late-model Cadillac and driven through the snow-slushed streets to see about Diamond and her unborn child.
    When they got to the hospital’s labor and delivery ward, Zeta broke down crying immediately. Pearl put her arms around her mother, and she wanted to cry too. The sight of Diamond was too fucked up for her to put into words. Instead of seeing an image of someone very similar to herself, a youthful fifteen-year-oldexpectant mother, Pearl’s twin sister looked like a cold, wet, exhausted dog that somebody had kicked around and starved, then dragged through the ghetto streets for weeks on end.
    “What the hell happened to you?” Pearl demanded, rushing over to her sister’s bedside.
    Diamond twisted and turned in pain, her hospital gown hiked over her stomach, her slender legs gaped wide-open.
    “The same damn thing that happened to you!” she snapped, grabbing her sister’s hand and squeezing it tightly.
    “Damn” was all Pearl could say as she looked down at Diamond’s small baby bump. She was naked under her hospital gown and her belly was barely big enough to even say there was a baby in it. Pearl reached for the sheet Diamond had flung off and tried to shield her twin’s nakedness.
    “Girl, cover ya ass. Daddy’s standing right there,” she said, eyeing the oddly shaped dark patch of skin directly below her sister’s navel. It was Diamond’s birthmark,