“The thing about me and Deuce,” she said when she was done chewing, “is that we’re still … we like each other. We’ve always liked each other. As friends. No matter what else might have been going on. And I have to be honest with you. That’s probably not going to change. He’s always going to be my friend.”
Nicolas seemed to think about that for a few moments, then he nodded. One firm nod, that had a look of finality and resolution about it.
“Thank you for being honest about that.”
The rest of the time in the diner, they ate in silence. And afterward, Nicolas took her home in an Uber. At the door, he kissed her goodnight, but it was perfunctory, and at the corner of her lips rather than on them.
This time, when he walked away, he didn’t look back.
~~~
she woke up to a text message. Nicolas had sent it within an hour of taking her home.
I think this isn’t the right time, it read. For either of us. But I enjoyed getting to know you Zora. Hope we can be still be friends.
She had just been broken up with by text message. Dropping the phone next to her and falling back against her pillows, she examined her feelings.
Rejection.
And relief.
Nicolas was right. It wasn’t the right time. Not too long ago, she had been naked in this very bed with Deuce. And she still hadn’t rid herself of thoughts of that night. She thought about it, and about him all the time. And the only reason Deuce wasn’t here with her now was that she was trying to be a good person and do the right thing. And give him room to be a good person and decide what the right thing was for him.
But she still loved him; and no amount of cute after-hours dates in diners with the hipster Senegalese jazz musician was going to change that.
Zora picked up her phone again and drafted a message. She drafted three of them. And deleted all three. Finally, she took a breath and decided that simple was probably best. No long missives were necessary to put to rest their pleasant non-starter of a relationship.
You’re a cool guy. I hope we can be friends too.
Then she hit ‘send’, tossed the phone aside and turned over onto her stomach to see whether she could get one more hour of solid sleep before heading over to Deuce’s to meet everyone for brunch.
~~~
She and Asha met at the Starbucks around the corner from Deuce’s apartment. Kal was running in Central Park, and Deuce hadn’t yet showed up from his father’s place. It felt too strange to go up when he wasn’t there, especially since it was to the place where he had practically lived with his girlfriend for the past few weeks, if not longer.
So, waiting in the lobby, Zora persuaded Asha to come down and meet her, pretending she had an immediate, urgent espresso craving. Even now, she wasn’t sure going back to Deuce’s place was a good idea.
“How’s things been? Moving to California, and all. You guys living together.”
At that, Asha couldn’t hold back her blush, and the much wider smile that followed it. She let her gaze drop to the table.
“Good,” she said. “It’s been good. Kal’s a little … overprotective lately, but yeah … it’s good.”
“He’s like a totally different person with you,” Zora said. “You do realize that, don’t you? You freakin’ … turned him inside out.”
Asha shook her head. “I don’t think so. He was always the man he is. He just didn’t know it yet. And now …” She stopped and pulled in her lower lip.
“And now …?” Zora prompted.
Asha narrowed her eyes and grimaced a little. “I don’t know if I should … He’s going to kill me if I …”
“You’re getting engaged, aren’t you?” Zora said, eyes open wide. She leaned in and grabbed Asha’s hand, squeezing it. “Tell me! Are you?”
Asha put her free hand to her mouth and chewed on the corner of a nail. “Well …”
Zora shrieked, then looked around at the other patrons in the coffee shop, none of whom had even glanced in her direction, jaded New Yorkers that they were.
“Asha! Are you serious?” She lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
“Ahm … yeah. But …”
“But what?” Zora insisted.
“Not right away. Not until after.”
“After …”
“Last night, did you notice I didn’t drink much of anything? It’s because …”
It only took a second, but Zora knew almost immediately what she meant. This time, she wasn’t just surprised, she was stunned. Her mouth literally fell open, and she instinctively looked down. She had noticed that Asha looked a little fuller, but never would she have guessed this.
“Asha.”
“It was a total accident,” she said, speaking in a rush as though explaining something to a disapproving parent. “And I thought for sure he would be angry, or feel like I was going to mess up his future, because you know, with the Olympic tryouts and B-School and everything … But he was …” Her eyes grew misty and her voice was thick with emotion. “I think it’s made him even more motivated.”
Zora watched Asha swallow back tears and felt a mass of complicated emotions of her own. But strongest among them was joy for her friend who, for whatever reason, still had to be convinced that she deserved good things.
“Oh my god, Asha.” Zora reached out and grabbed her other hand, so she was holding them both. “You’re going to be a mother?”
A momentary cloud drifted across Asha’s face and just as quickly was gone.
“You’re scared,” Zora guessed.
Asha nodded and then swallowed. “A little. But not about being a mother. Or not just about being a mother. I … I just … I want this to work out, y’know?”
“Oh, you don’t have to worry about that. Do you see the way Kaleem looks at you? Seriously.”
“Not that. Not Kal. Not about being a mother. I mean the pregnancy itself.”
“But you’re young, you’re healthy … Did a doctor say you had reason to …?”
“No. Just …” Asha shook her head. “I just worry.” She shrugged.
“And your mom …”
“She thinks it’s a mistake. Which is about what I thought she would think. I wanted to see her face when I told her, because I hoped that …” She shrugged again. “Doesn’t matter. Javier is excited. Wants to be a godfather already. And of course, Kal wants it to be Deuce, so that’s going to be a whole thing.”
Zora felt her own throat tightening. “Jesus, we’re all like, adults for real now, aren’t we?”
“I don’t know,” Asha laughed, the hint of a sob beneath it. “But if not, I feel like I’d better figure out how to become one. And soon.” She pulled a hand from Zora’s grasp and rested it on her abdomen.
“How about his parents? How did they handle it?”
“I can tell that Ibrahim, his father, is worried about us a little bit. But both of them … both his parents are so supportive. It’s like they just adopted me or something. The second I moved out there, it was like Kal and I were married already. Or at least that’s the way they treated me.”
“Maybe they knew something you didn’t,” Zora said.
Asha blushed again, fidgeting with one of her locs. “I was never worried about that. Kal’s kind of … purposeful, y’know? He just … always seems to know which direction to go.”
Between them on the table, Asha’s phone vibrated, and she reached for it. Seeing the name on the screen, she smiled and answered right away.
“Where you at, babe?” Kaleem’s voice was audible on the other end of the line, even across the table.
“Starbucks, with Zora. Are you back at the apartment?”
“Yeah. D’s here too. Look, we were thinkin’ …”
That they didn’t feel like going back out. And they were asking whether Zora and Asha minded picking up food for brunch.
Great. So there would be no way to get out of going to Deuce and his girlfriend’s love-nest. Zora inwardly braced
herself.
“We bring it, you guys cook it?” Asha asked.
“You bring it, we’ll cook it,” Kal confirmed.
“Done,” Asha said, giving Zora a thumbs-up.
They went to Zabar’s and bought way too much food. So much that they needed a cab to bring it back to the apartment. Asha had one of Deuce’s fobs so was able to let them upstairs without calling ahead first.
Zora took in the swanky hallway leading to Deuce’s unit, feeling a knot in her gut and wondering how it came to be that she was visiting his place the way any stranger would, and not feeling at all comfortable about being there.
Once the front door opened, and she saw inside, it was just about what she would have expected of Deuce. Wide, expansive and practically barren. But it was reassuring as well, because there was no trace that anyone other than him had been there, except for what were probably Kal’s runners, lying on their sides at the front door.
There was only a second to take in the living room before Kal came out of the kitchen and took the bags from them. Still wearing running tights under shorts and sneakers from his run he paused to lean in and kiss Asha on the neck.
“Thanks, baby. Y’all took long enough, though,” he said. “We over here starvin’ …”
Knowing what she now knew, Zora watched them closely. Parents. They were about to be parents. But strangely, there was nothing alarming about that.
Once Asha followed Kal into the kitchen, Deuce emerged, and they were alone, He stood a few feet opposite Zora, his expression inscrutable, wearing baggy basketball shorts, a form-fitting t-shirt, and Nike slides, he looked like he had taken a shower and thrown on the first thing to cross his line of sight.
Feeling a moment of sadness, Zora realized that she was no longer able to read him as easily as she used to. Maybe that was because he never had reason to hide his feelings from her before. She wondered if he was thinking of their abbreviated kiss the night before at the club.
“Want the tour?” he asked.
Zora nodded. “That’d be cool,” she said, grateful he thought of an ice-breaker before she had to.
Deuce walked her through the rest of the sparsely-furnished but large living room, back to his bedroom where Kaleem and Asha’s bags and clothes were strewn about, and then finally into the second bedroom which he was using as a home gym.
Turning away from the rack of free-weights, Zora faced him, twisting her lips and blinking laconically.
“It almost looks like no one lives here at all,” she teased. “Would it have killed you to hang some tapestries on the walls? A couple pictures of your siblings … something?”
At that, Deuce’s face relaxed. It was an old joke of theirs, his ascetic way of living. Between them, she was the pack-rat, the messy one, the collector of tchotchkes, the amateur decorator.
“I guess I was waiting for my girlfriend to take pity on me and come take care of all that.”
Zora’s face fell, and she looked down to mask it. “Well, you’d better tell her to get on that.”
“I didn’t mean Regan.”
“As far as I know, that’s the only girlfriend you have.”
Deuce took a step toward her, and she moved back a couple paces, closer to the door.
“Don’t.” She tried to push past him, but he held her arm.
“Just … why don’t you show me the … balcony?” Her voice sounded pleading, even to her.
It was hard enough being here, seeing his bedroom … his bed … and knowing that that bed, this entire place which was completely new and foreign to her was likely a second home to Regan. She was barely holding it together, and if he pushed, she wasn’t sure how long she would be able to. There was a tightness just beneath her breastbone that made it just a little tougher to breathe, and a physical pain in her heart, like it might burst.
Deuce seemed to be studying her, and then mercifully, he let her go and inclined his head toward the door.
Rushing ahead of him, Zora went out, through the living room and yanked the door open to head out onto the balcony. She had moved so fast, she forgot for a moment that they were on the nineteenth floor, and that she was a little frightened of heights.
Looking over at the surprisingly clear and blue horizon, she thought about what Asha shared in Starbucks. Had Kal told Deuce the news? Did he know that their friends were pregnant and planning to get married?
She inhaled deeply and looked up at the blue, blue sky. It wasn’t hot yet, but the air was weighty and humid as the day was geared up to become yet another scorcher.
Deuce had never outright proposed to her, but there came a time when he looked at her and she knew. She knew he was thinking it, and it had scared the crap out of her.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
After the night at the club, Deuce went straight to Regan’s apartment, driven there by dual and competing needs—to fight with her and break things off, and to fuck her so he could forget all about Zora, at least for a little while. He didn’t quite manage to accomplish all those goals.
Even though it was past two in the morning, Regan was awake and looked like she knew he was coming over and had been waiting for him. Her hair was disheveled, and she had a half-empty bottle of sauvignon blanc sitting on her coffee table in front of her.
Owen brought it over, she explained, when he glanced at it. He called me as soon as he landed from his trip. He said he could tell from my voice that I needed a drink.
Her tone was accusatory. Then, she laughed, a harsh almost ugly sound.
Deuce sunk on the chair near hers, instead of sitting next to her on the couch. He didn’t like the scent of wine coming from her skin, nor the slightly slack look of her mouth, like that of a corner-store drunk.
He asked me where you were, she said. He said, ‘where’s your boyfriend?’ like he couldn’t understand why you weren’t here.
You know where I was, Regan, Deuce said. I told you exactly where I was going and why.
You didn’t even invite me. Your friend Kal hates me. I can tell by the way he sounds when I answer the phone at your place. I bet that’s why you didn’t ask me to come. Her speech was slurred.
Would you have come?
That isn’t the point! You didn’t invite me. I don’t think you wanted me to come. I think there was someone there who …
Y’know what? Deuce stood again. I’m not in mood for this shit.
Regan stood too. She came around the coffee table, advancing toward him.
I know there was! I fucking know you. There was someone there you don’t want me to know about. Someone you probably want to fuck!
Deuce had plenty of experience with drunk, cussing women. He made it as far as the door and had his hand on the doorknob when Regan grabbed the back of his shirt. He had every intention of shrugging her off, until he heard her.
She was crying. Sobbing.
Turning in defeat, he let her hug him. Her hold was grasping and desperate.
He realized then that he had never mentioned Zora. Not one single word. As though Zora herself, and what she stood for was too sacrosanct to share. But even though he hadn’t said a word, Regan sensed his pulling away from her.
I’m sorry, she spoke between gulping breaths. Don’t leave. I’m sorry. I know I’m acting like a crazy person, but … it’s been so hard. I can’t … I want to be better, but it’s so hard.
He took her back to her bedroom, helped her get undressed for bed, and then undressed himself. Regan was asleep within minutes, and shortly after, he was too.
He woke up just after seven the next morning to the feeling of his dick in her mouth. It was an apology, he knew, because Regan didn’t really like doing that.
When she and Deuce first started messing around regularly, she told him she’d had a bad experience when she was fifteen. It was her first time giving head. And she didn’t know enough about sex to understand what it would be like when men ejaculated.
I didn’t know it would be so … much, she’d said, her face
balled up in distaste at the memory. And it was obvious I didn’t like it, but he didn’t care.
And Deuce remembered feeling a little sad for her that at fifteen, she was doing something so adult but was too inexperienced to even understand the mechanics and consequences of it. He had gotten sucked off plenty by the time he was sixteen and her story depressed him all the more because he wasn’t sure he would have noticed then if the girl wasn’t nearly as into it as he was.
So, he never asked or expected that from Regan, and she never did it unless she was penitent, or wanted something from him.
She always stopped before he came, then he either reciprocated or they screwed. This time, he knew they would do neither. This time, while she worked him over with her mouth, he couldn’t even look at her. He made her stop before he finished, the way he always did. The interruption of an act that should have been about intimacy, closeness and generosity only made him feel emotionally further from her than he had before.
Deuce made it out of her apartment by reminding her he had plans with Kal, and this time asked if she wanted to come, only because he was betting that she wouldn’t. The bet paid off, so he told her he had to go to his father’s apartment to shower and get changed. She let him leave without protest, but only after he promised to stop by later.
At his father’s place, Deuce showered for a long time, eyes closed standing under the pelting hot water, thinking about Zora in that white outfit, and about her looking at her phone and announcing that she had somewhere to be.
Once out of the shower, he hadn’t even had the energy to think about clothes, so he grabbed shorts and a top, put on the slides that were at the edge of the bed—probably his father’s—and headed over to his apartment to meet his friends.
After the depressing half-hearted morning head with Regan, he wouldn’t have gone at all. Except that he knew Zora would be there.
~~~
Kal let him up. He had just come back from his workout, and was on his runner’s high, jibber-jabbering a mile a minute.
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