“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked. The woman had really piqued my curiosity.
“You are doing things to him to make him upset. That’s not going to get him to come back to you. It’s only going to push him further away. Your energies should be focused on her. Lexie’s got him smitten. I’ve never seen him so, quote-unquote, in love,” she said with heavy emphasis on the words in and love. “She’s your problem, not him. As long as she’s around, you don’t stand a chance.”
I felt like a light clicked on in my head. She was right. I was going about this the wrong way. I needed to get that damn Lexie out of the picture, and fast. I couldn’t seem to penetrate him because of his so-called devotion to her. It was like he was always trying to protect her, and for what? What did she have that I didn’t? She didn’t look any better than me. I’m sure she couldn’t be as good in bed as I am. I know I’ve got what it takes to keep a man satisfied. Brandon is proof of that. BJ’s not even his and he has cared for him as if he were his biological father since the day he was born. The man will do anything I ask, no matter how crazy. I know because I’ve put him to the test a number of times and he’s never failed to bend over backwards to accommodate my desires. If only Brian would try to please me the way Brandon does. I needed a game plan because Lexie had to be removed from the picture fast. I’ve always gotten what I wanted, and Brian would be no different.
“Hello! I’m still here!” she yelled into the phone, piercing my thoughts. “Now what are you thinking about doing? The wedding is a mere three weeks away. Whatever you decide, you need to act fast. Once they walk down that aisle, your job becomes that much harder.”
“I know that. I just have to work a few things out. But rest assured I’ll get what I want. I always do.”
“Great! Now when do I get my money? Don’t act like you forgot our arrangement. This information does not come free. And from the looks of it, you’re going to need me even more.”
Bitch! “It will be in your account by tomorrow afternoon,” I assured her with a smile in my voice.
My phone started beeping for the umpteenth time. I’d been ignoring all the incoming calls while speaking to my informant. I looked at the display and Brandon’s name flashed across the screen. Days had passed since I last spoke to him and promised to come home and talk. He wasn’t my priority at the time, Brian was. “Missed call” flashed across the screen and I tossed the phone onto the couch. Still hot from my previous conversation, my cell phone began to ring again, dancing across the seat of the couch as it rang and vibrated simultaneously. Once again the display read “Brandon.” With force, I flipped the phone open and huffed.
“Yes!” I said, stretching the word to demonstrate my aggravation.
“Open the door, Shelly,” Brandon said in a dry tone.
Open the door? I had to repeat it in my head. I never told Brandon where I was staying. How did he know? I stood for a few seconds contemplating whether or not to actually let him in.
“Come on, Shelly. I know you are in there. I can hear you,” Brandon said.
I flipped the phone closed, cutting him off, and strolled to the door. Holding on to the knob, I counted backwards from ten before pulling the door open. Mr. Half-White, Half-Black Brandon was standing there glaring at me, looking pitiful and pissed. I challenged his glare with my hands on my hips in a real sassy-girl fashion.
“We seriously need to talk,” Brandon said as he pushed past me and entered my apartment. He looked around incredulously and turned to me, confusion registered across his pale face. “You kept this place the entire time. I thought you told me you sold it.” I sucked my teeth and he came close to me. “You knew you were going to leave me, didn’t you?” Realization now registered on his face.
“You had to know that it wouldn’t last,” I said, brushing his inquiry off with a wave of my hand.
“Where’s Brice?” he asked.
“Sleeping,” I said as I sauntered back to the couch and turned on the TV with the remote. After flipping the channels for effect, I dropped the remote to the side and pretended to watch whatever was on the tube. Brandon sat next to me.
“You knew all along,” he said with that same look of recognition.
“Brandon!” I sighed. “How could you not know? It’s not like we were dating that long before we got married. We were off and on for how long? There was never a real commitment. It was pretty much what some would call an arrangement.” Brandon cringed at hearing the word arrangement. “And I’ve grown tired of the farce we were living.”
“Farce? Shelly, I care about you and Brice. How could you call this a farce?”
“You care about me. See how you said that. You didn’t say you loved me. There is a difference,” I tried to point out. “I want what I want, and it’s not for someone to care about me. I want to be with someone I love and desire, not have something where all we do is care about each other, then stick around because it looks good to people.”
“Shelly, I do love you. I wouldn’t be here hunting you down if I didn’t.”
“No, what you love is what being married to me has done for you. Being associated this closely with my father has many rewards. I’m sure that, at this point in your career, you’ve proved yourself enough to continue to prosper on your own. You don’t need me anymore,” I said.
“That may have been what this was in the beginning, but Shelly, I loved having you in my corner. I love you. Really, I do. For me it was always more than a union that made sense and I want you to come back home with me.”
“I can’t,” I said.
“Why?” Brandon said and exhaled loudly. “What’s the problem? Whatever it is, we can work it out.” Brandon pleaded with his words and his eyes.
“Because I’ve gotten back together with Brice’s real father.”
Chapter 13 Lexie
I was happy to see Brian home again, but I wanted him to get the hell out of my way for a while. Anger had a hold on him like a vice grip. Since I was the only one around him, I had to deal with the heat. This whole situation with Shelly revealed a side of Brian I didn’t know existed. But now he was getting on my nerves.
“Brian,” I called his name casually.
“What now, Lex?!” he snapped.
I took a deep breath and tried my best to swallow the foul
words that were perched at the tip of my heated tongue. From ten to one I counted with my eyes closed. This wasn’t about me. It was troubling to know that Shelly was able to disrupt the atmosphere of my home. She and I needed to have a conversation. Brian would never approve, but as far as I was concerned, it was necessary. The only thing that stopped me from paying her an unfriendly visit was the fact that I couldn’t allow her to know that her antics were affecting me in any way. She would take great pleasure in knowing she was able to get a rise out of me. Shelly would never see me sweat unless she brought her venom directly to me. Then I would be justified in lashing out. That would be my chance to give her an old-fashioned, Vaseline-faced ass kicking.
“Don’t answer me like that,” I said tight-lipped, then sighed hard. I wasn’t good at holding my tongue. “Listen, Brian. I won’t have you using me as your dartboard. You have been snapping at me and throwing all of your daggers at me since you came home the other night. It’s not fair and I am not going to take this shit from you any longer. If you want to sit around here and be annoyed, you go right ahead. I’m out of here.”
“Whatever!” Brian said, dismissing me with a wave of his hand.
“Whatever?!” I couldn’t believe his audacity. “Whatever?!” I repeated. It took only two steps for me to get from the hallway to the couch where he sat. I leaned over and placed my face so close to his that I could feel the heat of his breath. “Listen, partner,” I said the word partner so hard tiny droplets of saliva sprinkled on his face. “I’m not the cause of your strife. You take that shit out on her, not me. I won’t stand for it.”
Brian jumped up from the couch, swatted at the spit on
his face and glared at me.
“You know what, Lex? I don’t need this from you right now,” he said and walked away.
My blood began to boil. I just knew steam would come whistling out of my ears like a tea kettle. I followed Brian on his heels as he walked toward the bathroom.
“You don’t need what? I didn’t start this, you did. I simply called your name and you snapped at me. Now you are dismissing me like I’m some kind of nag or something.”
“Well, that’s what you’re doing right now.”
My mouth dropped open. “Oh, so now I’m a nag?!” By now my hands were on my hips and the tips of my ears were burning.
Brian waved me off once again and walked to the bathroom. He attempted to close the door but I blocked it with my foot.
“You need to apologize to me before this gets any worse.” Even in my rage, I tried to diffuse the situation. He was really pushing my limits.
“Apologize to you for what? I’m not the one being a nag.” His attempt to close the door failed because my foot was still in the way. “I don’t need this bullshit from you right now! As a matter of fact…” He paused, then changed his mind about going into the bathroom. “Let me get out of here. I need some space. You women never know when to just let things be,” he said before pushing past me and heading back toward the living room.
That was it. The straw that broke the camel’s back. Rage released tiny needles throughout my body that settled on the edge of my skin. I tingled from head to toe. The room grew dim and my hands balled into tight fists.
“Now I am no different from Shelly?! Well, if you need space, take all the damn space you need!” I ran into our bedroom and began tossing all of his clothes out of the closet. I threw them on the floor in the hallway and kicked them toward the living room. “You can take your shit and get the hell out!” Salt from my tears stung my tongue as I screamed at Brian. “Maybe you need to go back to that sick-ass Shelly! You’re the one acting like her now! The two of you were made for each other and I just couldn’t see it until now!” Brian’s closet and armoire were now empty. I started on the dresser draws. “I waited and waited to accept your hand in marriage because of what might happen! Now I know! I won’t sit around being your punching bag every time Shelly decides she wants to act a fool! No sir, not me!”
Brian started back to the bedroom and his facial expression turned from annoyance to shock when he saw his belongings decorating the hall floor.
“Lexie! Stop! What are you doing?!”
My face glistened with tears and frustration. My breath came in hard, short gasps.
“I can’t do this.”
“Lex, you are overreacting. You need to relax.”
Brian picked up a handful of his garments and brought them back into the room. As he placed them on the bed, I threw them off.
“No, I am not overreacting. I want you out. I won’t let you and her make a fool out of me, and I can’t be with you if you give her power to reign over what we have,” I sobbed as I continued to toss his wears. “I always knew…” My spent energy left me limp and I stopped throwing his clothes as I prepared to finish my statement. The lump in my throat made it difficult for the words to pass through. Thinking it was easy, saying it made it real. “I always knew…one day…she’d win.” I’d arrived at a whisper by the time I was done. I could feel my heart breaking.
Brian dropped the clothes in his hand and closed the distance between us quickly, grabbing my arms. Defeat pushed my head down and my eyes studied the floor.
“Lexie, Stop! You’re being…I’m sorry, baby. Lexie, I’m not leaving you. We are getting married in three weeks.”
When he said married, a dam broke and I fell apart, sobbing, kicking, screaming, and swinging. Brian tried to escape my anguish but only after I had landed a few good strikes.
“Get off of me. I’m not marrying you,” I mumbled, not sounding convinced myself. The truth was I loved Brian like I’d never known love—loved him so much it made me feel like my chest would explode.
Brian took me by my shoulders and shook me slightly. I knew what I was saying. He held my hands to keep me from hitting him.
“Lexie, don’t say that! Calm down, baby. I’ll fix this.”
“No.”
Brian pulled me to him and my tears left small crimson circles on his deep red shirt. He held on tight, rubbing my head. My body shook under the weight of my emotions.
“Baby, listen to me. You are right. I don’t know what got into me. I never should have let her get to me like that. We are not supposed to let anyone else make us fight. I messed up, baby. I’m just stressed. We are going to work this out. I need you in my corner. I need my partner.”
Slowly, I pulled myself away from Brian. He studied my face. I closed my eyes, opening them again to see him still studying me. He tried to look directly into my eyes and I turned away. I didn’t want him to see me in the raw. The eyes told what our mouths and actions didn’t. Distress darkened my vision. My heart was breaking into small pieces. Defeat claimed me and I felt like a failure. Another relationship failed and I should have seen it coming.
“I’m sorry, Brian.” I tried to speak without crying but couldn’t, so I spoke through the pain. “This is what I was afraid of all along. This is also the reason I waited so long to marry you. I can’t be with you with someone else pulling the strings, all these outside forces.” I held my hands up in surrender, shrank from his touch, and walked toward the bathroom. Before closing the bathroom door I turned to Brian. “Maybe it’s me. I may not be woman enough to handle all of this. Either way, this is just the beginning. Brice is not even two years old. Please don’t make this any harder for me. Just go,” I said, breaking down once again before entering the bathroom and closing the door behind me.
As the door closed, the doorbell chimed. For a moment I didn’t care who it was, then decided to go ahead and answer it. Brian was still standing in the same spot I’d left him in when I’d headed to that private sanctuary. The doorbell rang again, followed by a series of knocks. Brian never changed his position, his head hanging low. Reluctantly, I headed for the door. When I peered through the peep hole, what I saw on the other side made the air in the already tense atmosphere even thicker. Pressing my eye closer to the lens to make certain that my eyes weren’t deceiving me, I peered harder. Then I stepped back from the door, opened it, and let Shelly and Brice in.
Chapter 14 Brian
“You can’t be serious!” I yelled when I realized who Lexie had just let in. Shelly’s and Lexie’s necks snapped toward my direction.
It was bad enough that I was facing the possibility of losing my wife-to-be mere weeks before we were to be united in matrimony. Now Shelly was popping up right at one of the most inopportune times. It was apparent to Shelly from the moment she stepped into the apartment that she showed up at a bad time. Well, a bad time for us, but probably the best possible time for her. The smirk she wore told me she knew her timing was impeccable. Brice could also sense the tension in the air. It was evident in his slow stroll toward me while sucking on his middle and ring fingers.
“What’s up, little man?” I greeted him while checking my anger and emotions. He never lifted his arms for me to pick him up, but I did anyway and pulled him into me.
The suffocating pressure from the atmosphere caused anxiety to settle in Brice’s spirit. Discomfort draped his pudgy little face. I focused on Brice for a moment because I wasn’t sure what was about to happen. If Lexie had written me off totally, I would be able to see that in her actions and comments over the next few minutes. I watched her closely and kept my other eye on Shelly while pretending to be into my son.
Shelly still hadn’t fully entered the apartment and Lexie kept one hand on the doorknob, the other on her hip. Surely Shelly felt the lack of warmth in Lexie’s disposition.
“What do you want?” Lexie greeted Shelly with blatant disdain.
Shelly stepped into the apartment, uninvited. Lexie put her hand up i
n the halt position to keep Shelly from moving in any farther, marking her territory and making it clear to Shelly that she wasn’t welcome. Shelly looked down at Lexie’s hand with her lips turned up, but the smirk quickly turned into a slick smile.
“Oh, sorry for the short notice, Brian,” Shelly addressed me but kept her eyes on Lexie. “But I’ll need you to keep our son for a few days. I have to make an emergency trip out of town and there’s no one else that can keep him.”
Lexie tore her gaze from Shelly’s face and landed on mine, shooting daggers across the room. I felt every single one as they pierced my skin. To say that she was beside herself with rage was the understatement of the decade. An undercurrent of rage boiled just beneath her skin, threatening to send her bursting into flames right before our eyes. Lexie’s anger kept mine at bay. I needed to be ready to diffuse any situation that could have escalated at that time. Without taking my eyes off of Lexie, I put Brice back down on his feet and walked him toward his pain-in-the-ass mother.
The daggers followed me as I moved through the living room, stabbing me like heated darts.
“No, Shelly. You can’t do this. You can’t just walk up in here anytime and drop him on me like this. That’s disrespectful. And I don’t live here alone so you are not only disrespecting me but my Fiancé as well, and I can’t let that fly.” My eyes were on Lexie when I said the word Fiancé, but she didn’t flinch. Of course she wasn’t going to let Shelly see her sweat no matter how bad things got between us. “You will just have to work something else out. Besides, I have to work, too. Brice is damn near two years old and you never came to me before with any babysitting emergencies. I have no problem taking care of my son, but I won’t have you pulling this type of shit on me. This is not happening.” I felt like beating my chest because I was putting Shelly in her place. The expression on her face changed.
I wanted her to get upset and to trigger one of her usually dramatic performances, cursing me out and becoming out of control. Then maybe Lexie would kick her ass out. Maybe taking out all of her anger on Shelly’s ass would make us all feel a little better. But Shelly just sighed and looked pitiful. I took that as a license to continue.
In Her Mind (Mountain High Valley Low ) Page 7