by Cheryl Faye
Stefàn’s parents had been married for thirty-five years. His father, Michael, or Mike, as everyone called him, was a licensed electrical engineer who had retired from Con Edison two years earlier at the age of fifty-six and gone into business for himself. An inch or so shorter than Stefàn, he was just as handsome, if not more so. Accentuated by a silver shock of thick, wavy hair, Mike Cooper’s features reflected what Stefàn would most likely look like when he reached his late-fifties. Despite the twenty-five-year difference in their ages, Mike’s physique was as toned as his eldest son’s because he was nearly as vain as Stefàn and just as dedicated to physical fitness.
Stefàn’s mother, Damaris, was the principal of the public elementary school Stefàn and his siblings had attended when they were children. A statuesque beauty, Damaris stood five feet, eleven inches in her stockinged feet and had a figure women half her age envied. Older than her husband by two years, Stefàn thought his mother was the epitome of the black woman. Wearing her salt and pepper, naturally curly hair cut short and close to her scalp, Stefàn had inherited his sense of style from his mother. Some people might classify Damaris as snooty since she was never seen in public without makeup and her bearing and style of dress was very classy, but in truth, her personality was warm, welcoming and she was much beloved by the students, parents and school faculty, as well as by the community at large.
Mike and Damaris lived a very active lifestyle and traveled often, actually at every opportunity that came their way. They had been all over the world on numerous cruises and excursions of all sorts. Since their children were grown and living their own lives, the couple took full advantage of their “childless” status and viewed the second half of their marriage as a rebirth in which they often behaved as newlyweds.
When Stefàn arrived, he noticed the lights were on in his parents’ backyard, so after parking, he headed back there. The house had a screened-in deck and since the night was warm, Mike had a couple of steaks on the grill. Damaris was setting the table on the deck for a late-night supper for her and Mike.
“Oh, I’m just in time to eat,” Stefàn called as he walked toward them.
“Sorry, buddy, this is a table set for two,” Mike called back when he noticed his son.
“That’s all right; treat me like a stepchild,” Stefàn playfully moaned.
“Hi, baby. We weren’t expecting you. We would have put a steak on for you, too,” Damaris said as he approached.
Kissing his mother and giving her a big hug, he told her, “It’s cool, Mom. I’m not staying anyway. I came by to say hi. I’m on my way to a bachelor’s party at Skip’s.”
Walking over to his father, the two men embraced and Stefàn kissed his father’s cheek. “Who’s getting married?” Mike asked.
“I don’t know if you know Greg Baker. He lived a couple of blocks from us in Queens but we didn’t really hang out much until we got to high school. He’s getting married in Montego Bay, Jamaica on Sunday.”
“That sounds nice,” Damaris said.
“Yeah, right?”
“So how are you, baby?” she asked her son.
Taking a seat on one of the stools at the bar on the deck, he said, “I’m good, Mom. How you doin’?”
“Great. You look sharp.”
He was dressed in black pants, shirt and shoes topped by a red sport jacket. “Thanks.”
“Hope you’re not going to be acting a fool at this bachelor party,” Damaris said with a sideways glance.
Stefàn quietly laughed, “No, Mom. I’m really not even in the mood to go but…you know. We’re pretty cool so I want to at least show my face for a couple hours.”
“Since when are you not in the mood for barely-clad women shaking their behinds?” Mike asked, knowing what a ladies’ man his son had always been.
Stefàn smiled. “Mom, you’re going to be happy to hear this, but I’ve met someone who…well, she…she’s given me a new outlook on a lot of things.”
“And who is this?” Damaris asked.
“Her name is Charisse Ellison. We met at my friend, Terry Wilson’s, wedding two weeks ago.”
“Just two weeks and you’ve already got a new outlook on life?” Mike questioned. “She must be some woman.”
“She is, Dad. She’s pretty amazing.”
Damaris and Mike exchanged a look of pleasant surprise.
“Y’all are probably like, ‘is he for real?’ Well, I am.” Stefàn lowered his head briefly and a jocund sound escaped his lips. “She’s going to be your daughter-in-law one day.”
“What!” Damaris made no effort to hide her astonishment at this admission.
“You’ve known her two weeks and you’re already planning to marry her, huh?” Mike said.
“Daddy, when did you know Mommy was the woman for you?” Stefàn challenged.
Mike looked fondly at his wife and smiled. “The first time I asked her out and she turned me down.”
Damaris grinned at the memory.
“She turned you down?” Stefàn asked, looking from his mother to his father.
“Four times,” Mike admitted.
“He wouldn’t take no for an answer. I went out with him to get him to stop asking me out,” Damaris revealed.
Stefàn laughed. “So how’d y’all end up married?”
“She had the time of her life, like I told her she would if she went out with me,” Mike bragged.
Still laughing, Stefàn asked, “Is that true, Mom?”
“Yes. He was everything I didn’t expect him to be. Your father was something of a playboy and I’d heard about his reputation. See, I had just moved into the neighborhood a month before. It was my first apartment and my first full-time teaching job. My next door neighbor had warned me about him. He lived with your grandparents in the building across the street from me. I thought he was arrogant and full of you-know-what. He was gorgeous, though,” Damaris added with a nod of her head.
“So he wore you down, huh?”
“I guess.”
“Persistence pays off, son,” Mike said with a knowing smile.
“But you changed your mind about him after one date?”
“As much as I struggled not to, yes, I did. He was the perfect gentleman and he somehow learned that I loved the Temptations. He took me to dinner in the city, then to my surprise, we went to the Apollo. I had wanted to get tickets to this show but after I paid my rent and my other bills, I couldn’t afford it. We had seats in the first row, dead center, and he didn’t even mind that I acted a fool when Eddie Kendricks singled me out in the audience while he was singing, ‘You’re My Everything.’ I acted a pure fool, but he was really sweet about it,” she said as she looked lovingly at her husband.
“Well, see, Dad, you realized Mommy was the woman you wanted to spend the rest of your life with before you’d even gone out with her. I’ve spent the last ten days with this young lady and every day I’m with her, my feelings get stronger and stronger,” Stefàn explained. “She’s different. She’s not like any of the women I usually fool around with. She’s in the church for one, but she’s not a holy roller, if you know what I mean. She’s new to her faith, but she’s really serious about it and she talks to me about what she feels about that and, come to think of it, she, uh, she put me off at first, too.”
“What do you mean?” Damaris asked.
Stefàn proceeded to tell his parents about his first encounter with Charisse. “My feelings were really hurt when she told me she didn’t want to get involved with anyone like me.”
“And you didn’t take offense to that?” Mike asked.
“Yeah, I hung up on her.”
“So how’d y’all end up going out?” Mike asked as he got up to turn the steaks on the grill.
“She called me back and apologized. The rest, is history.”
“It’s not a problem for her that you’re not in the church?” Damaris asked.
“I’m going to church with her on Sunday. Her birthday is next week and I asked
her if I could take her out and do something special for her birthday. She asked me to come to church with her. So I am.”
“Are you really serious about her, honey?” Damaris asked. Although she and Mike did not regularly attend church, Damaris didn’t take anyone’s faith lightly and she hoped Stefàn wasn’t doing so either.
“Yes, Mom. I love her. I’m in love with her. It’s not infatuation, either.”
“How do you know?” Mike asked.
“I’ve been infatuated before. This is so much more than that. She’s abstaining from sex. She made a vow to not be intimate with any man who was not her husband and I’m all right with that. I’m more than willing to wait for her. I’ve never even kissed her. Well, at least…not a real kiss.”
Mike and Damaris looked at their son in silence for a long moment. Damaris could see in his eyes the seriousness of his confession and was overjoyed. She often worried about Stefàn, more so than her other two children. Devin and Nikki were both married with children and had settled into their lives with their families and were doing well. She had often wondered if Stefàn would ever settle down. Too many times to count, she’d questioned him about that and he’d usually become irritated whenever she’d bring the subject up. To hear him admit he had met someone who had inspired such growth in him gave her a new appreciation for her oldest child. She knew Stefàn well enough to know that when he set his mind to something, there was no stopping him, and he appeared very determined with regard to his relationship with this young lady.
“So when are we going to meet her?” Mike asked.
“Soon.”
“What does she do?” Damaris asked.
“She’s an accountant, a CPA.”
“Is she pretty?”
Curving his lips upward to create a picture-perfect smile, Stefàn boldly declared, “No, she’s beautiful, inside and out.”
“Our son is in love, baby,” Mike said matter-of-factly.
“I see.”
“I never thought I could feel so strongly about anyone, especially someone so different from me. She’s quick to admit she was no saint before she was saved, but her conviction is so strong now that it makes me curious to learn what it is that motivates her. I believe in God, in Jesus Christ and everything, but, I don’t really understand Christianity the way she does. She wears her faith proudly but she doesn’t condemn you if you don’t feel the same way she does. I feel an uncommon sense of peace and joy whenever I’m around her. She really makes my whole… She makes me feel good all over,” Stefàn reverently admitted.
“You’re sure what you’re feeling isn’t motivated by lust, son?” Mike asked.
“No, it’s not that. No doubt she’s beautiful, very sexy, very appealing, but going there with her is so unimportant, Dad. I’m not going to lie and say I’ve never imagined what that would be like, but she’s so awesome that if she says we have to wait until we’re married, I’m more than willing to wait. She’s worth it.”
“Does she know how you feel, Stevie?” Damaris asked, using the nickname she’d given him as a child.
“About wanting to marry her? Not yet.”
“What if she doesn’t feel the same?”
“Mommy, she has feelings for me. It’s funny, but we connected immediately. When I first saw her at that wedding…. Actually, we saw each other at the same time. When her eyes locked on mine, there was something there that drew me like a magnet. That’s part of the reason she put me off at first.” Stefàn paused momentarily. “This woman makes my heart race whenever I’m near her. I want to take care of her. I want to do everything and anything I can to make her happy.”
“Wow,” Mike whispered, impressed by the depth of feeling he could hear in his son’s tone. He was happy, despite how genuinely surprised he was at the change in Stefàn. He had never heard his son express such heartfelt emotion when speaking of any woman.
“Well, you’ve definitely got to bring her around so we can meet her,” Damaris told him.
“I will, Mom. You’re gonna love her, too.”
“YOU’RE REALLY SERIOUS ABOUT HIM, HUH?” MYRA ASKED.
It was Saturday morning and she and Charisse were on their way to the Garden State Plaza mall for their monthly shopping trip. This was an outing they had been taking together for the past three years, ever since Charisse bought her townhouse in Englewood. She would drive to the Bronx to pick Myra up from one of her shops and they would spend about four or five hours going from store to store, trying on clothes, shoes and the like. When they were each satisfied that they’d found everything they wanted, they would then decide on a restaurant to eat lunch or dinner, depending on the time, before Charisse drove Myra back to her shop.
“Yes, Myra. And the feeling is mutual. The way we connected from the start and the way we feel about each other is no mistake.”
“What about all that stuff you said about cutting him off if you felt like you were getting too deep?”
“That was before I knew him. All the things we thought about him being a player and everything were true. He’s a single man and he was enjoying his bachelorhood. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But he’s serious about us being together, Myra, as a couple. He’s already told me he feels like there’s some greater destiny in store for us, together. He said he feels a permanence about our relationship.”
“So what about your promise not to have sex before you get married? You really think he’s going to go along with that?” Myra skeptically questioned.
“He knows about that and he said he would never do anything to compromise that and I believe him.”
Myra had nothing to say to that, but she still could not quell the doubt she felt about Charisse’s relationship with Stefàn. Could he have really changed so quickly from the flirtatious Casanova he had shown himself to be at Jewel and Terry’s wedding, then again at the barbecue they’d all attended, to this attentive, caring being Charisse was espousing?
“I can tell from your silence, you still don’t believe me. Once you get to know him, you’ll see what I’m talking about. And you will get to know him, Myra, because he’s already declared himself my boyfriend, which is fine by me, by the way. He’s making dinner for me tonight, and he promised to go to church with me, too.”
“You’re sure he’s not doing all of this to soften you up?”
“What do you mean?”
“When he thinks he’s got you where he wants you, his true colors are going to come out and you’ll see that he’s as much a player as you first thought he was.”
“I don’t think that will happen, Myra, but if it does….” Charisse shrugged. In a low tone, she said, “I have faith in him. I don’t believe he’s playing with me at all. God brought Stefàn and I together for a reason. With me being new in my faith and his wanting to understand what motivates me, we are in a position to learn a lot about each other, about Christ and grow together. Granted, up until we met, we were living very different lives, but deep down, we’re not really all that different. He wants to spend time with me, quality time, so we can get to know each other. I wouldn’t even be surprised if we got married one day,” she said with a smile.
“Married?”
“Yes, married. I love him, Myra. It’s only been two weeks, but I can’t deny what I feel in my heart for him.”
Reiterating her constant concern, Myra said, “I don’t want you to get hurt, Risi.”
“He won’t hurt me.”
“PROVINCE REALTY, STEFÀN COOPER SPEAKING. How can I help you?”
“What’s up, Coop?”
“Hey, Dub. What’s good, man?”
“You feel like taking a ride over to East Orange to play some three on three with Joe and them when you get off?”
“Can’t tonight, man. I’ve got a date.”
“How late you working? We’re looking at going over there at about five,” Julian countered.
“I’m out of here at four o’clock but I have to do some food shopping. I’m making dinner fo
r Charisse.”
The disbelief was evident when Julian asked, “You’re making dinner?”
Stefàn had to laugh at his friend’s reaction. “Yeah, man. I’m making jambalaya.”
“Have you ever cooked jambalaya before?”
“No, but I’ve got a great recipe that Margie gave me. And I’ve tasted it. It’s off the hook,” Stefàn told Julian.
“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to come out the way it did when Margie cooked it, man. Why would you want to do that to Charisse?”
“What? Man, I’m a very good cook, Dub,” Stefàn indignantly announced. “Just ’cause I don’t do it often doesn’t mean I can’t. I can follow a recipe. It’s not that complicated. I’ve already got most of the stuff I need; I just need to pick up a couple of lobster tails.”
Julian was silent on the line for the next few seconds.
“You still there?” Stefàn asked after a while.
“Yeah, I’m just… I’m trippin’, man. You must really have it bad for this lady, you’re cooking dinner for her. That’s my thing.”
“Julian, I’m in love with her.”
“Really? Are you sure?”
“I’ve never been more certain of anything in my life, man. I’m going to marry her.”
“You said that before.”
“I mean it, Dub. I want her to be my wife. I want her in my life for the rest of my life. This is no mistake, the way we feel about each other. We haven’t known each other for any length of time, but she’s feeling what I’m feeling, Dub. I know it. I’m going to church with her tomorrow.”
“Well, that’s good. Listen, man, I hope everything you want your relationship with her to be comes to pass. You’re my man and if Charisse makes you happy, makes you feel like—”
“She makes me feel like I can fly,” Stefàn reverently whispered.
Julian smiled. “That’s great. Hold on to that. It’s not often you meet a woman who makes the kind of impression she has obviously made on you. If you believe she’s the woman you’re supposed to spend the rest of your life with, she probably is. Are you prepared to give up the life you’ve been living to be with her, Stefàn?”