by La Jill Hunt
“It’s not a problem. You know I love spending time with my beautiful goddaughter.” He kissed Day’s fingers.
“You’d better not let your brother hear you say that. He’ll be ready to knock you out.” Kayla laughed.
“Yeah, you know how his jealous ass is,” Toby told her as he picked up the bag that held the port-a-crib and Day’s diaper bag.
“It’s about to get bigger too.”
“Bigger? I doubt if that can happen.”
“Believe me, it can. I got word that he was about to be promoted on the job. The announcement comes out today. Terrell Sims will be the new department supervisor,” Kayla said matter-of-factly.
“Shut up! I didn’t know. I can’t believe he hasn’t said anything to me. “Supervisor?” he repeated to make sure he heard her correctly.
“Supervisor. Can you believe I’ll be working for Terrell?” she asked as they headed out the door. As soon as she got to the driveway, she stopped. He looked to see what the problem was and he saw Craig standing next to her car. “What the hell are you doing here? What? You following me now, Craig?”
“I wanna see my daughter. I been calling you for two weeks now.”
“And? In case you didn’t know, my father had a massive heart attack. I haven’t had time to deal with you or your mess.” Kayla hit the alarm on her key-chain and popped the trunk at the same time. She motioned for Toby to put the crib and bag in the back of the car as she fastened Day into her car seat.
“What’s up, Toby?” he acknowledged, and Toby gave him a nod. “What mess? And I know all about your father being in the hospital. My mother called and offered to keep Day, but all of a sudden you don’t want her to have nothing to do with the baby. But I bet you Geno’s mom had her, didn’t she? She can keep her whenever she wants.”
“You know what, Craig? I don’t have to explain anything to you about my child. It’s none of your business. Now leave.” She got behind the wheel and started the engine.
“What do you mean it’s none of my business? Do you listen to yourself? That’s my daughter you’re talking about. I pay for her childcare and buy her clothes. I ain’t one of these deadbeat niggas that ain’t handling their business. I love my daughter. Even Toby can testify to that.”
At the sound of his name, Toby slammed the trunk down. He had kept quiet because he didn’t want to be involved. He knew that Craig did love Day. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for her. He also knew that Craig had a wife who had recently moved in with Craig’s parents along with their son, and that was the main reason Kayla didn’t have anything to do with him or his family. Why Craig was questioning Kayla’s actions when he knew all of this baffled Toby.
“I don’t need Toby to cosign. His ass ain’t no prayer book and his mouth ain’t no Bible! No offense, Toby,” she turned and said calmly. She returned her attention to Craig and her volume increased. “Again, what I do with my child is my business. You and your wife are full of games and I don’t have time for that. You wanna play daddy? Go do it with your other child because this one doesn’t need you.” Kayla put the car in reverse, nearly hitting Craig and Toby as she barreled down the street.
“You know what, Toby? That girl is crazy,” Craig turned and told him.
“I don’t think she’s crazy, Craig. She’s just going through a lot right now,” Toby replied. He could see the frustration in Craig’s face and felt for the brother. Craig did try to be a good father in his own way. He made sure that Day was well taken care of, but Kayla was right; the brother played too many games. He had told so many lies that no one believed a word he said.
“I don’t give a damn what she’s going through. That doesn’t have nothing to do wit’ me seeing my daughter. She don’t have no problem wit’ me paying that daycare bill every month or buying clothes and toys, does she?” Craig asked. “Now, that’s not fair.”
Toby just shrugged. “I feel you, bro. Just keep taking care of your responsibilities and she’ll come around, believe me. It’s just a lot going on in her life right now.”
“Oh, I’ma take care of some things. Believe that,” he said. Toby didn’t even want to know what he meant by it, so he didn’t ask. “I’m outta here, Toby.”
“A’ight, Craig.” Toby watched him drive off then went back inside.
Looking at the issues that Craig and Kayla were having made him appreciate the fact that he didn’t have kids yet. And now it seems I may never have any, he thought, remembering what his fiancée had told him earlier. He now understood why she was adamant about him wearing a condom whenever they were together. Even after he had shown her his clean bill of health from his doctor, she still insisted. There was another reason for the condoms. She doesn’t want kids, ever.
50
“I’d like to propose a toast. To my little—”
“Younger,” Terry corrected before Toby could go on.
“Younger brother Terry. He finally gets to be a big dog on the job.” Toby raised his glass and his friends followed his lead. They were sitting in their favorite sports bar watching the basketball playoffs. The place was crowded and cheers were coming from the Lakers’ and Pacers’ fans throughout the bar as they enjoyed their teams.
Toby had called Terrell and they agreed that the beef they had in the parking lot was stupid. He invited his brother out for drinks to celebrate his new promotion. Jermaine agreed to tag along.
“So, what’s up for the night, fellas?” Jermaine asked.
“It’s your night, Terry. What are you trying to do?”
“I’m down for whatever,” Terrell told his friend. “As long as you guys remember a brotha gotta be at work by nine in the morning.”
“Man, please. You’re trying to be home before Nicole gets home from work. Don’t even try it,” Toby joked.
Terrell looked at him and replied, “Don’t even try it. The only reason you called me was because Roni is out of town.”
“Ha! That’s true. I been trying to get you to hang out since I moved back, and if you not working at the club, you’re up under Roni.” Jermaine nodded.
“Forget both of y’all. Don’t hate because I’m ’bout to be happily married.”
“We ain’t hating because you’re ’bout to be married. We’re joking because your ass is sprung!” Terrell nudged Jermaine’s arm. At that moment, his cell began ringing. Noticing the time, he knew it was Nicole calling on her break, and he had to answer. He raised his eyebrow at Jermaine and Toby as he slipped it out of his pocket and answered.
“Hey, baby.”
“Aw,” the men groaned in unison as he walked away from the table.
“Looks like Toby ain’t the only one sprung!” Jermaine yelled.
Terrell ignored them, knowing that they would probably joke him the remainder of the evening. Any other time, he would have let the voice mail pick up, but he had been gradually making a change and was determined to remain focused on making his relationship with Nicole work, especially when he realized that there was a possibility he could lose her.
“Hey. You enjoying hanging with your boys?” she asked him.
“Not as much as hanging with you.”
“I’ll bet,” she laughed. “What time are you going home?”
“We’re not hanging out late. You know I have to get to work early.”
“Okay. Um, Terry, I have something to ask you.”
“What is it?”
“I don’t want you to get mad or upset. I just want you to know.”
His heart began pounding as he tried to think of what it could be. He knew he hadn’t done anything in the past few weeks to cause suspicion, but there were so many other things she could have found out about.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Gary came by tonight to talk to me.”
“And?” he asked. He tensed up, thinking about how much her brother irritated him. Since finding out about Nicole’s pregnancy, Gary had become even more of a pain in the neck. He was always at her house, and when Terrell was ther
e, he would purposely do things to irritate him, like talk about her old boyfriends or some guy he knew that wanted to holler at her. On more than one occasion, Terrell had been tempted to throw a punch, but he just ignored him.
“He’s got a new girlfriend. He seems to like her a lot,” she said. “He wants me to meet her.”
“And?” Terrell asked, wondering what this had to do with him. He could care less whether Gary’s short ass had a girlfriend.
“I told him we would go to dinner,” she sighed.
“What? Nicole, come on, baby. Be real. You know your brother and I can’t stand each other. It’s no secret that he don’t like me and I don’t like him.”
“Terrell, this is important to me. I know you and Gary don’t see eye to eye at times, but you’re both gonna have to get over it. I’m not going to be put in a position where I have to choose between both of you,” she snapped.
“I’m not asking you to choose, Nicole. I just don’t think us going to dinner is a good idea, sweetheart, that’s all.” He forced himself to remain calm as he stood in the small area near the pool tables, watching people play.
“Can you please just think about it, Terrell?”
“I’ll think about it.”
“I mean think about it with an open mind, Terrell. Gary is the uncle of your child, and might be your brother-in-law one day,” she added.
He shuddered at the thought. If that was the case, that meant he would have to get used to the idea of Gary being around, and he definitely wasn’t ready for that.
“I said I’d think about it.”
“Thank you. You know I love you for that, right? It may seem like—”
The phone went dead in the middle of Nicole’s sentence. He looked at his phone and saw that his battery was gone. He looked up and saw Jermaine headed toward the restrooms. He waved toward him. “Jermaine! Yo, let me hold your phone.”
Jermaine walked over to him. “What’s wrong with your cell?”
“My battery went out in the middle of talking to Nicole.”
“And that’s why you’re shouting my name out like that?”
“Shut up and give me the phone.” He snatched the phone and redialed Nicole’s desk number. “Weren’t you headed to the restroom?”
“Sorry. I’ll give you some privacy, lover boy.” Jermaine laughed and walked away.
“Labor and delivery,” Nicole answered.
“Hey, it’s me. My battery went dead,” he told her.
“I thought you hung up on me. Guess there’s no need to leave the nasty message I was going to, huh?”
“Oh, so it’s like that?” He laughed, glad that the mood of their conversation had changed. There was a beep and he looked at the phone. He blinked twice to make sure he was reading it correctly, “Yo, Jermaine got another call. I’ll be home when you get off. Call me.”
“Love you,” he heard her say just as he hit the button.
“Yo,” he said, answering the other line.
“Jermaine?”
“Naw, he’s busy right now. Who’s this?”
“None of your business, Terrell. What is he doing and why do you have his phone?”
“I’m saying. What’s up, Anjelica? Long time no hear from. I see why I haven’t now,” he said. He thought that the reason Anjelica hadn’t called him was because she was caught up with her family. Now he saw otherwise.
“I got your messages. Thanks a lot. I’ve been meaning to call you, but you know a lot has been going on,” she told him. “I really haven’t had time to talk.”
“You got time to talk to Jermaine, though, huh?”
“Why Terrell, is that a hint of jealousy I detect in your voice? I do believe it is.”
“Don’t even try it. I’m saying, I thought we were cool.”
“We are cool, Terrell. I can’t thank you enough for being there for me and my family. I appreciate it, and you know that. Please don’t trip about this.”
As she talked, Terrell watched the door of the men’s restroom open. Jermaine walked out. As he passed a group of females standing nearby, they all stopped and stared at him, one of them even making a comment about how fine he was. Jermaine just thanked her with a smile and kept walking.
“I ain’t tripping. I was just saying that all of a sudden you find time to call Jermaine but not me.”
“And how are Nicole and the baby?” she asked sarcastically.
“They’re fine. Here comes Mr. Wonderful right now,” he replied, passing Jermaine the phone. “You got a call, bro.”
“Hello,” Jermaine said. “Hey, sweetie. How’s it going?”
Terrell shook his head and returned to the table to join his brother.
“What’s wrong with you?” Toby frowned. “Where’s Jermaine?”
“On the phone. And get this—you’ll never believe who he’s talking to,” Terrell told him.
“Who?” Toby asked, suddenly curious.
“Anjelica.”
“Get the hell outta here!”
“I’m dead serious.”
“You gave him the number?”
“Hell no. She called him.”
“On the cell?”
Terrell was beginning to get irritated. “Naw, at home. Yeah, on the cell. You know she ain’t call him here at the bar!”
Jermaine returned to the table with a smile on his face. He ordered another round of drinks and sat down. “What’s the score?”
“What’s up with that?” Toby asked.
“What? Y’all don’t want another round?” He looked at the two brothers, both looking back at him like he had stolen something.
“That’s not what he’s talking about,” Terrell told him.
“What are y’all talking about, man?” Jermaine asked innocently.
“Man, don’t play dumb. What’s up with your girl hitting you up on the cell and you coming back to the table grinning like a kid on Christmas morning?”
Jermaine cut his eyes at Terrell. “Damn, just blow up my spot, why don’t you?”
“Whatever,” Terrell said and focused on the big screen television against the wall. The fine waitress brought their drinks, smiling and flirting with him. It took all he could not to flirt back and get her number, but he had to check out her thick behind as she walked away from the table.
“Anjelica is cool people,” Jermaine told them. “I started calling to check on her pops then we just started talking on the phone. I like her. She’s funny.”
He wasn’t saying anything Terrell didn’t already know. “So, it’s just a phone thing. That’s cool. For a minute I thought you were gonna say you were trying to holler at her.”
“I am. I got tickets for us to go check out Maxwell next month,” Jermaine said, raising one eyebrow, his signature gesture.
“What?” Terrell asked before he could stop himself. He tried to play it off when both Toby and Jermaine looked at him.
“What’s the problem?” Jermaine asked.
“Man, that girl is nothing but trouble. She causes trouble if nothing else,” Toby said, taking a deep swallow of beer. “Tell him, Terry.”
“She must not be that bad. Terry was hanging with her. That’s how we met, remember? She was dropping you to get your car. Now, according to her, y’all weren’t kicking it. Tell me now if it’s anything different and I’ll step off.”
“Man, you know Terry wasn’t kicking it with her like that. Were you?” Toby now turned and asked his little brother, wondering himself.
Terrell didn’t know how to answer. Granted, he hadn’t really kicked it with Anjelica, but they were friends. And they had slept together, even if it was only once. For some reason, the chance of her being with Jermaine bothered him, and he didn’t want it to happen. For once, he had the upper hand in the competition and he didn’t want to lose it. He thought for a minute then told them, “I’m just saying you need to think twice before you get caught up. She’s cool and everything, but I ain’t gonna lie; I hit it and I know someone else who did.
”
“Are you saying she’s a ho? She doesn’t come off like a ho, Terry. Is she out there like that, Toby?” he turned and asked.
Toby just shrugged, wondering why his brother was saying that about Anjelica. He didn’t think she slept around the way Terry was making it seem.
“I ain’t say she was a ho, Jermaine. I’m just telling you what I did with her. I didn’t know you were into my leftovers,” he said arrogantly. He hoped that would aggravate Jermaine to the point where he would leave Anjelica alone. “You always wanted fresh meat, remember?”
Jermaine picked up his half-empty bottle of beer and swallowed the remainder in one gulp, staring at Terry the entire time. When he was finished, he slowly told him, “Leftovers, huh? I don’t think Anjelica would be called a leftover, Terry. I think you may have just been the appetizer before the main course. And I’ve had a few appetizers myself.”
“What the hell are you talking about, Jermaine? Who?”
“That’s not important, Terry. And don’t front like you ain’t had a few appetizers yourself. The difference is I ain’t trying to put nobody’s business out there like you are. I like the girl. She’s good people, and as her friend, I don’t think she would appreciate you trying to call her out like that. I want you and her to remain friends, so the fact that you did that will remain at this table unless you bring it up to her.” Jermaine leaned back in his chair.
Terrell stood up and looked over at Toby, who hadn’t said a word. “Man, I can’t talk to him. You try and talk to him.”
“I don’t know the girl, Terry. You said yourself that I ain’t know her for real. I only know what you and other people have told me.”
“Fine. You can’t say I ain’t warn you.” He was about to walk away when he heard someone calling his name.
“Terrell, what’s up, man?”
He turned to see his friend, Theo, headed toward the table. “What’s up, Theo?”
Theo worked for the same company as Terrell. He was also a manager, but he worked in the finance department rather than customer relations, where Terrell and Kayla worked.
“Nothing. Came here to check out the game.” Theo spotted Toby sitting at the table. “DJ Terror, how you been, man? You set that date yet?”