by Mary Monroe
Despite what I was saying and feeling, I didn’t want him to hang up. It had never occurred to me that it was going to be so hard to cancel the feelings that I still had for him. I loved him from the bottom of my heart, but at the same time I hated the ground he walked on. If those mixed emotions were not enough to confuse me and have me talking and acting like a fool, nothing was. “And just to let you know, I hope you don’t plan on coming back, because I might not be here!”
“Annette, you can go wherever you want to go as long as you let me know how I can get in touch with my daughter. If not, you can leave her with me and go on to wherever you want to go,” he said calmly.
I almost blacked out. This man had no shame whatsoever. I had not expected him to say anything like that. It seemed like the more we talked, the more pain this conversation caused. I figured that if I didn’t want to end up in hysterics, the sooner I got off the telephone the better. “What did you call me up for?” I asked.
Pee Wee let out a loud sigh. I couldn’t tell if it was a sigh of relief or a sigh of disgust. “I will continue to pay all your utilities, your car insurance, and all of the other household bills. I’ll give you more than enough to keep Charlotte happy, but for the time being, you should be able to foot your own personal bills. You know, them beauty shop expenses and nails and stuff. Just until I get sorted out. It won’t be easy for me to pay for two households.”
“That’s not my problem. You chose to take on two households, motherfucker,” I said calmly. I was just waiting for him to tell me that he had already spoken to a lawyer.
“I want to see Charlotte at least three or four times a week. My new place has two bedrooms, one already done up for her. Toys and her own TV and stuff. There is a large backyard so she can run around like she wants to. I’ll even finally get her that puppy she’s always wanted, but that you wouldn’t let her get because you didn’t want to be cleanin’ up behind it.”
“Oh, that’s so damn cozy. That’s so…so Leave It to Beaver cute of you! I guess the next thing you tell me is that the Brady Bunch lives next door to you and your use-to-be hippie valley girl.”
“Annette, I am not in the mood to fuss and fight with you,” he whined. “I am tryin’ to make this…this adjustment work for everybody concerned. A change might do you some good anyway.”
“A change? What the fuck makes you think I need a damn change? I was happy with the way things were between us!”
“Annette, do I have to keep remindin’ you that when I was happy with the way things were between us…never mind.”
“If you bring up Louis Baines and that affair I had with him again, I am going to scream!”
“I am not goin’ to bring up Louis Baines. That’s one thing you do enough on your own. Right now my focus is my daughter.”
“Well, let me tell you one thing, my daughter will not be spending much time wherever you moved to. The less she sees of that cow, the better.”
“Let’s get one thing straight right now. You can’t keep me from spendin’ time with my child! You are not goin’ to interfere with my relationship with her!”
“I didn’t say that. But I can keep your whore from spending time with her.”
“Annette, I am surprised at you. One of the things I always admired about you was the fact that you didn’t use foul language that much, and you didn’t call people nasty names as easy as some people do.”
It felt like somebody had set me on fire because I was just that hot. “Yeah, I am using a lot of foul language these days, and I am calling your BITCH some foul names. What did you expect?”
“Well, I guess I’ll come to your house when I want to see my daughter, huh?”
“Our daughter. And let me remind you that I was the one who carried her. I was the one who suffered through hour after hour of labor to bring her into the world. She’s more my daughter than she is yours.”
“You’d better watch your step, woman.”
“Don’t call me woman! I am not your woman!”
“True. But after what you just said, I need to know something.”
“What do you need to ask me?” I screeched.
“Is Charlotte my daughter?”
I thought my ears were going to fall off because the words that had just hit them felt like acid. “How dare you ask me a question like that!”
“Well, is she?”
“Of course she’s your daughter. And if you don’t believe me, you can easily find out by getting a DNA test! I can’t believe you would even fix your lips to ask me something like that. Oh my God!”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to go there. Listen, all I want is to be able to see my child on a regular basis. And I plan to.”
“I am sure you will. But if you ever bring that bitch back to my house again, people are going to read about you and her both in the newspaper! The obituaries!” I warned.
“I knew you were goin’ to be talkin’ all kinds of shit before I even picked up the telephone!”
“Then why did you call here, asshole? Look, can you hurry up and finish saying what you called to say. I’ve…I’ve got a date!”
“Uh-huh. I see you didn’t waste no time.”
“No, I didn’t waste any time finding me somebody else. And guess what, he’s a real man. He’s not a punk….”
“All right. This conversation is over—”
I didn’t even let him finish his sentence. I slammed the phone down as hard as I could.
I was sorry about all of the profanity I had used and all of the hurtful things I’d said. I had always thought that I was a level-headed woman who didn’t fly off the handle the way I’d seen some of the other black women in Richland do. But I couldn’t even imagine a sister as regal and stately as Oprah not getting down and dirty in a situation like mine. If Pee Wee’s actions didn’t justify my behavior, what did?
I scolded myself for telling that lie about me already having a new man. But the one thing that I didn’t want Pee Wee and Lizzie—or anybody else—to think was that nobody else wanted me.
Now all I had to do was find somebody who did.
CHAPTER 41
As angry as I was, I knew it was not going to be easy for me to find a new lover and initiate a romance while I was still in love with my husband. But that was just what I was going to do. And I was not going to waste any time doing it. Well, I didn’t have any time to lose.
I didn’t expect to be rescued and wooed by a Prince Charming on a white horse. I didn’t expect too many men in my age group, who had a lot of younger and prettier women to choose from, to choose me. Things just didn’t happen that way in real life. If there was another available man out there for me, he was going to have a lot to live up to because I didn’t want just any old body off the street. Even before I got married, and went for months at a time without a date, I had high standards. I didn’t care how lonely or horny I got, I wasn’t going to settle for too little.
But I was not naïve enough to think that it was going to be easy, or even possible, for me to find love again.
After all, I was a forty-seven-year-old woman who had been out of the dating game for more than ten years. I wasn’t sure my affair with Louis Baines counted. Even if it did, I still didn’t have any time to waste if I wanted to save my own face. There were still some good men out there, but there were still a lot of desperate women out there competing with each other for those men.
I had to laugh when I thought about all of the women who had coveted my man! It seemed so ironic that none of those women had pursued him (as far as I knew), and that the woman who I least expected to be a threat turned out to be my downfall. I was thankful that I had other things in my life to fall back on. In most situations, that was Rhoda.
“Can you meet me at the Red Rose tonight around nine? That band from Cleveland is playing tonight,” I said to Rhoda, practically yelling into the telephone.
“I’d love to, but I promised Bully I’d go out and have a drink with him tonight.”
“Oh. I thought he was in London.” After all these years, I still got disappointed when Rhoda’s lover interfered with my plans. I liked Bully, whose real name was Ian Bullard, and he liked me. But I wasn’t always in the mood to socialize with him.
“He got back from London last night. Didn’t I tell you he would be back this week?”
“You probably did. Well, maybe some other time,” I said, knowing I sounded like a petulant two-year-old.
“If you don’t mind his company, I can meet you this evenin’. You sound like you need to talk.”
“Rhoda, I do need to talk and I don’t care if Bully, his dog, and his grandfather comes with you.”
“Uh-oh, this sounds pretty serious.”
“It is. I had a real tense conversation with that man.”
“That man you married I presume?”
“That man. He’s not coming back.”
“Well, didn’t you already know that? He took most of his stuff, and he rented a new place. That sounds pretty serious to me. Did you think he was coming back?”
“I don’t know what I thought! I thought I knew him. I thought I knew what kind of man he was.”
“Annette, give this some time. If you love your husband and want him back, there is always a chance that that will happen. You can make it happen, or you can move on. Now it’s up to you. I just want you to know that no matter what you do, I am behind you all the way.”
“Bully won’t mind us sitting there talking about my problems? His wife dumped him, so he will be able to relate, too.” I didn’t wait for Rhoda to respond. “We can send him to the bar for drinks a few times, long enough for us to chat. So can you meet me there?”
“I can and I will,” Rhoda told me. “It’s been a tense day for me, too, so I need to get out of the house myself. See you there.”
My mother had called my office six times during the day, and each time I’d lied and told her that I was on my way to a meeting. When she offered to come to my office and catch me between meetings, I told her I was going home early. “I need to talk to you,” she told me. “I need to make sure you doin’ all right.”
“I’m doing just fine, Muh’Dear. Please don’t worry about me.” My voice wobbled and I hung up before she could hear me sobbing, which is what I did in my office for the next ten minutes.
One thing that amazed and pleased me was the fact that as far as my employees were concerned, I didn’t have a care in the world. But when I left my office to go into the break room for some ice, Brian, a short blond with beady blue eyes, put his hand on my shoulder. “Annette, is everything all right? You look like you’ve been crying,” he said in a gentle voice. Brian was as gay as a picnic basket, and he was also the biggest gossip in the office. He was the last person in the building that I wanted to know my business.
“Oh, I’m fine!” I quickly replied. As hard as I tried to hold it back, a single hiccup slipped past my quivering lips. “I spilled some ink on my hand when I was changing the toner in my printer, and then I rubbed my eyes before washing my hands.”
“Oh. Well, I’m glad to hear that that’s all it is. Of all the people I know, you are the only one who is not shackled with problems and ailments.”
I spent the next ten minutes listening to a detailed account of Brian’s high blood pressure problems, his shabby nerves, his bad back, his insomnia, a mysterious gum condition his dentist couldn’t identify, and a variety of other afflictions. I was surprised that he was still alive. By the time he got through with me, I did feel somewhat better. I was glad that at least I still had my health.
When I got home, I found Muh’Dear had left six messages on my answering machine. She was the last person I wanted to talk to, so I didn’t even bother to call her back and ask if I could drop Charlotte off so I could go out. I arranged to send Charlotte across the street for a sleepover with one of her neighborhood friends.
“Whew! I was scared you was going to send me to Grandma’s house, and I’d have to eat cabbage greens and cornbread!” she informed me on her way out the door with her sleeping bag and backpack.
“Well, whatever the Turners are having for dinner, don’t you overdo it,” I warned. I watched until she made it across the street to the Turner house where her little friend was waiting for her on the front porch steps.
I wore to the Red Rose the same red blouse and black pants that I had worn to work. As soon as I walked in the front door, I almost fainted. There was Rhoda sitting at our usual booth near the back. But she had company, and it was not Bully.
Her husband, Otis, was with her, his long arm wrapped around her like a newlywed, but it wasn’t his presence that made my flesh crawl. Jade and Vernie were also with her, and that made my stomach churn. I slunk quietly back out of the door like a shy burglar. As I was sprinting back to my car where I had parked it on the street a block away, I heard footsteps. I kept running, but I turned around to see who it was, expecting to see either Rhoda or Otis. It was neither one of them. It was somebody from my past. I stopped in my tracks under a street light, so relieved I wanted to dance a jig. And he could not have timed our “reunion” better.
“Jacob Brewster,” I swooned, holding my arms out to him. “I haven’t seen you in years!”
“Girl, when I saw you come through that door, I didn’t know who you were until the bartender told me! You’ve lost a ton of weight!” Jacob yelled, looking me up and down. He was obviously pleased to see me, and pleased to see how good I looked.
“I don’t think it was that much weight, Jacob,” I said with a chuckle as we embraced.
“How come you didn’t come on in?” he asked, spinning me around so he could see my new frame better. You would have thought that I was posing for the cover of Vogue magazine the way I was showing off.
“Uh, I was, but I changed my mind,” I mumbled.
“I’m out alone, and your girl Rhoda is in there,” he added, beckoning toward the bar with his head. “She told me that she was supposed to be meeting you there.”
“Yeah, she was,” I said, feeling more relaxed. “I haven’t seen you since you took me to that party about twelve or thirteen years ago. I always wondered what happened to you.”
“Well, I thought you had flown the coup, given up on the north, and was sitting on a front porch down south somewhere!”
My jaw dropped. “As you can see, I am still here and I plan on staying here,” I said proudly. “I did hear that you had married one of the Fisher girls.”
“I did. I married one of the Hampton girls, too. And one of the Mason girls.” A sad look appeared on Jacob’s face. “I guess sooner or later one of my marriages will take.”
“I hope so….”
“I heard about you and Pee Wee busting up. You got you a new shoe yet?”
“No, not yet. But I…I mean, I am dating again, but nothing serious yet.”
“You know, of all the women I dated, you were the only one who treated me like a real man. I kicked myself in the butt for years over how stupid I behaved at that party I took you to. You ended up hooking up with that punk-ass Cunningham brother that night.”
“I was going to marry him, but that didn’t work out,” I said quickly. As far as I knew, Jerome Cunningham had not told anybody that he had dumped me because his uncle blabbed to him that I’d worked as a prostitute and that he’d been one of my tricks. If the Richland gossipmongers ever did hear it, it wouldn’t be from me. “I didn’t make it to your mama’s funeral last year because I didn’t hear about it in time,” I said, gently touching his shoulder.
“She was a good woman and I miss her,” Jacob mumbled in a low, sad voice. He blinked and let out a prolonged moan. But then his voice perked up like a shotgun blast. “Listen, if you don’t have to rush off somewhere, come on back in and have a drink with me. I don’t know about you, but I’d sure like to get reacquainted.”
CHAPTER 42
My previous relationship with Jacob had not lasted long enough for me to really get to know him that
well. That was why he reacted the way he did when I suddenly wrapped my arms around his neck and planted a juicy kiss on his lips. His lips were dry and his breath was as foul as it ever was. As a matter of fact, his bad breath was legendary. When I was dating him, my friends rarely referred to him by his name when he came up in a conversation. Instead, they usually referred to him as “that brother with the foul breath.”
I didn’t care about Jacob’s bad breath, or anything else, right now. The way I had embraced him, my stomach pressed up against his like a suit of armor, it looked like I was giving him the Heimlich maneuver. When I released him, he gasped. Then he let out a sharp laugh.
“Have mercy,” he panted. “It sure enough is good for a woman to pay me this kind of attention.” We were directly under the street light. A moth came out of nowhere and circled Jacob’s head. I fanned it away, thumping the side of his head like a melon. That made us both laugh. His eyes looked into mine with so much intensity it was like he was trying to see my soul. I could tell that he was ripe for the picking. “Something told me to drag my tail on over to this bar tonight!”
What Jacob didn’t know was that a few seconds earlier, I had spotted my husband cruising down the street out of the corner of my eye. The kiss had been for his benefit. I wanted that sucker to know that I wasn’t sitting at home pining my life away over him.
Just as Pee Wee drove near the street light and spotted me, he jerked his head around so hard and fast, he almost ran up on the sidewalk. There was a slack-jawed look on his face. Behind and above Pee Wee’s car was a large silver moon. It looked like a yo-yo suspended on an invisible string. Lizzie was with him, sitting so close to him it looked like she was on his lap. And that was not easy to do in a car with bucket seats! There was a stupefied look on her face, like I was doing something that she didn’t approve of. I was suddenly attacked by a siege of indigestion. I was afraid that the Chinese chicken salad I’d eaten for lunch was going to rise up out of my stomach and squirt out of my mouth. Suddenly, I had trouble breathing. I felt like I was being smothered by a large pillow that had been cruelly placed over my face. Jacob said something, but I couldn’t make out what it was. I was too busy trying to breathe and get the image of Pee Wee and Lizzie out of my mind. Somehow, I managed to contain myself.