Things Forbidden

by Maryam Diaab

  37

  Ajani walked slowly up the porch steps. He looked better than I remembered, older somehow, as if in these past few weeks the weight of the world had been resting on his shoulders.

  “How are you?” I asked, letting him in. He walked past me, making my spine tingle.

  “I’m good. How are you?” Ajani stood looking as if all he wanted to do was to reach out and touch me.

  “I’m-I’m-” I stuttered, unsure of myself. “I really don’t know how I am, actually. I think coming here may have been a huge mistake.”

  “I take it you’ve seen Wendy?” Ajani sat down on the couch and watched me curiously. “Is everything okay?”

  “You knew, didn’t you?” I asked, sitting next to him. “That’s what you wanted to tell me yesterday over the phone. You knew that Wendy and Terrence had been sleeping together.”

  “I found out after you left the wedding. They were arguing and blaming each other, and it just all came out somehow.”

  “But you wouldn’t tell me…”

  “I didn’t want you to think that I was making it up so that you would come back to me. Something that big deserved to be uncovered on its own.”

  “Well, it did. I heard them discussing their fling in Wendy’s hospital room after she almost lost her baby…their baby.”

  “I’m sorry, Yvette,” Ajani said me sincerely.

  “It’s not your fault; they were the ones who decided to betray me,” I said sadly. “Wendy and I have been friends for a very long time. You know this was not the way it was supposed to be? I moved to Nashville to get clarity, to find out if Terrence was really the man I was supposed to marry—”

  “If you think about it, Yvette, Nashville eventually did exactly what it was supposed to do. You found out that Terrence is a cheater and Wendy is a liar.”

  “But, Ajani, I’m more confused than ever. I have no job, no fiancé, no best friend.”

  “You’ve got me,” Ajani said, his eyes boring into mine.

  “Ajani, look at what my life has become.”

  “What? What has your life become? You’ve been given the opportunity to start over, make your own path, really be happy.”

  “It’s too late to start over!” I yelled at him, angry and frustrated at the same time.

  “No, Yvette, it’s too late not to!”

  I closed my eyes, hearing his voice echo in my ears long after he had stopped speaking.

  “Where did you go after the wedding?” he asked gently, moving closer to me.

  “My mother’s. I knew that no one would look for me there.”

  “And how’d that go?”

  “She’s doing well. I should have gone to her a long time ago. I learned so much while I was there, so much about myself and why I am the way I am.”

  “I was worried about you,” Ajani said, touching my face. I wanted to savor his touch, I wanted to feel him remove my clothes and place his body on top of mine, but I couldn’t…“I still love you, Yvette.”

  “Don’t say that, Ajani.”

  “Why not? It’s the truth. I love you and I want to be with you. I need you.”

  “As difficult as this is for me to say, Ajani, I need to choose myself. For the first time in my life, I need to listen to me. I need to slow down and find out what being Yvette Brooks is all about. It’s time for me to stand on my own two feet for a change.”

  “I get all that, Yvette, but—”

  “I love you, Ajani, but I have to learn how to love myself, too.”

  “So should I just go back to Nashville and pretend that we never met?”

  “No, that’s not what I want you to do.”

  “Then what?”

  “I want you go to back to Nashville and finish school, get a job and live your life.”

  “And where does that leave us, Yvette?”

  “It leaves us with six months that I will never forget. It leaves me loving a man who has changed my life forever.”

  “This is crazy, Yvette. So we’re done?”

  “We’re done.”

  Ajani stood, smiling that one-hundred-watt smile at me. “We’ve been done before, Yvette,” he told me, his confidence returning.

  “I know, but this time is different.”

  “Sure it is, Yvette. You’ll keep in touch, won’t you, come to my graduation and all that?”

  “Of course. Nothing could keep me away.”

  “I’m going to hold you to that,” Ajani said pulling me up. I wrapped my arms around his neck and inhaled his fresh, clean, masculine scent. “Don’t forget me,” Ajani said, pressing his mouth against mine for one last kiss.

  “Ajani, I could never, ever forget you.”

  Epilogue

  “Are you nervous?” Jordan asked me quietly. I stood at the open French doors looking out into the crystal-clear Caribbean Sea and marveling at how wonderful my life was turning out to be. Just three months ago, I watched Ajani walk across the stage to receive his degree, and now I was only minutes away from becoming his wife.

  When Ajani and I last saw each other, I honestly thought our relationship was over. I had vowed to change, I vowed to get to know myself, and ending things with Ajani was to be only the first step in that transformation. I sold my grandmother’s home and left Detroit and the memories of my life there and relocated to Denver, where jobs were plentiful and no one knew who I was, much less what I had been through.

  A few months later, I received an invitation to Ajani’s graduation. He never called or contacted me, but the invitation said it all: He was growing up and he wanted me to be a witness to his own new beginning.

  I was tempted to toss the invitation, wanting to forget everything that Ajani was reminiscent of, but something stopped me. I kept the invitation and logged on to the Internet to reserve my plane ticket and a hotel room in Nashville before I lost my nerve.

  Ajani looked more handsome and mature than I remembered. He wore a suit and tie, and his black gown was adorned with gold cords, indicating that he was graduating with honors.

  I sat in the packed gym stadium having second thoughts about being there. Ajani didn’t know I was there, but just as I stood to leave the stadium, his name was called. He walked across the stage and shook hands with everyone, all the while scanning the audience. As if by luck or by fate, our eyes met, and without caring about how it looked or what others would think Ajani hurried from the stage and into the audience, where I waited for him nervously.

  “Of course I’m nervous. Wouldn’t you be?” I replied, turning from the picturesque view and looking into Jordan’s smiling face.

  “Yeah, I guess I would be, but it’s been a long time coming,” Jordan said, holding my hand. “You look beautiful.”

  “I feel beautiful,” I said, looking down at the knee-length, white halter dress I was wearing. I held a small bouquet of red roses, my ponytail was held back with a sparkling tie and my feet were bare. “I can’t get over how different it is this time around,” I said, more to myself than to Jordan.

  “This time it’s right,” Jordan said, going to the French doors and beckoning me forward to follow.

  “This time it’s perfect,” I agreed.

  We walked through the French doors and onto the sandy Bahamian beach.

  “There she is,” Ajani said, smiling from ear to ear. He was flanked by his two brothers, Jabari and Dakari, and all three were wearing jeans and white linen button-down shirts. “Hurry up, girl! Let’s get this show on the road!”

  “I’m coming, I’m coming, Ajani. You can’t rush perfection.”

  “You look great,” he whispered, taking my hand and kissing me softy. “Are you ready?”

  “Are you ready?” I asked jokingly.

  “I’ve been ready since the day I met you.” He kissed me again, and a warm rush of joy spread through every inch of my body. This was real happiness; this was life at its best.

  “This is disgusting!” Jabari said, rolling his eyes skyward. “Can the two of you just tie
the knot already? I’m trying to get my party on, and if that waitress passes by with anymore rum punch, you’re going to have an extremely drunk groomsman on your hands.”

  “It is my understanding that you have written your own vows,” the minister said, looking at Ajani and me with an amused smile.

  “Yes, and Yvette will go first,” Ajani volunteered.

  I looked at him and smiled indulgently. “Okay, since I don’t seem to have a choice…” I stood tall and looked into Ajani’s eyes.

  “I can’t believe that I am actually standing here, so close to becoming your wife,” I began, immediately feeling tears form in the corner of my eyes. “The first time we met, I knew that you were someone special, someone I had been waiting for my entire life. But my world was so complicated then, and I couldn’t envision spending the rest of my life with you. Now, Ajani, I cannot imagine spending the rest of my life without you.

  “I promise to love, honor and keep you all the days of my life. I promise to always put our love first, give you lots of babies and to make you the happiest man in the world. I promise to make you feel as special as you make me feel.”

  Ajani took a deep breath and squeezed my hand before speaking. “Yvette, you are amazing. You are everything I never thought I wanted in a woman but everything I need. You are the first thing I think about when I wake up and the last thing I think about at night. You are my best friend, the one I want to grow old with, and the one I want to take care of. You are my everything, and it is because of you that I am complete.”

  I looked into Ajani’s eyes and smiled, peace and happiness filling every inch of me. This was real, this was right, and I couldn’t believe that I was finally here.

  The minister cleared his throat, “By the power vested in me by the Commonwealth of the Bahamas, I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss your bride.”

  As our small bridal party applauded, my husband wrapped his strong arms around me, pulled me close and kissed me until I was dizzy.

  About the Author

  Maryam Diaab was born in Detroit, Michigan and received a degree in Arts and Sciences from Tennessee State University in Nashville, Tennessee. She currently works as a fifth grade Reading and Language Arts teacher in the Metro-Detroit area where she lives with her husband and two sons. Her fist novel, Where I Want To Be, was published by Genesis Press in January 2008. Things Forbidden is her second novel.

  Visit the author at www.maryamdiaab.blogspot.com.