Grown Folks Business

by Victoria Christopher Murray

  “Until what?”

  He looked at her, but he couldn’t hold her glance for even a second before he stared at the floor.

  Sheridan said, “No.”

  “Okay.” He nodded slowly as if he was surprised. “I was only thinking of you. But this is great, because I’d prefer to stay in here with you, keeping everything as normal as possible. It’s better, especially for Chris and Tori.”

  “No.”

  Quentin frowned.

  “I want you out of my house.”

  “What?”

  “Quentin, are you out of your mind? Not only are you in love with someone else, but you just told your wife you want to be with a man. Do you think I’d want you anywhere near me? Do you think I’d want you near my children?”

  “They’re my children too.”

  She swallowed a mouthful of air to keep the scream inside. The scream that would inform him that Christopher and Tori wouldn’t be his children much longer. From this point forward the children would belong only to her, not to some man who couldn’t live life in the manner God planned. But she said nothing.

  Quentin said, “This is not how we should handle this.”

  “You don’t get a vote.”

  “I’m not leaving this house. Not until you understand that I love you and I love our children. But I can’t fight what’s inside of me anymore.”

  She pressed back her tears. He would not see her cry.

  “Sheridan, we can’t make quick decisions. That’s why I have to stay here.”

  “Okay.” She spoke as she moved toward her closet. “You stay.” She dragged a suitcase from the chamber. “I’ll pick up Chris and Tori from school, and we’ll stay in a hotel.”

  Quentin closed her suitcase. “I think you’re being overly dramatic.”

  God’s grace covered her; stopped her from striking him again. “Let me break this down for you, Quentin. Nothing is more dramatic than having the man you’ve loved for seventeen years come to you one glorious morning and tell you your life has been a lie.”

  “It’s not like that.”

  “Having him tell you that you don’t have anything he wants.” Her voice began to tremble.

  “That’s not true.”

  “Telling you you’re…not good enough.” She fought her tears.

  Quentin reached for her, but she stepped beyond his grasp before he could touch her skin. “I’m not being dramatic, Quentin,” she protested as the first tear rolled down her cheek. “I’m just trying to hold on to some form of sanity. I’m just trying to get from here to tomorrow.”

  In the silence that followed, Sheridan stared at the suitcase lying on their bed. Seventeen years of marital memories flooded her. “Please, Quentin,” she whispered as she kept her eyes on their bed. “If you ever loved me, just leave.”

  A beat passed. “I’ll go.”

  Only then did she look at Quentin. Those were not the words she wanted. She longed for her husband to take back all he’d said. To tell her he loved her, only her, and would forever. But she knew those words would never come.

  She pushed through a dense fog as she stepped from their bedroom and walked down the stairs. Everything around her was familiar, but nothing was the same. The furniture, the wall hangings, the carpet felt out of order. Even the house knew the world had changed.

  She opened the door to the home office for the business they shared: Hart to Heart.

  This space was crammed with their love. A business built on the sweet words Quentin had written from the moment they met. The poetry he wrote for her, capturing her heart and her business acumen. It had been her idea to start a company—specialty gift cards. After Tori was born, they’d started small and had grown the venture to over one hundred thousand dollars annually: just a pittance compared to Quentin’s income as an ob-gyn, but next to God and their children, Hart to Heart was a cherished venture. Their business was a manifestation of all that the Harts were about—their complete devotion to one another.

  There was only one word to describe their business—successful. And now there was only one way to describe their marriage.

  Sheridan stumbled to the walnut desk that sat in the middle of the room. She glanced around the walls, which held framed compositions of Quentin’s most romantic expressions. As she thought about all the wonderful words he’d spoken and written through the years, she asked herself if any of those had been meant for her. And when she answered that question, she laid her head on the desk and cried.

  It was an empty canvas of time.

  Sheridan had no idea how long she’d sat at the desk, struggling to free herself from the overpowering emotions. But when she heard the front door open, then close, she raced to her bedroom. Behind the sheer curtains, she hid and watched Quentin roll two suitcases behind him. His shoulders were squared, he walked tall; he moved like a natural man.

  He opened the back of the Mercedes SUV and slid the bags inside. When he closed the car’s door, he stood still, staring at the front door to their home. Sheridan held her breath. Could this be it? Could this be the moment when he would come and tell her it was a mistake? That all he wanted was to spend eternity with her?

  “Please, God. Make Quentin do the right thing,” she whispered.

  As if he heard her, Quentin looked up. She stepped from behind the curtains so he could see her. They stared at each other—until Quentin jumped into the Mercedes and rolled the SUV away. She watched until the car dipped around the curve of the cul-de-sac and out of her sight.

  She stayed in place, staring at her empty driveway, and then she noticed Mrs. James, standing across the street, staring into her window. Sheridan turned away, before the neighborhood crier could see her tears.

  She looked around her room, trying to find a familar space, but her bedroom was a foreign land.

  She stumbled to the bed and rubbed her hand along the pillow that Quentin had laid his head upon just hours before. He had held her last night as they slept, the way he always did. The way he had promised he always would, from the day they married.

  “The Bible tells us not to let the sun go down on our anger. And every night as we sleep, I will hold you, and you will know there is no anger inside of me. In my heart, there is only love.”

  She had melted at his words. Not only because she was sure he’d love her forever, but because she’d never dated anyone like him before—never knew a man who had such a strong relationship with God.

  It wasn’t like she’d had many relationships before Quentin. She’d met him when she was only nineteen, while visiting her doctor for a Pap smear. Quentin had been a third year medical student doing rotations at Harbor General. He’d taken her breath away the moment she saw him strut out of her doctor’s office, grabbing her attention from the article she’d been reading in People celebrating Vanessa Williams—the first black Miss America. Sheridan had followed him with her eyes as he glided down the hallway going in the wrong direction—away from her. She wanted to yell for the six-foot, muscle-packed man to return. But all she did was marvel at how fine he was. She’d never seen a man with a bald head before—at least not one as young as this one seemed to be.

  When the nurse took Sheridan into the examination room, she’d asked who that guy was in the white jacket.

  The nurse had chuckled. “Every girl who has come in here for the last week has asked me that. He’s a medical student working with Dr. Kennedy.”

  Sheridan had smiled, but her grin lasted for only a moment when she realized this student might be in the room when Dr. Kennedy examined her. How would she ever get a date with a man whose first vision of her was from down there?

  It was almost funny, as Sheridan remembered that time now. She squeezed Quentin’s pillow in her arms. She inhaled, grateful for the faint scent of Armani Man, which he loved. Grateful for the little bit of himself that he’d left behind. She wondered how long it would last.

  She rolled to the center of the king-sized bed. She’d been so happy with Quentin
that at times it had scared her. But she’d learned to live in the bliss. She’d thought her husband felt the same way.

  “I’ve fallen in love with Jett Jennings.”

  Sheridan tried to remember the last time she and Quentin had made love, but even when she closed her eyes, she couldn’t. It wasn’t that there’d been a problem; it was just the holidays—the planning and gift buying and entertaining and celebrating. They’d been busy with life. And anyway, she’d learned a long time ago that they didn’t always have to make love; they were in love.

  She tossed Quentin’s pillow onto the floor and jumped up from the bed. “You were the one in love, Sheridan. Not Quentin.”

  She caught her reflection in the mirror. Her shoulder-length, auburn-streaked hair was tied back; she was ready for her next beauty shop appointment. And the red crewneck sweatshirt and sweatpants hid the way she worked to keep herself in shape—for Quentin as much as herself. She had wanted him to be proud of her. And he had always told her that he was.

  “Was it all a lie?” she asked her reflection.

  Her reflection stared back as if she were a stranger.

  “What is so wrong with me that my husband would want a man?”

  Tears rolled down her cheeks as her answer.

  She picked up the card Quentin had given her on New Year’s, just four days ago.

  What word can I use to describe how I feel about you?

  Happiness. Serenity. Joy. None of those are enough.

  You are my blessing, my true gift from God.

  Happy 2004.

  When she read the card on New Year’s morning, she’d held him until her arms got tired. He did it to her every time: every time he wrote, every time he spoke, he left no doubt in her heart that she was the forever love of his life.

  “I’m in love, but not with a woman.”

  Sheridan shook those words from her head as she tried to remember again, when was the last time her husband had made love to her?

  “I’m in love with a man.”

  She returned her gaze to the mirror and wondered what Quentin saw when he looked at her. The sweat suit hid her curves—made her look less feminine. Is that what it was? Did she make her husband long to be with a man?

  The New Year’s card slipped through her fingers and glided toward the carpet, landing face down.

  “I’ve fallen in love with Jett Jennings.”

  Sheridan picked up the card and dashed into the bathroom. She tossed Quentin’s words into the toilet. A second later she released the bile that rose within her. She freed herself of her pain until she was drained. Then she pushed herself up from the floor, stared at the emotional waste that filled her toilet, and with a breath, she flushed it all away.

  Chapter Two

  She really didn’t want to do this.

  Sheridan paused at the stove as the first school van stopped in front of the house. This was the late van; the one that brought home the children who stayed for extracurricular activities. Sheridan watched Tori jump out, wave to her friends, then run to the door.

  For the fiftieth time, Sheridan wiped her face, hoping to erase all the emotional signs that had plagued her for more than nine hours. And she had counted every one of the five hundred forty minutes that tears had poured from her.

  “Hi, Mom. I’m home,” her nine-year-old screamed, the way she always did. But only today did Sheridan notice how Father Knows Best–ish her daughter sounded.

  Sheridan sniffed back her emotions, plastered the best smile she could onto her face, and waited for Tori to bounce into the kitchen. “Mom, that smells good,” she said as she raised herself on her toes and kissed her mother’s cheek. “Yeah, chicken fajitas. My and Dad’s favorite.”

  Sheridan had forgotten that part—how Quentin loved the whole-wheat fajitas as much as the kids.

  “Are you hungry?”

  “Yeah. Lunch was horrible today,” Tori said, as if she knew how to whip up a meal. She dumped her backpack onto the floor. “I think the real cooks are still on Christmas holiday.”

  “How was dance practice?” Sheridan asked, pretending this day was normal.

  “Okay. We got our assignments for the recital and I got the best part,” she chatted. “But I’m not telling what it is. The show’s in April. You and Dad are coming, right?”

  Sheridan swallowed. It was a typical question about their typical life. “Now, sweetie, have we ever missed one of your special moments?”

  Tori grinned. “Nope,” she said, swinging her thick braids from side to side.

  “Go change and get started on your homework. We’ll eat in about an hour.”

  “Okay,” she said. She grabbed her bag and said, “We’re eating early. Will Dad be home by then?”

  The question made Sheridan stop. She hadn’t expected her lies to begin until dinner: casually, she would tell the children their father would be gone, but for only a few days. Simple lies for the most complicated event in her life.

  “Mom?”

  “Your dad had to go away on business.”

  “He didn’t tell me that this morning.”

  Sheridan could hear the frown in Tori’s voice. “No, he didn’t, sweetheart, because this was an emergency.” Sheridan turned and faced Tori as if that were the truth.

  “Is everything all right?” Tori asked with her frown still in place.

  Sheridan nodded. “It was just some medical stuff. But he said to tell you that he loved you and…” She couldn’t think of anything else to say.

  She had her first victory when her daughter’s smile returned and Tori sang, “Okay. I can’t wait for him to get home. I learned a new chess move and want to test it out.”

  Sheridan breathed, but she knew Christopher would never be that easy. Her son was curious, destined to be a journalist or a lawyer.

  Fifteen minutes later, the inquisitive one barreled through the door. “Mom,” he bellowed.

  “Chris, why do you do that?” Sheridan asked the way she always did when he came shrieking into their house.

  He grinned the way he always did. “What? Don’t you just love hearing your number one son’s voice? Maybe I should sing for you.”

  Sheridan held up her hand. “Please don’t.”

  “Why not?” Christopher pretended to be offended. “I was thinking about dropping out of school and hooking up with Alicia Keys. Can you imagine me and Alicia hitting that keyboard together?”

  It was Sheridan’s first enjoyable moment of the day. Together she and Christopher laughed, and then together they said, “So, how was your day?”

  Sheridan still marveled at how much her firstborn was like her. So often they said the same things, thought the same way. Their only difference was that while Sheridan preferred sweats, Christopher had developed a penchant for his father’s preppy look. Today he could have posed for an ad from Junior Sportsman magazine, with his khaki pants and white golf shirt underneath the brown bomber jacket he’d received for Christmas. He even wore the brown loafers, although they weren’t Gucci like the ones his father favored. But Sheridan knew even that was coming soon. Like Quentin, Christopher had acquired a taste for all things designer, while none of that appealed to her.

  “You first,” Sheridan said, knowing she’d never tell Christopher the truth about her day. “How was the first day back?”

  “Cool. I’m lovin’ that next year at this time I’ll be a graduating senior on my way to Harvard or Hampton.”

  For the first time since Quentin had sucked the blood from her heart, Sheridan’s smile was genuine. She was so proud of Christopher: his grades were almost perfect; he was the president of the junior class and captain of his golf team; his guidance counselor had already told him he’d probably be valedictorian. And he didn’t give her or Quentin one ounce of trouble or worry—if she didn’t count the distress she’d felt from the moment Christopher had passed his driving test. There was no doubt he was the second love of her life.

  “Now your turn. How was your day, Mo
m?”

  Her momentary joy dissipated. “Not much happened,” she said before she could think about it. “Just the usual.” She almost laughed at how crazy that sounded.

  “What time is Dad going to be home? I need him to help me with my chip shots. We have a father-son tournament coming up.”

  His simple words twisted her heart, threatening to wring the last of her tears from inside.

  “Oh, I forgot to mention it, Chris. Your dad is out of town.”

  Sheridan returned to the chicken strips and green peppers and onions sautéing in the pan. She knew she wouldn’t stand a chance if she looked at her son.

  “Out of town? Where? Why? What happened?”

  Sheridan knew for sure now—Christopher Hart was going to be an award-winning journalist. She shrugged, hoping the motion would diffuse his concern. “He’s just covering for one of the doctors at some convention.”

  “Where did he go?”

  She hadn’t thought of that. “I don’t know.”

  “Mom, you always know where Dad is. What’s going on?” His tone let Sheridan know he wouldn’t stop until he got an answer that satisfied him.

  “Chris, why are you asking me so many questions?”

  “Because something’s not right.”

  It was going to take more than words to convince him. “Chris, what’s the big deal? Your father rushed out of town. I know he’ll call me tonight. And if I need to reach him, I’ll call his cell.” She stopped, wishing she hadn’t mentioned that. She didn’t want Christopher or Tori suggesting they call their father. “Anyway, like you always say, ‘It’s no big deal.’ ” She turned to face him with as wide a grin as she could muster and playfully jabbed his arm.

  He didn’t share her smile but retreated. When he picked up his bag and almost moonwalked out of the room, Sheridan exhaled. She couldn’t think of a time when she’d lied to her children, but she didn’t regret doing so now. She needed time; they needed time: she wasn’t about to blow up their world with this awful truth tonight.