If Only For One Night

by Victoria Christopher Murray

  She said, “I was hoping....thinking....maybe you know, it's been a long time.”

  She looked sexy, her voice was sultry, it was hard for me to see Monica this way. Hard for me to see her as sexy when all I saw in my mind’s eye saw was the way this usually ended up in a flood of tears. Hard for me to hear her as sultry when all I heard in my mind’s eye was the way I never knew what would send her spiraling downhill.

  And then in my mind’s eye, I remembered our last time. And how she’d just lay there, making me feel like we were in a remake of The Color Purple, she in the starring role of Celie, and me playing the villain of Mister.

  No, I didn’t want to do this. Not with the other visions that were still dancing in my head, the ones that could make me smile. I said, “Are you okay?”

  Her eyes squinted a little. “That wasn’t exactly the response I expected.”

  “I’m just saying, I hope this isn’t your meds or something.”

  She raised up, flipped over and sat on the bed. Her arms were folded when she said, “If you’re trying to kill the mood….”

  “I’m not trying to do that,” I lied. “It’s just that I’m always worried about you.”

  Her glower was deeper now, as she stared at me first, and then glanced down at her nakedness before she returned her glance to me. “Really. This is the moment you choose to be concerned?”

  “I’m always concerned. You know that.”

  “Well,” she stood, wrapped her arms around me, and pressed her body hard against me, “the only thing you need to be concerned about now is how to take care of Mama.”

  When she tugged at my robe, I grabbed her hand, stopping her. “Come on, Angeli....Monica."

  A flash — Angelique, touching my hand, right before…our kiss.

  She paused, stepped back, folded her arms and with a little one of those neck rolls, she asked, “What did you just call me?"

  I couldn't believe I'd made that mistake, and when I responded with, “Angel. I called you, Angel,” I wondered if this was what cheating husbands had to go through. Being quick, making up lies. And then, as I moved toward her, I wondered what a cheating husband would do next.

  I said, “Monica, I really appreciate you going through all of this for me, but….”

  Her arms were back to being folded, even as she stood in front of me butt-naked.

  I finished with, “I’m really tired. It’s been a long day.”

  If she was fazed by my slip-up, she didn't let on. Her concern was elsewhere. "What? You're never too tired for sex. I’ve never heard of that from a man.”

  "I am today. I'll take a raincheck." I walked to the other side of the bed, needing to step away from her before I started sweating guilt.

  But while I’d tried to put distance between us, she closed the space, coming to my side of the bed and stopping right in front of my face. "Really Blu? What’s really going on?”

  “I told you.”

  Her eyes narrowed as she studied me and I felt the heat of her stare. Before, I felt like a cheating husband and now, I felt like a criminal in one of those little interrogation rooms with the light shining in my face.

  When Monica said nothing, I told her, “Let’s just go to bed.”

  Now, she spoke, "You know my mama used to always say, if your man isn't getting it from you, he's getting it from somewhere else."

  I shook my head, a move that was meant for Monica and me at the same time. I wasn’t going to fight with her, so all I said was, “You know that’s not what’s going on here.”

  She sighed and stepped back. “I know and I don’t want to fight. It’s just that.” She stopped there and pouted.

  That was when I knew for sure that an argument and tears were not far away. For a second, I wondered if I could do this — just have sex with Monica because at this point, I knew that would make her feel better. But I couldn’t — because of all the thoughts in my head of Angelique.

  It was my guilt that made me say, “I’m going to check on the kids before I turn it.” It was my guilt that made me rush away, moving past her and out the bedroom. Closing the door behind me, I leaned against it for a moment, thinking about what I’d just done to my wife. I prayed that she’d be well tomorrow because then…I could. Just not tonight.

  Because I didn’t want to be a total liar, I checked on the kids once again, then settled inside the family room. I clicked on ESPN, and although I really wanted to catch these highlights, my mind wouldn’t stay on what was on the television.

  Instead, I was back and forth — Monica and Angelique. Angelique and Monica.

  I had no idea how I’d gotten to this place where Angelique occupied the same space as my wife. Yet, here I was about to sleep in my family room because when my wife wanted to make love to me, all I could think about was Angelique.

  That was exactly what happened. I leaned back and closed my eyes, and fell asleep with Angelique all up in my dreams.

  CHAPTER 15

  Angelique

  “I kissed him!” I declared, then pressed my hands to my face, covering my…what was it? Embarrassment? Excitement.

  “You kissed who?” Sheryl and Cassidy said at the same exact time, then looked at each other and busted into laughter.

  I was glad that my girls could laugh at what I’d just told them…well, at least, they laughed for now. But that was about to end because when I answered their question, I had a feeling all laughter would end.

  The two of them were still in the middle of their fit of giggles, so I waited, grateful that I wasn’t doing this over the phone. No, today, I needed a face-to-face girlfriend intervention and my transgression couldn’t have come at a better time. Cassidy had gotten an international assignment, so she would be based in London for a while and had no idea when we'd be able to get together again. So she'd summoned us to her place, for our own happy hour. Only it was Saturday…it was one in the afternoon…and we had already finished off two bottles of Stella Rosa.

  It had been a great afternoon of wine, appetizers and girl time, the three of us, just lounging on the floor, barefoot. Me, in sweatpants rolled up to my knees and Cassidy and Sheryl both in black leggings. But now, I knew I’d just taken our chatting to a different level.

  Finally, Sheryl waved her hand as if that would stop her laughter, then she repeated her question.

  “You kissed who?” She pressed her lips to her wine glass, taking another sip, though I wondered if we’d already had too many.

  The way Sheryl and Cassidy looked at me, I couldn’t figure out why they hadn’t figured it out. I mean, how many people were in my life that I should have been kissing? It must have been the wine.

  But since they still stared, still waited for my response, I said, “I kissed him. I kissed Blu.”

  And just like I predicted, the laughter stopped.

  Again, they spoke together. “You kissed Blu.” But this time, that didn’t send them into a fit of giggles.

  “Oh, my God!” Sheryl said and then, after a moment, a smile lit her face and she raised her hand to give me a high-five.

  But before I could think about moving my hand to meet Sheryl’s, Cassidy grabbed me. “Wait a minute,” she said. “This doesn’t seem like a moment to celebrate. I have some questions.”

  “Now that I think about it, I do, too,” Sheryl said. “Like, all you did was kiss him? Why did you stop there?”

  “He’s married!” This time, Cassidy and I were the ones who spoke in harmony.

  “And?” Sheryl said. “You’re not trying to marry him, you just want to get your groove back.”

  “Ugh,” Cassidy released her frustration. Then, she said, “Wait. Let’s back up,” Cassidy moved her arms in a reverse speed-bag-boxing motion. “What happened? When did you kiss him? And why?”

  “Why?” Sheryl said. “You are the one among us who least needs to ask that question. You’re getting more than me and Angelique combined and so I know you know why men and women kiss.” She paused. “So, they
can get it on.” And then, she fell back, kicked up her heels, and giggled.

  “Really?” Cassidy said. She swiped what would have been our third bottle of wine from the table, pushed herself up, then marched to the counter that separated the kitchen from the rest of her living room space. “Enough drinking for you.” Turning back to me, she said, “Maybe we all need to drink some water so that we can talk about this,” she glanced at Sheryl, “without getting hysterical at every little thing.”

  Cassidy traipsed back over, sat next to me, crossed her legs yoga-style and said, “Start at the beginning.”

  With my legs under the coffee table, I leaned back on the sofa. “He took me to dinner last night to celebrate me getting the funds for next weekend.”

  “Yeah, high-five on that, by the way,” Cassidy said and Sheryl raised her hand, too.

  I said, “Well, there’s one thing I didn’t tell either of you when we spoke this morning.”

  “Oh no,” Cassidy frowned, “what else?”

  “He was the one who gave me the money. I mean, not him. His foundation or rather a foundation that he works with.”

  “Wow, he gave you all of that money just like that?” Cassidy said.

  I nodded.

  Sheryl said, “Well then, you damn sure need to do more than just give him a kiss.”

  “Dang!” Cassidy said to Sheryl, but I stayed quiet.

  My girls and I always shared the truth — at least that was what I wanted to believe. But there was one part of this story that I wasn’t going to tell. I wasn’t going to tell how I’d wanted to give Blu much more than a kiss. And the only reason it hadn’t happened was because he stopped me, he stopped us.

  “I wish you could take this more seriously,” Cassidy said to Sheryl. “Because getting involved with a married man is a serious situation.”

  “Wait, hold up.” I raised my hand. “I’m not involved with a married man. I just happened to kiss him.”

  My words made Sheryl buckle over in laughter and Cassidy glared at both of us. “Really?” That question was directed to Sheryl. But she had the same question for me and that was when I knew I needed to start explaining.

  So I went back and told them about my phone call with Blu, his invitation and then, how he’d knocked me out with the private dinner last night. “We talked about everything and it’s so easy with him. I mean, we talk about our connection all the time. I’m telling you, it’s real.”

  “So that’s why you kissed him?” Cassidy asked and folded her arms. “Because in case you’ve forgotten, you cannot be connected to him because of this thing called marriage.” She leaned forward. “He’s…married.” She’d slowed down her cadence as if she were talking to children. Then, she lifted my arm and pointed to my hand. “And you are, too.”

  “I know,” I moaned.

  “He’s married, she’s married…and so?” Sheryl said again. When Cassidy glared at her, she added. “Look, I keep telling you I deal with this stuff every day. You keep telling her about how they’re married and she keeps telling you about their connection. Come on, Cass, listen to her. She and Blu are connected.”

  “They can’t be….they’re….”

  Sheryl held up her hands. “Please don’t say it again because we’ve heard you. Angelique knows they’re married, Blu knows they’re married, we know they’re married, the whole damn world knows that Angelique and that ninja are married, and not to each other.” She took a breath, giving Cassidy a chance to say something, but she didn’t speak.

  “All right then,” Sheryl continued. “Look, I know how the both of you feel about the sanctity of marriage and I get that. I get all of that forever and ever, sickness, health, richer, poorer thing. But with the kind of work that I do, this is what I know.” The pause was so dramatic. “Angelique, you may be married, but did you marry your soulmate?” She held up her hand, stopping me or Cassidy from saying anything. “And if you have this connection with Blu, how do you know that he’s not your soulmate?” Then, she slapped her hand against the table. “Boom!”

  We were both quiet for a moment. I was silent because her words…wow! Soulmates?

  But I guessed Cassidy was silent only because she was trying to think of a response. And she came back with, “Really, Sheryl?” She folded her arms. “So you want me to believe that Blu is Angelique’s soulmate when she’s known him for all of five minutes, and,” she continued with her voice escalating, “she met him in an app!”

  “And that’s what I’m talking about,” Sheryl said. “Who meets like that? Who has a connection like that?”

  “People who want to hook up, meet like that. People who are looking for only one thing, meet like that. People who are looking for an easy find, meet like that.”

  Then, they both turned their eyes to me, but Sheryl shook her head.

  “It’s not lust,” she said as if I’d told her that. “Not for Angelique, definitely, and I don’t think it’s lust for Blu.”

  “How would you know?”

  “Hello?” I held up my hand. “I can see you, I can hear you and I can talk for myself.”

  “Well then, tell us,” Sheryl said. “Is this lust or is Blu your soulmate?”

  Really, I didn’t know how to answer that, so I asked, “What’s a soulmate?”

  Sheryl grinned as if she’d won me over, even though all I wanted was clarification. I mean, I knew what I thought that meant — a person you were so connected to that you wanted to spend every moment, awake and asleep, with them. And that was how I felt about Blu. So…could he be…my soulmate?

  Sheryl said, “I’ve been studying this for years and the best definition I ever found was from an American writer. He said, ‘a soulmate is someone who has locks that fit our keys, and keys to fit our locks.’ And I believe that only a soulmate can open up your locks and that’s what allows you to be your authentic self. You can only do that with a soulmate. You can only feel totally complete inside when you’ve met that person.”

  “Wow,” I exclaimed, but all Cassidy did was shake her head.

  “So, are you saying that Angelique and Blu should be married?” Her tone let us know that she thought Sheryl’s words were beyond ridiculous.

  “No, I’m not saying that at all because being married to your soulmate, I think, is a very special thing. It doesn’t happen very often. People tend to marry their life partners, but not their soulmates. They’re with the dude who takes care of the bills, the female who takes care of the kids, but they’re not with the person who knows them instinctively, who connects with them on the deepest level, and who allows them to grow in a relationship. That’s a soulmate.” She paused at looked at me. “Is that what you have with Blu?”

  I nodded, but Cassidy answered for me, “It doesn’t matter what she has with Blu. This,” she pointed to the diamond on my finger, that even inside the apartment, shined, “is what she has with Preston.”

  “And no matter how many times you tell us this, we know it,” Sheryl said. Then, turning back to me, she added, “So, answer my question. Is that….”

  “Yes,” I answered before she could finish. “That’s exactly what I have with Blu. I mean, I connect with him…on that deepest level, like you said.”

  “Would you listen to yourself?” Cassidy put her arms up in the air. “How deep can it be? You’ve known him for five minutes.”

  I ignored her. “And though I haven’t long him very long,” I gave a sideward glance to Cassidy, “I know that I would grow with him. Because he respects who I am. I mean, he believes in it so much he was willing to give me money for my dream.”

  While Sheryl nodded, Cassidy said, “Or maybe he was just giving you money to get between your legs.”

  “What is it with you?” Sheryl asked Cassidy. “Why are you so down on this thing with Angelique and Blu?”

  “Besides the obvious?” She shook her head as she turned to me. “I don’t know how you can talk about someone you just met as a soulmate. You don't know him.”

/>   “But I do. I know him in my….” I paused.

  Cassidy said, “Please don't say…your soul.”

  I nodded and Sheryl grinned.

  “And I'm not even going to charge you for an office visit,” Sheryl said. Then, her smile went away. “Look, I'm telling you what I know.”

  “And I'm telling you what I know,” Cassidy said. “I don't think this is some divine intervention where God has introduced you to your soulmate because this meeting, the way you met Blu and who he is, is so out of order. What this meeting was all about for you is what’s going on with you and Preston. And how he’s been neglecting you. If Preston had been paying you any bit of attention, you wouldn’t have even turned your head to look at Blu.”

  Her words gave me pause. Was that true? Was it all just about Preston? Then, I shook my head. “I'm not sure about that, Cassidy. Because Preston has been neglecting me for a long time, but this is the first time that I've ever connected with anyone. This is the first time I’ve even spoken to another man.”

  “Exactly,” Sheryl said to me. Then, twisting to Cassidy, she asked, “And how do you know this isn't what God has for her?”

  With the heel of her hand, Cassidy pressed against her forehead. “I can't believe you would ask me that when you go to church more than I do. I told you, this is out of order. How can this be of God when they're both married?”

  “Here we go back to that marriage thing,” Sheryl said as she stood, shuffled to the kitchen and brought back the bottle of wine that Cassidy had taken away. “For someone who’s single, you sure talk about marriage a lot.”

  “Marriage thing? What God has put together let no man or woman take it apart.” She turned to me. “So we know how you feel about your vows with Preston….”

  “Hey, what're you trying to say?”

  She ignored my question, but asked me one. “How do you feel about Blu’s wife? If you go any further than that kiss…what about her? How would you feel if someone was doing this in your marriage?”

  Sheryl rolled her eyes. “Talk about a buzzkill,” she said, right before she took two gulps of wine.