Take Her Man

by Grace Octavia

“See, there’s hope,” I said. “Don’t worry, Tasha. Just pray that this will happen for you and it will.” Tasha sat up and looked at me.

  “I want you to come with me,” she said.

  “Me? Don’t you think that’s a job for Lionel? It just wouldn’t feel right.”

  “I’m not ready for all that yet. How am I going to explain that I even went to the doctor?”

  “Tasha, you have to tell the man everything,” I said. “He’s your husband. You have to trust him.”

  “I know and I do trust him. I love my husband.”

  “Then tell him what you want.”

  “I know. I know this is my bullshit, but I just have to work through this and then I’ll tell him. But right now…right now I need you in my corner.” Tasha started to cry again.

  “Fine,” I said. “I’ll come with you to the appointment, but then we really have to talk about some things, Tasha.

  “When is it?”

  “Monday,” Tasha said. “Monday at 3 p.m.”

  “I’ll definitely come and support you, Tasha,” I said, spinning my schedule around in my head. I got out of class at 2 p.m. on Mondays, so I would be able to make it. “You’re my girl. I have your back.”

  “Oh, and, Troy”—Tasha suddenly perked up a bit and smiled—“who was the cute man you were with?”

  Though I’d planned on getting in a quick thirty minutes on my StairMaster, I went to bed right after Tasha left. It was after 1 a.m. and my body just needed to rest. Between Julian and Tasha, I felt mentally and physically drained. I didn’t bother to explain who exactly Kyle was to Tasha. I just told her he was a friend of the family. From the look on her face, I could tell my old friend was ready to cook things up between the two of us, and the last thing I needed was more drama, drama, drama.

  After closing the blinds and checking my voice mail, I prayed for Tasha. I prayed that she would find peace in whatever God’s will was for her. Whether or not he saw fit for Tasha to have the baby, I wanted my friend to be happy and realize that even if she didn’t have a baby, she had a man at home who loved her. And all of us couldn’t say that—amen.

  I snuggled under the covers and closed my eyes, praying that sleep would come quickly. I felt my body unravel between the Egyptian satin sheets I’d given myself for my twenty-first birthday. The kinks in my back relaxed and my limbs felt heavy by my sides. Before I knew it, I’d fallen into a peaceful sleep.

  I could hear my cell phone ringing. It sounded louder than ever before, sitting on the night stand beside me. I groaned. Why did my phone have to ruin such a perfect dream? If I could get back to that place, I’d stay there forever.

  “Hello?” I growled, angrily picking up the phone. It was a blocked number, so I was wondering who it could’ve been calling me so late at night.

  “Don’t you ‘hello’ me, girl,” said the voice on the other end of the phone. I instantly knew who it was—my mother. “You should’ve said hello to me last night. Don’t think I didn’t find out about you sneaking that…that scoundrel in!”

  “He’s not a scoundrel and I didn’t sneak him in, Mom. He was invited,” I said, climbing out of bed. Pookie Po looked at me and ran out of the room. She didn’t want to talk to my mother either. “And why are you calling me so late at night from a blocked number?” I asked.

  “I got a new block on the phone and it’s early, Troy. It’s almost 7 a.m.” My mother was one of those people who liked calling folks first thing in the morning. The ultimate diva of the world was up, so everyone else in the world should be up too. I looked at my clock—6:52 a.m. Damn.

  “What are you still doing in bed, anyway? Shouldn’t you be studying for school tomorrow? Aren’t you going to church with your nana? Was that boy over there last night, so you’re too tired to wake up?” My mother had a way of stringing question after question together so tightly that you wondered which one she wanted answered first. Or if she wanted you to answer any of them at all. Maybe she thought she already knew all the answers. She paused resolutely, pulling in air for the next series, I supposed. Sometimes I swore the woman was reading from some kind of list—Questions Mothers Should Ask.

  “I guess you’ve taken him back after the breakup…” she said. I couldn’t tell if she was asking me if I’d done it or telling me.

  “No, Mom. Nothing happened between me and Julian. In fact, I caught a ride…Oh shit, my car!” I mistakenly said into the phone. I’d forgotten all about my car. I had to get to a garage in the middle of the Bronx to pick up my car and then get back downtown for church with Nana Rue. I’d never make it. Even if I did, I’d be too tired from the journey to consider going to church.

  “Are you cursing at me now? And what happened to your car?” my mother asked. I rolled my eyes, trying to figure out how she could’ve picked up on the thing about the car. Damn! I only said it once. She was like a private investigator.

  “No. Nothing is wrong with my car.” I tried to calm her down. “I just realized that I have something really important to do, so I need to get going.”

  “No time for your old mother now?” she said. I could tell she was having one of her dramatic days. “You know, one day you’re going to wish you were nicer to me. Then maybe you’ll spend days shopping with me like you do with your grandmother. How do you think that makes me feel to hear her brag about your little trip? You know she likes to throw stuff like that in my face.”

  “Mom!”

  “I’m serious, Troy. You’re my only child.”

  “I know, Mom.” I started the shower. “Maybe you should spend more time with Grandma Lucy, too. She’s really not that bad.”

  “Please, I’ve been down the ‘let’s be friends’ road with my mother already. It didn’t work.”

  “Look, Mom,” I said, looking at the time again, “I’ll come by the house this week and we can talk about it.” I tried to comfort her. She wasn’t going to back down until I came home.

  “Tomorrow for an early dinner. Say 6 p.m.?”

  “Fine.” I was sure I’d be done with Tasha and the doctor by then.

  “Troy, I miss you. Don’t cancel.”

  “I won’t.” I pulled off my T-shirt and threw it on the floor.

  “Great. Well, I’ll have Desta cook something fantastic.”

  My mother and Grandma Lucy had little in common, but one thing my mom had gotten from Grandma Lucy was a love of entertaining. Although she definitely hung with a different crowd, Mom was the type of person who could turn one person coming over for dinner into a fiesta. She’d pull out all the stops and make the visitor feel like royalty. “I want everyone to feel special in this place,” she’d say, preparing for her girlfriends to come over for their weekly Bloody Mary lunch break on our terrace. They’d sip on the red stuff until the sun went down.

  My mother’s desire to entertain didn’t escape me and my friends either. In fact, her habit came in handy when I was growing up. While other parents tried to force their children out of the house when their friends came over, my mother welcomed everyone with open arms. I’d have friends over and she would make us special treats and let us play dress-up in her closet for hours.

  “I’ll be there,” I said, remembering my mother running around the apartment to get everything perfect before she would accept visitors.

  “Yes,” she answered. “And one last thing, Troy.”

  “Yes, Mom.”

  “Be nice to Kyle at dinner tonight.” She hung up quickly and I sat frowning, looking at my cell phone. How had she found out about Kyle? See what I mean…private investigator.

  Divalicious

  It’s next to impossible to become anything if you don’t have a role model. If you’re an aspiring diva, there’s a green room full of divalicious role models to choose from. Salute the savvy sisters of yesteryear. From Patti’s “Lady Marmalade” to Aretha’s fierce furs, those sisters keep it interesting and oh-so divalicious. They paved the way so you too could wear chinchilla in the winter and Manolo Blahniks in
the spring. Don’t forget to add the divas in your life to the list. A toast, please!

  Name and Divalicious Destiny

  Aretha Franklin: Soul singer who demands R-E-S-P-E-C-T. Most folks know not to mess with “The Queen.”

  Diahann Carroll: The one sister on Dynasty who showed the world what it’s like to be brave, beautiful, and brown.

  Diana Ross: Bold eyes and big dreams. The diva supreme proved that Mahogany is where it’s at.

  Leontyne Price: The original diva who was the first black international classical singer.

  Madame C.J. Walker: Became one of the richest black women in history by giving sisters a new ’do.

  Oprah Winfrey: Media mogul who makes her own rules and breaks every one of theirs.

  Patti LaBelle: Made every black girl dream of flying after hearing her sing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.”

  How to Kill Two Birds with One Lip Liner

  If it wasn’t for my desire to curse out Kyle’s ass for telling my parents about our date—no, meeting—I would’ve gone straight home after church. I was dead tired from all the hustling to get the car from the Bronx and then down to Harlem to pick up Nana Rue for church, but I had a bone to pick and it was with Kyle. Where did he get off telling my mother about our meeting? I was in the middle of trying to get Julian back and I wasn’t interested in Kyle—no matter whom he had on his side. Period.

  When I arrived at Paola’s for dinner, thirty minutes late, I peeked inside to see if Kyle was still there. I found him sitting at a table in the back of the restaurant. There was a vase filled with magnolias sitting on the table in front of him.

  Determined to get my point across about him calling my mother, I stormed toward him, ready to use even my lip liner as a weapon.

  “Kyle,” I said angrily. Just as I was about to speak again, he looked toward me and smiled wide enough to make me stop dead in my tracks. He stood up with a bouquet of flowers in his hands.

  “These are for you, Troy.” Kyle handed me the bouquet and pulled out my chair. I sat down, holding the flowers in my arms, and I do believe I literally felt myself melt. My anger got lost somewhere between his smile and the calming scent of the magnolias. In the spring, Nana Rue decorated her entire brownstone with fresh-cut magnolias. The scent was so strong you could smell them in the street when you walked by. They were my favorite. But how did he know?

  “These are lovely,” I said, looking at the flowers. “My favorite.”

  “Well, I wanted to surprise you, so I called your mother this morning to ask her what your favorite flowers were. I hope you’ll forgive me.”

  “Kyle, this is really wonderful.” I paused. “It’s amazing.” Sitting there with one bouquet of my favorite flowers in my arms and another on the table in front of me, my little complaint about Kyle calling my mother felt tiny and insignificant.

  “I just wanted to cheer you up after last night. I know you were stressed about the whole thing with your car and then your friend. How is she?” Kyle smiled, and for the first time I noticed a tiny dimple in the middle of his chin. It was just small enough for me to stick my pinky finger in. It was adorable. I had to admit, Kyle was truly a good-looking man. He had a kind of classic, young Sidney Poitier fineness to him.

  “Tasha’s better,” I said, forcing myself to look at the menu and not at the dimple.

  “Well, that’s good to hear. She seemed pretty shaken up.”

  The waitress came over and Kyle ordered for both of us.

  “I must say, it was nice to see you last night,” he said as she walked away. “It was nice to get to know the real Troy.”

  “The real Troy? What does that mean?”

  “Well, in the car, I realized that you’re really down-to-earth. You’re funny, Troy.” He grinned. “You’re not just a…what do they call them…Black American Princess.”

  “Oh, so now you think I’m a BAP?” I laughed. I was used to the “BAP” classification. It always amazed me how quickly people wanted to put me into some category as soon as they found out my family had a little money and I had decent taste. Hell, for the most part it was true. I was a BAP poster child.

  “Well, let’s be honest, at the country club you seemed a little snobby,” Kyle said. “I wasn’t exactly fond of you.” He held up his napkin like a shield.

  “Snobby?” I said, grabbing the napkin. While I could handle being called a BAP, I was not snobby. Shoot, I could drink and cuss with the best of them! “Please, you know you were trying to get with this,” I joked.

  “Troy, you were acting like a spoiled little rich girl that day. Not my type.” We both laughed. I couldn’t help it. He was right. Kyle wasn’t even on my friend list.

  “But that’s the past. And what I know now, after talking to you in the car and seeing how carefully you took care of your friend, is that there’s more to you. There’s a lot more,” Kyle said. “And I’m happy you came out today, too,” he went on. “I was afraid you’d stand me up.”

  “Stand you up?”

  “Yeah. I know how you ladies can be about going out with, you know, religious men who have dedicated their lives to God. And you didn’t seem too thrilled about me being a virgin.” Kyle started laughing again and I realized that I’d almost forgotten about his occupation.

  “It was nothing, Kyle. Really,” I said. “I mean, it’s a choice.”

  “I’m glad you feel that way, because I didn’t want to spend all of my money on these flowers trying to impress you and then get dissed.”

  I sighed and looked down at the flowers. They were great. Kyle was great. But I had to tell him the truth.

  “No, the flowers are lovely, Kyle. But I have to be honest with you.” I paused, giving the waitress time to put the food on the table. “I’m not really looking for anything right now. I’m kind of in between places.”

  Kyle said a short prayer over our food and looked at me.

  “‘In between’? Oh, that’s a new one.” He dug into his steak forcefully. I could tell he was annoyed with me. It was obvious that he had gone through a lot of trouble trying to impress me. Hell, the man had called my mama! It was the right gesture—just the wrong man. Why couldn’t Julian have done something like that for me? Suddenly, the spring salad I’d ordered tasted incredibly dull in my mouth. I wanted to eat my words.

  “It’s not a line, Kyle,” I said, sliding my fork onto the plate. “You just caught me at the wrong time, that’s all.”

  “So my obligations don’t bother you?”

  “Well, I’ll admit, I’m not exactly thrilled with it, but it doesn’t make me not want to be your friend.” I reached across the table and grabbed his hand. “And I do want to be your friend.”

  “Hmm…” He gasped. “Friend?” He looked me over. “I guess that’ll work. Besides, then I’ll get to see you again. And that would be a blessing.”

  “Great!” I said. He smiled, and judging from the appearance of the chin dimple, it was a truce.

  “Troy,” Kyle said, looking at me, “whoever he is, he’s a lucky man.”

  “Thanks, Kyle.”

  “I really mean that or I wouldn’t even be here. I don’t exactly have a shortage of women trying to get to me at the church.”

  I had to laugh. Those church sisters were a trip. They loved trying to get with a single man of God—or even a married man of God. I saw the way they flocked to the pastor at my own church. They carried cakes to church, asked for special “prayer” meetings—some of them even tried to have their mamas hook them up. It was some stiff competition going on in the Lord’s house.

  “So are you throwing the church ladies up in my face?” I frowned playfully.

  “No, I’m just saying, I don’t want you to allow people to take you for granted.” He stared deeply into my eyes. “No one should ever take a woman like you for granted. You’re smart, loving, witty, and more beautiful than any one man could ever deserve.”

  “That might be one of the nicest things anyone’s ever said to me,
Kyle,” I said, after turning to look behind me to see if he was talking to someone else or reading from a script. The man was unreal. His words were so sweet, I didn’t know if I wanted to cry or jump over the table to hug him.

  “It’s true.”

  “Enough about little old me,” I said, blushing. “What about you? Tell me about you.”

  “What about me?” Kyle asked. “I’m an open book. No secrets.”

  “I mean, you mentioned the whole ‘obligations’ thing. What made you become a pastor? How did you finally decide to just do it?”

  “Hmm…” He looked up at the ceiling like he was searching for the right thing to say.

  “I’m sure plenty of people ask you that. I’m sorry if it’s a stupid question.”

  “No, it’s not stupid,” he said. “In fact, I like to answer the question. It reminds me of why I’m doing this. Keeps me focused.” He paused. “You know, my family history was one thing. I was born and raised in the church. It was all I knew for a long time. But then when I turned twelve and I thought I could go against my father and my grandfather, I decided that I didn’t want to be a preacher. I was like, ‘To heck with them and this whole church thing. It’s corny. I want to be a rapper.’”

  “What happened?” I laughed. I couldn’t imagine Kyle the Rapper! Christian Kyle was funnier. “I know they didn’t like that.”

  “No, my father always had this way of letting people see the truth for themselves. So he didn’t fight me.” Kyle smiled. “He went and got me a notebook and told me to write my rhymes in it.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. So I changed my name to MC K-Lover and I was writing rhymes, and my cousins started writing too, and we made up dances and stuff. It was crazy. We thought we were some kind of Tennessee rap group, about to take the world by storm,” Kyle said, laughing. “But then my father started asking me about the things I was saying in the songs. He asked me what I wanted to do with my music, how I wanted to change the world and touch people. I guess it had never dawned on me, because I couldn’t answer. I could think about the girls and the cars, but I didn’t know what in the heck I wanted to say in my rhymes.”