Be with Me (Strickland Sisters Book 3)

by Alexandria House

  6

  The first time I kissed Nicky Strickland, we were in sixth grade. We were on the huge playground at our school, hidden behind a tree. By then, we’d been friends since second grade and spent most of our time in our own little world. Me, the smart, awkward, super geeky video game addict who loved anime and all things Asian. Her, the tiny, pretty, smart, too mature for her age, geeky video game addict who loved anime and also loved fashion. I was too lame for the other boys, and Nicky was too complicated for the other girls. We were outcasts, but we had each other. And I can’t remember a time when I didn’t worship her.

  The kiss was her idea like just about everything else we did together. She’d always loved to read, but never read age-appropriate books. In the fifth grade, she was into Stephen King. In sixth grade, she became obsessed with romance novels, and at twelve, said she wanted to know exactly what it felt like for tongues to dance or mate or tangle. Of course, I said okay. I was already experiencing random erections, especially when I was around her, so I wasn’t going to object.

  “You ready?” she asked, as she sat in the grass in front of me. “You know what to do, right?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. I’m supposed to close my eyes and move my face close to yours real slow and put my mouth on top of yours and then put my tongue in your mouth. I’ve seen it done in movies, Nick.”

  “I know. Are you nervous?” she asked.

  “No,” I lied. “Let’s just do it.”

  She nodded and smiled. “Okay, because I’m so ready to see if it makes me moan like Lilly DuPont did in Croissants of Love.”

  “Where do you get those books, anyway?”

  “The public library. Come on, Dame. Let’s do this.”

  “Okay.”

  She was sitting crossed legged, and so was I. I scooted so close to her that I was damn near sitting on top of her, and leaned in slowly. Her eyes were already closed, and her mouth hung slightly open. I stared at her for a second, thinking to myself that it was right to share my first kiss with her, because at twelve, she was already the love of my life.

  Our mouths finally met and I closed my eyes, opened my mouth, and soon, we were both moaning. It was…no words can describe what it was or what it felt like. But we both liked it so much that we kissed right there behind that big oak tree every day for weeks until a teacher almost caught us.

  That kiss and all the ones that followed it were on my mind as I headed to Theo’s house. I missed the hell out of Nicky, but I knew this little challenge was necessary. She’d actually set a date, something I never thought she’d do. I was making it too easy for her to stay with dude. So I had to do this, even if it was driving me nuts. When I closed my eyes at night, all I could see was her dark, almond-shaped, wide-set eyes that revealed themselves to be brown in the right lighting, her high cheekbones, pillowy soft lips that were somewhere in between thick and thin, and brown sugar cinnamon skin. And her body, she was so tiny but somehow still possessed the curves of a woman with thick thighs that I loved.

  I missed the slope of her back and the hollow of her neck, and shit, of course her pussy. I really, really missed her pussy. But I needed her to miss me like she did when we were apart all those years. I needed her to give her time only to me like she did when I came home for that visit. I needed her to want me so bad, she’d forget about what happened in the past and be willing to make a future with me and me alone. So if I had to suffer to make that happen, I would.

  I pulled my car into my cousin, Theo’s, driveway. Well, it was actually my aunt’s driveway since he and his girl, Onika, lived with her. I pushed Nicky out of my head as I knocked on the front door of the yellow frame house.

  “Who is it?!” Theo yelled.

  “Nigga, really?!” I yelled back.

  Theo opened the door wearing what was his daily uniform: a faded black tee, raggedy black jogging pants, white socks, and black Adidas sandals. He was short and stocky with a messy beard and an afro that hadn’t been trimmed in years. He grinned, took a pull from a blunt—another part of his uniform—and handed it to me.

  “Shit, I forgot you was coming, cuz,” he said, as he backed out of the doorway, letting me into the house.

  “How, when I just called and told you I was on my way like twenty minutes ago? You need to stop smoking, man.”

  He shrugged, and I handed the blunt back to him, letting the smoke seep through my lips. I smiled when I saw my aunt sitting on the sofa. “Hey, Auntie.”

  She grinned. “Well, if it isn’t the best thing my sister, Wanda, ever made! You better come give me my hug!”

  I saw Aunt Monda at least once a week since me and Theo were in business together, but she always acted like she hadn’t seen me in years. That was probably because she was always high. Aunt Monda smoked weed every day like other women her age took daily multivitamins. She was the cool aunt, the one who always let us curse and smoke weed around her, and I loved her for that because my mom was so straight-laced, she was painful to be around. They were identical twins, but nothing alike.

  My aunt had been having an affair with some married guy forever, but they were so stealthy, no one in the family had ever seen him or even knew who he was. Well, Theo knew, but Aunt Monda had apparently sworn him to secrecy, probably because whoever it was, was his father. We’d always been tight, but he still wouldn’t tell me anything. What we did know was he took good care of her. She hadn’t worked in years and was doing well enough to still be supporting Theo’s grown, lazy ass. Nicky called Aunt Monda her she-ro.

  After Aunt Monda smothered me with a hug, I followed Theo down the hall, past his bedroom where an extremely pregnant Onika was in bed snoring, to the small room he called his office. Theo and I were collaborators on an online comic book/strip. He created the digital artwork; I wrote the story. We had twenty subscribers who paid ten dollars a month to read Foreign Son, which followed the adventures of Jules Marks, a quick-witted, angsty, snarky African American teenage boy who moves to South Korea with his parents. A real fish out of water story loosely based on my experiences while living there and what I observed of some of the expat students who attended the school I taught at, highlighting my love for Asian culture along with what it means to be a black man who’s secure about who he is but is living in a place where the only positive representation of you seems to be Will Smith. How it feels to be the only one of you in the vicinity, the desire for sameness in a place that is ninety-plus percent Asian, which was one of the reasons I hooked up with Missy Mae—familiarity.

  No, we weren’t making a bunch of money off of it, but it was a labor of love for me, and Theo had ridiculous talent and a lot of time on his hands, so it was a partnership made in Heaven. He showed me the line art for the next chapter, and after we talked business, we shared a beer, smoked another blunt, and I left, sufficiently numb to an aching need to touch Nicky Strickland.

  7

  It only took three days of being voluntarily unemployed for me to go out of my mind with boredom. Not that I wanted another job. Hell no to that. It was just that before I started working, I was in school forever, and when I wasn’t in class or at work, I was screwing someone. Now I had no one to screw to my satisfaction because of Damon-Motherfucking-Davis. I couldn’t let myself lose this bet, and there was no one else I wanted. So, to combat my boredom, I decided to visit my sister, Renee, and get a Baby Zo fix.

  My sister lived in a mansion with a painfully handsome husband, and their chubby little two-month old son was so cute, he made my ovaries pulsate and I didn’t even want kids. Of course I planned to give Travis a couple via surrogate or something—I wasn’t about to carry the man’s offspring in my body—but I fully expected to have a nanny to take care of them.

  I knew the gate code, so I drove right up to the front door and waved at Rell, this big fine-ass dude who was basically their driver extraordinaire. I rang the doorbell and a few seconds later, was greeted by Renee, who looked gorgeous in a yellow sundress and bare feet. She smiled, pulled me in
to a hug, and said, “I literally can’t believe this!” She gently pinched my arm. “Nicky, are you real?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Would you stop and let me in so I can see my nephew?”

  “I wanna feel bad about the fact that no one comes to see me anymore, but I can’t blame y’all. Little Zo is like this miniature version of his daddy and I love it.”

  “That’s because you’re so crazy about his big-juicy-fine daddy.”

  “I sure am.”

  “Shit, I would be, too,” I mumbled.

  Renee shook her head as she led me into the living room where I almost gasped at the sight of my father holding Little Zo in his arms, cooing at him. What the hell?

  I shot Renee a confused look. She just widened her eyes, and said, “Look who’s here, Daddy.”

  My father looked up, and this bright smile spread across his face. “Hey, baby girl! You here to visit our prince, too?”

  “Uh-um...yeah. Hey, Daddy.”

  At that moment, Lorenzo stepped into the room with a beer in each hand and grinned at me. “Hey, Nicky. Come to see Little Man?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. Y’all already giving him beer?”

  Lorenzo chuckled. “No, one’s for me. The other’s for his granddaddy.”

  “That’s right,” my father said in this goofy baby-talk voice. “I’m your granddaddy, your paw-paw!”

  I watched in awe as he kissed the baby’s forehead and then handed him to Renee. She kissed her husband and beckoned for me to follow her to the kitchen.

  “Let me feed him and then he’s all yours,” she said, as we sat down at the table.

  “Nay, what in all the fucks is going on? Who was that man in there spending time with family in broad open daylight? Holding Little Zo? And now he’s in there drinking beer with Lorenzo, and—” A burst of laughter came from the living room. I frowned. “Laughing and talking to him like they’re old college buddies? Girl, what the entire hell?”

  Renee shrugged her shoulders. “I’ve been meaning to call you since you forgot my number, but anyway, Daddy’s basically been coming over every day since I had the baby. He holds him, plays with him, and he and Big Zo have these long conversations. It’s the weirdest thing ever. It’s like he suddenly wants to be connected to family.”

  “Wow, did he have a near-death experience or something? I would think that’d be the only thing to make him suddenly become family-oriented.”

  Renee gave me this strange look, and I said, “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Anyway, I caught that little remark about me forgetting your number. I’ve just been busy. I’ve—” The doorbell rang, and Lorenzo yelled he’d get it. “Wow, it’s poppin’ around here, huh?”

  Renee nodded. “You can’t imagine. Everybody wants to see this little boy.” She kissed his forehead, and I smiled. She was so happy, and her happiness was way past due after spending years with an earthworm for a husband.

  A few seconds later, Angie appeared in the kitchen doorway looking cute in a white romper. I jumped up and hugged her, because I hadn’t seen her in like forever.

  “What’s going on? Y’all thought y’all could sneak in a girls’ night or I guess, day, without me?” she asked, as she pulled out of my hug and walked over to Renee. “Look at him! How can he just keep getting cuter and cuter?” she gushed.

  “I know, right?” I agreed. “Shit, he makes my uterus ache, and y’all know that’s a feat.”

  “It truly is,” Renee said.

  “Oh, I cannot wait to hold him! I’ve missed his little face!” Angie squealed.

  “Nuh-uh, I call first. I came over here just for Little Zo,” I protested.

  Angie took a seat next to me and rolled her eyes. “Fine. So, how are things? He’s what, two months old now? You and Zo getting adjusted?” she asked Renee.

  Renee nodded. “Yeah, it was rough those first few nights after our mom and his mom moved out, but we’ve got a good routine going now, and Zo is so hands-on. He’s so cute with the baby. He talks to him when he changes his diaper, tells him about the book he’s writing. It’s so funny.”

  “Wait, since he’s two months now—” I lowered my voice. “—y’all done started back to screwing, haven’t you?”

  “Wow…that’s what you got out of everything she just said?” Angie asked.

  “No, I mean, that was my first thought when you said the grandmothers had moved out. So…have you?”

  A little smile appeared on Renee’s face as she began burping the baby. “Girl, he damn near attacked me before they could get out the door good.”

  I threw my head back. “Ahhh! I’m sitting here living vicariously through your ass right now. What I wouldn’t give for some good sex!”

  Angie and Renee both stared at me, then Angie finally said, “I know you’re going to say I’m beating a dead horse, but um, you sure about this Travis thing?”

  “Yeah, take it from me, marriage is hard even with good sex, bad sex will not make it any easier,” Renee advised.

  I sighed and shook my head. A little part of me wanted to tell them everything about me and Damon, the truth of our relationship, the way I craved him day and night, and the reasons there could never really be an us, but what me and Damon had was a secret that I’d held onto for so long, I honestly didn’t know how to share it despite the fact that I wanted to, so I said, “There y’all go with that shit again. Look, me and Travis will be fine. I just gotta be patient with him. I was only tryna hear about some nasty sex in the meantime. Damn!”

  As she handed me the baby, Renee said, “Oooh, and it was really nasty. It was the nastiest, filthiest, grimiest sex you can imagine.” She grinned as she reclaimed her seat.

  I kissed Little Zo’s cheek, and sang, “Your mommy and daddy are freaks. Yes, they are. Yes, they arrrrrrrrre.”

  Angie chuckled. “Wow, y’all are really crazy up in here.”

  “You think this is crazy? You should’ve seen Daddy in there playing with the baby,” I stated.

  Angie’s eyes widened. “Girl, I saw Daddy in there guzzling beer and talking to Lorenzo. It’s a three-ring circus up in this joint.”

  “It really is,” Renee said. “So, how was LA, Ang?”

  “It was great! Such a nice event! And you already know the women lost their minds over Ryan.”

  “Hell, I know they did. I don’t know how your ass keeps from screaming every time he walks in the room,” I said to Angie, but my eyes were glued to the chubby little boy in my arms. “Nay, he’s everything. Everything,” I added.

  Renee beamed proudly. “I know. Isn’t he?”

  “Angie, when are you gonna have one?” I asked.

  “Girl, please. Renee put the fear of God in me when she was having Little Zo. I’m too petrified to have a baby!” she answered.

  “Hell, me too!” I said.

  Renee rolled her eyes “I didn’t cut up that bad.”

  “Sheeeiiiiiit!” Angie said.

  Renee smirked and looked at me. “So, what you been up to, and did you take today off or something since you’re here in the middle of the day?”

  I took a deep breath and tore my eyes from my nephew, looking up at my sisters. “I quit my job. Travis finally gave me the go-ahead. Even added me to his credit cards.”

  “Wow,” Renee said.

  “And in return, you had to do what?” Angie asked.

  I cleared my throat and shrugged a little, letting my eyes drift to the tabletop. “Set a date. September sixteenth.”

  Silence.

  I looked from Renee, whose eyes were downcast, to Angie, who wore a frown as she stared at me. “Damn, can I get a ‘congratulations’ or something?”

  “If this is truly what you want, congratulations, Nicky,” Renee said.

  “Yeah, what she said,” Angie agreed.

  I mustered up a smile. “So, you know you two have to be in the wedding.”

  “Yeah,” Angie said. “Of course.”

  Renee nodded in accordance.


  “Is Damon gonna be in the wedding?”

  I sighed. “Really, Ang? You had to bring him up?”

  “He’s family! What’s the problem?”

  I bit my bottom lip and fought back tears. Shit, I was going to have to get ahold of myself. I’d gone like ten years without seeing Damon at one point. Why the hell was I so messed up about not seeing him now? It’d only been a couple of weeks.

  I searched my brain for something bitchy to say, but all I could do was choke back tears, and mutter, “I should go.” Then I handed Little Zo to Angie and left.

  I went to a couple of stores, picked up some dinner for me and Travis, drove by Damon’s apartment complex four times, and when I got home, found both Travis and Damon sitting on the sofa.

  8

  I just stood there, my eyes glued to Damon, my heart racing. A thousand thoughts flooded my mind at once, the chief one being that I wanted to be in Damon’s arms. I just wanted him to hold me, needed him to hold me. And I wanted to cry. And after he held me and I cried, I wanted to screw him until my coochie locked up. That actually happened back in high school. We got carried away one night when his mom had left town, leaving him alone in their house. I’d snuck over there and we did it so many times, my coochie went on strike and locked up on us. He couldn’t even get a finger in there, so we were forced to stop until the next morning.

  Damon stared at me.

  I stared at him.

  Travis hopped up from the sofa, taking the bags from me and kissing my cheek. “Hey, babe! Look who’s having dinner with us.”

  “Hey, Nick,” Damon said, with a smile on his face.

  “Uh…hey, Damon.” I turned and plastered on a smile for Travis. “Hey, babe. What a surprise!”

  He grinned. “Yeah, I ran into Damon at the gas station and invited him over.”

  “Great! Let me go freshen up and set the table.”

  I damn near ran into the bedroom, shutting the door behind me. I slid to the floor, asking myself what the hell I was supposed to do. How in the complete fuck was I going to have dinner with Damon and Travis? It’d never been the three of us alone before.