“I’m not about to break up a happy relationship. Disregard my request then,” Fabian said, backing off.
“You give up way too easy.”
“I’m not giving up. I’m respecting your relationship.”
“Well I’m not really in one. Just trying to see where your head is.”
“Still playing games,” Fabian said.
“Not really. Part of what I’m saying is true. I had a man and I’m trying to get him back. He wants me but he hasn’t figured that out yet.”
Fabian nodded, saying, “Oh that’s it. He doesn’t know it yet.”
“Yes, but I will still go out with you. I need something to keep my mind off of things going on.”
“If you are okay with this, we can meet up tomorrow. Say around seven. I’ll pick you up if that’s okay with you.”
I paused, pretending to think about whether it was okay, but really I didn’t care. I needed a change of pace. Maybe me going out with another guy would jar Derrick into jealousy. Maybe this would be what it took for Derrick to realize I was the woman he wanted in his life, and he couldn’t let another man come in and swoop me up.
“Seven is good. I’ll see you then.”
“Then it’s a date,” Fabian said. “And if you don’t mind, I will take this money,” he said, snatching the money from my hand. “You did cause me to have to pay to get my car cleaned.”
Chapter 18
Jaquon
I knew Kea was a huge Tyler Perry fan and his new movie, Madea’s Big Happy Family, was coming to DVD today. Since we didn’t make it to the actual movie I decided I would buy it for her to watch at home. Even though I respected Tyler Perry for all he had accomplished despite some of the hardships in his life, I really wasn’t a big fan of his movies. I was more into martial arts movies and anything with a lot of action. Tyler Perry’s movies were made more for women. Call me a man’s man but tonight I was willing to sit next to Kea and watch this movie ten times if it meant getting closer to her.
After picking up the movie, I found myself standing in front of the video games. I was deciding if I should buy me another one to add to my growing collection. Well it was a growing collection before Kea destroyed some of them. When I saw God of War III I thought about Derrick and the time we spent playing part two together. We couldn’t wait for this version to come out. We used to spend hours on end playing not only this game but many other games. We would pick up some beer and snacks, making it a day of nonstop battling to see who was better. He won some and I won some. It was probably why our battles lasted so long: because we were each other’s competition. Neither of us was better at any game. We really were almost equal when it came to winning. Our battles would last until the sun rose again with neither of us having gotten a wink of sleep. Those were fun days that I missed. Now I was looking at a game I knew neither of us would play together. How ironic was it for our competition to be over a woman?
I had wanted to call Derrick but I didn’t think he would want to hear from me. Even if he considered talking to me I wouldn’t know where to begin in our conversation. The one thing I knew for sure was Derrick couldn’t stand betrayal of any kind. Our bond was compromised by both of us but I had no one to blame but myself for the demise of our friendship. I slept with Zacariah first, which started this snowball effect of “what comes around goes around.” Yes, he slept with Kea, too, but if I would have kept my dick in my pants, all of us would be in a good place right now. I felt my love for sex clouded my judgment over actually being in love with Kea and my friendship with Derrick, which was why things were so messed up right now. My cheating ways caused these dominos to fall and here I stood, wishing I could set the chips back up and start everything all over again. What we had going on right now was some grownup shit I wished I never stirred up. I wished a “How you doing, man?” or “What’s been up with you?” could begin the healing process of our friendship, but I knew better than that. It would take a higher power for real for Derrick to ever consider being my friend again. Thinking about the demise of our friendship brought back memories of the day I crossed the line when I slept with Zacariah for the first time a couple of years ago.
“Yo, Dee man, where you at?” I asked, busting my way through the door of Derrick’s home like I always did without knocking. Zacariah was curled up on the couch.
“Don’t you ever knock?” Zacariah asked with her usual attitude. “I’m sick of you busting up in here all the damn time like you pay mortgage up in this piece.”
“Girl, shut up. I was doing this before Derrick got with you and I’m going to continue to do it until he gets rid of you.”
“Well I guess I got to learn to lock the door then.”
“That’s fine. All I’m going to do is use my key,” I said, showing it to her.
“Aw. I can’t stand you.”
“And I don’t like your trifling behind either. Yo, Derrick man!”
“Stop screaming. Derrick’s not here. He had to take his mother to visit with his aunt.”
“Dag, that’s right,” I said, remembering he told me yesterday he was going out of town.
“So you can leave now. And like I said before, learn how to knock. I could have been coming out the shower or something and I don’t want you gawking at me.”
The visual of Zacariah naked wasn’t hard to imagine since most of the clothes she wore were revealing anyway. She sat there now wearing some cut-off shorts and a white tee tied in the back, showing off her tiny waist and voluptuous breasts. Just the thought of checking her out like that made me want to throw up in my mouth but my body betrayed me. A chain reaction started and before I knew it, I couldn’t control the rising of my manhood. I quickly put my hand in my pocket like I was sticking the key back in it as I turned away from her.
Zacariah looked at me sideways, asking, “What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Nothing.”
“It doesn’t look like that to me. You didn’t think I notice the old hand-in-the-pocket-to-hide-a-hard-dick trick,” she said, smirking. “You must like what you see.”
“Please. You wish.”
“Boy, please,” she said, getting up from the couch and sauntering past me with a leisurely stroll to the kitchen. “I know I look good and I don’t need you to tell me that.”
She did look good and I couldn’t help watching her fat ass gyrate its way out the room. As hard as I tried to calm myself down, the harder it felt like my manhood was getting. Zacariah came back moments later with a glass of juice and she had the nerve to be drinking out of a straw. This sent my mind into even dirtier realms as I thought about Zacariah’s lips sucking on the tip of my manhood, too. Hell, I had all the juice she needed.
“You still here?” she asked, taking a gulp of her juice before sitting back down on the sofa.
Even the tightness of her thighs as she folded her feet beneath her turned me on in this moment. What the hell was going on with me? I couldn’t find any words to say. I was known for talking mad game but right now I was speechless. My manhood was pulling blood flow from my brain. I had to be delusional to be hard over my best friend’s girl, and one I didn’t like at that. But my manhood liked her a lot.
“You still try to calm yourself huh. All this,” she said, pointing at her body, “got you tripping,” she said, giggling and looking at my crotch.
“How you going to walk around all the time damn near naked? It’s like you like dudes checking you out.”
“Jaquon, I’m at home. I can sit here with nothing on if I wanted to,” Zacariah said. “I decided to chill today. I was getting ready to cut the television off and read my book. This peace is a great welcome. Well, that was until you stormed up in here.”
She placed her juice down on the coffee table. She then cut the television off and picked up her book as she threw her feet on the sofa, lying back to start her reading. The silence was awkward as I watched her long, smooth legs cross at the ankles, which stretched out, leading to where her shorts tucke
d their way between her thighs. Feelings of doing Derrick’s woman trampled on how wrong this was but my body was telling me to go ahead, that this was exactly what Zacariah wanted.
Zacariah peered over the book, saying, “Why you standing there staring at me? You don’t have anything else to do?”
“I do,” I stuttered.
She laid the book down across her abundant breasts, and I wished I were the pages making contact with the thin cotton hugging her melons.
“Jaquon,” she said, snapping her fingers. “Why am I making you so nervous?”
“I’m not nervous,” I blurted. “I was thinking about what I was going to do now that I don’t have my boy to hang with,” I said, playing it off as much as I could, but I knew I was doing a horrible job at it.
“You have a girl. Go be with her. Better yet, go be with all them other women you choose to slum with,” she said boldly.
“I don’t slum,” I said defensively.
“Tell that lie to somebody who might believe you. Your first name should be lying, second should be cheating, and last should be dog.”
“I bet you want to catch some of my fleas,” I retorted confidently. “I’ve seen how you’ve looked at me too.”
“No, thank you. I don’t want any itchy and scratchy here,” she said, pointing to her camel’s foot.
“You can’t sit there and tell me you haven’t wondered why the ladies love me so much,” I said.
“I thought they were stupid. They see a cute face and lose their damn mind.”
“So you think I’m cute.”
“You all right. Derrick, on the other hand, is fine.”
“I would like to think both of us are good-looking men,” I said with assurance. “I don’t hang with unattractive people. I guess I should leave because I’m in the presence of one now,” I said, laughing as I walked to the door.
“Ha ha,” she said. “Keep letting those women swell your head up. One day it’s going to burst.”
“Please, Zacariah. You act like you haven’t whored in your day. I know your past reputation too and if the opportunity arose, you would hop on the first dick you saw.”
“I’m looking at one now and I ain’t hopping,” she countered.
“But you want to.”
“Please,” she said, picking up the book to go back to pretend reading.
“Admit it, Zacariah. You are curious about me,” I said, walking back toward her. “You have to wonder if my manhood is big. I do wear a size thirteen shoe.”
“Boy, I have seen men with your shoe size still swing something the size of my pinky so you better shut up about that. Shoe sizes don’t matter,” she said, holding up her pinky.
“In my case it does. I’m swinging real low.”
“I didn’t ask you. I can ask you this: why don’t you admit you have been goggling over me since you got here?”
“I’ll admit I was checking you out. I had never viewed you this way before.”
“And what way is that?” she asked, looking around the book.
“The way that made me rise up, wishing I could get a piece of you.”
Zacariah got up, placing the pages of the book down on the sofa to hold her spot. She got up and walked over to me. “You know I’m going to tell Derrick you made a pass at me.”
“No, you’re not,” I said, moving closer to her until her breasts were touching my chest.
“How you figure?” she asked daringly.
“Because your craving for me is too deep for you to pass up the chance to hop on this,” I said, looking down at my hardness.
“You’re crazy,” she said softly, looking at me seductively.
“And you know you want me,” I teased.
We started kissing ravenously and Zacariah didn’t bother to push me away. She dove into the abyss with me, pulling me into her until no space occupied the distance between our yearnings.
Next thing I knew I was inside her. She was bent over the back of the couch while I banged her from the back doggie style. I had to admit Zacariah had that good good. It was all nice and wet for a brother. I could have sloshed around in her for hours but I couldn’t. I had to get in and get out before my boy got home and saw me drilling his girl. Even though he was supposed to be out of town, my man Derrick could have been telling Zacariah this to catch her in a compromising situation. And I didn’t want to be the situation he caught her with.
That one incident led to several until Zacariah told me she was pregnant with either my or Derrick’s baby.
“You’re what?” I stared at her in disbelief.
“I’m pregnant and I don’t know if the baby is yours or Derrick’s.”
“I can’t believe this. You weren’t on birth control pills or something?”
“Yes, but it’s not a hundred percent. You act like I got pregnant on purpose. I don’t want a baby right now. I’m not even sure if I ever want kids.”
“So what are we going to do? You can’t tell Derrick you’re pregnant.”
“I know this, Jaquon. Derrick wants kids more than anything. If I tell him this and this baby end up being yours, it would kill him. But not before he kills you.”
“So what now then?” I questioned.
“I think our best option is for me to get an abortion.”
I never once argued against her getting one either. I was hoping she was going to say that. It was bad enough I slept with her but to get her pregnant on top of that, this had to be some type of double violation. I always told myself I would never let a woman get rid of a child of mine but in this case it was necessary. I knew I didn’t want to lose Derrick as my best friend or ruin my relationship with Kea. Hell I didn’t want Zacariah to be the mother to any of my kids so this had to be done. It was a choice we both came to easily.
I admit I had some doggish ways but never had I been dumb enough to get another female pregnant. Not until Zacariah. Still, our secret was out in the open, even though it was not in its entirety. I hoped it never came out. Derrick and Kea might think Zacariah told everything there was to tell that night of the cookout but little did they know we both had that secret. I hoped we both would take it to our graves. The pure fact that baby could have been Derrick’s would be a good enough reason for him to go over the edge. Killing his baby was the ultimate betrayal. Now we would never know if that child was his or mine.
I thought that’s why my hatred for Zacariah grew. She was the one woman who made me cross that line of friendship, and getting pregnant with possibly my child only fueled resentment I had. I knew I couldn’t only be mad at her; I had to be mad at me. I should have learned then how karma came back to bite but I kept pushing the limits and ended up losing Derrick and Kea anyway.
Chapter 19
Derrick
I felt a light tap on my shoulder as I stood trying to figure out which blank DVDs I wanted to purchase. I turned to see who was trying to get my attention. I thought it may have been a salesperson until I turned to see it was Jaquon. A smile popped on my face briefly until I remembered what he’d done to me and that’s when it dwindled. It had been awhile since I had seen him. The last time I saw him was the night of my cookout.
“What’s up, Dee,” Jaquon said, holding his hand out to shake mine, but I looked at it, not returning the gesture. Jaquon lowered his hand, saying, “Okay, I see you are still angry with me.”
“You think?” I said, turning my attention back to the DVDs.
“Look, man, I have wanted to call you so we can talk about this.”
“And tell me what? I thought everything that needed to be said was said the night of my get-together.”
“We never got the chance to discuss it,” he tried to say sincerely but I wasn’t trying to hear it.
“I can’t believe you betrayed me like that, Jaquon,” I said angrily.
“Derrick, I’m sorry. I’ve wanted to tell you that but—”
“You were my boy and you played me. Me of all people,” I stressed by putting my hand on
my chest. “We’re like brothers, thick as thieves. How could you do me like that?”
“Derrick, man, please hear me out.”
Pointing at him, I said furiously, “I was here for you. Every time you needed me, I was there. You practically lived at my mama’s house when we were coming up because you didn’t want to go home to your own damn family,” I said, thinking about how tough his home life was. He came from a single mother who tried her best to raise him the best way she knew how. In doing so she worked three jobs and was never home. His father left when he was a baby and his grandmother died when he was eight, which was around the time we started hanging out together. So, the only place he had to go was my house. As hard as his mom worked, she still found it hard to keep food on the table. My mom helped by letting him stay with us. Mama even offered for his mother to stay when their lights got cut off one time. They might not have had a lot but he knew he had looks and he played on them all the time. That’s why he was the player he was and that same player ended up playing me in the end.
“I know I hurt you, Derrick,” Jaquon agreed.
“I helped you move into your new place. I helped you get the job you got now. And let’s not forget how I was your alibi when it came to you cheating on your woman. Yet your doggish ways couldn’t resist sleeping with mine,” I said, hurting at the fact I’d lost my best friend over some ass, some trifling-ass at that. Sure, I could disregard and be his friend again. I could let friendship override betrayal since I found out Zacariah was a skanky trick anyway. But Jaquon destroyed our trust. I wasn’t sure if I could get over that.
“Derrick, man, you did all those things for me and I will never forget it. You are my brother, man. Blood doesn’t make people family. The fact someone is here regardless of whatever goes on and loves you in spite of is reason enough for me to know you are my family, Dee.”
I looked at his genuineness and knew he meant what he was saying, but it couldn’t alleviate the sting of it all. He fractured our bond.
“Derrick, it didn’t go down like that with me and Zacariah.”
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