by Mona Love
Before I knew it, he and I were off in a corner laughing and talking into the night. We had exchanged numbers at his urging, which was a first for a fat girl like me. I had always been the one begging for the number. The next day, I had shrugged off my interaction with Malek. I just knew he was going to sober up, remember the fun fat girl he’d had a good time with the night before, and rip my number to shreds. In other words, I didn’t expect him to call me at all.
So you can imagine my surprise when my cell phone had lit up that fateful day with his name and number. From that first call, I just knew Malek was different. We would speak for hours, laughing the whole time. He seemed interested in finding out everything about me. We had fun dates, the kinds that were stress free. Once, we went out and I didn’t even wear makeup, and trust me, that is a big no-no in my book. Shit, I wore makeup to go to the corner store on my block.
Malek didn’t have a lot by way of material things, but he made me feel like I was dating a rich man. He was definitely charming. He was also a gentleman, which at that point I hadn’t been used to. Before long, Malek and I had been spending so much time together that Leitha and our other friends had begun to refer to Malek as my “boyfriend,” a term I had never really had attached to me and any man I’d dated.
Things seemed perfect, and maybe they were too perfect. It was a nice fall day, and Malek had asked me on yet another real date. Up to that point, I had never turned him down. Back then, I didn’t care if Jesus Himself was going to be somewhere; if Malek wanted me to meet him in the opposite direction, I’d be going that way. Malek and I sat across from each other that day, and he kept staring at me.
“Why you looking at me like that?” I had asked, breaking eye contact because I was trying to mask the fact that my damn face was on fire.
“Why you think?” Malek had replied, chuckling.
“I don’t know, but you’re staring at me. Real hard, I might add. Shit, you better tell me if I have bird doo-doo in my eyes,” I had joked, swiping at the cracks of my eyes to make sure I didn’t have anything in them.
“I don’t have to have a reason to stare at you, Keisha. I just like staring at a pretty woman who I admire a lot,” Malek had said, reaching across the table and putting his hand on top of mine.
My entire body jerked. Malek’s touch always set off electric currents that I hadn’t felt before, but something about that particular day was different. It had been in that moment that I had started to question whether it was really love. True love. I didn’t know what that meant, but I’d always heard people say that when true love happens, you’ll know.
There was nothing Malek couldn’t get from me at that point. Right there at that little Brooklyn café table, in my mind, I had surrendered it all to him. There had never been another man who had come close to making me feel like that.
Malek and I had taken our time and enjoyed each other’s company. We’d sat across from one another at a small table in the back of the restaurant with sexual tension and maybe love buzzing around us like bees over a pot of sweet honey.
“Penny for your thoughts?” Malek had said.
“Hmmm,” I’d answered, giggling. “I’m not even thinking right now.” It was a dumb answer, because there were so many things I could’ve said since I’d been thinking about how damn in love I was with him.
He put his hands under his chin and made a sad puppy-dog face. “So you have no thoughts? Dang. We are sitting in this little sexy spot. I’m smelling all good, you’re looking all beautiful, and nothing?” Malek had responded.
I hung my head but was still smiling. I had never ever told a man my real feelings and thoughts this early. I’d been hurt so many times. In that moment, I swear it was like someone had cemented my tongue to the roof of my mouth. I wanted to speak, but I just couldn’t.
“Okay. Okay.” Malek threw his hands up. “Maybe that’s a loaded question and it’s a bit too much pressure for you.”
I inhaled deeply and lowered my eyes to the delicious plate of whole fried snapper sitting in front of me. There I was again, turning a pressure moment into an opportunity to overeat.
“I, um, I . . .” I started, but again I was tongue-tied.
Malek put up his hand. “It’s all good, Keish. No pressure,” Malek had said, flashing his pearly whites. “How about you give me a penny for my thoughts instead?”
Why is this man so perfect? I had screamed in my head. My stomach felt like it was sitting in the center of the table and someone was hitting it with a meat tenderizer.
“Okay, penny for your thoughts,” I had replied.
Malek opened his mouth and started to speak, but his words seemed to get caught too. I also noticed that his eyes had stretched wide and suddenly he looked as if he’d seen a ghost. His expression was so horrifying that I had whipped my head around and peered over my shoulder to see what the hell was happening.
That was when I saw her. Her: that’s how I still refer to her to this day. She was storming toward Malek and me like a tornado set to destroy everything in her path. At first, the shock of what was happening had kept me glued to the chair. I literally couldn’t move. My heart felt like it was going to jump loose from my chest, and I could feel the instant rolls of sweat falling in lines down my back.
“Malek!” the girl barked before she could even make it all the way to the table. “What the fuck, Malek?”
I turned my bulging eyes back to Malek and noticed that his eyes were also almost popping out of his head.
“I can’t fucking believe you!” the girl boomed. She was so close by then that I could smell her perfume, see the whites of her eyes, and feel the heat rising up off of her body.
Malek shot up from his chair like a jack-in-the-box. I moved my eyes from Malek to the girl and back to Malek again.
“You out here with this fat bitch when I’m at home waiting for you?” the girl spat, thrusting an accusatory finger in my direction. She was fairly cute, not fat, but not skinny. I think I was way prettier and I’m not just saying that, because I’m one who gives bitches credit where it’s due.
I stood up once she called me a fat bitch. I didn’t know if I wanted to slap her first and then Malek or vice versa, but I was immediately steaming inside.
“Who the fuck is this fat pig, Malek?” The girl pointed at me again and spoke like I wasn’t even there. “Who the fuck is this?” she repeated.
“I’m Keisha,” I answered, rocking my neck from side to side. Shit, I was tired of her asking and Malek’s dumb ass acting like he was stuck on stupid.
“Delia, what the hell are you doing here? You fucking stalking me?” Malek asked through his teeth.
“You just going to try to flip this shit on me, Malek?” the girl Delia said, sounding like she was about to cry.
“No. No,” I said, throwing my hands up. “I’ve seen enough.” I started grabbing up my jacket and purse.
“All of the work I put in and you turned around and cheat on me with a fat girl?” Delia spat, her bottom lip trembling.
“I ain’t going to be too many more fat girls and fat bitches,” I retorted.
“You can’t do this to me! I loved you even when you didn’t have shit! I have put in years and years with you, Malek.” Delia finally let her tears burst through the dam.
At that point, I had seen my own heart lying on the floor between Malek and me, and I envisioned him stomping on it with his Timberland boots. I had wanted to scream, “I knew it was too fucking good to be true!”
Malek looked at me and sighed and shook his head. “It’s a long story.”
“Seems like a short story to me,” I snapped. I had seen and heard enough. I dug inside my purse and tossed a couple of twenty-dollar bills onto the table. And trust me, that was just so I didn’t get arrested for theft of service.
“You’re lame,” I grumbled at Malek. Then I turned my attention to his little woman. “As for you, I’m no fat bitch, or fat girl, or nothing of the sort. I’m a big, beautiful woman, or
BBW as the real men like to call us,” I had spat. With that, I sauntered my fat ass toward the exit.
“Keisha! Wait!” Malek had called after me.
I couldn’t resist. I turned around with such a scowl on my face. I was sure Malek saw the devil flashing in my eyes at that moment, but he also probably saw the tears rimming my eyes.
“You know what, Malek? I thought you were different. I thought this was real, everything. I actually almost said some words to you today that would’ve made me go home after this bullshit and off myself. You’re the kind of man who makes women like me regret the day we were born. You get off on hurting others. You’re a fucking loser, and I really regret the day I laid eyes on you,” I had said through gritted teeth. With that, I had stormed away and couldn’t help the tears that finally spilled from my eyes once I was out of his sight.
Now, at my front door, he repeated, “Keisha.” This time the hint of urgency in his voice snapped me out of my daydream or nightmare, whichever way you looked at it.
“Malek, what are you doing here?” I rasped, actually feeling like someone had their hands around my throat.
“Can I come in and talk to you?” he asked, craning his neck to look over my shoulder into my apartment.
I stepped aside so he could enter, but I immediately scolded myself for that. I closed the door, turned around with my back against it, and stared at Malek. Everything came rushing back. I was fighting a losing battle combating the memories of what we had, even if it was a brief few months. I knew I loved him.
“Well?” I said, smirking as if to say, “Get to the point, nigga.”
“I, uh, um . . .” Malek stuttered. He swiped his hands over his face roughly. “Damn. Seeing you again makes this so hard all over again. I just, well, I never got to apologize for everything that happened back then,” he said.
I felt like I could hear sincerity in his voice, but what did that mean to me now? He hadn’t come to my apartment to apologize those ten days I’d stayed inside crying myself to sleep and binge eating until I vomited. He damn sure wasn’t the one who’d finally come and lifted me up out of the bed, made me shower, and took me out so I wouldn’t linger in a depression so deep I’d eat myself into being stuck in the house. That was Leitha who’d done that.
I twisted my lips and swallowed hard. “Soooo, you suddenly thought of me after all this time and decided now was the perfect time to apologize?” I asked. It was a rhetorical question, but I wanted to know.
Malek sighed loudly. “I know how this looks. It has nothing to do with you winning the lottery, Keisha,” he said, holding up his right hand. “When I saw you on the news, I was just reminded that I had chickened out of coming to apologize too many times to count. I figured if I didn’t come now, you’d be long gone soon. I’m sure with forty mil in the bank you ain’t staying around here,” he said. He tried to chuckle at the end with his joke, and I didn’t flinch, crack a smile, or even breath hard.
“And you would be correct,” I answered dryly. “I only came here to get my keepsakes: pictures, diplomas, shit like that.”
“Wow.” Malek shook his head like he was in distress. “I guess I always thought I had time to get back the one girl I actually loved, but fucked up and let get away,” he said sadly. He let out another long, slow breath. “And here she is about to be gone for good, off somewhere in the world and I’ll never get her back. I’ll never get that chance.” He dropped his head and shoved his hands deep into his jeans pockets.
My whole heart almost exploded. Malek was saying all of the right things. I wasn’t over him. I knew that now. I shifted my weight from foot to foot. I was antsy because I was still desperate for something I knew money wasn’t going to buy: love.
“Did you, um, say ‘loved’?” I said, almost whispering.
Malek crinkled his eyebrows as if I’d asked him something strange. “Yes. Keisha, c’mon, you had to know that I was . . . am . . . I mean, um, I love you,” he fumbled.
I couldn’t speak. I pushed past Malek. He tried to grab me, but I yanked away and tore into my bedroom and slammed the door. I put my back against it, slid to the floor, pulled my knees to my chest, and buried my face. Why was this happening? Why after all those lonely months that turned into a year would he come back now with this when I was supposed to be my happiest?
Malek softly tapped on the door. “Keisha? Let me just talk to you. I just don’t want you to disappear and we never get to say what we had to say to one another. That’s all. Nothing else.”
I shook my head, disgusted with myself. But still, I stood up and let him in. And that is not just what literally happened. It is a metaphor for everything happening.
We stood almost nose to nose for a few long minutes. My pulse quickened, and my head felt swimmy. I felt almost the same as I did the day I found out I’d won all that damn money.
Malek used the edge of his pointer finger under my chin and urged my head up to meet his gaze.
“Why now, Malek?” I gasped, barely able to get the words out. Fuck! I didn’t realize how weak I still was for this dude. The room was literally spinning around me. I felt like I had just downed a gallon of Hennessy straight. “What about—”
Malek put his finger on my mouth before I could say anything else. My entire body (all 320 pounds of it) was ablaze.
I moved my face away from his finger and closed my eyes. My instinct was telling me to push Malek in the chest, curse, and push him some more until he was at my front door and out of my life. But my weakness for men and my need to be loved kept me there. I felt a stab of hurt in my gut. My mind, again, flashed back to that day with his girlfriend or whoever she was. I wasn’t over what had happened.
“We don’t have to speak about the past. I’m here for you right now. To make sure that you know everything that we had back then was real to me, Keisha,” Malek said softly.
I hiccupped a quiet sob. He had me. I was all in now. Weak.
“How could it have been real when you had her all along? I just don’t understand that concept. If you loved me, then why not tell me to wait for you until you had that situation handled? You left my heart broken in a million pieces. I had never been with anyone who made me feel the way you did,” I said, barely able to keep it together.
“I know that now, Keisha. I swear, in my head things between me and her were over. When I met you, I felt, like, alive in so many ways that I hadn’t in a long time. You were fun, sexy, serious when you needed to be, and most of all your heart was made of gold. She was still there but just in theory. I never loved her. We had fallen out of like long before I met you. I just hadn’t taken care of the business of breaking up, and that was my fault. It was definitely all my fault,” Malek said sincerely.
I felt his words. By then I was sobbing until my ample cleavage shook. This shit was crazy. I wasn’t supposed to be crying unless it was tears of joy about this money and this new life I was about to start.
“That day, I was stuck, Keisha. I was caught between telling you how I really felt and risking that you didn’t feel the same way and telling her I wanted to be with you and risking her making an even bigger scene. I’ve regretted that day ever since. I kept telling myself there was so much more I could’ve done. So many ways I could’ve changed things and the outcomes,” Malek said.
I shifted uncomfortably under his touch. The heat from his body, the load of his words, everything was making me crazy. “I don’t know, Malek. I just don’t trust you. You could still be with her and here only because, you know . . .” I replied.
“I never saw her after that day in the restaurant. I had had enough of her and the antics. I never went back to her. I just suffered without you because I kept trying to get up the nerve to face you, to tell you how I always really felt about you. Right hand to God,” he said, raising his right hand.
Why was God playing this trick on me? That’s all I could think about. After all these months I spent lonely and serially dating all of these losers, God waited until no
w, now, when I won the biggest jackpot and was heading into a new life, to reveal to me that I’d always had a man who loved me out there? This had to be some sick fucking joke.
Nonetheless, I hung on Malek’s every word. I didn’t want to see him go, but I wasn’t sure he was going to be able to stay. How could I trust him? Something deep down inside of me said that he was there just for my newfound riches, but something else said that he didn’t have to come back to tell me all of this either. I was definitely stuck on stupid and caught up in the moment.
“I know you don’t trust me, Keisha. You don’t have to. I just wanted you to know. You always told me how you didn’t believe in yourself and believe you were worthy of a good man. Listen to me,” Malek said. He urged my head up again until I was looking in his eyes. “You don’t ever have to settle for less. You’re beautiful inside and out. Never let any man, woman, or child tell you otherwise, you hear me? Keisha Long, you’re the most beautiful woman I know.”
“Thank you,” I said, my tone low and soft.
“You don’t have to thank me for telling the truth,” Malek said.
I stared deep into his eyes. I was trying to see if I could detect any deception or an inkling of game. I didn’t. His eyes told the story. He did love me. I believed him.
I suddenly felt something inside of me pop loose. I wanted this man so badly it was like an itch deep down inside that I needed to scratch. I couldn’t take it another second. His words, his scent, his gorgeous face, and the feelings I had been stifling inside for him for so long all bubbled to the surface like a hot well spring of lust.
I grabbed his face and crushed my mouth on top of his. It was not my usual habit, but I couldn’t help it. It was as if some unknown force was moving me. Our tongues intertwined, performing a soft, sensual dance. Malek groaned into my mouth and pressed his body into mine. I moved backward toward my bed. What was I doing? I didn’t know, but it felt damned good.
We moved together, kissing, touching, feeling until finally, he forced me down gently onto my back. The sounds coming from us—grunts and pants and hisses—were almost animalistic. Malek’s hand ran a race over every inch of my body. I held on to him tight, feeling things happening to my body that I hadn’t felt in a long time. My head got swimmy and so didn’t my panties.