Synergy (7 page)

After a
few more minutes of talking, Tom hung up the phone and smiled at
Jason.

“
Lydia’s having a
nap so I didn’t get to talk to her, but Carmen said she’s been
telling her daddy’s home tomorrow
.” 
At that, Tom beamed the biggest smile and Jason, who couldn’t help
but smile back, could tell how much he wanted to see
her.

“
That’s awesome
man. I’m gonna come see her once I’m settled in at
home
.”

“
J, I can’t wait. Feels like a
lifetime.”

“
Tell me about it. I’m salivating thinking about the food
already.”

Tom
chuckled, and sprayed some deodorant on himself as he
spoke.

“
You wanna grab some food?”

“
Yeah I’m starving.”

“
Whatd’you wanna do tonight?”

Jason
thought for a minute and decided as long as he got out of the
hotel, he was up for anything.

“
You decide, as long as I get out of here. I’m getting cabin
fever.”

“
Really? You’re letting me decide?”

“
Don’t make me regret it.”

Dee

It was
Friday, and while the rest of the world was hoping to finish work
soon and go out for the night, Dee was on mom duty. Though she
hated working at the club sometimes, she was glad she got to spend
the daytime with her son. She got to pick him up from school, spend
time with him afterwards, and put him to bed before she went to
work. That’s something that a lot of moms couldn’t say they get to
do. Working a 9-5 they barely saw their kids. The teachers had them
at school, someone else had them at after-school club or a friend’s
house and their moms barely got time to feed them or bathe them
before it was time for bed. Tushaun was only two, so though he
wasn’t old enough for school, he went to a pre-school as Dee
thought it was healthy for him to spend time with other kids. He
went for half a day so by 12 noon he was ready to be picked
up.

Just
before 12, she arrived at the school and pressed the buzzer for the
receptionist to let her in the building. The staff all knew her by
now, and so they’d say hi and make small talk with her until
Tushaun was ready to be let out by the teaching staff. Sometimes,
Dee liked to watch through the classroom window just to see him
interacting with the other kids. She loved seeing him play and be
happy, and wished his father could see what an amazing little boy
he was growing up to be. Although frankly, she was in two minds
about him seeing Trey because she hated the thought of her sweet
little boy being corrupted. She didn’t want Trey to take away any
of Tushaun’s sweetness or innocence. Today, Dee watched through the
window for a few minutes. She saw Tushaun playing with another
little boy with a fire truck and she smiled as she watched him
making the truck noises and flying it over the other kid’s
head.

“
Fire trucks don’t
fly, baby,”
 she commented, as she
smiled contently.

The receptionist sitting behind the desk to her right
laughed. 
“He’ll figure it
out,”
 she replied.

After a few minutes, she saw Miss Lowsley, the mid-thirties
pre-school teacher helping Tushaun into his jacket and taking him
by the hand. As she walked him to the door where Dee stood, he
spotted his mom through the glass and immediately started to toddle
faster to the door. Upon the door being opened by Miss Lowsley, Dee
exclaimed 
“Hey,
baby!”
 as Tushaun flung his arms up
in the air and Dee swooped him up. She kissed his forehead and
smiled at the pre-school teacher, who was watching them with a
smile on her face.

“
Bye Tushaun, have
a good day
!” she said, and he waved his
little hand at her before turning back to his
mom.

He was
wearing jeans and a Detroit Pistons jersey which was covered with a
jacket. He also wore a children’s backpack and had the latest Nike
airs on his feet. Considering how warm the day had turned out, Dee
put him down on the floor and knelt in front of him to help take
off his jacket.

“
It’s too warm for
a jacket today,
” she told him as she
unhooked the backpack from him and then took off his jacket. She
stuffed the jacket into his backpack before fishing in the bottom
for a juice box she knew she’d packed this morning. She put the
backpack back on him and then pierced the juice box with the straw
before handing it to Tushaun.

Tushaun
automatically held out his free hand for his mom to take, and
sipped on his juice box with the other hand. When he’d had a few
sips he looked up at Dee.

“
Where
going?”
 he asked in broken
English.

“
We going to the
park before we go home.”
 Dee
explained, and Tushaun smiled enthusiastically.

“
And then nana’s
gonna make us some dinner, that sound good
?” she asked.

“
Yay!”
 he cheered, almost
dropping his juice box in the process and Dee
laughed.

“
Come on clumsy
ass, don’t make a mess.
” She joked, as she
picked him up off the ground, deciding they’d get there a lot
quicker if she carried him.

It was a
short walk from the pre-school to the nearest park and she
preferred this one to the one nearer her house. There were more
kids and fewer bums that hung out here so the chances of finding a
needle or two were a lot less. Still, she had to watch him like a
hawk to make sure he didn’t go anywhere but the jungle gyms and
swings designed to be played on. Tushaun was a happy kid, and
though he was only young, he played well with other kids, even if
he didn’t know them. He was a little gentleman too. She watched as
he let two little girls go before him on the slide even though he
got there first. Part of her wondered whether it was because he
wanted to check them out first as they went down, but then she
laughed realising how ridiculous it sounded. As she relaxed on the
bench watching him, she took her phone out of her pocket and
checked it for the time. As she pressed the home screen button, she
saw she had a text and it only took her brain a second to register
the name ‘Trey.’

Before
she even opened the text, her heart started to pound.

‘I wanna see Tushaun, can i have him dis weekend plz? x
’

First
off, she was surprised he had put the word please at the end of
that sentence. She was also surprised he’d offered to have his son
on a weekend, when it was prime partying time. Honestly, the fact
she got the text at all surprised her because lately he’d been
seeing less and less of his son, and she wondered if he’d
eventually cut off contact altogether. She looked up from her phone
to see Tushaun running around the jungle gym having the time of his
life and sighed. She wondered if it would be easier to just cut off
all contact, but she knew it wasn’t her decision. She couldn’t not
let them see each other, it wasn’t fair to Tushaun. He had every
right to know his dad whether she liked it or not, so after a few
minutes of deliberation, she typed out a reply.

‘
Sure. Call me later to arrange
time.’

After her text sent, she actually checked the time as she
originally planned before putting her phone back in her pocket.
Still keeping her eye on Tushaun, she reached into her bag and
pulled out a pack of cigarettes, taking one from the box and
resting it between her lips. As she lit it, she inhaled it deep and
sat back against the bench, knowing she could relax for a few
minutes before it was time to get Tushaun home.
‘
Home
’ she
thought, thinking of the reality of that situation. When she and
Trey had split up, they were living together. When he then moved
out and left her and the baby in the house, she had hoped to stay
living there with her son. She hoped she could provide for him on
her own, but the reality was her low paying job couldn’t cover
everything she needed for herself and a baby. She found herself
having to choose between paying rent and buying food. Buying
diapers or buying electric. It was clear to everyone she wasn’t
coping well so her mother had done all she could do, she invited
them to come and live back at home.

Dee had
grown up with her mother in one room, her brother in another, and
Dee and her sister in the third and last room. Adding a baby to
that mix wasn’t easy on space, so they had set up a crib in her
mother’s room, and the two women temporarily swapped rooms, her
mother moving in with Dee’s sister. It was simply too much for her
mother to be bunking with a crying baby when she had three jobs to
attend. As Tushaun progressed to a ‘big boy’ bed, the bed was put
in her mother’s room too. Now he was a little older, her mother was
back in the room with Tushaun, and she loved having the company.
Dee felt like a failure that she couldn’t provide for her son on
her own the way she’d planned to, but she’d had no choice but to
move back in with her family, and she was glad for the extra
support. After finishing her cigarette, she went and got Tushaun
from the play area and told him it was time to go. Her mother had
made them dinner in between two jobs and she wasn’t about to be
late for it. She knew even at 22 not to mess with her
mother.

Chapter 7 – Famous

Jason

Jason was surprised, to say the least, that they had ended up
back at the spot where they started all those weeks ago. They’d
gone out pretty early because, even though the both of them wanted
to have a good night, they didn’t think a late, heavy night before
their flight tomorrow was a good idea, so they settled for a meal
and then headed to a few bars early on. It was now around 10pm and
just before Jason and Tom were ushered into the club by the
security, Jason took a look up at the neon sign above the door,
squinting from the brightness.
 Club
X, really? 
He thought. Personally,
he’d thought it was a bit of a dive last time he’d came in here but
then he remembered going home with 
her
, and he smiled for a second. He
wasn’t expecting her to be in here tonight though; he figured two
nights would be too much of a coincidence.  

As they
headed inside the club, his attention turned to the main stage
where there was a buxom blonde twirling around the pole in her
underwear. Tom gave him a look and he laughed aloud. He felt
relaxed, especially knowing she wasn’t here for any awkward small
talk and that he was headed home for a while tomorrow; it was a
good feeling. As if to mirror the same behaviour the weeks
previous, the extra security on the door walked into the club and
led them to a private booth separated from the rest of the club by
a rope, which he lifted for the two of them to step through. On the
table once again was an array of beverages set out for them, though
Jason expected they wouldn’t be getting through them tonight.
Nevertheless, he took a cold beer out of an ice bucket, opened it
and took a large swig. He winced slightly at the coldness of it,
licking his lips afterwards to warm them.

“I can’t believe you brought us back here
,” said Jason, as he sat forward to hear Tom over
the pulsating music.

“
What’s wrong with
here
?” Tom smirked, popping open his own
bottle and swigging it in the same manner.

“
Nothing, but...”

“
You’re scared
you’re gonna see your woman
.” Tom said,
poking fun at him.

Jason
lifted one eyebrow at him, trying to appear angry, though he knew
he didn’t pull it off too well. His face was too soft, and he ended
up looking more intrigued than pissed off.

“
I’m not scared
I’m gonna see ‘
my
woman’
, I just think it’s a little bit of
a dive,
” he retorted.

While
Tom had been teasing his best friend, his eyes had been elsewhere -
drawn to the stage where one dancer had been replaced by
another.

Jason,
though, was clueless, and Tom could hardly contain a smirk as he
waited for the realisation to dawn.

Tom
nodded at Jason, glanced at the stage and then back to
Jason.

“So, if you saw her, you’re not gonna get all nervous like
you’re back in high school
?” he
joked.

“
What?
”

Jason
followed Tom’s gaze toward the stage and saw the familiar curls
that fell down the dancer’s back, the gold hoop earrings that poked
through them, and that body that he couldn’t forget. In that
moment, he really did feel fifteen years old again. He was almost
sure he blushed, something he didn’t do very often, if ever, and he
was suddenly very aware that Tom was watching him.

Before
he had time to think of anything to say, Tom roared with laughter
on the other side of the booth.