Up to No Good (22 page)

“His woman?” She sounded surprised. Again, there was some muffled talking to the other people in the room with her, but I couldn’t make out what she said this time. “So you live with him?” she asked when she came back on the line.

“Yes, I live with him. He sleeps with me every night.”
Take that, bitch. You the ho, not me.

“You don’t live in Detroit, do you?” she asked.

“No,
we
live in Jamaica.” I made sure to emphasize the we.

Again she started talking to the other people. Why did she need to keep conferencing with them? Did they share one damn brain or something? “Jamaica, Queens, or the island of Jamaica?”

“Do I sound like I’m from the islands? We live in Jamaica, Queens.”

This time when she relayed my answer to her people, I heard lots of chattering in the background. For some reason, this news was really exciting them. I was starting to get a little leery of this woman and her crew. She was asking too many questions, and it dawned on me that she didn’t seem to be upset in the least that I said I was Louis’s woman. If she was his wife or something, she sure wasn’t acting like it.

“So who are you to him?” I asked. “And how do you know him?”

“It’s a long story, but I was planning on coming to New York in the next few days. Why don’t we get together so I can explain it to you?” she offered, like we’d go to lunch and be all civil and shit. Didn’t she realize this was my man we were talking about?

“I can come to your house if you like,” she said when I didn’t answer. “What’s your address?”

She must have thought I was some kinda stupid. Why the hell would I tell her where I lived so she could come over here and do God knows what? She might not have seemed jealous right now, but maybe that was all just an act. For all I knew, she wanted my address so she could come over here and beat my ass.

I hung up the phone, glad that I had blocked my
number. I was hoping that the phone call would give me some answers, but I felt even more confused than before. Was this Rashid person the man I knew as Louis, or was it some kind of crazy coincidence that Louis had an ID with that name on it? And this woman in Detroit said she knew Rashid Jensen, but I didn’t get a description from her, so I couldn’t even be sure we were talking about the same man. Something treacherous was going on, but I still didn’t quite know what it was. All I knew was if it turned out that the man I loved was a bigger womanizer than my father, Louis’s ass was gonna be sorry he ever met me.

I checked my rearview mirror, then glanced at my watch before I turned the corner to drive down Keisha’s block. It was 8:45, and there she was, like clockwork, standing next to her car. She was looking fine as hell in a hot-pink top and a tight skirt, but the frustration on her face didn’t do her beauty any justice. The way she was shaking her head told me she was not having a very good start to her day. I almost—and I do say almost—felt sorry for her as I pulled up next to her car.

I rolled down my window and asked, “Everything a’ight?”

She sucked her teeth and glared at me. “I’m not a fool, Darnel. I know you did this.”

“Huh? Did what?” I bit the inside of my cheek to suppress a smile.

She pointed at her front driver’s side tire. “You let the air out of my tire.”

“What are you talking about? I just got here.”

“You are such a fucking liar, you know that?”

“You need to stop trippin’, Keisha. I was just on my way to work. I didn’t do anything to your tire.”

“Yeah, right. This is a little out of the way for you, isn’t it?”

“Nope. I just moved to the other side of Baisly Park, so I guess we’ll be seeing a lot of each other, won’t we, neighbor?” I flashed a smile and put my car back into DRIVE. “Good luck with that tire. I know how you hate to be late for work.”

I pulled off slowly and started counting backward: “Three … two …” And before I got to one, she shouted, “Darnel, wait!” I put my foot on the brake and waited for her to jog up to my car. She leaned in the passenger’s side window.

“My boss is going to be mad if I’m late again. Can you—”

“How about if I give you a lift? That tire’s gonna have to wait.”

She glanced around the block as if looking for a better option than the one I ’d just offered. But it wasn’t like a tow truck was going to come down this street anytime soon, and she’d always been too damn cheap to pay for AAA membership, so riding with me was her only choice if she wanted to keep her job. I had her right where I wanted her. Since she’d stopped answering my phone calls, I felt like I had no other way to get her to talk to me.

“Oh, all right.” She went back to get her purse, then returned, looking like she dreaded every step.

When she got in, the scent of her perfume filled my car. It was something new and light, and it smelled kind of fruity. It wasn’t the scent I was used to, but on Keisha, anything smelled good to me. Once again, I realized how much I loved this girl, even if I hated her.

As I pulled away from the curb, Keisha sat silently and glared out the window. She was leaning as far
away from me as she could possibly get. I tried to reach out and touch her shoulder, but she jerked it away from me.

“Why are you so tense, Keisha? You should be happy I was driving by this morning, or else you never would have made it to work on time.”

She looked at me and rolled her eyes. “Please. You think I don’t know you planned this whole thing?”

“I still don’t know why you’re accusing me of doing something to your car,” I said with mock innocence. I was so furious about what I ’d read in her diary that I didn’t really give a shit if she knew I ’d messed up her tire.

“I’m accusing you because no one else would do some shit like that to me.”

“But why would
I
do something like that? I love you, Keisha.”

“I don’t know why you’d do it, but for some sick reason, you did. Just like you broke into my apartment.”

Damn! Now, that one I did care if she knew about. The last thing I needed was some more charges against me. I pressed her for details.

“What? Someone broke into your apartment? When?” I did a pretty good job of sounding shocked, if I do say so myself.

“You know when,” she said, folding her arms across her chest and giving me an evil glare.

“No, Keisha, I don’t. Was anything taken?”

She turned her head away and looked out the window as she answered. “You know what’s missing.”

I ignored her comment. “So, did you get a locksmith to come fix your locks?” I asked.

“They weren’t broken.”

“Wait. So, the locks weren’t broken…. How do you know someone broke in?” Things were looking better for me by the second.

Her shoulders sagged in defeat. “I just do. I was in the shower, and I heard a voice.”

“And did you see anyone?”

“No. I ain’t stupid. I wasn’t about to get out the shower and go investigate. What if it was some rapist or something?”

“Exactly! How could you say it was me? It was probably just some crack head looking for shit to steal, and he heard you in the shower and took off.” My suggestion wouldn’t be too hard to believe, considering Keisha didn’t live in the safest of neighborhoods.

Keisha shrugged her shoulders. It wasn’t an apology for accusing me, but at least she no longer seemed sure that I was the one in her apartment.

“Did you leave your windows open or something?” I asked.

She nodded.

“You know … if I was living there, you’d be safer.”

This finally got her to turn and look at me. “Darnel, don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t do this to yourself. Just let it be.”

“Why? Can’t I worry about the woman I gave the best years of my life to?”

She frowned. “Yeah, sure, you can worry about my safety, but we both know that’s not what this is about.”

“Then what is it about?”

“I told you we can’t be together right now. Maybe someday, but not now. It’s just not working.”

“It can work,” I protested. Believe it or not, I truly did feel like we could work things out. I ’d read Keisha’s
diary from cover to cover, and I knew about every dude she’d ever fucked—or at least the ones up to that night with Omar. But even after all the pain she’d caused, I finally realized I would never stop loving her. No matter what she had done in the past, I wanted to believe that we could start over again: she would confess the truth to me, I would forgive her, and she would remain faithful from now on.

“No, it can’t work, because you can’t seem to forgive the past, and truthfully, I just want to get on with my life.”

“Oh, so it’s like that, huh?”

“Darnel, don’t. Please don’t start this.”

We had arrived at the parking lot at her job, and she reached for the door handle to get out of the car. I grabbed her wrist tightly.

“You’re not going anywhere, Keisha.”

Rather than struggle against my grip, she leaned back against the seat and cut her eyes at me. “Look, we had some good times, Darnel, and I’ll always love you. You were my first love. But—”

“But what? You got a new love now? Omar? Or maybe Mark?” I asked, throwing out one of the names I ’d read in her diary.

She gave me a look that said,
“How the hell did you know about Mark?”

“That’s right. I know about Mark. I know about a lot of things.”

“Whatever. You shouldn’t believe everything people tell you,” she said, playing it pretty cool for someone who was so close to having all her dirty little secrets thrown in her face.

“If you say so,” I answered. “So you’re still sticking with your story that Omar was the only one, huh?”

“Look, I’m not gonna go there with you. I made a
mistake with Omar, but maybe it’s best that it happened this way. Maybe it just wasn’t meant to be between you and me. Have you ever thought about that?”

“Oh yeah, I’ve thought about it,” I said honestly. “But I believe we were meant to be together. In spite of everything you’ve done to me, I still love you. I wanna make this work.”

I looked at her for a reaction, but she sat staring at me and said nothing.

“Let’s go to dinner tonight and talk about this some more,” I suggested.

“I can’t. I have something to do.”

I was getting tired of her negative responses to everything I said. Why did she have to make it so damn hard when all I wanted to do was love her? Well, if she wanted to make this difficult, I was through being nice.

“Oh, you have something to do. Another date? Who you screwing tonight—my dad? Lord knows he’s screwed everything else in my life.”

Her eyes welled up with tears. “How can you say that?”

I laughed. “I’m just telling the truth. You’re a fuckin’ whore, aren’t you? And so is he.”

Keisha pulled her hand back as if to slap me.

“I swear to God, I’ll smack you right back,” I warned.

She lurched forward like she was going to hit me anyway, but then she dropped her hand to the door handle.

“Look, can’t you see I love you?” I said, not wanting her to leave the car mad.

Before she could respond, a big dude was tapping on the driver’s side window. I rolled it down and glared at him. “What the heck you want?”

He looked right past me and asked Keisha, “Are you okay?”

“Mmm-hmm,” she answered quietly, wiping away the tears that had fallen down her cheek.

The guy didn’t move away fast enough for me, so I looked at him and said, “Oh, are you screwing her too?”

He gave me a disgusted look and told Keisha, “I’ll wait inside the lobby for you.” Then he told me, “I’ll be watching through the window, and I won’t hesitate to call security if I see you touch her.”

When he walked away, I turned to Keisha. “We going to dinner tonight, or what?”

“No, we’re not.” She pulled the handle and climbed out of the car.

“Well, then that flat tire is just the beginning,” I said under my breath.

“What did you say?” she asked, leaning down to speak to me through the passenger’s side window. “You’re crazy, Darnel.”

I turned and smiled at her. “Only because you made me this way. And trust me, you haven’t seen crazy yet.”

I liked to smell good for my lady, so I dabbed on just the right amount of cologne. Some people put on so much “smell-good” that it actually smells bad and works like a repellent. I preferred my scent to be subtle so that a woman had to get close to get a real deep whiff. Something about a woman inhaling at my neck always made me happy.

I pulled my belt through my jeans, slipped on my leather jacket, and I was good to go. I smiled as I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. Not bad for a man in his forties. Hell, why be modest? I took good care of my body, and I looked better than most of these young brothers out there. If I could just get rid of this cough I ’d had lately, I would be straight.

The doorbell rang, and as I went to answer it, I felt an excitement building in my body. Sandra and I were going out to the Hamptons on my new motorcycle, and I couldn’t wait to see what she was wearing. Last time we went riding, she wore the sexiest leather outfit. She always managed to outdo herself, even when she wore jeans and a T-shirt.

I opened the door, smiling from ear to ear, but it
wasn’t Sandra who greeted me. It was Crystal, and my smile fell right away.

“What’s the matter? Aren’t you happy to see me?”

“Sure, I’m always happy to see you, Crystal.” Normally, that would have been true, but not today, not when Sandra was due to arrive at any moment. “I just wasn’t expecting you.”

“Really?” She gave me that flirty look that had always shot straight to my groin. Thank God I was wearing loose-fitting jeans, because this time it didn’t work, and I was as surprised as she would have been if she knew.

“Well, after that last conversation, I wasn’t expecting this. Once I told you I couldn’t commit to a relationship, I kind of figured it was over between us.”

“It’ll never be over between us, James.”

She took a step closer, and it made me feel a little uncomfortable, something I ’d never experienced with Crystal. It was like my body was telling me it was time to stop messing with her. This blew my mind. After all these years, I had absolutely no desire to take what Crystal was offering. If this was true, I realized, then I was ready to commit to a relationship with Sandra—which was a good thing, since I ’d already told her as much. I still hadn’t told my kids, but I had talked to Sandra about how and when I would do it, and there was no turning back now. As weird as it felt to say it, Sandra was my woman, and even with Crystal standing before me, I had no regrets about the decision I ’d made.