Adore You (8 page)

“How did you deal with that motherfucker, babe?”

We were in the middle of eating lunch when I asked Bee that question. I’d gotten a few curious looks when I showed up looking for Devorah. I wasn’t sure if that was because I worked for
The Competition
or because no other man has come into the Jamieson & Weil offices for her prior to me. The petty side of me wanted it to be the latter. Bee seemed pleasantly surprised by my pop up. I’d come over to take her out to lunch, but was summarily turned down. Instead we’d ordered in some Cluck and commandeered a conference room to chow down.

“Which motherfucker is that, El?”

“Rob Parker, Jr. That guy is a head case.”

“Oh that guy,” she replied, rolling her eyes, “Not having to deal with him anymore is the only upside to us no longer having the Parker account. He used to call me at least six times a day with design suggestions.”

“Oh, so I should feel special because he’s only calling me three times daily?”

“Low key, I think he had a thing for me and assumed since my girl was dating his brother that he had a shot, but…” she trailed off, shuddering.

“Yeah, he definitely had a thing for you. He manages to bring you up in nearly every damn conversation. He’s lucky I haven’t cracked his head yet.”

Devorah threw her head back laughing loudly. “Jealous much?”

“Woman, please. You know I got you sprung.”

Devorah stopped laughing and sat back in her seat. Eyes narrowed, lips pursed and ready to fire off venom I’m sure, she remained silent just ice grilling me.
Here we go.
We sat there in uncomfortable silence for a few minutes before Devorah let out a low chuckle.

“You think you got me on lock, huh?”

A cocky smirk spread over my face before I answered.

“Don’t think; know.”

“And you’re sure of that, huh?”

Something in her tone let me know that I should probably be a little less cocky with this answer. She was giving me a chance to amend. The truth was I didn’t know how she felt about me. We’d been dating...or whatever the hell you could call alternating spending time at either of our houses for the past couple months. She took that silly ass pledge I made up, but that meant nothing. She was adequately demonstrative or whatever, but the fact that we were rarely around anyone else but each other gave me no clue about how she really felt about me. I’d already put my balls in her purse by agreeing to this no outside dates within a twenty mile radius shit, so I was not about to ask her to talk about her feelings.

“I mean…” I trailed off, shrugging, “You’re a hard nut to crack, but you ain’t put me out yet, so I gotta chalk this one up to the sprung column.”

Devorah laughed, “I’m fucking with you, El.”

I nodded, “Yep, that’s what I thought. Sprung.”

Devorah laughed as we finished up our meal and departed ways. We initially had plans to meet up after work, but part of the reason I had surprised her for lunch was because I needed to break our evening plans. Trey called me earlier, throwing up the SOS. He didn’t want to get into it over the phone, but something told me there was trouble in paradise. Bee and I weren’t going to be doing much besides being laid up and catching a flick, so rescheduling wasn’t a huge deal.

“So you just gonna sit here, drinking my beer and taking up space in my house, or are you gonna tell me what was so important that I cancelled on my girl tonight?”

Trey came over and had been acting strange since he arrived. He kept one hand in his pocket and got up intermittently to pace my living room. In the ten minutes since he’d been here, he hadn’t said a word. I was being patient, letting him cook, but now I was annoyed. I sat back, sipping my beer waiting for him to finally say something. He stopped pacing, took that damn hand out his pocket and sat a small blue box on the end table in front of me.

“Is that…”

“Yep.”

“Are you…”

“Yep.”

“So can I say it?”

Trey cut his eyes over to me, a look of exasperation on his face. “You think that’s what I wanna hear right now?”

“You think I give a fuck about what you wanna hear when I’m right?”

“Man, whatever. So get this shit though, I went to ask her dad for his permission and do you know this motherfucker said no.”

“Wait. I thought you and Walt were on good terms?”

“Me too. But when you’ve kept his daughter on hold for damn near fifteen years, those good terms lose some of their luster. I mean he’s never been rude, but man, I didn’t think he’d straight up tell me no.”

“So what you gonna do?”

“I’m going to ask her anyway,” Trey responded and then ran down his plan to me.

“That’s pretty ballsy, bruh. But wait...you tryna do all this shit by when?”

“I got three days. Which is why I need your help. I’ve talked to her sister Tracee and managed to get them on a flight. Putting them up at the Omni for the night, but I need you to bring them to Pembroke for the engagement surprise.”

“You got it, man. So how you feel?”

“Nervous as fuck.”

“So what made you break down?”

“Pregnancy.”

“Wait...Demi is…”

“Nah, man, but we thought she might be. That shit had me shook. She told me that if she was pregnant the baby wasn’t going to have my name despite us being together. Because why is it important that the baby have my name when its mother didn’t? Said it would be coming from her body, she’d be the primary caregiver, so why shouldn’t it have her name, too?”

“Yikes.”

“Yep. Fucked me right on up. So I thought about the reason I was so opposed to marrying Demi and honestly, I couldn’t even remember why the fuck I started this no marriage BS.”

“It was because--”

“Nigga, I don’t need your reminder. Moral of the story is that’s dead.”

“So you really are going all in, huh?”

A grin broke out over Trey’s face.

“For broke.”

“Aw shit! Congrats, bruh. You think she’s going to say yes?”

“You think she ain’t?!”

We both laughed at that. I couldn’t believe my boy had finally come to his senses. I mean damn, the brother was damn near married already since he and Demi had been inseparable since college. His parents’ marriage imploding during our senior year really did a number on him though. Before all of that went down, he talked nonstop about marrying Demi and keeping her pregnant with a gang of kids. Glad to see he’d worked through whatever shit was lingering and was concentrating on making his girl happy.

“I saw Sophie the other day. That baby is so adorable. She’d be cuter if she were made of half of you though. You just had to give Everett away to that lil red girl. Now look at you, lonely as you wanna be,” my mother laughed.

We had been on the phone for the past twenty minutes and I wondered how long it would take her to work in a reference to the fact that I was still single. This was part of the reason that despite us living only a few minutes apart, I refused to visit her in person more often. We did dinner once a week if she was lucky and that’s it. She still, however, insisted on calling me daily much to my chagrin. And in every damn conversation, she found some kind of way to bring up the fact that I was, as she calls it “alone and lonely”.

“Takes one to know one, Lonely Linda,” I joked.

“Watch your mouth lil girl. Been there; done that. I’ve had the husband. Got the baby. You, on the other hand, can barely manage to hold onto a boyfriend for more than six months.”

“By choice…”

“Mmmhmmm, so you say. You sure there isn’t anything you want to tell me. I may not understand it, but Mama is always here for you no matter what.”

“Ma, what are you talking about?”

“Maybe you got a lil girlfriend instead of a boyfriend? I’m not judging you…”

“Oh God, Ma! I’m not a lesbian. I’d tell you if I were.”

It’d certainly make my life a helluva lot easier right now.

“You sure, baby? I mean it has been a while since you brought a young man around. I’d love you regardless, you know that, right? Retha’s girl came out the cupboard recently and nobody looks at her any differently.”

“Out the closet, mama. And Jenice wasn’t ever
in
a closet to begin with.”

“Cupboard, closet…wherever. It’s a storage space. And I just want you to know that I won’t mind if you’re a secret lesbian. Just make sure she makes enough that we can buy me some grandbabies.”

“Ma! I’m not a secret lesbian. I’m actually seeing someone. A male someone.”

“Mmmhmmm, sure baby.”

“I am!”

“When you bringing him by to meet your mama?”

“No time soon and you know why…”

“Aw. C’mon, Devvy. You must cut mama some slack on that one. You told me y’all were a sure thing. How was I supposed to know the boy couldn’t stand a couple few questions?”

The last man I’d seriously considered serious relationship material, Mark, was to whom she was referring. He and I had been dating monogamously for about six months when he asked about meeting my mother. I wasn’t too keen on the idea, but he had it in his mind that we needed to go to “the next level” and in order for that to happen, he had to meet my mother. We planned to have brunch at her place after church. Church wasn’t really my thing, but she somehow convinced me that she needed to see how Mark “comported himself in the house of the Lord”, so church it was. Because he was a good sport, Mark went along with it. We met my mother for an early service and then headed to her house to chow down on the brunch spread she had awaiting us.

We were having a good time, or so I thought, eating and making pleasant conversation. Mark entertained my mother’s off-color commentary about the pastor’s wife’s new wig and various other inappropriate comments about random church members. At some point, conversation turned to more personal questions about Mark and his familial history. She started off innocently enough, but soon crossed the line into asking preposterous questions about his virility and how soon he wanted to knock me up. Mark handled himself well for the most part, but when she asked if he had any nuts in his family tree—he left abruptly.

I later found out that his mother was actually in a mental health institution, dealing with issues related to bipolar disorder and schizophrenia that left her vacillating between manic peaks and ocean deeps lulls. My mother’s ten-minute rant about “Looney Lucy” from her old neighborhood did me no favors. Turns out that was Mark’s mom. Needless to say, I was cool on bringing anyone else around Mama anytime soon. Not that I was bringing Ellis around her soon anyway. I could see it now; she’d be calling me all sorts of harlots and jezebels for “knowing both of Randi’s boys biblically”. I didn’t want or need that kind of stress in my life.

“Ma. C’mon. You know good and well a couple questions weren’t why Mark dumped me.”

“I’m sure your little attitude had something to do with it as well,” she trailed off.

“Nope, not doing this with you. Love you, mama. Talk to you later.”

I hung up the phone knowing that she’d call me back immediately. Sure enough, my phone rang instantly, flashing her face across the screen wearing her favorite Sunday go to meeting hat.

“I don’t know where you get this rudeness from. Must be your daddy’s side of the family.”

“You called me back to—”

“I called you back to say I love you too, lil miss rudeness,” my mother said and immediately clicked off the line.

Laughing, I placed my phone back on the charging station on my breakfast bar and continued cleaning the kitchen. Cadence was supposed to be coming by later. She and Geoff had an obstetrician appointment today to find out the sex of the baby. Ellis and I had a bet on the sex of the baby that I was desperate to win because it meant he’d have to cook my favorite meal that he prepares—his gumbo. I don’t know who taught that man how to make a roux, but it’s the basis for a ridiculously addictive dish. It was almost comparable to some of the gumbo I had on that trip to NOLA for AdTech that started this whole damn shebang.

That seemed like a lifetime ago. I can’t believe that Ellis and I were still…dating.
If you want to call it that.
Honestly, I couldn’t believe he stuck around with my ridiculousness for this long. I was sure he’d be bored of me now and moving along to the next flavor, while I mended my broken heart, but nope. He’s been hanging in here patiently. Cade said that I should trust his intentions, but I don’t know. It’s only been a few months of us seriously trying to be together. If I gave in, the thrill of the chase would be gone with him right behind it I’m sure.

“So remember when were at Cluck and I told you to trust my mother’s intuition? In ya face, sucka!”

Cadence barely made it through the door before thrusting the sonogram photo in my face.

“Sis, what am I supposed to be seeing in this Rorschach blot? You wanna hold your hands still, perhaps?”

“Your niece, heffa!” Cadence said, snatching the photo back.

“You’re having a girl?”

“Yes, Devorah. Keep up. I told you this
weeks
ago.”

“Your faulty intuition also tried to convince me that Ellis and I were meant to be and that yet remains to be seen, so…”

Cadence rolled her eyes as she strolled past me toward the kitchen. I closed the door that she’d left wide open and walked into the kitchen to see her rooting through my fridge.

“Sis, where is the food? I know you’ve got to be eating well. It certainly looks like it from here. And I know El doesn’t play that eating out every day shit you’re normally on…”

Did this heffa just call me fat?

“And who’s to say he’s here every day?”

Cadence turned from the fridge and leveled me with an amused look.

“Don’t get cute.”

She pointed to my breakfast bar, where a charger was still in the plug.

“Android charger, when you’re a slave to the Cult of Jobs. Size 13 Js near the doorway aren’t yours unless your feet have had a sudden growth spurt in your thirties. And finally, this damn craft beer I see in your fridge when you don’t even drink beer like that. Bet if I went into your bedroom his draws have their own drawer and there’s a soft bristled toothbrush in the holder next to yours in the en suite. So…”

“En suite? Really, Cade. You’ve been watching too much HGTV.”

“And you aren’t a masterful seguer, so…like I said…where’s the food?”

“Seguer?” I said, arching a brow.

Cadence walked over to the cabinet, grabbing a glass to fill with water from the refrigerator. She said something I couldn’t hear over the whirr of the ice machine, so I asked her to repeat herself.

“I said…sis, you’re the wordsmith working in advertising. You sure that ain’t a word?”

She walked over to the kitchen table, sitting down, looking at the sonogram picture again.

“I’m a graphic designer, I don’t even do words and I know that ain’t a goddamn word.”

“Stop taking God’s name in vain in front of my baby, you heathen. Seriously though, Bee, what’s up with that food, though? How do you invite me over here and not have anything for me and my child to snack on?”

“A—you invited yourself over here. And two, there’s fruit in the crisper.”

“Devorah, you think I can see down that low?” Cadence deadpanned.

“Sis, you’re not that pregnant. Cut it out. We haven’t had a chance to go food shopping this week. It’s been kinda hectic with the engagement and everything,” I said, purposefully timing my statement with Cade’s sip of water.

She sputtered, nearly spitting water all over my table before catching herself. I tried holding back laughter as she gathered her composure, but failed.

“En-who-ment now?”

Still laughing, I replied, “Trey and Demi got engaged the other day. Ellis helped Trey set up the surprise and had been running around with him all week in preparation.”

“I was about to be hot if you suckas got engaged and I wasn’t included. I’m the reason y’all are even together!”

Just then my phone rang. I walked over to the counter to see who was calling and saw Celena’s sunny smile flashing across the screen. I immediately swiped to answer it.

“Hey, boo.”

“Hey chick, what you up to today?”

“Not much, Cade just came by with the sonogram results. We’re chillin’. Likely gonna order in some food depending on her damn cravings.”