Cheaters (52 page)

Jake chuckled. “Thought he wasn’t cut out for infidelity.”

I picked my cuticles, sighed. “He’s using me as a cover.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Tonight’s the band’s last night before they go to Paris.”

“So he’s gonna get one last ride on the roller coaster before the park closes.”

I answered, “Uh-huh.”

“Wish I could be up in there. It’s gonna be live.”

Silence. Chanté Marie Ellis. I was thinking about Chanté.

Jake said, “He’s gonna fuck up a good thing. Dawn has her head on straight, works hard, looks good. That book shit he’s tripping off on is just an excuse. He’ll be sitting with his head low, realizing that it wasn’t nothing but a fuck.”

I softened my words with a joking tone, “Like you.”

“Like me. Yeah, being selfish won’t do him no good. All he’s doing is digging his own grave. Yeah, we always think the other woman is better than our own.”

He appraised me with a glance.

I patted his shoulder, said, “Why don’t you give Darnell a call before tonight? Tell him that.”

“Nope.”

“Why not?”

“Let’m fuck up. You know misery loves company.”

We laughed.

Jake said, “I’ll give him a jingle. Yeah, wish I could be up in Shelly’s tonight. It’s gonna be wall-to-wall honeys.”

“What’s up with you and Pamela?” I asked. “She still on?”

“We still kick it every now and then. But you know how that is. She ain’t it. Man, I don’t know what I was thinking. Messing with her when I had Charlotte right in my hands.”

He started talking about women, his flaws, why he always had to have so many. Through all the years of us hanging out, he’d never been this vulnerable. He opened his heart and wondered. Why no matter how good one seemed, another had to be tested. Each new woman had something to offer that the others didn’t. Always trying to trade up to a better woman, even when you had the best one holding on to your arm. Looking for somebody perfect to make you feel complete. He said he wished he could melt them all together and mold the perfect woman he wanted.

I told him, “That wouldn’t make any difference.”

“Why you say that?”

“She’d be too perfect.”

We laughed. It was good to hear him laugh.

He said, “Yeah, you right. She’d be too boring.”

“Too predictable. A special perfect woman would be too predictable.”

“I have to have a challenge.”

“Me too.”

“Somebody who can control my ass.”

We were fools who didn’t mind looking through windows but hated to look in a mirror. We’d both been looking for something new and didn’t want to give up nothing old. Minimal investment with maximum payoff.

I wanted to talk to Jake awhile, tell him that my daddy had died all alone. With all of the women he ran, all of the men like him, like us, that my old man shared stories with, when he died there was no one to buy him a grave, or throw a spoonful of dirt on his city-furnished pine box as a token of friendship and remembrance. I wished I could’ve been there to say good-bye. To jingle the change in my pocket as he was being given back to the earth. Then maybe his leaving me wouldn’t have hurt so much.

I never got around to it. After all the years I’ve known Jake, I still didn’t know how to talk to him like that.

He said, “Charlotte is beautiful and intelligent. A brotha’s dream. She was a little frigid. Passive. She wanted me to do all the initiating. Made me feel like some kind of freak. Like I wanted her too bad. Or she didn’t want like I wanted her.”

“She might’ve been holding back because she knew.”

“Guess so. Damn. One bad day changed everything.”

I shook my head. “Man, ain’t no love for a brother out there on them corners. You have to stay home for that.”

He sighed like his life would never be the same.

He said, “The other women were just something to do. Something to make time go by. I was looking, trying to find something better than what I had at home. Than what I used to have at home.”

“Always looking for a better offer.”

“Always.”

“Same shit I’ve been doing. Toyomi. Brittany. Samantha.”

“Hell, don’t name every-damn-body.” A beat later he asked, “Who you kicking it with these days?”

I shook my head. “Nobody. Just chillin’.”

“I tried that once.”

“What happened.”

“It lasted two days. My dick started talking to me.”.

We listened to the sounds of the streets. Watched a flock of cute sisters walking into the Cienega Apartments across the street.

Jake flashed his smile, waved at them, then said to me, “I love Charlotte. Not seeing her ain’t easy for me. I’d rather have twice the number of dreams than to lose her for a day.”

“I know you would. But you can’t keep following her around. You can’t keep calling her.”

With a burdened tone he mumbled, “I know. But I love her. I realize now how much I did. That I do. Damn shame, ain’t it?”

“You need to let her be. Set her free.”

“Don’t do a Jesse Jackson and start rhyming.” He sighed, massaged his goatee, and nodded in agreement He said back when they went to court, Charlotte refused to glance his way. When he called her name, she passed right by him in the hallway, moved by him like he was Casper the Pining Ghost, and hurried into the courtroom. Charlotte stood next to some African guy Jake didn’t know—he didn’t think he was a boyfriend or nothing like that, more like an adviser—and talked to the judge. A couple of people from Charlotte’s job showed up as witnesses. Others signed a notarized statement.

They told the judge about Jake calling all the time, about his coming by the hospital making unwanted visits, upsetting Charlotte and leaving her unable to work. One of Charlotte’s friends was dramatic, said distractions like that could leave Charlotte unfocused and cause her to give a patient the wrong medication and have them go flatline.

He said the judge nodded in agreement. People who used to smile at Jake when he’d take Charlotte to lunch had turned their backs on him.

“Man, Judge Son-of-a-Bitch asked me why I was doing this. I told her, and I said it to Charlotte, stood up straight and proud, looked everybody in the eye and said that I

loved her, acknowledged I’d fucked up a time or two, and would do
whatever
it took to get back on track. I said it real loud in front of everybody. All Charlotte did was shake her head.”

“What did the court say?”

“Told me I can’t come within one hundred yards of her for three damn years. Every time I violate the order, I’ll get five days at the Sherman Block Inn. Told me if I come back to bring a good lawyer and a toothbrush ‘cause that’s all I’ll need.”

“Three years.”

Jake told me he had to go back to court next week. The Mexicans were suing him. They’d had a new car and no insurance. A doctor’s bill that they wanted him to pay.

I said, “Damn.”

“If I don’t pay, those bastards might garnishee my wages. Maybe put a lien against my condo.”

Again I said, “Damn.”

“All of this because of five minutes of pleasure with a big-booty heifer who looks like Jennifer Lopez.”

In the middle of his catharsis, the alarm went off. Jake jetted back into the station to suit up.

Before I crossed Fairfax to my car, the fire trucks whipped out, made a quick right, turned left and whizzed down Slauson. They were headed back in the direction that Jake grew up. That scared me. Made me think deadly thoughts. He was heading back toward the area where a fire had made both of his parents angels. Another day, another unforeseen moment that had changed everything in Jake’s life.

The truck disappeared. I stared in Jake’s direction and mumbled, “Find ‘em. Find yourself. I’ll try and find me.”

On the way home I stopped at Darnell’s. He wanted me to help him set up his master plan so he could get away. Dawn was walking the floors, and I was in their office, looking at Darnell’s broken scanner. I told him one of the leads was broken.

He asked, “What does that mean?”

“The board is defective.”

“Damn.”

“I’m joking. All I’ll have to do is resolder a new inductor and it’ll be good as new. Won’t take but a few hours.”

Actually, it was a five-minute job, if that. We were loud talking the techno stuff. Doing that for Dawn’s benefit.

Darnell was in jeans, a plain T-shirt. I already knew that his clothes for tonight were hidden in his car. He grabbed his keys, the scanner, and I followed him into the garage.

Dawn was right behind us, moving slowly, like she had a lot on her mind, so much that it had weighed her down.

“Darnell?” she said.

“Yeah.”

“Leaving?”

“Yeah.”

“Coming home soon?”

“I’ll be with Stephan for a while.”

She asked me, “What are you guys planning, Stephan?”

I paused, then said, “I’m gonna stop by Radio Shack, get the part to fix his scanner, then we’ll sit around and talk about Jake.”

Nobody laughed but me.

She asked her husband, “How long do you plan to be gone?”

Darnell replied, “Awhile.”

She made a sound that said she didn’t like his answer. She said, “Can you come here a minute?”

He passed the scanner to me and went to her. They stepped inside the house. I couldn’t hear her voice, had no idea what she said. Darnell’s face was different when he came back. Anger. Confusion. I don’t know what it was. Something that Dawn said had disturbed him to the point of silence.

The garage door was up and I was parked behind his BMW. I’d put the scanner on my backseat before he came back out.

I asked, “You okay?”

“Let’s go.” He said that abrupt and quick, like he had to leave before he exploded.

Dawn called out, “Stephan?”

“Yeah, Dawn.”

“Make sure your friend has condoms. I don’t want him bringing nothing home.”

She closed the door.

The mailman was walking up as we drove away. Darnell was in front of me. I saw the mailman wave, but Darnell didn’t respond.

I followed him up the 60 freeway as far as the Phillips Branch Road exit. I went home to get ready for tonight.

He went to rent a suite and get ready for his downfall.

Nine p.m. came faster than I wanted it to.

There was going to be a lot of trouble tonight.

Heartbreak and embarrassment. But mostly trouble.

I did the three S’s. Flossed while anxiety had my insides tossing and turning. Brushed my teeth while my nerves cranked into overdrive. Lotioned up and felt a chill of discontent. No suit tonight. I threw on my olive linen slacks and alabaster white cotton shirt, dark brown belt, dark brown Italian shoes. Headed toward a powder keg ready to blow. All the way my sound system pumped out some sweet jazz by Najee. But not even Najee could mask the sound of discontent crackling in the air.

People were on the walls outside the restaurant, dancing everywhere. The parking lot was packed, trees decorated with ribbons and balloons. Shelly’s was more festive than a backwoods juke joint on New Year’s Eve.

Darnell’s car was parked near the law offices that faced Foothill Boulevard. I parked by his ride, and as I got out, the music jumped into a familiar and dangerous Afro-Cuban groove.

The air crackled with passion, thundered with Tammy’s voice.

Cheers. Laughter. Oooos. Ahhhs.

I saw Chanté as soon as I walked under the ivy-covered pathway. Black skirt, dark blue sleeveless blouse with a wide collar. Wild hair jutting out like she was the Queen of Trend. Silver bracelets. She was at a circular high-topped table, her backside on a black bar stool. Several glasses—some half empty, others half full—were under her nose. There she was, laughing, smiling, touching the shoulders and elbows of the brothers who were at her table, cheesing like life was the best.

The seven days since I’ve seen her have felt like seven years. And now each moment that I watch her next to someone else feels like twenty-four hours of the blues.

Sistas always looked better, always looked so damn happy after the love was gone. Yep. Absence had definitely made her look better.

She saw me, stopped laughing for a second, turned away, then went back to whooping it up with the men at her table. One of the vertically impaired brothers took Chanté’s hand with too much familiarity. She held on and freely bounced up to join in with the crowd’s sexy moves, tugging her form-fitting skirt down to decency as she followed.

I stood in the door glaring like a chicken hawk working overtime at Foster Farm.

More cheers, a lot of laughter.

Tammy sang to Chanté as she came up front, “
See-line woman, with wild hair, shake that ass, make the brothers stare.
”

Darnell was off to the side. Watching. Smiling. Waiting.

Chanté wiggled close to Tammy and threw down some moves. I watched her break a sweat trying to keep up with Tammy’s groove, hoofing it up with a big-ass grin plastered all over her face.

In between finger pops and improvised lyrics, Tammy saw me and waved. Darnell found the time to stop admiring Tammy and waved at me too. My attention was elsewhere. Chanté and her partner were on the floor, his crotch creeping

up on her butt, dancing like it was a ritual to a Cucamonga mating call.

She cut her eyes at me, made sure I was watching.

That was all I needed to know.

My grim expression showed my feelings.

Two sisters who were sitting on the wall near the fountain saw me. They sipped wine and mouthed something to one another when my hunt sent me their way. One of the sisters had artificial blue eyes to go with her blonde hair. A wannabe. The other chocolate-flavored sista held onto a c-phone as well as her liquor. I did like Jake always did and sent them an ice-breaking smile. They waved. It was on.

They both spoke. The girl with the phone spoke a little louder. I guessed that was her way of saying she saw me first.