Decadence (35 page)

“Wow. You're joking, right?”

“Serious. You were a star on campus. You had no idea?”

I shrugged. “We walked all over campus talking.”

“This one, this was the first time you cooked and I was invited to your dorm. You cooked Trini food. You cooked for Chris too.”

“You remember.”

“It was a big deal. I was surprised that you had invited me to your dorm to eat. I didn't know how to cook, and that terrified me. I still can't, to tell the truth. It's never really interested me that much.”

“Cooking wasn't your thing, but you showed up with enough alcohol to get the whole campus intoxicated.”

“I had no idea what people might like, so I bought everything. I made drinks. I was the oddball. The new kid. I was really trying to fit in and be cool and make friends. I was the bartender and I made more drinks than I can remember. But I was nervous. I kept thinking, wondering if someone was going to snitch and get me kicked out.”

“You did make some damn good drinks. I made Caribbean food and M and M made fried chicken and you made drinks that had everybody running up to my room with a plastic cup in their hand.”

“M and M went on a rant about black women and hair. I remember that because I didn't really understand what the issue was. She was always so focused on hair and complexion and hated Barbie.”

“That was her thing.”

“She had a couple of drinks and shouted something like, ‘Black people are always trying to do the black version of white people, and white people are never trying to do the black version of a damn thing black. Movies. Theater. Ever see the white version of a black movie? Or of a black play? Hell no, and you never will. But we imitate them. Know what that means? In the culture wars the white man has won.'”

“She was drunk as a skunk and looking at you.”

“She was looking me right in my eyes.”

“And you didn't flinch. Everybody thought that she would run you out of there.”

“Never bothered me.” Then she imitated M&M and said, “‘White people sing black music. Elvis. They sing R and B. And Vanilla Ice couldn't rap. If a black man sounded as bad as Vanilla Ice, he'd get booed off the Apollo. When a white man sings half as good as a black man, he makes ten times more money than a black man. When a white woman sings R and B, she makes more money than a black woman singing the same song.'”

“Had forgotten about that. She could be a bit extreme.”

“She was a piece of work. Then someone brought up politics and welfare and she had a lot to say. ‘All people on welfare are not illegal drug users, but those folks on welfare that are using illegal drugs shouldn't be on welfare. People who pay for the people on welfare to get a check, they take drug tests at their jobs, so people on welfare should do the same. I think that only those people guilty of using the illegal drugs would object to proving that they aren't. And for the record, listen up. Just because you can have a baby doesn't mean that you should have a baby. And if you are already on welfare and can't support yourself, don't have any more children. If you can't feed a baby, don't make a baby.'”

“You remember that day better than I do.”

“M and M ended up dropping out of college and living off welfare for a few years. After all of that righteous talk, she was on food stamps.”

“Had no idea that things had been like that for her.”

“Well, I remember that day from my perspective. Everyone always remembers a different part of something, sees it a different way.”

“That's true. When a crime has been committed, if ten people witnessed that crime, there are ten different ways that crime would have been seen. And maybe none of those versions is the truth. They are true, but they are not the truth. The truth is never in black or white; it's in the gray area of life. But to each person, what they think they saw, what they experienced, what they felt, that was their undeniable truth.”

“I remember that day. It was a special day for me.”

“It was the day that I introduced you to my boyfriend.”

She pulled her lips in, looked the photos over, paused on some.

She said, “We had a lot of fun. All of us; we had so much fun.”

“A lot of fun. Chris. Look at him. His dreadlocks were so long.”

“His hair was something else. His hair and those eyes.”

“Yeah. I had imagined he'd be in the NFL and those locks would be his brand.”

“After the injury he taught high school physics for a while.”

“He became a teacher?”

“For a while.”

“He was one accident away from being great.”

“You have no idea. When you're up that high and it all ends, it's a major readjustment. He was a mess, very depressed for a long, long time. Hard being married to a depressed man. Almost drove me mad.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

Then she closed the folder and slid those memories back to me. As haunting music played, I put the folder back inside of my locker.

Her voice trembled. “I want to know something, Bijou.”

“Let me say this first.”

“Okay.”

I said, “I wanted to say that I was sorry to hear about what happened to your parents. They were good-hearted people, altruistic and role models for the world. I say that I am sorry and I grieve for your loss. Not as a friend, but as one human being to the other. Now, for the other thing. If you're crying over Chris, all I can say is that you get what you get. You get the love that you deserve. I deserve better.”

“Did you sleep with my husband?”

“I used to be altruistic. Like your parents. I was so naïve. I fed you. I tutored you, taught you how to cook, introduced you to my friends, let you make my dorm your second home. And I introduced you to Chris. I had imagined that one day I would marry Chris and you would stand in my wedding. That's how I felt about you. We almost lost everything back then. So. Did I sleep with Chris? Your husband contacted me. He saw me here, followed me around, and as soon as you and your husband left he sent me a request on Facebook. He called me. He masturbated for me as I showered. He told me that he would leave you to come back to me. He wanted me to meet him here. He sent a limo for me. He paid my admission. I came here on your dime. We swam. We talked. We laughed. We went inside of a room. No one saw us. But they heard us. He still roars like a lion when he comes. Again he said that he would leave you for me. While he made love to me, I did fuck him. Twice. Two times. Then things got ugly. Very ugly.”

“Things turned ugly.”

“Extremely.”

“Why?”

“Because I regretted it. Because I remembered when I walked in on one of my best friends and my boyfriend while they made love. Because he remembered I slept with Rigoberto. Chris remembered the fight with his
tigre
. Because I remembered all the fights with you.”

There was a long pause.

She shed more tears. The truth spared no feelings.

Her voice splintered. “He's never gotten over you.”

“But I am over him. He had an affair with you. He chose you. He knocked up my roommate. I had no idea. I didn't have all of the information. Now I do. You knew that and you married him.”

She said, “Not before. After. It didn't come out until after. Four years into the marriage, it came up. It surprised me too. It's been hell. Seems like Mona has us in court every year. She lives off us. We had to pay for the kid being on welfare. She filed and gave Chris zero-percent visitation. He didn't fight it. She took the money and ran.”

“In that case, better you than me.”

“Marriage is forever. Marriage has trials and tribulations.”

She was as emotionally dependent on Chris as he was financially dependent on her. That was my assumption. That was my hypothesis.

Only when a woman was truly independent and free of those things could she have the clarity to choose properly, if the desire remained to choose at all. Anything less was an act of desperation.

That was what I knew.

She asked me, “How did you end up here, Bijou?”

“I came to Decadence to study people. I did that at first. Mob behavior, group behavior, wanted to see what sexual energy did to the crowd. But for me it was like being in Plato's cave. Most of us live in dark caves and that darkness becomes all we know, what we adjust our eyes to. It is what we view as the truth. Darkness can be your truth and you can live fine that way, but that truth is not how things really are. You leave the cave and step into the sun. When you first leave darkness and step into the light it will be overwhelming, it will be blinding, it hurts. You're dazzled. Too much to process. Then your eyes adjust. When you return to the cave and try to describe the sensation of light to those who have lived in the cold, when you try to describe light to those who have only lived in the dark, when you try to explain enlightenment to the ignorant they will only laugh and criticize or chastise you for ever wanting to feel the sun and step away from darkness. They chastise what they can't comprehend. The egocentric and self-centered and terrified cannot understand or process what others see differently. But you have left the cave and now you don't want to go back inside because it is no longer where you belong. It's like leaving a small town for a big city. It makes it hard if not impossible to return to Mayberry for long. Mayberry is wonderful for some, but not all of us are cut out for skipping rocks on a lake and playing horseshoes and that nice, easy pace. I might go back to Mayberry. But it'll be a while. I'm enjoying the sun.”

“That was beautiful.”

“Most of that was bullshit. In reality, like everyone else here, I came for the sex, for pleasure. I came here to enjoy this part of life.”

“It's amazing here.”

“This could be a hard habit to break.”

“Once you leave the cave, it is hard to go back inside.”

“Decadence, for now, fulfills my desires. Going to bars, meeting random men, it can be exciting, daring, and fun because there is a rush, it's unpredictable, and I understand why men do what they do. The high that you get, everything that happens before the orgasm is a thrill ride. It can be thrilling but it can be dangerous. Decadence is safe and they embrace my desires here. Every need was nurtured.”

“You did all that?”

“I've done a lot of wonderful things. And I have done things that I will regret forever. I have had . . . up to now . . . a pretty exciting life.”

“I think I married too soon. There was a lot that I didn't do. I married so young. If I had known about this place before I married . . .”

“Then Mona would be living off of me.”

“And I would be fucking so many sexy men up in here.”

We laughed. She didn't palter, wasn't being deceitful. She was sincere. Envy danced and jealousy painted her face in bright colors.

It was a soft envy.

I asked, “Did you make it to graduate school?”

“University of Miami. Went immediately after Hampton. You?”

“USC. I went back home long enough to get my masters. Left all of the madness that had happened behind me.”

“Congratulations, Bijou.”

“Same to you. Congratulations.”

“I'm not the writer. My thesis sucked. Writing has never been my strong point. I'm decent at articulating, at times debating, but when it comes to putting pen to paper, and spelling, not my strong point.”

“I should've been a better tutor. But it was cut short.”

“You were damn good. Despite everything else, I thank you.”

“I should thank you. You've taught me more than I taught you.”

She nodded, then said, “If you don't mind my asking, how did you end up here? Maybe not how, but why this particular club?”

“It wasn't because of Chris, if that is what you're thinking.”

She looked relieved. I was being honest. I owned no attitude in body language or voice.

I said, “I was working on a film. Somehow this subject came up. Maybe because of the plot and characters in the film. They had multiple lovers and lived in harmony. And this actress, Lola Mack, said that she had heard of this place, she had heard of Decadence. She had always wanted to come here. Then I did my research. Eventually I joined.”

She exhaled. “Totally random that you were here.”

“Totally. My first night here and I ran into Chris; then I ran into you. I was speechless.”

“No, you weren't. You were rude. You were a bitch.”

We laughed a little.

I apologized for what I had done. She accepted.

Then she apologized for all of the pain that she had caused me. Her lip trembled and she wiped her eyes again. I accepted. Then I almost cried. She wiped her eyes over and over and said, “Thanks for the kind things that you said about my parents.”

“They were good people. They had good character.”

Again she nodded. “They were strict. While other kids were having parties on beaches and going to Paris and fun places for the summer, I always felt like I was being punished and dragged to some place where disease ran rampant. They were overbearing at times. They were über religious. But they had hearts filled with love and hope and forgiveness. They were the best parents in the world. And at the same time I could not wait to get away from them. I miss them now. I miss them every day. It hurts. Your mother is still alive, right?”

“She is.”

“Enjoy her while you can.”

“I do.”

Not for Chris, maybe we would've been the best of friends, lifelong friends. Not for Chris, I never would have become a pariah, wouldn't have felt like a persona non grata at my own university.

I said, “Good fucking.”

She grinned. “Good fucking.”

I walked away and left her that way. She had robbed me then. I'd robbed her now. Like a thief in the night, I had broken into her marriage and burgled her. A woman stole a man from another woman and then was shocked when he horned her by cheating with another woman. Putting a wedding ring on him doesn't change his character.