Homecoming Weekend (14 page)

Then, late one night, around two, as he and Nadine lay in his bed, Jesse's doorbell rang. Then there was loud knocking. She looked out the window to see her husband's car. He had gotten
her phone bill and noticed the inordinate amount of calls to Jesse's number. Through some Internet system, he was able to get an address to that number—Jesse's house. When he pulled up to see his wife's car in his driveway, he was furious.

Jesse's chest swelled and he wanted to confront Nadine's husband. But she pleaded for him to not go to the door. “Nothing good can come from that,” she had said.

It was that scenario that Jesse began to understand the magnitude of dealing with someone else's wife. He started to feel less enthusiastic about his future with Nadine. Worse, he began to question the person she was. After all, she was married, and yet she spent so much time with him that he almost forgot she had a husband.

She was so bold that she went out of town with Jesse—twice—and even demanded that he not see any other women. He did date, but his heart was with Nadine.

Soon after the doubts crept in, she moved out of the house with her husband and filed for divorce, easing Jesse's mind about her commitment to him. Though there were various other trust concerns—from both sides—they married nonetheless. But love could not hold them together.

Simply, Jesse did not trust Nadine. He told his friends that they divorced because “there was just too much drama. Every other day there was something. I couldn't please her,” he said. “All the little drama situations added up to one big problem that I didn't want to deal with anymore.”

And while that was the truth, he could not bring himself to share with his boys the biggest factor: he did not trust her. He witnessed too many occasions where she was corresponding with men, inappropriate things that made him question himself as to why he did not walk away at the first sight of infidelity.

Love was his answer. And hope. But those elements could not override the continual dishonoring of him and the marriage. So he did the strong thing. He left.

“Did I cry when I left my wife—let's get that part straight,” Jesse said. “No, I didn't. I was hurt. It was a bad time for me. But I've never cried over a woman. I don't think there's anything wrong with you if that's where you go with it. I just felt deflated.

“And, no, I would not trust her to go to dinner with an ex-boyfriend. Would I trust any woman to see an ex; I would hope so. It's really about the person I'm dealing with at that time. My ex-wife is a great person, but she is not trustworthy. So I couldn't and wouldn't cry over someone who didn't understand the value I brought to her life or who would disrespect me as she did with other men.

“To be honest, I have had to forgive myself for continuing to deal with her after learning some things. She says she didn't sleep with anyone. But I didn't believe her. And there were two ex-boyfriends who she'd never take a call from while I was around and I saw comments from her to various men that were out of line.”

Don handed Jesse a Heineken. “I didn't know it was that bad,” Venita said. “When you don't have trust, you can't have a relationship. I do trust my husband. I do. But I ain't stupid, either. While I'm here for homecoming, he'll be at home doing whatever it is he does when I ain't there. I guess all you can really ask is that he's responsible, don't bring any drama into our house, no diseases—and that I don't find out.”

They laughed.

“But here's the thing,” Venita added. “When your wife did what she did, it was the end of your world, right? You were devastated.
Men
. I'm not saying it wasn't horrible or anything. It was. But women have had to deal with y'all's crap forever. And you men
just expect it to run off our backs and for us to keep moving, forgive you and be okay with it. Not all men, but it still amazes me that when I woman does what men have been doing since the beginning of time that the woman is looked at as this awful person unworthy of you.

“There's something wrong with that. That's what's been the norm in how people look at that; that's how men look at it. And I hate that double standard.”

“It never fails,” Don said. “We get here for homecoming and start tooting and the next thing you know we're in some really deep conversations. I thought we're here to have a good time.”

“Nah, this is a good time,” Jesse said. “We're going to get our drink and our party on; you know that. It's good to exercise your brain a little bit, too, with people you love and respect.”

“Oh, boy, Jesse's getting ready to cry,” Don joked.

“Kiss my ass, fat boy,” Jesse said.

Venita laughed. “Okay, get out of my room—the both of you. I will catch up with you later at the jazz concert. You behave between now and then.”

“We will if you will,” Don said, with a smile and raised eyebrow.

Tranise, Brandon and Kwame

T
ranise received more attention in an afternoon than she'd had in the last year in Atlanta. It made her feel good—and conflicted.

She only fantasized about one unattainable man in her life; Denzel didn't count. Brandon Barksdale aroused her interest not just because he was a good-looking man (although that certainly helped). She admired the way he was with people. She did not know him, but she certainly paid close attention to him and his actions and demeanor whenever they were in the same room.

“I like the way he makes everyone around him feel good,” she had told Mary back when they were in school.

Other men might have sparked an interest; Brandon struck a chord.

Even as she socialized at the bar with Kwame, she occasionally glanced across the room to see Brandon mingling or dancing. Kwame, an apparent catch in his own right, did not know what distracted Tranise, but he knew something was there.

“So,” Kwame said to her, “here you are at homecoming, looking great and standing here with this great guy—if I'm allowed to say that about myself—who is very interested in you, has had a crush on you since he was a kid . . . and your mind seems to be somewhere else. I don't know how to take that.”

“Oh, no, I'm sorry,” she said. “I'm not distracted. I'm just a little overwhelmed. This is my first homecoming since I graduated, and I had no idea how warm it would feel. Seeing old friends and old faces has brought me back in time and has made me feel good.”

“That's a great thing,” Kwame said. “I can tell already I'll be returning every year. It kind of validates the beauty of going to an HBCU.

“I actually was going to go to the University of Virginia. I got accepted. My parents wanted me to go there. It was expensive, but I got some scholarship money. But you know what sold me on Norfolk State?”

Tranise sipped her cocktail. “What?”

“I was a senior in high school and I came over to Norfolk State for the Battle of the Bay against Hampton,” he said. “The game was sold out. The tailgate was amazing. It was like homecoming, there were so many people. The sprit in the air was so festive. I just felt at home.

“I visited Virginia—beautiful campus. Great school. But I didn't quite feel like I did at Norfolk State. It was like the school wrapped its arms around me and hugged me. My cousin, Mike, told me that was the same way he felt when he got to Norfolk State. It's something about the HBCU experience that gives you the feeling of family. We know family can get on your nerves and be a pain in the butt. But we also know family loves you. And in the end, you can rely on your family.”

Listening to Kwame made Tranise look at him differently. The way he crafted his statements, the thought he put into his expressions . . . she saw something in him. He wasn't just talking. He was
expressing
himself. Big difference.

“I couldn't agree more,” Tranise said. “I can't believe I haven't been back in five years. But the one good thing about it is being
away so long and now being back has made me really appreciate it so much more—the education, the friendships, the experiences. This was home when I really turned from a teenager into a woman.”

“You have done just that,” Kwame said with a coy smile. “So, you don't have a man waiting for you in Atlanta?” he asked.

Even the way he asked her that made an impression on Tranise. It was strong but not aggressive.

“I'm sure there is somebody there for me, but I haven't met him yet,” she said, smiling.

“Well, that means the men down there are not doing their jobs,” Kwame responded with no hesitation. “I don't understand it. Are you some undercover psycho or something? Why wouldn't you have a man? I'm glad you don't. But I still don't quite get it.”

Tranise had asked herself the same thing more than twice. The men who crossed her path wore an arrogance that she did not appreciate—or would not tolerate. It was as if being in Atlanta spoiled them. The numbers were what they were: women with something going for themselves outnumbered men in the same category by leaps and bounds. And there were enough women who would accept a man who was short of what he should be because they preferred to not be alone.

Tranise was not that way. She preferred her dignity over a warm body. So, when men approached her with too much aggression and too little chivalry, she was turned off immediately. And she had no problem letting them know it, either.

“I had to tell this one guy, ‘Excuse me, but I'm not pressed for a man. You seem to think I need you in some way. Wrong.' He looked at me and said, ‘No problem. Women are a dime a dozen in Atlanta. I ain't pressed, either.' Then he walked away.”

“Are you serious?” Kwame said. “Guys are that rude down there?”

“I would never say all guys,” Tranise said. “I can say I have met
more than enough of them. And every time I get so pissed because it's insulting. It's like they're saying, ‘Take me with all my arrogance and flaws because if you don't, someone else will.' I'm a nice woman. I am. But that gets me going.”

“I believe you,” Kwame said, smiling. He put his hands on both her shoulders. “Don't get riled up. You look too good to have steam coming out of your nose. You handled those guys the way they needed to be handled. As much as we'd like to, we can't account for everyone's actions. You gotta just pray for them.”

“Pray?” she said.

“Yes. I'm serious,” Kwame said. “I visited a church in New Jersey one time: First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens in New Brunswick, I believe. The pastor said, ‘When you pray for those that anger you, it lifts the burden off of you and places it back on them.' I tried it and it works.”

Tranise was more intrigued. She was having a real conversation with a man, a conversation of substance. It had been so long that she did not quite recall when it was or whom it was with.

“So, don't you know I'm four years older than you?” she said. “Why aren't you with ladies your age?”

“You don't remember me telling you I had a crush on you from way back, when I met you when I was in high school?” he said. “At that time, I was sixteen, maybe seventeen, I think. You were probably twenty, twenty-one. Age mattered then. I knew I couldn't get anywhere with you if I had the nerve to even say something.

“But I'm just about to turn twenty-two. Age matters much less, if at all—at least as far as I'm concerned. I'm ready for you now.”

He smiled the brightest smile she had seen in some time. It was like he amused himself while totally serious. Or that he said something daring, something he wanted to say for years, and he delighted in it.

“You don't really know that,” Tranise said. Her smile was bright, too. “As a matter of fact, what do you mean you're ‘ready for me now'?”

“I am very clear about that,” Kwame started. “I'm ready in the sense that I understand a woman's needs, how to treat her. And I understand who I am, what I can offer a woman. When I saw you when I was in high school, I was just, you know, taken by how you looked. Talking to you now gives me a better sense of who you are. So far, I like you—and want to get to know you better. I'm ready now to hold up my end of a conversation. That's where it all starts. Conversing.”

Tranise smiled again. He showed a lot in that statement. One of her pet peeves, especially as a middle school teacher was the use of proper English. She cringed every time she heard someone say, “conversate,” as if it were a word, instead of “converse.”

She was interested in Kwame. He had a youthful exuberance but did not necessarily look younger than her. But there was an age difference that Tranise did not want to overlook.

And Kwame sensed it. “You're not old enough to be a cougar—and there aren't enough years between us, either,” he said. “I saw the movie,
Jumping the Broom
. We're not like those two characters. The older we get, the more age makes less of a difference.”

He had a point, but Tranise knew admitting it would relinquish any advantage she had with the young man. “I like the idea of conversing,” she said. “What could it hurt?”

“And it could help a lot,” he said, smiling.

Before Tranise could respond, she felt the presence of someone behind her. She turned, looked up and saw the smiling face of Brandon, her personal heartthrob.

“Hey, I was just saying good-bye before I leave,” Brandon said to Tranise. She was flustered and looked at him.

Kwame introduced himself. He was a little taken aback at first. But then he saw Brandon's wedding ring and relaxed, so much so that he excused himself to go to the bathroom.

Brandon slid into Kwame's position. Tranise gathered herself.

“I heard you married Felicia,” she said. The alcohol made her more daring and she just put it out there.