Something to Talk About (8 page)

Roxy tried not to laugh but was woefully unsuccessful. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to laugh. But this is so cute, you’re actually jealous and getting all territorial and whatnot. I have to say, I like that in ya,” she said with another laugh. “I like it a lot because it’s going to make my next words much easier to take. You need a makeover, girlfriend. And I’m just the one to get you hooked up.”

Alicia looked stunned for a moment, and then set her jaw grimly. “You know what? I think you’re right. I’ve been looking like this since I was sixteen.”

Roxy clasped her hands in delight. “You’ve been looking like that since I’ve known you, and that’s a long time. Same long ol’ braid, no makeup, sturdy shoes, and pants for all occasions. Has Adam ever seen you in a dress?”

“Has
anyone
seen me in a dress since my first communion? Yeah, every time I’m a bridesmaid.” Alicia laughed. “He’s seen me in shorts lots of times, though, and bathing suits, too.”

“Not the same thing. A dress is something else, Alicia
;
it gives
off
an entirely different vibration. So does a skirt, it shows your legs in an elegant, sexy, flirtatious way, not like wearing shorts that just say ‘get outta my way, I’m running,’ or rock climbing, or whatever.”

By now the two women were in the dressing room of the suite staring into the mirrored wall behind the built-in vanity. They were both studying Alicia’s reflection and looking objectively at her tall, shapely body covered by serviceable slacks and an unremarkable tailored shirt.

‘You’re right, Roxy. I can look better than this. I’m
going
to look better than this,” she said with determination.

Roxy bounced happily and gave Alicia a big hug. “Now that’s what I’m talking about! When we get finished he’s not going to be able to resist you. You won’t have to do another thing, just
let him get a load of you in your new look and he’ll be swept off his feet. And maybe you two will get busy at last,” she said merrily.

Alicia gave her friend a very private and mysterious smile. “You mean get busy
again.
Adam and I have been intimate before, Roxy.”

The look on Roxy’s face was well worth the barrage of soaps and shampoos she threw at Alicia in her zeal to get the whole story.

Alicia was laughing as she allowed Roxy to chase her through the suite. “Okay, okay. Get out of your suit and put on your
jammies
and I’ll tell you the whole story. I promise
,
I won’t leave out anything.”

“You better not, woman, or I won’t be responsible for my retribution. Talk slow, I don’t want to miss a word,” she warned.

Chapter Six

Ten years earlier

A light rain was falling as Alicia and Adam left the library. They were among the last students to leave, not unusual for the time of year, which was just before finals. And it was certainly not unusual for the two graduate students pursing double degrees.

“I keep thinking that may
be I should’ve just stuck to ar
chitectu
r
al
design.” Alicia yawned. “Why did I think I needed to have a master’s in urban planning, too?” Adam waited until she was in mid
-
yawn and thumped her on her chin, something that always caused her to wrinkle her face comically and take a swing at him.

“You need both degrees for the same reason I do, so we can write our own tickets when we get out of here. Don’t be so lazy,” he chided her.

Alicia narrowed her eyes and made a fist at his temple. “I got your lazy right here, pal. Don’t even try it, I’ll brain you. Did you bring the wine?”

It was Adam’s turn to yawn as he fished around in his backpack to produce a bottle of serviceable red wine. They were on their way to Alicia’s apartment where Adam’s girlfriend, Yvette, was cooking dinner for the four of them: Yvette, Adam, Alicia, and Alicia’s
fiance
, Preston. The thought of a cozy dinner for the two couples was very cheering to Alicia.
 
They reached the doorway of the old brownstone building just as Alicia was saying something about how fortunate they were to have such understanding mates.

“If Preston wasn’t so caring and supportive, I don’t think I could make it through this program. And this is just the first year,” she said with a playful shudder. “I’m so glad he’s willing to wait until sifter I graduate to get married,” she added, once again inspecting the big diamond ring on her left hand.

Adam held the door open for her without comment, maintaining his thoughtful silence up the flight of stairs to Alicia’s front door. He held her books while she fished her key out of her pocket, and they looked at each other strangely when the door opened into a dimly lit living room with no smells or sounds of a meal to be found. Alicia walked into the living room and looked around expectantly, but no one was there. She turned to Adam with her hands outstretched and was about to speak when a noise from the back of the apartment caught their
attention.
 
They moved to the hall and stopped when it became evident that the noise was coming from the bedroom. The door was ajar and Alicia suddenly froze, overcome with fear. On some level she knew what she was about to see, but she couldn’t face it. Adam had no such concern; he pushed the door wide open and allowed the sickening spectacle in the room to be seen by both of them.

Alicia turned an ashen gray as she witnessed her beloved
fiance
, Preston, having frantic and sloppy sex with Adam’s
girlfriend, Yv
ette. They were so involved in their frenzied activity
that
they had no idea they were being observed. Yvette’s head was banging over and over against the headboard as she screamed Preston’s name out loud. Preston, clad in his fraternity T-shirt and black silk socks, one of which had a tiny hole in the heel, was making the gorilla face that heralded a massive orgasm, as he demanded to know whose body he was savaging.

“Whose is it, Momma? Whose is it? Who’s your daddy now, huh?”

Despite the sordid scene before him, Adam’s dry wit didn’t desert him. Flipping on the overhead light, he asked in a monotone, “Are we too late for dinner? Since y’all seem to be having dessert, it only seems right to ask.”

Yvette screamed and pushed Preston off her writhing body, causing Preston to lose his balance and fall off the bed. Alicia stared at her faithless
fiance
in stark horror until she finally remembered to breathe, then she pushed past Adam to go back into the living room. Adam felt no need to leave, however.

“Get dressed and get out and if either of you so much as looks at Alicia while you’re leaving, you be leaving here butt-ass naked,” he said with true menace in his voice. And to their total chagrin he stayed where he was while they scrambled into their clothes like an amateur porn movie played in fast-forward.

Incredibly the whole thing only lasted about ten minutes. Alicia sat in the living room, her face an unmoving mask of pain, while Adam ushered them out the door, not allowing either to speak a word. When they were gone he went into the bedroom, stripped the linens, and opened the windows to release the fetid smell of illicit sex. Coming back into the living area, he located a trash bag in the kitchen and deposited the soiled and irredeemable sheets into the trash bag and put it in the corridor outside the front door. He knew without being told that Alicia would sooner die than lie on those sheets again, no matter how often they were laundered.

Finally he washed his hands and came into the living room where Alicia sat without moving, staring at nothing at all. His concern was all over his face as he sat down and put his arms around her. At first she resisted, but the strong, sure touch of his warm hands made her melt against him. She allowed him to pull her into his arms and give her the comfort she deserved.

“I’m sorry you had to see that, Alicia, I’m sorry that I brought that selfish little bitch into your life. I feel like this is somehow my fault, baby.”

Alicia didn’t answer at first; she just crawled into his lap and held on to him for long wordless moments. Finally she mumbled something he had to ask her to repeat. She sighed, then sat up and spoke more clearly.

“Don’t be sorry. Be glad we found out what they really are before it was too late. Just think, I could have married that jerk,” she said in a croaky voice that didn’t sound anything like her own.

Adam rocked her like a baby for a while, and asked if she wanted to spend the night at his place. Alicia’s eyes grew misty and she smiled, a weak and shaky smile to be sure, but it was a start. “Thanks, but I’m not letting him run me out of my own home. I am, however, sleeping on the sofa. After we drink that wine, that is. Open it up and let’s get drunk,” she said, wiping her leaking eyes.

***

Roxy’s eyes were wide and her mouth was hanging open in amazement. “Girl, no, you didn’t! Y
’
all drank that bot
tl
e of wine and in the middle of a drunken fit you started ripping each other’s clothes off! I’m ... I’m stunned. I’m just floored, I really am.”

“You’re also wrong,
Rox
. You’re completely and totally wrong. We didn’t do anything but have a few glasses of wine. I was too numb to do anything else. I was in such a state of shock I couldn’t really react at that moment. I couldn’t talk, I couldn’t think, and I was damned if I was going to cry in front of Adam; I just wasn’t going out like that. My brothers would have beaten the paste out of me if I’d ended up a sniveling mess; I had the Fuentes name to uphold. We don’t break down in front of anyone; no matter how much it hurts you never let them see you cry.

“
We drank the wine, we sat there looking stupid for a while, and he left. I made up a bed on the couch and I eventually went to sleep. The wine was good for that at least,” she said ruefully.

They were now sitting in the middle of the big bed and Roxy fell over on her side with a groan. “Alicia, quit dragging this out and get to the meat of the story. Did you or did you not do the deed with Adam?
And if so, when?
Don’t do this to me, woman, you know I have immediate gratification syndrome, I need to know
now."

“My goodness, you are impatient, aren’t you? Okay, sit up and listen. I was like an automaton for the next few weeks. I managed to
get a new mattress, finish
my exams, explain to my family that the engagement was off, and ignore the gossip on campus. I even survived the inevitable confrontation with Preston, who somehow had the shiny brass
cojones
to try to get back into my life and my bed by apologizing. Over and over again, I might add. He sent so many flowers my apartment looked like a funeral home, or it would have if I hadn’t given the flowers away to everyone in the building,” she said derisively.

“I was miserable, but I made it through all of that mess until Yvette came to me and announced that she was pregnant and if I would just be so kind as to stop clinging to Preston, they could have a life together. That was just too much sugar for a dime, as my grandmother used to say. He didn’t want her and had the gall to use me as a reason for not marrying her,”
Alicia said indignantly. “I went ziggety-boom on that heifer. I cussed her for old and new and told her to go hell. Don’t pass go, don’t collect two hundred dollars, just go straight to hell and take her Satan spawn with her. I swore for about ten minutes in Spanish and English until her eyes were popping out of her head and she looked like a troll doll. She was standing in my doorway like I was supposed
to invite
her in for tea or something
. 
I shoved her bony butt into the hallway and slammed the door.” Alicia’s eyes were blazing with remembered pain.

“For some stupid reason, that’s what did it,” she admitted slowly. “That’s what made me go all gooey
in the noggin
and head straight to Adam’s apartment.”

***

The scent of the spring rain coming in the open windows was a refreshing contrast to Adam’s current mood. The situation with Alicia was eating at him like a slow-acting poison. He knew he’d never forget the look on her face when she realized that the man she was prepared to spend her life with was rutting another woman in her bed like a boar servicing a breeding sow in heat. He’d cursed himself over and over again for pushing open that door, knowing what was on the other side, but he couldn’t undo what he’d done. And he certainly couldn’t take back the set of circumstances that had led Yvette and Preston to betray the people they supposedly cared about. It was ironic in a sick way; he’d been as devastated as Alicia over the incident but for an entirely different reason. He wanted to rage and rant and plant his foot deeply in Preston’s behind, but not because of Yvette, because of Alicia.

He and Yvette had been dating, true, but she was like every other woman in his life, a temporary diversion, someone to spend time with. She was pretty and mildly amusing, but finding her in bed with another man affected him only because it almost destroyed Alicia.
She was gaunt and pale and listl
ess, and even though she was putting on a brave front, she was miserable. He was frankly amazed that she’d
ac
ed all her exams and was still going to take on a fellowship over the summer. He smiled wryly, thinking that in many ways, she reminded him of his sister Benita. She was
completely feminin
e, true, but she was also tough and resolute. No one was going to keep her down for long.