The Sweetest Taboo (12 page)

Drae stopped dead in her tracks and immediately the residue of the previous lump in her throat filled her mouth. This time she wasn’t ignoring him, she was speechless.

“I was just playing.” He chuckled. “I guess you really mad now? So how much this attitude gon’ cost me? What, I need to buy you a new Benz, some shoes?”

Drae took a deep breath, every part of her wanted to kick Hassan’s ass, but instead of fighting a losing battle she took the blow he just dealt her in stride. Her mother was her world and he knew that, still, he took every opportunity he could to curse her.

Drae took one last look at herself in the mirror, slid on her mink, grabbed her purse and her totebag, and left the room.

“Drae!” he called behind her.

“Fuck you!” she screamed as she slammed the front door.

Yuri

         Yuri took a strong pull off her cigarette, tilted her head toward the ceiling and blew smoke into the air. She and Jeff were celebrating their seventh wedding anniversary on the
Spirit of New York
’s evening cruise, which sailed for three hours around the island of Manhattan.

The deep waters splashed against the sides of the ship as it made its way past the multitude of red and yellow city lights that lit up the early evening sky.

Will Downing’s “Moods” set the tone for the ship’s spinning lounge that sat on the top deck and twirled around to show off spectacular views of the New York City skyline.

Celebrating their anniversary was Yuri’s idea. After all, lately Jeff had been treating her like a roommate with fuck benefits: saying very little to her, unless it was an insult; looking at her, rolling his eyes; and only touching her long enough to part her pussy lips and soothe his hard dick. And that had been only twice, both episodes on opposite ends of the same week. And at neither time was there a kiss, a fondle or a whisper. He treated it like a business transaction. He rolled over, advised her he wanted some pussy and she held her breath long enough to give him some. The last time, they simply looked at each other and, without saying a word, they both knew that fucking the other had become a done deal.

Nevertheless, Yuri was determined to make herself feel like she had a marriage, which was why she’d been ignoring Britt’s efforts to reach her for the last month. She sent all of his calls to voice mail, ignored his text messages and dumped the weekly flowers he sent to her job in the trash. Besides, Britt needed to wallow in his own shit for a while.

She opened her purse, peeped at her cell phone and saw Britt had sent three new text messages: “Yo enough is enough…. Stop playing games and answer your fuckin’ phone!…You begging me to come see about you….”

Yuri read each message about three times before deciding to respond. “Kiss,” she texted, “my ass.”

Within seconds he texted her back, “I’m trying to.”

“Then you’ll have to work your way around my husband’s dick.” And she put her phone away.

“I doubt if there’s a signal out here.” Jeff sipped.

“What?”

“Weren’t you looking at your cell phone? I doubt if there’s a signal, he can’t get through.”

“Do…not…start,” Yuri said sternly.

She mashed the last of her cigarette into the ashtray and stared at Jeff. She did what she could to find something intriguing about him. At least his Unforgivable cologne smelled delicious and he was easy on the eye. His tailored Gucci suit was impeccable and his loose silk tie gave him a certain sex appeal that, for a split second, reminded Yuri she was once attracted to him.

She picked up her Perfect ten and clinked Jeff’s shot of Hennessy. “To our future.”

“Yeah,” Jeff said, “to the future.”

Yuri ignored Jeff’s spin on her toast. She sipped her drink and smiled at him. “So…Jeff,” she figured she needed to say something, especially since for the last hour they’d been eating fried wontons, listening to Will and saying the bare minimum to each other. “Would you like to dance?”

“Naw…” He looked around the room. “I’ll pass.”

She did all she could not to roll her eyes; instead she turned around slightly and looked at the couples on the dance floor. She was happy that Jeff had said no, especially since the couples dancing actually seemed to be together. “Oh…kay,” she said facing him again. “I was thinking…about kids.”

“Really?” Jeff raised his eyebrows. “I have a kid.”

“I mean
our own child,
” she stressed.

“You mean one you can accept?”

“Exactly.”

“He’s an innocent little boy.”

Yuri took a deep breath and assembled a smile. “Sweetie, where do you see us in five years?”

“Divorced,” he said matter-of-factly, as he tapped on the table to get the waiter’s attention.

When the waiter came to the table, Jeff took his index finger and moved Yuri’s plate from in front of her. “You’ve eaten enough.”

“What?”

“You heard me. When I got up last night I saw that you had eaten an entire bag of potato chips; and you’re big enough, don’t you think?”

“Miss,” the waiter said, cutting through the obvious tension, “would you like to refresh your glass?”

“No, thank you.” Yuri wanted badly to slap the hell out of Jeff, yet she didn’t want to cause a scene; so she sat back in her chair and crossed her legs. Her black wrap dress revealed most of her thighs and her toned calves. Once the waiter walked away, Yuri clenched her lips and exhaled. “I’m tired of you always saying something about my weight, but when I start talking about your dick shooting water and that fuckin’ Oreo cookie you got, you wanna argue.”

“Nice, Yuri,” he said sarcastically. “Now you’re calling a five-year-old names. Real adult of you.”

“You know what, Jeff? What…the fuck…are we sitting here for? As a matter of fact, what are we doing? I hate that I even suggested this shit; it’s obvious you don’t wanna be here and I’m not so sure…if I wanna be here either.”

“No, what’s obvious is that you’re cheating, and the obviousness of it is what makes the shit so fucked up.”

“Psycho’s on the loose again.” She popped her eyes wide open. “You’re right, Jeff”—she smirked—“me cheating…is
sooooo
goddamn obvious. But, tell me, is it as obvious as the baby you had on me?”

He pushed his face close into hers. “Leave my son out of this.”

“I just asked a simple question.”

“Well, don’t ask me any damn questions. Besides, it’s your pussy, and if you handled your game correctly you would learn from my mistakes. Instead, yo’ fat ass is so fuckin’ silly that you doin’ a buncha stupid shit. Insulting the hell outta my intelligence. And then you expect me to sit up here and play happily ever after? Celebrating what? A wrapped-up marriage? Mrs. McMillan, please.”

“I swear, not even one night”—Yuri held up her index finger—“can we go without your brain running away and leaving you. Think…what you wanna think. Hell, maybe I should cheat so you can be right for once.” She threw that one out there just to see what he would come back with.

Jeff fell out laughing, then reared back and pulled his loose tie even farther down his neck. “Sweetheart, you’re killing me. You’d be better off convincing me that you wanna jump overboard.” He slid his cigar out of his breast pocket and lit it.

“I’ma try my best not to even say anything, ’cause the next thing I say will come after I steal on yo’ ass!”

And for the next hour and a half they both looked out the ship’s windows.

As they left the pier and hopped in a cab, Yuri felt her cell phone vibrating. When she checked it, she saw she had ten missed calls—all from Britt. “Who was that?” Jeff asked, “ya niggah?”

“As a matter of fact, it was,” Yuri snapped, slamming the taxi’s door.

“Now, my wife, that’s probably the one honest thing you’ve said tonight.”

Before she could cuss him out and let him know she’d had enough, her phone rang again. This time she answered it. “Yes.”

“You playing with me, right?” Britt spat.

“Hi,” Yuri said in her best bill-collector’s voice, “how are you?”

“You fuckin’ that niggah?”

“Uhmm, last time I checked they were shootin’ again.”

“
Stop
fuckin’ playing with me. Since when have we had an argument and you bounce?”

“You know,” Yuri continued, “I believe that was my husband’s idea…. He’s a brilliant man.”

“Hilarious. Now, where you at?”

“On my way home.”

“Don’t go home, come here. I wanna see you.”

“Uhmmm…not.”

“Not?” She could hear his disbelief.

“Not.”

“Okay, go home. Please, go home. I gotta trick for yo’ ass.” And he hung up.

Yuri acted as if nothing happened and watched the dance of passing traffic. Manhattan was definitely the city that never slept. Even at eight o’clock in the evening there was a traffic jam, which was why Yuri and Jeff had elected to leave their cars at home. A decision Yuri was starting to regret; at least if she’d insisted they take her car, she could’ve pulled over and put Jeff the fuck out.

As the taxi pulled in front of their apartment building, Yuri started breathing heavy and immediately all the nerves in her body took cover and headed for her stomach. Britt was leaning against the front of the building, with his left leg propped up on the wall and both of his hands in his front pockets. He was wearing an army-green scully with his dreads resting on his shoulders, a white thermal, an army fatigue jacket, a pair of baggy jeans and Timbs.

There was a light coating of snow falling from the sky and some of the flakes landed and melted on his face.

Yuri started fanning herself.

“Why are you sweating?” Jeff asked as he handed the cab driver money for the ride and a tip. “It’s the dead of winter.”

Yuri couldn’t speak, especially since she’d stepped out of the cab and her knees were incredibly weak. As she went to take a step, one of her legs gave way, twisting the heel of her Mary Jane stiletto.

“Dammit.” She stumbled, trying her hardest not to look at Britt as he twirled the toothpick in his mouth, his tongue flicking back and forth. Just looking at him was making her feel faint, as she wondered what the hell he was doing here. Was he trying to swing his dick in her husband’s face? Didn’t he know better than to leave his post and show up at her front door? And he said
she
didn’t know how to play this game; was
he
insane? It didn’t matter that they were all from Brooklyn and went to high school together. What mattered was the here and now, what they were to one another today.

Okay, this is what she planned to do: see and not see him; in essence, wave her hand and keep it movin’. Hell, he was outside the building and she doubted it very seriously if he was bold enough to try and come in.

“Wassup, Jeff?” Britt said as he and Jeff gave each other a brotherly hug and handshake.

“Britt,” Jeff said in an upbeat surprise, “it’s been a long time. Congratulations on your CD.”

“Thanks. And, yeah, it has been a long time. I’ve been trying to reach…your wife.” He stared at Yuri. “I got a new CD dropping and you know this chick can sing her ass off, so I needed to talk to her about a remix.”

“I stopped singing,” Yuri snapped. “All I do is rhyme now.” She fumbled for her keys to get into the building.

“Funny, I don’t remember you having a sense of humor.” Britt curled his lips.

“Oh, she a real Mo’Nique these days,” Jeff said as he took Yuri’s keys and opened the entrance door. “Britt, come on in.”

“Thanks, Jeff, I sure will.”

Yuri could’ve shitted on herself, suddenly she felt as if she had diarrhea. Britt walked in behind them and as Yuri walked past him he squeezed her ass.

“Would you like something to drink, Britt?” Jeff asked as he opened the apartment door and tossed Yuri’s keys on the glass table. “Some wine, perhaps?”

“Yeah, that sounds good,” Britt responded, while conveniently standing in a position where he could unnoticeably stare at Yuri.

“Yuri, fix the man a glass and y’all talk about the remix or whatever. You’ll have to excuse me.” He looked at Britt. “I’ma need to grab a shower and change.”

“No problem.” Britt gave a sly smile. “I understand.”

Yuri sauntered into the kitchen with Britt following behind her. She opened the wine cooler and did her best to play things off until she heard the bathroom door close. “What the fuck are you doing here?” she snarled.

“What’s yo’ problem, man? And don’t shoot me no bullshit.”

“Right now, my problem is you trying to get me put out. And since my mother moved back to Chicago, my resources on where I’ma go…are limited.”

“Well, I ain’t fuckin’ movin’ until you talk to me like you got some damn sense.” He slid into the breakfast nook. “And if need be, I will sleep here.”

“Britt”—her hand began to shake as she opened the six-foot-tall wine cooler—“ou gotta leave.”

“Really? I guess you didn’t hear what I just said.”

Yuri peeked at the doorway, she couldn’t see too well through the frosted glass, but from what she could see she was able to make out the bathroom door still being closed. “Listen,” she said through clenched teeth, “it’s not about me loving you. Hell, I’ve loved you since the eighth grade, and no matter how hard I try, the shit won’t go away. But I’m tired of being with you and not being with you at the same time. My marriage is about security and that’s what I need…to be safe.”

“And I guess calling you a buncha fat asses, jumping up in the middle of the night to see if you had something to eat and telling you he hates that you lost weight keeps you real safe. You damn sure,” he said sarcastically, “will remain intact with that.”

Yuri stood silent for a moment. She hated that Britt’s words made sense. “Look, I can’t take the chance you’ll wanna be with me, when you won’t even tell me you love me.”

“So we’re finished? You don’t want me?” Britt slid out from the nook and walked up so close to Yuri that she backed into the glass door of the wine cooler. The melting ice smudged and soaked into the back of her dress, causing the material to lay against her skin like a fresh coating of paint. She hated that this turned her on. “Please move, go call Troi.”