Page 19 of Marrying My Ex's Boss

I looked at her, then at them; the youngest one had an ice cream mustache and looked guilty as hell. “Aunty Mo-Mo said we could have it.”

“Aunty Mo-Mo?”

“This is grown folk business, Missy. Don’t get involved.” Believe it or not, she was talking to me, not the three pint-sized people she was corrupting.

“Alright, munchkins, who wants some more swizzle sticks?”

The noise level went up a notch, and all I could do was look back at Marcus, who was standing near the door with Carl by his side. Both of them with an indulgent look on their face.

I can see I’m going to have trouble on my hands when it comes to these three and my kids.

‘Oh, leave the poor kids alone, you stuck-up twit.’

You’re becoming more of a bitch every day.

‘Takes one, honey. By the way, that was hot as fuck back there. Diplomatic immunity bitch, you can suck a dick. I’d love to see the look on the old hag’s face when she hears she can’t do shit. Heyyyyyyyy.’

No!

‘Hear me out. Now that we have a free pass, shouldn’t we use that shit? I got a list.’

“What’s your twin conspiring now?”

“You don’t wanna know.” I’m gonna have to get used to him knowing my secret.

JUSTINE

Monique pulled me aside when the kids dragged Marcus and Carl over to their toy chest. “Look, you’re not the only one going through a divorce; those kids soon will be too. You’re an adult; you know your ex is a piece of shit; to them he's still Daddy.”

“I know Gracie has school tomorrow, but fuck school, she’s five. She ain’t learning shit at this age other than how to annoy people. What are you crying about?”

“Who’s crying?” Marcus jumped up from where he was kneeling, looking at one of the kid’s toys.

“Oh shit.” Monique rolled her eyes. “His crazy is on full display today.”

“No one is crying; she got something in her eye.” He didn’t look like he believed her and looked at me. I nodded my head to reassure him and tried not to cry. Once he was distracted by little Emma, she looked at me questioningly and mouthed the word ‘what.’

“You already know my daughters’ names.” She hugged me and then yelled at Marcus to mind his own business when it looked like he was going to come toward us.

“You’re gonna have your hands full with him. I’d call and warn your ex-mother-in-law not to force the issue unless she wanna come up missing.”

Why did I think she was serious? She nodded her head as if reading my thoughts. “It might take him a while to get used to being back here where everything isn’t settled with violence. That’s his love language.”

She cracked herself up with that one, and the two of us ended up howling with laughter, which caused the men to turn to us with suspicious looks, which only made us laugh harder.

* * *

After that whole thing with the cops, Marcus was torn about whether or not to spend the night, but in the end, I convinced him to leave. I wasn’t even sure how I was going to explain the divorce to my kids, let alone have them wake up to a strange man in the house.

When I turned my phone back on that night before I went to bed, there were a lot of missed calls and texts from my ex. He started out yelling at me for embarrassing him in front of his peers. Then he started with how he didn’t know what I thought I knew, but I was wrong because he wasn’t having an affair.

By the next day, he was cussing me and calling me out my name, then back to begging me to talk to him so we could get to the bottom of this. I turned my phone back off and went to sleep. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but I’ve been sleeping like a baby ever since that night.

You’d think I’d be up tossing and turning and wondering where he was because note, even with all the calls and texts, I haven’t seen hide nor hair of him since I kneed him in the balls.

I woke up the next morning waiting for the feeling of fear and anxiety to kick in, but there was none of that. I went downstairs and poured my first cup of coffee before sitting at the kitchen table and looking out the window at the birds that were picking at the seeds in the feeder.

My mind kept wanting to latch onto something, anything that would explain what I was feeling, but there were no words. When I thought of my ex, I didn’t feel burning rage like I did that first night. All I felt was a sense of… I don’t know, relief? Exasperation? I don’t know what to call it.

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