Page 1 of Somebody Else Will

He slidhis arms around me as I brushed my teeth, mentally preparing for a busy day. I had twelve deliveries, and that didn’t include bouquets I had to get ready for tomorrow. I glanced at Will in the mirror and wanted to roll my eyes. We’d been together for nearly two years, but he was hanging on by a thread.

“Good morning, baby,” he said and kissed my cheek.

He thought he put it down last night. That mediocre shit only irritated me and left me craving more. I snatched my rose off the nightstand and got myself off immediately afterward, while he lay there watching me. He was so fucking clueless. Like, how didn’t you understand that you didn’t satisfy me if I had to use a toy to get offafteryou were done?

If there was some logical medical explanation as to why he couldn’t seem to get me off, I would do my best to understand. He assumed I just didn’t cum during sex. The problem was that he didn’t try to figure outhowto make me cum during sex,despite my direction. My pleasure and satisfaction were second thoughts, if a thought at all, and I was sick of it.

I was glad I had my toothbrush in my mouth. I didn’t have to respond to him. It seemed I brushed even longer to avoid greeting him. When he walked out of the bathroom, I rolled my eyes and rinsed my mouth. If all the other aspects of our relationship were top tier, I would be willing to work with him on the sexual aspect of it. The truth was, he’d become an inconsiderate, self-absorbed jackass. Everything that concerned him revolved around howhefelt and no one else.

He never thought about how his lack of attention and affection impacted how my day went. I wanted to feel loved, cherished, adored… all that shit people in love were supposed to feel. My grandmother had it right when she said love could be like a flesh-eating cancer, just eating away at everything good until there was nothing left. It felt that way with me, because for some crazy reason, I was still with him, putting up with his mediocrity and toxicity.

It felt like I was on the bullshit that said it was better to have a piece of man than to not have a man at all. I used to be the first person to roll my eyes at the thought of that, but after evaluating myself, I realized I was doing that exact thing. Masking it as being patient and waiting for him to fulfill his potential was toxic at best, but I couldn’t seem to find the audacity to tell him to get the hell out of my house.

I believed I was on the rebound and lonely. The man I had crushed on for years had me in the friend zone. I wasn’t as confident, and felt like he didn’t like big girls, so I never took my shot. However, when he called me to order flowers for a woman he was feeling, my heart dropped. What made it worse was that she was a fabulous BBW just like me. I had been treating him like a friend instead of a man that I wanted and missed my opportunity. My body language when I was around him said Iwasn’t interested. That was my fault. Now he was married to her, and they had a beautiful baby girl.

Once a month, I had to travel to Houston to pick up purple magnolias for his wife, and it only depressed me more, knowing that I could have had a man that worshipped the ground I walked on. Ford was everything I wanted, and I let his fine ass slip right from my fingertips. Struggling with the loss, I picked up Will, hoping he would be just as great.Wrong!

He was great in the beginning. They all were. Once he got comfortable, that was it. The excessive affection slowed to barely any at all. The only time he was affectionate was either before sex or right afterward. I was lacking so much, and he couldn’t see it because his own desires were blinding him to every and anything else.

I finished my hygiene routine then went back into the bedroom to get dressed, and he was lying in bed, stroking his dick. I took a deep breath and exhaled loudly. “Will, I don’t have time. I have a lot of work to do today.”

I walked right by him and headed to my closet while he frowned. He could fuck himself. Staring at him while he was naked didn’t even turn me on anymore.Why am I still putting up with this shit?

“Come on, Nishia. You know you want this dick.”

I rolled my eyes for the umpteenth time, then walked back into the bedroom and got in bed with him, sliding down his dick.Why am I this way?My mind was never in the moment, so I didn’t know how I stayed wet. She definitely had a mind of her own to achieve that. He didn’t care about passion or love. He just wanted to be fucked. I bounced on his shit fast and hard to get him off so I could leave.

Within literally three minutes, he’d fired off in my depths.Thank God for birth control.“Damn, girl! I knew you wanted this. You can’t resist it.”

He chuckled as I hurriedly left the bed and went to the shower. I didn’t understand why I did this shit to myself. It was like I needed to be reprogrammed. I realized that he put his needs first because I put his needs first too. How could I make him see the things I needed when I pushed them to the back burner all the time?

Once I was done, I hurriedly went back to the bedroom to get dressed. I wouldn’t have time to stop at Starbucks before going to the storefront now. Happily Ever After Floral Shop was my baby. I put my all into it to make it a successful business. It was the one thing I invested a lot of time in that benefited me. Because of my hard work, the revenue sustained me… and Will, apparently, since the nigga only worked part-time.

He didn’t have to go to work until noon, so he was under the covers, going back to sleep. He didn’t have a care in the world. After losing his full-time job, he hadn’t been in a hurry to find another one. When we met, he was working both jobs, showing me that he was a hustler… a go-getter. I spoiled him. I took care of him too well, especially since he wasn’t my husband. I was trying to show him that I was wifey material.

That engagement was still pending. At this rate, I didn’t want the shit. He was living with me because I wanted to help him after he lost his job. The only thing he did that benefited me was keep the house clean. Thankfully, he was a neat freak. He couldn’t stand clutter, chaos, or disorganization. Every now and then, he cooked as well.

After I finished getting ready, I left the house without telling him bye. He was asleep anyway. Checking the time, I saw it was a quarter to eight. The shop opened at eight. I typically liked to be there twenty to thirty minutes before. As I whipped my car around the corner, my phone rang. When I saw Ford’s number, my heart softened a bit.

“Hey, Ford. What’s up?”

“Hey, Denishia. I need to cancel my delivery for the month. I forgot to reschedule it for earlier this month. We’ll be out of town.”

“Okay. No problem. How’s everything?”

“Everything’s good. We’re taking Naima to Disney World before it gets too hot.”

Naima was his daughter. She was only two or three. “Oh, okay! Well, y’all have fun.”

“We will. You good? You sound somewhat down. I can tell you’re trying to force excitement.”

I took a deep breath, wanting to close my eyes. “I’m okay. Just some personal stuff going on.”

“Well, you know I’m a great listener. I would like to think we’re friends, right?”

“Of course, we are.”

A friend I wish was more.There was no way I would go into telling Ford about my relationship drama, bullshit I was allowing for the sake of not being alone. We knew one another from school but only as acquaintances. We were closer now than we were back then. I kind of hid in the shadows, and he was a star basketball player. He was so laser focused on the game, though, he didn’t notice all the girls that were crushing on him.

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