Page 8 of Candid Moments
“I know you don’t know me but it’s a blizzard out there. The roads are closed and there are no other options. I can practically hear my momma’s voice in my head yelling if I don’t help a Black woman in distress. For my momma, please share my room with me.”
A smile creeps across her face then she shakes her head. “For your momma and because I’m pretty pathetic and homeless right now in this shitty ass town, I will but can I see your license?”
“My license?”
“Yes, please,” she insists with her hand held out.
“My name is Denim.”
“Okay. Your license please, Denim.” After pulling my wallet from my pocket, I produce my driver’s license and place it in her awaiting hand. She examines it. “Crescent Falls? I definitely know where this is and so do my Manor cousins,” she says, smirking. The Manor neighborhood is notorious in Crescent Falls.
She knows my town.
“Are you from Crescent Falls?” I ask.
“Born and raised in The Manor but currently reside in The Millennium,” she says proudly. CFers will represent and I love that about us. “I’m Jamila, by the way.”
“Nice to meet you, Jamila. You good now?”
She presses her phone dramatically, then looks up to me. “License sent. Now, I’m good. And for the record, I do have a taser and mace.”
“Calm down, killer. You won’t have to use either on me. Scouts’ honor, I am a gentleman and I’m my momma’s son.”
While eyeing me suspiciously, she asks, “Were you even a boy scout?”
After pressing the up button on the elevator, I mumble, “Hell no.”
Jamila
Desperate times call for even more desperate ass measures.
In less than an hour, my entire world just turned upside-freaking-down. The man I thought I knew and loved is a lying, cheating, fuck boy. Not only has he concealed his government name from me for over a year, he also had the gall to bring me all the way to this little ass town, in the dead of winter, during a blizzard, and fuck on his high school bitch and pocket dial me so I can hear him cheat.
The fucking nerve!
I’m so overwhelmed with fury that there’s no room for me to acknowledge or even address my heartbreak. My anger has been fueling all of my actions since I walked into that suite. It caused me to smack the shit out of him, pour the ice bucket filled with half-melted ice into his suitcase back in our room, throw his iPad over the balcony, and slap the shit out of him when I stormed out of the room. He disgusts me and I refuse to share any space with him any longer.
I expected to get my own room for the night and catch a red eye in the morning. That was the plan but the universe decided to fuck with me just a little bit more: no rooms, blizzard, closed roads, and grounded planes. Just like Cornelius and his little mistress, the universe is a bitch. She is giving me the blues today and I’m over it. So over it that I’m walking into a hotel room with a stranger.
Denim.
My kindred spirit.
The warm shoulder I cried on.
My rescuer.
Denim Morris from my town, Crescent Falls.
“You take the bed and I’ll have the sofa,” he says as soon as we step inside.
“No. This is your room. I’ll take the sofa and you the bed. There’s no way you can lay on that.” For a woman, I consider myself pretty tall. I’m five foot eight and a half and when I had on my six-inch heels earlier, he was taller than me and now, he’s towering over my tall, thick frame. “How tall are you anyway?”
“Six-four and I think this is a sofa bed.” He leaves the bags by the door then walks over to the bed. After lifting the cushions, he glances back at me. “I was wrong but I can make this work.”
“You won’t because I won’t let you. I appreciate you letting me crash here. At this point, I would be happy with the floor so the sofa is a luxury. I’m good.”
After dragging my luggage and tote to the sofa, I plop down on it, claiming my sleeping domain before he can object.I’m hungry, exhausted, and ready to take a long hot shower so I can leave this nightmare in my dreams. “Thanks again for letting me stay. I’m going to pay my share. In the morning, we can discuss your preferred method of payment but tonight, I’m buying dinner. I’m starving and about to order room service.”
