Page 5 of All This Love
“Stick with me kid. Soon enough, you’ll be into all kinds of shit.”
The bartender placed our drinks in front of us, and I took a sip of my Bahama Mama. “What do you do for a living?” I knew enough entrepreneurs and successful black men to know that being young, having gold teeth, tattoos, etc. didn’t always equate to street pharmacist.
“I sell a little weed here and there,” he replied casually.
Onyx drove a nice car, wore nice jewelry, designer clothes, and expensive shoes. I doubted he sold a ‘little’ anything, but I also didn’t expect him to confess to me if he was some big-time king pin.
“My father has an auto shop that he wants me to help him run. If I move here, that’s what I’ll spend most of my time doing.”
Bobbing my head, I took another sip of my drink. I could respect that. The money may have been good, but there was no longevity in drug dealing. It was nice to know that he had something else to fall back on.
“When will you know if you’re moving here?”
“Maybe a few weeks. I’ll be here for at least two weeks handling some business. I don’t know how long it’s going to take just yet but once that’s done, I’ll know for sure.”
“Why are you single?” Since I survived ziplining, I was for sure going to interrogate his ass. His answers and our chemistry on the date would determine whether or not I blocked him when we left the adventure park.
“I was with someone for two years, and she joined the military. Between basic training in South Carolina and AITschool in Georgia, we were apart for fourteen weeks. Then, she chose a duty station in Korea for a year. I wasn’t going to stop her from doing what she wanted to do, but I damn sure wasn’t going to Korea, and I knew she wouldn’t be able to come home like that. We chalked it up as a loss,” he shrugged passively. “That was a year ago, and I’ve just been living life and doing me since then.”
I knew people only told the parts of the story that they wanted to, but it was a relief to hear that it wasn’t cheating or some general fuck nigga shit that caused him to be single. So far, the only red flag I’d seen was the fact that Onyx liked to partake in pass times that could ultimately kill him. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that, but he was a nice guy. During our encounter when I did his pedicure, two phone conversations, and our date, he hadn’t made any crude sexual comments. There wasn’t one bad thing I could say about him, but it was still very early.
The bartender made my drink super strong, so two drinks had me giggly and feeling really good. I didn’t know Onyx well enough to give him my address, so I met him at the adventure park. He walked me to my car and promised to call. I couldn’t believe my giddy ass smiled all the way home. Of course, I had to tell someone, so I called my best friend, Fatima. She answered the phone in a muffled tone.
“What are you eating now, Big Back?” I teased. Fatima was seven months pregnant and literally ate every hour. She alternated between full-blown meals and weird snacks. I still believed there was an extra baby hiding in there somewhere because no way did she eat like ten men just from carrying one baby that at the moment only weighed three pounds.
“The baby wanted a Biscoff bundt cake. And a strawberry and cream cheese one. And a red velvet one.”
Cackling like a witch, I tossed my head back and had a good laugh. “Bro, stop blaming your gluttony on that baby. Fatima,that’s ridiculous. You’re going to weight six hundred pounds by the time you give birth. What happened to eating fruit when you wanted something sweet?”
“Didn’t you hear me say one of these cakes was strawberries and cream?”
“Okay, friend. I’ll change the baby’s diaper but rolling you over and washing in between your cracks and crevices won’t be on the list. Your husband will have to do that.”
“Anyway, bitch, what’s up?”
Before answering, I ran my tongue across my top row of teeth. “I just went out on a date with a fine ass man. I’m talking ‘bout that 90’s man kind of fine. That melt in your mouth not in your hand chocolate type man with waves and gold teeth.”
“Oh my God. And why are you on the phone? You didn’t fuck the saliva out of his mouth?”
“No,” I laughed. “Ivan damn sure isn’t as fine as him, but I’m trying not to be blinded by the wrong things and make another huge mistake.”
“Ugh. I hope you did your research and those aren’t his homeboy’s grills.”
“Girl! Not his homeboy’s grills,” I laughed. “I pray nobody is fronting that bad. That’s nasty. Nah, I don’t think they out here doing that.”
“You never know. Anyway, who is this man, and where did you meet him?”
I ran all of the details down for Fatima as I drove to my parents’ house to pick Angel up. The fact that I smiled the entire time that I talked was insane. No way should I be that enthralled after one date.
“Ohhh he’s not from Golden Waters, I love that. Prayerfully, the city’s finest sack chasers haven’t already put that demonic pussy on him.”
There was a group of five women that were dubbed The City’s Finest Sack Chasers. Between the five of them, they’d been with damn near every well known, financially stable man in the city from dope boys to minor celebrities, the most popular tattoo artists, DJ’s, club owners, you name it. Pretty much no penis had been left unturned. Once I found out a man had been with one of them, that instantly made him unattractive in my eyes. My gut literally churned at the thought of one of them getting their hands on Onyx.
“If he’s been here for more than a day, I’m sure one of them saw the bat signal,” I joked. “He doesn’t live here though, so there’s no need to think too far ahead. He’s not sure whether or not, he’s going to move here or remain in Charlotte.”
“That just means you have to work your magic and give him a reason to stay.”
“I don’t know about all that,” I mumbled as I turned into the driveway of my parents’ home.
