Borrow Trouble (8 page)

W
hen I found out I was pregnant, the first person I called up was Inez.

“I am so happy for you!” she squealed. “I can't wait to tell my girls. Those two little monkeys are always asking me how come their auntie Renee doesn't have any kids of her own.” Inez paused and then started talking in a low, serious voice. “How is the proud papa taking this blessed news?”

“I don't think he's going to be anybody's proud papa when I tell him,” I told her, gripping the telephone in my sweaty hand. “He wanted us to wait.” Leon's daughter, Collette, had only been to the house a few times since I'd moved in. I liked the girl. She was no better or worse than any of the other kids her age that I knew. At least, that's the way she was around me. However, Leon had one horror story after another to tell me about how Collette misbehaved when he was alone with her. He'd even told me about an episode at the mall where she had thrown a major hissy fit because he had refused to buy her the new Prince CD. She had stomped out of the music store and run into the mall atrium, screaming, until a burly security guard calmed her down.

“You have to make young kids feel like they are important. Especially girls,” I told Leon when he told me about Collette's tantrum at the mall.

“Well, from now on when she comes to visit and wants to go to the mall, you take her,” he told me. His voice was cold and steely, and his jaw twitched.

Leon was not a patient man. Even when it came to his daughter. So I knew that I always had to watch my step with him. I eventually reached a point where I could pretty much read him like a book. As long as it wasn't too much of a hardship, I bent over backwards to keep the peace between myself and Leon.

Whenever Collette visited now, I volunteered to take her to the mall before she even asked, and she seemed to enjoy my company. When I refused to buy her something, she didn't even sulk. I had a way with kids, which was why I had chosen a teaching career, and why I was looking forward to having one of my own in a few months.

“Leon is so full of surprises, I never know what to expect from him. But I hope he's happy about the baby. He's been awfully nice lately. And by the way, I am glad to see that the two of you are acting more and more civil to each other these days,” I told Inez.

“I'd still keep my guard up if I were you,” Inez advised, with a snort. “Leon wears a mask more often than a full-time bandit.”

“What's that supposed to mean? Look, I know he is trying his best to tolerate you—”

“Tolerate me? What in the world…why…That's a strange word,” Inez said, cutting me off in mid-sentence. “I have never met a man yet who felt he had to tolerate me. I won't
tolerate
behavior like that from a man!”

“Well, Queen of Sheba, if you feel that way, why should you care if my man only tolerates you? He sleeps with
me.”

I didn't like the silence on the other end of the line.

“Did you hear what I said? Leon sleeps with me,” I said in a firm voice.

Inez cleared her throat before speaking again. “Now, yes. But I assure you that Leon wasn't a virgin when you hooked up with him, like Robbie was.”

“Where is this conversation going?” I demanded. “How did we get from talking about my pregnancy to talking about Leon and Robbie?”

“I didn't want to go there. You brought up Leon. I didn't.”

“No, you brought him up. You started talking all that shit about him wearing masks. What is your problem, girl?”

Inez gritted her teeth and let out a tremendous sigh. “I am sorry, Renee. I don't like it when people talk trash about my men, so I should know better. It's just that…I don't want to see you get hurt.”

“Hurt how? Why are you so worried about me getting hurt? What do you think Leon is going to do to me?”

“Renee, let's just drop it. I am happy for you, and I will pray that you have a healthy baby.” Inez sniffed. “Where do you want to have drinks tomorrow?”

“That bar on Morrison is nice. Ernie's.”

“That's fine with me. But I am telling you right here and now, you will not drink any alcohol! I don't want that baby coming here with two heads and hooves.” Inez laughed.

I laughed, too. But a strange feeling came over me. I was not satisfied with her responses as to why she seemed so concerned about Leon hurting me. I knew Inez well enough to know that she was not the type to hold back critical information. Especially when it involved me.

When I arrived at Ernie's Bar on Morrison Street the next evening after work, enduring a bumpy fifteen-minute bus ride because Leon wasn't answering his cell phone and I didn't have money for a taxi, Inez was sitting in a booth in the back. Shonda and Pat from her nail shop were with her.

So was my husband, Leon.

It was too late for me to slink back out of the door without being seen. If Inez had not spotted me and started waving and drawing attention to me, I would have made a U-turn and left that place, running. The way Leon looked at me, wide-eyed and amused, you would have thought that I was naked. I sat down hard next to him, purposely hitting his knee with mine. I pinched his thigh under the table, not surprised that he didn't even react.

“Did I miss anything?” I asked, forcing myself to smile.

“Shonda and Pat insisted on joining us,” Inez explained, looking at Leon as she spoke.

He cleared his throat before speaking. “And as I was on my way out, these lovely ladies were on their way in. They invited me to have a drink with them,” he volunteered, scratching the back of his head so hard, sparks flew off. Normally, when we ran into each other in public, he greeted me with a kiss. He didn't kiss me this time, and that surprised and disappointed me. If anything, he seemed annoyed by my presence.

“Well, I won't stay long,” I said. I was beginning to get used to Leon doing things that surprised me. “Baby, I thought you were going to visit your uncle in the nursing home?”

“I did. But he was so out of touch, he didn't even know me,” Leon said sadly. His elderly uncle Martin had been struggling with Alzheimer's for several years now and was in a nursing home in Shaker Heights. I visited the old man more often than Leon.

I patted Leon's hand for the benefit of the others at the table, but as soon as everybody looked away, I pinched his hand and whispered, “You just wait'll I get your black ass home, you nasty buzzard.” I planned to read him the riot act. He ignored my threatening words as he delivered a delayed but passionate kiss on my lips, his tongue darting in and out of my mouth like a serpent's. I was glad that I'd eaten a garlic pizza for lunch. My breath was so foul, it made him cough.

As usual, Inez dominated the conversation. She had more adventures than a pirate, and she loved to talk about them all. She and her rich Iranian were still going strong, but she had gone behind his back and spent a night with her second ex-husband, on a mercy fuck mission for his benefit. Everybody at the table, except Leon, laughed as Inez regaled us with one blue story after another.

I didn't know what that woman did to her men to make them so devoted to her, even after she dumped them. I had asked her several times what it was that she did to them that was so potent. Each time she'd just winked at me and told me that whatever it was she did in bed, it was her “fucking” business.

I finally stopped asking her when she told me one day that smart women didn't share their bedroom secrets. I considered myself to be a smart woman. But I knew that I would never have that kind of control over men, even if I brought a gun to bed with me. One of the many things that I was thankful for was the fact that Inez and I had never competed for the same man. And there was no reason for me to believe that we ever would. As far as I was concerned, I was married to Leon for life. And Inez could hop into as many beds with as many men as she wanted to. I just hoped that my girl would settle down and be with one man on a permanent basis before it was too late. I knew of a few elderly sisters in the neighborhood, some in my own family, who had spent the best years of their lives playing musical beds. But now their most frequent companion was loneliness. I looked at Inez and blinked back a tear, hoping that she would not end up in that club. She caught my gaze and gave me a puzzled look. I grabbed a napkin and pretended that I had something in my eye.

I didn't order anything when the waitress came to the table. Instead, I looked at my watch and rose, pulling Leon up by his hand.

“Baby, we need to get going. I need to stop off at the grocery store and pick up a few things for dinner,” I said.

Leon was hesitant, but with an annoyed groan, he rose, dropping a wad of bills onto the table.

“You sisters have a nice evening,” he said, following me out of the door. As soon as we got outside, he got loose. “Woman, I don't appreciate you clowning me in public like you just did,” Leon barked, shaking a finger in my face the same way I often did with my unruly students.

“I don't know what you are talking about. I didn't expect to see you in that bar with all those women,” I snapped, hands on my hips. We had reached his Range Rover, parked at the curb. I stood by the passenger's side, with my mouth hanging open. He snatched open the door on his side and jumped in and started up the motor.

“I need to talk to you,” I said, opening my door and easing into my seat. I kept my eyes on his face the whole time.

He stepped on the gas, and the vehicle shot off like a bullet. “I'm listening,” he said, grunting and glaring at me. He frowned when he noticed that I didn't have my seat belt on. “Don't you need to buckle up?”

“Uh…I think I can make it home all right without it.”

“Baby, I know you don't like the way the seat belt wrinkles your skirt, but I think your safety is more important. Now buckle up that seat belt before I buckle it for you.”

“My stomach is feeling kind of weird, so I don't want that belt strapped against it.”

“What's wrong with your stomach? And how come you didn't order a drink? Oh, I know. All of that crap coming out of Inez's mouth made me queasy, too.”

“Inez didn't say anything worse this evening than she's said before. I don't think that there is anything she can say that would make me sick,” I said, speaking like I was reading a cue card.

“So, what is wrong with you then? Why are you looking and acting like a zombie?”

“Leon, I was hoping to tell you in a more romantic setting, but I guess this will have to do.” I stopped and looked at Leon. “I…We are going to have a baby.”

He shook his head and cussed under his breath. Then he started laughing.

“I know you don't want any more kids right now, but I'm pregnant, and we have to deal with it,” I said, crossing my legs. I was losing steam. I was no longer interested in telling him off when we got home.

He laughed again. Then he did something that surprised me more than finding him in the bar with three women. He pulled to the side of the road and stopped. Then he leaned over and kissed me long and hard.

“I hope that means we are not going to fight about what I just told you,” I said meekly. I licked my lips, savoring his kiss. “We'll have a beautiful baby….”

He let out a hearty sigh before he replied. “And it better be a boy,” he said, with a smug sniff.

“Does that mean you're happy about this?” I asked. I was apprehensive, to say the least. This man was full of too many surprises for me not to be.

He pulled another surprise out of his bag of tricks. He pulled into the parking lot of a motel at the corner, even though we were only a few minutes away from our house.

“What are we stopping here for?” I wanted to know, looking around the deserted parking lot. This was the kind of place that rented rooms by the hour, with nervous couples coming and going at all times.

“Bring your fine ass on,” Leon ordered, pulling me by the hand out of the Range Rover. We checked into a room, where he made love to me like it was the first time.

In a way it was. Things would never be the same between us after that day.

M
y pregnancy was very difficult. My morning sickness got so severe and went on for so long that I had to take my leave of absence from work three months earlier than I had originally planned. I had backaches that would wake the dead. No matter what I ate or drank, it gave me indigestion.

Mama and Inez took turns coming to the house to sit with me while Leon was at work. I was so clumsy and bloated, making love was so awkward that Leon stopped sleeping with me. Even though Dr. Lukas had said that it was all right for us to continue making love up until my eighth month as long as it was not painful or uncomfortable for me. I was just seven and a half months along, but Leon still wouldn't make love to me. Every time I tried to seduce him, he ran. Some nights he even took a blanket and slept downstairs on the living-room sofa.

“I offered to do other things for him,” I confessed to Inez during one of her goodwill stops. “He doesn't even want me to touch him,” I moaned.

“Well, if that's the case, there is nothing you can do about that,” she told me, leaning over my bed to fluff the three pillows under my head. Inez was dressed like she was on her way to participate in a fashion show. Her head was wrapped in a red turban, and the black leather jumpsuit that she had on showed off every curve she had. And, like always, her make-up was flawless. I looked like hell. My hair was all over my head, and my face was puffy, and as dry and rough as sandpaper. My belly looked like I had swallowed a large watermelon whole.

“But I don't want him to get impatient and horny enough to get his lovemaking somewhere else,” I said, with a groan.

Inez spoke without looking at me. “Do you think he would?”

“Well, the man is a man. I know you know a lot more about men than I do, but even I know that when a man's in heat, he'll stick his dick in a hole in a wall. If Leon won't let me touch him, I don't know what else to do to keep him out of another woman's bed.”

“I can get you some saltpeter,” Inez said, looking over her shoulder toward the door. Mama and Frankie were downstairs.

“What's that?”

“It's this shit that they used to sprinkle on convicts' food in some prisons to help suppress their sex drive,” Inez explained. “I like to think of it as Viagra in reverse.”

“Where do you get it from? Have you used it before?”

“Don't worry about where I get it from. I've told you before that smart women don't reveal all their bedroom secrets. But, yes, I have used it. I used it on my second husband. I had some problems with bleeding when I was pregnant with Malena, so I couldn't get too cozy with Paul in the bedroom. I had to do something to calm him down, keep him from fucking other women.”

“Did it work?”

Inez chuckled and nodded her head, standing over me with her hands on her hips. “Oh, it worked all right. And it kept on working, long after I'd stopped stirring it in his food.” There was a distant look on Inez's face. “I loved that man. But the last six months of our marriage, he couldn't “cum” if I called him. It would take me an hour just to get him aroused. Then, before he could do anything, his peter would peter out and go as limp as a wet dishrag.” Inez threw her hands up in disgust.

“I sure don't want to take any chances with that shit. Especially after it backfired on you and Paul,” I said, shaking my head. “All I can do is pray that Leon honors his vows.”

“Can I ask you something personal? You don't have to answer me if you don't want to. But if you do, I want an honest answer,” Inez said, a serious look on her face. She sat down gently on the edge of my bed, looking at me in such a strange way that I got nervous and scared.

“What?”

“Would you cheat on Leon if the right man approached you? And use your imagination. I'm talking about somebody truly hard to resist. A hot piece of property, like a Denzel or a Will Smith.”

I shrugged. “I don't care that much for Denzel or Will,” I lied.

Inez held up her hand. “Be serious. And I only want an honest answer.”

I shook my head. “I would never cheat on my husband, period. I'm not that kind of woman,” I said, meaning every word.

“What if he gave you a reason to cheat?”

“What reason would justify cheating?” I gasped. There were times when I said things that I immediately wished I could suck back into my mouth. The words that I'd just spoken had an ominous feel to them. And not just that. What I'd just said sounded downright naïve. Nothing justified cheating. People either did it, or they didn't. They didn't need a reason.

“Renee, you've got so much to learn.” Inez laughed.

“Would you cheat on your man?”

Inez covered her mouth with her hand and laughed so hard, she shook.

“Oh, I forgot,” I said, with a sigh, bowing my head. I was embarrassed. Everybody in town knew what a free spirit Inez was. She was still involved with the Iranian, but she was also seeing a man from Jamaica who had followed her home after her last trip. He had sold his business in the islands and was living in a flophouse near downtown Cleveland, just so he could be near Inez. It frightened and intrigued me to know that there were women with that much sexual power. In a way, I was glad I was the way I was. Having that kind of power could be a very dangerous weapon for a confused woman like me to keep under control. It would probably end up controlling me.

“Let me give you some advice, sister. Never say never,” Inez quipped, leaning over my bed.

“I don't want to cheat on my husband,” I said. “I hope I never find myself in a position where I'd want to,” I added hopefully. “My own mama told me that as long as I made my husband happy, he would not have any reason to even look at another woman.”

“Little Mama, you are twenty-six years old now, not sixteen,” Inez said, her mouth hanging open after she'd stopped speaking.

“So? What's that got to do with anything?”

“You've been to college. You are not some naïve country girl just off a bus from Hicktown, Mississippi.”

“I don't need you to tell me about myself. My mama does enough of that. But my mama is a smart woman, and she usually knows what she's talking about.”

“Your mama told you that as long as you keep your man happy, he wouldn't go with other women? Well, I know your mama, and I am sure she
thought
she knew what she was talking about,” Inez said, with a thoughtful look.

“Uh-huh,” I muttered. I didn't have the nerve to tell Inez that when I was around nine, my mother had thrown my daddy out of the house because she'd caught him with another woman. All I could think of was that my mother had not kept my daddy happy. Mama did everything she could to get Daddy back. Until the day he died, she treated him like a king. I loved Leon, but I did have some limitations, some things I would not tolerate. I just didn't know how far I could be pushed before I pushed back.

“Sister, your mama lied to you. You could be the sexiest, best-looking woman on the planet, and your man would still fuck another one!”

“Why would he?”

“Why wouldn't he? Because he's a man, dammit!”

I wanted to slap that damned turban right off of Inez's know-it-all head. This conversation was getting on my nerves, but I wasn't going to change the subject until I'd said everything I had to say. “Well,” I started, rolling my eyes up at the ceiling before continuing. “
If
Leon wants to cheat on me, he will. I can't stop him.”

“You sure can't,” Inez agreed, with a vigorous nod. This was one of the few times that I couldn't wait for her to leave the premises.