Cheaters (38 page)

I hung up on her.

Tammy adjusted her peach satin robe and said, “Dag. What did you do, Darnell, swing rope to rope or hitchhike on a 747?”

“Took Highland, waved my Uzi, threw up a gang sign, yelled ‘Westside,’ and people moved out of my way.”

She laughed and her breasts bounced.

I laughed too. It was right before noon. She’d called me at my job this morning, told me that she had some news to share with me. Without a second thought I took off from work and drove through the flooded streets and freeways toward Hollywood.

I asked, “Did I get here too quick?”

“You got here a lot sooner than I expected. I just stepped out of the shower. This place is atrocious. I was at rehearsal half the night and didn’t have time to clean up.”

I closed her front door behind me. Stepped from the mists of North Hollywood into a rectangular room with off-white walls, plenty of furniture, lots of pictures. African sculptures here and there. A kitchen table draped in bright yellow. Dramatic but not overbearing. Lots of candles. The incense aroma in the air was circulated by a slow-moving ceiling fan.

She asked, “You have a hard time finding Chandler Boulevard?”

“Directions were good. All I had to do was follow your fragrance to the peaceful-colored two-story stucco building right next to North Hollywood High.”

“You look good. I love men in wet suits.”

We hugged. Caressed a little longer than was necessary.

I said, “Your music is jamming. CD or radio?”

“CD. Sista named Smooth. Hip-hop soul on the true R&B tip.”

Her damp hair was wavy, smelled like strawberries. Her robe, short and clinging. A million fantasies raced through my mind.

I asked her, “So, what did you have to tell me?”

“Be patient. I’ll tell you while we share our writing.”

“Good news or bad news?”

“Depends. Could be neither, could be both.”

“You’re a tease.”

She winked. “When I need to be. A woman’s prerogative.”

I smiled. She pressed her lips against mine. A stage kiss.

“Get comfy,” she said with a hungry sigh as she eased away from me. “I’ll be back in a sec.”

“Where are you going?”

“I’m a mess.” She pouted. “Hair’s wet. Oh, I’ve let you see me without my face on. Plus I don’t even have drawers on yet.”

That last sentence startled me, aroused me.

She adjusted her gown to show less of her breasts, but most of her legs showed at the split, and her nipples stood high and mighty underneath her robe. Awake and staring. I watched her thickness sway across her gray carpet, a barefoot stroll that had a rhythmic flow, eyed her as she kept her flirty eyes on me.

She grinned, eased her tongue out, stirred the air.

I did the same.

She asked, “You feel me?”

“I feel you. See you. Taste you. Smell you.”

“Me too. And I hear your thoughts, Darnell.”

“Read my mind to me.”

She leaned against the doorjamb and baptized me with a smile. “In some strange way, I want to be completely yours too. Can’t get you off my mind, no matter what. I was so nervous waiting for you. Scared of what might happen when you got here. That’s why I’m not ready. I bathed longer than I usually do, couldn’t figure out what to do with my hair. Felt fat. Looked in the mirror and hated my thighs.”

“You’re fine. I’m the one who should be running to find a tofu sandwich.”

As her subtle smile disappeared into the bedroom, her voice flowed from her den of sin. “Make yourself at home. Juice in the fridge. My new headshots are on the table. Tell me what you think.”

She eased the bedroom door up, but I didn’t hear it click.

I’d expected to see a shrine of Nina Simone photos, but there was only one photo of Nina, a framed picture that shared a wall with Dorothy Dandridge and Sarah Vaughan. In the picture Nina was young, dark-skinned, hair in a bob.

I put my attaché case down on her kitchen table. Behind a vase of fresh-cut flowers were a stack of black-and-white headshots. A flyer for the play
Who Will Be There for Us
was on the table, next to six tickets, all stamped with the word comp. I stared out the window at the rain that was leaving lake-sized puddles in the tennis and basketball courts at North Hollywood High. Then I moved her
Dramalogue
and
JAZZIZ
magazines to the side.

Smooth’s music grooved me while I twiddled my thumbs.

Pictures of jazz greats Charlie Parker, Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday, Astrud Gilberto, and Antonio Carlos Jobim were on another wall. Movies from Spike Lee to Hitchcock. CDs from BeBe Winans to Missy Elliott to Bonnie Raitt.

What I was looking for, I didn’t see. No family pictures.

Photographs of her, Chanté, and Karen, smiling and hugging, were in one of the cubbyholes on her entertainment center.

A sweet smell came in and pulled my attention toward the bedroom. Tammy must have been putting on perfume, dabbing drops on her pulse points, between her thighs, the same woman thing that Dawn did every morning.

Anything that happened today, I wondered if I could leave it between me and God. Or if I would break down and throw myself at the feet of my wife-for-life.

I called out, “Where’s the bathroom?”

“This way. To the left.”

Tammy’s bedroom door wasn’t closed, open wide enough for me to see her on her four-post bed, on top of her green and gold comforter, wearing jeans, still barefoot. Her hair pinned up in a French roll. Sitting still. Wearing no bra.

Breasts not hidden. Dark nipples on cream-colored flesh. An awesome contrast. I stared. She wore red lipstick, eyes on me, her mouth open wide enough for me to see the pink of her tongue.

Fresh-cut flowers were on her pearl-colored dresser.

I pushed her door part of the way open.

She didn’t jump, or reach for something to cover herself.

Tammy swallowed, licked her lips before she asked, “How was work today?”

My eyes stayed on hers, my mouth so watery I thought I was about to drown in my own saliva. “I’m working on a settlement offer to Circus Circus. They shipped ammunition, another hidden shipment of explosives that they neglected to tell FedEx about.”

“Seems like everybody has to hide something.”

I nodded. “Last week I sent a notice out for one hundred thousand. They offered twenty thousand.”

“Big difference in what you want and what they want to give you.” Her hands touched her breasts, squeezed them, then she let them go. She said, “Sometimes you have to take what you can get.”

“There’s always a middle ground.”

“Not always.”

“I’m going to reject it and send a letter out for fifty thousand. I want thirty-five, but that’s how you play the game.”

Her eyes were soft, so agreeable.

She spoke airily. “Yes. That is how you play the game. When you can’t get what you want, maybe not as much as you want, I guess you drop your standards and accept a lower offer.”

With care, I replied, “Just because you accepted a different offer, that doesn’t mean you’ve lowered your standards.”

Tammy patted the bed next to her. That was where I sat.

She loosened my tie, slowly, like she wanted to make sure what she was doing was okay by me. She unbuttoned my shirt. Folded both, lay them to the side, then pulled my T-shirt off.

For a moment I was topless, uncomfortable. Body conscious and uneasy with my physical faults. Until she touched me softly, told me she appreciated what she saw.

Even with the flaws, her eyes spoke of desire that went way beyond the physical.

Then we lay back and I held her. The only sounds were the Smooth CD playing an up-tempo tune. Which was good. The sound of that rain and the dark skies had already created a dangerous mood. Anything slow, anything too sensual would have added to the temperament in the air and made this moment explosive.

I had been feeling really unloved. And somebody had come along and made that feeling go away. I didn’t want to leave this moment. I was feeling as though I’d never be desirable again.

Consequences. Everything has a consequence.

I kissed Tammy. Soft tongues and heavy breathing. I held her breasts to my chest and savored her softness. That single kiss seemed to last for the better part of an hour.

She moaned, “Darnell, baby, your kisses are like lilac wine.”

“So are yours.”

I stopped swimming upstream against my emotions.

My hand drifted down, tried to find her zipper.

Her fingers caught mine, gently stopped my journey.

She whispered, “Darnell.”

“Yeah.”

She groaned. “I’m on my period.”

We laughed.

Within two hours the rain stopped. The sky was still gray. We were fully dressed, had finished critiquing each other’s work. Tammy had put on a white button-down blouse, lacy black bra.

For a while we had lounged across her bed, engaged in verbal intercourse about the art of writing, discussed character motivation. Talked about our ambitions.

Now we were at her table eating a chopped fruit salad topped with raspberry sauce. It tasted like cuisine for the gods.

I covered my mouth to keep from spitting out my food, laughed with Tammy, and said, “The band wants you to go to Perris with them? That’s no big deal. That’s on the other side of Mo Val.”

She sipped guava juice. “Not
Perris
, California.
Paris.
”

“France?”

“
Oui, oui monsieur.
That is where
Paris
is located.”

I was impressed. “Your French accent was great.”

“They’re going to Europe. All expenses paid. The two Nina Simone songs I did blew them away.”

I smiled, then felt an immediate emptiness when she added that she’d be gone for a month. Thirty days without water was forever. Already I felt the drought coming on.

I asked, “You tell your family?”

“Oh, please. Outside of my mother, those fools wouldn’t care one way or another. If I danced naked on top of the Eiffel Tower, they wouldn’t telegram me to get my yellow ass down.”

I cleared a lump from my throat, tried not to make my words sound too heavy when I said, chuckling, “Are you coming back?”

“Would you miss me if I didn’t?”

My answer was a vulnerable smile. But that numbness was still growing in the pit of my stomach. “What about Chanté and Karen? You tell them?”

“Not yet. And no, in case you’re wondering, I didn’t tell Bobby. Actually, I might not tell him at all.”

“How’s he treating you?”

“Well, the relationship has definitely reached a plateau. It’s kinda like working out. You reach a level, get comfortable, then you either have to work out harder, or get a new program.”

That reminded me of the Peter Principle. The rule that said every man eventually rises to his own level of incompetence. I wondered if the same applied to relationships. To marriages.

“Nope, he don’t know.” Her voice softened. “You’re the first to hear it from my lips. I wanted to tell you first.”

I reached across the table and took her hand. Her red fingernails matched her lipstick and the paint on her toes.

“What about the play?”

“I’ll do a few performances. Then an understudy will be glad to kick my butt out on Santa Monica Boulevard at curtain call. She’ll be happy as hell. It’s Hollywood. The show goes on.”

“So you’re going to go with the band.”

“Only a fool would turn down a free trip to Paris.”

She took a few bites of her salad; I did the same.

She swallowed, washed her food down with her juice, then asked me, “You think I shouldn’t go?”

“Only a fool would expect you not to go.”

We held hands a little longer. Our palms were sweaty.

A thousand years of wanting were in her voice when she asked, “Will you be able to come to opening night?”

I remembered the date on her flier. I said, “Your play opens mid-week.”

“On a Wednesday night. I’d love to see your face in the place.”

“I saw the date.” It hurt to do, but I shook my head, released truthful words that were hard to say. “Dawn has already made plans. We’re going to dinner and a movie.”

“That’s your first time saying her name.”

Cars passed by under her window, tires squelching on the wet pavement. Another skidded out on Chandler. Somebody who wouldn’t let their dreams be deferred by a day of rain was at the high school shooting hoops.

Tammy asked, “Can you come by Shelly’s tomorrow night?”

“I’ll try.”

“Even if you can only come for a quick minute, hang out in the back and at least wave at me. I’m working on a different Nina Simone song. My wink’ll mean it’s dedicated to us.”

Her words gave me a blissful feeling. “What song?”

“It’s in French,
Ne Me Quitte Pas
, and I’m really scared to sing it in front of a crowd of black people.”

“Why?”

“They might not appreciate it.”

“Don’t underestimate our people. Half of them hadn’t heard of Nina Simone, myself included. You’ve opened a lot of us up to a whole new world. New music. A new way of thinking.”

She smiled. “Be there for me, if you can.”

“I’ll try.”

We held hands a little tighter. Talked awhile. I must’ve drifted, or maybe a look was on my face, or something in my eyes.

She said, “Penny for your thoughts.”

I put what we had on the line, stayed honest, and took

the chance of offending her. “Do you ever dream about your child?”

“All the time. Think about it every day. When I see a baby that’s close to my complexion, I look and wonder if it’s mine.”

It.
Not him or her.
It.
She really didn’t know, hadn’t seen her own child. Would never see that child. That made me sad. Made my problems insignificant.

Tammy closed her eyes and hummed a melody that could soothe the world. One that could rock a baby to sleep. I closed my eyes, tried to latch on and travel to that same peaceful place.

She trembled a little. “I want to experience you before I go. Some of that love I see when you look at me, I want to take some of that kindness across the Atlantic with me.”