Mick Sinatra 4: If You Don't Know Me by Now (13 page)

“I had him
investigated when she first started dating him.
 
He’s clean.”

“On paper,
I’m sure.
 
But what about according to
daddy?”

“I don’t
care for him,” Mick said bluntly.
 
“I
don’t think he’s right for her.
 
But she
loves him and it’s her life.
 
Just as
long as he does not bring her any harm, I have to let her make her own
choices.”

“It’s just
seems like such an unhealthy relationship.”

“Oh, it is
that and more,” Mick said.
 
“But I’m
fairly certain most people would say that about your relationship with a man
like me.”

Roz couldn’t
help but smile.
 
“True that,” she said.

But as they
sat in the chairs and continued to play with, and be with, their babies, Roz
couldn’t shake the feeling that her relationship with Gloria was going south
fast.
 
Which would be a shame after the
closeness they once shared.
 
And for
Gloria to threaten her like that, as if she had the goods on her, bothered her
too.
 
She didn’t like people to feel as
if they had something over her head.
 
She
didn’t like that shit one bit.
 
She had
to talk to Gloria.
 
She had to see just
what she thought she knew.

Then she
dismissed such unproductive thoughts, and gave her children and husband the
attention they deserved.

Cecil Graham
walked into Roz’s office the next morning with a smile on his handsome
face.
 
He wore his usual attire: a
dashiki, an African
kufi
cap, and a backpack.
 
He considered himself a wanderer, and looked
the part.
 
Roz, seated behind her desk
and just hanging up her desk phone, smiled when she saw him.
 
“Daddy!” she said excitedly.
 
“I didn’t expect to see you today!”

“Surprise,
surprise,” Cecil said with a smile of his own as Roz hurried from behind her
desk and ran into his open arms. He was an oddball from way back, an aging
musician with a rock star,
never give up
mentality, and she loved him exactly the way he was.

When they
stopped embracing, she looked at him.
 
“What are you doing here?
 
I
thought you had a gig in Calgary.”

“I did, but
it was too damn cold for me.
 
Besides,
can’t I come and see about my little girl?”

“You know
you can.
  
Anytime!
 
Sit down, please,” Roz said.
 
“Want me to take your backpack?”

“Nobody
touches my backpack,” Cecil said and Roz, already knowing that answer, laughed.

Both of them
sat down in the chairs in front of her desk, with Cecil sitting his backpack on
the floor at his feet.

“But why
didn’t you come by the house?” Roz asked.
 
“You could have seen the twins.”

“No
thanks.
 
When they’re full human beings,
then I’ll see them.”

Roz was
flummoxed.
 
“
Full
human beings?
 
When will
they be fully human, Dad?”

“One year
old at the earliest,” he said.
 
Roz
laughed.
 
“I do not do babies, and
especially not two at a time.”

“You are the
weirdest person I know,” Roz said.
 
“Do
you realize that?”

“You know
you love me for it.
 
When you were a
child you couldn’t stop hanging around me and my weirdness.
 
I think that’s why we’re close today.
 
You can appreciate the artist in me, with all
of my uniqueness.
 
Nobody else in our
family even tries.”

Roz knew
exactly what he meant.
 
To the outsider
looking in, her father was a failure, a man with a college degree who blew the
good life in exchange for a career that went nowhere.
 
Since Roz’s career went nowhere too, they
empathized with each other on a level the rest of their family could not
fathom.

“So,” Cecil
said, “how’s your Daddy?”

Roz
frowned.
 
“How’s my
what
?”
 
Then she realized who
he meant.
 
“Very funny,” she said.
 
“Mick is fine, thank you very much.
 
And he is not my daddy.”

“That’s what
you think,” Cecil responded.

“And what is
that supposed to mean?”

“Mess up,
you’ll see.
 
He’ll have you over his
knee, or down on your knees, in a flash.”

Roz gave him
a dismissive wave of the hand.
 
“Nonsense, Dad.”

“I heard he
did some damage in New York.”

Roz looked
at him.
 
How in the world would he know
about what went down in New York?
 
“Damage?” she asked.
 
“What
damage?”

“Oh, come
now, little girl.
 
I get around.
 
I heard he damn near . . . Never mind what I
heard.
 
I’m sure he doesn’t go into those
kind of details with you, so I won’t either.
 
But they said he did what he did to protect you.
 
That true?”

Roz couldn’t
deny that.
 
“That’s true, yeah,” she
said.
 
“But I’m good.”

“Oh, I know
you are.
 
Mick the Tick don’t play.
 
I know that too.
 
But there’s a cost to be boss.
 
And there’s a cost for you,” Cecil said,
looking hard at his daughter, “because you’re the boss’s woman.”

Roz
nodded.
 
She couldn’t deny that
either.
 
“True.”

“How are you
holding up?
 
Y’all been married, what?
 
A year, two years?
 
How’s things been going?”

“Better than
you can imagine, Daddy.
 
We have a
wonderful relationship.”

“I’m glad to
hear that.”
 
Then Cecil exhaled.
 
“I wish the same was true with mine.”

Roz didn’t
understand.
 
“Yours?
 
I thought you were flying solo, Dad.
 
Don’t tell me you got married!”

“I am flying
solo!
 
I’m talking about that mother of
yours.”

“Mom?
 
What about her?”

“She’s
supposedly sick.”

“Sick?”

“Yeah.
 
She had some sort of surgery or
something.
 
Of course she didn’t tell me until
after the event, and Tyson didn’t bother to call me either.”

“Dad, you’re
her ex-husband.
 
Why would he call you?”

“Because I’m
the only person who takes care of her when she has her bouts of illness.
 
Ty don’t. You sure as hell don’t.
 
I take care of her.
 
We might be divorced, but I still love her.”

Roz loved
her father’s devotion.

“I had to
end my gig short so I could go and see about her.”

“Cut it
short?
 
I thought you said you weren’t in
Calgary because it was too cold up there.”

“That too,”
Cecil said.
 
“But your mother mainly.”

There was a
long pause.
 
Roz and her mother did not
ever get along.
 
“You think I should come
with you?” she asked.
 
“You think it’s
that serious?”

“I have no
idea.
 
That brother of yours won’t tell
me anything, and that mother of yours think I’m just being nosy and intrusive.”

“Maybe I
should go with you.”

“I don’t
think so,” Cecil said.
 
“Let me go and
assess the situation.
 
If it’s dire
enough, or if I think you should come, I’ll send for you.
 
But you stay here with those half-humans of
yours, and your Big Daddy of course, and I’ll take care of the grown folks
business.”

Roz pushed
him playfully.
 
“If Mick’s my daddy,” she
said, “then Mom’s your momma.”

“Damn
straight she is,” Cecil said proudly.
 
“You should see the way she slap this thang!”

“Eww!
 
TMI, Dad!” she said as her secretary, opened
the door and peered inside.
 
She looked
at her.
 
“Yes, Teegan?”

“Mrs.
Dawson-Blake is here to see you, ma’am.”

Cecil stood
up.
 
“I need to get moving anyway.”

“You just
got here!”

“And I’m
just going.”

Roz stood up
too.
 
They hugged.
 
“Call me when you get there,” she said.

“For what?”
Cecil asked.
 
“You ain’t my mama.
 
Your mama is!”

Roz laughed
again, and her father left.

“Bye, pretty
lady,” he said to Teegan as he did.
 
She blushed.

“Send her
in, Tee,” Roz said, and sat back down.

Within
seconds, Roz’s friend Tamron Blake came bursting in.
 
“Hey, girl,” she said as she came.
 
“That your father?”

“That’s
him.”

“Wow.
 
Not bad for an old guy.”
 
She made her way to the chairs in front of
Roz’s desk.
 
“You ready?”

Roz
frowned.
 
“Ready?
 
Ready for what?”

Tamron put
her hand on her hip, her tiny swing purse swinging on her wrist.
 
“Roz!”

“Oh, Tam,”
Roz said, suddenly remembering.
 
“I can’t
go to lunch with you today.
 
I am so
sorry.
 
I forgot to call!”

“But why
can’t you go?
 
You have to eat.”

“Yeah, but
I’ve got too much work, girl.
 
Not gonna
happen this day.”

“Please?
 
Just for an hour?”

“No.
 
Can’t.”

“Oh,
alright.”
 
Tamron sat down beside
Roz.
 
“Let me rest a minute before I move
on.”

Roz
smiled.
 
“Been shopping and almost
dropping?”

“You know
it.
 
Oh!
 
Heard about J.J.?”

Roz looked
at Tamron.
 
Tamron knew J.J. Crane when
they were all working in New York.
 
But
what was there to hear about her?
 
“What
about her?”

“She’s
dead!” Tamron said with dramatic effect.
 
“Apparently she had some kind of car accident in Belize.
 
Or some such place.
 
But yeah, girl, she’s gone.
 
A friend of mine text
me
the news report.”

Roz thought
about Mick, and how he never left loose ends.
 
She also knew he would never admit or deny any involvement.
 
“Sorry to hear that,” she said.

“Probably
got what she deserved if you ask me,” Tamron said.
 
“Always sleeping with somebody’s
boyfriend.
 
I never did like that chick.”

Roz didn’t
know what to say to that.
 
So she didn’t
say anything.

“I hardly
ever see you anymore,” Joey Sinatra said as Gloria sat up on the countertop.
They were inside the mailroom at S.I. where Joey worked as supervisor.
 
“We used to hang out.
 
At least we were starting to.
 
But now you’re always too busy.”

“I know,”
Gloria said.
 
“And we’ll hang out again,
Joey.
 
Promise.
 
But it’s been hectic lately.”

Joey
continued to sort mail.
 
“Because of
Fonz?”
 
He said this and glanced at her.

Gloria
became defensive.
 
“Fonz has nothing to
do with it.
 
I don’t know why you guys
always want to blame him.”

“Maybe
because, after you got back together with him, you stopped hanging out with
us.
 
Maybe that’s the reason.”

“Whatever,”
Gloria said.
 
“But it’s not true.”

The phone rang
and Joey, refusing to get into it with Gloria over her own personal life,
answered it.
 
“Mailroom,” he said.
 
Then he looked at his half-sister.
 
“Yeah, she’s here.”
 
He handed her the phone.

Gloria was
surprised.
 
She came to the mailroom when
she wanted to hideout for a few.
 
“What?”
she asked.

“For you,”
he said.

Gloria
mouthed the word
Blair
, as in Blair
Conyers, her supervisor.
 
But Joey shook
his head.

Gloria took
the phone and answered.
 
“This is
Gloria.”

She was
surprised that it wasn’t Blair tracking her down, but she was even more
surprised that it was the upstairs receptionist tracking her down.
 
“Your father has been looking for you,” she
said.
 
“You aren’t answering your cell
phone.”

She left her
cell phone at her desk.
 
“What does he
want?” she asked.

“He wants to
meet with you.”

Gloria was
surprised.
 
Her father almost never asked
to meet with her at work.
 
“When?” she
asked.

“I’ll call
you back when he’s ready,” the receptionist said, and then ended the call.

“Dad wants
you?” Joey asked, with envy in his eyes.