The Atonement (8 page)

“Shrewd move. You know, if I’d known you were
coming, I’dve asked you to ride down with me.”

“Too bad, huh.”

“You know, I was thinking about you the other
day.”

“Really? Like what about,” she said moving
closer to him, her face barely inches from his.

“That I’d like to know more about you. You
think that might be possible?”

“Depends. What do you want to know?”

“Everything. Would you like to sit at our
table for a bit?”

“I’d love to but I came with my girls. I
don’t want to be rude, ya know?”

“I hear ya.”

“But…knowing them, I may need a ride home
later. Would you be willing to save me a seat in case I needed it?
I’d be really grateful.”

“No problem.”

“Thanks. I’d better be getting back.”

“See ya later.”

“Don’t forget about me.”

“Never.”

“Mission accomplished,” Allyson thought
smugly to herself. She had him right where she wanted him.

*****

“Allyson. Allyson, you gotta wake up.”

“Hmmm?”

Allyson could hear Jason calling her, but she
was still half-asleep.

“Allyson! You gotta get up.”

Allyson opened her eyes, but it was still
dark. It was always dark in the mornings in the fall. It took a few
moments for her to remember where she was. Jason turned on the lamp
that was on the nightstand, and the light blinded Allyson for a
split second. She sat up in the bed still feeling a little dazed.
All the alcohol she’d drank made her head feel like there was lead
in it. Then all of a sudden, she got hit in the face with a swath
of fabric. It turned out to be her blue dress.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean for that to happen like
that. Just trying to help you out.”

“What?”

“Ally, I had a great time last night and I
really like you and all and I don’t want you to take this the wrong
way, but you gotta go – for now at least.”

“What the hell?! You screw me, then wake me
up at freaking six o’clock in the morning and tell me it’s time to
go like I’m some five-dollar trick! How else am I supposed to take
it?” said Allyson as she got up and put her dress on. She was
absolutely furious.

“All right, I’ll be honest with you. My ex is
on her way up and I don’t want any drama. I really want to see you
again, Ally. But right now we gotta be discreet, ya know.”

“If she’s your ex, then why would you care if
she knows I’m here or not?”

“Okay, so she’s my soon to be ex.”

“I can’t believe this! Jason, you are so full
of it!”

Allyson couldn’t believe what she was
hearing. “He must think I have the word ‘fool’ stamped on my
forehead,” she thought as she collected her bra and pantyhose and
stuffed them into her purse.

“Ally, please. I know I should have finished
things with this chick before we hooked up, but I couldn’t help it.
I didn’t want to risk you losing interest in me. Just give me some
time to break everything to her.”

“Do you really expect me to believe that? I
would have more respect for you right now if you’d been honest with
me up front.”

“I know you may not believe it, but it’s
true. This chick means nothing to me.”

“Yeah, I get it. That’s why you’re brooming
me out the door right now,” said Allyson as she slid into her shoes
and grabbed her coat. Then she left.

“I’ll call you! I promise, Ally,” said Jason
calling behind her.

“Whatever. I won’t hold my breath,” she said
not bothering to look back.

She went to the elevator and waited. In the
time that elapsed, her head started to hurt so badly she thought it
was going to explode. She was really starting to feel her hangover
and had to lean against the wall to steady herself. When the doors
of the elevator finally opened, she almost knocked over a girl
coming off. She was a skinny brown skinned girl with glasses who
wore her hair in dreds and dressed like she was stuck in the
1970’s. Allyson watched the girl walk down the hall toward the way
where she had just come from. It was her. It had to be.

“She’s not even pretty,” Allyson huffed to
herself.

When the door opened in the lobby of the frat
house, Allyson had decided, she didn’t want to go home. Her sisters
would want her to dish on her night with Jason and had it been a
true conquest, she would not have minded indulging them. In the
aftermath of another romantic humiliation, all Allyson wanted was
to be alone. It was still very early, but she knew there was a
cheap diner nearby campus that she could go to that was open at
this time of the day. As she walked along, foot traffic picked up
on the sidewalks as people began to head out to work. Allyson had
to take it slow because her four-inch heels could get stuck in
cracks on the sidewalk and throw her down. She usually never walked
more than a block in her shoes, but she felt she desperately needed
to get away. By the time she got to the diner, her feet were
hurting from the four-block trek. Allyson was one of the first
customers in Chuck’s diner. She slumped into a booth all the way in
the back, kicked off her heels and put her head down.

“Morning, miss. What can I get you
today?”

Allyson shot up. She didn’t expect the
service to be so fast, but then again, she was the only one in the
diner.

“Uh – I’ll have a large coffee, black, no
sugar,”

“Coming up,” said the woman eyeing her
strangely.

“There are lots of better guys out there.
Jason’s not really worth it anyway. He’s an heir to a media company
that deals mostly in publishing periodicals. Then add to that the
fact that he’s not very bright. In ten or twenty years, he’ll be
irrelevant and his fortune will be almost nothing,” Allyson
reasoned to herself to assuage her bruised ego. It didn’t do much
to help. No matter what she said to herself, she still felt
rejected and it still hurt. Allyson took out her smart phone. She
scrolled through what had to be hundreds of names in her contacts,
but she couldn’t find one that she thought would actually care
about how she was feeling right now. The loosely connected
individuals that comprised her family were a joke. The one person
in her family who she felt had ever shown her any love, and who had
always been loyal to her was dead.

“You gotta be strong, Ally. You’re the only
one you can depend on,” she said to herself. Allyson had been
taking care of herself for a long time. She was a survivor and she
was a fighter, but at times like this she didn’t know how much
fight she had left. There were times when she just wanted to be
wanted by someone. But she didn’t want to indulge these feelings
because she didn’t want to be weak. Allyson flipped away from her
contacts and started browsing the web. She checked out one of her
favorite e-retailers and saw that there was a sale on handbags. She
bought five, each in a different color and charged them to her
paypal account. By the time she had to pay, she’d have her next
infusion of cash and credit from her mom. “I bet Ms. Dreds can’t
afford one of these designer bags even at the sale price,” Allyson
thought smugly to herself. Then she switched over to another high
fashion website to see the previews. It wasn’t long before she was
putting some of the items in her virtual shopping basket. “I can’t
wait until next week, that silk muslin is so hot. Trish is going to
be so jealous when she sees me in it. I hope they don’t run out of
my size.”

Little by little, Allyson’s spirits began to
lift. If only she could coordinate her life as well as her
wardrobe.

Seven

Jim spent most of his time in the hospital
either watching the preachers on the Word Network or reading his
Bible, which was what he was doing right now. He was reading from
the book of Psalms.

“Have mercy upon me, O God
according to thy lovingkindness: according to the multitude of thy
mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from mine
iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my
transgressions: and my sin is ever before me. Against thee, thee
only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy
sight…”
¹

When he had finished, he put the Bible on the
table next to him and lay back against the pillow and stared at the
ceiling. Jim felt just like David. He wished the Lord would just
change him so that he wouldn’t make any more wrong choices that
could possibly destroy his future as well as that of his loved
ones. The minute Allen told him about Darius, every tense moment
from Jim’s past relationship with Callie replayed itself in his
mind. Jim tried to convince himself that he wasn’t the father. He
told himself that the affair happened so long ago that there was no
way he could be Darius’s father. Unfortunately, the numbers did not
add up in his favor. Darius was already 13 months old, subtract
that and the nine months that Callie had to be pregnant, and it
brought him back to January, which was the last time he and Callie
had been together. Then when Allen showed him Darius’s picture, Jim
immediately recognized his mother’s eyes. There was no doubt in his
mind that he was Darius’s father and this threw Jim into a state of
deep despair.

Jim had a child now – a son. Darius was an
innocent life that he had helped to bring into the world. This
child was really his responsibility, not Allen’s. It was Jim’s
responsibility to take part in raising Darius, and yet he didn’t
even have the means to take care of himself. Not only did Jim not
have anything to offer his son, but his lack of forethought had
basically doomed his child to a broken home with parents that may
not be able to work together for his good. If this wasn’t bad
enough, there was what he had done to his best friend.

Allen had been his best friend since he was
seven and Allen was five. They had been through so much together
they felt more like brothers than friends. Jim also knew that
Callie was the main character of Allen’s romantic fantasies. Allen
had always loved her from afar and Jim was the only person that
Allen had ever confided in about his feelings for her. In fact, it
was Jim who had arranged for Allen to become Callie’s tutor in
school, which gave them a chance to get to know each other. Now he
had stabbed his best friend in the back – twice over.

Keeping his affair with Callie a secret
would’ve been hard enough but Jim didn’t think there was any way
that he could allow Allen to raise Darius given the way things
were. That would be worse than what he’d already done. He wanted to
tell Allen the truth, but at the same time he knew that Allen had
probably deeply bonded with Darius. He could tell by the way Allen
gushed over the little boy’s picture. Jim was certain the
revelation of Darius’s paternity could possibly devastate Allen,
and that was the last thing he wanted to do to his best friend.

The only person who he didn’t really care for
in this whole situation was Callie. He was angry about how she had
obviously lied to, used, and manipulated Allen up to this point.
Even the way she acted all nonchalant when she had visited him
earlier, seemed to smack of duplicity. The only thing that could
possibly redeem her in Jim’s eyes was that she hadn’t slept with
Allen and made him think Darius was his. He couldn’t wait until he
saw Callie again.

In any case, Jim knew that he was in a pretty
big mess. Not only did he feel guilty about all of the lives he had
ruined while he was in the game, now the list of casualties was
getting longer. He could count two more lives that were now ruined
due to his thoughtless and selfish actions. Jim was tired of
hurting people. He was tired of suffering in misery and guilt. So
Jim did the only thing he could do. He prayed.

“Father, I admit I’ve done a lot of awful
things and messed up my life and so many other lives in the
process. I need you to help me. I’m tired of doing the wrong thing.
I’m tired of making mistakes. Please bless me with the wisdom and
the courage to finally do the right thing”

As he was praying, he heard someone open the
door to his room.

“Hey, Jim. How are you feeling this morning?”
asked Callie.

“How would you feel if you found out your
best friend had been raising your child for nearly a year?”

Jim was going to be blunt and to the point.
There was no use in sidestepping.

“I know what you’re thinking, Jim.”

“Believe me you don’t.”

“Who said Darius was yours? You were gone a
long time.”

“Callie, Please. I’m not stupid and despite
my condition I can add and subtract very well. Why didn’t you tell
me?!”

“When you came in, you were in bad shape.
Pastor Bynum felt that everyone should wait until you were
stronger…”

“No, I’m talking about before. You had a
whole nine months and you knew where I was at!”

“I tried to tell you! At the time, if you
remember correctly, you weren’t ready to be anybody’s anything,
much less a father. From the looks of things right now, I’d say
nothing’s changed.”

“You can say whatever you want about me, but
that doesn’t give you the right to play a game on Allen. After all
he’s done for both of us, he doesn’t deserve that!”

“So what do you think I should do? Hunh? You
want me to call him in here right now and tell him about our fling?
Tell him that Darius is your son? How’d you think that would make
him feel?”

“Don’t come here with that. If you cared
about Allen, you would’ve been honest with him from the beginning.
And you certainly wouldn’t have conned him into a
relationship!”

“I didn’t con him! I do care about Allen,
deeply.”

“Please. The only person you care about is
you.”

“And what about you? All you want from him is
a place to stay ‘til you can think of your next hustle. You think
the two of you will be able to live under the same roof once he
finds out? Have you thought about what the others will think when
they find out?”