The Company We Keep (26 page)

H
arrison had never pursued a woman so vigorously in the thirty-two and a half years of his existence. But Teri Stewart wasn’t just a woman; she was the only woman for him. He had not made that revelation clear to her or anyone else. He was compelled to make her see that now, if she’d let him.

It had been two days since the Yvette fiasco. He had lost count of how many messages he’d left on Teri’s home phone, her cell phone, and her work phone. She had not returned a single call.

Harrison had a lot of male friends that he had bonded with over the years. He had always been quick to share some of his most intimate thoughts and secrets with his boys. But this was one thing that he wanted to keep to himself.

The only reason he didn’t beat a path to Carla Andrews’s office was because her calendar was booked solid for the next two months. It seemed like everybody in L.A. was in need of therapy. She had back-to-back appointments with some of her longtime patients and new patients were crawling out of the woodwork, some on the verge of suicide. Harrison wasn’t
that
bad off, but he was at a point where he really wanted to talk to somebody about what had happened.

“If I get a cancellation, I will call you immediately,” Carla told him. “But you hang in there.
Things are going to be all right
.” Harri
son had not told Carla the source of his latest stress-induced condition, but he was hoping that if she had talked to Teri, she would know. However, with Teri believing the worst, her version of the events would make him look like the asshole she thought he was. Harrison couldn’t imagine what was going through Carla’s head about why he needed to see her all of a sudden. But he didn’t care what she thought about him, as long as she was still able to give him the professional assistance he felt he needed.

He started to lose hope by the end of the week. He stopped leaving messages for Teri. When Carla finally did call him to tell him that another patient had just cancelled an appointment and that she could see him right away, he had too many other things going on to take her up on her offer. For one thing, it was too late for him to switch his broadcast hours with Beverly Blue or one of the other DJs. And skipping work to go see his shrink by calling in sick was something he would never do. One of the things he was most proud of was the fact that he had a work ethic that he didn’t want to compromise.

By the second week, he was feeling much better. He had lost all hope of ever resuming his relationship with Teri. This was one personal situation that he chose not to discuss with his friends or coworkers but that didn’t stop some of them from being nosy.

“Man, I’ve been meaning to ask you—what’s going on between you and Teri? I haven’t seen you with her lately, and you haven’t even mentioned her,” Trevor said with a suspicious look on his last visit to the station.

“Teri’s fine, as far as I know. We’re not as close as we used to be,” was all Harrison offered, promptly changing the subject. “I’ve got some extra complimentary tickets to that jazz show at the Staples Center this coming weekend if you want to join me.”

“Yeah…right,” Trevor responded, giving Harrison a sympathetic look. But that didn’t stop Trevor from pointing his nose in another direction. When he saw Teri at a small, private wrap party at Eclectic Records the next evening, he tried to get more information from her. “Uh, how is my boy Harrison these days?” he asked Teri, his sympathetic hand rubbing her shoulder. That little gesture alerted her right away. She knew Trevor already knew that she and Harrison had parted company.

“Why don’t you ask him?” she asked, not facing Trevor as she stood in a corner nursing a flute of champagne. Despite her evasive behavior, she was as cordial and businesslike as ever. Victor had suddenly run off again with his wife. This time to Mexico for a few days to celebrate their wedding anniversary. Teri was glad to be in charge so soon again. The distraction helped her keep her mind off Harrison—and that was not easy. She saw him in her dreams, and several times she saw men on the street that looked so much like him it made her heart skip a beat each time.

The Monday after the wrap party a huge bouquet of roses arrived at the office for her. Despite the fact that roses were her favorite flowers, she was disappointed when she looked at the card and saw that they had come from Dwight. When she called him up to thank him, the first thing out of his potty mouth was, “The drums tell me that you finally ass-wiped that dickless Harrison. When can
I
see you?” Less than a minute after she declined Dwight’s crude invitation he told her, “Lady, I don’t know who you think you are, but you need a reality check. You know now that Harrison is a punk! I know what you need. You know what I can do for you, and I’ve been trying to give it to you again for eons. But all I get for my trouble is a runaround. Well, this is the last time I try to get next to you.”

“Thanks again for the roses, Dwight,” Teri said calmly, a dry smile on her lips. “You still know the way to a girl’s heart.”

“Fuck that shit. I want to know the way to a girl’s pussy!” Dwight hollered.

“Dwight, I have to go now,” Teri insisted. Nicole occupied one of the two seats facing Teri’s desk. There was an anxious look on her face and she couldn’t wait for Teri to end her phone call so they could talk trash about Dwight. “If things change, I might call you up again.” Now she was teasing him. She had no desire or intentions to call Dwight again. At least not for the reason he wanted her to call.

“When?” Dwight asked, now sounding so humble it surprised him more than it did Teri. “You wait too long, you might not ever be able to reach me again,” he warned.

“That’s good to know,” she told him. She hung up and shrugged her shoulders and let out a gentle laugh. She couldn’t remember
the last time she’d enjoyed some humor. Nicole looked like she had just swallowed a canary.

“That was cute,” she told Teri. “It’s good to see you laughing and having fun again. You’ve been too serious lately.”

Teri knew where Nicole was going with this conversation so she didn’t waste any time steering it in another direction. “I saw the sample shots for some of the new CD covers. Eric’s getting so good we won’t be able to afford him someday.” Teri flipped a few sheets of paper, not realizing they were upside down. “Now all we have to decide is which covers we want to use for which artists…”

“Can I ask you something?” Nicole didn’t give Teri a chance to respond. “And please don’t get mad…”

“What is it?”

“Do you miss Harrison?”

Teri nodded and blinked hard.

“I’ve seen him at a couple of parties. Two nights ago, I saw him having lunch at The Ivy. I took Eric there for his birthday.”

“It’s good to know he’s getting on with his life.” Teri paused and restacked the same documents she’d already stacked up three times in the last five minutes. “Uh, how’s he doing?” She couldn’t believe her own words. The last thing she wanted was for Nicole or anybody else to know that she was even thinking about how Harrison was doing.

“H
e was alone,” Nicole stated. “Well, not alone as in by himself. Each time I saw him he was with one of his male buddies, not a female.”

“I didn’t ask you
that
,” Teri snapped, glad to hear that anyway.

“He asked about you,” Nicole reported. “Every time I see him he asks about you.”

Teri blinked and cleared her throat, which felt like a fist-size lump was stuck in it. “Did you ever get that polycom machine fixed so people who can’t come to the office in person can dial in and participate when we have staff meetings?”

“Fuck that polycom. If you want to change the subject, I know you can come up with something more interesting than that damn thing. And just to let you know, again, yes, I did get it fixed,” Nicole said in a harsh tone of voice, crossing her recently slimmed-down legs. She had on a denim skirt that she had not been able to squeeze into for more than a year. Thanks to the vigorous bedroom workouts that she participated in with Eric, she had lost fifteen pounds.

“Teri, Eric saw Yvette a couple of nights ago,” Nicole said, proceeding with caution. “They talked…”

Hearing this disturbed Teri. She leaned back in her chair and narrowed her eyes as she studied Nicole’s face. She was surprised
to see that Nicole didn’t look as disgusted as she usually did every time Yvette’s name came up.

“Oh? And you let him?”

“I didn’t
let
him do a damn thing. The only person I have the right to let do anything is my son, and that’s only because he’s still a baby. Eric can do whatever he wants to do.”

Teri looked at Nicole out of the corner of her eye. “What does all this mean? What could she possibly have to say that he’d want to hear? Or vice versa?”

“It means that now that enough time has passed and they’ve both cooled off, they decided to call a ‘truce’ so they could tie up a few loose ends. Eric had some concerns about certain things coming back to haunt him if he didn’t take care of them now.” Nicole paused and looked off to the side. She suddenly seemed unbearably uncomfortable.

“Please don’t tell me that heifer is pregnant by Eric,” Teri said, holding her breath.

“I don’t think so. If she is, she hasn’t said anything about it so far. Besides, I think that if she was, she’d get rid of it in a heartbeat. Just like the other three…”

“Shit. How in the hell did a man like Eric get involved with a woman like Yvette in the first place?”

“You’d have to ask him that. Anyway, he wanted to make sure that he left no stone unturned where she’s concerned. Would you believe that they had a joint checking account? And that Yvette was authorized to pick up Akua from school?”

“I guess that once upon a time he didn’t think she was that bad. But when he realized she was, it was too late. That just goes to show you what kind of man Eric is—too lenient for his own good.”

“I don’t think so. He’s just being fair,” Nicole defended.

“Whatever you say. I guess you know the man better than I do.” Teri yawned and stretched her arms high above her head. “I suppose if worms can be tolerated, so can the Yvettes of the world.” She let out a loud breath and gave Nicole a pensive look. “Since you’ve said this much, you may as well tell me the rest of what’s on your mind.”

“Teri, Harrison didn’t fuck Yvette.” Nicole paused long enough
to let her words sink in. She didn’t like the stunned look on Teri’s face, but she continued talking anyway. “She ran into him at the club that night after Eric had kicked her out. She’d been drinking, Harrison had been drinking, and things got out of hand.”

“Apparently,” Teri scoffed.

“Stop! Let me finish,” Nicole ordered, holding up her hand. “Anyway, she was hurting so bad that night, she wanted to hurt somebody. Anybody. Isn’t that what Miss Cookson called ‘displaced aggression’ in our eleventh-grade sociology class? Harrison just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. If it hadn’t been him, she would have latched onto somebody else to torture that night. Harrison’s only crime was his connection to Eric and me. And, as if you didn’t know this already, you are not one of Yvette’s favorite people. She wanted to hurt you and has for a long time.”

“And you and Eric believed Yvette? Why should you believe her now?”

“She has no reason to lie about it now. She accomplished what she set out to do. But she didn’t gain or lose anything. You and Harrison are the losers in this drama.”

“Did we really have anything to lose?” Teri asked, a dumbfounded look on her face. “We tried to make a life together twice and both times we failed. If that’s not a clear indication that it wasn’t meant to be in the first place, I don’t know what is. So I don’t know what you think we lost.”

“You lost each other,” Nicole insisted.

Teri released a groan as she rearranged herself in her seat, sucking in her stomach. She wondered if she’d gained the fifteen pounds that Nicole had lost. She didn’t know why everything seemed to taste so good these days. Last week when she went to purchase a new pair of leather pants, she was horrified when the clerk informed her that the size 10 she had struggled to try on was actually a size 12! In addition to working longer hours, she killed time shopping everywhere from Rodeo Drive to Wal-Mart. This was what her life had come to.

“I don’t think so. He made a choice. And I don’t care what Yvette says, I’m sure she didn’t have to hold a gun to Harrison’s head to get him to take her home that night. He walked into that
mess with both eyes open. And knowing her, she’s going to cuckold another fool soon, if she hasn’t already.”

“Well, that’s for sure,” Nicole said with a touch of sarcasm. “She’s one rolling stone that won’t ever gather any moss. That sister rolls around more than a Chinese marble. Shit, she’s already involved with someone else. And it must be serious; she’s already moved in with him. Remember that blind rapper?”

Teri gasped and her mouth dropped open so wide her jaws almost locked. “Well, only a blind man could not see what a piece of shit she is.”

“Not him,” Nicole said, shaking her head. “His brother. Dude just got out of prison so you know he’s not too particular. I guess that just goes to show that there is somebody for all of us,” Nicole said rising.

Not
all
of us
, Teri thought to herself.

T
eri still avoided listening to Harrison’s show, and she declined invitations to parties or other events that she thought he might attend. She did hear from Nicole and Miguel and even Victor that Harrison still supported a lot of their artists on his show.

Since Teri was never one to discuss her personal life with her coworkers, most of them didn’t even know she’d been dating Harrison in the first place, let alone that the relationship had been severed. Victor was too busy trying to hold his marriage together, so he had no more interest in Teri’s love life, or anybody else’s. And besides, his main interest in Teri was whether she continued to make him look good.

Teri ran into Carla at a boutique the day before the Fourth of July and the first thing Carla asked her about was her relationship with Harrison.

“Oh, that didn’t pan out,” she confessed, shifting her rapidly increasing weight from one foot to the other. “I’ve been meaning to make an appointment to see you, but I’ve been so busy lately…working my fingers to the bone trying to keep the company afloat while Victor takes his spur of the moment vacations.”

“Things have slowed down quite a bit for me, so when and if
you’re ready to talk, let my secretary—no, you call me direct like always and let’s schedule an appointment,” Carla told her, patting the side of her arm. “You don’t have to make an appointment if you just want to talk on a personal level. We’re still friends, Teri. And I hope we always will be.”

Under normal circumstances, they would have strolled over to the Starbucks at the corner like Carla had suggested. But Teri avoided that when she remembered she’d promised her grandparents she’d stop by on her way home. She’d been avoiding them lately. Since she’d opened her big mouth and told them that she was bringing Harrison to the Fourth of July cookout with her, that seemed to be all they wanted to talk about. She hadn’t told them about the breakup and had decided that she wouldn’t. When they did ask her how he was doing she always told them the same thing—“He’s doing fine as far as I know.”

She assumed the questions would stop after the cookout. It would be painful and awkward for her, but she’d help them talk about him like a dog for not showing up. It was the only way she knew how to save face.

About an hour after Teri had run into Carla, she decided to backtrack and go to Starbucks anyway. Not the same one that Carla had suggested, but one in a strip mall near her condo. As luck would have it, five minutes after she’d picked up her latte and plopped down at a table in a corner outside the restroom, Carla exited the restroom.

“Well, now this is a coincidence,” she yelled, ignoring the surprised look on Teri’s face. “Do you mind if I join you?” Teri let out a heavy sigh and nodded toward the seat across from her that Carla had already claimed. She wondered why people did things first, then asked if it was all right.

Yes, I do mind if you join me
, she wanted to say. And had it not been Carla she would have said it aloud. But in the back of her mind, she knew there had to be a reason for this turn of events.

“Carla, please do me a favor and don’t mention Harrison Starr,” Teri requested.

Carla gave her an amused look. “That’s fine with me. I hadn’t planned to. I’m more interested in telling you about all the great sales I stumbled across today.”

“You see, things ended on a very bad note. After what Harrison did, I don’t think I will ever trust another man,” Teri announced. “I don’t know how much you know about what happened, but this is my side of the story…”

Despite the fact that Teri had just said she didn’t want to discuss Harrison Starr, for the next ten minutes she shared with Carla every single detail she could remember about the events that had occurred that night. Some parts she repeated several times. “Now, according to Nicole, Yvette broke down and told Eric she’d set Harrison up.”

“Why Harrison? If she wanted to set somebody up, wouldn’t it have made more sense for her to go after Eric and Nicole?” Carla asked.

Teri nodded. “Yes, but she couldn’t get to them. She knew that by wrecking Harrison’s relationship with me, it would affect Nicole and Eric on some level.”

“Teri, I can understand your feelings. But this was nothing more than a foolish ‘prank’ played out by a scorned woman so vengeful she didn’t care who she hurt,” Carla said, gently squeezing Teri’s hand.

“It doesn’t matter now. I said some pretty nasty things to Harrison and I can’t take any of that back.” Teri paused and sniffed. The tall latte that she had ordered remained untouched. “Even if he was telling the truth…”

“Teri, listen to me.” Carla leaned across the table and squeezed Teri’s hand even harder. “He was telling the truth.” Teri pressed her lips together and gave Carla a skeptical look. “And wipe that look off your face. You’ve known me long enough to know that I’m rarely wrong when I reveal something.”

Teri knew she couldn’t argue with that because it was true. “I could apologize to him for what I said, but I don’t know where to go from there.” She shook her head. “Do you think I should call him up anyway?”

“You have to make that decision.” Carla reared back in her seat and pursed her lips.

There was no place else for this conversation to go. “Uh, I’ll call you soon,” Teri said, rising. She left the latte on the table, still untouched.

Teri crawled out of bed the next morning with a splitting headache. As much as she loved her grandparents the last thing she wanted to do today was attend their holiday cookout and deal with a dozen or more of their friends and neighbors. She knew that she’d probably be the only person in her age group present. For a painful moment she even considered calling up Dwight and inviting him to join her—with his sleazy self! But he hadn’t pestered her in a while. She wasn’t even sure he was still interested. The last thing she needed at this low point in her life was for him to reject her. Knowing how crude he was, he would no doubt reject her in a profoundly brutal way to get back at her for giving him the brush-off so many times.

Her thoughts were interrupted by her cell phone ringing on the nightstand next to her bed. She didn’t want to answer it, but on the fourth ring she did. The caller ID was mysteriously blank, which usually meant the call was coming from a telemarketer or some other party who had a blocked telephone number. “Hello,” she said softly, yawning. She sat up on the side of her bed and looked around her bedroom. The caller didn’t respond. “I said hello,” she repeated.

“Teri, this is Harrison Starr.”

“What?” She stood up, dragging the bedding behind her like a train. “What in the world—”

“Baby, please don’t hang up on me! I know I am probably the last person on the planet you want to talk to, but please don’t hang up.”

“I won’t hang up,” she assured him. She was glad he had called and she was anxious to hear what he had to say.

“I called because I need the address and directions to your grandparents’ house.”

Teri covered her mouth so he couldn’t hear her gasp. “What? Why?”

“Well, I promised I’d attend their Fourth of July cookout—if it’s still on.”

“It is. But I didn’t think…”

“If you think my presence will be too upsetting for you, I won’t come,” he offered.

Her headache had intensified and now her head felt as if it were going to explode. “I don’t know what to say,” she admitted. “The invitation is still open.” She was confused and elated at the same time. She rubbed the back of her head, then her neck, and then the side of her face. “I didn’t think you’d still want to come after…after what happened.”

“Teri, that’s over and done with. We’ve both moved on and that’s all that matters now.”

“I…
We
at Eclectic appreciate the fact that you still show our artists a lot of love on your program.”

“I know. And you can tell Victor he can stop thanking me by sending me all that damn champagne. I’m running out of room.” He laughed. She laughed with him. “Are you going to give me that address or not?”

“Uh…uh, yeah.” She rambled off her grandparents’ address. “Don’t ask me to give you directions. You can get them from MapQuest.”

“Sure. Oh, before I hang up, I just need a few particulars. I presume I can dress casually, and can bring a guest? Should I bring a bottle or a pie or something? This would be one way for me to get rid of some of those bottles Victor sent.” He laughed again, but this time Teri didn’t. She was still thinking about the part where he had mentioned bringing a guest.

“Uh-huh. You can bring a bottle, or two and yes, it’s okay to bring a guest.”

“Good. Trevor’s on his own today and I thought it would be nice for him to do a little celebrating. He loves good barbeque as much as I do.”

“Trevor? Uh, yeah. He’s welcome to come.”

A full minute of silence passed before either of them spoke again.

“Do you want to talk?” she asked, holding her breath as she awaited his response. “About us…”

“Will it do any good?” he asked her so quickly he almost choked on the words.

“I think it will,” she admitted. More silence followed. “I am willing to listen to anything you want to say to me now. Then, we can go from there.”

“I’ve had a lot of things on my mind that I wanted to discuss, Teri. But so much time has passed, and so much damage has been done, I doubt if they will have the same effect now.”

“You don’t have to keep your promise about attending the cookout. I didn’t expect you to, and if you want to back out now, I will certainly understand.”

“What do you want me to do, Teri?”

“I want you to come,” she said with a sniff. “After my grandparents stop making a fuss over you, we can sneak off to an empty room and talk.” She wanted to say the room she had in mind was her old bedroom, but she didn’t.

She could hear him breathing. “What time should we get there? I hope it’s not too early because Trevor operates on CP time.”

“Him and everybody invited to the cookout operates on Colored People’s time—including my grandparents—and even our non-black friends.” It felt so good to laugh some more. “Anytime after two is fine, if you still decide to come.”

“I will see you at two, Teri. And I’m really looking forward to seeing you again.”

“I’ll see you then for sure?” she said, asking as if she still needed more confirmation.

“You will see me for sure,” Harrison assured her.

A few miles away, Carla Andrews stared at the caller ID on her cell phone. She chuckled and decided not to answer Teri’s call because she already knew why she was calling. Carla didn’t want to tell Teri that this time things would work out between her and Harrison. She wanted her to find out for herself.