Real Men Knit

by Kwana Jackson

  Not that it should make any difference who Kerry caught in his kitchen, but still, it somehow didn’t feel right. Kerry in there with Erika or whoever it might be. That was Mama Joy’s domain. His brain did a mental freeze. Mama Joy’s domain. He guessed he’d have to change his thinking on that, and soon. But shit, it had only been a little over a week, and he wasn’t quite ready to make space in the kitchen or his heart just yet.

  Having woven through the tables, Jesse pushed his wayward thoughts to the back corner of his mind as he greeted Ziggy with a dap and moved in to sit.

  “Where’s Craig? I thought he would be here by now, especially with seventy-five-cent wings being over in thirty minutes.”

  Craig came up behind them just then. “What are you talking about?” Craig said. “As if I’d miss wing hour. I’ve already put in my order for twenty. I suggest you get yours in before it’s too late. You know how they are here. Once the time is up, the price goes up.”

  Jesse nodded and raised his hand, hoping to get the attention of their server. Thankfully he came over quickly, a young guy with deep-brown skin and a serious expression. Way more serious than the job and the venue called for, but who was Jesse to judge? He’d spent most of the day brooding in a yarn shop, so he wasn’t one to talk.

  After putting his order in, he leaned back, letting the energy of the room, and the fact that he was out, take over his mind and body. It was good to be out and not think about the shop for a little while. Not think about his life two weeks ago or his life twelve hours from now. Right at this moment, he just wanted to be in the moment.

  “So, how are you making out?” Ziggy asked, breaking into his zoning.

  Jesse tilted his head and thought about the question, not sure he wanted to answer and not sure he had an answer.

  “You held it together pretty good during the funeral. I have to hand it to you. I don’t know if I could have been as strong as you were. Must be something to do with your last name. Your mother was an amazing woman. She definitely passed a few things on to you and your brothers,” Craig said.

  “That she was,” Jesse agreed, and he didn’t have any words to add besides. “Strong” wasn’t the adjective he’d use to describe himself or his brothers these past two weeks. Honestly, he didn’t know how he’d found it in himself to even fight for the shop the way he did. Everyone had thought he and his brothers were so together. Four misfit princes of Harlem—but lately they had been more misfits than princes. Barely talking and only meeting in passing, except when it was time for Mama Joy’s weekly dinners. Now, without her and those dinners, when would he see his brothers?

  Who knew, maybe that was part of why he fought so hard to keep the shop open. How could he lose her and them too in one fell swoop? He knew he couldn’t take it.

  When he came out of his own thoughts both Ziggy and Craig were staring at him, as if he maybe had stopped talking midstream and they expected him to say more. He hoped like hell that he hadn’t expressed any of his thoughts out loud, but he didn’t have to worry about it much because just then their server came over with their drinks and Craig’s order of wings, along with Ziggy’s.

  Craig was all about the wings and immediately dug in, but Ziggy wasn’t ready to let the conversation go. He’d picked up a wing but still pointed it at Jesse. “So, you didn’t answer. How you holding up?”

  Jesse shook his head and took a sip of his beer. “I’m like you see me here. I’m okay. Don’t I look okay?”

  Craig slipped him a look, then nodded. “You look all right. Still a little too pretty, and I’m not sure why I hang out with you. But yeah, alright.” He stared at him a little harder. “But you’re not sleeping worth a damn, are you? You need to get some rest. That pretty face won’t last forever.”

  “Aww,” Jesse said, and reached for one of Craig’s wings. Craig’s horrified expression was priceless. “Thanks for your concern, Auntie.”

  “Shut the hell up and be prepared to give me one of yours when it comes or shoot me a dollar.”

  “A dollar?” Jesse said. “It’s a seventy-five-cent wing.”

  “Interest, my man. Interest. And wing hour is about over anyway.”

  Jesse laughed, feeling kind of glad to have come out now that Ziggy had broken the mood. “Okay, so wings aside, what’s up with you and Erika Taylor? You and her getting serious?”

  Jesse’s laughter quickly faded. Dammit, word traveled quick. “No, we’re not getting serious. Nowhere near close to that. She may have stayed over at my place, but it was a onetime thing.”

  “A onetime thing?” Craig asked. “Damn, you pretty motherfucker. That’s a smooth-ass drop right there. Slipping in about Erika Taylor staying over and then a onetime thing. Your lucky ass been tipping with her about a minute, pissing off half of Harlem and the Bronx, and now you’re talking a onetime thing.” Craig shook his head. “You really are worse off than I thought. Here, have another wing. You need a refill on your drink too?”

  “More like a few-times thing, but her sleeping over at my place was a onetime thing. She knows this,” Jesse said. “Just like I told you. And I gotta keep my mind on my grind right now.”

  “Oh, Erika can keep a brother’s mind on his grind. That’s for damn sure,” Craig said as he and Ziggy clinked glasses.

  “So what’s the grind?” Ziggy asked. “Did you and your brothers decide how you’re going to close up the shop?”

  Jesse felt the tension that was just starting to dissipate rise up again. Even his boys didn’t give any thought to him keeping the shop open. Nothing like a high dose of no one believing you’ve got any ingenuity to bring a guy down. Still, he faced his detractors head-on. “No, we’ve decided to keep the shop open. Or rather, I have. My brothers will help me out when they can.”

  The looks the guys were giving him had him thinking for a moment that he was speaking another language. Even Craig had stopped chewing. He decided to continue on. Go remedial and maybe they would understand. “We figured it’s what Mama Joy would have wanted. She cared about the shop and what it means to the community. I figured I need to at least try.”

  Craig and Ziggy continued to stare.

  “Jeez. Why are you both looking at me like that? Is my reputation that bad? Don’t I always come through whenever either of you needs me?”

  They frowned and looked at each other skeptically, no doubt thinking of all the times he’d been late to a party or hadn’t shown for an event at all. “Come on and cut me some slack,” he said. “This is going to work out.”

  Finally, his friends nodded. “We get it,” Ziggy said. “We were just a little shocked is all.”

  “Yeah,” Craig agreed. They were turning into quite the little act as they shook their heads and confirmed their comments with their wings. “You know,” Craig said between bites, “though, sure, you can do whatever you want and put your mind to, it’s just the idea of you and your brothers running a knitting shop is a little shocking. Do you plan on converting it into some sort of other kind of business? Like do some sort of play off the Strong Knits name. Say Strong Brothers Bodega. Or go the ironic route and do Strong Brothers Vegan Snacks.”

  “Vegan snacks? This from the wing happy hour champion? Besides, Harlem doesn’t need another redundant or useless business with a short shelf life.”

  Craig shrugged. “You got a point there, don’t go vegan. If it was me, I’d do a chicken and rib shop.”

  Jesse made a face. “Didn’t I just say we don’t need redundant?”

  Craig nodded. “I know it sounds that way. But with chicken and ribs it’s all about the sauce, and I’ve got a helluva sauce.”

  Jesse knew there would be no getting Craig off this particular bone, so he just let him go with it. “When you open that rib shop, I’ll be first in line,” he said. “I know you can burn. Until then, I plan on doing my best with the yarn shop I’ve already got. Besides, I’ve g
ot a plan, and luckily Kerry is staying on awhile to continue to help out. Between the two of us, with the way she keeps her nose to the grindstone and her mind on her work, we shouldn’t have any problems.”

  Zig frowned. “Mind on her work? If you say so.”

  Now it was Jesse’s turn to frown. “What’s with the ‘If you say so’? You all know Kerry. She’s the girl who worked in the shop all these years helping out Mama Joy.” He shook his head. “Maybe you didn’t notice her. Brown skinned, glasses, kind of unassuming, but a nice smile.”

  Ziggy laughed. “Oh, we noticed her all right. We been noticing her. Just like half the guys over by the bar right now. I don’t know what’s wrong with your eyes—that woman is no girl.”

  Jesse spun around quick enough to catch a crick in his neck, but still didn’t see Kerry.

  Zig laughed. “You don’t see her because she’s got guys on each side of her jockeying to buy her a cheap drink. Look to the right. She’s with that friend of hers with the ample assets and the dimples.”

  It took another second, but then he spotted her. There was Kerry, and just as Zig had said, she was flanked by more than a few dudes and her friend Val. She’d changed from the simple jeans and loose top she’d been wearing earlier and was in really tight jeans paired with a tank top that showed more than it hid. She wore her twists up high, showing off her long neck, and large hoop earrings made her skin glow with a kind of iridescent invitation.

  Jesse felt his heart begin to thump with a wild beat. Why had he never seen her like this before? Why was he suddenly seeing her in all sorts of ways that made little to no sense? He stared. This woman holding court at the bar was definitely not the shop’s Kerry Girl but some alternate of her morphed into his dream and nightmare. This woman was Kerry Fuller and more than he could probably handle.

  Jesse polished off his beer and put it down with a thud as he turned to his friends. “I could use another drink. What about you guys? Next round’s on me?”

  Ziggy and Craig looked at each other with caution then back at him and shrugged. “Well, if it’s on you, then yeah,” Craig said as Jesse got up. “Just make sure you only get the drink. Don’t go over there starting shit. She’s off the clock, so not your employee tonight.”

  But he was already on his way to the bar, their voices growing distant. Right now it was as if he was being pulled by an invisible thread straight toward Kerry Fuller.

  8

  Kerry was pissed as well as a little buzzed when she stripped off her clothes to shower that night.

  It was moments like these when—though she missed her mother since she’d up and moved to Virginia, following behind the hopes of yet another love—Kerry was at least grateful to have their tiny Harlem apartment all to herself. This way her mother wasn’t home to cast judgment on her condition, not that Kerry hadn’t seen her more than way past buzzed more than a time or three. Also, Kerry no longer had to sleep on the old pullout in the living room, since the apartment was only a modest one bedroom.

  Still, being both pissed and buzzed made Kerry slightly uncomfortable in her own skin as she went through the motions of taking off her hoops and putting them in her jewelry dish, then lathering makeup remover on her already smudged-beyond-belief eyes. She added more of the oil-based cleanser to her lips, working it in to get off the deep berry stain that had looked so good when she’d first left with Val for drinks but over the course of the night had turned dry and cakey. Like so many other things, not living up to advertised expectations.

  She stared at herself as the makeup came off but still couldn’t quite settle herself, no matter how she tried. This low-grade out-of-body thing she was experiencing was probably welcome to some, but to her, it just felt off. It made her wonder if it was the drinks or scarily something more. Usually she was a one-and-done type of girl, preferring to stay fully in control at all times. Buzzed was not a feeling that appealed to her. But for some reason just one drink hadn’t cut it tonight. Not with Jesse Strong all around her. In her mind and then in the flesh.

  And as for being pissed, though it was not entirely new, of course, she hated that feeling all the more, especially seeing where tonight’s unsettling pissery came from.

  Damn him, he was putting her off her game. Messing up the well-crafted persona she’d spent the better part of her adolescence and twenties creating for herself. Kerry liked to think of herself as a calm spirit and wanted others to think of her as one too. It was part of her armor. And it worked for her. Some did the whole tough-bravado thing. She did the sweet-unflappable-sensitive-caregiver deal. She’d worked hard to create a safe space in her mind where everything stayed calm. But now with Mama Joy gone, and taking on the shop with Jesse, it seemed that space was under constant attack. So much so that she couldn’t even go out, feel uninhibited for just a moment and have a good time without the reminder of her troubles, the shop and how they wove too closely together. Yes, Kerry could easily admit, at least to herself, that she cared about the Strong brothers. All the Strong brothers. But damn Jesse for taking her feelings and things too far tonight.

  She turned on the shower and debated whether to make the water extra hot or extra cool, wondering which would regulate her mood in its current state. Sure, she was being flirty but she was also, as usual, on alert while at Bird’s, being extra careful given the energy of the restaurant that night.

  Kerry was no fool. She wasn’t about to just take a drink from any stranger on the street. Man, woman, hot or not. But the offers hadn’t been bad. At least it was interest, she’d first embarrassingly thought. No one was looking at her tonight with pity or, worse, tolerance. No, she wasn’t just a fixture. She was a living, breathing woman, and for a while she liked it. So Jesse, helpful as he may have been, had a lot of nerve swooping in like he did and ruining her good time when he didn’t even know about the situation.

  There she was, politely refusing the kind of pushy—okay, maybe a touch swarmy—dude with a beard, neck tats and ridiculously dry lips, judging by how he couldn’t stop licking them. Yeah, he needed to move back and out of her personal space. And yeah, no matter how much she shimmied backward on the barstool or angled her back, the swarmy guy was still too close.

  Kerry shivered, trying to shake off the good feeling Jesse’s fake claim had given her. She felt her body heat as she remembered the damned comforting warmth of his body when he was suddenly solidly by her side. But the fake part was what she had to remind herself of. His pretense of acting like she belonged to him was about as real as that jerk of a swarmy, dry-lipped guy telling her how amazing she was. How she was a dream, a snack, a dime piece, and all he ever desired. She didn’t believe that asshole, and she damned sure didn’t and couldn’t believe Jesse.

  Kerry knew she shouldn’t be too mad though. Not at Jesse. The dry-ass lip licker was a lot. The person she should be mad at was herself, and she’d add Val to the mix for coaxing her out and into that particular meat market when she’d told Val there was a rom-com with her name on it.

  “Why you playing hard to get on my boy here?” Lip Licker’s wingman had said.

  Though flattering at first, their lines were getting old, and Kerry just wanted a table.

  “Come on, Shorty,” Lip Licker said. “Why you acting like that?” The host called a name, and he got a tap on his shoulder from another of his friends. “Look, our table is ready. Why don’t you two come and sit with us?”

  Kerry shook her head. “No thanks. We’re fine. We’ve got our own drinks and our table is coming.”

  Val gave her a little nudge with her knee and a nod of agreement. Though her friend was the original persuader in getting her out earlier—“You need a break,” Val had said, “and I need some dick”—even she wasn’t open to what these dudes were offering up. Instead she looked at Lip Licker’s wingman. “Yeah, we’re good. We’ve got this, but you guys enjoy your night.”

  Lip Licker, not happy w
ith the dismissal, changed his tune to a decidedly darker note. As if angry and bitter would somehow be the game changer that instantly had Kerry wetting her pants for him.

  “That’s the problem with women nowadays, don’t know how to take it when a man is just trying to be nice. They always got to be too fucking independent for their own good.”

  “And thank God for it. I for one can appreciate a woman who can take care of herself.” Kerry heard Jesse’s voice come from over her shoulder as he reached around to take the glass out of her hand. He looked her in the eye as he casually took a sip of her cocktail.

  “But seriously, Ker, independence is one thing—these sweet drinks are another thing entirely,” he said, making a face.

  When she just stared at him, he tilted his head. “So what’s up, Ms. Independent? You buying?”

  She let out a sigh. “Don’t you wish.” But then she noticed Lip Licker starting to flex and changed her tune. She didn’t need unnecessary drama, and even more so, Jesse and the shop didn’t. She looked at him, and though his posture was relaxed and he had his usual smile on, she knew it was fake. There was that subtle hint of tension in his jaw, and when she saw his nostrils flare as he looked at Lip Licker, Kerry decided defusing the situation would be best.

  “I do enough,” she said. “Don’t you think? How about you clean out your pocket for a change?”

  “I don’t know what’s going on, but I thought you were coming to sit with us?” Lip Licker said, his delusions grand indeed.

  “Um, no. That’s not what we said,” Kerry started, but was cut off by Jesse’s familiar arm around her shoulder. For the life of her she didn’t know why she didn’t push it away but wanted to lean into him even more. He looked at the guys as he directed his words to her and Val. “Okay, ladies, let’s go. I’ve got wings cooling over there, and I hate my chicken cold.”