Like a Fly on the Wall

by Simone Kelly

  I grabbed my bag and adjusted my hair in the mirror by the door. “I know, it’s way too dangerous up in here.” We walked into the elevator with teenagers who smiled at us.

  As the doors closed, Chauncey whispered in my ear. “Yeah, bring panties next time, will ya? You big tease.”

  I laughed so loudly I startled the unsuspecting kids.

  Chapter 12

  Kylie

  I didn’t realize how far apart Olivia and I had grown until it was time to hang out. Olivia is busy being a mommy, wife, and all. She’s just becoming an old fart. Her feet are always hurting. She’s always tired and only wants to hang out at Annabelle’s Coffee Shop. If I’m lucky, occasionally she’ll venture out to On The B-Side Entertainment events, a famous open mic night in Miami.

  I’d rather get a few moments at a bar, live music, or even go to the movies, just us girls. I wasn’t trying to drag her to a strip club or pick up men anywhere, but she shied away from the things we used to do. She was a perfect example of why I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be a mother or get married. I love my freedom! It was time to grow up but I don’t think I am quite ready.

  Getting to see her was still good, though, even if it was just at a coffee shop on a Sunday afternoon. I couldn’t wait to tell her the update.

  Olivia had on a beautiful bright burnt-orange tie-dyed sundress. Her long locks were wrapped up with only a few strands caressing her face. She had a regal presence, and her British accent made her sound like royalty. If people only knew her mouth was sometimes as bad as mine.

  On my phone, I showed her a photo of me and Chauncey on the beach.

  “Girl, Chauncey is everything and more.”

  She snatched the phone to get a close-up view. “Ohhh . . . nice. Chauncey . . . Chauncey . . . He looks like he has a nice one. You fucked him, didn’t you? You slut. Have you learned nothing from me?”

  “I know you want to live through me vicariously, but I got nothing!” I held up my hands in surrender.

  “You do tell the best stories.”

  “Well, at least you got a husband, all I got is stories.”

  “Oh, please, he’s okay!” She blushed. She still had a glow when she spoke about her husband, even though she’d been married for four years. “You’ll find yours someday, when the time is right. I didn’t even know who I was until I was thirty. You’re only twenty-seven, so relax.”

  “Oh please, you’re thirty-six and you act like you’re sixty-six.”

  “Oh hush! I’m just so happy you moved down here. I was starting to miss you. Not many people I connect with here.”

  “Well, I’m glad, too! Who else will remind me of how exciting my life is?” I did a sarcastic eye roll.

  “It is exciting! Sooo . . . you sure you didn’t do it?”

  “No, I didn’t! And if I learned anything from you, I would have fucked him already. You Brits are loose! I remember your stories about before you were married.”

  “No, no . . . you Americans are just uptight. When we like someone we just do what we want, we don’t play games.” I smiled at her babbling. She said, “Look at that glow, you are such a liar. You got your leg over, I knew it.”

  “Olivia! Come on, you know I would tell you. Shit, I came pretty close to it, but I got the hell out of there. I had a fabulous time and laughed all the way home. I couldn’t wait to finish off the night and this time go all the way with B.O.B.”

  “Who is Bob? I don’t remember him. Same website you met Chauncey on?”

  “No, girl, that’s just my battery-operated boyfriend.”

  “Oh, well, for now I guess B.O.B. will have to do. I’ll give you two more dates, tops!”

  “I’m not even gonna bet you.” I shook my head and smiled. She sipped her tea and we laughed. “But check this out, guess who’s been texting me?”

  “Who else? That scoundrel Breeze.”

  “Yes, he keeps trying to say hello. He sends me photos and I just ignore them or reply with a smiley face.”

  “Please, he’s such a user. You should just do away with his number. Block him.”

  “I know, but he’s still someone I love. I just hate him at the same time.”

  “It’s complicated, eh?” Olivia said.

  “Yeah, pretty much.”

  She pointed at me like a big sister. “Well, you know what kind of relationship it is. A bed-buddy, nothing more and nothing less. He won’t give you what you want.”

  “It just feels so hard to get away from him! I feel like there is some crazy connection with him.”

  “There has got be a part of you that enjoys the bad boy side to him. It just does not make any sense.”

  I sipped my coffee. “I know, I know, it’s a sick addiction.” I shrugged.

  She leaned in. “Kylie, my love, it’s self-sabotaging is what it is. It’s what you are used to and I think maybe a part of you thinks it’s actually normal.”

  “Come on! I know this strange on-again, off-again shit with Breeze is far from normal.”

  Olivia challenged me. “So, then why do you keep accepting it? You keep putting up with it. You make it easy for him to keep coming back. You drop everything when he calls.”

  I grasped for anything. “I know. . . . Maybe in my past life . . . maybe we were married.”

  “Or maybe you were his mistress.” Olivia snorted a goofy laugh. “Why don’t you ask the sexy psychic? Maybe you were lovers in a past life!”

  “You know, I really believe it. When it’s good it’s just soooooo good with him, he knows me so well, we just gel. I feel like I am fucking floating. But when it’s bad . . .” My voice faded as I tried to believe my own lies. “Well, he just does a disappearing act. He becomes so busy with work.”

  “What he does is abandon you, Kylie, and that’s just cruel.”

  I gave her a harsh squint. My heart crushed when she said it. Abandon. YOU. Abandon. YOU. It echoed in my head. She was right.

  “It’s like he takes me on all the rides and plays all the games with me at a fun adventure park but then instead of taking me home, he dumps me on the side of a road on a dark night to hitchhike home and figure it out.”

  Olivia’s jaws tightened and her eyes looked dark and serious. “That is emotional abuse.” She took a deep breath. “You ever think not knowing your dad could be why you are so drawn to him? An older man?”

  “He’s not that old, only seven years older.”

  “Still, he acts older, and even you said the way he talks is like an older man, always calling you darling and sugah.” Olivia giggled, trying to lighten the tone.

  I rubbed my temples and said sternly, “You take two psychology classes in grad school and now you want to psychoanalyze me. Guuuuurl, please!”

  “What? It’s not that hard to figure out, you have daddy issues. It’s not a big deal. Most of us do.”

  “Well, if that is the case, I have mommy issues, too. Look, when I really think about it, Breeze was like the family I never had. He was my man, my dad, my big brother, my best friend.”

  Olivia said, “Well, you know how I feel. You are a precious jewel. You don’t need to be treated like a cubic zirconia. When you keep letting him back you’re just letting the universe know . . . ‘Yeah him. Gimme this guy, that’s what I deserve. I will take the scraps that he offers.’ The second I stopped settling I met Keith.”

  I chimed in, “Oh please, you know damn well Keith was stalking you for a minute, even when we met back in yoga. You treated him like shit, that is why. Men somehow love when women treat them like crap and ignore them.”

  “No, no, that’s not how it went. I just stopped looking and focused on myself more. I really stopped looking at every guy I met as a potential husband. That’s not quite treating him like shit. I just realized how worthy I was. I put myself first. Once I did, I attracted something better and he pursued me and courted me, the way it’s supposed to be. He cherished who I was.”

  I started shaking my head. “Wait! Wait!” I held my hand
up to her. “Didn’t you guys fuck on the second date in the club bathroom?”

  A booming laugh escaped Olivia. She had a wide-eyed look and raised her voice. “Yes, ummm, but technically, I knew him for over a year before that! Over a year!” She pointed. “And he still cherished me. He made sure I didn’t fall into the toilet. That is a bloody gentleman, I’d say.” She leaned in, looked both ways, and whispered, “Bathroom fucking is so much fun.”

  “What I say? Brits are loose!” We broke into hysterical fits of laughter. “That’s some funny shit. He’s a gentleman all right, as he propped you up in a dirty bathroom stall.”

  Olivia’s laughter was contagious and we couldn’t stop. Some of Annabelle’s customers looked at us and smiled, hoping to catch a sliver of our joke. If they only knew!

  “Yes, let’s just say we had a lot of passion. Still do.”

  “I like Keith for you, he’s a good dude and a great dad. You lucked out.”

  “Oh, Kylie, there are plenty of good dudes out there. I’m going to plan a get-together so you can meet—”

  “Oh no, noooooo, please. I don’t want to meet none of those country bumpkins from Keith’s job. We went through this before, Liv.”

  “Please, give it a chance. Keith has some nice-looking friends. What’s wrong with a nice Southern gentleman? That’s what you need, to be treated like a lady.”

  “Yeah, I won’t hold my breath. I’ve seen his coworkers at his accounting firm at your last barbecue. Sorry, not my style.”

  “Okay, keep on playing around with those Craigslist killers.”

  “It’s Match-dot-com! Shut up!”

  “I just think it’s nicer to meet in person right away. It happens more organically. Not all that swiping to the side business to find a man.”

  “That’s Tinder. . . . You don’t swipe on Match.”

  With a quick snort she replied, “Whatever, it’s all the same shit.”

  “We do meet in person . . . eventually.”

  “And you want to have a reference. A referral. Someone who can background check and make sure they’re not psycho.” Olivia started fixing her head wrap as she lectured me.

  “Oh please, you can be referred by Obama and the pope and still be psycho!”

  “Well, when you meet him, you’ll know. You know how I knew Keith was really the one? We were even.”

  “Even?” I furrowed my eyebrows.

  “Meaning, he courted me, he called me . . . but I called him, too. I thought about him as much as he was thinking about me. I never felt smothered and I gave him his space. We got to know each other over time and we just meshed. We were even. It was balanced. It was a no-brainer to get married. We just knew. It just made sense. When you meet your man you shouldn’t have to be hoping and praying he calls you. You’ll be even. Breeze is a magician. The disappearing act gets tired.”

  I waved her off; I was exhausted already with the scolding. I wish I’d never told her so much. “I hear you.”

  “Do you? He is not even boyfriend material, much less husband. Have him show you with his actions, not all talk. Right now his smooth words always talk your panties off and you lose your senses. I’ve known you for five years, Kylie, and it’s been the same thing every time.”

  “He was my first.”

  “Well, he doesn’t have to be the last.”

  I took one last sip of my drink as her husband called—saved by the ring!

  Even though I felt I was in a beat-up-Breeze session, she had a lot of valid points. Frankly, it was a wake-up call that I needed to hear.

  Moving to South Florida from New York was a reinvention for me. I wanted change. Maybe even get to know my mother on a deeper level and ask her the questions she always avoided. Get inside her mind. True was only sixteen years older than me, but I wanted to feel like a daughter for once, be treated like her child and not her buddy. I had always wanted a mother. Still did. I thought that now that I was jobless and couldn’t afford my rent in Brooklyn she would come to my rescue.

  True moved down to Miami two years before I did to launch her massage business with her Big Mac man—the longest she’s ever had—Basim Kharabi, the Reiki master. Basim pulled her away from the seedy massage scene. Even though he met her there, it was still no place for a woman like True. She deserved her own spot, he said. True was very guarded and he helped her release a lot of that fear over the three years they were officially together. I never heard my mother talk about a man the way she did about him. She actually respected Basim.

  Basim was a handsome Iranian man, slightly balding, tall, and lanky. His energy was definitely relaxing. You could tell he was good at what he did. I learned that Reiki was a healing technique that started in Japan. It’s sort of like a type of energy healing. It looks like a massage, but they don’t rub you, they don’t even have to touch you, which I find fascinating.

  I thought it was bullshit at first, until I had a session at his spa with one of his practitioners. It was mind-blowing. I felt the heat coming from the woman’s hands as she opened up all of my chakras. I felt extremely relaxed, lighter and clearer afterward. I was a believer after that! I think Basim was probably doing Reiki on True a lot since her energy has been better since she’s known him.

  He was a businessman with a successful natural healing office in Fort Lauderdale called Chakra. He rented out rooms to bodywork practitioners like acupuncturists and massage therapists. He helped True gain some stability for once in her life. He really set her up. She still works at massage parlors, and sometimes for him, but they aren’t as bad as they used to be. True still does things for a tip and I don’t think she’ll ever stop. All over the place with no focus was True in a nutshell. Jack of all trades, master of not a damn thing but the art of seduction. And she could never resist making a quick buck.

  According to True, Basim fell in love with her on the massage table in Chinatown. She was the only black masseuse in the entire parlor—all the rest were Chinese or Korean. She stuck out like a sore thumb and was frequently requested for her exotic appearance and flowing wrap dresses that hugged her in all the right places. Toe rings and henna art on her arms or hands were her trademark. Her sweet caramel complexion, deep brown eyes, and big golden Afro made her memorable. Aside from her happy endings, she was also very proud of her velvet massages, during which she got on a client’s back and kneaded him with her knees and eventually her wetness. Panties? True despised them. She even used to tell me, when I was a child, that a women needs to “breathe down there.” She confessed that even those massages came with a special price and she got an absolute kick out of turning these men on.

  Basim doesn’t seem to be going anywhere anytime soon and I’m kinda happy about that. However, being the tree-hugging hippie that he is, he’s on the road for six months out of the year with one of his many activist groups. Last year, it was three months in Indonesia. This time it’s the Wildlife Preservation for the Rainforests of the Amazon. He’s living with shamans and pretending to be a part of their indigenous culture. He’ll be back in about three months, give or take a few.

  I have to make it my goal to get out of here before he comes back. Although he isn’t her boyfriend, Basim is her Big Mac and the reason we could afford to stay in the plush area of Coconut Grove.

  “A woman needs to always have a backup plan, Ky. Men do it allll the time,” True always ranted. “You need to get you a Big Mac, a man you can rely on to take care of your basic needs. Then your French fries pick up where he’s lacking. The Big Mac at least has to know how to make love and how to treat you good. The others can take care of the rest.” Words of wisdom from the book of True.

  Chauncey definitely had more Big Mac potential than anyone I’d come in contact with since I left New York. I had my guard up, though. I would keep it up for as long as I could and see if he failed the three-month test. That’s usually the time a dude’s Mr. Wonderful acting skills start to conk out on them. It’s when they can no longer hide their true colors. I think,
as pathetic as it sounds, I might just have to accept the fact that I might be like my mom. No husband, still trying to find myself at forty-three. Hey, I know I don’t want to be in her shoes, but it’s sadly a possibility. I can’t wait to ask Jacques what’s next.

  My cell phone rang at ten P.M. I didn’t recognize the number. “Hello?”

  “Hey, sugah, special delivery for Miss Collins.”

  “Breeze?”

  “The one and only! What’s crackin’, baby? I’m gonna be in town for the American Black Film Festival. Wanna grab a bite with me when I come? How is Friday looking?”

  “Are you serious?” I couldn’t help but smile and wondered if he could see me cheesing, even through the phone.

  “Yeah, you’re not far from South Beach, are you?”

  “Fifteen minutes, depending on traffic. But when did you get—”

  “Let’s just make it happen, sugah,” he said in a slow sexy voice.

  Damn damn damn! Why can’t I ever say no to him?

  “I have plans, Breeze, but let me call you back. I’ll try.” I tried to sound uninterested, but I’m sure he knew I was full of it. He just knew me, period, maybe even better than I knew myself.

  “I’ll be waiting, sugah. Peace.”

  I put the phone down and starting pacing. I walked past Phantom, who seemed annoyed I was disturbing her sleep. I was nervous, excited, and pissed all at once. Only he knew how to evoke a whirlwind of emotions inside me.

  I plopped on the bed, thinking about what I was going to do. I can’t see him, I can’t be in his space. Not now when I’m starting to feel my own power again, when I’m starting to really feel a connection with Chauncey. Breeze was sweet and soft like his nickname, but the hold he had on me was mighty, like a hurricane. Karma is a bitch, because it was my fault for luring him into my life.

  Was bad karma the result of my childhood? By the age of twelve, I knew how to get a man’s attention. True’s French fries would revel in how cute I was, how I looked just like a mini version of my mother. But I saw how they looked at me. Perverts.