Man Enough For Me

by Rhonda Bowen

  As her gaze shifted, her eyes fell on a black SUV that had pulled up to the curb a few meters down the road. The doors opened, and two men stepped out, one from either side. Jules squinted against the sunlight to catch a better look at their faces. Even from a distance, something about them looked vaguely familiar. She watched the taller one walk across the sidewalk, and up the steps of one of the better looking apartment buildings. The other lit a cigarette, leaned back against the stationary vehicle, and watched his companion enter the complex.

  Jules racked her brain trying to figure out where she had seen them before. She stared so hard at the brother with the cigarette that she swore he must have felt her eyes on him. But she couldn’t help it. Something about him, from his slightly crooked cornrows, to the large ring on his pinkie finger struck a chord in her memory. She just didn’t know why.

  From the corner of her eye, Jules saw a silver Toyota 4Runner pull up across the street and a tall male in baggy jeans and a Sean Jean sweatshirt step out.

  “Never thought I’d see you here,” Jules said, slightly turning her head as Easy approached them.

  “I was passing, and I saw ‘Dre’s car,” Easy said.

  “Oh, yeah, I forgot you lived near here,” Tanya said from her position fully stretched out on the hood of the van. Jules knew that underneath her shades, her eyes were closed. She shook her head. Only Tanya could use Truuth’s photo shoot as an opportunity to get a tan.

  A movement in the distance caught Jules’s eye, and she found herself again watching the familiar man as he put out the cigarette he was smoking. It was clear that he was getting a bit impatient, as he had started walking back and forth in front of the van, all the while with his eyes fixed on the apartment building. Jules leaned forward and squinted to see if there was anything going on near the building’s entrance, but a hedge of grass blocked her view.

  “What you looking at, baby girl?” Easy asked curiously, as he watched Jules crane her neck to get a better view.

  “Huh?”

  “Why you so interested in the dude down there?” Easy asked. Jules was so preoccupied that she missed the slight edge that had crept into his voice.

  “I’ve seen that guy before,” she said absently.

  “That guy?” Easy asked, nodding toward where the man was still pacing. “Are you sure?”

  “Positive,” Jules said. “I know I’ve seen him before, but I can’t remember where.”

  Just then the first man emerged from the building with a duffel bag, which he promptly threw in the back of the vehicle.

  “Him as well,” Jules added.

  “Baby girl, are you sure those guys were the ones you saw?” Easy asked again.

  “Yes, Easy,” Jules said, slightly annoyed that he kept asking her the same question over and over. “Don’t you think I would remember who I saw? Why do you keep asking me?”

  “‘Cause those cats are pushers.”

  Jules’s head snapped around. Easy’s eyes had gone dark, and there was a grave expression on his face. Out of nowhere a nervous jittery feeling began to build in the pit of Jules’s stomach.

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Look at me, Jules. Do I look like I’m kidding?”

  Jules looked up at Easy for a moment, then back at the scene. The men were getting into the car. Only moments later they made a U-turn and were headed down the road. Jules wished that the dismal feeling building inside her had left with them.

  Even though the sun was beating down, all of a sudden Jules felt cold and uneasy. Something was coming. She didn’t know what it was, but she had a feeling she was going to regret knowing what Easy had just told her. Sliding off the hood of ‘Dre’s van, she slipped on her jacket and went to find ‘Dre. She didn’t want to be here anymore. She just wanted to go home and lie down. Maybe if she slept for a little while her sudden paranoia would go away.

  She found ‘Dre standing with Ryan, looking at digital prints of Truuth’s photos on Ryan’s laptop.

  “Hey, Jules, I was just about to call you over here,” ‘Dre said, making room for her in front of the laptop. “You want to take a look at these shots?”

  “Maybe later,” Jules said. “I’m gonna go, okay? I’ll talk to you guys later.”

  “Jules, you okay? You don’t look too good,” Ryan said with an air of concern.

  “I’ll be fine,” Jules said, already walking away. “I’ll catch up with you later.”

  She was halfway to her car before Easy caught up with her. She had hoped to make it home without having to talk to anyone else, but apparently that was not going to happen.

  “Baby girl, we need to talk.”

  “Not now, okay, Easy,” Jules said, sticking her keys into the car door. She noticed some fliers sticking to her windshield, and she impatiently plucked them up and tossed them on the sidewalk.

  “Yes, now.”

  Jules ignored him, yanked her car door open, and tossed her purse on the front passenger seat.

  “Jules.”

  She stopped short when she heard the edge in Easy’s voice. She realized then that he wasn’t playing, and that she wasn’t going anywhere until he had finished talking to her. She slowly turned around to face him.

  “Where did you see those brothas before?” he asked her in a tone that warned her not to lie to him.

  “I don’t know,” Jules said, trying to fight the images that were flashing in her mind.

  “You saw them with your boy, didn’t you,” Easy said.

  Jules leaned against her car as she felt her whole body weaken.

  She nodded. “They were with him, in his office at the store.”

  “That’s what I thought,” Easy said flatly. “I saw him with them too. I figured that it was nothing the first time, but then I saw him get into that vehicle with them….” He shook his head. “Why didn’t you come talk to me, Jules?”

  “I don’t know … I didn’t think …” She struggled with words as she tried to give a reasonable answer. But she couldn’t even explain to herself what had made her put away her own concerns and trust Germaine so completely.

  “I tried to tell you he wasn’t right, baby girl….”

  Jules felt herself slide down the side of the car and crouch down on the ground. She wanted to cover her ears and block out everything Easy was saying. But every time she closed her eyes, all she saw were the two men standing in Germaine’s office.

  Suddenly the truth hit her like a ton of bricks.

  She was involved with a drug dealer. Her boyfriend was a drug dealer.

  It sounded so ridiculous in her head that she figured it couldn’t be true. But somewhere in the back of her mind she knew it was.

  But how? She knew him. How could she have been involved with him for so many months and not known? How was this possible?

  Images of every moment she had spent with Germaine seemed to flash through her mind in quick succession as she tried to pick out anything suspicious she might have missed before. The truth seemed to float into place like pieces of a puzzle she had never been able to put together. The confrontation at the store; the way he tried to distance her from the Sound Lounge and his business; the reason he didn’t like Easy. Easy had been the only one who could have revealed his secret.

  A drug dealer. How could she have been so wrong about him?

  How could she have been so foolish? She had never trusted another guy so completely so quickly.

  But he hadn’t been some random guy. ‘Dre and Maxine knew him. They had vouched for him. He was Truuth’s family—and Truuth was like family to her. He had come to church with her. She had let him into her world, introduced him to her friends, and trusted him with her business. Invited him into her home—invited him into her mother’s home!

  “Oh, Lord,” Jules groaned. She felt like she was going to be sick.

  “Its okay, baby girl, I’m gonna get you home,” Jules heard Easy say somewhere in the distance.

  “No,” she murmured. She too
k several deep breaths before standing up. Slowly, but steadily she reopened her car door and slid inside.

  “Baby girl, let me drive you home. I can get ‘Dre to bring my car—”

  “I’m fine, Easy,” Jules said with more calm than she felt. He looked at her doubtfully, but knew she wasn’t going to let him take care of her.

  “Okay,” he said. “But let me handle it. I don’t want you going anywhere near that nig—”

  “No, Easy,” Jules said, shaking her head stubbornly.

  “Jules, don’t fight me on this one,” Easy warned. But Jules wouldn’t back down. She got herself into this; she would get her own self out.

  “No, Easy, I’ll deal with it,” she said, as she turned the engine. “This is my life.”

  She watched Easy brooding on the side of the road. He kept closing and opening his fists, and she knew he was itching to handle Germaine in a way that wouldn’t involve many words. But she refused to let him.

  “Promise me you’ll stay out of it,” Jules said, squinting up at him through the bright midday sun.

  Easy shook his head and clenched his jaw stubbornly, refusing to meet Jules’s eyes.

  “Easy, give me your word you’ll stay out of it,” Jules insisted. He stared at her hard before answering.

  “All right. I’ll stay out of it. But if anything happens to you …”

  Jules didn’t hear the rest. She had already sped off down the road, leaving nothing but dust and a frustrated Easy standing in her wake.

  Jules checked her blind spot quickly, then slipped into the far left lane of the 401. After hearing the truth about Germaine at the morning’s photo shoot, she’d had every intention of going home, slipping under the covers, and crying herself into a sorrow-induced slumber. But at some point after the Mc-Cowan Road exit but before Ajax, her despair had transformed into burning anger.

  How could he do this to me? How could he look into my eyes and lie to me every day for months? How could he put me and my friends and my family in so much danger?

  Realizing that she would have no peace until she got answers to her questions, Jules took the next exit off the highway, turned around, and headed back to the city.

  Twenty minutes later Jules pulled right up to the front of the Sound Lounge and parked. As she slammed the car door shut, she noticed the one-hour parking sign. She wasn’t worried. She wouldn’t be there that long.

  Storming past the front counter, she burst into Germaine’s office, swinging the door shut behind her. It slammed so hard that the walls shook, and several papers on Germaine’s desk blew out of place.

  He looked up at her in surprise. When he caught sight of her expression, however, Jules was almost sure she saw a look of fear flash through his eyes.

  He should be afraid. Very afraid.

  “I’m gonna ask you one question, and I want you to think long and hard before you try to lie to me,” Jules said quietly. “Are you pushing drugs?”

  Even though it was supposed to be a question, it sounded more like an accusation coming from Jules. She watched as a million different expressions seemed to slip across Germaine’s face, as the reality of being caught dawned on him. She wished that even one of those expressions had suggested her assumptions were wrong. But sadly that was not the case. Germaine seemed a lot of things, but confused was not one of them.

  “Well? Are you gonna answer me?” Jules asked angrily, her voice going up an octave.

  “Do I really need to? You’ve already made all your assumptions about me,” Germaine said. His voice, like his face, was emotionless and impossible to read.

  “Negro, please, don’t even try to play the victim here,” she said angrily. “I didn’t assume nothing. I am standing here asking you to tell me the truth. Like I’ve been asking you all these months.”

  “Who are you kidding, Jules? You didn’t come here to ask me anything. You came down here to accuse me. You already decided I was wrong long before you even stepped through that door.”

  “I can’t believe you’re trying to turn this on me,” Jules said, shaking her head in anger and disbelief.

  “But it is about you. It’s about you not trusting me.”

  “When have I ever not trusted you?” Jules screeched.

  “When I told you the guys you saw in my office were just people I was working with,” Germaine said. “Before the words were fully out of my mouth you were already asking Maxine and your friends about me. And let’s not forget how salty you got when I wouldn’t lay out every inch of my business to you.”

  “Now who’s the one exaggerating,” Jules said dryly. “All I asked was what kind of business you had with those guys …”

  “And I told you I couldn’t talk about it. But now you’re throwing around these unfounded accusations about my being involved in something illegal.”

  “Unfounded?” Jules echoed in disbelief. “Are you serious? Germaine, you’ve been consorting with drug dealers!”

  “Oh, so that’s what you think I’m doing? Who told you that? Your friend Easy?” he asked, scowling.

  “He didn’t have to tell me anything. I saw you with my own eyes.”

  “Jules, you don’t know what you saw,” he shot back. He was finally beginning to get upset.

  “You know what’s funny about this whole thing,” Jules said, her eyes narrowing. “Even now, you still haven’t denied anything. You still haven’t said, ‘Jules I’m not involved with that mess.’”

  “Why bother?” he asked, tossing down his pen onto the desk. “It wouldn’t make a difference to you anyway.”

  “How would you know? You didn’t even try!”

  Germaine closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His jaw was clenched tightly.

  “Jules, I am not pushing drugs. I am not selling drugs, and I definitely am not involved with any drug dealers.”

  “Liar,” Jules said, in a low, shaky voice. The hot tears that she had been holding back began to run freely down her cheeks. “I saw the two brothas in your office, Germaine. I saw them talking to you, that day you went off on me about coming here,’ she said shakily. Her whole body trembled as she stood in the middle of Germaine’s office. “I saw them again today, at Regent Park. I know who they are. I know what they do.”

  She watched all the anger drain from him in a single moment.

  “Jules, it’s not what you think,” Germaine said, getting up from his chair and moving toward her. His voice and his eyes pleaded with her to believe him. But she couldn’t. Not anymore.

  She shook her head. “How could you look me in the eye and lie to me like that?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper, her eyes looking at him accusingly.

  “Jules, when have I ever lied to you?” Germaine asked. “Since the day we met, I have always told you the truth. I may not have told you everything you wanted to know, but I never lied to you.”

  Jules sniffled but said nothing. She had thought he had been honest with her. But as far as Jules was concerned, omission was still deception. And this time the evidence was overwhelming. There was no way he could sweet-talk his way out of this one.

  Germaine raked his hand through his hair in frustration. “Geez, Jules, why is it so hard for you to trust me?”

  “I did trust you!” she exclaimed in frustration. “I trusted you with my friends. I went into business with you. I let you into my whole life. And what do you do? You put me, and my family, and everything I know in danger!

  “How could you do that to me?”

  Jules knew she was losing it. Her eyes were swollen, her face was wet, and her throat was raw from crying and shouting at Germaine at the same time. Not to mention, she was exhausted.

  She looked at Germaine and tried to catch a glimpse of the man she knew, the man who had become such a vital part of her. He was more than just some new guy she had a crush on. He was a friend, a confidant, and someone she had felt safe with. She looked desperately for the man she had grown to admire so much. But he was gone. In fact he had neve
r existed. The Germaine she knew was just a fabrication of the stranger who stood before her.

  The sadness of that thought seemed to suck all the energy out of her, and she knew then that it was time to leave. She turned to go, but Germaine grabbed her wrist before she had a chance. She flinched and pulled her hand away.

  “Jules, can we at least talk about this?”

  “There’s nothing to talk about,” she snapped, a bit of her strength returning. “I don’t do drug dealers.”

  “Jules, this is a mistake.”

  “You’re right. It was all a mistake,” she said as she opened the door. “We’re done.”

  As the door swung shut behind her, she felt another door close—the door to her heart.

  Chapter 12

  “I want to move Truuth’s launch to a new location.”

  Four pairs of eyes looked at Jules as if she had lost her mind.

  Jules, ‘Dre, Tanya, Maxine, Truuth, and Easy were all meeting in Triad’s conference room to discuss the plans for Truuth’s album launch when Jules dropped the bomb. Now, with the request hanging in the air, almost all of them were looking at her as if she was crazy.

  Two days had passed since Jules’s confrontation with Germaine, and while she was ready to move on from him, there were some unfortunate ties that still bound them together.

  “Jules, the launch is in six weeks. Half the promotional material has already been printed. We’ve been telling everybody about it; we can’t switch venues now,” ‘Dre said.

  “All of that is minor. The posters and fliers have been printed but they haven’t gone out yet. We can get some stickers done and cover the Sound Lounge with the name of the new venue.”

  “That’s not even the point,” ‘Dre said. “We’ve been working on this thing for months. Why did you just decide you need to change the venue now?”

  Jules remained calm and emotionless. She was prepared for this question and every other question ‘Dre could throw at her. It didn’t matter how many objections he had. They were moving the launch away from Germaine’s place.