by Derrick Jaxn
I had something to look forward to in life, they didn't. They needed to get whatever laughs they could get because this was where the buck stopped for them. That reminder brought me back to earth and dealt me a smile.
So, I channeled my inner Chuck Norris as I turned and walked out the door, mentally dedicating my first million dollars to opening up another restaurant across the street to put them all out of work. Bastards.
***
Later that evening, I came home to an empty house. Danielle was working. Normally, I'd be trying to catch a nap so I could make it through my work shift.
I didn't know if I should start rehearsing my lines I'd give Danielle as to why I lost my job or pick up the remote and turn on the TV. I chose the latter.
I flipped through a few shows I'm never interested in: Home Improvement, 90's high school re-runs, game shows, etc. After a futile effort to entertain my mind off things, I got up looking for something to eat, and not to my surprise, found spaghetti in the fridge with my name on it. That was my green light to go ahead and whip out the apron and get to work.
I went to pre-heat the oven and looked at the different temperatures. They all looked hot to me so I picked one, then proceeded to picking out what seasonings I'd use.
I was familiar with the basics, salt and pepper, but outside of that was foreign territory. I had cooked before but only for myself in which my only standard of excellence was for it to be edible.
I saw a few seasoning salts, lemon pepper, and other colorful containers I never noticed in the cabinet before. Once I had them all out, I looked to the freezer for the meat and saw some nice, thick-cut pork chops towards the back.
Perfect.
There was no point in waiting for it to thaw, and besides, it could thaw out while it was cooking, so I thought. I tore the plastic off and began seasoning them right away. No need to make things complicated.
I had a pretty good lather of flavor going within the outer coating of ice so I went ahead and stuck the chops in the oven. Not sure if I needed a pan to set them on, but with the way the oven racks looked, I assumed they were designed to be something like an indoor grill, perfect for direct application of my chops.
I set them neatly about an inch apart in the oven. No need for a timer. I pretty much could use the eye test to see if they were done. Everybody knows what cooked food should look like.
I was starting to see why Danielle had made spaghetti instead of the home cooking I longed for; this stuff was not easy.
Since I had done such a good job on the main course, I rewarded myself by being lazy with the vegetables and opted out of a homemade salad for a few sliced pickles. They were just as healthy as any piece of lettuce and prevented cramps too.
I didn't care for rice very much and bread was a lot easier to handle, so it was a no brainer on what we'd do for the grains portion of the dinner.
Pork chops, pickles, and sliced bread; full course bon appetite. All I had to do now was wait. Waiting sounded like a great idea and sitting on the couch and resting my eyes seemed like an even better one.
"Superman, what's that smell?"
"Hey, baby, when'd you get in?" I looked up and saw Danielle standing over me.
"I just got here. Didn't you hear me open the door? Were you asleep or something?"
"Sleep? Nah, ain't nobody sleep." I looked at the clock and saw two hours had gone by. I jumped up and ran to the oven. I had forgotten all about my pork chops. "No, no, noooo!" I opened up the oven and the smoke rushed out, filling up the kitchen
"Superman, please tell me you did not go to sleep with food in the oven. Now you're going to have the whole house smelling like smoke and you better hope that smoke alarm doesn't go off because if it does, then-" Like clockwork the smoke detectors sounded off.
Even when you're fully aware of what's going on, they have a way of making you panic. She started yelling. "Oh my gosh, please, shut that thing up! I told you not to let the smoke alarm go off."
"You act like I asked it to or something. Help me find a towel." We both scrambled around the laundry room for a towel since there wasn't any hanging up in the kitchen. I saw one in the dryer, and frantically started beating the smoke detector with it to stop it from screaming.
I managed to get the one I was working on to stop but the smoke detector closest to Danielle was still going. Quicker than I could say "You might wanna move," I turned around to see the fire sprinklers emerging from the roof in uniform fashion.
It was already too late; Danielle stood helplessly as she was drenched from the top down, all the while looking at me without so much as a blink. I had really outdone myself this time.
So after the fire trucks and policemen stopped laughing at the reason for their false alarm, I mopped up the floor and apologized repetitively until mine and Danielle's empty stomachs started calling for attention again.
"Danielle, I was just tryna-"
"Why was you tryna do anything when I made spaghetti? There's plenty of it left. I know you saw it. You know what, let's just go out and get something to eat. I don't even feel like warming up any food now, much less cooking something else. " She folded her arms and looked the other way in disappointment.
I got up and started towards the door. I wasn't going to argue with anything that meant having a free pass to avoid the spaghetti, even in the wake of me screwing up. She threw on a hat to cover up her freshly blow-dried hair and headed out after me.
We were silent the entire walk to the car so I assumed that meant the decision of where to eat was on the driver, me. So I played it cool and went to this wing spot downtown.
It had a diner atmosphere but fast food prices, which was perfect for living within my means now that I had my new job of being unemployed.
We remained silent during the drive as Danielle's head was buried in her phone the entire way. She had been getting more wrapped up into social media and reality shows, so it wasn't long before the social apps would stake their claim on her attention as well.
We pulled up to an empty parking lot, both of us looking like 'who shot Jon and forgot to kill ‘em, so I wasn't complaining.
Empty restaurants are better anyway; first dibs on seats, quick service, and if there are TV's, you can pretend you're trying to listen to them in awkward moments like the ones I was sure to have.
A teenage, brace-faced blonde-headed girl met us at the front. She looked us up and down as if she expected us to ask her for a quarter then remembered to lead us to a table just in case we were customers.
"Hello, my name is Amanda and I'll be taking care of you two tonight. Would you care to start off with a beverage; maybe coffee, tea, or orange juice?" she said. Amanda sounded a lot nicer than the tone of her body language.
"Yeah, I'll take a water please." I used to be embarrassed to get water because I felt like it screamed 'broke'; which a lot times, was the truth.
Fortunately, I had begun looking like I might be in some kind of shape so getting water for health reasons was my cover in case anyone asked.
I looked over at Danielle who wasn't even paying attention. "Babe...your drink?" I said, staring at her along with the waitress.
"Oh, sorry. I'll take a water too please," she murmured.
Amanda's demeanor turned back into 'aggravated' as she went to the kitchen to fetch our drinks.
"So what's up, Danielle? Tell me how your day was."
"I mean it was okay, Same ole' same. How was yours?" she said, not even breaking concentration from her phone.
"It was cool. I mean other than the cooking part. I didn't go to sleep in any of my classes today. I know you gotta be proud of that. And today was a pretty easy practice. Ready for the season to finally be over though, I can't lie." I looked over and saw her still focusing on the phone.
I went a few seconds of not saying anything, and then she gave an "mmhmm" in agreement to what I said seconds ago. She was listening like a man.
"What's in that damn phone that's so important?"
"I'm trying to talk to you. I mean, can't you put the phone down for just a few minutes for us to have a decent convo? You can update your status and tweets later."
"For your information, I'm trying to study my notes for a test I have tomorrow, something I would be doing at home if you hadn't tried to burn the house down. Secondly, I was listening to you. I can multi-task."
"Look, I wasn't trying to burn anything. I was trying to cook for us. Don't you get tired of cooking spaghetti? I know I get tired of eating it."
She put the phone down in her lap. "If you didn't like my spaghetti, all you had to do was say so." I could tell her feelings were hurt, but the truth was out. No going back now.
"I just wanted to help, Danielle, that's all."
"Well, you've done quite a fine job tonight. As a matter of fact, you can eat by yourself. I'll be waiting in the car. I just lost my appetite." She snatched my keys off the table and started walking out.
"Danielle, wait. I'm sorry, come on now, you know I was just playing wit' you."
She kept walking. The waitress came back out with two cups of water. I grabbed one of the cups and took a sip so her hard work wasn't in vain, then followed Danielle outside.
I got in the car, and put the music on blast to make it clear that I wasn't expecting her to talk. Keyshia Cole was on the radio singing one of her "Niggas ain't shit" anthems so I turned stations to hear more of the same from scorned female R&B singers doing their part to keep women miserably single.
Finally, I turned to some country music where I knew I could at least free myself from lyrical cosigns to Danielle's disappointment in me. We drove for a couple of minutes and then she reached over and cut the radio off. Always a pet peeve of mine.
"I was listening to that."
"Well, I wasn't."
"Look, Danielle, you can be mad all you want. It's your pity party. But this is my car and I said I was listening to it." I reached over and turned it back on.
She turned it back off. "Well you're not the only one in this car and since when have you ever listened to country anyway?"
"I listen to anything I damn well please." I turned it back on again. She looked out the window the rest of the ride and it was clear both of us couldn't get home soon enough.
We got back to the apartment and wasted no time going our separate ways. She changed into her pajamas, something she normally only wore to bed when she was on her period or to signify I could expect no nightcap, and I went and took a shower.
I still had yet to let her know that I was out of work, and at this point, I wasn't sure if I even wanted to let her know. I stayed in the shower long after the last soap suds were gone, just letting the water flow down the back of my neck. It felt like it was rinsing the tension from my body so I could clear my mind; a much-needed stress reliever.
I came out of the shower to see Danielle still glued to her phone.
I looked over at her pile of books in the corner of the room and realized her laptop was sitting on top of them and wondered why she still needed the phone to study.
I wasn't about to ask though. That meant breaking the silence that wasn't completely my fault in the first place.
I mean after all, while I didn't have much tact, what I said about the spaghetti was the truth. I was sick and tired of it. And it wasn't like all I did was sit and complain; I actually tried to help the situation by cooking.
It's not my fault I'm not a chef. She had yet to thank me for any of my efforts so I had just as much a right to feel unappreciated as she did.
I got in the bed, put the covers over me, and turned away from her toward the wall. Usually, I would cozy up behind her and she'd fit her body up against mine; and I would hold her till we either fell asleep or got too horny to go to sleep and had sex.
But not this time. I hated nights like this. They were unnecessary and never fixed anything. I relieved myself of the responsibility to figure it all out and closed my eyes.
I said "I love you" under my breath, purposely low enough to where she couldn't hear it.
No matter how angry we were at each other, I never wanted to go to sleep without at least saying the words because I knew there was no promise I'd have another chance to do so later.
Chapter 13
Blurred Lines
"So let me get this straight" Jazmin said, pacing in front of her living room TV. She did this a lot when she had to think hard about something.
"You tried to broil frozen pork chops. Except you went to sleep on the frozen pork chops while they were in an oven at a temperature you're not even sure of, possibly 500 degrees or better. And when she comes home, the house is almost on fire, she gets drenched by the smoke detector sprinkler system, and then you take her out to eat only to diss her cooking?"
I looked down at my shoes and swallowed. "I mean, come on, when you put it like that, it sounds worse than what it is. But yeah, that's what happened."
"So what part of 'you fucked up big time' don't you understand? I can only imagine how mad she was. If that was me, the police would've had a little more on their to-do list, starting with getting my shoe out your ass. Especially with the money I pay for my hair, I would've slapped you for every strand of 100% Brazilian Virgin Remy you caused to get ruined. You lucky all she caught was an attitude." She started readjusting her hair as if to make sure it was still intact.
She had some nerve. I hated when females did the whole u-n-i-t-y, we-shall-overcome thing. No matter how wrong they may be, the benefit of the doubt goes to the one with the ovaries.
"First off, she doesn't wear weave. Secondly, how many men even attempt to cook for their woman? I mean damn, can I at least get some credit for the effort? I was trying to do the right thing. It just didn't turn out like I planned."
"You mean the same way she was trying to do the right thing by making sure food was cooked when you got home every day?"
I squirmed a bit at the conviction of the statement. A part of me couldn't argue. The other part said, "You're taking her side now. I just lost my job and all I wanted was dinner with my girl."
"Wait, you lost yo job? How'd that happen?"
I slouched back on the sofa and picked an imaginary spot on the ceiling to focus on. "Long story, but my point is, I'm trying my hardest here. I don't know what I'm doing, I just know what I want to do and that's make this work. Sometimes I don't know if I'm cut out for this. But I love her."
She walked over and sat on the cushion beside me. "Have you told her?" This time her tone was much softer.
"Of course, I tell her I love her every day."
"No, I mean that you're thinking about leaving her."
"Whoa, I never said I was leaving her. I just said I didn't know if I was cut out for it. Doesn't mean I'm giving up, I'm just...I don't know, man." I got up, went to her fridge and poured me a glass of vodka. No ice, no chaser. Yeah, that's how I felt.
"Well, maybe you should reconsider being in a relationship if you feel like you're not ready. It's not giving up, it's just seeing if it's what you really want. I mean how will you know if you just continue stressing? Nothing will change unless you change it."
I took a sip and realized I either underestimated the strength of vodka or overestimated my strength to drink it straight. I came back and sat on the couch next to her. "So you're suggesting I break up with her? Even after you just said she deserves to be mad? I'm confused, Jaz."
"Well, I want you to be happy. It's sounding like she's not making that happen and regardless of whether or not you were wrong, that's a problem. You do a lot of dumb shit, but you deserve that much. You're not a complete asshole." She cracked a smile as if she was hoping for me to return one. I wasn't in the mood.
"But I'm part time? Gee thanks, you really got a way with words, ya know?"
"You know what I'm saying. So okay, back to the subject. Do you really wanna make things right or what?"
"You know I do."
"Well, do something about it. You've never had a real relationship outside of high school and this. You don't know whether or not you're settling for less or if you're really messing up a good thing."
"What are you getting at here?"
She focused her eyes slightly away from me. I could tell she was losing confidence in whatever point she was making, but I was still curious to know.
"What I'm getting at is, maybe stepping out of the situation will help you get a broader perspective. In the meantime, you should try at least one more fish in the sea, just to make sure it's not you that's the problem."
"Nah, Jaz, you talking crazy. I'm not with the whole experimenting thing, not when it comes to love. Our relationship is serious, not some case study."
"I get all that, Shawn, but you can't even think straight right now. You said yourself, you don't know if you're ready for this. So what if you're not? You keep trying to force it, it's only gonna be worse for both you and her at the end of the day."
"What happens when she goes and tries another fish in the sea, huh? What happens when that fish is better than me and I lose her because I 'couldn't think straight'?" I felt myself raising my voice a bit. The thought alone was scaring me.
"Well, you know what they say. If you let something go and it doesn't come back, then it was never yours to begin with." Not only do I not know what 'they' say, but I don't know who 'they' are and why 'they' are qualified to give me life lessons.
"I can't risk that. I know I'm not a bad dude, but I also know any guy would love a chance with her. This is one lesson I don't wanna learn the hard way. I wouldn't be able to stand to see her with another man."
Jazmin paused for a second, pursed her lips, then set her eyes directly into mine. "Has she been acting strange lately? Is she a bit moody more than usual?"
"Yeah, sorta."
"Has she been on her phone more often, sometimes at odd hours? Or right after a heated argument?"
