by Tina Martin
My cell phone went off amidst my pondering. I recognized the new number as Kevin’s.
“Hello.”
“Hey, Monica.”
“Hi there!”
“Are you busy right now?”
Busy? I definitely wasn’t going to leave my apartment. It was too cozy and there was no way I was coming up out of those pajamas.
“Ah…no. I’m just relaxing at the moment.”
“Could you use some company? I would love to talk to you, play catch up…you know, brother and sister stuff.”
I smiled. “Okay. Come on over.”
He must have been somewhere in my neighborhood, because ten minutes later, he was ringing my doorbell. It was about seven o’clock.
“Hey, Kevin. Come on in.” He took off his snow-covered boots and left them by the door. Then he sat on the couch. “So, what’s up?”
He said, “It’s just crazy how we can be siblings and I don’t even know you. There are so many things I want to know.”
“Okay, well I can handle one question at a time.”
“Alright. What do you do?”
“For a living?” I grinned.
“Yeah. I’m sorry. What do you do for a living?”
“I’m a teacher.”
“Oh yeah? What grade?”
“Kindergarten.” I could already foresee that this was going to be a long night. Kevin was going to have more questions for me than contestants on Jeopardy. So, before we got heavy into discussing our lives, I said, “I’m going to grab a soda. Can I get you anything to drink?”
“Sure. I’ll take whatever you’re getting for yourself.”
I came back into my living room with two cans of Pepsi.
“Ah, Pepsi drinker. Yep, you’re definitely my sister.”
We laughed and popped our sodas open at the same time.
“So where was I?” Kevin said right after he took a sip. “Are you married?”
“Oh no. I haven’t been so lucky in that department.”
“Well, love takes time, I guess.”
“What about you? Married? Kids?”
“Yep. Been married going on four years now and we have a three-year-old daughter.” Kevin took a photo of his family from his wallet and showed it to me. His wife was a little stout and light-skinned with long crinkly hair. His daughter’s complexion was a mixture of both genes, but she definitely had her mother’s hair and her father’s looks.
“You have a beautiful family.” I looked at the picture again. “What are their names?”
“My wife’s name is Chandra and my daughter’s name is Ciara. She’s four.”
“Okay.” I took a sip of Pepsi. “So you got married pretty young, huh?”
“I’m twenty-eight now…got married when I was twenty-four. I knew I loved her, so there was no need for me to wait, right?”
“Yeah, you got that right.”
My cell phone went off. I looked at it, and noticed Sean’s cell phone number. Why is he calling me? Ignoring the call, I continued my conversation with Kevin.
“So what do you do for a living?”
“I’m a real estate agent. I work for Shorewest.”
Interesting. He was in the same line of work as Sean. I had to find out if he knew him, just to satisfy my curiosity.
“Do you know Sean Beauvais?” I asked him attentively, as I sat on the edge of the couch with anticipation.
“Yeah, I know him. That cat is making mad money on his own. I think I’ll branch out like he did one day. And speaking of Sean Beauvais, didn’t I see him at the funeral today? Did he know Dad?”
“Nah, he knows me. He just stopped by to be supportive, I guess.”
“How do you two know each other?”
“I was babysitting his son over the summer.”
My cell phone went off again. I knew it was Sean before I looked. Still, I wasn’t about to answer it. I put it on vibrate so my conversation with Kevin could go on uninterrupted.
“You’re running a hotline tonight, huh?” Kevin said with a slight chuckle.
“It looks that way.”
“You can go ahead and take your calls. We can do this another time. We’ll have plenty of time to play catch up.”
“No, Kevin. Stay. I insist.”
Sean was really starting to embarrass me with these back-to-back phone calls. What does he want with me, though?
I turned my attention back to Kevin and my phone vibrated on the coffee table. I looked at Kevin and smiled, then glanced at the screen on my cell and noticed it was Warren’s cell phone number. I definitely was going to answer his call. Maybe I should have told Kevin to go after all. The night was turning out to be busier than I had expected. I excused myself from Kevin and went into the kitchen to answer the phone.
“Hello.”
“Hey, Monica. It’s Warren.”
“Hey, Warren.”
“I didn’t get a chance to talk to you at the funeral and I just wanted to give you my condolences. I’m sorry about your father.”
“Thanks, Warren. I really appreciate it.”
“How are you doing?”
“I’m okay.”
“Good. I’m glad to hear that. And if you need anything, I mean anything, call me ah’ight?”
“Okay, I will. Thanks for calling.”
“No problem. Take care.”
“I will.”
“Okay. Bye.”
I returned to the living room.
“People are starting to call now to offer their condolences. I’m sure you’re gonna get a lot of calls, too,” I told Kevin.
“Yeah, I know.”
Those phone calls from Sean remained on my mind. He had me curious, but right now, I had to focus my attention on Kevin. After all, he was my guest and I wanted to learn more about my brother. So, I intentionally left my phone on the kitchen table so it wouldn’t be a distraction to us.
“Now where were we?” Kevin asked, while rubbing his hands together.
As soon as he could get the words out, I heard my phone vibrating on the kitchen table. I couldn’t just let it ring without first checking to see who it was. So, I jumped off the couch like an Olympian, dashed into the kitchen, and snatched the phone off of the table before the fourth vibrating ring. It was Sean…again. I put the phone down and left it in the kitchen, and as I walked back into the living room to join Kevin, my doorbell rang. There were three quick rings followed by a pause, then three more quick rings. I looked through the peephole and saw Sean standing there, anxiously awaiting the door to be opened up to him.
Great. Now I was stuck. I had to answer the door or Kevin would know I’m in the middle of some drama. Looks like he was going to know anyway.
I cracked the door open. Sean was standing there wearing a brown leather jacket, some blue jeans, and a pair of boots.
“Sean, what are you doing here?”
“I wanted to see you, and since you wouldn’t answer your phone, I figured I’d just show up.”
That’s the problem with men with money. They think they can do anything they want and get away with it, especially Sean. He was cocky enough to do anything.
“You can’t just show up at my house unannounced!”
“I tried calling.”
“And?”
“You didn’t answer the phone, Monica.”
“Look…what do you want?”
“Can I come in?”
“No, you can’t come in. I have company. Now what do you want?”
“I want to talk to you.
Kevin got off the couch and walked over to me. “That’s okay, Monica, I’ll leave. We can talk later.” He put on his boots and zipped up his jacket.
“No, Kevin. I don’t want you to leave.”
“Don’t worry. We can talk later, but not too much later, okay?”
“Okay, Kevin. I’m sorry about this.”
He hugged me and spoke to Sean as he walked out the door. Sean turned around to look at him, and then he looked
at me. We remained standing at the front door.
“Who was that?” he asked right away in a strong, domineering tone.
“Don’t worry about that. Why are you here?”
That was the question of the day. I would rather have spent more time with my newfound brother than have another shouting match with Sean.
“I’m here because I was worried about you, and I wanted to come by and make sure you were okay. But I see you don’t need my help, so I’ll be on my way.”
Sean turned his back to me and slowly walked back to his truck.
“Be on your way then,” I yelled to him. “You should not have even come over here in the first place!”
I didn’t take Sean to be the jealous type, but he sure was upset to see a strange man walking out of my apartment. That’s what he gets for assuming things and showing up at my crib unbeknownst. And I definitely wasn’t about to run after him. How stupid would I look chasing a man that kicked me out of his house? I was never one for running after a man. Didn’t matter how fine he was. So, I went back into my apartment and shut the door.
I sat on the couch and took a deep breath. I have a brother, I said to myself. That really had me trippin’. I wanted so badly to call Kevin and tell him that he could come back now. On second thought, I didn’t want to scare him off. I just chilled on the couch for a minute. I needed a moment to relax anyway.
BZZZZZZZZ!
My cell phone vibrated on the table again. I don’t remember the last time I had this many calls in one day.
“Hello.”
“Hey, Monica. It’s Nikki.”
“Heyyy, Nikki. I haven’t heard from you in a while.”
“Yeah, girl, I know. I just been busy traveling. I just wanted to extend my condolences to you. I heard about your father. I am sooo sorry.”
“Thank you.”
“If you need to talk, I’m here. Okay? I know what you’re going through.”
“Okay. Thank you so much.”
“Alright, girl. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Okay, and thanks for calling.”
“Okay. Bye.”
Before I could put the phone back on the table, it vibrated in my hand. It was Sean again. I ignored the first call, and he called again. He was really starting to annoy me.
“What!” I shouted as loud as I could into the phone.
“Why are you yelling at me?”
“Why are you calling me?”
“Because I want to talk to you, Monica!” he yelled back.
“You had your chance to do that a few minutes ago. You walked away. So what you calling back now for?”
“Because we really need to talk.”
“And what is it that you have to say to me that you couldn’t say ten minutes ago?”
He was silent for a moment, then he said, “I may have done a lot of things to you, and I admit I’m not perfect, but I have always been faithful to you.”
Talk about being left in the dark…I had no idea what he was talking about. Maybe he was referring to our marriage, but we both knew and understood it was a mistake in the contract. Sean, however, seemed to have taken it seriously. I just sat there with the phone in my hand, puzzled, not knowing what to say to him. I have always been faithful to you? What does he mean by that? I had to find out more.
“Sean, what are you talking about?”
“Who was that guy?”
“Don’t worry about all that.” I was about to show him that he wasn’t the only one that knew how to cop an attitude at the drop of a dime. “What do you want?”
“Is he your boyfriend?” He completely evaded my question, but he wanted me to answer his – just like a man.
“What if he is my boyfriend, Sean? What’s it to you?”
“Is he your boyfriend, Monica?”
I was seconds away from hanging up on him. “Is that what you meant by always being faithful to me? You think Kevin is my boyfriend?”
“I don’t know if he is or not. That’s why I’m asking.”
“No, he’s not. But what if he was?”
Sean was losing it. He was treating me like I was his woman.
“If he was, then I would have a problem with that obviously.”
I laughed out loud. “Oh, you would, huh?”
“Yeah, I would.”
“And why is that?”
“Don’t play with me, Monica! Why do you think that is? Huh? Why do you think I would have a problem with another man coming up out of your house?”
“Hmm…let’s see…because you’re a control freak?”
Sean quieted for a moment. I knew I pissed him off. That was my intention.
“No. Try again.”
“Because you’re selfish and you think you own me?”
“No. I would have a problem with that because I love you, and even after all the drama, I’m still in love with you.”
I laughed out loud again to keep myself from crying. Sean had me feeling mixed emotions. He actually sounded like he was being heartfelt and honest. There was only one way to find out.
“You love me? You threw me out of your house and now you want to claim that you love me?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Why are you even apologizing to me? It’s been two months. Oh, let me guess…my father died and you feel sorry for me, right?”
“No, I just…”
I cut him off. “Well, you know what, Sean? I don’t need you. I don’t need anything from you.” I carefully enunciated my words so that he knew I meant business. “Let me tell you something about me. I’m not like these uppity, snobbish, will-do-anything-for-a-dollar type of women that chase you all over Milwaukee like you just won American Idol.” I was heated. I could feel my blood pressure starting to rise.
He said, “That’s not what I want from you, so I’m glad you’re not one of them. And yeah, I felt guilty for the way I treated you, but don’t act like you had nothing to do with that, Monica. You’re not innocent in all of this.”
“As far as I know, I didn’t have anything to do with this.”
“You had everything to do with this! I told you that whenever you left my house to just let me know where you were. That’s all I asked and you couldn’t even do that?”
“So that’s why I got the boot, huh?” I know this wasn’t the time for me to be sarcastic, but that’s something I usually did when I was in an argument.
“Oh, you trying to be funny now? Well, I’ll tell you why you got the boot…I was tired of you playing games with me.”
“What games? I don’t play games with anyone.”
“So you weren’t pretending like you didn’t care about me, like you weren’t feelin’ me?”
“As I recall, you were the one who wanted to play the pretend game. You wanted me to pretend to be your wife and say that I love you even if I didn’t meant it. That was your bright idea, Mr. CEO!”
“Well, that’s over and done with. Ah’ight? We need to move forward. We need to get past this.”
We need to get past this? Sean said it like it was no big deal, like I could just let it roll off of my back and keep on stepping. But it wasn’t that easy. He hurt me. It was going to take more than a telephone conversation to fix this, if it could ever be fixed at all.
“You can’t be serious? You think you can just call me and then all of a sudden, everything is back to normal?” Tears streamed from my eyes, and I knew I was in trouble now. “I didn’t have to pretend to love you. I did love you. I just didn’t want to admit it. Why do you think it was so hard for me to make the decision as to whether or not I should stay or go?”
“Well, maybe instead of running away to think about this stuff, we should’ve communicated with each other.”
“Well, maybe we could have if you were a little more patient with me and try to understand my feelings instead of always just thinking about yourself. And now after two months you want to apologize? You think everything can just go back to the way it was?”
“I miss you.” Sean dodged my question again.
“Then why is it that you never called me? I betcha it probably took the death of my father for you to even think about me.”
I was coming down hard on him, but I had to see if he really meant what he said or if he was just blowing smoke through my receiver.
“That’s not true. I have thought about you every day since you’ve been gone. Every. Single. Day. I didn’t call because I didn’t think you would want to hear from me.”
“And you think I want to hear from you now, on the day of my father’s funeral?”
“If you didn’t, you would not have answered the phone, now would you?”
He made his point. I did miss him. I missed his family. I missed making breakfast for Roman in the mornings while he watched cartoons. I missed the early morning and early afternoon phone calls from Sean on the few days he did go into work. But I wasn’t willing to hide my pain in order to get back in good with the family.
He continued. “My family misses you. We need you.”
I guess that old saying is true. You never know what you got until it’s gone. Sean was just starting to realize that. But it doesn’t take an entire two months to let a person know that you miss them.
“If you miss me and your family misses me, then why is it that I haven’t heard from you in two months? You could have at least allowed Roman to call me, or better yet, just brought him over here to visit me.” Though he answered it already, I was hung on that question.
“I told you why…because I didn’t think you wanted to hear from me. But when I saw you at the party, I knew there was still hope for us. And when I heard your father died, I thought maybe you could use my support because I know what you’re going through.”
“Why don’t you let me worry about my father? He’s none of your concern.”
“None of my concern, huh?” I could sense that Sean was grinning like I had just told a joke.
“Yeah, that’s what I said. Why should you give a crap about my father? You don’t even care about me, and you know me. How can you care about somebody that you don’t know?” I sniffed and stepped in the bathroom to get some tissue. I can’t believe this man got me crying like this.
“I do care ‘bout you. You know that.”
“The only person Sean Beauvais cares about is Sean Beauvais.”
“What reason do I have to lie? If I really didn’t care about you, I wouldn’t tell you I do. It’s just that simple. If I was not concerned, why did I call you? Why did I come to your father’s funeral if I didn’t care?”
