by Curtis Bunn
“First, I gotta say I’m sorry again, Michele,” he said. “I feel embarrassed and ashamed that I did that to you. At the time, it was not the thing to do, but I truly believed it was the right thing to do for me.
“Not because I didn’t care about you—you know I did, I hope. But because…I have had a problem trusting people in general, but women in particular. My position has always been that a woman will eventually disappoint you. So, I told myself that before I got disappointed by you, I would leave.”
“And you think that makes sense?”
“No, I don’t,” he answered. “All this time later, it sounds stupid. But I’m a different person now. Well, maybe not even a different person, but definitely a more mature person. I thought I had it together back then, but I can see now—by the way I was thinking—that I didn’t.
“I promise you, this has been a struggle for me, knowing I hurt you like that. You were nothing but great to me. Seeing you at the banquet…it made the light switch come on. I tried to block you out so I wouldn’t have to think about what I did. But most of the time, it didn’t work. To see you again brought all those feelings of being stupid and selfish, cowardly and shameful—I felt all that as soon as I realized it was you.
“But I also felt a sensation. It was like the sun was shining on me. Through all that shame and embarrassment, I felt good about seeing you. You know, excited. Hopeful.”
“But is this about redeeming yourself with me or…well, what is it about?” Michele asked.
“I can’t lie,” Solomon said. “It definitely is about redeeming myself. You don’t do that to people. It’s hard to swallow that I let other women’s actions change who I should’ve been. But here’s the thing: If I didn’t really care for you so much, redeeming myself wouldn’t be as important—the true redemption, for me, comes with finding out if we still have that great connection.”
“Solomon, are you telling me that here in Atlanta, where women are in overabundance, you don’t have a girlfriend?”
“No, I don’t,” he said. “I date—well, I did date. But since I saw you, I haven’t had the urge to see another woman. And that’s the truth. In fact, I had a date set for the night I saw you. After that, I cancelled it.”
“Why?” Michele asked.
“Because it would’ve been a waste of time,” Solomon answered. “I don’t have a serious interest in anyone else. I have women I saw because I’m a man and I like women; we all need companionship. They are good women. But I don’t really trust women, so I got only so close emotionally.
“But there was never that special something that we had. There were never moments like we had when I laughed till I cried. No moments when I would stare at someone while she slept, wondering what she was dreaming about.”
“You did that?”
“I did, a few times,” he said. “I think, Michele, the honest reality is that I was afraid of you. I wasn’t ready for you. I was 25, 26 and just, you know, out there. Then you came along and I felt all connected to you. But I’m thinking, ‘She’s too good to be true. The shoe will drop.’ And I’ll be disappointed and hurt because that’s what happened to me many times before.”
“That’s no way to live, Solomon.”
“I know. I know that now. At the time, my mindset was effed up. It’s hard for a man to admit this, but I’ll be real with you. I was hurt several times by females, starting when I was a teenager. I came to believe that’s what women will do to me, and I was scared of feeling that hurt and disappointment again. So, somewhere in my mind I decided to not get too close or care too much. Just get what I wanted out of it and leave. It was stupid, but it was a way to protect myself.”
“So why didn’t you try to reach me when you realized you messed up?”
“To say what? Sorry? Forgive me? I was sick in the head?”
“That’s exactly what you’re telling me now,” Michele said. “The exact same thing.”
“Yes, but it is the truth,” Solomon said. “I never thought I’d see you again. But I never hoped I’d never see you again. I could go long stretches blocking all this out. Then one day I saw this woman on the opposite side from me at Lenox Square Mall. It looked like you so much. I tried to get a better look, but I lost her in the crowd.
“But it made me very curious. So I called your home number— I remembered it—but it was disconnected. I had changed phones about five times and somewhere in there I lost your cell number.”
“So what do you want from me now?” Michele said.
“I want to hang out with you, have a cocktail or two, chat, enjoy the moment. And I want to sweep you off your feet so you can see how I grew up from back then. And anything in between.
“But right now, I want to take you to lunch next week.”
Michele knew what she was going to do, but refused to give in. “Well, I have to think about it, Solomon. Let’s talk again in a few days.”
“Fair enough. In a few days.”
Those few days passed by slowly for both of them. Solomon’s days were particularly mundane; he avoided the four-woman rotation he negotiated before Michele. Prior to their unlikely reconnection, Solomon went round and round between them, a carousel of meaningless and misleading sex.
But he needed the women for a number of reasons, reasons he did not truly contemplate until those days waiting to have lunch with Michele. The more Texas margaritas he consumed, the more honest he was with himself.
So, Solomon sipped cocktails and spewed truths. He confessed to himself that he juggled women because he did not like being alone—a hard reality for someone who claimed he did not care much for people; that despite the confidence he showed, there was an underlying insecurity that needed women to validate his worth; that he loved sexually pleasing women and being pleased, but only physically—not for an emotional charge because he could not put his emotions in a position to be influenced by women.
Above all, he surmised that there was something wrong with all that, something wrong with him.
By the fourth drink, he figured it out:
He did not have a soul.
That revelation saddened him, for a moment. He asked himself: Where did it go? How did it go? His spirits quickly changed when the next revelation arrived: Regaining Michele’s love would be tantamount to regaining his soul.
And so his commitment was redoubled. If it were not 1:37 a.m., he would have called Michele right then. But considering the impact the liquor had on his mind, it was a good thing that he got to sleep it off and start fresh the next day.
If he had called, Michele would have answered. Unlike Solomon, who could not find his friend Ray to be a sounding board, Michele unloaded all her conflicting emotions on Sonya, who was a willing listener.
“So you think I should go out with him?” Michele asked Sonya. “Forget all about what he did to me?”
“In a word, ‘yes,’” she answered. “What are you proving by going against your heart? You’ve been basically miserable for eight years. If you didn’t have Gerald, you’d be crazy—and driving me crazy.
“Here’s a man who is open about making a mistake and apologizing for it. Most guys won’t even apologize for not opening the door for you. From what you have told me, Solomon has been almost overly apologetic.
“So I say, again, give him a chance. Because he did something years ago doesn’t mean he’ll do it again—or that you shouldn’t forgive him. If you let your son go out with him, then why not you?”
Her cousin made perfect sense, but Michele learned something about herself: She was not a chance-taker.
“Honestly, the easy thing for me to do is to go on with my life,” she said. “There’s no risk in that—I know what that’s like.”
“Well, you can—and will—do what you want,” Sonya said. “But to go on with your life when you’re not happy with it…well, that doesn’t show me a lot. Here’s my last point and I’m done with it: There’s something called risk-reward. The bigger the risk, the bigger the rew
ard. Sometimes, that’s what it comes down to in life. To me, there’s something exciting about that. And whenever we can throw excitement into our lives, how can that be bad?”
Sonya then got up, hugged her cousin and left Michele in her home to deal with her dilemma. She was in a struggle with two sides of herself, and they were at a stalemate. When she finally pulled herself off the couch near 2 a.m., she stopped by Gerald’s room to look in on him.
She stood in the doorway and watched him sleep soundly. Her existence was about providing and protecting Gerald. Michele threw herself into him partly so she would not have to deal with her loneliness.
The reality was that no man before or after Solomon even dented her sensibilities. She dated because it was, basically, a necessary evil. It had become so droll until it eventually became unimportant. Men bored her with talk of themselves or talk of nonsense; lack of chivalry or overly aggressive; so smart they were dumb in relating and so dumb they were intolerable.
The monotony and predictability of men changed her. She was audacious enough to jump out of an airplane, but scared to accept a date with the one man who actually moved her to emotional and intellectual heights.
The sadness of all that rushed to her brain as she looked at her son, and she shook her head. Her eyes watered—she loved little Gerald so much that she could become emotional about him in an instant. But the question she posed to herself was this: Do I love myself enough to take a risk to get the reward I deserve?
She had many girlfriends over the years that sabotaged their relationships because, in essence, they didn’t believe they deserved the happiness they had. Michele deduced that she was doing the same thing to herself by hanging on to what Solomon did or might do as opposed to what he would do toward her happiness.
That thought allowed her to crawl into bed feeling differently about herself and the prospects of her life. If Solomon truly wanted her back, she was going to give him a chance to show it.
And that idea helped her to lay in bed with her eyes closed and her heart open.
CHAPTER 10
BABY STEPS
Solomon called Michele that next morning a little before nine. It was a Saturday. Michele answered after the first ring.
“Good morning,” Solomon said. “I know it’s breakfast time, but are you ready for lunch?”
Michele laughed. “Not right now, but I will be ready at one.”
“Cool,” Solomon said, relieved. “I’m thinking we could go to Arizona’s out at The Mall at Stonecrest. I love the Pasta Sedona.”
“I’m good with that,” she said. “Actually, that’s perfect; I can drop Gerald off at his friend’s house in Conyers.”
“Do you want to bring him to lunch?” Solomon asked. “I’d like to see him.”
Michele felt good about that. But she wanted Solomon to herself. The conversation, she figured, would get too involved for Gerald’s ears.
“Next time. I think he’d enjoy spending some time with you,” she said.
“Okay, but I’m serious about next time,” Solomon said. “He’s a great kid.”
“I appreciate you saying that,” Michele said. “He likes you, too. He admires and respects you. And that’s a great thing; I love it when a man can spend some time with him and impart things I just can’t.”
“My pleasure. So, we can figure out another time for me to connect with Gerald. I’d actually like to take him to the gym to work on his game. But we’ll figure that out.
“In the meantime, I look forward to seeing you at one at Arizona’s.”
“Me, too, Solomon,” she said before hanging up.
It was a date that generated actions Solomon rarely went through. That is, he tried on three outfits before deciding on designer jeans with a beautiful John Varvatos plum shirt and black Too Boot New York slip-on loafers. Stylish yet Saturday-afternoon-casual, he decided.
Michele went through an even more painstaking process. Jeans or skirt? Pullover blouse or button-up? Boots or heels? For ninety minutes she tried on combinations, seeking the attire that would not be overtly sexy but not shut down, either.
Finally, Gerald walked in her room as she was standing in front of the full-length mirror in the tenth outfit. “I like that, Mommy. You look good.”
And her clothes for the lunch were decided right there, by Gerald: dark blue jeans with a crisp white button-up blouse and chocolate suede heels. Simple and elegant.
She smiled at the thought that a seven-year-old boy dressed her. Michele picked a pair of hoop earrings and a brown suede bag and she was ready. She wanted to wear a necklace, but decided it would draw attention to her cleavage, which had grown two cup sizes with the birth of her child. Even after so many years she still was, at times, uncomfortable with the growth. Besides, she would have to leave the top three buttons open to expose the necklace, which would expose too much and send the wrong message.
Solomon arrived early at the restaurant. He wanted to be there to watch Michele walk in. And she came in feeling and looking confident. She spent ample time applying makeup and lip gloss and styling her hair. She looked great, fresh.
The way he saw it, she was walking in slow motion as she entered Arizona’s. Statuesque and radiant. The extra pounds she had put on did not faze him.
“Hi there,” he said. Solomon was unsure if he should hug her or not—he told himself to be very careful about how to handle this first date—but he immediately discarded that idea and leaned in for a hug.
Michele leaned in, too, and they embraced. “Ah, you smell so good,” Solomon said. “I see you’re still into Avon.”
She laughed loudly—that was one of his favorite things about her that he had forgotten: Michele laughed a full, throaty laugh that was infectious.
“I have you know this is Mary Kay,” she joked, and they both laughed.
The hostess sat them in a booth near the front of the dining room. “I think this is an occasion for a midday cocktail,” Solomon said. “Some champagne?”
“Sounds great,” Michele said, and Solomon ordered two glasses of Veuve Clicquot.
“What are we toasting to?” Michele asked.
“How about, to redemption and recapturing?” he said.
“And renewing,” Michele added, and they tapped glasses.
Over the meal, they enjoyed small talk, caught up on each other’s families and in general felt each other out.
The “elephant in the room” had been ignored for quite a while before Solomon said: “Thank you for being here, Michele. I don’t even know if I deserve your forgiveness, but I’ve been asking for it for years, putting it out there in the universe because I didn’t think I would see you again.
“But here you are and I’m grateful. I have a friend here, Ray, who I told that I don’t live with regrets. But, really, that was crazy. Everyone does things they wish they hadn’t, and at some point they regret them. I regret what I did to you.”
Michele just looked at him; she didn’t know what to say.
“Now, I’m trying to find my soul,” he went on.
“Your soul?” Michele said.
“Yes, my soul,” he said. “For me, my soul means my heart, conscience and rational mind. Those three together. And when I…never mind.”
“What?”
“I’ll leave it at that for now.”
“Okay, I see,” she said. “Well, thanks for asking me out and being patient. My thing is I had to come down off the whole righteous indignation. I was hurt, but that’s a part of life, relationships. It doesn’t mean that it’s okay or that I don’t have my issues behind it because I do.
“And the main issue is trust.”
“I understand that,” Solomon said. “That’s something, if you give me a chance, that I have to earn. That I can earn.”
“Yes, but it’s really more about me trusting myself,” Michele said, “trusting my mind and my heart. And when they disagree, trusting that I can and will make the decision that makes the most sense.
&
nbsp; “You may leave here today saying, ‘She’s gained some weight and she has a kid and she’s crazy and I don’t want to deal with her’—and disappear,” she said. “That would be messed up, but I couldn’t be afraid of that anymore. I had to go for what I believed in.”
“And you believed in me? Wow,” Solomon said.
“I believe in the idea of you,” she answered. “And what’s the idea of you? I’ll hold that for another time.”
They talked for another hour across the table after they finished their meal. The conversation ranged from living in Atlanta to the earthquake in Haiti to all the drama President Obama has had to deal with to Kobe vs. LeBron.
All the while, they were assessing each other and reaching the same conclusion: “We’re good together.”
Finally, Michele said she had to pick up Gerald at his friend’s.
“Two things,” Solomon said. “One, how does a kid born in 2002 have an old name like ‘Gerald’? I’d think his name would be Hennessy or Escalade or Nuvo—something, uh, contemporary like that.”
Michele laughed so loud other patrons turned toward their table. “You are crazy,” she said. “But I was waiting for that question. I’ve heard that question a lot. Gerald actually was my dad’s middle name.”
“Your dad’s middle name? Why didn’t you just give him your dad’s name?” Solomon said.
“Because I wasn’t going to call my son Cleophaus,” she said, and Solomon laughed as hard and loud as he had in who-knew-when.
“Oh, my God,” he said. “Don’t mean to laugh at your dad’s name. I don’t. But damn…”
“You can laugh at it; I don’t care because it’s funny,” she said. “He didn’t even go by it. Everyone called him ‘O,’ even my mom… But what’s the second thing?”
“Oh, thanks for reminding me,” Solomon said. “The second thing is this.” He pulled out of his pocket a little pouch and handed it across the table to Michele.
“What’s this?”
Solomon did not answer. In it was a David Yurman charm bracelet that he bought Michele for Valentine’s Day of 2001. She wore it one time and left it at Solomon’s house.
