Southern Comfort (9781622863747)

by Skyy

  Katrina knew things were going to get worse. She braced herself for the meltdown.

  “Don’t you walk in here and tell me that you are leaving me. No, I don’t accept that. I won’t.”

  “Saura, you left me!” Suddenly the familiar anger filled Katrina’s body. “You popped back up and yes, I really did think very hard about giving this a second chance but the truth of the matter is you left, you gave up on us, and I moved on. Period, point, blank.”

  “You don’t just move on like that. You can’t do this to me. I came back here for you. I gave up my agent and a career I could have had for you.”

  Katrina shook her head. “You didn’t give up for me. You gave up because things weren’t going the way you expected. You really expect me to believe that if you would have landed some dream role that you would have thrown that opportunity away for me?”

  Saura paused. She didn’t want to admit the truth. She did hate Los Angeles and she hated going on cattle call auditions where there were hundreds of other girls just like her. In Memphis she was sought after, she was the it girl. In Los Angeles she was just another face in the crowd.

  “Katrina, please, it’s me. This is us. We built this life together. You can’t throw it away; don’t do this.”

  Saura rushed up to Katrina. She grabbed her arm. Katrina stood still, her feet planted firmly on the ground. The tears streaming down Saura’s face didn’t have the effect that Katrina thought they were going to have. She knew for sure in that moment that she was completely over Saura in that way.

  “Saura, please, can we try to part ways on good terms? I will help you get your own place and everything. I don’t want you to hate me.”

  “You don’t want me to hate you?” Saura cocked her head to the side.

  Katrina watched as Saura paced the floor. She finally sat down on the couch without saying a word. Katrina felt uneasy as she watched Saura staring into space. She didn’t want to say anything, fearing she might blow up.

  Saura suddenly looked up at Katrina. She nodded her head up and down, over and over again. Her legs were shaking. She pulled her hair back into a ponytail. Katrina wondered if she was about to try to fight her. She pulled her cell phone out just in case she needed to call Devon real fast.

  “You know what, fine. I’m not about to do this with you.” Saura stood up. “You want to be with the bitch, go be with the bitch. But know something: I am done. Do not come crawling back to me when you realize that she isn’t all you expected her to be. There will never be another woman as good as me.”

  Katrina didn’t know what to think. Saura went from ten to zero in a minute. Katrina didn’t move from her spot. She couldn’t say anything. Saura had the right to be pissed.

  “I know you don’t want to hear this but I really do care about you and I will always. I hope one day you can come to realize that I never wanted to hurt you.”

  Katrina stood there for a moment as she watched Saura move about as if nothing had happened. She didn’t respond; she just casually walked back to the bedroom. Katrina thought about going back to check on her, but decided it was best to take her exit.

  Katrina quickly left the house. She got in her car and pressed Devon’s name as soon as her Bluetooth connected to the car.

  “Do you need police?”

  “I don’t think so.” Katrina sat in the driveway staring at her door. She expected Saura to come running out with a baseball bat.

  “She took it okay?” Devon questioned.

  “I honestly don’t know what to make of it. But I’m getting the hell out of here before she changes her reaction.”

  Katrina drove off, staring at her house in the mirror just to make sure she didn’t see anything crazy.

  Teri watched her ceiling fan spinning slowly around. She hated that Victoria was still on her mind. In one week a woman managed to get under her skin; things like that didn’t happen to her. While her friends mocked her for her choices in women, Teri knew the reason she chose to date the women she did. She knew she would never want to settle down with the ratchet girls she dated. They were in and out and that’s how she liked it.

  Victoria was different. She had all the things she would want if she were to ever really date a woman. She didn’t want to admit it, but she did fantasize about having something real with Victoria one day. Teri allowed the possibility of a real relationship enter her mind. She opened her own Pandora’s box and now she needed to find a way to close it.

  Teri suddenly felt weak; she felt as if she wasn’t herself. She allowed Victoria to break the confidence she had in herself. Teri thought about it: yes, Victoria was sexy and powerful, but in the end she was just another woman. She knew she just had to keep telling herself that.

  Maybe it was the fact that she was turning thirty-three in a few days that had her on edge. Was she finally getting the itch for a sense of normalcy in her life? Why didn’t she crave a relationship the way her friends did? Maybe deep down she wanted to come home to someone. Teri shook her head; she didn’t want that. Did she?

  She climbed out of bed and walked to her kitchen. Her refrigerator was almost bare. She had been living on fast food and take out for a while. Even the meal she had with Victoria was delivered by her favorite Chinese place. She picked up her phone; she realized how bad it was that she knew the delivery restaurant’s number by heart.

  An hour later her doorbell rang. She grabbed her wallet and headed to the front door.

  “Hey,” she said opening the door while trying to simultaneously pull money from her wallet.

  “Hello.”

  Teri looked up to see Victoria holding her takeout bag.

  “Don’t worry. I already paid for you.” Victoria smirked.

  Teri grabbed the bag from her. She held up twenty dollars. “Keep the change; and you can go too.” Teri leaned against her wall.

  Victoria’s devilish grin only infuriated Teri. How dare she act smug toward her?

  “Oh, Teri, don’t be like that, love.” Victoria walked past Teri and into her living room.

  Teri couldn’t believe the audacity of Victoria. She watched as she switched in her short shorts that were hugging her ass just right. Teri shook the erotic thoughts out of her head. She was going to finally put this woman in her place.

  “All right so obviously I let you get away with this shit a little too much. But this showing up at my crib and thinking that you are running anything dealing with me is about to end right now.” Teri walked into her living room.

  Victoria picked up a bottle of wine from her wine rack. She read the label, nodding her head in approval of the rare bottle of wine. “This is nice. Why haven’t we drunk this yet?”

  “Are you crazy? Seriously? Because I’m really starting to think you are bat shit crazy.” Teri took the bottle from Victoria and sat it back on the wall.

  “Oh come on, Teri, don’t spoil everything. We were just starting to have fun.”

  “I don’t have fun with bitches who get dick on the regular,” Teri calmly said as she tried to ignore Victoria’s fragrance that was working a number on her senses.

  “Touché.” Victoria nodded her head again. “I guess I deserved that.”

  Teri sat on her couch. She wasn’t going to back down. But Victoria was looking very sexy in the tight pants and the little black tank looking like a backup dancer in Beyoncé’s “Crazy in Love” video.

  “Okay so yes, you are right, I was wrong for not telling you. I just saw you and knew I had to have you. I want to keep having you. Why does this little thing have to affect what we have? I mean we were just fooling around.”

  Teri knew Victoria made a valid point. It wasn’t as if she had never messed with a married woman before. The married ones were always the easiest because they would have to always go home afterward. “The difference is you didn’t give me the option. I don’t play that shit. What if your husband would have caught us?”

  “That would never happen.”

  “How do you know it?
”

  Victoria sat on the couch next to Teri. “Well for one he still lives in Atlanta. He’s a surgeon at Emory.” Victoria put her hand on Teri’s thigh which Teri immediately moved. “Second I am very careful with what I do.”

  Teri’s head cocked to the side. “What you do? Oh so this is some regular stuff for you. Tell me just how many women are you fucking at the hospital?”

  Victoria pushed Teri. She didn’t mind the attitude but she wasn’t going to allow her to treat her like she was some type of slut.

  “Okay so I get that you are mad, but can you please stop acting like a jealous bitch?”

  “What did you just call me?” Teri’s head snapped around at Victoria.

  “You heard me. In the end, Teri, we are just fucking. I picked you because I thought you could handle that. I mean what did you think was going to happen? We were going to fall in love? Ha!”

  Teri didn’t know why Victoria’s comment made her feel like shit. Teri wanted to smack the smug grin off of her face. “First off, fuck you, and second off, you say that that shit as if I am some kind of bullshit, nothing-ass chick. Plenty of women would be more than happy to be with me.”

  “I’m not most women,” Victoria replied.

  “What makes you so different?”

  Victoria stood up. She stared at Teri who truly didn’t see the point she was trying to make. “Teri, okay. Yes, you have a nice thing going here, but seriously, look at me. I graduated top of my class from Yale Medical School. I am currently considering positions from some of the top medical facilities in the country.”

  “Are you trying to say you are better than me?” Teri felt her hands starting to tremble.

  Victoria shrugged her shoulders. She picked up her thousand dollar bag. “Look, none of this matters. Can we just drop it?”

  Teri never felt so small before. She wanted to spit out all her details, tell Victoria how she got into all types of prestigious colleges but chose Rhodes because she wanted to stay in Memphis. She wanted to tell her how she could work in any hospital in the country but chose to stay local because she wanted to, but in the end she knew it wasn’t going to matter. Nothing she could say would change Victoria’s opinion. She was just a dyke from Memphis with a lower pay grade than hers.

  “You need to get the fuck out of my house, and never fucking contact me again.” Teri looked Victoria directly in her eyes. She wanted to make sure she understood just how serious she was.

  “Oh, Teri, don’t be like that. In the end all that matters is that we were having fun.” Victoria tried to put her arm around Teri who quickly pulled away.

  Victoria pulled her keys out of her purse. She looked at Teri glowering back at her.

  “Well, I guess it’s a good thing I’m going back to Atlanta. See I have a few amazing offers on the table so I’m going to go back home and decide where I want to go. I thought we could have a good-bye fuck but I guess that isn’t going to happen.”

  “Guess not.” Teri held her position.

  Teri almost found Victoria’s cockiness amusing. Not only did she come in her house and completely insult her, but she actually thought she was going to get some sex after everything. Teri decided to take the initiative: she walked to the front door and held it open. Victoria held her head high as she walked out. Before Victoria could say anything else Teri slammed the door in her face.

  Teri stood in her doorway holding on to the little bit of confidence she had left. Teri couldn’t help but question herself. She wondered what was so wrong with being a pharmacist. She made a lot of money doing what she did and easily could have been a doctor if she wanted to be. Her status had never been questioned before. She didn’t like it.

  A guilty feeling overwhelmed her. She thought about all the women she dated who she did the same thing to. Teri fell against her wall; she felt horrible. There she stood pissed at Victoria when she wasn’t any better. There had been millions of times she looked down on women because of their professional status. She was a snob and didn’t even realize it. Out of nowhere, Porsha entered her mind.

  Teri grabbed her phone. She scrolled to Porsha’s number. She wanted to call but didn’t know what she would say. Porsha probably hated her. What would she say to a woman she dumped for no good reason? Teri pressed the message button.

  I know you probably hate me but you crossed my mind. I am having a birthday party at Restaurant Bleu on Sunday and would love if you came. Teri

  She wondered if she was going to receive a message cursing her out, or a call to tell her just where she could stick her invitation, but she got nothing. Teri knew what that meant. If a woman cursed you out that meant they still had some type of feeling. But when they didn’t care to respond at all, it meant they were completely over you. Teri suddenly wanted to call every woman she had ever dated but knew she shouldn’t open that can of worms. Karma came back to kick her in her ass, and she knew she was just going to have to take it.

  Chapter 27

  The next three days were perfect. Willow woke up in the arms of Katrina each day. Katrina spent the mornings with her, showing her more sites of Memphis, and went to the restaurant at night to work the busy dinner rush. The restaurant was booming but Katrina found a way to make it work. They weren’t sleeping together; each night Katrina came back tired. They just fell asleep in each other’s arms.

  “Are you sure about this?” Katrina questioned as she rubbed Willow’s head.

  The couple sat on a blanket overlooking the pond at Shelby Farms Park. Figuring out they wanted to be together was done; now they had to figure out the rest. The plan was for Willow to move to Memphis.

  “I told you, I’m okay with it.” Willow smiled.

  “I just feel real bad about making you move from your home. I mean you own your place and it’s a big-ass deal to come from London to little ol’ Memphis.”

  “I don’t care where I stay as long as I am with you.”

  Katrina leaned in, planting a sweet peck on Willow’s lips. It only made sense for Willow to come to Memphis since Katrina was just opening her restaurant. She was going to design her clothes and open a small boutique in Memphis. Things were coming together. Willow was going back to London to get herself together; then she was moving back to America.

  “I gotta get home and figure out the visa situation and everything.”

  “Why not just stay here and never go back? You can live like an illegal alien like a lot of people.”

  Willow hit her giggling girlfriend. “No, I’m thinking that a visiting visa should suffice. If not I might have to enroll in a university or something.”

  “Are you nervous at all?” Katrina asked Willow.

  “Why would I be nervous?”

  “What if you get here and realize you hate my black ass?” Katrina smiled.

  Even though joking, the thought entered her head. What if they realized they really didn’t want to be together? Katrina would feel horrible for uprooting Willow from her whole life.

  “Hey, life is a gamble right? If this doesn’t work out I can always find me another woman.”

  Katrina pinched Willow for her comment. Even with the uncertainties Katrina knew Willow was the one she wanted to be with. Everything else would work itself out.

  Katrina thought about Saura; she hadn’t talked to her in days. She was afraid to go by her house, fearing what Saura might do or might have done to the house. Teri scolded her, saying she was setting herself up to come home to find herself cleaned out. Katrina didn’t worry about it. She was floating on a cloud, and if Saura did wreck anything she would just replace it. It would give her reason to start completely new with Willow.

  Katrina dropped Willow back at Devon’s house. She headed to the restaurant to prepare for the dinner crowd. She pulled up to the restaurant to see Saura’s car parked in her personal parking space. Katrina knew something was up.

  “Hey, boss,” Misty said as she rolled silverware. “There’s a woman waiting on you at the bar.”

  Ka
trina looked up to see Saura sitting in a sexy leopard pencil dress nursing a martini.

  “All right, thanks.” Katrina took a deep breath, bracing herself for the worst.

  She walked up behind Saura who was laughing at a joke the bartender told her. She seemed to be in good spirits, which was a plus.

  “Saura.” Katrina leaned against the bar. “What’s going on?”

  “Hello, love.” Saura flashed her million dollar smile. She looked amazing and she knew it.

  “Um, hi, what’s up?”

  “I just needed to talk you real quick. Don’t worry I’m not here to cause a scene.”

  The two headed to Katrina’s office. Saura walked in and took a seat in the chair in front of her desk. Katrina closed the door, hoping no one overheard whatever was about to happen.

  “So I’ve decided to just go ahead and accept the situation. I left you and unfortunately in this case I snoozed and I lost.” Saura shrugged her shoulders.

  “Saura, I don’t want you looking at it like that.”

  “Well it is what it is. Don’t worry, I’ll be all right. I think I am going to try my luck in Atlanta, you know they call it the black Hollywood.”

  Katrina wanted to let out a sigh of relief. Saura seemed to be in a good space and that was all that mattered in the end. “Well if there is anything I can do to help you—”

  “Actually there is. I know you mentioned helping me get a place. Well are you willing to help me with that but for Atlanta?”

  “Sure, I can help you with moving expenses.”

  “I’m going to have to stay at our—I mean your—place for a little longer while I get things together. I hope you don’t mind.”

  Katrina shook her head. “Not at all, it’s cool.”

  The two looked at each other for a minute before Saura stood up. Katrina walked her to the door. Katrina tried not to notice how good Saura looked in the dress.

  “Oh tell Teri I said happy birthday. What strip club is she making you go to?”

  Saura and Katrina laughed.