by Xyla Turner
BOMBSHELL
Xyla Turner
AZINA MEDIA
237 Flatbush Avenue, #187 Brooklyn, NY 11217
This is an original publication of AZINA MEDIA PUBLICATIONS.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
Copyright © 2015 AZINA MEDIA PUBLICATIONS
Cover Page by Dynasty Cover Me
Editor: Terri Griffith
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized edits.
All rights reserved.
eBook ISBN: 9781943132065
DEDICATION
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
Prologue
Chapter 1: No coffee
Chapter 2: I don’t date
Chapter 3: The anonymous meeting
Chapter 4: Saturday
Chapter 5: I call bullshit
Chapter 6: In trouble
Chapter 7: The agreement
Chapter 8: I’m interested
Chapter 9: Dinner guest
Chapter 10: The slap
Chapter 11: Finally
Chapter 12: That’s it mama
Chapter 13: Going Public
Chapter 14: Don’t Understand
Chapter 15: Stay Away
Chapter 16: Double Standards
Chapter 17: Something about Elevators
Chapter 18: Stranded & Rescued
Chapter 19: Our Secret
Chapter 20: Meeting the Kelly’s
Chapter 21: It’s Positive
Chapter 22: Announcement
Chapter 23: Replacements
Chapter 24: On the mend
Epilogue
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
XYLA’S OTHER BOOKS
XYLA’S CONTACT INFORMATION
DEDICATION
To all of you who think there is no way out.
There is!
Just keep holding on.
Joy comes in the morning.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
First and foremost, I want to acknowledge my family and friends for their continued support! They read my books, ask me the hard questions and shake their heads.
Love you guys!
Big thank you to Mi-Mi for selecting the title!
It is PERFECT!
Shatisha, I cannot thank you enough!
Not just for being a beta reader, but a confidant and being able to capture what I sometimes cannot articulate.
I appreciate you!
Xyla Crusaders!
You guys ROCK!
Finally, but certainly not least. I want to thank God.
He knows my name, He knows my every thought.
He sees each tear that falls and hears me when I call.
Thank you!
NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
I want to preface this by saying, there were many conversations about whether readers would be able to handle a book like BOMBSHELL. I am of the mindset that you can, therefore I’m writing this to ask that you please give it a chance.
BOMBSHELL is a book that is near and dear to my heart for several reasons. One of them is because I am addressing something that we as a society often overlook. Two, it is my first interracial book and that is just awesome. And three, it discusses something that some of my friends and people that are close to me have endured and I wanted to share how love can win.
I encourage you to read the entire book and watch love endure.
Prologue
I knew it. I just knew it. Why pay a $25 co-pay for them to confirm what I already knew. The other doctor I saw when I was 19, said that the results were negative. So, I just continued to live my life knowing that she was wrong. I could see the symptoms and I could feel it coming, but I didn’t know what to do to stop them. I just knew it. I’m sitting with my butt exposed on a doctors recliner, swinging my legs and shaking my head, because I know what she is about to tell me. I’m a 31-year-old woman, I’ve been running my business for only three years now and dammit, I was about to hear the worst news.
Wait, maybe it could just be me making the symptoms up in my head. That is so true, about what you believe and how it manifests. If you think you have a headache, you’ll get a headache. So maybe it’s true, I’m making the symptoms up in my head. I’m not a doctor, what do I know about these sorts of things?
Whatever, I knew it.
The small Asian doctor stepped into the cold room. Approximately three weeks ago, I came to my OB-GYN to get swabbed with a long, wooden Q-tip. She told me I needed to get swabbed to see if this was what I thought. She said that she didn’t think so by the looks of it, but the test would let us know. I was now back in that same office, waiting for my life sentence. I’m not even sure when I contracted it or if I did. It would have been when I was a teenager, I had one consistent partner who was only around during those cold winter months, because during the summertime, he was too busy to mess with a young girl. He was seven years older than me, but whatever. I was grown and sexy, you just couldn’t tell me that I wasn’t.
Jay burned me once that I know of, because I was having a smelly discharge and went to get tested. I will never forget marching over to his mom’s house, because he was 24 living with his mother. He also had two kids. I was so out of my league, but I was so young and full of everything, except what I needed. I cursed him out, made a big ole drama about how he couldn’t talk to me anymore and left the house like a boss. I had chlamydia, a sexually transmitted disease that was curable. Thank God.
Now, almost ten years later, I sat and watched the doctor deliver her somber speech.
“Samantha, so glad you could make it back. We called you in here because your test came back and that lesion that I swabbed was positive for herpes.”
I blankly look at her.
She continued, “But this is a common thing and there is medication to treat it, we’ll manage it, so it is not the end of the world.”
Huge tears started to drop down from my eyes. I couldn’t even control them. Dr. Leng was a small blur, as I tried to listen to whatever else she was saying. She was so sterile in her delivery and not that I expected her to cry with me, but on some level, I wish I could have avoided that look on her face that said ‘so sad for you.’ The room became stuffy and it felt like I was choking. Maybe I just couldn’t catch my breath. If I were a fair skinned person, I might have turned red. I knew I had it, but I was holding out for my last hope.
“Samantha,” she handed me a tissue. “Believe me when I tell you, this is common.”
I continued to silently cry. My love life was already non-existent, so how in the hell would speed dating work out for me. “Hi, I’m Samantha Wilde, I’m a Sagittarius, 31, single and I have herpes. But don’t worry, it’s common and manageable.”
Yeah, that would go well. I live in Washington, DC, where everyone knows everyone and although most people aren’t from DC, like me, word of mouth operates like the states. Everything seems to revolve around DC, including people’s business. How do people in North Carolina and Texas know people’s business in DC? I know the power of social media has a lot to do with this, but so does the good ole’ people running their physical mouths on a physical phone. I’m not important enough for people to chat about me like that, but I plan to be.
Therefore some things could be detrimental. I think I read too many celebrity magazines. The exes are always posting sex videos, pictures and telling horrible things about the other. I don’t want that sort of drama.
The tears became bigger as I saw my future go down the drain. How will I have a baby? Will I have to join Herpes Anonymous to meet other people? Does that mean no more oral sex? Will I have marks on my face and call them cold sores?
I was full of questions, but couldn’t even muster up the strength to ask them to the one person that would know. Relying on Web MD did not seem appealing at this point, because honestly I didn’t want to see the horrid pictures and I damn sure didn’t want to see the symptoms in writing.
My life was officially over!
I started to gather my things and the doctor looked shocked. I couldn’t stay in there any longer. I didn’t want to think about it, as the entire conversation was just too overwhelming for me. I pulled on my panties and skirt right in front of her, then turned to button my blouse before I put on my boots.
“Samantha,” the doctor called me as I put on my coat with my back still facing her.
Turning around, I raised my eyebrows in acknowledgment of her. She looked concerned about my reaction. I grabbed my purse and pulled on my forever scarf. The doctor watched me at first, looking as if she wasn’t sure whether to stop me or console me. I don’t think she was expecting this. I strode to the door. She then said, “Samantha, I know you are upset, but when you calm down, please call me so we can talk about treatments, ways to manage this and how you can live your life to the fullest.”
That stopped me in my tracks.
Live my life to the fullest?
I turned around, looked at her, then asked, “How do you expect me to do that?”
There was no real answer for this, so I walked out. I didn’t intend to be bitchy to her, because it wasn’t her fault that I contracted herpes. It was my own fault and I had no one to blame but myself.
As I walked out of the doctors’ office, I started to ponder all the things that were wrong with my life, how this could happen to me and what I did to piss God off so much that I contracted this incurable disease. Then I tried to be grateful it wasn’t a fatal disease, because I don’t have MAGIC JOHNSON money. Then I went back to self-pity and realized I couldn’t go back to work and actually be productive. Standing outside of the office, I called my next appointment to reschedule and thankfully they were grateful because they didn’t want to be late for our session.
I’m a marketing consultant and I travel all over the country helping various businesses and their marketing teams to expand their brand, re-design their marketing approach and reach other audiences. I started S & W Consulting three years ago after I got tired of working for someone else. Especially Nunce Media, Inc. aka ‘the dunce.’ I realized after six years of this industry, I knew enough people and information to start my own company. That would also give me the opportunity to travel as I’ve always wanted and allow me to set my schedule. My previous two jobs were at marketing firms that were top heavy and very male dominated. I have nothing against the male species, but apparently an outspoken woman was not something they liked too much. Therefore, I stayed in “trouble.” The older I became, the more I grew weary of ‘grinning and bearing’ their foolishness.
One day at my old job, ‘the dunce,’ I received an email stating that my tone was abrasive to another colleague and how that was inappropriate for the workplace. Let me not forget the vulgar things they said to one another and about other people. Don’t even get me going on the terms they said to women. ‘Sweetie, honey, sweet thang, doll baby?’ That’s appropriate for the workplace? However, I tell a junior account manager ‘that his marketing strategy is derogatory, offensive to the Latino and Asian culture and he should really stick to junior thoughts, because that was not senior level thinking’ and I’m abrasive? No one else would have said anything to him about that line of thinking and it would have gone all the way up to corporate and then we all looked bad because he’s the office pet and nobody wants to ‘crush his spirit’, so they let that nonsense slide. It was ridiculous. I don’t care how much coffee he brings and how many cookies he bakes for the office, the idea was crap and somebody needed to tell him.
My response to that ridiculous email basically said, “Sweetie, here is my resignation letter.”
Problem solved.
My emergency funds could last me for eight months, plus as a senior account manager, I didn’t have a problem finding a job. However, I didn’t want to be in that cut-throat male-dominated environment any longer. I had enough ‘sweeties and honeys’ to last a lifetime. I’m not a big fan of pet names, but especially coming from those male chauvinistic pigs, who often tried to put the little lady (me) in my place, but refused to hold themselves accountable.
As I rode the elevator down towards the lobby, tears were streaming down my eyes. I was so caught up in my thoughts, I didn’t realize that I was on the first floor and the doors were open. On auto-pilot, I walked off, not really seeing where I was going and bumped into something hard. I bounced back into the elevator and started to fall. Someone grabbed my arms, but I still hit my elbow on the elevator bar. The pain was delayed, but I closed my eyes in anticipation for it to register with my brain. I opened my eyes to focus and saw it was a man that I bumped into. He was the one that prevented me from falling, but he looked pissed.
I stammered out, “I’m sorry, sir.”
He kept his hold on me, but his facial expression didn’t change. He looked really mad and all I could assume was that he was mad at me for bumping into him. He still didn’t say anything and once I gathered my bearings, I wiggled out of his grip. He kept the scowl on his face, so I snapped at him, “I said I’m sorry.”
He cocked his head to the side and asked, “What’s wrong with you?”
His voice was deep and gruff.
I looked at him, “What?”
My voice was thick and tight.
“What’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing is wrong with me!” I exclaimed.
“Then why do you look like you’ve been crying?”
I turned to the mirror on the side of the elevator and gasped. I looked worse than I thought. My olive-toned skin looked paler than I’ve ever seen it, not to mention my tear-stained eyes, mascara lines trailing down and puffy eyes. To top that off, my hair looked like a cat rubbed up against it. I could not believe this. Being in the marketing business, my appearance is extremely important. Most people can’t tell what nationality I am, which I like because it really shouldn’t matter whether I am Black, White or Hispanic. Can I do the job? Does my reputation speak for itself? Am I competent enough to handle the responsibility given me and make you more money than was projected. The ‘where are you from’ questions, always annoy me. I tell people, I’m from D.C., because that is where I’m from. It should not matter that my grandparents were White, Black, Hispanic and Indian. They told me we were Black and that is what it was.
The elevator was being held up by this man and I was still in the elevator. Once that reality hit me, along with the state of my face, I pushed past the man and headed towards the building exit. A tall caramel macchiato was calling my name and Starbucks was one block away. I went through the tall turnstile, but my scarf caught around the pole, so I was yanked back. I turned to remove my scarf, and realized the guy from the elevator was right behind me. He was following me.
What?
As I pulled my scarf from the turnstile, I raised an eyebrow at him. He closed the distance between us and I asked, “Can I help you?”
He smirked, “You’re the one that looks like they need help.”
He cannot be serious!
I just received one of the worst news reports in my life and this man I do not know is making snarky comments. Rolling my eyes, I pushed past him and walked away. That is where my friends get upset with me, because the man could have been cute, but I didn’t even see that. I saw an
annoying man. Yes, I get annoyed very easily by people and especially men. They think I’m asexual or something. I tell them it’s because nobody really strikes my fancy, until I get to know them. Unless they are Ryan Gosling or Idris Elba. I mean, hello? They are two drop-dead gorgeous men. However, with this man I couldn’t look at anything beyond his scowl.
I heard rustling behind me, but I kept walking, because I needed to get out of that place. I may even need to change doctors. I don’t even know how to feel right now. Herpes? Of all the diseases, I got the gift that keeps on giving.
Chapter 1: No coffee
SAMANTHA:
“Can I get a tall macchiato caramel? “ I asked the Starbucks barista.
“Is that all?” she asked.
I nodded and opened my purse that was hanging off my shoulder and rested on my left hip. I needed to call my best friend Roslyn. She was my sister from another mother (not by blood or marriage, but we are tight) that I just met five years ago at ‘the dunce.’ Roslyn worked in another department and had been at the firm one year longer than I had. She was a Dominican-American woman with a brown complexion, long flowing hair and a smile that stopped most men in their tracks. She was married to her high school sweetheart, Hugo, and he has spoiled her rotten. They do not have kids yet because Roslyn wants to be made partner first, so she can cut her hours and delegate, as she often said. She is no delegator, so I have no idea when she’ll have kids. I also questioned whether they will make her partner, because they are sexist pigs at ‘the dunce.’ She and I have had this conversation over and over, but she is determined. My hat goes off to her, because those people there were too much for me.
Roslyn always said I have no tact and there are better ways to address my concerns. She felt like I blew that thing out of proportion starting with my response to the junior executive. She and I went round and round about this. I kept explaining how it needed to be said, and she kept explaining that it didn’t need to be said like that. She said I needed to use more tact. I told her that was me using tact. She ended our disagreement by stating that this was why I didn’t have a man. I sat there looking at her with my mouth open that she would hit me below the belt like that.
