It was an experience like no other.
I saw them all in my dreams, saw them separately, and at times all at once.
In my dreams I was the performer, maybe a conductor, the leader of a band of lady lovers.
I orchestrated opulent orgasms one by one but imagined the collection of clients as a choir of angels, an orchestra of beautiful women with orgasm-inspired voices. I saw them side by side, backs arched, eyes closed, staccato breathing, all being pulled under until they were three levels deep. Every client I’d been paid to touch, I imagined them working in collaboration. In my mind, it sounded like the largest choir in the world. It was so tremendous that angels wore earplugs. I had put a few to sleep at night, touched them again in the morning, showered, pampered them until the buzzer sounded, then regretfully kissed away the tracks of their tears as we said reluctant good-byes.
It was time to move on and let that go.
That was no longer my life.
Now it was mornings in rush-hour traffic, days of meetings, and evenings in rush-hour traffic.
Maybe this repetition was part of the reason Christiana’s world had seemed so fascinating. Maybe that was why so many ran to her, to break the monotony of their own dull, repetitive, predictable lives.
Even with work as a project manager, I found other things to keep me occupied on the weekends.
Dwayne, Frenchie, André, Joëlle, Fela, and his girlfriend, Chavers, we all went to Disneyland.
It was interesting watching Fela and his first love. I hoped his heart didn’t get broken too fast.
For everyone else life was good, and love was strong.
The money I had made with Christiana was stashed. I didn’t put it in the bank because that infusion of money would cause the IRS to ask questions. They’d want their cut or incarcerate me for leaving them out of the loop. Those bloodsuckers. I had it, had every dime I’d earned, hidden in my apartment, waiting on a rainy day.
I wasn’t a fool with money, not the way Coretta had been.
I still owned three hundred things. I still sold wine off and on. And I still rocked Miss Mini. Miss Mini had never let me down, had never abandoned me. I was as loyal to her as she was to me. Would be a little longer. I was considering giving it to Fela on his birthday, then getting something new for myself. It was time for me to upgrade rides.
* * *
—
A FEW WEEKS later, on a Saturday morning, I woke up to the smell of blueberry pancakes. It was still dark, about an hour before sunrise, and I thought I was dreaming. Then I saw a light was on in the front part of the house. I heard soft music and singing.
When I headed to my kitchen, Mocha Latte was there cooking as if she’d never left. Tight jeans, a purple THIS GIRL LOVES MALAKOFF, TEXAS T-shirt, no shoes, hair short and curly, as decadent as the most expensive chocolate in the world. She stopped, flipped a pancake, and looked at me, then tendered a nervous smile.
“Hope you don’t mind. Knocked before I came in. I kept the key.”
“When did you get back?”
“Two hours ago. You were in your twelfth dream when I came in.”
“Drove?”
“All the way from Texas. Did a two-day cross-country drive. Thirteen hundred miles.”
“What brings you back?”
“I missed your oversize classic sofa.”
“Really?”
She laughed, then tapped some papers on the counter. I went to see what it was.
I asked, “What are these?”
“My credit report and last three filings with the IRS.”
I looked at her. “Really?”
“Really. Let’s get that out of the way. Show me yours when you’re ready.”
I took a moment, absorbed what she was telling me. “You got off your tractor and came back.”
“I was gone ninety-four days. I was with family and people who love me, but yeah. I drove back. Followed my heart and it led me back to your doorstep. For ninety-four days, day and night, I thought about you.”
“What are you saying?”
“For you, Brick. You. I’m back for you. For the oversize classic sofa too, but mainly for you.”
“For me?”
“To be your girlfriend, Brick. To give it a try. To share bacteria. I missed kissing you. Is that okay?”
“Depends. Tell me who has scored the most points in NBA history.”
She winked at me. “Kareem. If you’re going to challenge me, bring it.”
“Name the movie. ‘I don’t have to show you no stinking badges!’”
“The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.”
“Where did Woodstock take place?”
“Oh, a slick question. Woodstock took place in Bethel, New York. Fifty miles outside of Woodstock.”
“How many US states begin with the letter A?”
“Four.”
“What city banned burials in the 1900s?”
“San Francisco.”
“The least densely populated country in the world?”
“Greenland.”
“First country to print paper money?”
“China.”
“You’re good. Damn, you’re good.”
“Oh, boo, I’m good at everything I do. And you know that.”
“You play chess?”
“I can learn.”
While we held eye contact, I said, “You know my secrets.”
“You know mine. You know everything I’m ashamed of, and you still look at me . . . like that.”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
“Scary. But we already know the ugly stuff. No surprises there.”
“Do you know what you want?”
“I’m looking for love. Ridiculous, can’t-live-without-each-other love. I want to meet someone decent. You’re decent, Brick. I want a partner. Someone who ain’t dating everybody else. Or fucking everybody else. Would be nice to hold hands. To share bacteria. To fall in love. But I can’t fall in love with you, Brick. The physics of it is impossible. You can’t fall to land on a place where you already are. I already love you. I want someone to go to the movies with. I want that somebody to be you. We can take it slow, check out a matinée, and take it from there. First date will be on me. I’ll buy you a large popcorn, Raisinets, and a large bottle of water. Second date we can get dinner at Katana in Hollywood, eat sushi, maybe go dance at Savoy. Third date, you know. Look in my face, forget about Coretta, and see I love you and see your future. Then we can get to know each other and eventually make babies.”
“We don’t have a foundation.”
“We tear down what we have and build a new one—and never talk about the old one.”
I went to her, hugged her. “It will take a while, but I’ll save and buy the home.”
“We can start with a condo.”
“Or a town house. I have to have a garage.”
She winked. “Maybe we can save and buy a house together. Just a dream. Am I going too fast?”
“It’s okay. We can dream together.”
As she held me tight, we rocked side to side a moment before she said, “I might have a job offer.”
“Yeah?”
“Interview on Monday. Like God knew what I needed and finally came through.”
“Yeah? With which company?”
“Dan L. Steele. Joëlle introduced me to her mentor, older guy named Tyrel Williams.”
“That guy’s big in the industry. Gives a lot of seminars around the world. He’s major. Excited?”
“Nervous. I get to go back to the real world, and it’s terrifying me.”
“You got this. You’re as brilliant as you are beautiful. You got this.”
“I missed you. Missed talking to you. Dancing with you. Missed standing in the streets kissing like fools.�
�
I asked, “How’s the sleepwalking?”
“I haven’t . . . not since I stopped. Doing that, that lifestyle, it had me stressed. I don’t talk in my sleep like I used to, don’t sit up and do the same motions over and over, don’t scream or fall or run into things or go urinate in the closet. I’m a lot better now. Just lock the doors, don’t move the furniture around or leave out things I could trip on, just in case I backslide and have a moment. I stopped taking Ambien. I think the Ambien made it worse.”
“Good.”
Looked like she was scared to ask, but she did. “How’s . . . how’s the cancer?”
“Still gone. Last scan came back clean. Next scan in a year. Doing blood work in between.”
“I’ll be here for you. No matter what, I’m going to be here. You’ll never be alone again.”
“And I’ll watch over you.”
“Brick, most people just want someone to care for them and watch over them.”
“So simple.”
“Yet so complicated at the same time.”
We kissed, shared more than eighty million bacteria like each was made of pure sugar and honey.
She said, “I was surprised. My credit score is pretty good. Bet it’s better than yours.”
“Stop talking.”
“We gonna do it right now?”
“Been too long. We’re about to Roc and Shay right here, right the fuck now.”
“Let me turn off the pancakes before we burn down the building climbing the stairway to heaven.”
With permission I tugged her tight jeans down over her bubble, pulled those dungarees to her ankles. I eased inside Mocha Latte, broke the skin, opened her inch by inch, bit by bit, teased her, didn’t rush, and along every part of that journey, as I sucked her neck, as I sucked her ear, as I felt her waking up a sleeping beast inside me, our moans danced, those wicked moans our first sounds as boyfriend and girlfriend; our desperation to feel good and please amalgamated, and those vibrations made one beautiful sound. My kitchen became the penthouse in our own private heaven. While I was inside her I stripped her naked and tore away my clothing, then took her to the classic sofa. That long, low sound of pleasure, that enthusiastic reverberation of much-needed suffering that preceded the promise of a very voluptuous orgasm, the unique uncontrollable groans as our heated bodies pulled away and rushed to collide into each other over and over, the soft wails as the flesh of a king slapped against the flesh of his queen, the curt whimpers that could not be controlled, the echoes like sobbing, the sensuous whines, the lamentation that erupted into a pre-orgasmic clamor, a noise that rose like a doleful cry begging for this road to ecstasy to never end, it was all followed by a command for me to not be gentle, a demand for me to not stop, and again came a chain of elongated moans that made me want to fill her up and crawl inside her to become one; as the sun began to rise and give us a new day and second chances, we lived in our sounds, swam in all of our sounds, lived in her emotional soprano moans that darkened in timber as I stroked her with a delectable rhythm. With each measured stroke that made my classic sofa give and creak like a musical instrument that needs a touch of WD-40, we united in body and spirit. She took me three levels deep. My baritone and hedonistic cries expanded as that southern girl raised her Texan hips to give me all of her as she accepted all of me. I told her I loved her as she set free epicurean moans and confessed that she loved me, let tears flow, took down her wall and confessed that she’d loved me from the first moment we’d shared blueberry pancakes. Right now with me, on this journey, in this union, as we engaged in this healing, the wildfire took control and we became the most feral of feral lovers, and together we made that rugged, off-key, heavy and harsh breathing and purring at the start of a new day sound like operatic music written in the key of lust and debauchery. We fell to the carpet and laughed and kissed and fucked like overeducated, unsophisticated demons, sweaty-bodied demons who needed love, Nubian demons who needed more than love, fiends who needed each other because we were tired of making this loveless journey alone.
We fucked hard, then slept harder.
* * *
—
SEVEN HOURS LATER we held hands and strolled down Degnan toward the epicenter of Leimert Park. As we passed black academics arguing if the area should be renamed Nubian Village to remove Leimert’s racist name, I showed Mocha Latte Coretta’s tax papers. My ex owed the IRS more than a hundred and sixty thousand dollars, was in collections, but that wasn’t the biggest surprise.
Mocha Latte said, “Her status is ‘Married Filing Separately’? Married? Married? Coretta is married?”
“Yeah. She has a husband and a kid out there somewhere.”
“She has a secret family? I thought only men did that.”
“I guess not.”
“Secret child and a secret marriage, and she was shacking up with you?”
“I had no idea. Neither did Maserati Mama. But I know that if you’re separated from your spouse by a separate maintenance decree, you can file as single. That means she’s not even legally separated.”
“Had to be something she did while she was young.”
“That’s why she freaked out. I got too close to her truth and she left. We were talking marriage and she was already married.”
“Have you talked to Coretta since finding out she has her own duality?”
“I sent her a text, straight up asked her if she was married with a kid. Asked her if she had me looking for engagement rings when she already had a husband.”
“And?”
“She ghosted me. Blocked my number and blocked me on social media.”
“I won’t ghost you; I’ll talk so much you’ll beg me to act like Casper and ghost you.”
“So.”
Mocha Latte laughed, amused.
“So what?”
“You gonna tell me your name?”
She grinned. “Zélie Nimota Torres-Ferreira.”
“Beautiful name. Matches everything about you.”
“Words, Brick.”
“Get used to it, Zélie. Get used to me complimenting you day and night and day and night.”
“If I have to call you by your nickname, you have to use mine.”
“Whatever you say, my queen from the Nile of the Americas.”
“So, you and your older brother have the exact same name? How the hell does that happen?”
“I’ll tell you all about it when we get back home.”
Her smile broadened. “Home. You have no idea how bad I need a place to just call home.”
My enthusiastic expression matched hers. “Yeah. Home. You have a home. With me.”
“I have a boyfriend.” She sang like a smitten teenage girl. “I. Have. A. Sexy. Ass. Intelligent. Boyfriend.”
“I haven’t had a girlfriend in a long time.”
“I plan on being your last girlfriend and you will be my last boyfriend. Just letting you know my intentions.”
“Now you’re talking.”
“Keep looking at me like that and we might have to hop in Miss Mini and go to Vegas for real.”
I said, “As long as we can stop in the middle of nowhere at the McDonald’s in Barstow.”
“Oh yeah. Their McDonald’s looks like a train station and they have a cool gift shop.”
André and Joëlle pulled up on his blazing iron horse just as we passed Eso Won. They parked in front of Hot and Cool Cafe. Mocha Latte handed me back Coretta’s tax papers, and I dropped them in the garbage can that was overflowing with rubbish right outside the café. Then, as we went to greet André and Joëlle, Dwayne, Frenchie, and Fela came out of Eso Won bookstore cracking up. This was what we did Saturday mornings, and would do this for as long as we could. No matter what, we were a family. Today was the day I was going to reveal I had been ill, now that I was better and there was
no need to worry.
For a second, I looked east, toward where a man had a shop called Tres Dwaynes. He was still my dad. I was still his son. So was Dwayne. I’d try again next year. But for now, with my brothers and their cheerful lovers, with my nephew and my tractor-riding girlfriend from Malakoff, Texas, together, we headed inside Hot and Cool Cafe, all hugs and smiles, then raced for the piano and put on a show.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Dear Perfect Reader,
As “Lights, Camera, Action” plays in the background . . . and I wish I could gwara gwara . . . ☺
Years ago, I had started working on a novel set in Leimert Park featuring three brothers (using the names Blue, Raheem, and André, I think), and put it aside, maybe due to good old writer’s block. Eventually I saved the file, let it be a moon floating around in the Dickeyverse, and went on to create the McBrooms instead. (Love the McBrooms!)
Now I decided to give it another shot and write about three different brothers. I started off with Brick and only Brick. Initially I had no idea that I was going to add two more bros. It started with me improvising, had a guy in a car waiting on someone and I had no idea why. It became a story with Brick waiting on Penny, then being introduced to Mocha Latte and Christiana, and via good-old improvisation the novel sort of led me to this other fascinating world and took on its own life after that; eventually I added Dwayne, gave him his own conflict and POV, then added André. His story was much larger, and he had a killer POV, but it was all cut. The way I write, the book would’ve been the size of War and Peace. Let’s just say, Joëlle took him on a wild, erotic ride between chapters. ☺ It felt like the perfect combination: three guys, three personalities, in three different types of relationships, all coming from three different places. Well, I hope it all came out fine. I hope that you, perfect reader, will enjoy this read as much as I enjoyed finally writing this one.
The Business of Lovers Page 33
