Brice picked through his clothing, deciding what he was going to wear to the meeting, then packed them in his suitcase. He was glad that the investors that Carl had been working with were willing to meet late on Friday. That would give him time to prepare and finish up classes for the week.
Getting away for a couple of days would do him good. Since the blowout with Naomi, it had been pure torture to sit in her class, look at her, listen to her, know what you had, and realize that it was over. Over for reasons that she had yet to explain to him.
He jammed some socks in the suitcase. If she would have just given him a chance to explain what he’d done, maybe they would be together now. He closed the suitcase.
What did it matter? She’d made up her mind. Maybe she went back to her ex. Maybe the dean position took precedence. He didn’t know. He didn’t care. He walked past the dresser’s mirror and caught his reflection. Who was he kidding? Of course he cared. Too much. He’d dreamed of her—at least on the nights that he could sleep, he heard her voice in crowds, smelled her scent. Sometimes her presence was so powerful that he’d turn in his bed at night and swear that she’d been there.
There had been so many times when he’d picked up the phone, dialed her number and cut off the call before it started to ring. He’d get up late at night and drive around the city, often finding himself in front of her door, looking up at her window.
Yeah, getting away would do him good. And in a few weeks this part of his fellowship would be over and he’d be back in New York, and maybe he could start putting this chapter of his life behind him.
He went to the kitchen and got a bottle of water. He leaned against the counter and took a long drink. He missed her. The idea burst in his head. Missed her so badly that it felt as if a part of him had been carved out and tossed away. How do you get over that? How do you ever feel better?
He’d never been in love before. Not real love. So this must be that heartache thing that he’d heard about and always tossed off as silly. It wasn’t, and it hurt. And he needed to put an end to it once and for all, because he knew he couldn’t keep living like this.
“You did what?” Alexis chuckled into the phone. “It’s about time you told that a-hole off. Good for you.”
“It did feel good,” she admitted. She’d told Alexis about her encounter with Trevor, leaving out the part about Morehouse. A promise is a promise, she reminded herself, even though she’d been itching to share that tidbit of info with Alexis for a while.
“Long overdue,” Alexis was saying.
“I know.”
“So the good Doctor gave you a reprieve. You’re lucky.”
“That’s what I keep telling myself. He made it clear that if it was earlier in the semester he would have kicked me out of the department.”
“Hmm. Thank goodness for tenure, or he could kick you out of school.”
“Believe me, I know I missed the bullet today. Well, I need to go over some notes for tomorrow and turn in early. I ordered Chinese for dinner. I wish they would hurry up. But in any event, I intend to do a Patti LaBelle and have a new attitude starting right now.”
“Good for you. Well, I’ll let you get to it. Lunch tomorrow?”
“Sure.”
“Okay. Good night.”
“Night.”
Naomi put the phone down on the coffee table just as her bell rang.
“Coming,” she called out, and went to get her purse. She went to open the door and the mouthwatering scent of sesame chicken and lo mein greeted her. “How much is that?” She took the plastic bag.
“Ten seventy-five.”
She handed him a twenty, waited for her change, then gave him a dollar tip. “I hope I have my hot mustard in here,” she said, peering down into the bag.
“Have enough for two?”
Her head jerked up. She hadn’t seen him come up the walkway, but there he was standing at the bottom of the steps.
The delivery boy trotted down the stairs and back to his car.
“Brice…this isn’t a good idea.”
He came up one step and then another. “It’s the best idea I’ve had in weeks.”
Less than a foot separated them.
“I’ve missed you like crazy,” he admitted. His eyes rolled up and down her face and settled on her eyes. “Tell me that you don’t feel the same way and I’ll turn around and go away.” He waited.
“I can make it stretch for two.”
He felt like a lottery winner.
She took his hand and closed the door be hind them.
The moment was captured on camera.
“You went to the president of the college?” she asked, dumbfounded by what he had done.
“I wanted some clarity on the policy. I’d met the president some years ago and was reintroduced when I came here. He gave the impression that above all else he’s fair and open-minded.”
Naomi slowly chewed on a piece of chicken. “Go on.”
“Well, I used a totally hypothetical situation, of course. And he promised to get back to me—and he did.”
“What hypothetical situation?”
“Okay, what if a professor met a potential student, off-duty and off-campus, and they started dating, only to find out later what kind of situation they were in. And that the student wasn’t really a student but a visiting fellow.” He grinned. “That’s when he shot me a look and his eyebrows rose.”
Naomi giggled. “Go ahead. What did he finally tell you?”
“He said that visiting fellows were not considered matriculated students, and that although the scenario was highly irregular, there was no rule against it. He did warn me that ‘whoever’ this person was should still be discreet. No reason to cause talk, he said.”
“That’s what you were trying to tell me,” she said, her voice laden with guilt.
“Yeah, but that’s all water under the bridge now.” He reached across the table and took her hand. His gaze caressed her. His thumb brushed lightly across her fingers.
The pieces to the broken puzzle of his life were beginning to come together again. That ache that sat in the center of his chest began to ease, and he could take deep breaths without hurting inside. This is what he had been missing.
He’d wanted to convince himself that he could move on, that he could push Naomi and what they had to the back of his mind. But he couldn’t. And every day that he rose and slept, the purpose of it all escaping him, reconfirmed that inescapable fact: his life was empty without her.
Naomi lowered her eyes, tried to find the words to explain that, although what he’d done for them with the college was just short of heroic, she understood that the hurdle crossed was fine for their immediate reality, but what about when school ended and he went back to his life in New York and the rigors of getting his dream turned into reality. There were too many miles, too many demands that would separate them, make them resentful. She didn’t want to see that happen between them. She wanted him to have his shot, and she didn’t want to be the one that distracted him from it. He would come to resent her, and that was something she could not bear.
“Brice,” she began softly. “I can’t tell you how much it means to me what you did.” She ran her tongue across her lips. “And for now that’s fine. For the next few weeks that’s fine. But then there is the rest of reality.” She leaned forward, passion brimming in her eyes and her voice. She needed him to understand. “You have to go back to New York. You have to do everything within your power to make your dream of opening that school come true.” She looked away for a moment. “You can’t do that running back and forth to Atlanta. I can’t leave and you can’t stay.”
“Oh, ye of little faith. You still don’t get it yet, do you, baby?”
Her brows drew together. “Get what?”
He took a breath. “I’m in this for the long run. Not the sprint. I know things are going to be tough, but we’re going to work it out. And if things fall into place the way I anticipate, we’ll have much less to worry about than you think.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ll know more after Friday, and I’ll tell you everything, I promise.” He took her hands and brought them to his lips. He placed a tender kiss on them. “I know what you were trying to do, Nay. You’d rather sacrifice us and your happiness so that I could have mine. But don’t you understand, baby, that since you’ve been in my life, you have become that driving force. I could put up a million schools, reshape thousands of young, strong black men’s lives, but at the end of the day I want you there.”
Her heart was so full that it spilled over and slid down her eyes.
“Look at me,” he said with a tenderness that was like a lullaby.
“I love you, Naomi. From the bottom of my soul, I love you. And whatever I need to do to make sure that every day that you walk this earth it’s with me at your side, I’m going to find a way to make it happen.”
The tears flowed so freely and so fast they clouded her vision, but she found his lips and kissed him with all the thanks and happiness and longing and passion that she had bottled up inside. He loved her. He loved her and she knew it was true and solid and forever.
And she told him. It poured from her lips and radiated from her body when they coupled and moved as one. She showed him by giving herself to him like she hadn’t with anyone before. She bound them deep inside her body, hollowing out a place in her soul where they could always meet, no matter where they were in the world. And she whispered it in his ear, against his mouth, along the valley of his shoulder, with her fingertips, the rise and fall of her pelvis against his. She told him over and over again.
“I love you, Brice.”
And he knew that no matter where he was in the world, this was home.
They spent most of the night snuggled together, talking in low whispers, as if they wanted to be sure that they’d shut out the world from their hopes and dreams and secrets.
Much too soon the sun was beginning to light up the sky and part the night like a theater curtain, offering the moon and the stars their final bow.
“I probably should be getting out of here,” Brice said, although he hadn’t moved an inch.
Naomi tightened her hold on his waist. “Hmm, not yet,” she said, her voice still filled with intermittent sleep.
He kissed the top of her head. “Need to take care of a few things before I head out this afternoon.”
“You sure you can’t tell me?”
“I promise, I’ll tell you everything the minute I get back.”
She pouted then pushed up to a sitting position in bed. She brushed away the tangled mass of hair from her face and looked across at him. “Fine,” she said, trying to sound put out. “Don’t tell me.”
Brice chuckled. “Oh, don’t try the old wounded trick. It’s not going to work.” He reached around and pulled her down on the bed and quickly pinned her beneath him. “But this might,” he said, his eyes darkening as he pushed her thighs apart and lifted her hips to meet the thrust of his entry. He groaned deep in his throat as he slid inside her, shoving the air out of Naomi’s lungs so that it escaped in a gasp from her lips.
She lifted her knees and pressed them firmly against his sides, holding him in place. And then they found their special rhythm….
More than an hour later, Naomi, thoroughly loved up and happily tired, leaned in her doorway kissing Brice goodbye.
“I’m going to miss you,” she confessed.
He slid his hand between the folds of her robe and slowly caressed her, traveling downward to tease her one last time. She whimpered in delight before tugging his hand away.
“You’ll never leave if you keep that up,” she warned.
“Hmm, I know.” He opened the door and he kissed her again. “I’ll be back tomorrow morning. But I’ll call you tonight.” He pecked her on the lips again. “I love you.
“I love you, too.”
He jogged down the steps and out into the already humid morning.
Naomi stood there for a moment and waved, as he backed out of the driveway, before going back inside.
The camera documented every move.