For three weeks, Juanita resisted the urge to contact Brandon. There were times when the urge grew into a need, but she held it together. Meanwhile, Maurice upped his game and paid more attention to his wife and less to ESPN. Juanita appreciated the effort and felt optimistic about the prospects of her married life.
When Maurice’s birthday arrived, Juanita planned a dinner party for five other couples at Del Frisco’s Double Eagle at CityCenter in downtown D.C. She considered it more than a celebration of his birth, but also a monumental moment in the rebirth of their marriage.
Juanita had avoided spending time with others as they worked on fixing their union. She did not want to have to put on a happy face when she was sad. But the therapy and Maurice’s notable change brought Juanita to a comfortable place.
In getting ready for the party, Juanita sipped on a glass of chardonnay as she applied makeup while wearing her bra and thongs. She smiled in the full-length mirror as she maneuvered into a form-fitting little black dress that her conscientious eating habits and consistent exercise habits allowed her to wear with pride. She felt sexy and carefree, ready for a wonderful night with friends she enjoyed.
Maurice emerged from the other bathroom looking tall, handsome and happy. They smiled at each other the way they used to when they had first married, before kids and long work hours.
He extended his hand. “Let’s go have some fun, wifey.”
Juanita’s heart fluttered; he had not called her “wifey” in years. She clutched his hand and they walked down the steps smiling. Juanita was relieved that she had survived her cheating episode without any noticeable damage to the marriage.
The party was a surprise—Maurice thought they were having a quiet dinner for two. But he was ecstatic that Juanita thought enough of him to organize the event.
Their friends greeted Maurice with hugs and gifts, and he embraced Juanita with as much gratitude as he had ever shown her. “Can’t believe you did this for me,” he said. “Thank you, ’Nita. I love you.”
“I love you, too, Mo.”
He kissed her on her face and they took seats in the middle of the long table. They enjoyed lively conversation and laughs. . . and many drinks.
“I can’t eat another thing,” Juanita said. “But I can take another drink.”
“Oh, really?” Maurice said into her ear. “Don’t drink too much now. Don’t want you getting drunk.”
“You should. It’s easier to take advantage of me,” she said, rising from her seat.
“Going to the bathroom?” Wanda Coleman, a friend from their neighborhood, asked. “I’ll go with you.”
“Me, too,” Diana Murray, one of Maurice’s coworkers, said.
The ladies made their way from a table on the lower level, beyond the bar and up the stairs to the bathroom.
“Really glad you invited us, Juanita,” Wanda said. “We don’t get to go out much anymore. No one invites us to anything. I guess because our kids are five and six, people think we don’t want to have fun anymore. But we need fun the most.”
“I know that’s right,” Diana said. “You’ve got to make the time. Hire a sitter. We’re blessed because my parents live nearby and they are excited to have our kids spend the night or even the weekend. So we get our social life in. If we didn’t, we’d fall into a rut. I can see it. And the way these women are out here, they don’t care if your man is married or not. They go for what they want. So you’d better keep things exciting.”
Juanita took in their perspectives as she reapplied her lipstick. She agreed with their positions and reasoned she would suggest more one-on-one time with Maurice. She had been so committed to building the family, that interest faded in keeping her husband-wife relationship strong. In that moment, she realized the more excitement she built with her husband, the less she would have urges for Brandon.
“Let’s get out of here,” she said. “We need to do a birthday toast to the birthday boy.”
The ladies filed out of the bathroom, with Juanita last. As she came out of the bathroom, she noticed the other ladies’ heads turning at a man who was entering the men’s room. When she looked up to see Brandon, her heart skipped.
His did, too.
“Well, she lives,” Brandon said.
“Hi,” was all Juanita managed to get out.
“You know him?” Wanda asked.
“We go way back,” Brandon said. He turned to Juanita. “Haven’t seen you in—what—ten, twelve years?”
“Something like that. How have you been?” Juanita said. She was relieved that Brandon did not blow her up with her friends.
“Good. Real good. And you? Y’all hanging out tonight?”
“It’s Maurice’s birthday and Juanita had a surprise party for him,” Diana interjected.
“Yes,” Juanita added. She was not comfortable, but tried hard to be smooth. “We’re downstairs. Who are you here with?”
“Oh, I’m with a young lady I’m dating,” he said. Juanita’s heart raced. “You all are all married and happy and shit. I’m trying to find that right one.”
“I can’t imagine you have troubles finding a woman,” Wanda said.
“The good ones are already taken,” he said, glancing at Juanita. “So, the search continues.”
“We have to go,” Juanita said. “It’s good to see you.”
“Nice to meet you ladies,” Brandon said. Then he leaned in to hug Juanita. She hugged him back. “And really good to see you after so long,” he said. Brandon squeezed Juanita’s ass before letting her go. She did not flinch. Rather, she was turned on.
That kind of risk-taking and show of attraction excited her. She looked back with a sly smile at Brandon as they walked away. En route to the table, Juanita scanned for women sitting alone to see who might be Brandon’s date. There was only one woman sitting by herself: She was young and elegant, pretty and poised. Immediately, Juanita became jealous.
She worked hard to mask her distraction, and everyone was so tipsy and conversational that they did not notice Juanita maintaining an eye on that table. Finally, after a few minutes, Brandon joined the woman, and Juanita’s distraction turned into spying. She glanced at him and his date every thirty seconds or so, somehow believing she could gauge his interest in her. She almost hyperventilated when he moved from across the table to sit beside her. They faced Juanita now, but she could not focus on the woman’s face—only Brandon’s, and her spastic mind told her Brandon moved beside her to make her jealous—or so he could see what she was doing.
Either way, the fact that she could see him whispering into her ear and making her smile and rubbing her back and commanding their space—all the things about him that she loved—made her sick. Literally.
She gathered herself enough to make the toast and lead the Stevie Wonder “Happy Birthday” version to her husband, but her mind was about thirty feet away at another table. After nearly thirty minutes of faking as if she were interested in the conversations around her, Juanita became nauseous.
“I’ll be right back,” she told Maurice.
“You okay, dear? You seem a little—I don’t know—flustered.”
“Not sure the champagne is agreeing with the crab cakes, spinach, butter cake and martinis,” she said.
In reality, it was seeing Brandon with another woman that upset her stomach and messed up her head. She knew he saw other women—he was single and a catch. She had left him hanging without expressing why. She had focused on her marriage and put her indiscretion in the far recesses of her conscience. She had tried to make it like Brandon did not exist.
But seeing him made her dismiss all that.
As she passed his table on the way to the bathroom, he looked up and smiled. She did not smile back. She was angry: angry that he was with someone else and angry at herself for being angry. It did not help that she got a good look at his date. The woman was clearly younger than Juanita and she appeared smitten with Brandon, which, to Juanita, meant that he had slept with her.
He heard them laugh as she walked by, which she took as them laughing at her. Her night that represented so much promise for her marriage ended up registering as a clear and present indicator that all was not well with her, no matter how much she ignored Brandon or dismissed him. What he provided was far different from Maurice, and the difference made a difference for her.
In the bathroom, she cursed herself. “Are you fucking serious?” she said aloud, looking into the mirror.
Right then, a woman came out of one of the stalls to answer and startle her. “I didn’t think anyone was in here.”
The woman said, “It’s okay. I curse at myself all the time. Feel better afterward, too.”
Juanita did not feel better. All the ignoring of Brandon and counseling with Maurice and working to bring things together with her husband collapsed like a popsicle-stick house in a windstorm.
She took a few minutes to gain her composure and let her queasiness subside before vowing not to dignify Brandon and his friend by acknowledging them. But when she stepped out of the bathroom, there was Brandon, arms folded.
“How long were you going to make me wait?” he asked.
“I didn’t know you were out here,” Juanita said.
“I wasn’t talking about tonight.”
“Forever then.”
“Really? Why?”
Juanita looked around. “I’m married, remember,” she said in a low voice. “It couldn’t go on.”
“I thought we were at a point where you’d at least say that and not ignore me. You made me feel like you used me for sex, to fulfill a fantasy or something, and then move on.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for that to happen. I needed to get back to my life.”
“The life that drove you to me in the first place?”
“Yes, that life, but only better with some work.”
“I squeezed your ass a little while ago. Did you like it?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“Sure it matters. If you didn’t like it, you would have made it clear. But you liked it. You loved that shit.”
“Why do you think you know me so well?”
“Only because I do. Trust me, as I’ve always said, I don’t want to cause drama in your life, in your marriage. But you know we have something between us that’s not normal, not regular.”
“That didn’t stop you from being on your date with fake Beyoncé down there.”
“Jealous, are we? She’s not Beyoncé, but the fact that you would bring Bae into the conversation says you see how beautiful she is. She’s smart and sexy and, for some reason, seems to really like me.”
“So why are you here talking to me?”
“Because she’s not you. You and me. . . we have something. We don’t have to work at it. Never had that with anyone else. So, I see you out tonight—your husband seems like a nice guy, by the way—and there’s no way I can’t at least let you know I miss you and I wish the best for you.”
He said it with sincerity, which threw Juanita. She expected that he would make her feel awkward.
“Thank you. I apologize again for not being up front with you. But I thought cutting ties cold turkey was the easiest way for me to move on. I needed to do that. And it seems you’ve gotten over me pretty quickly.”
“What, you want me to sit at home in the dark, flicking the lights on and off? I moved on—had no choice. But I didn’t get over you. Never got over you from way back when.”
Brandon smiled, and Juanita, despite all her efforts, smiled back. “You’d better get back to your people,” he said. “Good to see you. Oh, and you look sexy as fuck in that dress.”
She shook her head and smiled as she went in for a goodbye hug. Brandon kept his hands to himself this time, and Juanita was disappointed. So she squeezed his ass.
“You’re a bad girl.”
“Not as bad as I wanna be,” Juanita replied.
“Remember I’m your partner in badness,” Brandon said. They laughed and he watched her walk toward and then down the steps. “Don’t be a stranger.”
“What took you so long?” Maurice asked when Juanita made it back to her seat. “You okay?”
“I’m better now. Should not have had that champagne,” she said. Brandon made it back to his seat. “But I feel like continuing the celebration now.”
Wanda and Diana waved for Juanita to come to the far end of the table to take photos. The server took five versions of the same pictures with five different cell phones. Then Diana suggested Juanita and Maurice pose for photos.
Everyone began snapping. Juanita smiled instinctively, but she worried how it looked to Brandon, who sat in a perfect line of vision to their table.
“Okay, enough already,” Maurice said, ending the succession of clicking phones. “We’re not Princess Diana and Prince Charles. But my wife is a princess. Thank you, baby, for this night with great friends, good food and good drink. Really appreciate it.”
Juanita, distracted, said, “Okay, you’re welcome, husband. It’s my pleasure to do something like this for you. You deserve it.”
They hugged, and she looked over his shoulder for Brandon. But he was gone. And despite all the cheer and joy around her, Juanita felt a little empty.