6
Filling the Void

This was the break for which I’d been waiting and quickly moved toward the door of the apartment, “Well, it appears that I might have overstayed my welcome.”

Trying not to display any anxiety, her voice fell like a feather on cotton, “No! I mean, you fine,” Cherish said.

“Look, I didn’t mean that comment the way it sounded. I’ve just got a lot on my mind right now. Tomorrow’s going to be a long day,” I explained. “It’s getting late. I better be going.”

By the time she could make it around the table to where I stood, the door was unlocked and already partially open. I gave her a peck on the cheek and said good night before starting over to the elevator. After pressing the button to go downstairs, my mind had moved several blocks ahead and was already in the Impala traveling down Broadway toward 116th Street. Still trying to remember where I had put the parking ticket with Officer Lady’s number on the back, I stepped onto the elevator and pushed the button for the basement. As the door began to close, I was thinking how I’d just dodged a serious bullet at dinner when an arm was thrust through the opening.

Cherish stepped in as the door retracted. “Thought the least I could do was walk you out to your car.”

“That’s okay. You really don’t have to do that,” I told her. What I really wanted to say was, Can’t you take a hint? I’ve got business that doesn’t include your fine ass.

As the elevator started down, she asked, “You on your way home?”

Knowing I had already told her before leaving Sam and Eunice’s apartment, I played along. “Yeah, I’ve got to get started pretty early in the morning.”

As we stopped on the second floor, she asked, “Where you live in the Village?”

The door opened and four Hispanic teenagers came in with a small radio playing music to which neither Cherish nor I could understand the words. We were both quietly watching the new passengers as the two females seemed to recklessly throw themselves at their boyfriends. The couple closest to us was oblivious to our presence as they quickly engaged in a tongue-wrestling match. That rather uncomfortable display lasted until the door opened for us to get off in the basement.

As we let the kids pass out the elevator first, “Near Bleeker and Houston,” I said.

Cherish seemed a bit confused, “Excuse me?”

“Where I live in the Village; you asked on the elevator,” I reminded.

Approaching the Impala just outside the exit as I remotely unlocked the driver’s door from a few feet away, she continued, walking around to the passenger’s side of the car, “That’s supposed to be a nice area, I hear. Lotta artists and them types down there. Some real nice buildings too.” She then asked, “Mind if I sit for a minute?”

I was so ready to be gone but kept my cool with as sincere a smile as I could fake, “No. Not at all,” I said.

The remote was pressed twice to unlock the passenger’s door. Just then, the interior light came on and my curiosity was put to rest. The parking ticket with Officer Lady’s number on the back I’d been wondering about most of the evening was resting in the console.

Unfortunately, Cherish saw the citation as she opened the door to sit down. Recognizing the legal form, “You ain’t tell me you got one too,” she said.

I dismissed her comment, “Well, like yours, it’s not a big deal.”

She cut her eyes at me, “Like mine, huh?”

I pretended it was a non-issue, “You know what I mean.” I said. “I’d forgotten all about it.”

Cherish picked the ticket up to take a closer look, “Why, you just got this earlier today, about the same time you came over.”

I commented, gently removing the paper with my thumb and index finger while hoping she hadn’t noticed the writing on the back illuminated by the dome light, “Yeah, on the corner in front of the building. ”

Mimicking her father, she said, “Be sho ‘n takes care o’ it soon as ya can ‘fore it goes ta cote.”

Displaying my disinterest in her feeble attempt at humor after having located the phone number, now, I was more eager than ever to get away from the good badness I couldn’t seem to shake, “Yeah right, sure thing,” I said.

The citation was placed back into the console when I turned to Cherish, coincidentally, about the time my cell phone rang. BBBRRRIIINNNGGG, BBBRRRIIINNNGGG. When I answered, I was a bit surprised to hear Moms’ on the line.

She said, “Tell Cherish she left and ain’t latch da doe. She need to git her mind back ‘nside her head. This ain’t no place to be doin no shit like that.”

“Yes ma’am,” I responded.

Moms eventually asked, “She wit you?”

As I suddenly felt a slight tug at my zipper, “Yes ma’am,” I answered.

Before I could intervene, the fly of my boxers was open and I felt the warmth of Cherish’s hand searching until it discovered the fleshy treasure she was seeking. There came an involuntary cough.

“You a’ight?” Eunice asked.

I was caught totally off guard. Cherish just looked at me and smiled while holding the index finger of her free hand up to pursed lips, signifying I should keep quiet. Part of me wanted to stop her. The part in which she was most interested at that moment had no thoughts of doing so.

“YYeess, uh-hum, yes ma’am,” I responded.

Eunice spoke from a place of motherly concern, “Hopes you ain’t comin down wit nothin.”

I said, in agreement while wishing she would just get off the phone, “Yes, ma’am. I hope so too. I mean, I hope I’m not coming down with anything either.”

“You know, to catch cold this time o’ year, the worst thang. Seem they’s worse ‘n colds you catch durin death o’ winter,” she said.

I was trying to keep my composure. “Yes ma’am. I take the vitamins and stuff you gave me. Okay Moms, I’ll be sure and let her know. Good night.” Just before conceding to the thought of the unthinkable things I’d began thinking, it dawned on me where I was, and who I was with. This is my godmother’s baby girl. We’re parked behind the building where the people live who’ve taken me as one of their own. “Stop, no…no, stop,” I mumbled.

Cherish continued pawing at my zipper as if I hadn’t said anything, “Tell me you’re not thinking what I think you’re thinking and I’ll leave you alone.”

I softly yelled, “Stop…stop… Dammit, stop! I can’t do this!”

She was a little shaken. “What the hell’s your damn problem?”

“Nothing,” I said abruptly. “There’s not a problem.”

Leaning over with her hand on my shoulder she whispered, “But, I thought that’s what you wanted.”

My head was laid back on the headrest. “Yes; it is… No! That’s not!” I sprang up like a soldier snapping to attention.

“What the hell goin on wit you? One minute you into me and getting all worked up. The next, you bouncin off the damn walls tryin to get away from me like I’m a disease or somethin,” she said.

“It’s not you,” I assured. “Well, it is you; but not the way you think.” I know she was confused because I was confusing the hell out of my damn self. I was pressed against the door like a nervous puppy. “I keep trying to get past the thought of you being my sister. I mean, you’re not my sister like blood and shit, but your mama is my Moms. That’s how close we’ve gotten…and your dad.”

“You mean Sam,” she said.

I was already agitated, “No, I mean your damn dad!” I said. “Give the man some bitching credit, why don’t you?”

“How you gone crawl all up in my shit ‘bout somethin you don’t even know?” she snapped. There was a long pause. “Wait, don’t get it twisted. The situation with me and Sam…well, my dad…it is what it always have been and it ain’t just gone be different ‘cause you showed up. But it don’t got nothin to do with what’s goin on right now…at least, not far as I’m concerned. It ain’t like we no kin for real.”

“I’m feeling you on that, but you have to understand when I say; commitment is a really big deal to me,” I began.

Looking like I had just punched her in the neck, Cherish held her hand up to stop me from talking, “Now wait a minute; you got it going on and all that but I ain’t said nothin about no commitment. You musta took me wrong when I talked about you coming out to L.A. and all. I just got things workin good for me out there. I’m down for some fun and good times, maybe even a good hard time when the mood hit me, but I ain’t wit that livin together like no husband and wife shit.”

“Where the hell did you get that?” I asked. “I’m not trying to be anybody’s damned husband. You never heard me spit some stupidness like that out my damn mouth.”

She sat back in the seat and sighed, “So what you saying?”

Feeling I was no longer in immediate danger, I relaxed a bit, “Well, I’m going to be straight with you.”

“I would hope so,” she said. “Wouldn’t expect you to give it to me no other way…straight and hard.”

I was trying to figure out the best way to approach the subject, “Now, I know you’ve heard a lot about me from Moms and Poppy.”

“I done heard enough,” she said.

“This is already hard as it is. Can’t you just bite your tongue and let me finish what I have to say?” I asked.

She grunted, “Uuugh, just like a damn man. Always want to get his first.”

I ignored the sexual connotation, “They told me about you, but not very much. All I really knew was that you’re the youngest girl and live somewhere in California.”

“Hell, they didn’t tell you nothing,” she stated. “What, you mean my peoples ain’t give you no dirt on they wild, rebellious daughter? The one child that can’t decide what she want in life and always moving from place to place trying to find herself. Shit, ‘least I ain’t gonna settle for being stuck somewhere depending on no damn man to take care ‘o my ass. Hell, a little privacy, some batteries…and I can take care of my damn self just fine if I need to.”

I was trying to get a word in over her continued bantering, “Cherish, are you going to stop long enough to breathe or not?” I asked. “You posed a question. If you let me, I’m trying to give you the damn answer.”

“Ain’t nobody stopping yo mouth from movin. You can say what you gotta say. I’m just over here mindin my bidness,” Cherish continued.

“Just in case you need a hint, we’re supposed to be engaged in a conversation. That means I listen when you talk and you’re supposed to stop flapping your gums long enough to let me get in a word every once in a while.”

Noticeably annoyed, she huffed, rolled her eyes, and sat silently. Only a second passed before her hand went to the keys, switched the ignition to the “aux” position, and she began surfing the radio stations, “So what you trying to say?”

I began the explanation again, “What I’m saying is, when I got off the elevator upstairs and took a good look at you, everything that was rational and made sense, suddenly, didn’t.”

She intruded on the moment, “Man, just say what you trying to say? Damn all that mumbo-jumbo bullshit. Just spit it the hell out.”

“Okay, look; I’ve got much love for your folks, but when I saw you…when I look at you…Damn.” With eyes closed, I simply dropped my head. “I’m not trying to disrespect them in their house.”

“I told you, we can go over by your place,” she offered.

“No, we can’t,” I said. “I’m not just talking about their apartment. I’m talking about the family...the family into which they’ve invited me and of which I’ve now become a part. Something I’ve honestly never really had before. Maybe you just can’t wrap your mind around the whole thing.”

In a most sincere tone, “Naaaaw, I gotcha,” she answered. “I ain’t dumb as I pretend to be; but they is sometimes certain advantages to being blonde. Guess that means I done got myself another brother.”

I glanced at her and apprehensively stated, “That could be one way of looking at it; in a weird kind of Old Testament sort of way.”

She looked me over with those enticing bedroom eyes, “So that mean we can’t be getting together and hanging out ‘n shit.”

“Well”—I adjusted myself in the seat— “I don’t see a problem with us getting together and hanging out when we’re both in town. It’s the ’n shit that would sooner or later stir up some trouble.”

“You know,” she said, “This the most decent I ever been rejected. Don’t feel nothing like usual.”

I had a surprised look, “It’s not that you’re being rejected, just a matter of unfortunate circumstances. Besides, I don’t imagine you have to deal too much with rejection.”

Pushing the door open and climbing out the car, she said, “If you only know’d what I go through.” Cherish looked up and made note, “Starting to rain. Roads can be kinda slick when they gets wet.”

I looked over and winked, “Be sure I’ll keep that in mind.” I said. “Thanks for the concern.”

She turned, climbed back inside the car; putting her left knee in the seat, reached into the console, handed me the parking ticket and flipped it over, “Maybe it ain’t too late to call the police,” as she stood up, gently closed the passenger’s door, and sashayed back into the building.

I watched through the drizzling rain as she gracefully strolled inside the entrance. It wasn’t until after the doors closed behind her that what she had said registered. All I could do was shake my head while whispering, “Damn...Damn, damn, damn.”