Chapter 23

 

We returned to land late Sunday evening. It was hard to say goodbye to Derrick when he dropped me off at my apartment. We must have kissed for ten minutes before I got out of the car.

As I stood at my bed unpacking my suitcase, the doorbell rang. I rushed to the door to see who it was. Reggie was standing there. I do not need this right now, I groaned to myself right before I opened the door.

“Hey, Reggie.”

“Hey, can I come in?” he asked me but then walked on in with his hands in his pocket, probably trying to think of something to explain himself and finally answer my question. I went back into my bedroom and finished unpacking my suitcase. He followed me.

“You going somewhere?” he asked, standing in the doorway.

“No. I just got back.”

“Where from?”

“From sailing?”

“Sailing? With who?” he inquired.

“Derrick.”

“Derrick?” he said, frowning.

“Yeah. Derrick.”

“So you back with him now?”

“Yes. We are together again.”

“So you doing this to get back at me?”

“No. My relationship with Derrick has nothing to do with you. I love Derrick because he treats me like a lady and he has all the qualities I want in a man. And you know what Reggie, I don’t have to beg for his attention. I don’t have to wait for him to realize he loves me because I know that he does already!”

“When have you ever had to beg for my attention?” Reggie asked, walking closer to me. “And you know I love you. Don’t try to pull that one on me. Why you doing this, Tiffany?”

“I told you why,” I said, throwing my dirty clothes in the hamper.

Reggie was heated. He walked out of my room and I could hear the front door slam as he left. It didn’t even faze me and I kept on unpacking. I wasn’t about to let his temper tantrum affect me. He had plenty of women to choose from. There was no need for him to be sweatin’ me so hard.

Derrick called me right before I went to bed to wish me a good night. He said he missed me and he didn’t want to go back to work. He only wanted to be with me. I felt the exact same way about him.

 

I WAS SITTING behind my desk the next morning, my legs crossed, sipping on a cup of hot chocolate and checking the latest news on Yahoo! – my daily morning office ritual. Bentley quietly came into my office, shut the door behind him.

“Good morning, Tiffany.”

“Morning, David.”

“How are you feeling?”

“I’m great. Life is wonderful.” As hard as I tried, I couldn’t wipe the grin from my face. Derrick had me feeling good about our relationship. He called me first thing this morning to tell me he loved me and that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me.

“I guess it is judging by that smile on your face.”

“Yep.”

Bentley took a seat at a chair in front of my desk, crossed his legs and I chuckled a bit thinking how professionally-dressed business men seemed to cross their legs whenever they sit.

“So I heard through the grapevine you were dating Derrick Brooks.”

“Wow. Word sure does get out fast, huh?”

“So it’s true?”

I took my eyes off of the computer and looked at him. “David, since when do you take a personal interest in my love life?”

He smiled, then said, “I was asking because I know him.”

“You do?” I asked with raised brows, fully attentive now.

“Yeah…went to the same college.”

 “And how can you be sure that my Derrick Brooks is the same one you went to college with?”

“Ah…let’s see…light skin, black kinda curly hair, a lil’ buff, taller than me – the girls used to say he resembled Rick Fox…”

I smiled. He was definitely describing my baby all right. “Yeah, that’s him. I’m gonna ask him if he knows you,” I told him.

“Nah, I mean he probably don’t know me but I know him. I used to date his wife – well, I used to date her before she married him…you know what I mean.”

My mind immediately went blank. Wife. What wife? Derrick never mentioned anything about a wife. I felt like I was getting smaller and smaller, being sucked into a vortex of permanent chaos and confusion. I was stunned beyond belief but I couldn’t let Bentley see me sweat.

He continued, “She died about four years ago though. I actually went to the funeral…felt sorry for him, because the brother had just changed his life around. I mean, he was a bachelor like me,” Bentley said poppin’ his collar, “But I ain’t had nothing on Derrick. All the women wanted Derrick Brooks…had me jealous for a minute. Then he quit the game, got married, settled down and to have something like that happen must have been devastating.”

It felt like the entire building was spinning while I sat still. I was that house on Wizard of Oz.

“But I see he has found himself another good woman. Tell him I’m jealous,” Bentley said, standing. “I’m going to get back to work. You’re going to lunch with the group today, right?”

“Yeah. I’ll be there.”

“All right. I’ll see you later then.”

Deep breaths, Tiffany. Deep breaths. I wanted to pick up the phone and call Derrick immediately, ask him about this and get it over with. I resisted the temptation. First, I needed to think about the information. Then I needed to talk to Derrick face-to-face to find out why he neglected to tell me he was married and that his wife had passed.

While having lunch with the office crew, that was all I could think about – Derrick being married. And I didn’t know whether to feel angry at him for not telling me, or sympathy for his situation. He had left a few messages for me too…talkin’ bout he wanted to see me and how much fun he had on our weekend getaway. I didn’t call him back.

 

DERRICK SHOWED UP at my place in the evening. I opened the door, forced myself to smile and said, “Hi.”

“Hey,” he said, appearing to be in high spirits as usual. We embraced for a moment, then he walked in. “So, I tried calling you a few times today.”

“Yeah. I was busy.”

“Is everything okay?”

“Not quite…” I said.

“What is it? Did I do something wrong?”

“Ah…well, Derrick…”

“What is it, Tiffany?”

“Just wondering why you didn’t tell me you were once married?”

He looked surprised. He probably never intended on telling me. If it wasn’t for Bentley and his big mouth, I probably would’ve never known.

“I wanted to tell you but—”

“But you didn’t. Derrick, I share my life with you. You know me. You even know the details surrounding my screwed-up relationship with Reggie. But the one thing I should’ve heard from you…”

“I wanted to tell you, Tiffany. I just don’t like to talk about her.”

“But you’re a part of my life now, Derrick. I mean, you claim to love me.”

“No, I don’t claim nothing. I do love you. You know that,” he asserted.

“Okay, well if you do then you should trust me enough to confide in me.” I took a moment to collect my thoughts. “Derrick, I know this may be a touchy subject for you, but if we’re going to be together, you need to share these things with me. I don’t want to learn information about you from other people. I want to hear it from you.”

“You’re right. You’re absolutely right and I’m sorry. I wanted to tell you over the weekend but I didn’t know how.”

Derrick sat down on the couch and I sat down next to him. He said, “I was married for four years and I loved her with…with my heart and soul. Three years into our marriage, she was diagnosed with breast cancer and for the last year of her life, I watched her suffer through chemotherapy until finally, her body couldn’t handle it anymore. She died the same year, and that was four years ago.” Derrick wasn’t emotional as he spoke. Maybe he had already passed the grieving stage. It had been four years since she died.

He went on to say, “And I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to fall in love with me out of sympathy. I wanted you to like me for me, not because of my situation.”

I absorbed everything he told me. It all made sense and I knew Derrick was telling the truth. “You still mad at me,” he asked.

“No. I’m not mad.”

“Good…then I can kiss you?”

Derrick leaned toward me with those wet, luscious, firm lips of his. I closed my eyes and kissed him too. He was all over me and while he kissed me, all I could think about was how he found the courage to date again, to love again. He had found me.

“You’re still upset,” he told me as he pulled away from me.

“No, I’m not.”

“Yeah you are. I don’t feel the same energy in your kiss.”

“I’m not mad. I was thinking about what you said about your wife and I have a question.”

“Okay.”

“Would you get married again?”

“I would.”

“Under what circumstances?”

“What do you mean?”

“What would it take for you to make that commitment again? Would you want someone like her…who looked like her, talked like her?”

“No. Not at all,” Derrick said.

“Then what?”

“I want a woman who likes to spit watermelon seeds at her friends for recreation.”

I smiled. Derrick had an incredible memory and sense of humor. “I love you, Derrick.”

“I love you too, Tiffany.”

He kissed me again, this time shifting his body on top of mine as we laid there on my couch making out like college students.

“Mmm,” Derrick said as if kissing me gave him his fix for the day. “Your lips are addictive,” he told me.

“So are yours,” I said, kissing him more.

We laid there smiling at each other, then Derrick said, “Do you want me to get off of you now?”

“Is that a trick question?”

Derrick laughed then stood up.

“Hey, did you have dinner?” I asked.

“No. You want to go somewhere?”

“I actually had dinner with my Mom not too long ago. I have some leftover baked chicken. You want some?”

“Sure.”

I made Derrick a plate of food – baked chicken, macaroni and French cut string beans – and brought it to him. “Here you go.”

“I can eat in the kitchen, baby. I don’t want to mess up your living room.”

“No…you can sit right here. It’s okay. If you spill something I’ll have to give you a spanking.”

“Don’t say that. I’ll turn this plate over right now.”

I smiled, then said, “I hope you like it. I know it’s not fancy but it’s good.”

“It ain’t gotta be fancy.”

I watched Derrick take a bite out of the chicken.

“Mmm, this is good,” he said.

“Glad you like it.”

He ate quickly. I took his plate back into the kitchen, snatched two cans of Coke from the fridge.

“So since we’re telling each other’s secrets, what is it that I don’t know about you?” he asked me.

“Nothing. My life is boring and uneventful. I wasn’t a player like you.”

Derrick laughed it off. “I was a player. I changed that lifestyle a long time ago. Now I’m a one-woman man. What about you? Any secrets you wanna put out there?”

“Nope.”

“C’mon. I know there’s something you could tell me.”

I smiled. “Nope. Not at all.”

“Okay, well I wanna ask you something. You remember a while back when I stopped by your apartment and Reggie was there? You answered the door and Reggie was with you…he had his shirt off…was there something going on that day between you two?”

“I don’t remember that.”

“It was the day I stopped by to see you after not seeing you all day and when you answered the door, you said y’all were in a pillow fight or something.”

“Oooh…that day.”

“Yeah…was something going on?”

“You really wanna know?”

“Yeah.”

I inhaled deeply, exhaled slowly. “Okay, we were kissing. I mean, Reggie had been coming on to me all day and then I had our parents over for dinner. After dinner, he stayed and we kissed. Nothing else happened.”

“So had I not shown up, something could have happened?”

“Not necessarily, and I don’t want to dwell on it. The past is the past, right?”

Derrick nodded and said, “Where is Reggie, anyway? I haven’t seen him around.”

“He came by yesterday. He was mad when I told him we were back together. He just bounced, said I was doing this to get back at him.”

“Why would you need to get even with him?”

“Well first of all let me say that I am not trying to get even with him. But my relationship with Reggie goes way back. It’s a long boring story.”

“I have nowhere to go.”

“Okay. Well I’ve always had a crush on Reggie, but the feelings I had for him multiplied when we started high school. I thought that since we were friends, I was guaranteed the girlfriend position. Then he started dating other girls. He was a ladies man like you were. Reggie had all the girls and I just stood back and watched him. I guess you can say I was like a sister to him.”

“A sister?”

“Yeah. We were a family. He loved me. So anytime I needed him, he would come to my rescue. His girlfriends didn’t like that and therefore, none of them liked me. The last girl he dated even came here, to my apartment and begged me to leave him alone. Said she loved him but he wasn’t loving her like he should have because I was in the way. I understood what she meant and I agreed to leave him alone. When I did, he flipped out…said I was more important to him than his own girlfriend of two years. A few weeks later, he broke it off with her. Around that same time, I had my first date with you. Then suddenly, he began showing an interest in me…started coming on to me and telling me how much he loved me. He even confessed that I was the woman he always wanted…said he wanted to marry me and have children with me and couldn’t stand by my side and watch me love another man – you.”

“So that’s why you broke up with me.”

“I hate to admit it, but yes. I finally had my chance to be with him. Then one day, it dawned on me. Reggie only wanted me because I was with you. That was the only reason. So in conclusion to this long boring story, I’m not trying to get even with Reggie. I love you because you make me happy. I love the way you make me feel. You make me feel like I’m worthy of your love and I don’t have to wait for you to realize that I’m feeling you because you already know.”

“Yes…I…do,” Derrick said as he kissed me.

I leaned over and rested against his chest. Derrick put his arms around me. It was a familiar feeling of being in the arms of a man who loves me. I felt the same love while I was with Reggie. The difference was, Derrick made me feel wanted and desired. He practically had bent over backwards to please me. Derrick was the type of man who would do anything to satisfy his woman. All I had to do was play my position and he made that easy to do.

“Baby, I hate to leave but gotta be to work bright and early in the morning,” he said.

“Nooo. I don’t want you to leave. I want you to stay here forever and hold me like this.”

“Ah baby, don’t make it hard for me.”

“All right, all right. I guess you can go.”

I walked Derrick to his car, gave him a goodbye hug and kiss. I didn’t want him to leave. I was starting to feel dismal whenever he wasn’t around and that’s how I knew I needed him. We needed each other.