Come Share My Love (32 page)

     “Oh, I’ve met a few that are so emotional that they put women to shame.  It’s scary.”

     “I know that’s right.”  Kemah laughed.  “I just wish the male species would get a damn clue.”

     “That would be nice.  I believe that if a man looks, he’s cheating.  What is he looking and admiring for?  Is he wishing that she was his woman or his woman had the same attributes or qualities as this other woman?  To me that’s cheating.  But let’s change the subject.  We came here to have a good time and I’m ready to begin.  We can’t stay in this suite all week, no matter how cozy it is.”  Shyla stood picking up her traveling bag.

     “I can’t wait to go shopping.  I saw some boutiques on the way over.”

     “I’m all for that.”  Shyla began putting her belongings away.  “So what do you think we should do our first day here?”

     “Eat.  That’s the first thing on my agenda.  We haven’t had anything since before we left California.  Can you
believe these airlines now?” Kemah shook her head.  “You either buy their high priced, unpleasant food on the plane or you bring a snack.  You can’t bring a snack because they take it at security.  You know they don’t really throw that stuff away.  They probably take it home to their families which wouldn’t be a problem but the least they could do is give it to the homeless.  I tell you, you can’t win for losing.”

     “True.  Now back to the plans.  I want to do everything, the casinos, clubs, dancing the night away, and sightseeing.  You name it, I’m there.  We do have that tour scheduled for tomorrow morning.  And after sampling some of their food we’re going bike riding and probably snorkeling.”

Kemah’s head snapped up.  Her friend always wants to do something, no matter what it was she was a go getter except when it came to love.  “Shyla, black people don’t go snorkeling.  Quit dreaming.”

     “Black people may not but brown people do,” she said seriously.  “And since we’re a brown skinned people today, we’re going snorkeling.  I don’t know what color we will be tomorrow because of that baking ass Jamaican sun but for today we are brown.  It’s like an oven out there.”

     “I know, and I don’t do heat all that well.  My perm is going to be a mess when I leave here.  I have a feeling that I will be in braids by the end of the week.”

    
“I can get with that.  I thought about getting them before we left but Char was booked for the next month and I wasn’t about to let anyone of those other chicken heads in her shop do it.”

     “I heard that.  Let’s get unpacked and we’ll go eat, drink, be merry and bike ride.”  Kemah moved towards her luggage.  “You think they have any bikes with umbrellas on them?”  Shyla shook her head.  “I didn’t think so,” she sighed.  “But I can dream though.”

Both women finished putting away their belongings, showered, dressed and went in search of eats and bike rentals.

   The sun was set on hell when Zackary walked off the plane.  It was sure to be a scorcher by the time he got to his hotel off the beach.  Zackary needed a vacation.  He didn’t want to admit it; he was too focused on his job.

   Zackary was a veterinarian.  He and his partner and best friend opened a business several years before and today would be his very first real vacation since his wedding years before that. 

   He was no longer married, he no longer had to please the selfish woman he’d married and give her all his time and money.  He was content for the most part.  At times there was loneliness.  There were even women he dated but nothing serious enough to do anything about.  He had two beautiful daughters to consider, and their happiness came first.  Zackary hadn’t wanted to come on vacation without them but his family insisted that he needed time to himself, to relax, unwind and get laid , one of his brother’s had told him.  He didn’t know about the latter but he definitely needed to relax. 

   Zackary wasn’t one to have casual sex, but he knew many who did.  The last thing he needed was to catch something from someone and something of his fall off.  Just thinking about it made his body cower.  He’d be alright.

   The first thing Zackary noticed when he entered the airport terminal was the many beautiful women.  Some just getting in, others waiting to head out, but they were all beautiful.  Black, Caucasian, Asian, Latina, you name it, but to him, black women were the most beautiful creatures in the world.  Like California Bing Cherries, the darker the sweeter.  That’s what he’d always been told.  Experience made him a believer

   He couldn’t help
but notice how several of them were checking him out, whispering and waving.  He wasn’t dressed in any kind of special way.  A pair of navy blue Dockers white V-neck T-shirt and sandals.  His sunglasses sat atop his head.  He did have a nice body but you couldn’t see the full blunt of it with what he was wearing.  At least that’s what he thought.

   Zachary made it to the rental outlet, picked up his vehicle and was given direction to his hotel. The SUV he rented had a navigator system so he was sure not to get lost.  He thanked the attendant and was on his way. 

     “I can’t believe these stations don’t have real music.” he continued to punch the seek button on the radio  “Reggae is fine but what about R&B, slow jams, Miles Davis, Down Home Blues.  Something different,” Zackary complained to the interior of the vehicle. Thank goodness he had thought to bring his CD case with him.  He never left home without it.  Most of them consist of artist like B.B. King, Koko Taylor, Percy Sledge, Jimmy Reed, Ray Charles, Bobby Blue Bland and Memphis Slim to name a few.  Denise La Salle was MIA.  He wondered what had happened to it.  One of his brothers happened, no doubt.

   He came across his favorite girl…Etta James.  He kissed the CD and said ‘beautiful’ before sliding it into the CD player.  Etta would sing to him all the way to his hotel and maybe into the night.  He sang and popped his fingers to her songs as he drove down the sandy roads in Kingston, Jamaica heading for Hope Bay.  The land was beautiful, the beaches were amazing.

   He had heard the food was good.  He couldn’t wait to taste it.  He was almost to the end of his journey when Etta began her rendition of At Last.  Nobody could sing it like Etta.  She was the best.  Before Etta could get out you are mine, and the ending note, Zackary say a flash of orange riding pass on a bike and then a streak of blue, baby blue.  He knew that face.  He knew that body.  It was mostly covered at times but he knew that body.

   So many times he woke up having to take a cold shower because of the dreams he had staring that body.  His body ached just seeing her.  Maybe he was wrong.  Maybe it was just what he wanted to see.  He wanted Shyla so bad that he saw her everywhere.  In the market, the movie theatre, at his favorite eating place just a mile or so from where he worked, everywhere.

   As much as he wanted to he couldn’t go back.  They would be long gone by now, anyway.  He wondered if they were registered in the same hotel.  That would be great.

   If that was Shyla, his Shyla, he would have her this week.  Maybe getting laid wasn’t such a bad idea after all, as long as the person was Shyla Wilkes.

     “I don’t think I’ve had this much fun since college.  Essence and I use to go up to the mountains and ski.”

     “You and Essence, skied?”

     “Yes!  At least we tried to ski?”  They sat in the small kitchen enjoying breakfast.

     “That’s what I thought,” Kemah chuckled lightly. 

     “We really went just to get away from the city.  It was so much fun.  People thought we were crazy, getting up early just to have snowball fights and make snowmen with the younger kids.”  She laughed.  “Hell, when you don’t normally go places, or grew up not going places, you tend to forget how to act when you do get out.”

     “Remember that cruise we went on about four years ago?” Shyla nodded.  “Now that was fun.  All the food we ate, and dancing until the sun came up.  I don’t think a day went by that we didn’t dance.  We hardly ever slept.”

     “I know that’s right,” Shyla said.  “I must have gained about fifteen pounds that weekend.”  She looked down at her body.  “And I’m still trying to get it off.”

     “Girl, please,” Kemah waved her remarks away.  “You have a body to die for.  As long as you have a flat stomach and banging ass hips like we do, we look good.  Some men don’t care if a woman has a lot of junk in her trunk or more than a handful to put in his mouth, just as long as he can sample.”

Shyla laughed aloud.  “Kee, you are too much.”

     “But accurate.”  She sat her glass of juice down on the table.  “I was out walking on the beach this morning, before you got up and ran into a whole swarm of them.  Each one checking out my, extra baggage.”  She pointed to her backside.  “At least two had the bravery to approach, try talking to me, but wouldn’t you know they were talking here instead of here,” she patted her ample breast and then pointed a finger to her face.

     “I know that feeling, all too well.”  Shyla shook her head while taking another bite of her croissant.

     Kemah stilled her hand.  “Oh but you haven’t heard the best part.  It was a white guy, fine, had a body to beat all white boy bodies, every inch of him that was uncovered was flawless, no scares, no bruises, no hair on the chest no nicks or cuts on the face, legs as smooth as silk, flawless.  Not one man in Hollywood could touch him, I tell you he had it going on.  Until,” she dropped her butter knife in her plate, “he opened his damn mouth.”

     Shyla laughed.  “What did the moron say?”

     Kemah rolled her eyes.  “Hey, Shawty, looking good.  Can I get into some of you?  My face fell; I thought I was going to be sick.  I was absolutely speechless.  Dude was coming on strong, trying to sound down, his buddies was egging him on and I guess because I was still standing there that he thought it was an invitation to keep talking.”  She rolled her eyes.  “And then the little cretin asked me were they real.”

     “I hope you slapped the taste from his damn mouth,” Shyla said annoyed. 
“I know I would have.”

She scrunched up her face and shook her head, no.  “I said all 44F inches of them.  His mouth began to water.  I know because he wiped his hand across it before he said anything else.” 

     “Then stupid said, “Damn baby, I’d like to wrap my tongue around those.  Would you like to breast feed me, baby?  I stood there with my hands folded across my chest.  Then he touched me.  He touched me, girl,” she said excitedly but not in a good way.  “Now you know I don’t like anyone to touch me that I didn’t invite to touch me.”

     “Shyla he dropped my hands to my side and said let me look at you.  Then he walked around me.  Stand up Shy.  Stand up.”  She pulled her to her feet and demonstrated what the guy did.

     “He had one hand folded under one arm while the other was rubbing his chin, walking around scoping me out, and this fool said, ‘now I can definitely work with you.  I’d like to take my tongue and give you the best bath you’ve ever had.  Going up in you would give me great pleasure.’”

     “Okay.  That’s nasty.  Did you call a lifeguard or security?  I think I’m going to vomit.  I can’t eat another bite.”  They both sat back down.  Shyla pushed her plate away.

     “No I didn’t call anyone.  I started laughing.  He must have thought I was crazy, until my face turned serious.  I said, “Do you really get women with that mouth, because I have to tell you that was weak.”  His buddies began laughing at him.  I turned to one of the black guys standing there, he just shrugged his shoulders.  He didn’t know what dude was ranting about.  I shook my head.  I told him to school his boy on what a real woman likes. 

     Afte
r I kissed his cheek, he said, ‘yes ma’am’, all nervous like and I laughed inside, way too hard.”  She was still laughing.

    
“Turned to homeboy and told him to, back up before you get smacked up.  I jumped at him and he flinched.

     “He tried to whisper, talking behind my back as I walked away saying, ‘she probably likes women any way.’  I stopped.  Pointed at myself saying, ‘I know he didn’t just say that.’  I turned back and said, ‘Hey Casanova’, he and his group looked my way.  I kindly turned, pulled up my sarong, bent over showing my big ass and thong, popped it all up in their faces then dropped it like it was hot.”  She demonstrated.  “Then I said, ‘trust this, I don’t do anything but poles’ and walked away.”  She laughed again.  “You should have heard those clowns.  One said, ‘I think I’m in love’, and then hollered ‘I love you.”

     Shyla couldn’t stop laughing.  She laughed until her sides hurt. “Kee you probably gave someone a heart attack.”  Shyla still continued to laugh.

     “I know.  You’d think these idiots would go someplace and act civilized.  Maybe they thought I was from here I don’t know, but it shouldn’t matter.  No one deserves that kind of treatment.  I don’t want another person to come up in my face and complain about how black men
act.  I’ll probably knock fire from them, and I’m not a violent person.  Hopefully the idiot learned his lesson.”

     Shyla sobered.  “Yes hopefully.  At any rate, be careful.  They could have attacked you.  Then I would have been in jail in Jamaica for what they would call Capitol Murder.  Don’t walk alone anymore, okay.  We go together from now on.  Okay.”

     “Bet.  What’s Capital Murder to them, Shyla?”