Turned Out Saga (5 page)

“How come you just didn't let me beat his ass?”

“That would have been too easy.”

“I don't know, Thomas. I don't feel right about what we did. I'm not gay, and the shit feels wrong.”

“Man, please . . . just because you let another man suck your dick don't make you gay. When I was in foster care, it was either that or get beat down. Which route would you have taken? Don't even worry about it. It's between us. We don't even have to talk about it anymore.”

To Zyair, just because it wasn't talked about didn't mean it didn't happen. It was something he thought about occasionally but never discussed ever again with anyone. He decided that the incident was something he would take to his grave.

* * *

Later that evening Zyair and Champagne sat on the couch discussing Champagne's business plan. Suddenly Zyair glanced at his watch. “Oh, shit.”

“What's up?” Champagne asked.

“I forgot I told Thomas and the boys I'd hang out with them. Today is Thomas' birthday.”

Champagne didn't know whether to believe him or not. It's funny how insecurity can creep up on you at any given moment. Ever since they'd had their we-need-a-change-in-our-relationship talk, she'd been second guessing herself. Then out of the clear blue sky, Zyair informed her that he was hanging out that night, which didn't make it any better. She knew that he was anal about his schedule.

“Where are y'all going?” she asked.

“I'm not sure, but I'll call you while I'm out.”

That made her feel a little better, because he couldn't be doing too much if he telephoned her.

“What time do you think you'll be back?”

Zyair stood up. “Why the third degree?”

“What? I can't ask you any questions?”

Not in the mood for an argument, Zyair chose not to answer. Instead, he just leaned over and kissed her on the forehead. “I'll call you while I'm out.”

Zyair and his boys had taken to doing something at least once a week.

While in the mall shopping, Champagne admitted to Alexis that she was a little jealous.

“Girl, please . . . don't be jealous. A man needs his space, just like a woman does. I'm sure you don't want to be cooped up under some man all day every day. You need to be you and let him be him.”

“I know, but I've gotten spoiled. It's just been me and him for the past couple of months.”

“Reality check! You've also been miserable. Plus, you're going to have him for the rest of your life. What's a couple of hours here and there?”

* * *

Champagne knew Alexis was right. She also knew she was going through some emotional shit right now. She felt like she was on some sort of roller coaster. She was definitely leaving her job. She was going to start a new company, and to top all that off, Jackson expected her to train the new girl. She was feeling a little sensitive and a lot overwhelmed.

Camille, her new partner came in making demands, acting like she was Whitney or some other diva. Champagne knew that Camille and Jackson were fucking. The way he was rolling out the red carpet for her, there couldn't have been any other reason. He was even paying her a higher starting salary than normal, and as if that weren't enough, what really broke the camel's back was when he tried to hand over one of Champagne's better clients, who politely told him that the only person he was interested in working with was Champagne.

Thank God, she had already talked to some of her clients and informed them she was leaving. Most of them said they would like to continue having her service them, no matter where she was employed. She informed them that she would have to look over their contracts first. She didn't want to get into trouble legally by stealing clients under contract. If she discovered she couldn't be held liable for them leaving, so be it.

* * *

“You know, tomorrow is the day I'm officially handing in my resignation.”

Alexis didn't hear her because she was looking at a pair of shoes. Champagne knew not to repeat herself because nothing came between Alexis and her shoes.

“What do you think of these?” Alexis held up a pair of white three-inch heels.

“I don't like white shoes, you know that.”

“Well, humor me.”

“Anyway, I'm resigning tomorrow, and I'm a little nervous about it.”

“That's understandable.” Alexis looked at the cashier and told her she'll take the shoes in a size eight. “Champagne, honey, you're about to embark on a big project. Starting your own business isn't something small. You have a right to be nervous. I believe in you, though. You're smart, and you're a go-getter. It'll all work out.”

* * *

Champagne heard what Alexis was saying. She knew she was right about her being a go-getter. Shit, mostly everything in life she wanted to achieve she'd achieved. She and her brother Sir were raised by a single mom, who tried her damnedest to instill in them a sense of pride and self-esteem. She told them over and over that they could be whatever they wanted to be and do whatever they set their minds on doing. Champagne believed her. Sir didn't. Growing up, neither of them knew their fathers.

Sir was two years older than Champagne and always seemed to have a hard time, as a child and as a man. It was like he was cursed. He just couldn't seem to get it together. He did average in high school, flunked out of college, couldn't find a job, and turned to drugs.

Champagne blamed it on the fact that there wasn't a male figure around, someone to guide him and be an example. Champagne and her mother tried to help him the best they knew how but to no avail. Sir committed suicide at the age of twenty-two. It devastated Champagne. She went into a shell for over a year, not talking to anyone or doing anything. School was all that mattered to her. She was determined to graduate at the top of her class.

Champagne became an overachiever and sometimes she still found herself falling into the am-I-doing-enough, am-I-achieving-enough trap. Every time you turned around there was something else she wanted to do. First, she wanted to be a teacher, then a counselor, then in the arts. She went back to school to get her master's and was considering going back to get her doctorate. Why? Because she could. She often wondered,
Why settle, when the world has so much to offer?

What drove her were memories of her brother and his unhappiness, his insecurities, his failures and, most of all, his suicide. There was no way she would be so displeased with her life that she would take her own, so her response was to consume herself with work and Zyair. She knew it was unhealthy, but she didn't know what else to do about it.

After her brother's death, she and her mother barely spoke. Whenever she tried to initiate a relationship, she was pushed away. Eventually she gave up but her plan was to correct that soon.

* * *

“You know what? You're right, I can do this. I'm intelligent, I'm talented, I've made some of the clients more popular than they ever believed possible. Most of them want to come with me when I leave, so what do I have to be concerned about?”

Alexis smiled. “Now that's what I like to hear.”

“What's on your agenda this evening?” Champagne didn't have anything planned, Zyair was working late, and she didn't feel like being by herself.

“I've got a hot date, girl.”

“Get the hell out of here. When was the last time you've been on a date? Does he go to your church or something?”

“No, he don't go to my church. And why you gotta rub in the fact that I haven't been on a date in some time? Actually I met him at the Laundromat.”

“The Laundromat? What were you doing at the Laundromat? You have a washer and dryer at home.”

“Something is wrong with the dryer. Anyway, let me finish. I had just finished putting my clothes in the dryer and was about to walk out when this fine, with a capital F, brother strutted in. I was about to leave, but I hesitated.”

“You hesitated?” This surprised Champagne because Alexis never ever made the first move. She was a Christian and believed that women shouldn't go looking for men, that men are the hunters.

“Yeah, girl, that's how fine he was. Not only that but there was this magnetism about him that just drew me.”

Champagne couldn't believe what she was hearing.

She laughed. “Magnetism?”

Ignoring her; Alexis continued, “So I turned around and decided to wait until my clothes dried and see if he would strike up a conversation.”

“Did he?”

“After a good ten minutes of waiting and not even a hello, I said to him, ‘Are you new around here? I've never seen you before.”'

“No, you didn't.”

“Yes, I did, girl. It was a weak line, but it worked. He's new in town. Only been here for three weeks. His name is Khalil. He works construction.”

That surprised Champagne because Alexis usually didn't go for blue-collar brothers. “Construction?”

“Yes, construction. Anyway, we talked a little more, and he asked me if I'd like to go out for dinner one night. So I said yes.”

“You said yes?”

“I figure why not. I've been praying for God to send me the right mate, and I'm not saying he's it, but I know I need to be more open and stop carrying this list in my head on what the perfect man is.”

“I know that's right, because your list was unrealistic.” Champagne recalled Alexis and her pulling out a piece of paper with “the qualities of a good man” on it. It went something like this: Christian man, honest, hard-working, making sixty Gs a year, over six feet tall, in good physical condition, great lover, no kids, must be at least thirty.

After reading the list, Champagne told her, “I've already got the man.”

“Don't brag.”

“What are you willing to compromise on?” Champagne asked.

“Well, you know there's one thing I'm not comprising on, and that's him being a Christian.”

“Is he?”

“Yes. I asked him what churches have he attended since he's been in town. He said that was the first thing he did, find some place to serve the Lord.”

“Get out of here.”

“I know, right. “

Champagne was glad for Alexis and told her so. “Make sure you call me, no matter what time it is, and let me know how things go.”

“You know I will.”

They shopped a little while longer and separated in the parking lot.

Champagne hoped this Khalil guy was the one for Alexis. She was tired of seeing her best friend single, and thought she deserved a man, some children, and the white picket fence with the big yard, all the things little girls dream of having when they picture their lives as women.

* * *

When Champagne was young she dreamed of being rich beyond her means, jet-setting from place to place, purchasing whatever she wanted, whenever she wanted it. A man was never in the picture. Don't get it twisted, Champagne didn't think she'd be lonely for life but her main concern was to make her life successful. She'd been in and out of relationships, mostly shortterm, dated occasionally, and had sex once in a while. Then she met Zyair and her life plan changed.

One evening Champagne and Zyair were out to dinner. Their relationship was just getting off the ground, and they were both in denial of their feelings toward each other. Of course, neither wanted to be the first to admit that they were falling in love. They were both afraid of jumping into a relationship headfirst, due to past romantic failures. They both tried to be nonchalant about what they had, not labeling it and just letting it be, although, neither could deny their feelings were growing stronger by the day.

While at dinner, Zyair asked, “What does a man represent to you?”

Thrown off, Champagne asked, “What kind of question is that?”

“Just a question.” Zyair wanted to see where her head was. He was ready to make her “the one.”

“I don't know how to answer that.”

“Answer it honestly.”

Shit, that was a question she'd never given any real thought to. She knew what a man was supposed to represent, security, peace, family, a sense of well-being, but up to this point she hadn't seen any evidence of that. To her; a man just represented companionship, a date, and sex. She didn't want to tell him that because thinking it made her feel a little apprehensive, so saying it out loud surely wouldn't be any better.

“Companionship,” she told him, leaving the rest out. He was satisfied. “What's companion, to you?”

“Someone to talk to, someone to share your wishes, your dreams, and your securities with. Someone to cuddle with and make love to.”

Zyair knew he could be those things.

* * *

Returning to the present moment, Champagne glanced at her Gucci watch, an extravagant gift from Zyair, and saw that time was ticking. Sometimes she felt like he spent way too much money on her. Not that she was complaining, because being spoiled was nice, she just wasn't used to it. She made well over seventy K a year and saved more than she spent, which was a good thing now that she thought about it, especially since it allowed her to start her own business.

Instead of going home, Champagne decided to go to the office to copy the clients' files she was interested in taking with her. She'd been glancing through them all week but not wanting to make it too obvious, decided to wait until the last possible moment to make copies. No one should be in the office other than the security guard, who she knew wouldn't say a word, because Jackson treated him with arrogance and disregard.

When Champagne arrived at the office she was surprised that Jimmy, the security guard, wasn't at his post. As she walked toward her office, she noticed that Jackson's door was slightly ajar and that a ray of light was shining through the crack. She could also hear soft music playing in the background.

Knowing she was wrong and nosy for what she was about to do, she moved closer to the door and peeked through the crack, only to see Camille dancing seductively in front of Jackson. The formfitting skirt and jacket she wore to the office was on the floor, while she paraded in a red spaghetti-thin G-string panty, black thigh-highs, and a red lacy bra with her breasts flowing over the top.

Champagne looked at Camille and noticed that she appeared much thicker in the near-nude than fully dressed. It was a kind of thickness that would turn on any man, or woman if you went that way. It was definitely turning on Jackson, whose attention was razorsharp, watching every hip thrust and every pelvic movement.

When Camille's hand caressed her stomach and moved on to her breast, squeezing her nipples, his eyes followed. When her hands moved down between her legs, rubbing her pussy, his eyes followed. Champagne found her eyes following as well.

When Camille turned around, Champagne noticed that her eyes were closed. She bent over in front of Jackson, and he grabbed her ass and started massaging her buttocks. Champagne could feel her pussy walls opening and closing, and that could only mean one thing. The scene before her was turning her on. She didn't quite know how to react to this. On one hand she was disgusted with herself. On the other, she had to admit that curiosity was getting the better of her.

Common sense finally took over, and she turned away and hurried toward her office. Sitting behind her desk, she tried to catch her breath. There was no way she was going to stay here and make copies, after the episode she'd just witnessed.