Don’t Ever Wonder (19 page)

SIX MONTHS LATER

Brendan was recovering
quickly. He was still in therapy but was now working out vigorously. He ached at night but he didn’t complain, he was lucky to be alive. He was self-conscious about the slight limp he walked with. The doctors told him that the next surgery would eliminate that and he’d be back to normal. Aside from the two-inch scar on the side of his head, which was now covered by the curly fro he’d grown out, he had no visible marks from the accident.

Each morning he would get up and go to therapy. After that he would go to the gym with Nate and Dee. Nate was on a mission, working out like he had never before. His regimen inspired Brendan to push himself to the brink and had been part of the reason for his speedy recovery. Dee, in the meantime, had gone back to college and was trying to regain his youthful physique for the college girls. He’d decided he wanted to be an elementary school teacher, of all things. It was a noble profession, but hard to imagine a guy with the history that he had molding young minds.

In addition to his partners working out, Brendan was getting even more inspiration from his newborn son, Khalil Brighton Shue. Trina had reluctantly given their son his last name. She had been trying to convince him to give their relationship another chance for the sake of their son.

Brendan, for his part, told her that he merely wanted to take it slow. There was so much damage to repair. Before he even wanted to tackle the idea of trying to become a family, he needed to get well physically first. In addition, he was seeing someone who had been there for him through it all. He wasn’t willing to turn his back on his blossoming relationship and blow what could possibly be the type of love that he’d always wanted by giving yet another chance to Trina’s psychotic, lying ass.

I arrived last
to Nate’s crib. When I got there I could smell the food when I hit the door. I walked in and took my shoes off as was required. “Hey, Cory,” everyone spoke.

“What’s good?”

Brendan walked in off of the balcony. “What’s up, dog?”

“I can’t call it,” I answered. “Where’s the baby?”

“Renée is in the back changing him for me.”

“So, playing Mr. Mom is rough, huh?” Just then Renée walked out of the room with a freshly changed baby. “I see you brought in some reinforcements.”

Renée handed Brendan the baby and gave me a kiss on the cheek. “Hey, love,” she said.

Nate had on an old-school mix CD playing, and currently “Joy and Pain” was bouncing through the system. I looked around the room as I found a seat and thought about how fitting the title of the song was to everyday life. We each had been through our own personal turmoil in the past couple of years. Then I wondered why it was that the
joy
that was so elusive and the
pain
so easy to find.

On a positive note I looked at Nate over there with his fiancée. Anita’s divorce wouldn’t be final for two more months but she was already wearing a five-carat diamond ring straight from Harry Winston, and had said yes to Nate’s proposal. He had flown her down to North Island in the Seychelles where he’d rented one of only eleven secluded villas. They had spent four nights in the 4,500-square-foot villa. Nate had told her that the trip was only for her to clear her mind and relax, but on the second night there, he presented the ring to her as they watched the sunset. He’d told me that the vacation was the best fifteen grand he’d ever spent. I wasn’t sure if it was because of the wedding he was now planning or all of the incredible lovemaking he’d claimed they’d done.

My life was settling into a steady pattern of woman sampling. I wasn’t ready for another relationship. At least I kept telling myself that to keep from getting bent out of shape about the poor luck I was having finding a suitable mate. I looked over at Brendan holding his son and found it hard to believe that he too seemed to be on the verge of settling down. Even if he was going to have a baby’s mama situation on his hand, he seemed content. I figured having a new lease on life will make a man put things into perspective. He had been repeating that “life was too short to be involved in a bunch of drama.”

He definitely had a point, but I was having some trouble finding out what was the point without the drama. My crew was getting boring.

“Listen up, everyone,” Nate yelled out. “I have an announcement.”

“Turn the music down,” I said. “This is gonna be good.”

His grandmother was smiling, waiting to hear her loudmouthed grandson profess his love for Anita or shower her with some other outlandish romantic gesture. Everyone else in attendance tuned in as he clanked his fork against the side of a wine bottle.

Nate made his way out to the middle of the floor and for some reason he pulled his T-shirt off. “Man, it’s hot in here,” he said.

“Come on, man, what is it? A brother is ready to sample some of that grub,” Brendan said. “What’s up, you posing for
Playgirl
again?” The room erupted into laughter.

“Not quite,” Nate said. “But I will be making a return to the public eye.”

He had us all at attention.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out his necklace with the diamond-encrusted boxing glove charm and put it around his neck. “I’m coming out of retirement. I’m going to fight again.” He was grinning from ear to ear; meanwhile everyone in attendance, except for Anita, sat there with a blank look of surprise.

“What?” I said.

“What did you say?” Brendan chimed in.

“You heard me,” Nate barked. “I’m fighting again. Don’t try to talk me out of it, I listened to your concerns before and I retired in my prime. I have my wife-to-be’s blessings and that’s all I care about.”

“C’mon, man, you haven’t fought in seven years,” Brendan said. “Who’s you gonna fight, Sugar Ray?”

“I already have a deal lined up. Two tune-ups and then Henry Scott for the light heavyweight title.”

“You got to be kidding,” I said. “Henry ‘the Horse’ Scott. Why would you want to fight him of all people? This is ridiculous, man. I mean, why would you want to fight, period, it ain’t like you need the money.”

Nate was quiet. Then he looked over at Anita. “The stock market has been a bitch. What can I say?”

I shook my head. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Nate Montgomery had been the youngest welterweight champion in boxing history at seventeen. He had skipped the Olympics and started fighting professionally in order to get an early shot at the belt. He had surprised the champ at the time, Marco Revera, with a patented overhand right. The odds in the fight had been thirty to one. Revera was 29–0 at the time. Nate was in only his tenth fight. He had gambled every bit of drug money that he’d ever made at that time and even gotten his uncle to loan him the money that he’d be earning on the fight. In all, Nate had bet close to two hundred thousand dollars on himself. He’d walked away with nearly six million dollars.

Nearly every fight the odds were against him and every fight he bet on himself. By the time he reached twenty wins, he was worth nearly twenty million dollars. He had planned to make a hundred million in the ring like his idol and fellow D.C. boxing legend, Sugar Ray Leonard, but in his twenty-first fight he had suffered a head butt that knocked him out cold. He had landed on the back of his head, bursting a vessel in his brain, nearly dying.

He recovered and saw four of the best doctors in the world; to his dismay, they all agreed. His career was over. Not one punch, but the accumulation of head trauma caused by sparring, could and most likely would prove fatal. Even with headgear it wasn’t safe for him to absorb punishment. No sparring, no boxing, it was simple as that. Or at least I guess until the money ran out.

“Man, this is crazy,” I yelled. “If it’s money you need, I got you. We can start some kind of business and we’ll be all right.”

He shook his head no. “Sorry, brother, I don’t do handouts. Besides, I can whoop this nigga. You saw his last couple of fights.”

It was true. Scott was showing signs of aging and he no longer had the same speed or power he’d shown early in his career. But against someone who hadn’t thrown a punch in the ring in seven and a half years, he didn’t seem old at all. “Yo, how much could you make off a fight with him?” Dee asked.

“Five million, maybe as much as six.”

“Yeah, but you’d have to win two fights to get to him, right?” Renée asked.

“He’ll win.” Anita said, trying to sound supportive. “He has been training like mad. Look at him.” Nate flexed and indeed he did look rock solid.

“Seriously, though, folks,” Nate stated, “I’m gonna need all of your support and no negative energy allowed. Understand, Nana and Cory?” He was looking at us.

We all debated with him for the next hour before we began reminiscing about his career. By the time we’d eaten we’d all given in and were either going to support him or keep quiet. I had resigned myself to the fact that I was going to be carrying his casket. Nate might as well have been fighting a gorilla as far as I was concerned. There was no way he would beat Scott, but you couldn’t convince him of that, so I gave up trying.

I had to
go and pick up Amani from my mother’s house. School had started and I was taking her all week. Her mother and I had worked out arrangements that suited us both. One week a month Amani would stay with me the entire week and I got another weekend. In addition, she had started taking her past my mother’s home on a regular basis. My mother was thrilled that she was given an opportunity to play catch-up and spoil her youngest grandchild. So much so that she redecorated my bedroom in the latest cartoon for girls. Every Saturday she would pick Amani up and take her to dance class.

The advantage to Shelly was that she had more free time to run back and forth to New York to see Ricky Reyes. Things seemed to be serious between them. It was no shock that she was in a hurry to get the divorce papers through and didn’t ask for a dime in child support, said she trusted that I would do the right thing.

It was a good-money bet that she and Ricky would be getting hitched or at least shacking up as soon as those papers came through. We had a court date for the week before New Year’s. For her, it would be out with the old and in with the new in more ways than one. But I wasn’t mad at her for moving on so quickly. As a matter of fact, I had to admit that the brother had some long cheddar and he was obviously feeling Shelly. He spoiled her in an almost sickening fashion. They say that diamonds are a girl’s best friend. If that’s so, then a man who owns a diamond store obviously runs a close second. Followed third by a man who will buy them.

Though I had nothing lined up as far as a relationship, I was ready to move on with my life. I was enjoying my time with my daughter and our bond was growing tighter each day. I was finding that my life did have meaning beyond a relationship or sex with a woman. Eating dinner, braiding hair, and doing homework were becoming my favorite dates and the only ones that I came to look forward to.

It was becoming obvious that life has its own way of developing you. As I drove toward my mother’s home, I thought about all that I had to go through to obtain the type of growth that I had. I’d once heard that no matter what you go through you always wind up in the same place, which was learning. I’d learned that even if I loved women, I needed to respect boundaries. A pretty face and a piece of ass are never worth causing a bunch of confusion over. I realized that, in my past, all I’d ever done was chase women based on those criteria. Married or not, sisters or not, and even with Renée, I realized that yet another line had been crossed. I shouldn’t have done it. She and Brendan were special to one another and I had violated that bond.

I was more like the old Nate than I had ever realized. The only difference was that he was who he had been by design. He always embraced being a conqueror of women. I did it without intention. And without thinking. I didn’t know which was worse.

A packed crowd
filed into the D.C. Convention Center to witness Nate’s return to boxing after a layoff of seven years. Everyone and their momma had come down to the brand-new facility to be a part of one of the top social events of the year in Chocolate City. Many of the spectators hardly remembered Nate’s previous efforts when he was at the top of his game. What they did know was that even though tonight’s battle was supposed to be the first of two tune-up bouts, he was coming back to eventually fight the Horse.

His fight was billed as the co–main event, but everyone knew that
his
definitely was the fight that everyone had come for. It was evident by the cheers of the crowd when the music came on, signaling that he was prepared to make his way to the ring. I wondered how he was feeling as he came out of the locker room and heard the roars from the crowd. The cameras were rolling, the fight was being broadcast on ESPN2, and a host of other media outlets had their people on hand to cover the event.

Nate came through the tunnel as LL blared “Mama Said Knock You Out,” wearing a pair of silver-and-red customized boxing shorts by Sean John. Brendan and Dee were in his corner working with his trainer, manager, and cut man. Nate had asked me to sit with Anita and keep her calm, which I was having trouble doing myself. I was nervous as hell for him. He had a lot to lose. The street credibility that he valued so highly, his dignity, and even his life.

Like most events held in D.C., the fight had become a fashion show. There was an ocean of Christian Dior–, Gucci-, Prada-, and Cavalli-clad women walking around the hall. The crowd was filled with the finest women in the city, most of them half-naked, trying to see and be seen. Of course, every baller and wannabe baller in town was posted up trying to see who was wearing the most expensive gear. There was a lot of standing around until the hour had come for Nate’s bout. I noticed a few local celebrities, including the mayor, who was seated five chairs to my left, next to a bunch of other local VIPs. A couple of players from the Redskins and Wizards sat ringside. Of course, some D.C. fighters had come to support Nate. Sharmaba Mitchell, Darrell Coley, Chop Chop, and “Too Sharp” Johnson were in the stands.

Suddenly the crowd came to its feet as Nate climbed into the ring.

He looked over toward me and Anita and I saw him shout, “I love you,” as loud as he could.

Anita knew what he was saying and mouthed the words back.

It took no time for the announcer to bring the other fighter to the ring. He was from Saint Louis and surprisingly garnered a loud applause from the crowd. I expected Nate’s trainer slash manager, Wally Booker, to get a fighter who didn’t look as imposing as this opponent. He was an inch taller than Nate and his muscles made him look like the Hulk or at least Hulk Hogan.

When the bell rang, my fear gave way to excitement for my friend. I didn’t care whether he won or lost the fight, I just wanted him to stay alive. After watching the first round it was evident that either Nate had truly prepared himself for the ring, or that the Hulk he was fighting was too slow to hit air.

To open the fight Nate had hit his opponent at least thirty times while getting struck no more than twice. The second round was the same as the first, only this time Nate caused the Hulk to cover himself up after being stung by a barrage of punches.

Forty seconds into the third round and the Hulk made a desperate attempt to throw a wild, lunging punch. Nate easily ducked back and was able to put his full force into a counterpunch. The right hook that Nate connected with landed flush on his opponent’s jaw. The mouthpiece flew from the Hulk’s mouth, followed by a grunt as his neck absorbed the horrible impact of Nate’s punch. Two seconds later, after the sound of the thud echoed through a silenced crowd, the referee was standing over him and counting him out.

Ozio’s Cigar Bar
on K Street had been shut down to the general public. Invitation only, or you had to know somebody, namely our crew to get into the after-party. It was a surprise for Nate to celebrate his successful return to the ring. Dee and Brendan had prepared the party. I had paid for it. Dee made sure that the place was filled with women. Brendan made sure that all of our family and close friends were there.

Nate arrived in a stretch limo. He stepped out in a white T, a pair of Evisu denims, and all-white Air Force 1s. The diamonds on his bracelet, Rolex, and chain had him looking like a rapper headed for an award show. When he entered the party all eyes were on him as he moved in search of Anita. There was an embrace between them before he began hugging and shaking hands with all of his well-wishers.

“What’s good, my niggas?” he asked as a smile slid across his face.

“Your right hook, I guess,” I laughed back.

We were a little too close to the speakers. Biz Markie was on the turntables spinning a mix of old-school hits. Nate pulled me to the side.

“So, Cory, tell me, bro. How did I look?”

I tried to keep from blowing his head up any bigger than it probably was by now. “Man, you looked sharp in there. I have to admit that you surprised me. That was a big boy that you knocked out in the ring.”

He nodded then commented, “Yeah. But that kid wasn’t all that experienced. My next fight will be more of a test. I’m gonna go against Anton Moncrief. He’s that German guy who was locked up for attempted murder. He just got out after four years. He’s 7–0 since being released. If I whoop him I get the Horse.”

“Yeah, I know about him. He stabbed an animal-control worker who tried to pick up his dog. They say that he’s a little off in the head.”

Nate shrugged his shoulders, letting me know that he wasn’t a bit worried or at least wanted me to believe that he wasn’t. Dee and Brendan walked up on us, each holding a bottle of Cristal and glasses. “Come on, take a glass,” Dee yelled.

Brendan began pouring glass after glass. Just then I noticed Renée and Anita walk up. Anita seemed to be glowing. She didn’t realize that she had done the incredible by capturing Nathan Montgomery’s heart. I was waiting to see if she could do the impossible in keeping him a one-woman man. I looked around the room as we all put our glasses in the air. I saw nothing but hungry women. Who wouldn’t want a piece of what he had to offer? Brendan summed it up with his toast, “To our friend, our brother, the once and future champ, Nathan Montgomery.”

“Here here.”

“Thanks,” Nate said. “Thanks all of you.”

The look on
his face said it all. When I reached the lobby and made my way past the doorman, Brendan was standing on the curb eyeing me. I stepped out into the light of day to face him. He’d been outside my apartment when Renée had come down twenty minutes earlier. He hadn’t said anything to her, instead he watched her stroll to her car with the look of a well-rested and satisfied sister.

“So it’s like that, huh, Cory.”

I didn’t really have a response, so I responded with a futile, “Listen, B.”

“I don’t understand you, man. How could you do that shit to me?”

My response was silence.

He went on, “We supposed to be family. How could fucking her be so important that you would throw twenty years of friendship away?”

“Man, I wasn’t trying to do that.”

“What the fuck were you trying to do? I mean come on—” He was so disgusted that he was having trouble speaking. “How long has this been going on?”

I didn’t know if he really wanted to know but I had to be man enough to give him any answers that he asked for. “Not long. It’s only happened a few times.” The truth was that Renée and I had become booty-call partners. We would hook up usually once a week, sometimes twice, if one of us went out and had drinks. On the way home, the effects of the alcohol would usually take over and the other would get a call to hook up. Understandably, I was in a holding pattern after the Shelly-Nina situation came to an end. I wasn’t ready to get into anything serious. And the truth of the matter was that Renée and I thoroughly enjoyed fucking one another.

“How long, man?”

“It didn’t happen until after you came out of the coma.”

“Man, why didn’t you tell me?”

I told him the truth. “She begged me not to. She said she didn’t want to hurt you even though you had broken her heart with the whole Laney mess.”

Brendan stood there for a moment. He had his hands in his pockets and he slowly pulled them out. He handed me the keys to my apartment. “Well, it looks like I got hurt anyway, huh?”

“C’mon, Brendan, can we go talk about it?”

“There ain’t shit to talk about. Things will never be the same between us. I love you like a brother and I always will, but I could never see us having a friendship on any level less than what I have had with you over the years. It’s no sense trying and, to be truthful, I’d rather not even have to deal with someone like you. You go your way and I’ll go mine…. Hell, at least you got a decent piece of ass out of the deal.” With that, Brendan turned and walked away.

I walked behind him and once he climbed into his car, I said, “Brendan, I’m sorry, man. Like you said, we’ve been friends too long to let something like this come between us. Besides, man, you and Tuesday are supposed to be so close. I didn’t think you would care what Renée was doing.”

He gave a slight laugh. “Bro, you are a piece of work. Yeah, I dig Tuesday…no, let me check that. I love Tuesday. She’s been there with me through all of this drama with Trina, the accident, and now the baby. She is a ride or die chick and it’s hard for me to imagine a life without her. She has earned a place in my heart for sure. But I have my doubts and lately I have been thinking about Renée, if she and I should have given it a serious try.”

“B, I had no idea—”

He cut me off. “Let me finish. Last weekend I invited her over to talk about it. I was honest with her about my feelings for Tuesday and for her. I told her I wanted to make sure that there was no unfinished business between she and I before I let go, ya’ know. She and I ended up making love and afterward she cried for an hour and kept apologizing for not being stronger.” He put his shades on. “I didn’t know exactly what she was talking about then, but now I do.”

I nodded because I felt his pain. Then I thought of Renée and how good she was at keeping secrets. I knew I was wrong but I couldn’t believe Renée had slept with him and didn’t tell me. There was truly no honor among thieves.

He went on. “It was strange that I noticed how you looked at her last night at the party, like you wanted to eat her up. But, hell, I chalked it up to her looking good and didn’t think twice about it. Then I called her all night and got no answer. I tossed and turned thinking that I might have to let Tuesday down easy after all. I came over here this morning to talk it over with you…maybe get some advice. What a fucking joke.”

“Man, I swear if I knew…I would have never—”

“The point is, you should have
never
any damned way. You got a problem, man, and this time it’s gonna cost you. Peace.”

Brendan pulled off. I was in shock. First of all, I couldn’t believe that I had gotten caught. Second, I had just lost one of my best friends. I had the worst feeling of shame as I moved toward my building. One by one I was destroying the people close to me. I thought back to Nina’s words “you’re toxic.”

I shook my head in disgust and at that moment I wished I was never born.