Don’t Ever Wonder (22 page)

It was a
cool summer night. The breeze more than likely signaled rain was on the way but I didn’t care. I was feeling good. I’d just completed my second session of counseling. It was odd but I wanted to shout to the world that I was in therapy. Leaving the doctor’s office, I tried to decide whether I would head home or out for a drink. I opted for the drink and called Brendan to see if he was going to be able to hang.

He was leaving in a few days to help Nate in his last week of training before the fight. Dee was going with them to work in Nate’s camp and said that he wanted to hang out before he rolled. We all decided to meet at the Red Tavern Grill at the Boulevard at the Cap out in Largo. Once we got there we realized that everyone must have been thinking the same thing because the spot was packed.

We positioned ourselves until we managed to get seats at the bar. “Yo, here’s to our boy. The future light heavyweight champion of the world,” Dee said as we sipped our drinks.

“No doubt,” I responded as we clanked glasses.

“So you think he’s ready?” Dee laughed out.

“We’ll soon find out,” Brendan shot back.

“On the real, I’m starting to think that he has a chance to beat this nigga,” I said. “I just wish he wasn’t doing it for money.”

“Money seems like a good-ass reason to me,” Dee commented. “I’d fight the Horse for a million. Shit, I’d have platinum chains and fronts, the whole nine.”

“You’d need more than a million just for your medical bills if you fought that nigga, Dee,” I said, laughing at the thought. “On top of that you wouldn’t have any teeth left to put platinum fronts on.”

“Speak for yourself, he’s have to catch me to hit me. And if he got off a good shot on me, it would probably be to the back of my head ’cause I’d be running the whole fight,” Dee laughed out.

Brendan was quiet and it made me curious. “What, B, you nervous or something?”

“Nah, I was just thinking ’bout something.”

“What?”

After a second he commented, “You both should know that Nate is far from broke. He ain’t fighting because he needs the money.”

I was dumbstruck. I was convinced that there could be no other reason why he would risk his life other than to protect his lifestyle. “You kidding, right?”

“Nah, I’m serious as a heart attack. I overheard him talking to his broker a few weeks back. He was talking about moving a couple million from one fund to another. When I confronted him…he admitted it. He said he told us that just so we wouldn’t question his motives for fighting. So then I asked him why he was risking everything to fight.”

“What did he say?”

“He said the reason was simple. He wanted to be champ again before it was too late. Said he didn’t want to be sitting around wishing he had done something more in the ring. He actually told me that one day while he was sitting in Charlotte he saw a special on ESPN that showed the top fifty greatest fighters in history and there were two fighters in the top fifty that he had knocked out.”

“And?”

“It pissed him off. He knew in his heart that if he hadn’t stopped fighting, he would have been listed in the top fifty. He said the next day he got up and went to the gym.”

“So he doesn’t need the money?” I said, thinking aloud.

“Nope.”

“Ain’t that some shit,” Dee said. We were all silent for a second and then Dee raised his glass. “Here’s to some Rocky Balboa–type shit. May Nate whoop his ass like Rocky did Mr. T.”

We all laughed and argued about which was the best Rocky movie, which stars were sexiest, and who we wanted to see in Vegas at the fight. It was after midnight when we paid the tab and headed out.

I paused at the door and said, “Let me hit the bathroom right quick.”

“All right, we’ll be at the door,” Dee said.

I made my way to the restroom and handled my business. I was digesting the idea that Nate had lied about his motives. I wasn’t mad at him. He was right in assuming that I would have never let up if I knew he was fighting just to take one last shot at glory. As much as I didn’t think that it was smart, I recognized that my fears were not his fears and I needed to respect how he wanted to live his life. My therapy was helping me put a lot of things in perspective. I had come to realize that while my life was affected by the actions of those around me, it was most affected by my own actions and decisions.

On the way out I was stopped in my tracks when I saw her standing a few yards in front of me, going through her purse. It was Nina. She hadn’t noticed me and I couldn’t decide if I should speak. I figured that she was more than likely waiting for her date.

Before I could say a word, the door to the ladies’ room swung open. I looked over and saw Shelly walk out and say, “Let me see your cell, baby, I have no signal in here.”

Nina instantly handed her the phone and they walked off toward a table in the back. I was stunned to see them together, but happy at the same time. There had been a tremendous amount of guilt that I had never realized was still bothering me about coming between the two of them. Suddenly it was lifted. The last thing I wanted at this point was for them to see me, but I followed them anyway. I watched them walk back to their table. Two other girls were seated with them. I was in a daze as a quick couple of minutes slid by. They were laughing and I could tell that they were engaged in heavy girl talk. They were sisters again. I turned and walked away.

“Man, I thought you fell in back there,” Dee said. “What’d you do, take a shit?”

“Hell no,” I laughed. “I saw someone I knew.”

Brendan and Dee had spots up close so I said my goodbyes and headed off across the lot to my car. “You need a lift to your car?” Brendan offered.

“Nah, I’m just over there. I’m good.”

“All right then. Peace.”

There was a reason for everything that was happening. Nate would be fine. I knew it. It would be a stressful time for all of his friends, but I decided to enjoy the ride and give him one hundred percent of my support. There was a lesson to be learned and I was more than willing to accept it, whatever it was.

I woke up
late and decided to take the day off. I wanted to do some shopping for the trip, so I showered and headed for Mazza Gallery to Saks Men and Neiman’s. I got there when they opened and headed for the elevator in the garage to get up to the main shopping area. When I got on the elevator I was shocked to see Trina with Khalil in his stroller. Trina was hugged up real tight with a brother looking really comfortable.

When she saw me her eyes got big but she spoke. “Oh, hey Cory. How you doin’?”

“I’m good,” I responded. “Look at him. He’s getting really big.”

The guy gave me a goofy grin. I was sure I shot him a weird look in response. There was no issue with her being with another man. She and Brendan were no longer together. What was odd was the way she was trying to rush and control the conversation.

“You all ready for the fight?” she asked.

“I’m getting ready for it now. Picking up a few things,” I said as the elevator hit our floor.

The door opened and she tried to escape the elevator as if I had passed gas on it. As she began to exit she said, “Good seeing you. Take care.”

“You too,” I responded and then took one last look at the baby, then at her friend. Instinctively, I said, “Oh, my bad, brother. My name is Cory, by the way. I’ve know Trina for years.”

He turned and extended his hand for a shake. “Nice to meet you. I’m Khalil.”

The Ghostbar was
pumping. Everyone was in Vegas for the fight. Half of the crowd in the club tonight was VIP. The Horse always brought out the stars to his fights. He was from Compton and his West Coast following was unreal. There were at least a hundred A-List actors and models in the party and at least twenty groupies or wannabes for each of them. I shouldn’t have had a hard time staying upbeat with all the excitement but I found myself struggling to stay in a partying mood.

My mind had been heavy for a full week. Ever since I had uncovered Trina’s dirty little secret, I had been trying to find the right time to break the news to Brendan. My answer had come to me when she had stopped at my mother’s home and left me a message to call her. When I called her she wasted no time admitting everything to me. She told me that she loved Brendan. She always had and she always would. The boldness and honesty of her words after that both shocked and repulsed me at the same time. After she finished and I had a chance to digest them, I realized that what they really did was scare me.

The discussion had been heated. “Trina, how can you say you love him? All you’ve ever done is lie and cheat on him.”

“Cory, but I do. I can’t even imagine my life without him.”

“Well, you better get used to the idea. ’Cause this time there definitely won’t be any forgiveness. As a matter of fact, you might want to get the fuck out of town. ’Cause if it was me you pulled this on, I would be ready to kill you.”

She paused. “It’s not how you think. The only reason why I was with him that day was because…”

I cut her off. “Trina, please. I’m not Brendan, so there’s no sense in you trying to feed me any of your insane bullshit. You actually named the kid after this other guy. How foul is that?”

“I only did that because I was so upset with Brendan for cheating on me. Yeah, I did fuck around on him with Khalil. But it wasn’t like I was in love with Khalil.”

“But you decided to name the kid after him? You must have been feeling him,” I snapped loudly. I was hating her at that moment.

“Khalil was out of the picture, Cory. He didn’t even find out that the baby was his until a couple of weeks ago. Did Brendan mention the incident where the baby had to get stitches?”

“Yeah, I remember him saying something about it.”

“Well, until that day it had never dawned on me that one of the parents had to have the sickle cell trait in order for Khalil to have it. Two days later I called Khalil and had the test done.”

“You ain’t shit.”

She ignored my statement and asked, “So you’re going to tell him? Or have you already?”

I sighed. “Don’t you think if I had you’d be dead by now?”

In a sarcastic tone, she spit, “You didn’t kill Shelly for keeping your baby from you and having another man raise her for five years. Neither did he for that matter. Stuff like this happens. I’m not saying it’s right.”

“Trina, for real. What’s your point? What did you want?”

“I want you to give me some time. Some time to tell him in my own way.”

I paused for a second. “Listen, let me ask you something.”

“Go ahead.”

“Why do you do this shit? Why do you fuck around on him time after time?”

She snickered a bit into the line. Not in the way that would indicate the she thought there was any humor in the situation, more like she laughed to keep from crying. Then she answered. “Cory, to be honest with you, I don’t know why. I have always been promiscuous. I love sex.”

I listened and thought about some of the things that Brendan had told me over the years about their sexual antics. She went on into a short explanation of how she came to be the slut that she was. “Cory, when I was twelve, my next-door neighbor’s son, Ralphy, was in the army. One time he came home for a month. The nigga was like twenty-one and fine as hell. All of us little girls would sit out front and dream of the day we’d kiss a boy who looked like him. One day when he was out front cutting the grass, I walked up to him and told him I wanted him to be my first. He laughed, thinking that it was a joke. When I didn’t budge, he realized that I was serious. He told me to come over the next morning after his folks left for work. I remember getting up at seven as soon as my parents left for work. I waited patiently on the steps for his parents to leave. His mother’s car was barely down the street before I was at his door. As soon as I made it inside his house he was all over me. I was scared at first, too excited to stop him. By the time he finished, my body felt strangely satisfied.” I noticed that her voice trailed off a bit but she continued, “I went back almost every day until he left to go back on duty. The truth is he turned my twelve-year-old ass out. After that it was on. I was never satisfied. I became known as the fast ass of the hood. Once my body filled out, the attention I received was overwhelming. I got used to going from one boy to the next. Most people would say that basically I became a freak or whatever, but to them I say
at least
I became one on my own terms.”

It was a tough pill to swallow, realizing that women like Trina existed. I was quiet and wondered if she was finished spilling her guts. “You have until we get back from the fight to tell him,” I said sternly.

“Cory—” she said.

I hung up.

“Yo, Cory, this
joint is off the hook,” Dee said. “I can’t believe we are doing it like this. The promoters are treating us as if
we’re
the one’s fighting. Nate is at the hotel chilling. He said he needed complete seclusion. Anita wasn’t even allowed to his room.”

We were sitting off in a so-called private lounge with everyone from Team Nate. Tuesday was up underneath Brendan, looking very much in love. It was hard to get a handle on Brendan’s feelings for her, or anyone other than Trina for that matter. He’d always worn his feelings on his sleeve when it came to her. He loved her in all her slutty glory.

Dee, meanwhile, was having the time of his life. He was Nate’s authorized, yet unauthorized, spokesperson. He had done interviews on Nate’s behalf that aired on sports shows all over the country. More than anyone, he was enjoying the limelight and the women crowding him trying to get a line on Nate.

People were popping bottles everywhere, dancing wherever they could find room. The women had on the slinkiest, albeit most expensive dresses you could imagine. It was almost like sensory overload. Because of where we were seated, people were stealing glances, trying to see if Nate was going to appear.

I saw plenty of nice-looking women but hadn’t made a move on any. I had been in a real holding pattern since starting therapy. I was embracing my solitude, getting my life quieted down. It was strange that as soon as I began doing that, all the problems that I had making decisions about my personal life were no longer an issue. The women who were chasing me became less than appealing and the quiet that entered my life in their absence was welcomed. I was just as turned off by their desperation as I was by the fact that I finally began to realize what I wanted in a woman. There was a long list of qualities that I was looking to find in one woman. I was still working on myself but I knew that ultimately I wanted a wife. It wasn’t hard for me to realize that none of them were it.

It had happened gradually, a missed or ignored call here, an unreturned e-mail there, and suddenly I wasn’t dating anyone or sleeping with anyone for the first time in years. I had a clean slate.

At three in the morning I left the party and headed for the hotel. Waiting on the corner of Flamingo Avenue for a cab, I noticed a sister heading in my direction. She was holding a pair of shoes in her hand and was walking barefoot. As she moved closer I could make out the fact that she had a dynamite shape and, even moving without shoes, she was as graceful as a runway model.

A cab pulled up and I got a glimpse of her face. She reminded me of Melinda Williams, the girl who played Bird on the Showtime series
Soul Food
. But once she was within clear sight I recognized her, though for a second her name escaped my memory.

Somehow, right on time, it came to me. “Faith,” I said.

She looked at me, puzzled. I realized then that I obviously hadn’t made the same impression on her in Chicago as she had on me. “How do you know my name?”

“I met you and your friends one night. You’re from Chicago right? I was at a bar and bought you all a drink.”

“Oh, yeah, I remember you. You were doing the robot off of the Michael Jackson music,” she laughed out.

“You want to share a cab? My treat.”

“Sure, but that really wouldn’t be sharing now, would it?” she said and then climbed in.

Once we were both in we said the same thing to the cabbie, “MGM Grand.”

We both smiled when that came out.

“So you’re a big fight fan,” she asked.

I began explaining my ties to Nate. She explained that she was a fan of the Horse but that she would be praying for my boy. She said it in a joking manner but I was hoping she was serious.

When we reached the front door of the MGM I gave the driver a twenty and hopped out. I had done well at the crap table earlier, plus I was in a great mood. “Thanks for the ride,” Faith said.

“Yeah, don’t mention it,” I said. “Hey, are you hungry?”

She looked like she was trying to figure it out. Then she looked at her watch, “It’s a little late to eat, don’t you think.”

“Let’s just call it early for breakfast,” I said. I thought about it for a second. I remembered how she had slipped away in Chicago and how it had been for the best. Now that I was well on my way to self-discovery, here she and I were, crossing paths more than half a country away from where either of us lived. “Listen, tomorrow is going to be a really busy day for me. To be totally honest with you, if I had the chance to spend some time with you, nine out of ten times I would blow off whatever for the chance. But this case is different. I’ll be ringside with my boy. My flight leaves Sunday at four, so it’s almost now or never. Please don’t make it never.”

She stared at me, peering deep into my eyes. “Brother, you are so intense.”

“Only when I’m sure about something. And believe me, it’s been a long time since I’ve been sure about anything.”

“Well, what makes you so sure about this. And what exactly are you sure about?” She adjusted the strap on her dress. It had slid down her shoulder.

“I’m sure that I want to get to know you better. I was sure when I saw you that night in Chicago that you weren’t the average girl. You had class and sex appeal. You were so confident, it blew my mind.”

She nodded her head and held her bottom lip with her teeth before she responded. “Wow” was all she said.

I reached for her hand and she gave it to me. I led her through the lobby.

I woke at
ten a.m. to a knock at the door. “Housekeeping.”

“Got-dammit,” I grumbled.

“It’s too early,” Faith said. Then she yelled loud enough for them to hear, “Come back later, please.”

We were both still in our clothes from the night before. We had fallen asleep, talking after eating steak and eggs from room service when we’d come in.

Her dress was wrinkled and her hair a little mussed but still she was still gorgeous. I scooted up against her and wrapped my arm around her. We drifted back off to sleep for another hour before my cell rang. Nate needed me, or more so wanted me. He told me that he wanted to talk to me about a few things, alone.

I didn’t want Faith to leave, so I asked her if she would come back at four to have dinner with me before the fight. I was feeling her tremendously. We had talked until almost six, and it seemed like it was only twenty minutes instead of two hours. By the time she left my room we had all but planned a trip for her to come to D.C.

My divorce had become final and I was free to pursue Faith with a clear conscience. I was honest with her about my situation, although I saw no need to go into all the details. I had learned to let some sleeping dogs lie. Although she had never been married, she had been engaged for two years. She had broken off the engagement when she realized that she was settling. Her fiancé had been a corporate lawyer and had done some modeling. He was long on money and looks, she’d said, but short on all the intangibles that she was looking for in a husband.

“Believe it or not, you asked me more of the right questions in a few hours than he did in three years,” Faith said as she embraced me before she left my room. “I really enjoyed you, Cory.”

“So, I’ll see you later?”

“For sure.”

I entered Nate’s
suite; it was as dark as a tomb. He had candles burning and the curtains closed. Dee answered the door and he was preparing to walk out past me.

“Where you headed?” I asked.

“I’m headed down to do a preliminary press spot for payper-view, then coming back to pick up his food. He has a personal chef across the street preparing some type of organic shit…don’t ask.”

Nate called out, “Cory, come on back.”

He was in the rear room of the suite soaking his feet. “What’s up?” I asked.

“Have you seen Brendan?”

“Not since last night. Why?”

“Dee said he talked to Tuesday this morning. She said Brendan got a call from Trina last night and went off. He started throwing shit around the room. Then he told Tuesday he needed some time alone. She slept in the room with Anita and this morning he hasn’t answered his door or his cell.”

I was worried, so I tried calling him. No answer. “I’m going down to his room,” I said.

“No,” Nate said emphatically. “Listen, I don’t know what he’s tripping off of because of that crazy bitch, but I can’t let that negative energy invade my circle, you feel me?”

I nodded and he went on, “I am going to need you in my corner tonight. Brendan’s head isn’t right but I can’t let that be my problem. So it’s me and you. Pops will tell you what to do. Mostly just be there for me…just like always.” He sounded nervous.

“You got it,” I said. We sat and talked about nothing in particular. I told him about Faith and how strange it was to run into her.