Layover (14 page)

“So you’re saying Allen didn’t really hit Lisa?”

“No, he really slapped her ass! I’m just saying that you need to decide how you feel about Allen, knowing that fact. You can’t decide how you feel about him based on how that act is perceived by others. Yeh, he hit his wife, but does that make him a wife-beater? That’s for you to determine.”

“Denise, you don’t think he would tell anyone else about what happened last night, do you?”

“No, Allen wouldn’t do that. He didn’t really want to tell me - and he tells me everything. I kind of dragged it out of him. I knew something was eating away at him and I made him tell me what it was.”

“Good. I don’t want anyone to be hurt by that.”

“Ny, let me tell you one more thing. I love both of my brothers. So, whatever you do, maintain your integrity in all of this. Do right by them both. If you want Allen, you need to deal straight with Kenny. Don’t lead him on and drag this thing out.”

As we pulled up to the house she left me with one prevailing thought.

“You’ve got some choices to make and you have to make them soon”.

We got out of the car and went into the house.

When I walked in the door, the first face I saw was Allen’s. I quickly turned my head and walked to my room. I wasn’t ready to face him - literally or otherwise. I had just been devastated by what Denise had told me. There were a lot of things about Allen that were starting to appear and concern me about him. Just as heavy on my mind was this situation with Akina. I wouldn’t care so much if this was really his child, but I don’t understand how she can be so sure it’s his and he’s so sure it’s not. I could deal with a little baby mama drama in my life, but he had to first acknowledge that it’s his baby - assuming it is. I didn’t really feel like thinking about this right now. I just wanted to go to sleep. I laid down across the bed and dozed off. I’m not sure how long I was sleep, but I was awakened by a disturbing dream. I was deep in a beautiful blue ocean, but I was drowning. There were all kinds of tropical fish around me. I got up and went into the living room, my heart still beating very fast. I must have looked rattled because everyone looked at me strangely. I proceeded to tell them about my dream. When I was finished, everyone sat quietly without a word. Then my mother-in-law announces:

“That means somebody is pregnant.”

“Not me,” I assured her.

“No, it doesn’t have to be you. I could be anybody, but a fish dream means somebody is pregnant.”

Everyone looked at Denise.

“Don’t even think about it,” she insisted, “If I remember anything from health class, it’s that you must have sex to become pregnant. That excludes me.”

It was a silly old wives tale, but Black folks believe very strongly in the fish dream. However, I didn’t lend a whole lot of weight to it. Hell, maybe I just wanted some fish!

Next, everyone’s head turned to Lisa.

“Well,” she said shyly, “We had been trying but we stopped some time ago.”

They had been trying? What the fuck does that mean? Allen is trip! I guess he conveniently forgot the mention that to me. I just wanted to run away. The more I stayed around this house, the more crap I find out about Allen. Maybe Lisa is pregnant. I almost wish she was so I wouldn’t have to make a decision about Allen. If she’s pregnant, he will just stay with her on default.

I excused myself and went to lay back down. I was tired and I needed to rest. I couldn’t really sleep though. I was half sleep but I could still hear people talking and noise throughout the house. I was in a lucid state of dreaming and couldn’t really distinguish between what was in my dreams and what was happening in the house. Still, I had to rest. I had been up most of last night and my body was trying to shut down on me.

I woke up about an hour later and walked into the living room. Everyone was gone. It was very unusual. In fact, the whole time I’ve been married to Kenny and coming here to visit, I have never seen this house empty. There is always
someone
here. But this time there wasn’t. I laid down on the couch and turned on the television. It was late afternoon and I was struggling to find something at least halfway decent to watch. I tried to think of where everyone could have gone. Tomorrow was Kenny’s birthday and Thanksgiving would be in a few more days. Maybe they went grocery shopping or something. I started thinking about Allen and all the things that had come out since we had been here in Mississippi. When we were in Colorado, everything was so perfect. It was like a fantasy. Now we get to his hometown and all the dirty laundry comes out. I couldn’t help but think about Akina and wonder what his relationship was like with her. As the story goes, he was very much in love with her. I imagine she was probably very beautiful back in the day but when I saw her she looked tired and aged. You could see traces of beauty trying to peer out from behind those tired, baggy eyes. The creases in the forehead were starting to show and the subtle lines around the mouth were certainly manifest. Not to mention she was grossly overweight for her height. Her hair was cut short and simple. I don’t imagine there is much time or money to get your hair done when you have all those children. Even with all that, I wonder if Allen wouldn’t start reminiscing about their relationship if he saw her again. After all, love is blind. If he really loved her, he wouldn’t care how she looked. He’s not like Kenny. Kenny is all about the show: Light skin, long hair, size 2! Allen is deeper than that. I mean, I know he likes attractive people too, but he has the ability to see beyond the physical - Kenny does not. I know one thing, she probably would love to get her little chunky hands on Allen again. I guess she sees that the grass is a lot browner on her side of the fence and now she wants to come back to the green pastures. I wondered if there were any old pictures of her and Allen in the house anywhere.

I really didn’t know where everyone was or how long they would be gone but I really wanted to look for old photos. I knew the family albums were in the library off of the family room, but there were so many of them from so many years, it could take hours just to find what I was looking for. I decided that I had to know. I went into the library and began to search for the books I was looking for. I skipped over the ones that were dusty an obviously too old to contain any pictures of Allen and Akina. I still, however, had to look through dozens more before I got to the teenage years of the children. I wasn’t surprised to find numerous pictures of Kenny with different girls. He must have attended about 30 proms, dances, and balls in his 4 years in high school. There were a lot of girls in Kenny’s past. I wasn’t surprised to not find any pictures of Denise with any boys. She was man hater as far back as anyone could remember. I looked through pages and pages of pictures until I finally came to one of Allen. I could hardly believe what I was looking at. The girl on the picture resembled me so much that it was frightening. It was like I was looking in a mirror. It was definitely Akina. She was absolutely stunning on the picture. I couldn’t believe it was the same girl who came over the other day and made me curse her out. I sat there staring at the picture, as if it were going to tell me a story. I continued to flip through the pages and there were more pictures of them - lots more. They must have been so in love. I could just imagine them in high school. I bet they were that couple that everyone thought was going to get married. They probably walked the halls wearing sweat shirts with each other’s names on the back. I hated her. I hated her for having Allen. I hated her for something that I had no control over. I couldn’t help but think that it was such a waste of love! I was sitting there in shock. I must have been pretty mesmerized, because I didn’t even hear the front door open. Before I knew what was going on, Allen was standing in the doorway looking down at me sitting on the floor with a mess of photo albums scattered around me. I must have looked like a kid who got into the baby powder and sprinkled it everywhere.

“What are you doing?” He asked.

“Just looking at the family pictures.”

“More specifically...”

“I just wanted to see what she used to look like.”

“You wanted to see if she was prettier than you?”

“Something like that.”

“Nya, no one is prettier than you. But don’t you get it? That’s not what makes you so attractive. What makes you attractive is your confidence and your determination. The fact that you sling hair all over the place is just gravy!”

“Thank you. But I’m not worried about her being prettier than me. I’m worried about you loving her more than me.”

“That ship has sailed.”

“Allen, I heard something today that really disturbed me. I hate to put other people in a bad position, but Denise told me something that really concerned me.”

“Ny, I already know what you are going to say. Listen, if you want to know anything about me, you need to ask me - stop listening to other people.”

“That’s what I’m doing now,” I told him.

I looked up at him to confront him about hitting Lisa, but all I could do was stare into his warm brown eyes. I wanted him so badly. All I could think about was how he fucked me so well the night before. I wasn’t ready to ask him about Lisa. I needed to get away from him before I did something I would surely regret.

“Where is everyone?” I asked, trying to change the subject.

“They drove to Aberdeen to see Chucky and Lilly.”

“That’s more than an hour’s drive, isn’t it?”

“It depends on who’s driving. Why do you ask?”

“I just wanted to know.”

“Well, if you want to kiss me, go ahead. No one will be here for a while,” He joked.

“I wouldn’t kiss you if..,” I started.

“If what?” He asked defensively.

“Nothing.”

“Nya, why didn’t you sleep with me when you were in Denver? I know you wanted to.”

“Whatever! You don’t know anything.”

“You didn’t want me to think you were easy? Is that it?”

“I didn’t sleep with you because I’m married. And besides, I didn’t want to.”

“Liar. You know you wanted it. Just like you wanted it last night. Just like you want it right now. That’s why you wanted to know when everyone would be home.”

“You are so stupid! I don’t want to sleep with you. You just made all that up in your head because you can’t stand to be around me for one minute without your little ding-a-ling getting stiff! Grow up and get a life!”

I started walking toward my room.

“Nya wait. I’m sorry.”

“Allen, you need some serious help. What has gotten into you?”

“You. You are what’s gotten into me. I haven’t been able to think straight since you left Denver. Ny, I’m in love with you and not having you is killing me. It’s causing me to act very stupid and make bad decisions. You’ve got to believe me, I don’t act like this. I’m not like...”

“Like who? Like Kenny? Is that what you were going to say? Well, at least Kenny doesn’t hit his wife.”

“Neither do I.”

“Don’t lie, Allen. Denise told me you hit Lisa.”

“I didn’t hit Lisa. I slapped her.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize there was a difference,” I said sarcastically.

“Well, there is. Lisa was hysterical. I was trying to calm her down.”

“Calm her down from what?”

“I’m not ready to talk about that right now, but believe me when I tell you that I was trying to help her. I would never hit my wife in anger. Nya, you’ve got to believe me. I don’t know what kind of person you think I am, but I wasn’t brought up that way. There is nothing Lisa could do to make me hit her in anger.”

“Then why would she want to leave you? If you didn’t beat her, why would she want a divorce?”

“Nya, I can see you have your facts all mixed up. You assumed that Lisa wanted to leave me because I hit her and that is not true. Look, there’s a lot that I’m not ready to talk about with you right now, only because it’s not fair to Lisa. As I told you before, Lisa wanted to leave not because of me, but because of her. It was something
she
wanted. When it’s the right time, I will tell you everything. But now is not the right time. If you want to be with me, you need to make decisions for yourself and stop relying on information you get second hand. I would never do anything to hurt you, Ny. I only want to love you. I would treat you well and give you everything your heart desired and I would never do anything to lose your trust or respect. Now, do you believe me? Ny, are you ready for that kind of life?”      

“I’m ready. Where do I sign up?” I joked.

“Seriously, Ny, the first thing we need to do is tell Kenny and Lisa how we feel. It’s time to tell everyone that we want to be together. I can’t wait much longer. I have to have you, in every way. I want your mind, heart, body, soul, and spirit. I want it all. I want us to share a life together. I want that life to start right now. This is the last holiday I want to spend at this house with Lisa. The next time I come here, I want it to be with you. Are you ready to take that step? Are you able to let go of Kenny. Are you ready to be Mrs. Reilly?”

“I am Mrs. Reilly,” I reminded him.

“Are you ready to be the
real
Mrs. Reilly? Mrs. Allen Reilly?”

“As long as I don’t have to change my name,” I insisted.

“You’re crazy. Do you realize that?” He joked.