When All Hell Breaks Loose (5 page)

“Oh really?” I say. “So she was a support system for you during troubled times, huh?”

“Something like that. We all get a little confused sometimes, and Adrian was there during my confused time in life. She was able to make me see things for what they are rather than what we want them to be. My boyfriend had just dumped me and left me scared and pregnant. I didn’t know what to do. You know what I mean?”

I think about my family situation. “I know exactly what you mean. Adrian has been there for me in good times and bad, too. She makes me think about other things instead of the things that hurt.”

LaShawn looks at me as if she wasn’t expecting that answer. She straightens her skirt and fixes her collar. “Well … I just wanted to say thanks.” She smiles and walks out of the office quickly.

I sit semi-stunned for a brief moment, but I figure LaShawn felt uncomfortable when I mentioned my personal situation. I guess she didn’t want me to get personal with her and I hope this doesn’t change our boss-employee relationship.

I briefly entertain the thought of LaShawn having a private crush on me. I’m not saying that I’m all that, but let’s face it, I got the job, the money, and the looks. Who wouldn’t fall in lust or love with a five nine, proportioned, brown-skinned brother with dark eyes, an award-winning smile, and hands that love to touch bare skin? I like kissing and nibbling, too. Women always compliment me on my full lips, my well-manicured light mustache, and my smile. I am in the perfect position to cater to a well-deserving woman, and any woman in her right mind would be happy with me … as long as she’s in her right mind.

LaShawn is young, but she’s going to make some brother real happy one day—that is, if she doesn’t go through any more heartbreaks or heartaches.

A woman can become hardened after too many damaged and failed relationships. “Faithless” is the word I prefer to use. They quit going out to socialize; they gain weight and start hanging with gay men, and when they’re out and about running errands, they’ll have on house shoes, with big pink rollers in their hair, and they’ll be in sweats. Not the sweats that you go shopping in, either. I’m talking about some sweats they wore in college that are now two sizes too small with a few holes in them. Then, the one time you do see a bitter sister looking good, she’s got this look on her face that says,
Don’t even try it!
I don’t know, maybe I’ve come across too many bitter women in my lifetime. My point is, young, hopeful, smart girls like LaShawn Denton should never have to face that reality.

Women should know by now that they have to be responsible for themselves. Brothers out here ain’t tryin’ to act right. And the few who are find themselves constantly being tempted by women I refer
to as bitter women who want revenge. These sisters are angry because their man left them for somebody else, so they go out to take someone else’s man. Black women can be a trip.

I can’t believe Terry McMillan had the audacity to write
Waiting to Exhale
, as if she needs to male-bash with all the loot she has! If the women who read that book were smart, they would have protested her, because she made them all look desperate and conniving. I only read the book after walking into Adrian’s salon one day and the customers were gossiping and carrying on about how good the movie was. They all looked up at me with those real beady eyes as if I had left each and every one of them in a bad situation. Mad at the world, and for what? Because Ms. McMillan had put it in writing
and in their heads
that the brothers are the problem.

If you ask me, the
only
problem is that black women haven’t taken it upon themselves to handle up on their personal business when they get involved in a relationship. They are the ones who need to provide the condoms, make a non-car-having brother walk or take the bus, take back their apartment keys, stop waiting for the phone to ring, and get off their knees praying for a man. The average brother only has two things on his mind: making money and getting laid. I’m not an average brother; this is why I can say the truth and not be ashamed.

Last note, sisters need to learn how to breathe, too. Because, like my man LL Cool J said, “Waiting to exhale collapses lungs.” That statement was funny when I first heard it, but it’s true. Besides,
Waiting to Exhale
wasn’t nothing compared to
Disappearing Acts
. Now,
that’s
the book that should have been put on the big screen. The way Franklin pooped over Zora is what should’ve had sisters fuming like scarred dragons. Better yet, the way Zora let herself be pooped on! I don’t know how I got on this trip about the sisters, but I got mine and I will do whatever it takes to keep her, because Adrian is a good woman, I’m a good man, and we go good together. This evening at the gym, I will tell the fellas about my engagement. I can’t wait to hear what they have to say. I’m already expecting at least one of them to be disappointed; the question is, Who?

B
y the time I get over to the gym after work, Tim, Eric, Jamal, and Phillip are already there. We all work at Data Tech together, except for Jamal. He’s self-employed and works from home.

The guys are sitting together in the bleachers while the referees get the gym set up for the game. We’re all about the same height except for Phil, who is about five six and the color of manila paper. He’s stocky and has calf muscles that look too big for his legs.

Phil went to Jarvis Christian College—a small black college in East Texas. Back in the day, Jarvis was known as Jarvis “Crooked” College because many of its students never matured to the collegiate thinking level and on any given night you could travel down there and catch a good game of dominoes, spades, or dice, and even football and basketball pots went around for the big gamblers. The students were rowdy and full of party back then, and I hear things haven’t changed much. Sometimes you can’t tell Phil has been a part of the higher education system by the way he talks and acts.

Jamal doesn’t have a degree, but he’s the exact opposite of Phil.
Well read and highly intellectual, Jamal knows more than most of us about general subjects. He went to trade school and got certified in graphic art. He can talk all day about the history of African life in America, the slave trade, how the human brain works, and even the mating habits of the South American june bug. He reads anything and everything he gets his hands on. Jamal is a friend of mine from high school and part of the crew.

A little Asian woman is walking around with a clipboard. She looks like she’s getting everyone’s names and phone numbers. I stroll over to the bleachers where the guys are and take a seat next to Eric.

“Greg, what’s up, man?” Eric says. He flips his blond hair away from his temples.

“E, how ya doin’?” I spread dap to Eric.

“There he is! The last of the great bachelors. Congratulations, brother,” Jamal says. We lock hands and grip. He has his shoulder-length dreadlocks pulled back in a rubber band and has on an old faded shirt that reads,
I SURVIVED THE MILLION MAN MARCH
. I dap him. “Another good brother is about to help this old world out,” he says to me.

“Thanks, man. You-all are going to be my groomsmen, right?”

“As long as the woman you couple me with is single and has a big booty,” Phil responds. “It’s bad enough you gettin’ married, but please don’t couple me with no ugly-ass female.”

“Forget Phil, Greg. We got your back, man,” Eric huffed.

Jamal and Tim nod and voice their agreement.

I pull out my sweat towel and a water bottle, not worried about Phil anyway. He’s the youngest of all of us and the one with the most lessons to learn. Eric pats me on the back. He’s the only white guy in my clique. Actually, he’s cool to be as white as he is. Eric has blond hair and grayish-green eyes that seem to turn every time he blinks. He graduated from Baylor, one of the biggest and whitest schools in Texas. But when you see his mannerisms along with the way he walks and talks, you’d think he’s a brother straight from the ’hood somewhere.

“Finally making the big step, I see,” he says. “Life gets pretty solid from here, you know.”

“Yeah, can’t wade in the water forever,” I respond.

“Whatever!” Tim yells loudly. He’s bouncing a basketball and doing rotating drills between his legs. “I’m going to wade in the water a long time. Too many fish in the sea to be on lockdown with one big trout.”

“Tim, when did you ever have a reason to stop being a player?” Phillip asked. “All the women you date are just as selfish and lonely as you are.”

Eric points to Tim. “I think you should turn in your Players’ Club card. It’s about time you found a woman who’s going to be around a while.”

Jamal laughed. “Ain’t no woman alive who’ll put up with Tim’s shit for a lifetime.”

Tim picked up the ball and looked at us sitting on the bleachers. “Man, I was born a player and I’m gonna die a player. If it wasn’t for men like me, half of y’all wouldn’t have a reason to be good men, but I makes ’em and breaks ’em before they break me.”

We all laugh as Tim shoots and misses the basket.

Jamal taps me. “So how did you come to this conclusion?”

“Adrian is my girl and I love her. I figured three years was more than enough time. She’s good to me and she’s never given me any reason to doubt her love for me.”

“That’s cool, man. I hope you two have a long, successful life together.” Jamal ties his shoes, then leans back on the bleachers.

Eric runs over and starts guarding Tim. They get caught up in a playful game of one on one, leaving me, Jamal, and Phil sitting together.

“Greg man, I don’t understand you,” Phil says. “You have the finest woman I’ve ever seen, and you’re going to ruin that by marrying her. I mean, don’t you still want to ride that ass when you want to and send her home when you don’t feel like being bothered?”

Jamal looks at Phil. “Man, what kind of question is that?”

“J, man, I’m just keeping it real. When Greg marries Adrian, she’s going to change. All women do. By the way, Greg, does Adrian cook?”

“Yeah, she cooks. Why do you want to know?”

“Shit, if a man is going to marry a woman, the bitch needs to know how to cook.”

“Phil, why is every woman a bitch to you?” I ask, disgusted. “Don’t you know that term is played out?”

“It’s just a figure of speech. Don’t get all bent out of shape. Just because I have a degree don’t mean I have sold out to being true to the game. I didn’t come from humble surroundings like some of us in here.” Phil sends his words out toward the court.

“I know you ain’t talking about me!” Tim yells. “Women can still be bitches in my book. I just choose not to use the term too loosely. Y’all remember Ronnie Banks, right?”

Some of us shake our heads, recalling the Italian model Tim flaunted around us for three weeks before breaking it off with her. If my memory serves me correctly, she used his credit card to buy a plane ticket for some guy she swore was her manager. Tim cut her loose immediately after that.

“Ronnie used to let me call her my bitch. She loved it but only allowed me to call her that in private. She even called herself a bitch.”

I laugh at Tim’s remark before getting back to Phil. “Phil, your degree is not a symbol of selling out, but rather a symbol of better positioning. All I’m trying to say is, stop referring to women as bitches.”

“Brother, sisters are too precious to be called bitches. Is your mother or sister worthy of such a title?”

I can tell that Jamal is about to start preaching his pro-black talk. He’s the only brother I know who can talk endlessly, all day long, about male and female relationships, but prefers to be single. On average, Jamal dates one woman every four or five months. One day he told us his philosophy on dating was simple: “If you don’t waste a woman’s time, then your time won’t be wasted.” I think this brother has been through a lot of emotional struggles and is just using that as a very lame excuse. But I have to hand it to him, he definitely knows how to treat a woman. He’s always approached by the finest sisters when we go out, and women from his past still hound him.

“The black woman is to be put on a pedestal and not lusted for or prematurely desired. Calling her a bitch is causing within yourself psychological warfare, Phil.”

Phil gets up and walks away. “Fuck that Malcolm shit, J, these bitches ain’t worth it. These tired-ass women always talking about what can I do for them. Shit, I ain’t got time for that. When is a bitch gonna do for me?”

Eric fakes around Tim and shoots. The ball falls gracefully into the net. He throws his hands up and looks at Phil. “You’ll get someone to do for you when you grow about five inches.”

I can’t help but laugh, and Jamal joins me. We all tease Phil about his height, but it never seems to bother him.

“Man, that brother has some critical issues,” I say, referring to Phil.

“I feel you,” Jamal responds. “I hope you and Adrian plant some beautiful seeds and keep our people going. “We need to create a strong generation of brothers and sisters.”

“Now you sound like my old man.”

“It’s important, man. Young black couples today will spend their life earnings on a wedding and then turn around and say they can’t afford children. It’s selfish and unfair to the unborn spirits.”

“The economy is bad.”

“Forget the economy. The economy ain’t never stopped them from showing us shit like
The Brady Bunch
. Had us believing you could support that many kids and still manage to vacation every year and wear nice clothes at a time when our country was at war. Surely, you don’t believe that ‘economy is bad’ shit, brother.” He leaned back. “When I find my queen, we’re having a whole tribe like our grandparents used to swing it back in the day. My grandmother had nine, her sister had thirteen, my mother’s sister even has ten. I think it’s cool to have your own village like that.”

“Where do you plan on finding a woman who’s going to have that many kids in this day and time?”

“They’re everywhere. But I want a natural sister. She has to eat right, be spiritually in tune, be humble, and be ‘dechemicalized.’ ”