I questioned my language and tone as I trekked upstairs to the bedroom. It was repressed when Zoey slipped into bed shortly after, using her mouth to apologize without using words. But then the next morning when I awakened to her frantically searching for her clothes, saying she’d overslept and needed to go to the guest bedroom before JR got up, I was livid all over again. That didn’t last long because we’ve been creeping in and out of one another’s places during crazy hours since. Every time I say this is the last time, I find myself thrilled by the surreptitiousness of it all. Sneaking around was fun when in the act. However, overall, it was exhausting.
I hear a tap at the window, snapping me from my thoughts. It’s Rob, telling me the coast is clear. I’ve been sitting in the back of my truck waiting for clearance to go into the back of the second location of Zoey’s bakery. It’s bigger than the first one she opened. When I enter the door, Angela, who has an office here, waves me to the back. With flowers adorning my hands, I follow, only we don’t go into Zoey’s office. We pass right by and walk into Ang’s.
The room is quieter than the hall, but I can still hear voices in an exchange. Angela takes a seat, too casually for me. She motions for me to take one, too. Hesitantly, I follow her instructions, feeling awkward by the fact that she hasn’t spoken any words since I walked in the building. When I go ask why, Ang raises her index finger, then uses it to tap on her ear followed by pointing to the wall behind her.
Suddenly, the voices become clearer now that I can make out Zoey’s.
“Look. I’m sorry about that.”
“Sorry? Sorry, Zo? You messenger me my ring without having the balls to call since that fiasco with Stenton, busting into our hotel suite—”
“Room.” She corrects and I know the other voice is Bernard’s.
I leap from my chair and Angela follows suit to counter me with her arms stretched toward me defensively.
She mouths, “Please!”
“Room…suite…whatever!” Bernard screams like the bitch he is. “That’s the way you leave things? Do you even care about me? Did you ever love me?”
“Bernard, don’t go there,” Zoey whines. I know that whine. It’s the one before the rage. The one that signals you’re not going to win this fight. “Of course, I care about you…and love you, Bernard. We’ve known each other since junior chorus. We’re like family.”
“Family? You get engaged to family?”
“That was a mistake and you know it, Bernard. You know you were no more prepared for what we were going to do than I was. Marriage for us would have been the biggest mistake of our lives.”
“And that’s not what you’re going to do with Stenton Rogers? Is he finally offering you what you deserve?”
That motherfuck—
“Let’s just talk about us, Bernard. I’m sorry I haven’t made the time to properly end things between us. Yes, sending the ring back to you instead of bringing it myself was a wimp’s move, but I didn’t want to keep something as important as your engagement ring. It belongs to you.”
“And now you belong to Stenton Rogers.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means he goes all barbaric, saying he wants you back and you ran right into his arms. That doesn’t sound like the Zoey I know. You don’t just jump when a man asks you to do something—”
“Maybe it took the right man.”
Things go silent. Angela rolls her neck then throws punches into the air.
“I’m sorry. That was mean. I just don’t like being goaded. You should know that.” More silence. “Look, Bernard, I don’t know where things are going with Stenton and me. I just know the man brings out things in me that no one ever has. He excites me in a way that’s indescribable. Jordan can perhaps have a real…nuclear family like I’ve always had.”
“So you are marrying him.”
Fucking prick.
“Yes. No…I don’t know. We’re just…together.”
And there’s that fucking term again. The one she and I are struggling to define. I have one meaning, she has…none.
Things go quiet again.
“I’m sorry for the messiness in all of this, Bernard.”