Dating Games Page 11

Livvy grabbed her purse and keys and was walking to the door when the phone rang. She looked back, the open door in her hand, and thought of not answering it, knowing that it was for one of the girls, most likely Ally. But she let the door fall closed and went to pick it up anyway.

  “Hello,” she said.

  “Hey, baby. I’m coming over to see you tonight, so look good for me, okay.”

  It was Carlos, and something in Livvy was both delighted to hear his voice and furious. She didn’t speak for a moment, telling herself to be strong, because even though she was angry at him for not returning any of her last four phone calls, she still wanted to see him. She could feel her body preparing itself for him at that moment. She shook free of the lustful lock her body temporarily had on her, and said, “Don’t bother, because I won’t be here.”

  “What do you mean? Where you goin’?”

  “Out, Carlos.”

  “But I want to see you.”

  “How about the four times I called you, wanting to see you? Didn’t make a difference then. But now that you want to see me, I should jump at the chance, right?” Livvy said, her voice firm.

  “Baby, I’ve been busy with the business and all. You know how that keeps me tied up. But the first chance I got to get away, which is now, I called you. C’mon, cancel whatever little plans you got tonight. I’ll swing by, and we can do what we were supposed to do last time. Night on the town, baby. Best restaurant. Drinks after that, then you and me. What do you say?” His voice sounded as sweet and convincing as ever. As he spoke, the events of his planned night with Livvy unfolded in her mind, and for a brief moment, she wondered just how mad Wade would be if she called him and canceled. Then she caught herself. She was falling back into the same trap that she had a thousand times in the past, and although it felt like the hardest thing she had ever done, she said, “No, Carlos. I won’t cancel my little plans. I’m going out, so I’ll talk to you later.”

  She hung up the phone and felt powerful. She wasn’t sure, but she thought she might just finally be able to get rid of this man.

  That night, Wade was a total gentleman. Each time she got in and out of his beautiful car, he opened the door for her and closed it behind her.

  “Is everything okay? You all right?” he seemed to ask her a thousand times that night, and she never tired of it.

  The restaurant was at the top of the John Hancock Building, ninety something floors up in the sky, and Livvy could see all of Chicago spread out before her. She looked out at the millions of lights sparkling like diamonds cast on the city’s streets. It was breathtaking. The live jazz trio played soft music as Livvy and Wade toasted their new friendship.

  Afterward, they went to a small hole-in-the-wall blues spot Wade said he frequented every now and then. The music was so loud that Livvy could barely hear a word he said when he tried to speak to her. He had to yell in her ear when he asked, “You having a good time?”

  “I’m having a great time!” she yelled back, and it was the truth. The place was packed with people drinking, laughing, and clapping to the music that the band of old, suited black men played. The large black woman who sang was covered with sweat, and there was so much emotion in her voice, in the words, in her movement, that Livvy had to stop herself from crying right there. It was like sensory overload. She was having such a wonderful time that she had forgotten about all that had happened earlier today, about her financial situation, and about how Carlos had mistreated her for all those years. Livvy just gave herself over to this place, to this woman singing about how her man had mistreated her, and how “finally she was able to see the light, see what was right, and in his shadow she would no longer dwell, but tell him to kiss her ass, and go to hell.”

  Livvy laughed out loud and wiped tears from her eyes at the same time, and feeling Wade next to her, she turned to him, threw her arm around his neck, pulled him in, and gave him a big kiss on the cheek.

  That was an hour ago, and now, strolling down Columbus Drive, pulling off her sweater, Livvy glanced over at Buckingham Fountain and saw the color of the lights changing under the water that sprayed up some thirty feet into the air.

  Wade spread the blanket he had pulled from his car out on the grass facing the calm waters of the lakefront. There they sat, Livvy staring out at the water that seemed to go on forever and Wade lying on his side, curled around her.

  “What’s on your mind? You’ve been quiet,” Wade asked.

  Livvy came out of her trance, and apologized. “It’s just that I’ve had such a wonderful time tonight—I mean, I’m having such a wonderful time. I don’t think I’ve ever had this much fun,” she admitted.

  “That’s really nice of you to say,” Wade smiled.

  “No, I mean it.” Livvy turned to him, a serious expression on her face. “There’s like an entire world out there that’s going on, where people have fun, and don’t worry about …” she cut herself off, about to talk about her desperate financial situation. “… where they don’t worry about anything. They just enjoy life, enjoy their work, enjoy everything they do.” Livvy lowered her head. “It’s just not that way for me.”

  Wade didn’t say anything to her at first, just gazed at her, again noticing how beautiful she was. Then he said, “Well, change it.”

  Livvy looked up at him and laughed sweetly. “It’s not that simple.”

  “And why not? Why not? What’s the biggest thing that’s bothering you now?”

  “I guess what I do for a living, being a nurse’s assistant,” Livvy said, a tinge of shame in her voice.

  “And what do you want to do?”

  “I want to be a nurse,” she said, brightening some.

  “Then go for it. Just like that.”

  “Well, there is this essay contest that I’m going to enter. And if I win, I get a full scholarship to nursing school.”

  “Now see, there you go.” Wade gave Livvy’s shoulder a confident squeeze. “That’s a start. But what if you don’t win, Livvy?”

  Livvy looked taken aback, overwhelmed. “I don’t know.”

  “Why don’t you? Just because you don’t win the scholarship, does your dream to be a nurse change?”

  “No,” she said.

  “Then why should your plans? You want to be a nurse, then you plan to go to nursing school. You get the free ride, great. But if you don’t, then you go anyway.”

  Livvy never thought about that, never really thought it was possible, and actually still didn’t think it was. “But how can I afford …”

  “Livvy, there are grants and loans all over the place for people like you who want to go back to school.”

  “But my daughters—”

  “Your daughters are grown women. You said they’ll be eighteen any month now,” Wade said, resting a reassuring hand on top of her hand. “You’ve sacrificed and raised your children. You’ve given to them, and now is the time to give something back to yourself. I don’t know exactly what that’s going to take, but you find out, and you make it work. Okay?”

  “Okay,” Livvy said, feeling as though she had a new outlook on life.

  THE SHINY Lincoln Town Car pulled up in front of Livvy’s building and parked for a moment.

  “I hope you had an okay time,” Wade said.

  “Don’t act like you don’t know,” Livvy said, taking his hand. “I already told you I think I had the best time of my life.”

  “Oh, yeah, you did say that, didn’t you?” Wade smiled, leaning in closer toward her.

  “Yeah, I did,” Livvy said, doing the same, their lips almost touching. “I want to thank you for everything tonight. All you’ve done and all you’ve said. You’ve given me so much to think about.”

  “And, I hope, so much to do.”

  “Yeah, that too,” Livvy said, leaning in to kiss him. They kissed for only a moment, his kiss, soft, sweet, and lingering. Then he gently pulled away.

  “I really hope I’ll be seeing you again, Miss Livvy.”

  “You can count
on it, Mister Wade.” And with that, Livvy backed out of the car, closed the door, and waved as he pulled away. She was absolutely bubbling inside, and she wished the girls had been looking down from their window to see Livvy getting out that man’s car. She had wished they had been around to see how their mother was getting treated all night long.

  When Livvy walked into her apartment, the girls were still up watching MTV. Livvy closed the door behind her. Henny looked up, and said, “Mama, you look happy.”

  “I am happy, baby.” Livvy walked over to the sofa and sat down on the edge of it, next to Henny.

  “You had a good night?”

  “Oh, wonderful night.”

  “What did you do?” Henny said, excitedly. Ally just laid across the love seat, looking very uninterested, flipping channels.

  “We did everything. Had dinner at the John Hancock Building, heard some blues, went to the lakefront. He’s such a wonderful man.”

  “Well, who is he, Mama? Tell me,” Henny practically bounced up and down on the sofa.

  “No, not yet. You’ll get to meet him. You’ll both get to meet him.”

  “So he took you out, hunh, Mama,” Ally said, still flipping through the channels, not looking at her mother.

  “That’s right, he did.”

  Ally turned to look at Livvy. “So what did he want from you?”

  “What do you mean, what did he want from me?”

  “You know what I mean. When Carlos takes you out, he always want something. More times than not, you always give it to him, even if he don’t take you out.”

  “Ally, you need to shut up,” Henny said.

  “I don’t need to do nothin’.”

  Livvy did everything within her power to keep from pulling herself from that sofa, walking across that room, and smacking the taste out of her daughter’s mouth. She swallowed hard, the anger going down with it, and then she calmly said, “He didn’t ask for anything. He just took me out to have a good time. He’s not like Carlos. And you might as well forget Carlos’s name because I have. This new man is special, and I think this might be the beginning of something good.”

  “That’s wonderful, Mama,” Henny said, smoothing a hand across her mother’s back.

  “Well, before you go forgettin’ Carlos’s name, he called twice tonight,” Ally said, spite in her voice.

  LIVVY didn’t know what was wrong with Alizé or her relationship with her. She acted as though she wanted Livvy to get rid of Carlos, and she knew how much Livvy desperately wanted to. So why did she scoff at the possibility of Livvy’s finding someone new, someone nice? And why did she go and tell Livvy that Carlos had called? She had to have known Livvy was weak. Ally wasn’t a child, and Livvy knew she had been around men, knew she knew the effect they could have on a woman, the effect that Carlos had on her. She knew that it would take a willpower that Livvy didn’t possess to stop herself from calling him back. She knew that even though Livvy had had a wonderful time with Wade, it wasn’t so easy to erase Carlos from her life.

  Livvy knew that it would be wrong to call him back, knew that he would want to come over there and slide up in her, use her body ’til he was satisfied, and then leave. But the thought of even just that was too much for her.

  NOW THAT Carlos was lowering his body onto hers, spreading her legs, and entering her, she knew that she was wrong to have called him back, but she was so glad that she had.

  SEVENTEEN

  TONIGHT WAS Ally’s date with the so-called bailer she had called back, and she was thankful. She should never have given that fool Rafe the time of day. Knowing he didn’t have any money should’ve alerted her to the fact that he didn’t have no sense either.

  “Motherfucker turning me down, like I’m just any ole piece of ass, Ally complained to her girls, Sasha, JJ, and Lisa.

  “Maybe you are just any ole piece of ass, and don’t know it yet,” JJ said, sticking a barbecue sauce-covered fry in her mouth. They were all at Lenny’s B-B-Q, carry-out, picking over rib tips and sipping pops.

  “He was broke as hell, and I should’ve known better,” Ally said, pacing about in front of the girls.

  “Damn, Ally, this is really bothering you, ain’t it, girl?” Sasha said. “Just relax. Ain’t no big deal.”

  “It’s like lack of money is the same as lack of oxygen for these fools. It causes brain damage.” Ally spun a finger at the side of her head. “I can’t believe he played me. And for my nerd-ass sister at that.”

  “Henny’s cool,” Sasha said. “Why can’t she have a man feel her too?”

  “Because she got everything else,” Ally spat.

  “Aw, poor Ally,” JJ cooed in her big baby voice. “She’s upset because one man out of the thousands that she threw ass at didn’t want it. You having a hard time getting dick, baby? Come to mama, and I’ll make sure you never want that nasty thing again.”

  “It’s all good though,” Ally said, ignoring JJ’s teasing. “I’m gettin’ wit’ dude tonight, and he gonna take me out, wine and dine me and thangs, and then if he lucky, I’ll give him some.”

  “And then if you lucky, he might take some and not turn your ass down like yo’ boy just did.”

  All the girls started laughing.

  * * *

  DUDE’S NAME was Rick, and he drove a phat-ass black Lincoln Navigator, with black tinted windows and shiny chrome wheels. When Ally stepped up into the truck, he had a DVD playing on a tiny screen that popped up out of his car stereo. It was Set It Off, one of Ally’s favorite movies, and Jada Pinkett, Vivica Fox, and Queen Latifah were in the middle of yankin’ down a bank. They had their wigs and dark glasses on, waving their guns, threatening to shoot anyone who blinked.

  Now this is more like it, Ally thought as she pulled the truck door closed behind her.

  “Damn, you lookin’ fine as hell tonight, girl,” Rick said, reaching down while he was driving, grabbing one of Ally’s calves. “Thick!”

  She had decided to wear a skirt that fell just below her knees. She let Rick have his feel, let him run his hand up the side of her thigh before he pulled it away. Maybe that would loosen a little more of that change from his wallet when it was time to spend, she thought.

  Rick wheeled the big truck coolly down streets and around curves, spinning the wheel with one finger sometimes as he glanced over at the tiny DVD screen. He was a decent-looking guy, brown skin, baseball cap, so Ally didn’t know what his hair was looking like. He was bigger than average, but she didn’t know if it was muscle or fat because he wore a huge Chicago Bears football jersey.

  “You know how long I been try in’ to get wit’ you, girl?” Rick said, throwing a glance her way, then looking back at the road.

  “I know, baby. I had a lot goin’ on. But that don’t make no difference, because you wit’ me now.” Ally placed a hand on his knee.

  “I never had to call no woman more than once. I call them, and we do our thing. But you …” He left the sentence hanging there, as though he was searching for the words to finish it.

  “I know, I know,” she said smiling, sweet, and stupid. “I don’t know what I was thinkin’.”

  “Damn right.”

  Ally grabbed his hand from the armrest and squeezed it. “You think you can forget about that, and we can just start this over from right here?”

  He gave it a second, looked like he was putting some serious thought into it, and Ally thought, if this fool doesn’t respond in two more seconds, I’m going to really tell him what he can do with his Navigator and his funky attitude.

  “Yeah, it’s cool,” Rick finally said, turning around, smiling, showing his silver-capped tooth.

  THEY DID dinner just like Ally had asked, but it wasn’t no five-star spot downtown. There were no waiters in white waistcoats, or French-speaking hosts who pulled her chair out for her and commented about how fine her dinner selection was. It was a soul food restaurant on the South Side. But the food was real good, and although there were some ghetto-lookin’ folks
there, nobody decided to start shootin’, and that was always a good thing.

  After that, they went to a comedy club. South Side again, but Ally decided not to complain. To her surprise, she was having a fairly good time, and this Rick guy didn’t turn out to be as much of an asshole as she’d thought he most definitely was at first. He was kinda funny after he loosened up, and for a minute the thought that this guy might be someone she could chill with flashed through her mind, but then she stopped that nonsense immediately. She’d just gotten out of a relationship, so why go get all chained into another one, when there were a million other men out there after a woman like her?

  After the hour-and-a-half show at the comedy spot, Rick had really loosened up with the help of about four drinks. His eyelids hung low, and he was smiling as he wobbled out to the truck beside Ally.

  “You all right?” Ally tried to steady him by holding his arm.

  “Yeah, I’m cool. But why don’t you drive.” He dipped a hand into his jeans pocket and fished out the keys, handing them to her.

  “Cool,” Ally said, excited, because she’d never driven a Navigator before.

  They were on the highway, and Ally was being a good girl, driving with hands at ten and two o’clock like she was taught in driver’s ed.

  “Girl, what are you doing?” Rick said, turning his spinning head toward Ally. “This is a Lincoln. Punch this bitch so we can get to the hotel before next year!”

  That was all Ally needed to hear. She punched the gas, and the truck took off, pressing both of them back into their seats.

  “Whoooooo!” Ally cried out, feeling the force of the huge truck.

  “Now that’s what I’m talkin” about!” Rick said.

  * * *

  ALLY knew she heard Rick say hotel, but what they were walking toward, with a plastic key in their hand, was a motel room. Funny what a big difference one little letter M could make, Ally thought. She had had a good time tonight, though, and now it was time to finish things off right. As long as this place provided privacy and a bed, she’d be all good.

  Ally figured that she would make out all right tonight. She noticed the first time that Rick had stepped out the truck that he had a little bulge up front, so she guessed that he was packin’. She just hoped that he knew how to use it, because up until this moment, as Rick slipped the key into the door, and they stepped in to see the huge king-size bed awaiting them, Ally hadn’t realized just how sexually frustrated she was.