Tegan #2
I laughed. “Oh, so you’re going to blame your entire career choice of not becoming a nurse to your parents’ dissatisfaction on the fact that I’m a baker?”
“Where’s the lie, friend?”
“You’re full of it.”
“I’m thinking about heading to the mall to do a little retail therapy while I wait. It will be the perfect remedy to get my mind off my plump ass and my bestie’s efforts to sabotage this fine ass body of mine.”
“Whatever.”
“You wanna come with?”
“Nah. I’d better pass. I’m already late today, and I have another inspector on the way.”
“Booooring,” she sang and then yawned.
“I’ll tell you what wasn’t so boring.”
“What’s that?”
“I went to the local coffee shop and ordered a coffee and my breakfast.”
“Wait, you didn’t go to Brew ‘N’ Sip? You love that place.”
“I do, but this morning, the line was wrapped, and I was already running late. So, I remembered that there’s a coffee shop across the street from me, and I decided to grab something there. As luck would have it, they made my specialty drink and have the Danishes that I love.”
“Friend, I’m falling asleep over here. I’m not interested in your gut health, just making sure that you keep those buns of steel in place. Where’s the not boring part?” Palmer whined.
I laughed. “You’re silly. You make me sick, you know that?”
“You love me. Now tell me the good stuff.”
“Anyway, someone ordered the exact same thing that I did and tried to claim my order.”
“There are two of you lunatics in this world?”
“Whatever. Yes, there are. Anyway, he tried to snatch my drink, and I had to check him. Only he proved that I was wrong because when he spun the cup around, the receipt had his name on it, not mine.”
“And?”
“And, I was embarrassed, apologized, and he followed me out of the coffee shop. He owns the barber shop directly across from me. Then he proceeded to offer me a discount if I came and checked them out sometime.”
“Yeah, because you really need to cut all that long, beautiful coppery-red hair off your head,” she replied sarcastically.
“Well, apparently, there are hairstylists in there too. They don’t just do haircuts.”
“Okay, so he’s just as loony as you are, and he’s a business owner. Is he fine, friend?”
“Girl, I wanted to rip that man’s clothes off and ride him right there. You know that’s not like me.”
“Honey, any girl who hasn’t had dick in two years is susceptible to humping the first man that walks by and pays her attention. Just be careful, friend. I don’t want you hurt again.”
She was right. Along with the stress of my last job and being sexually harassed by the head chef, I also had problems in my relationship at the time.
Carl Stubbs, my ex-boyfriend, was not the most supportive person in the world.
He gaslit me the entire time, making me feel that what I was going through with the chef was my fault.
He blamed me for the way that I wore my hair, how I dressed, the perfume I wore, and how late I used to stay at nights. No matter what I did, it wasn’t good enough, and the chef was only harassing me because of something that I did to get his attention.
I had been unhappy with Carl for a while.
The first year, he used to do nice little things for me like take me out, buy me charms for my charm bracelet, cute little rings and necklaces—nothing too expensive or fancy.
The second year, he upped his game a little and would splurge on outfits and lingerie he liked seeing me in, and I would reciprocate by gifting him with things I knew he liked.
I started suggesting vacations together, but he made sure that I paid for my half, which rankled me a bit, but I didn’t complain.
Our third year, he started “forgetting his wallet” at home whenever we went out or saying that his check was short.
There was always another reason why I had to pay for our excursions and dates.
By the fourth year, he wasn’t even bothering with the excuses anymore.
He would just expect me to pay for everything, and if I said something about it, he would tell me to stop complaining and nagging.
He would say that I should be grateful for my blessings and stop being so selfish.
If I pointed out that he was my man, he would come back with, why do women want all the independent privileges and benefits, but none of the responsibilities?
When I lost my job at Seasoned, he was frustrated whenever I asked him to cover something. We stopped going out, and all we did was argue and barely had sex. He complained about everything that I did, and he was emotionally unavailable for me while I was going through the rough patch at Seasoned.
When I asked if I could temporarily move in with him because I might get evicted soon if I couldn’t get the money to pay my bills, he gave a firm no. He pointed out that my parents had a house large enough for me to move into.
Whenever I pointed out the problems in our relationship, he tried to make me believe they were all in my mind, or if they did exist, it was my fault.
For the sake of my mental health, I broke things off with him. I had lost a dead-end job; why not lose a dead-end man? He wasn’t going to marry me or ever be a good husband.
At that point, I decided it was time to start life over on my terms. I got a loan from my parents, paid my bills up a year in advance, and started an online bakery.
From there, I was able to grow my business, my customer base, and eventually repay my parents.
After I did that, I took out a bigger loan at the bank to open Baby Got Buns.
I hadn’t looked back, and I’d be damned if I allowed another man in my space to fuck up my dreams.
Fine or not fine, I didn’t need Harlem in my life, not right now anyway.