Chapter 6 Hasheem
By the time we made it back to the room, Harlowe was already on ten. She still had the drink she insisted on getting on the way out in her hand.
“This is insane,” she said as she paced a damn hole in the floor. “Like, actually insane. Simone really just cornered me. She thinks I lied to her face about my feelings for you, and I can’t blame her because I am out here in Africa on a couple’s trip . . . with you!”
“Harlowe.” She was talking so damn fast I could barely make out what she was saying.
“She called me a backstabber. Said we must’ve been fucking around when y’all was together. Can you believe that?”
“Harlowe!” I called again, but she kept pacing and rambling.
“I brought her into our friend group, and she thinks I was fucking you the whole time. Is she for real?”
“Yo!” I stepped in front of her, catching her by the elbows before she wore a groove in the floor.
“You not finna let Simone have you in here tweakin’ like this.
Fuck what she th—” Her body collided with my chest before I could finish.
The glass tilted a little, spilling the pink drink down the front of my shirt and all over the couch.
“Shit.” She gasped, jerking back. “Oh my God. I’m so sorry.”
I looked down at my soaked tee, then over at the dark wet patch spreading across the cushion and shrugged.
“It’s just alcohol,” I said. “Just like it’s just Simone.”
Simone being here didn’t move me like that. She was old news to me. I’d already taken that L, healed from it, and kept it pushing. What I wasn’t going to do was let her be the reason Harlowe didn’t enjoy this trip and everything she’d worked so hard for.
“Yeah, but now you’re all sticky, and I ruined the couch,” she groaned.
“Couch will live,” I said. “You, on the other hand, need to sit your ass down somewhere before you burst.”
“I just . . . Simone snatching me up was a lot.”
“I know. We’re gonna get that shit under control alright? But right now . . . Let’s get you in the shower so you can chill and reset.”
“You go first,” she said quickly. “You got sweat and rum all over you. I already showered before we left. I’ll wipe this up.”
“Nah.” I shook my head. “You been in your head since the bus. Go wash your brain or whatever you be saying. I can take the other shower.”
She hesitated, then nodded. “Okay. Fine.” She grabbed her toiletry bag and dress for tomorrow and disappeared into the main bathroom, the door clicking shut behind her.
After a second, the shower cut on. I pulled my shirt off, tossed it over a chair, and grabbed the hotel towel to blot the couch. The cushion was damn near soaked.
“Yeah, that’s gon’ stain.” I dabbed what I could, flipped the cushion, then dropped the towel on the floor for housekeeping.
It’d be alright. I was sure the brand had a budget for this type of shit.
I walked over to my suitcase and grabbed some clean shorts and a tee, then headed for the other bathroom.
Last thing I needed was sticky liquor on my chest while I tried to relax.
I stepped into the bathroom and turned the water on hot, letting the steam build as I stripped down.
I stepped under the water, and for a second, I just stood there with my palms on the tile, letting the water beat down on my shoulders.
This fake boyfriend shit was messing with my head.
I told Harlowe not to make it weird, but I was the one more unsettled than I wanted to admit.
All I could think about for the last couple of hours was Harlowe’s lips.
Now, I couldn’t stop picturing her pressed all up on me on that dance floor, like she belonged tucked up under me.
I knew it was wrong on so many levels, but my body and my mind weren’t getting the memo.
I washed quick . . . wasn’t about to have no long ass think piece in the shower.
That kiss had unlocked some shit I’d been able to steer clear of for a long time, and the only question now was, did I shove that shit back down and act like nothing was different, or did I pursue it and say fuck the fall out?
I cut the water off before my brain started doing too much.
I stepped out the shower and threw on my fresh shorts and T-shirt before making my way out of the bathroom.
Soon as I hit the bedroom, I had a whole new problem.
Harlowe was laying across the bed, looking effortlessly fucking beautiful.
She had her bonnet on and a big T-shirt that had her titties spilling out and thighs exposed.
She looked like she tasted so damn good. I shook my head.
“You good?” I asked, and she glanced up, trying to shift her body so I wouldn’t see all her assets, but it didn’t help. Shit, if anything, it revealed she wasn’t wearing panties. Fuck!
“As good as I’m gonna be tonight. Just editing content.” She waved her phone in the air. I nodded as I went to the closet, grabbed an extra blanket, and started spreading it over the couch.
“Hasheem, what are you doing?”
“Making a pallet.”
She frowned. “The couch is wet. I spilled a whole drink on it. You are not sleeping on a sticky ass cushion.”
“I done slept in worse places than this couch.” I shrugged, still tucking the blanket in. “I’ma throw some sheets and shit on it and it’ll be good.”
“Hasheem.” Something about the way she said my name made me look over.
She’d thrown the covers back on the other side.
“We share beds all the time,” she said. “Family trips, movie nights, that time my heat went out, and I crashed at your place for a week. This is no different. I’m not making you sleep on a wet sofa.
” She wasn’t wrong, but that was before I wanted to eat her ass off the bone.
“This different,” was all I said as I continued laying the sheet across the couch.
“It’s not. Get in bed.”
“Alright, man.” I dropped the blanket on the couch and made my way to the bed. It wasn’t no point in going back and forth. She wasn’t going to drop it. “Scoot over.”
She rolled to her side, giving me space, and I slid in, careful to leave a strip of sheet between us.
“That’s better.” She clicked the lamp off, and the room went mostly dark, besides the blue light from outside sneaking in under the curtains. For a minute, all I heard was both of us pretending to breathe regular, but I could feel the tension between us.
“That kiss changed stuff, didn’t it?” she blurted out, cutting through the silence.
I stared up at the canopy netting. There was no point in lying. I’d never lied to her. “Yeah. Little bit.”
She let out a humorless, little laugh. “I was scared you were gonna say that. I was hoping you’d be like, ‘Nah, Lowe, you tripping.’”
“You not trippin’, and you’d be mad as hell if I lied to you. You felt what you felt. Speak on it.”
She was quiet for a second before saying, “I can’t . . . un-feel what your mouth feels like now or that dance or your dick print. Having you lying next to me right now, I just feel like some schoolgirl with a damn crush, and I’ve never felt that way about you.”
That shit hit me right in the chest.
“You not by yourself. You’ve worn this exact T-shirt around me a hundred times, and this the first time I’m lying here thinking about how easy it would be to roll over, climb between yo’ legs, and cross a damn line we wouldn’t be able to uncross.”
“Hasheem.”
My jaw flexed. “What? I’m just saying how I feel.”
“You can’t just say shit like that and expect me to go to sleep.”
A quiet laugh broke out of me. “You the one who brought up my mouth and my dick, shorty. I was over here minding my business.”
“I was . . . processing.”
“Yeah, well,” I said, voice dropping. “Same.”
For a minute, we just lay there, staring up at the netting, both of us too awake and too aware.
“So, what do we do with that?”
I turned my head to look at her.
“I don’t think we do shit with it tonight,” I said, staring up at the netting.
“We tired, we jet-lagged, we halfway buzzed, and you got a whole brand watching you tomorrow.” She was quiet, so I kept going.
“I’m not finna act like I don’t feel it,” I admitted.
“And I’m not finna jump on you like some nigga who don’t know how to act either.
We close our eyes, we get through tomorrow, and if it’s still loud in your head after that .
. .” I shrugged against the pillow. “We talk about it.”
“And if it’s still loud for you?”
“It’s already loud for me,” I said, letting her have the truth. “Question is just when we deal with it, not if.”
That pulled a little breath out of her.
“I don’t want to lose you, Hasheem. You’ve been my best friend since Myspace.”
“Then you won’t.”
“Okay,” she whispered.
“Get some sleep, Harlowe,” I said, rolling onto my back. “We got a whole fake love weekend to survive.”
“Good night, Hasheem.”
“Night, Harlowe.” I rolled over on my side and exhaled a deep a breath. It got quiet again, but the air between us wasn’t the same. And I knew as clear as day that we weren’t going back to how shit was before.