Chapter 23
MAHOGANY
“You have to visit The House of Nova Ray today at one thirty and—
“Is there a way we can push that back?" I quickly asked.
"Again? Are you sure?” Asked Tamia with raised brows. “You’ve been pushing a lot of y’all meetings back.”
I’d been rescheduling in-person meetings with Crescent like crazy.
I hadn't seen him in over a week and needed to. The last time I saw him, I ended things. For real this time. I had to. It wasn’t just because of what happened with Duke and him threatening us; it was also because I didn’t have any room in my life for a man.
Things with Crescent and I were getting too serious and well…
that scared me a little. What did I look like?
Jumping from one situation to the next, unhealed?
It was hard to do, considering being with Crescent did give me a sense of comfort.
I couldn’t run away from my responsibilities forever, though. I literally had to go down to The House of Nova Ray. A walk through was required at this stage of designing.
I sighed and rubbed my lips together. “No. Don’t push it. Sorry. Keep it… Make sure Addison is available to accompany me.”
Tamia turned the corner of her lips up at me and squinted. Sitting the iPad down, she crossed her arms over her chest. “Okay. Spill it.”
“Spill what?” I asked, looking up away from the iDesign program, at her.
“What is going on between you and Mr. Carter?” She looked over her shoulder at the opened door and walked over to close it.
I drew back. “Nothing is going on between Mr. Carter and I.”
Tamia scrunched her face up at me. “You know I can tell when you’re hiding something, right?”
“How can you tell?”
“You think I’m about to tell you? Hell no,” she paused and laughed. “But you’re hiding something. Something is going on. Something has been going on for a while now. And... I think it’s quite... fucking... spicy.”
“Tamia!” I yelled. “If you don’t get the hell out of my office with that shit.”
She pulled a chair out from my desk. “Nuh, uhn. I’m not leaving. I don’t care. I don’t care. We are off the record. When’s the last time we were off the record, NeNe? We’ve been so on the record lately that I forgot we were home girls too.”
“Girl,” I mumbled.
"Girl...” She repeated. “Don’t girl me. I know something is going on between you two. Every time I walk in on y’all you get weird and he’s watching you like a hawk.”
“What?”
“What?” She mocked again, making a face.
“I know ball, bitch. And I know! Something happened between y’all.
Probably not on the elevator that day but definitely in your office that day I came to tell you I was leaving.
I’m a vibey ass bitch and the vibes told me something spicy happened.
Y’all kissed? He ate your pussy? Y’all fucked? Duke been acting reaaaal strange. I—”
“Tamia, mind your business,” I seriously said. “Nothing happened between Mr. Carter and I. Okay? Leave it at that.”
She drew back and raised her brows. “Okaaay.” Clearing her throat, she grabbed her iPad and said, “So... you sure you keeping the meeting or you want me to call his people with another excuse?”
I squinted, ready to curse her out. But instead, I just shook my head and told her to keep it.
My first mistake was mixing business with friendship.
I should have kept Tamia on the business side of things.
But we came up together. She was with me from the bottom, so the friendship naturally happened.
I just hated that she knew something. I wondered if anyone else could see something between Crescent and I.
Was it loud? Our attraction for one another.
Did the rest of the team think something was going on, too?
The last thing I needed was for there to be whispers around the office about me and Mr. Carter.
I would be mortified. Sighing, I brushed my hand over the top of my head, slicking my ponytail back.
What the fuck? You know what... Claire was a little smiley today.
And when I walked up to get on the elevator, Sean and Shardae stopped talking like they were talking shit about me.
Shar worked closely with Crescent. Did he mention me too many times?
Compare too much? Say something he shouldn’t have said? Or was it something else? Shit.
“Is it...” I said, as Tamia headed out. “Is it obvious?”
She turned around, the corners of her mouth pushed up. Cutting her eyes at me, she asked, “Is what obvious?”
I sucked my teeth and tilted my head to the side with an attitude. “You know what the fuck I’m talking about.”
“Nope. I sure in the hell don’t. I know you’re not talking about what you just damn near cursed me out over.”
I rolled my eyes. “Tami.”
“Mahogany!” She shot back. Rolling her eyes, she said, “Yes, it’s obvious. To me. I’m always around. I doubt it if anyone else noticed anything.” Doing a little shuffle, she hurried back over to the desk. “Details. I want details. What happened?”
“Girl... I'm not sharing any details with you," I said, avoiding eye contact.
She sucked her teeth. “Why not? You act like I’m one of them other bitches.
It’s me. The same bitch that hugged you that time you came into the office, looking a mess, crying, pretending it was about not having any clients.
Back then I didn’t ask anything, but I noticed the signs.
Ya nigga had just cheated on you. Not just ya nigga but your husband. ”
My jaw dropped and I shook my head. “Tamia...”
“He cheated again, didn’t he? That’s why the party was canceled, and he was up here with flowers and shit that day.
I know an ain’t shit nigga when I see one and Duke has been reeking of it since I met you.
I pray to God you fucked Mr. Carter. I hope you fucked him really good!
You know how many times I had to come in here, see you sad and not ask about shit?
You know how much I picked up on? Every time I walked out of this office after one of them days, I said I hope she cheat back.
I said... please Mahogany... fuck one of them rapper ass niggas.
Cheat! I was hoping to walk in on you and Sada that time but.
..” she sucked her teeth and waved me off.
“Whatever. Anyway... when I peeped how much Mr. Carter was on your ass and how you just seemed to eat it up... I said... yes! This is the muthafucking one!”
What was it about the people outside of my family noticing things?
Did I just drop the mask in front of strangers?
Because my family... they didn't know a damn thing. I did a good ass job keeping things intact in front of them though. Maybe being around strangers made me just... release. Not pretend so much. Because she was spot on. How spot on she was, was crazy. I’d been carrying on for years, pretending Duke and I were perfect, and she could see right through it.
I shook my head, thinking about the many times she complimented us. She was fronting too.
By the time she stopped talking, I was smiling with my mouth open, and my eyebrows furrowed. This bitch. I laughed.
“Tamiiiia,” I said. “Sada?”
“Any one of them rap niggas for real. But I just felt like Sada would’ve handled your ass the way you needed to be handled.
You had been so uptight and... I don’t know.
.. around that time. I was like my friend need to be fucked good.
You needed somebody to take you through there.
And a hood ass nigga would have done the job.
You know who I didn’t want you to fuck? Mr. Reynolds.
You remember how flirtatious he used to be?
He made my skin crawl.” She shivered and just kept going.
“So... How was it? Did you fuck him? Please tell me you fucked him.”
I cut my eyes at her with a smile. I didn’t want to tell her anything.
I didn’t want to share details or brag about it like it was a good thing.
At the end of the day, Crescent was my client and I shouldn’t have fucked him.
It was bad for business. If she saw everything else, she had to see that too.
“Mmhmm. I knew it. I fucking knew it. That’s why he wanted to work so close with you. Talking about Shar was incompetent. Shar was fine. He just wanted to get back close to you. Niggas. You must’ve fucked him real good, girl.”
“I am not having this conversation with you,” I said, back to tapping away at my computer.
“You don’t have to.” Tami nodded. “He must’ve fucked you real good too because you do not have on your wedding rings.”
I looked down at my bare hand and back up at her with a sigh. “You so damn nosey.”
I didn’t purposely not wear my rings to work. I intended to. It was just that I hadn’t been wearing them around the house, or to run errands or anything for days now. I just forgot to put them on this morning.
“Nope,” she paused. “Just always around so... I notice things. Like how you moved that picture to that wall over there. You would only do something like that if you were hiding something. You didn’t put pictures on that wall because the stencil made a statement.
You purposely left it bare. Now there’s a picture there.
I went to look behind it the other day, but you used command strips and—
“Okay, Tami. Okay,” I said, cutting her off. With a sigh, I closed the program I was using and stared across the desk at her.
Shrugging, I said, “Things are... things are bad right now. Duke punched a hole in the wall.”
“He found out about Mr. Carter?”
“Not just that... he walked in on us.”
Her jaw dropped and I went on to tell her everything. It was weird... me telling her everything. But a relief at the same time. I figured, why the fuck not? There was nothing left to hide. I had hidden from the people I loved long enough.