19. Koi
SIX MONTHS LATER
I welcomed change, but I was trying to breathe through so much of it at once. Salem had been so good to me. After our initial reunion, I spent that night with him. I woke up the next morning to breakfast in bed, and then we went back to my place so that I could shower and dress.
Afterward, he took me with him to meet up with a realtor friend of his. We checked out a large space that was a combination store and warehouse. When I asked him what it would be used for, he informed me that it was mine.
Salem had invested in a place for me to sell my sculptures and paintings and space for me to teach sculpting and pottery. I couldn’t believe how invested he was in our relationship, and we had barely been together for any length of time.
When I asked him about it, he told me that he knew I was his, and he would do anything to make me feel safe, provided for, and loved.
It made me think about my attitude toward our relationship, and I knew that I needed to do better.
I couldn’t be half out and half in. I had to be fully committed to him the way that he was to me.
That was what pushed the change that was happening today. I had finally decided that I would show him how all in I was. I had made an appointment with his same realtor. There was a house that I had been eyeing for a while, which was halfway between his apartment and mine.
I hadn’t told Salem anything about it when I first went to see it. I broached the subject later that night about moving. He offered to move me into his place or for us to find a place together.
I called the realtor the next day and put an offer in on the home and arranged for us to tour the house after hours. I took him out to dinner that night, and after we left, I drove us to the house and showed it to him. Salem made love to me in the empty house that night. He loved the house.
The realtor contacted me the next day with the counteroffer, and I accepted. It was within my price range. Within a week, we were at the table closing on our first home together.
At my brother-in-law, Kalvin’s, urging, I had hired him for a dollar to represent me in a lawsuit against the college for the allegations and trouble I had in the past, along with the current case. We sued for harassment and won.
“Can you please move that closer to the window?” I instructed the movers who were setting up an oversized armchair and ottoman in my reading room.
“Baby, relax. You’re gonna be stressed out about this move if you don’t.” Salem wrapped his arms around my waist and pressed his lips against my neck.
I sighed. “I’m sorry. I’m just so excited.”
“Me too, baby, but you’ve had them move that same chair three times already.
I promise you that if you don’t like it where it is, I can move it later.
You can sit over there with something to drink, and I’ll remove my shirt, get all hot and sweaty for you, and move it to wherever you want me to put it.
After you decide where you want it, I’ma fuck you real hard in that chair,” Salem whispered in my ear.
Although his words turned me on, I laughed so hard. I knew that I was blushing, and I looked up in time to see the movers staring at me. My nipples had grown hard from Salem’s words.
“Uhm, I’m going to let you handle them. I’ll just go set up my art room. How about that?”
“You need a muse?” he asked with his hands on his waist. He winked at me, and I fell out laughing.
Salem’s best friend, Nate Diggs, owned a moving company. We had hired him and his team to move us today, but that hadn’t stopped Salem from getting in on the action too.
“Girl, if you don’t let that man work.” Chelsea giggled as she munched on a bag of chips. She rested her hip against the island as she stood beside me, looking over into the living room.
We had an open concept home, and it was easy to see from the living space through the kitchen and the backyard living area beyond.
“I’m letting him work.”
“Hmph. If the way your nipples are hard under that T-shirt and the way you’re all red in the face is any indication, you’re either about to drop to your knees and suck him off or have him bend you over that chair and drill your ass.”
I laughed and nudged her with my elbow. “Okay, maybe I’m like point seven seconds away, but I’ll wait for y’all to leave.”
“Mm-hmm. But you still have one more room of furniture for them to unload,” she replied, referencing the guest bedroom. “I’m thinking about staying overnight to check out that new bed you purchased.”
“Uhm, hell no.”
She tittered with laughter. “Why can’t I check it out? I just want to make sure that it’s exactly what you purchased and the quality you want.”
“No thanks, ma’am. Salem and I are going to break that bed in tonight as soon as y’all leave. I’ll be able to tell if that bed is the quality I’m looking for or not. If it can hold up under the way that man drills my ass, then it’s damn good quality,” I confessed with a giggle.
My best friend scrunched her nose and side-eyed me. “TMI.”
I shrugged. “I just want to make sure it’s excellent quality before my friend gets in it.”
“Heffa, I don’t want to get in after y’all two finish doing the nasty in it.”
I laughed before I changed the subject. “So Nate.”
“Huh?”
“Heffa, if you can ‘huh,’ you can hear,” I answered as I grabbed a hard lemonade from the refrigerator. “I saw the way you’ve been watching him while they were moving.”
“I mean, the man is dark chocolate, and he’s glistening with all that sweat on him. I’m a mature woman, not dead.”
“Mature, Chels? You’re one year younger than I am. At twenty-nine, you’re only two years older than him.”
“I thought Salem was twenty-five.”
“He’s twenty-six now.” He had come into his inheritance from his paternal grandfather on his birthday a few weeks ago. “He told me that Nate was two years older than he is, which makes him two years younger than you.”
Chelsea chewed her bottom lip thoughtfully as she continued watching the movers.
“Just a thought, girl. Shoot your shot.”
“Does he have a woman?”
“You think I would be pushing you in that direction if he did? Come on, friend. You know me better than that,” I replied as I walked to the front door.
I saw the deliveryman pulling up. “Come on and help me get this food so we can feed these men.”
I headed outside, and with Chelsea’s help, we grabbed the seven pizza boxes, wings, and breadsticks. We already had several liters of soda, juice, water, and beer in the house.
We returned inside the house and set all the food out.
“Hey, guys. You can wash your hands in the hall bathroom and come and grab something to eat.”
Six big men filled my house. All of them instantly stopped what they were doing and rushed to the bathroom. Nate went to the guest bathroom in the guest bedroom, and Salem headed to our bathroom, while Chelsea and I pulled out paper cups, plates, and a bucket of ice.
I watched her and Nate find a place to sit together as they ate and talked. The rest of the men gathered and talked about football and boxing after everyone thanked me for feeding them.
Salem grabbed his plate and sat in the chair that I had the movers reposition repeatedly.
“Come here, li’l mama,” he ordered.
I grabbed my plate and cup and walked to him.
“Get on your seat,” he commanded and patted his lap.
“My seat is on your beard, sir.”
“Got that damn right. But seeing as how we have company—unless you wanna head to the bedroom.”
“I can wait,” I replied with a wink and a smile.
“Yeah, because we both know your ass can’t keep quiet.”
I giggled, and I took my seat on his lap. Salem took my plate from my hand, and he set both of our plates on the small table beside him. He grabbed a slice of my pizza and fed it to me.
“I still can’t believe that we’re doing this,” I shared after I chewed my food.
“Living together?”
“Yeah. Some people will think it’s too soon.”
“Some people can get the fuck out my face. If they are not for us, baby, they are not with us. From here on out, it’s you and me, making moves. We’re not living for anyone else. We spent months avoiding what was meant to be because of them hating ass niggas at the college.”
“You’re right,” I replied before I took another bite of my pizza.
He kissed my neck, and we resumed eating.
“You know I love you, right?” he asked when we finished eating as the other men returned to unloading the truck.
“You’d better after we bought this house together.”
“It’s you and me, baby, until the end of time. I promise you that.”
He kissed my lips and returned to the guys. Chelsea came to stand by my side.
“Are you happy with your choices?”
“Yeah.”
“Good.”
“Sometimes, I feel we did it backwards. We were supposed to date for a while, marry, buy the house, and have a kid. That’s the traditional way, Chels.”
“Nothing about you and this man has ever been traditional, Koi. You don’t have to live according to other people’s expectations. It’s time that you embrace your happiness. You deserve it. You have been through a lot with the relationships from your past and that school. Do you, boo.”
“He brings out the best in me. I thank God for him every day. I got it right this time.”
Salem turned to look at me as he carried a large sculpture inside. He blew a kiss at me and winked. My heart was full, and my soul was happy.