14. “Walking On Sunshine”
FOURTEEN
“WALKING ON SUNSHINE”
(KATRINA AND THE WAVES)
A t seven oh three that night, I pulled myself up into the passenger side of Javi’s truck.
I barely got my behind in the seat when he ordered, “Mouth.”
Bossy.
Hot.
Weirdly sweet.
I turned to him to see he was turned to me so I could lean right into his demand.
I should have told him how bossy he was being, but I didn’t, since it was also hot and weirdly sweet.
So I just leaned right into his demand.
We didn’t make out, but there was a delicious touch of tongues before Javi broke the kiss and said softly, “Buckle up, lil’ mama. Let’s get home and eat. I’m fuckin’ starved.”
I did as told and Javi put the truck in gear.
“Good day?” I asked as he set us to rolling.
“Had a word with Cody,” he replied readily. “He feels shit he screwed the pooch with lookin’ after you. He promised to get his head in the game.”
“That’s good,” I said. “Anything from Kevin?”
“Babe.”
He said no more.
I turned back to him.
“I took him down,” I reminded him.
I marveled that his sun-bright smile didn’t melt the windshield. “You did that.”
“Javi—”
“Listen, baby,” he began, “I know you women aren’t backing off. All the men know that. We also don’t like it, and you know that . So you cannot be pissed I’m not gonna feed into your play.”
I flounced (yes, I could do this even seated) to face forward and crossed my arms on my chest.
It was at this juncture (and in this mood) I decided to tackle something else.
“I know we have a date tonight, but after pizza and our talk, you’re going to take me home.”
“The hell I am,” he replied.
I turned to him, telling the straight truth, since I knew he didn’t miss me attacking him last night, and he definitely didn’t miss us rolling around in his bed yesterday morning.
“Javi, it’s hardly going to work, this taking it slow thing, if we’re living together.”
“I don’t have any problem with you setting the scene.”
He actually didn’t, which stymied me, and therefore, I had no retort.
Which gave Javi the opening to lay down an ultimatum.
“Right, your choices are, you stay with me, or I stay with you. I don’t give a shit where we stay. But you are not going to be unprotected.”
“I take it whatever you got from Kevin, if you got anything, means that situation isn’t sorted.”
“It is not.” He enunciated each word irritably, giving me a hint at how he felt about the fact that they, too, came up with zilch from Kevin.
“You guys didn’t get anything out of your interrogation?” I asked to confirm.
“Oh, he sang.”
Hmm.
“It’s just this is his bud’s thing, and it’s oozing everywhere,” Javi went on.
“What’s his bud’s thing?”
Javi didn’t reply.
Ugh!
I changed tactics. “Where is Kevin now?”
“Someplace safe.”
He said no more.
Gah!
I tried again. “Since this is happening to me and my girls, don’t you think we have the right to know what’s going on?”
“Nothing more is going to happen to you or your girls.”
That would be good.
Still, we could help. Many hands make light work and all that jazz. Not to mention, we had an uncannily dab hand with this stuff. Sure, most of it was dumb luck, but still.
On that thought, I wondered how I was going to get away from him to go to our Angels meeting, then have beer and wings, then hang with Titus for a while.
“We done talking about that?” Javi asked.
“For now,” I told him.
“We sleeping at yours or mine?” Javi asked.
I hadn’t stepped foot in my place in two days. I needed to get my mail. I needed to see how my mushroom looked with my décor (though, I already knew it’d be fab, I still wanted to see it in all its pink and white glory). I needed to make sure nothing in my fridge was spoiling.
But Javi had a bigger bed, his sheets were better, and I didn’t have any bagels.
What was I thinking?
“With Cody back on board, I’m sure I’ll be safe,” I remarked.
“With me sleeping right next to you, yeah, you’re right.”
He was annoying me, and I didn’t want to be annoyed.
I wanted to eat pizza, get our heavy discussion behind us, and then I’d recommence the discussion of sleeping in different places like any newly dating couple should do (if I was in that couple).
So I pulled out my phone and asked, “What kind of pizza do you like? I’ll order it so we don’t have to wait too long for it to show.”
“I already ordered it and scheduled a time for it to deliver, which is about ten minutes from now.”
How thoughtful!
Since I had my phone out, I disseminated the minimal information I had to the Angels text group, saying, Javi isn’t giving much, but he did say Kev talked, and whatever this is, it’s all about Trev .
As I was hitting go on that, my phone rang.
When I saw who was calling, my heart sank.
It was my mom.
Oh no.
In all that was going on, I forgot to reply to her text.
I worried my lip, trying to dredge up the courage to let the call go to voicemail.
“Who’s that?” Javi asked.
“My mom,” I told him.
“Ignore it.”
“That’s hard, Javi,” I admitted.
“You got a life. You’re with your man. You’re gonna be eating pizza with him in ten minutes. She can wait and talk to you when you’re ready.”
“She doesn’t know I have a man,” I pointed out.
And…
Was Javi my man?
Things in favor of this idea: he was sweet, protective, a great kisser, knew how to cure a hangover, we’d slept together three nights in a row, I was showering in his shower, and he was taking me to and from work.
Things that negated this idea: we hadn’t yet had an official date, or at least one that wasn’t weird, we hadn’t had sex, and, well…that was kind of it.
Oh my God.
He was kinda-sorta my man.
My phone stopped ringing.
“I’m gonna pay for that,” I muttered.
“You’ll be okay,” he replied.
He didn’t know my mother.
Five minutes later, we swung into his townhome complex.
One minute after that, we were in his townhome.
He moved around, turning on the few lamps he had (another mental note: along with the throw blanket, I needed to ask Javi if he was okay with me buying him some lamps—there was a standing one at West Elm that overarched and had an acrylic balloon shade that would look killer—I also needed to discuss an armchair with him, since every man needed an armchair).
Thinking these thoughts, I threw my bag on the kitchen island.
“Got beer,” Javi said, moving to the kitchen. “Got you some wine. Which one you want?”
“You bought me wine?” I asked, touched yet again by Javi being thoughtful.
“Noticed you liked it,” he muttered.
I was still mildly annoyed at him about our conversation in the truck, and now I was more annoyed with him because he made it so hard to retain hold on annoyed.
“Wine,” I said.
He went to the bottle of red I now noted was sitting on the counter by the fridge, marring his pristine, no-one-lives-here-nor-ever-has vision of his kitchen.
Man, we really needed to get down to our talk.
However, it was Friday, and on Fridays (as with most evenings), after work, I usually liked to take a quick shower, lotion up with my lavender-scented lotion and put a comfy lounge outfit on.
Conundrum.
Jess and Shanti had packed a couple of lounge outfits for me.
But Javi said this was our Friday night date, and even if it, too, was weird, since it was pizza at his place where he thought I was platonically spending the night (though, I hoped we made out a little), it was definitely a date this time. And you didn’t wear a lounge outfit on a date.
You also didn’t shower and put on a lounge outfit if you wanted to convince your date to let you pack your stuff and move home after it.
But my lounge outfits were super comfy.
You see my dilemma.
I hadn’t come up with an answer before the doorbell rang.
Javi was pulling out the cork on the bottle, and his attention went to the door. Mine did too.
I heard the cork pop before I heard the bottle hit the counter and turned back to Javi as he said, “Pizza’s here,” while moving to the door.
I rounded the island into the kitchen to find a wineglass (if he had one, just a glass-glass if he didn’t) and open a beer for him when I heard him state angrily, “How many fucking times do I have to tell you, this is not gonna happen.”
My gaze raced that way, and at my angle, I could see a man standing outside Javi’s door.
He was huge, like Javi, though older and blond.
But I knew instantly it was Javi’s ex-NFL dad.
The dad who had created a new definition of deadbeat, leaving his son and ex-lover to go it alone on the streets.
I saw the direct lineage through the clean, square, perfect cut of the man’s strong jaw, the straight, exquisite line of his handsome nose, the high faultless angle of his cheekbones, the strong flawless ridge of his brow, all of this he gave to Javi.
Javi’s coloring came from his Latina mom.
The rest was all his dad.
All of it.
Including his tall, muscular body.
Whoa.
“Son, I have—” the man began.
“I’m not your fuckin’ son,” Javi interrupted him with such venom, I felt his fangs sink into me all the way across his townhouse.
And that poison was so potent, it instantly turned my blood ice cold.
“You have a brother and two sisters,” the man said.
“You had one of those kids on the way when you cheated on your wife with my ma and left her and me swinging in the breeze.”
“I made a mistake.”
Wait.
Hang on.
What?
Oh no, he did not.
A mistake ?
He characterized what he did as a mistake ?
Suddenly, my blood was boiling.
“Fuck yeah, you did,” Javi returned.
“I’d like a chance to make amends.”
“Yeah, you’ve said that. And I’ve told you to go fuck yourself.”
“Javi—”
That was when Javi lost it.
“ Do you have any fuckin’ clue what our lives were like? ” he roared.
The man winced.
I moved.
Fast.
“It kills me—” the man started but cut himself off when he caught sight of my approach.
“It kills you?” Javi asked. He then drawled sarcastically, “I feel bad for you, man, since I get you, seeing as we barely survived day-to-day.”