Sterling #2
“Nah, just a simple man who has been trained his whole life to pay attention to details. I know you can’t deny I’m right because even though your jewelry is simple and tasteful, it’s expensive.
You can’t help but reach for quality no matter what you purchase because it’s been drilled into you your entire life.
” He nodded to the small ruby solitaire necklace and diamond earrings I always wore.
Rubies were my favorite stone and the studs were just out of habit since I’d gotten them for my eighteenth birthday.
Since most people wore studs that were diamond knock-offs I didn’t have an issue wearing them because no one paid attention to them. No one except for Dr. Davis it seemed.
“You’re not wrong.”
He grinned as though he almost expected me to deny it. “Thank you for your confirmation. Now, tell me where you’re from.”
“Sag Harbor.”
His face broke into an amused grin, and I could see he was extremely proud of himself. He brushed off his shoulder like he still had it before he spoke. “The hamlet of the Hamptons for the wealthy Black folks. I can see it. Thankfully, you’re not at all pretentious.”
My head tilted to one side and I couldn’t tell if he was being nice or nasty. “Thank you, I think.”
“It’s a compliment. But let me let you get back to work. I’ve got to check on a few things.”
“Yes sir. Besides, there’s about three from your harem that have been waiting patiently to accidentally bump into you when we got done talking. Can’t leave them waiting.” I didn’t dare look in their direction but I wagged my eyebrows suggestively.
Dr. Davis’ face fell and he sighed like he was over his own attractiveness. “This shit is getting out of hand.”
I giggled since he truly seemed aggravated. “Being pretty becoming too much for you?”
He cut his eyes at me like I’d given him some sort of insult.
“I’m not pretty. That Scottish cousin? That’s the pretty nigga in the family.
Blonde locs and green eyes to boot. This shit is just infatuation.
The last thing I would ever do is lose my license dealing with someone in the hospital where I work.
That’s grounds for a harassment case and somebody being able to hold on to me longer than they need to. I’ll pass.”
“Experience?”
“Being smart enough to learn from the mistakes of others so I don’t have to live it.
But let me brave this shit. If I don’t cross paths with you again before you head home, be safe.
Morning traffic is always a bitch.” He gave me a friendly wink and I felt like he was saying my secrets were safe with him.
“I will, thank you.”
Dr. Davis walked away and was almost immediately waylaid by a nurse with a question.
I could tell by the way he was speaking to her like she was five that she’d asked him some inane question she should’ve been more than able to handle without him.
How they thought someone like him would be attracted to incompetence since it only made his job harder was beyond me.
I went back through making my rounds and checking on patients before I scanned my badge to sign out the med cart.
I knew some states allowed a range of nursing licensures to dispense medication but on this level, it was required that the highest-ranking nurse on the floor at the time dispensed any medications.
Most of what I did was double-check behind the other nurses and they hated it.
I could understand their irritation but I was just following orders.
Of course, they weren’t going to say anything to him so I just let it roll off my back.
It was already March and my time here was ending.
I’d have a few quiet weeks by the sea before I got dropped into the pit of cobras known as my family.
The women here and their silent treatment were child’s play compared to what I had waiting for me.
I dropped my bag inside the door of my short-term rental and I knew that I wouldn’t get much sleep soon.
The time I’d been working this assignment had been lucrative but it was time for me to start packing up.
That was the hardest part about travel nursing: moving from assignment to assignment and ensuring that you left nothing behind.
I had a hard and fast deadline that meant I wouldn’t be able to take a new assignment.
In my mind, it would better to skip taking a short turn around assignment and prepare myself for what I was getting ready to do.
It was almost time for our family’s annual gathering, which would take all summer.
I didn’t want to be bothered with it but traditions were what they were for a reason.
My family was from New York, Sag Harbor specifically, and that came with a massive amount of responsibility.
Our family was one that had made generations of history and was proud to be descendants of free Black landowners all the way back to the Revolutionary War.
One of my mother’s favorite bragging points was that our family was in America before it was even a country.
Which wasn’t a flex because at some point that ancestor had to buy himself out of bondage.
But to let her tell it, he had just materialized all on his own from the shores of the motherland with freedom, wealth and influence.
Everyone lauded his accomplishments but rarely wanted to remember how he arrived where he did.
Like they were almost ashamed of the fact that he’d been enslaved.
As if I’d thought her up, my phone was buzzing and I knew it was her.
My body, which had once been winding down from my long night at work was instantly keyed up again as all the stress hormones flooded my system.
It was crazy how I had to brace myself to deal with this woman, which is why I did it so sparingly.
If I didn’t answer she would only call me until I did and then berate me when she got me on the phone.
It wasn’t something I was interested in dealing with so I sucked it up and answered the phone.
The apartment I was in wasn’t one that would be up to her standards so I was glad to see that she wasn’t using a video call.
The idea of sitting through another of her lectures about the standards we had to uphold in our family wasn’t high on my to-do list today.
“Hello, mother.” I plopped down on the couch like a petulant teenager because it was something that she hated. She couldn’t see me, but the defiant act made speaking to her slightly more tolerable.
“Is that how you greet me? I have been emailing you for days and I haven’t gotten a call back.
Since you’ve worked with the indigent for a living I guess I have to do things on your time.
” Her voice was filled with derision, her tone was haughty and I prayed that wasn’t what Dr. Davis heard when I spoke to him or the patients.
This was just the warm-up for how she was going to start up with me so I propped my feet up on the coffee table to prepare myself for her rant. “I’m sorry about that, Mother. I’m just walking in from pulling a double.”
“Am I supposed to have sympathy for you? This is a choice that you made to wipe asses for a living when you could be doing something much more beneficial to the world. You have a home up here and although it’s not the most respectable place it sits empty for months at a time. You might as well sell it.”
“I’m not selling my house, Mother.” Her issue with my house was that it was small, and something I’d purchased without her help or her money.
Which meant she couldn’t lord it over my head or use it to control me and that pissed her off more than anything.
My cottage was one that had been used for vacation rentals and it sat near enough to the water to make it a popular place.
The couple that owned it no longer wanted the hassle and their family only wanted the access without the work.
I made them an offer after agreeing to be their last rental customer and started renovations on the place right after I closed.
“Waste of money. Anyway, I was emailing you to get your measurements so that I could find pieces for you.”
I sat forward on the gray landlord special sofa, my mind back on high alert. “Pieces of what?”
I could perfectly envision her look of disdain at my questioning her. “Clothing, Sterling. You’ll need to have clothing that’s appropriate for when you come up for the gathering. I’m sure they’ll put you in one of the attic rooms since you don’t have a partner or a family still.”
Another barb that I was so used to it didn’t bother me to hear.
“The attic rooms have the best views so I don’t have an issue with them.
You can see the water at its best vantage point from up there.
” Our family’s estate was beyond what one would call multi-generational.
It was a vast complex that had been expanded over the years since our family purchased the land at the beginning of the twentieth century.
“You should care because you’re not being treated fairly. I wish you would say something to them.”
It was funny because as my mother she’d never stood up for me. Whatever was doled out she didn’t stand in the way of it and often tried to make herself look better by making my punishments harder. Whatever pleased them was her aim.
“I understand that I don’t have a family and don’t need as much room.
It doesn’t bother me to be in the attic rooms. Like I said, the views are beautiful.
” And they were. She wouldn’t know that because she would never go up to the rooms that had been the old servants’ quarters.
The water views were breathtaking from the attic because the family home was taller than most in the area.
“Always trying to make everything so positive, Sterling. You must have gotten that from your father. I’m not so lost in being idealistic that I can’t criticize someone for their behavior.” My mother’s voice was so filled with disgust that I knew we were overdue for ending the call.
Since her criticisms were never outward I took what she said with a grain of salt. “Okay, Mother. Also, I don’t need you to purchase clothing for me, I know how to dress for the visit.”
This was just my mother’s way of trying to get information on what size I was, how much I weighed and if she could stress me into losing twenty or more pounds in the next six weeks.
Because of my body type, I would never be the willowy figure she’d had her entire life.
My shoulders were broad as were my hips and curves were my best friends.
I’d been on a diet for most of my life and whenever I let her get in my head my relationship with food got more fucked up.
I’d already talked to my therapist about what was to come and she was warning me not to even go to the family gathering.
If only it were that simple.
Anything over a size four for my mother was plus sized and since I was triple that on a good day I would never be what she wanted. My mother often lamented the fact that I’d gotten my father’s everything. Normally it was stuff that she didn’t like about me. Which seemed to be everything.
“I’m not sure I’ll like what you bring.” And she somehow said it as though her hating my clothes wasn’t even more reason for me to wear them.
“Well, you’re free to waste your money; that doesn’t mean I’ll have to wear it.
If I’m going to go, I’m going to wear clothing that I like and feel comfortable in.
” My mother and her siblings, cousins and extended family tried to make everything a competition.
I had one cousin who showed up with an entire custom wardrobe for the summer just to ensure none of us had the same clothes as her.
Denise was always a head case about wanting to be the center of attention and I knew my mother secretly wished I was more like her.
I’d rather go no contact before that shit happened.
She sighed and I knew the lecture was about to come. “If you would just lose weight—”
I took my feet off the coffee table and stood up from the sofa. “Bye, mother. I will see you in a few weeks.”
I hung up the phone without hearing what she had to say. There was no need to because it would just be more of the same. Criticism. My eye twitched and I could tell that my stress levels were skyrocketing. There was no way I was going to survive an entire summer of this bullshit.
Momentarily, I thought about seeing if I could take up Dr. Davis on his offer. I would love to avoid this and despite the inner voice screaming that I could didn’t mean that I would. I was too happy to keep the peace in my life even if it meant that I sacrificed it for a few months.
I headed to the small, well-equipped kitchen and grabbed the bag of bell peppers I’d put in the fridge.
The generic feel of this place made it clear no one was welcome to stay for long or to change anything about it.
Stark white cabinets, stainless appliances and laminated takeout menus that screamed don’t do too much in here.
I’d wanted something different but I would pick something healthier since I knew I needed to get in the right frame of mind for the visit.
I felt like I was slipping back into someone else’s life and I prayed I could find a way out of it.
Instead of wallowing I took the fruit and grabbed my phone. I made the short walk down the hall to my bedroom before I located the number I needed.
“Let me guess, you talked to that lady who gave birth to you and she’s already annoyed you.”
“Hey to you too, Dee. And yeah, you guessed it.”
“From that crunch I can tell she’s already gotten into your head and you’re eating rabbit food.” His disapproval was loud and I should’ve known not to call him immediately.
“I eat a good diet.” This was a lie but not a big one.
“And it goes to the extreme every time you talk to that woman. Don’t let her get in your head.” I nodded at the advice he seemed to give me too often that I could never take for long.
“I won’t.” I was lying, since she never really left my head but his worrying about me wasn’t something I needed right now. “Are you going to be there at the start?”
“Yep. I won’t go for the entire summer because I have things to do, but I’ll show my face to this happy little cult of weirdos we’re related to for a few weeks.”
“At least I’ll have some reprieve.”
“Maybe we’ll have some emergency that forces us to leave.”
I smiled for the first time since I’d left the hospital because that thought was a happy one. “From your mouth to God’s ears.”