Chapter 8 #2
Every new thing I learned about him made him more human and intriguing. My heart had hurt for him when he talked about his aunt.
It was funny, with Tom, I’d imagined his money and position would put him at arm’s length, but every time I saw him, it seemed like he wanted to move closer. I knew he was trying to get personal, and if I was smart I’d put a brake on it, but who was I kidding?
I wanted him.
My plan to heed Melissa’s cautionary tale and keep things professional for as long as this project was going went completely out the window the moment I set eyes on him.
Which was ridiculous because Tom was a multi-millionaire, and I was a social worker living in a studio in Harlem.
This could never work; our lives were too different.
That reminded me about living right by Red Rooster.
Harlem was booming these days, but it was still not the fashionable part of town for the rich and famous.
Someone with Tom’s money only lived in Harlem if he made a very intentional choice.
Dammit.
I so wanted to dismiss him as just another rich asshole, but everything about Tom so far was wreaking havoc on my plans to hate him.
I was brought back from my thoughts when I walked into my best friend Juanpa’s condo and smelled the homemade pizza he’d promised for dinner.
I was trying to tug my shoes off when I noticed lit scented candles on the coffee table and smiled.
He bought this place in Yonkers last spring, and he’d been surprising us with his domestic side since then.
I called out since he was nowhere in sight, “I’m putting these bottles of wine I brought down and then I’m going to go look in every closet to see where you hid the boxes, Juan Pablo. You’re not fooling me into believing you made pizza from scratch.”
Patrice, our other best friend, was on the couch texting on his phone. He just smiled and shook his head at my teasing. Juanpa hollered from the kitchen.
“Fuck you, Camilo! You ingrate. Here I am killing myself to make you a nice meal and you start disrespecting me as soon as you walk into my crib. Did you take your shoes off, motherfucker? I don’t want you tracking your subway filth on my hardwood floors.”
He was ridiculous.
“Oh my god! You’re so fucking annoying with this floor obsession.
I came on the Metro-North, thank you very much, and I’m not wearing those stupid slippers you put by the door either.
” I stopped in front of the couch where Patrice was still tapping on his phone.
“Patrice! Get off the damn phone. I haven’t seen you in weeks and you can’t stop sending pictures of your dick to Easton long enough to say hello. ”
Patrice, as always, was completely unbothered by my ranting and finished whatever he was doing before getting up and coming to where I was to give me a double kiss and hug hello.
He had his locs coiled up in a big bun today.
He was wearing a Cornell sweatshirt, loose jeans, and his Malcolm X glasses on.
I’d missed his face so much. I pulled him in for another hug before letting him go.
“I missed you, P.”
His usually unexpressive faced softened. “I missed you, too. I was texting Odette about tomorrow.” I smiled at the mention of his mom. He always called her by her name, never Mom; they were so formal with each other. “Are you and Dinorah still coming to her place for dinner Friday?”
I rolled my eyes at the question. He knew that was a given. My mom and Patrice’s were still very close. Odette was the only one who could get her out of the house these days.
“We’ll be there. No way am I missing the annual Joumou night.” Patrice smiled at that.
“Good. I’ll have someone to back me up when she starts getting on me about not wearing ‘proper clothes.’”
I laughed at his annoyance and shook my head.
“You need to get over that. You two have been having that argument since middle school.” He just glared in answer and I shrugged.
“You know I have your back, but I’m not pushing, because that soup is too fucking delicious to mess with my standing invitation. ”
Patrice smirked as he pulled his phone out of his pocket.
I noticed the way his eyes widened at whatever he saw and I wondered if my teasing about the dick pics was more on point than I thought.
But before I could ask, he shoved his phone in his pocket without responding to whomever had messaged him.
“You know that Joumou night invitation will always be there.” I nodded, because he was right, I knew that.
Every year his mom would make a traditional Haitian pumpkin and beef stew and invite our group over.
Traditionally the soup was part of the New Year’s Day celebration our families always did together, but after we got out of college and were busy doing our own things, Odette started making it in the fall, when “we could all make it.” This year only Nesto, the fourth guy in our little crew from the Bronx, would be missing it.
Nesto moved to Ithaca the year before to try his luck in getting his Caribbean food truck to take off.
He’d had massive success up there and this past spring opened his restaurant.
Along the way he’d also met Jude, the love of his life, and they were happy as fucking clams up there in the boonies.
I missed having him around but was so thrilled for him and all he’d achieved in the past year.
He’d worked his ass off to make his dream happen and deserved everything he’d gotten.
Now Patrice was up there, too. He’d finally finished his PhD at Columbia in May and taken a position as an assistant professor for the economics department at Cornell University.
Although he assured us there was nothing going on, it didn’t escape any of us that from all the offers he had—and he’d gotten plenty—he chose the school in the town where a certain assistant district attorney he’d gotten tangled up with last year lived.
“What are you glaring at?” Juanpa walked out of the kitchen with a wine opener and three glasses, looking like Drake’s skinnier little brother.
“He’s been sexting with Hudson or whatever the fuck his name is since he got here,” he said, angling his head in Patrice’s direction.
Juanpa refused to call Easton by his name just to get a rise out of Patrice.
“He thinks I can’t tell, but his eyebrows get mad twitchy when he’s up to something.
You’re not fooling anyone, pa.” He cut his eyes at Patrice and we all laughed.
I noticed Patrice didn’t even try to deny what Juanpa was saying though.
Juanpa turned to me after a minute as he poured us all some wine. “How was your meeting with the millionaire? Did he get creepy on you?”
I shook my head and sighed. “Nope, not at all. He cleared the air as soon as I got there, assured me he would be respectful, and then we proceeded to have an hour of polite conversation. If anything, now I’m more attracted to him.
” I took a big gulp from the glass Juanpa had just handed to me and slumped on the couch.
“I’m such a hypocrite, too, because I was actually disappointed.
I was hoping he’d be all flirty and suggestive, and then I could just say he was the one who started it.
But instead, he was real and respectful and basically gave me no excuses to do anything stupid. Isn’t that fucked up?”
Neither of them answered, they knew me well enough to know I had to process all this to death and that I probably had more to say.
“I don’t even know why I’m so worked up about this guy.
What could possibly happen between us? He’s a rich dude with all kinds of privilege; it’s only a matter of time before all that rears its ugly head.
” Even as I said it I felt like shit, because so far all I’d seen from Tom was that he was generous and incredibly down-to-earth.
The eye roll I got from Juanpa was so intense, his eyelids actually popped. Patrice just looked at me and shook his head like I was an idiot.
“Why do you need to take everything to the extreme, Camilo? Why can’t you just chill and see what happens?” Juanpa rarely chimed in when it came to relationships, so the fact that he was so fired up about this gave me pause. “Not everything needs to be decided and done with after two minutes.”
“Like I’m taking advice from you. You’ve been in love with Priscilla for eighteen years and you still can’t make yourself say it.” It was a low blow to bring up his ex, but I didn’t want him to get too comfortable with these lectures.
“We’re not talking about me right now though.” He jerked his thumb at Patrice. “And we’re not talking about how this one is upstate now, literally fucking with the Po-Po—
“He’s not a cop!” All three of us looked stunned at Patrice’s very out-of-character outburst and then Juanpa busted up, pointing a finger at him.
“Eeeey! Made you say it!” His glee at Patrice’s slip up was hilarious.
Patrice just glared and muttered. “Asshole.”
Juanpa just kept shaking his head with a huge grin on his face. “Can’t take it back, my guy.”
The interlude was fun, but we were supposed to be focusing on my fucking man problems. So I got up and waved my hands in between J and Patrice.
“Back to me, assholes!”
Did that shut Juanpa up? Nope, he jumped right back into his lecture.
“Nah. That’s where your shit gets problematic, Camilo.” He pointed his glass of rosé at me to press his point. It was really hard to take this asshole seriously sometimes.
“You’re too judgmental, pa. You create a whole fucking situation in your head.
God forbid a dude says or does something differently than how you deem it should be done, then they’re dead to you.
You don’t leave any room for people to be human, mi hermano.
Under those conditions you will always be disappointed. Full stop.”