Chapter 32 Geneva
Geneva
It had been days and I was still walking on air.
“Geneva Holliday, what the hell is wrong with you?” Darlene kept asking me.
“Nothing. Can’t a girl smile?”
“Not like you been smiling,” Darlene stated, and then leaned in and gave me a hard look before pulling back and slapping her hands over her mouth. “Geneva Holliday, you got some dick, didn’t you?” Some customers looked up from their meals at us.
“Lower your voice,” I said, grabbing on to her arm and dragging her to the far end of the diner. “I did not.”
“Yes, you did. I can tell.”
“You can’t tell nothing, now stop it.” I blushed.
“Hmm, you can’t fool me. I know what a woman looks like when she gets some dick, but then again…” She trailed off, then gave me another penetrating glance. “Humph, it could be an I’m-in-love look too,” she said, screwing her face up and scratching her chin.
“I ain’t get no dick and I’m not in love,” I said, turning my head away.
“You got something or in something. You hit the number?”
“Darlene, leave me be, okay?” I said, and sauntered away from her toward the counter.
I was humming when he walked in, humming and thinking about those words, his lips, that night!
He took his regular table. “You got a customer, Geneva,” Darlene called over to me, and then nodded in Deeka’s direction.
I looked over and my heart almost exploded. But I contained myself and took my time walking over to him.
I poured some coffee in his cup and asked, “What can I get you?”
“A tall cup of you, with a side order of you.” He grinned at me over the menu.
“Shhh,” I giggled.
I hadn’t seen him since that night, but we’d been talking on the phone until all hours of the morning. Once we almost got busted when Eric picked up the extension, but luckily Deeka didn’t breathe a word until he heard the phone hang up.
“I need to see you,” Deeka whispered. “Tonight.”
“I don’t know if I can,” I whispered back, trying my best to look nonchalant.
“Try. I’ll pick you up at ten.”
“At night!” I screamed, and I could see Darlene’s radar go up from the other side of the diner.
I gave her a nervous smile and scribbled some nonsense down on my pad while I spoke from the side of my mouth. “I can’t go out at ten o’clock. What am I going to do with Charlie?”
“Can’t your mother—” he started to say, but I ended that with a quick shake of my head.
He looked down at his menu. I could see his mind was working at a solution. He looked back at me. “I wouldn’t mind her coming out with us.”
Men just don’t get it, do they?
“It’s ten o’clock at night, Deeka.”
“Well then, I’ll just have to come there.”
My eyes popped. “Are you crazy? What about Eric?”
“Eric has a gig tonight at nine. I’ll pop in to make sure they’re all set up and then pop out and come uptown to hang with you for a while.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“It’ll be fine.”
***
Charlie was fast asleep with her Pooh tucked protectively under her arm by the time Deeka called me from his cell phone. “Coast clear?”
“Yeah.”
“Then open the door.”
I had spent most of the night putting on and taking off clothes, messing with my hair and gargling with mouthwash after each cigarette.
Finally I decided on a pair of black leggings and a T-shirt that Chevy had brought back for me from a trip to the Bahamas.
It was a cheery pink with a large green and purple palm tree on the front.
And it was large enough to not make my gut so noticeable.
“Hey,” I said when I swung the door open.
“Hey,” he responded, and walked in planting a long, lingering kiss on my lips. Stepping back, he held up a large paper bag. “I brought champagne and sushi.”
Sushi?
“Oh, baby, I’ve already eaten,” I said, not wanting to chow down on raw fish and seaweed.
“Really? I should have checked with you first,” he said, spreading everything out onto the table. “Well, at least you can try one roll.”
I folded my hands and nodded. “Maybe just one.” I guess my face was screwed up because when he turned to look at me again, he said, “Oh, you don’t like sushi, do you?”
“Well, I don’t think I do. I’ve never had it, on account it’s raw fish.”
“Hmm,” he mused as he picked up a pair of chopsticks and poked at one of the rolls. “Try this one, it’s a California roll.”
I made a face.
“No fish, just imitation crab, cucumber, avocado, and rice.”
Dipping it into soy sauce, he made an airplane sound as he guided it toward my tightly pinched lips. “C’mon now, open up.”
I did, but reluctantly. I braced myself as I bit down, and you know what, it wasn’t bad, wasn’t bad at all.