Chapter 11
MAHOGANY
I was riding shotgun with Crescent, head resting against the window.
He was quiet. I was quiet. Where we were going I didn’t know.
I just told him I didn’t want a drink and that I wanted to leave instead.
He was with it. Told his boys he would get up with them later and led me out of the restaurant.
They knew me as Mahogany of Couture Interiors.
Keeping my reputation intact was important to me.
But tonight, when all I needed was a safe escape, I didn’t give a damn.
Tomorrow though… tomorrow I would care. A lot.
There was music playing.
At a low level.
Sounded like Maxwell. Yeah, it was Maxwell.
He was crooning over the speakers, talking about this woman’s worth.
With closed eyes, and a soft smile on my face, I hummed along with him.
I felt good. Like I was soaring. Like I was floating.
The edible and those drinks had fully caught up with me.
However, I didn’t feel drunk. I felt light as a feather, like I didn’t have a care in the fucking world.
Because in that moment, I truly didn’t. I wondered if it the liquor and the edible were all to blame.
I wondered if I was so content because I was with him.
“Mo,” Crescent called out.
I opened my eyes and looked over at him from the corner of my eyes. “Hmm?”
“You smooth?”
I nodded. “I am.”
“Where you wanna go?”
“Wherever you wanna take me.” I shrugged.
I was tired of rules.
Tired of playing it safe. Tired of trying to control every little aspect of my life. I wanted to give the control to someone else for a change. Someone I felt like I could trust. It was crazy… how comfortable I was with him. How free I was with him. Crescent felt like a hug.
About twenty minutes later, the car came to a halt in front of a brick building that looked like a condo. He killed the engine and I felt his eyes on me. Looking over at him, I asked, “Your place?”
“One of them,” he said.
“Ohhh, look at you. Big baller,” I joked, corny as hell. Only because I was buzzing. Had I been sober, I would have never said that.
He laughed. “You drunk.”
“Not enough,” I said through a sigh. Nodding towards the house, I asked, “What do you have in there?”
“Let’s go see.”
He undid his seatbelt and I undid mine. Before getting out of the car, I grabbed my purse and checked the time on my phone.
It was close to eight. On a school night.
Man, I needed to be home but in the moment, I didn’t give a damn.
Before I left the house, I told Aubry to order food around eight.
She was more than capable of watching her siblings.
When we walked into the condo, I immediately came out of my heels. He took my jacket, and I looked around. I wasn’t surprised to see that most of the décor was black and gold.
“Very Crescent coded,” I mumbled. “Nice though.”
He looked over at me. “Here you go again with that,” he laughed. “What’s wrong with black?”
“Nothing, besides it being the basic masculine color to go for,” I told him as I followed him out of the foyer, up another set up stairs, into the main area of the condo.
He hit a light switch and looked over his shoulder at me. “What color would you have gone for?”
Shrugging, I said, “Neutrals. There is a lot of natural lighting. Neutrals would have complimented the open floorspace and the cabinetry very well.”
There I was again. Always in designer mode.
Even now, with weed and liquor in my system.
I couldn’t help it. Any time I walked into a space, especially for the first time, I thought about what I would have done to make it better.
And with Crescent’s condo, I would have done a lot.
There wasn’t any ‘love’ in it. He said it was one of his places, that was probably why.
I wondered what his main home looked like. Probably a replica of this one.
I followed him to the kitchen, pulling a barstool from underneath the island. He stood at the cabinets, opened one, and pulled two glasses out, sitting them on the counter.
“Neutrals huh? That’s playing it safe. You probably have a lot of beige and white at your spot.”
I smiled and looked away. I did. Maybe he had a point. Going with neutrals was a safe route to take. “What you know about colors and playing it safe?” I joked.
“I learned a little something from this dope ass designer. She don’t think I listen, but I do.
When she’s speaking, I pay attention. I was working with her side by side on this project that’s very important to me…
she pulled out though. On some lame shit, in her feelings because she feeling a nigga and don’t know what to do about it.
So now we behind and she tryin’ to go virtual on a nigga like that shit would ever work for us. ”
I sucked my teeth and twisted my lips up at him. “Shut up. I’m sure that’s not the reason she pulled out. And if she did, I bet she put you in a set of good hands and you screwed it up somehow.”
“Not a set of hands ‘round this bitch as good as hers,” he said, with his eyes locked on mine as he pulled the cork from a bottle of whiskey.
“Mmhmm. Shardae was perfect.”
“Shardae wasn’t you.” He paused and switched gears. “I would have never taken you for a Manhattan woman. You give lemon drop, French seventy-five.”
“How do you know I’m a Manhattan woman?”
He sucked his teeth. “Come on now,” he said, as he poured liquor into the glass, on top of ice. “You know I was watching. You had three. Probably shouldn’t have a fourth, low key.”
“You probably don’t even know how to make it,” I teased. “Talking about a Manhattan like you about to just whip me up one.”
He smirked. “I don’t have all of the shit for a Manhattan, but I got you on the whiskey though. I know a little something about liquor. I own a couple of bars; when I’m bored, I work ‘em.”
I hiked a brow. “You work the bar?”
“Why you say it like that?” He asked, wearing a smirk, before squeezing juice from a lemon he pulled from the refrigerator, into the glass.
I shrugged my right shoulder. “You just don’t take me as the type to serve.”
“Oh, I serve, baby,” He said before biting on his bottom lip. “Only when I want to though.”
We weren’t talking about the bar anymore. That was made very clear by his eye contact.
I mumbled. “Mmhmm. So,” I propped my head up on the palm of my hand, my elbow digging into the island. “What are you making me?”
“A classic,” he paused and poured simple syrup into the glass. “A whiskey sour.”
“What if I don’t like it?”
“You gone drink it anyway,” he smiled, laughing a little. “Because you need a drink.”
I sucked my teeth. “No, I don’t.”
“Yes you do. You always need a drink when you’re with me. Shy ass.”
“I’m not shy.”
“Yes you are,” he dropped a cherry into it and pushed the glass across the island toward me. “You act like it. Can barely stay still.”
I really wasn’t shy. Hadn’t been shy since I was a child.
It was him. He made me nervous. He made me feel things I’d never felt before.
Like tingles for no reason. My heart raced when I was with him.
My hands grew clammy. I wasn’t Mahogany.
I didn’t know who I was with him and it drove me a little crazy.
I’d just had a couple of drinks at the bar and here I was again, needing another one.
Why? Why did I need another fucking drink just to interact with him?
We interacted. We interacted often. I should be past this stage by now, but I wasn’t and I found that very crazy.
“Whatever,” I said before picking the drink up, taking a sip.
It wasn’t bad. Not my usual. A little sweet, but I’d have it again.
Especially if it was made by him. I looked up at him, with the sleeves to his buttoned-up top rolled up, tie loosened, in his element, comfortable.
He was busy preparing his own drink. I wondered if he could feel my eyes on him the way I could always feel his on me.
“How is it?” He asked, pulling me out of my trance.
I nodded. “It’s good. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome, baby,” he said with a smile. “I knew you would like it.”
“You keep calling me baby…” I stated with a giggle.
“Yeah, so?” He looked over at me with a smirk. “Baby. You got a problem with that?”
No.
I didn’t have a problem with it, but I told him I did anyway.
“Yes,” I said with a playful eye roll. “I’m not your baby.”
“Yes you are,” he cockily replied, pouring liquor into his glass. “You just don’t know it yet.”
I just didn’t know it yet. Cute. Crescent was, as always, bold with his flirting. This was why I needed a drink after having three and an edible already. He made me giddy. A little too giddy. My hand found the back of my neck and I looked away, unsure of how to respond to him.
“Plus,” he paused. “You act like a fuckin’ baby. Bratty as hell.”
I drew back. “I act like a baby? I’m not the one who complained about absolutely nothing and failed to reply to an email. A professional email by the way, after complaining about the progress on a very important project.”
“That wasn’t me acting like a baby,” he paused and tapped around on his phone. A couple of seconds later music emanated from speakers I couldn’t see, playing SZA’s The Weekend. “That was me going after what I wanted.”
I took another sip of my drink. “I guess. Seems pretty babyish to me.”
He took a sip from his drink and shrugged. “I like to look at it as persistence. Dedication… refusing to settle.”
We made eye contact and silence welcomed us. It was intense. So intense that I closed my eyes. I didn’t like his eyes on me tonight. Felt like the question he always asked me was sitting on the tip of his tongue.
How are you?