CHAPTER FIVE First Message
For three days, Maya and Jalen barely texted.
A joke about traffic. A photograph of a renovated gym he was proud of. A message from Maya congratulating him when he mentioned signing a professional basketball player as a client. Nothing intimate.
Nothing Andre needed to know.That was how Maya phrased it to herself.On Wednesday evening, she stayed late at the office
finishing a campaign presentation. The building had mostly emptied by eight. Through the glass walls, Culver City glowed with restaurant signs and brake lights. Maya kicked off her heels beneath her desk and rubbed the bridge of her nose.
Her phone rang.Jalen.She watched it vibrate.A phone call felt different from texting. More
deliberate. More dangerous.It stopped.A message appeared.Jalen: Sorry. Didn't know if you were busy.Maya typed: Still at work.Jalen: Of course you are. Little CEO.Her breath caught.The nickname.Not May this time. Another one he had not used in
seventeen years.
Maya looked around the empty office as if somebody might witness the feeling crossing her face.Maya: You remember that?
Jalen: I remember more than you think.She should have ended the conversation.Instead, she called him back.
"Hey," he answered, almost immediately.His voice through the phone was warmer than it had been at the mall.
"I have ten minutes," Maya said."You always had ten minutes.
Even when you really had forty.""Somebody has to establish boundaries.
""Still bossy too.""And you're still annoying.
"He laughed.There was a pause, comfortable in a way it had no right to be.
"How's the boyfriend?" Jalen asked.Maya sat straighter.
"Andre's good.""Andre.""Yes.""He know you're talking to me?
"The question scraped against something raw.
"We're not doing anything wrong."Jalen was silent for half a beat.
"That's not what I asked."Maya looked at her reflection in the dark window.
"No," she said."Why not?""Because I just ran into you.
It's not a big deal.""Then tell him."Irritation rose because he had said exactly what she did not want to hear.
"You don't get to police my relationship.
""I'm not. I'm asking because I don't want to be the reason you mess up something good.
"Maya nearly laughed at the irony."That's mature of you.
""People grow up.""Do they?""Some of us had to.
"There was history under every sentence now.Maya leaned back in her chair.
"Why did you cheat on me?"The question came out before she had decided to ask it.Jalen exhaled.
"We really doing this?""You said people grow up.
Give me the grown-up answer."He was quiet long enough that she thought the call had dropped.
"Because I was insecure," he said finally.
"And selfish. And because attention made me feel important.
You loved me so hard I thought it meant I could do anything and you would still choose me.
"Maya's throat tightened."That's awful.""I know.
""You made me feel stupid.""I know.""You made me compare myself to every girl who looked at you.
""I know."The repetition should have angered her.
Instead, it sounded like accountability.
"And I hated you for it," she whispered.
"I hated myself later."Maya closed her eyes.For years, she had carried unanswered questions like stones.
Now Jalen was handing her explanations one by one, and some wounded part of her mistook the relief of being understood for the return of love.
"I have to go," she said."Okay.""Andre will be home soon.
""Okay."She waited."Goodnight, May," Jalen said softly.Maya ended the call.The office seemed too quiet after him.She packed her laptop and drove home through streets shining with late-evening traffic.
Andre had left the porch light on. Through the front window, she could see him moving in the kitchen.He opened the door before she reached it.
"There she is.""There I am."He took her laptop bag from her shoulder.
"You eat?""Not really.""I saved you pasta.
"Maya stepped inside and smelled garlic, basil, and the cedarwood candle Andre always lit when he was cleaning.He had made the bed.
Folded laundry sat in a neat stack on the sofa.
Her favorite glass waited beside the bottle of wine they had opened the night before.Nothing in the room demanded her attention.
Nothing was dramatic.Nothing hurt.Andre touched her cheek.
"Long day?"Maya looked into the face of the man who had loved her consistently for seven years.Her phone, inside her bag, still held the warmth of another man's voice.
"Yeah," she said.Then she kissed Andre and told herself she would stop talking to Jalen tomorrow.