Giving a fuck about things feels so strange to me.
We reach Jackson’s office. He smiles when he sees Ace. When he sees me? Not so much.
“You busy, Pop?”
“Nah. Come in.” He stands and rounds the desk. “Good to see you.”
After a stiff hug, he nods at me without making eye contact, then Ace and I sit across from his desk.
“What’s this about?”
He looks just like he did last time. Crisp suit. Head bald and shiny. Perfect goatee. But he lacks the confidence and control he had when I was in here last. Now, he looks just as nervous as I feel.
“I’ll just go ahead and come out with it,” I begin. “I’m so, so sorry, Mr. Taylor. I didn’t mean to send that video to you.”
He clasps his hands together on top of his desk, his jaw working before he speaks. “I don’t understand how something like that happens by accident. Who did you mean to send it to?”
Ace shakes his head. “She didn’t mean to send it to anybody. She taped it on her phone for herself. It’s real easy to hit the wrong button.”
“Exactly. I was watching it for my…own enjoyment,” I say, a little embarrassed and a little turned on by my own lie. “I would never in a million years do something like that.”
His gaze drifts back to me. He’s skeptical, and rightfully so, but damn, this is theonetimeI actually didn’t pull some bullshit.
“I’ll be honest,” he says. “It made me very, very uncomfortable.”
“Understood.”
“That’s understandable.”
Ace and I say this in unison.
“I’m really sorry," I repeat. "I’d like to move past it if we can. That’s not who I am, I promise.”
Everybody in this room knows that that’sexactlywho I am, but we all have a part to play, here.
Ace tilts his head, a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. “You’re not sure if you believe it, right?”
He laughs, which makes me laugh, and Jackson very decidedly doesnotlaugh. In fact, he looks disgusted with the both of us.
Okay. Plan B.
“It’s important to us that we’re able to move on,” I say. “Because…Ace, tell him.”
He grins. “Raya’s having a baby.”
Jackson blinks twice, then his eyes go wide. “You’re pregnant?”
“Yes,” I say. “And it’s not yours.”
Ace bursts out laughing again, his hands spread and his eyebrows furrowed in a gesture that saysCome on, Raya.
“Sorry,” I say, laughing too. “I had to. The joke was right there.”
Jackson just shakes his head. “What the fuck iswrongwith y’all?”
“My bad, Pop. Our humor is…it ain’t for everybody.”
“Yeah, it ain’t for me. Take that shit elsewhere.”
