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.
“VeryCrescent 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 somelame 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. “Youwork 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.”
