“Okay, I’ll say it. You know it’s actually legal to hang out with women outside of your little ‘arrangements,’ right? Normal people go to clubs, meet nice women, and ask them on dates without a set of terms and conditions.”
“What are you getting at, D?”
I know exactly what he’s getting at. I just really don’t feel like having this conversation, and part of me is hoping he’ll surprise me. That he’ll say something other than the fact that I’m‘different.’ That my way of meeting and entertaining women is more than a little unorthodox.
“I’m getting at the fact that you treat intimate connections like a business alliance,” Drake counters.
“Just because I like to set and manage expectations with women doesn’t make it an alliance,” I argue, checking my mirrors as the highway opens up. “It ensures things stay clean. I don’t like leaving people guessing about where they stand. That’s how you end up with a stalker who shows up at our offices wearing nothing but a trench coat during our Monday morning staff meetings.”
Drake sucks his teeth.
And before you ask, no—I’m not some heartbroken brute holed up in the woods, coping with "the one who got away" by remaining void of real connection. I am a formerly heartbroken Black man—though my heartbreak didn’t come in the usual form—who moved to a remote part of Canada to reconnect with what matters most.
With who matters most.
Me.
If I just so happen to invite a woman into my space from time to time, it’s for a very specific reason and a very specific amount of time. It’s how I like things: compartmentalized and comfortably quiet.
The bonus? This is Canada, not America. So I’m not actively being scouted for target practice every time I leave the house.
Here, I’ve got peace. Solitude. No drama. No BS. Just clean air, solid ground under my boots, and my best friend, Drake.
“Why do you insist on throwing my mistakes in my face when we were talking about you?” Drake groans. “It was one time, Eli.”
I let out a short, dry laugh. “I’m not throwing your mistakes in your face. But you’re constantly criticizing my lack of relationships, yet you can’t seem to stay out of the drama inthe ones you scramble into. My way keeps the peace. Your way has us calling the police when women show up at the office wondering why you haven’t called.”
“Like I said. It was one time and Amber has learned from her mistakes.”
I shake my head. “Whatever, Drake.”
“I’m serious. Come out. Be messy. Meet someone who doesn’t come with a pre-negotiated exit strategy.”
Drake and I haven’t known each other that long, only about five years, but we met at a sustainable housing summit here in Canada and clicked fast. One conversation turned into three, then suddenly we were grabbing beers and arguing about policy like we’d known each other forever.
I’m driven by affordable housing. Real solutions to homelessness. Drake’s passion runs parallel. He’s obsessed with sustainable materials, building furniture that’s meant to last instead of mass-produced junk that falls apart and ends up rotting in a landfill.
Once we started talking shop, that was it. Instant friends. Eventually, business partners. From the jump, we realized we were building different things for the same reason. Purpose first. Everything else second.
Well…almost everything.
Drake will always put a good time near the top of the list. Probably above most things. And honestly, that’s exactly why I like him. He’s the built-in reminder that life isn’t meant to be all work and solitude. He makes sure I don’t turn into a full-blown recluse, even when I’m tempted to.
“Come on,” he pushes. “What do you even have going on tonight?”
“It’s a school night,” I say, even though it’s a Friday. “I have zero interest in spending my evening shoulder-to-shoulder withall the other old men at the club. And I really need to work on that pitch.”
“Thirty-eight is not that old, E. And for the love of lemon pepper wings, please don’t work on that pitch on a Friday night.”
“Hush. And thirty-eight is still too old to be out chasing women and whiskey. I’ve got better things to do with my time than compete with dudes barely out of undergrad.”
“Oh, you mean like Carl?”
I laugh. “Yes. Carl, with the taco meat on his chest.”
Drake loses it. “Gold chain tangled in it, and a head so shiny it looks like he bathes in baby oil.”
We both crack up. That’s Carl to a T. Also the head deacon at my mom’s church.
