As I headed out of the kitchen, I decided to call my mama. My father would tell me to see what was up with her, but I wanted to get inside my mother’s heart. She understood the inner mechanisms of a woman’s mind, heart, and motives, and that understanding was what I needed most. In the past, Mama used that understanding and intuition to try and warn me about certain women, but I ignored it. I wouldn’t ever ignore it again.
“Hey, baby,” she answered, and I could hear the smile in her voice.
“Hey, Ma. What you doing?”
“Nothing. Waiting for your daddy to get back home with dinner.”
“Aw cool. I’m getting ready to cook in a little while myself.”
“Oh yeah? Must be a special occasion for you to be cooking on a weekday.”
With a chuckle, I agreed with, “I guess you could say that. I uh . . . actually have someone coming over. This . . . woman from my past that I?—”
Mama gasped before hooting and hollering and thanking Jesus. Her dramatics made me laugh, but when she was finally quiet enough for me to talk, I tried to sound as serious as possible.
“I’on know why you acting like I told you I was about to propose to somebody. I just said she was coming over.”
“And seeing as you haven’t let a woman into your home or your heart in over three years, it feels like a proposal to me.”
Laughing, I sat down on the couch in the living room. “Ma, please. You’re about to make me regret even calling you about this shit.”
“Okay, okay. What’s up, baby?”
I sat back and ran my hand over my face. “You remember the girl I used to like in high school? The one me and Mike used to call Peanut Butter?”
“Yes . . .”
“Well, it’s her. She’s a journalist now and came over a week or so ago trying to get an interview. I declined but she just kept coming around.”
“And let me guess . . . those feelings have returned?”
“Yeah. I guess they never really went away. They just buried themselves after I graduated high school. We agreed to be friends, but I can’t lie and say I don’t want more.”
“Then why don’t you have more?” she asked, as if it was that simple.
“Did you not hear me when I said she was a journalist?”
Mama scoffed. “Oh. So this is about Tiffany?”
“To an extent, yeah. The girl stole my book, Ma. I can’t act like that never happened.”
“I’m not asking you to. What I’m asking you to do is let it go and move on. Tiffany did that to you, not your little peanut butter cup.” I chuckled as she laughed like she was headlining a comedy show. “I don’t want you to punish her or any other woman for what Tiffany and Brooke did. Mama’s not downplaying what they did to you, but I don’t want what happened with them in the past to keep you from being loved in the present and giving me some grandbabies in the future.”
“Ma—”
“Obviously you like her enough to have her in your personal space. That alone says a lot. If you want my advice, surrender to that part of you that trusts her. Your brain might be telling you that you can’t, but there’s a part of you that’s actively showing you that you can. That you do. Give her the chance to show you that you’d be safe with her, and see what happens next.”
I sighed and nodded like she could see me. It was easy to say let the shit go when it wasn’t you. This wasn’t just my heart; it was my career too. I wasn’t sure how many times I could take being betrayed in this industry and not lose my passion for publishing. Though I’d never let anyone take away my love for writing, I was at a point after what happened with Tiffany and the paparazzi where I was seriously considering retiring.
People were dragging me online for being upset about my work being read by millions of people for free. I was accused of being greedy and not being grateful for my supporters. Never mind the fact that I’d spent time and sacrificed to create that book, and they were taking money out of my pocket.
And after I popped Trey in the eye for not catching the fucking hint, people started labeling me as an unhingedhoodlum who didn’t deserve the platform I had. True enough, I had a core of solid readers who defended me and still supported me, but that shit was draining. While I wouldn’t say I felt like Avery would do me the way Tiffany did, I couldn’t control what would happen if I opened that door professionally, and that was what had me hesitating to get closer to her.
Because the truth was, even if I didn’t give her an interview, if people found out we were dating, that would take on a life of itself online. For years, I’d gotten used to being in my own little bubble, and something was telling me if I kept dealing with Avery, that bubble was going to be popped.
8
Avery
