Madison stared at me with that you-know-good-and-well smirk.
Since we all knew I didn’t give a damn, Omari finished the platitude, then shook her hand. Damn, I wanted him to cross the line. “Came by to check on Madison,” I said.
Translation: You do nothing but breathe the same air as her.Fine by me.
“The last one’s finished,” Madison mumbled.
“Last one of what?” I raised a brow. “Last I checked, all your creations were like Forrest Gump’s box of chocolates. All different.”
“Well, I’ve created a set, Wash.” She huffed. “Now, c’mon. The beginner class is in the other studio. I’m not feeling the teacher’s style, but she’s never late.”
Avoiding confrontation noted.We moved through the cement hall, hand in hand. The place was heavy on man buns, two dudes. The rest were toddlers who’d stolen goggles from NASA, official business. Along with ambitiousmémères.
Eyes narrowed, I searched for a sign to verify the room’s occupancy. If they were at capacity, we would be the first to bounce.
“You sure you’re ready for this?” Madison asked.
“Long as Glass & Sass doesn’t burn down,bébé.”
After dressing for Dungeons and Dragons, the teacher handed out molten blobs. When he got to me, I glanced around.I almost said,No, sir, not me, until Madison said, “Thank you,ma’am.” Okay, he was ashe. And the woman played with fire. My eyes swept the room. Damn, everyone was holding their own.Beginner class, my ass!
“Watch me first,” Madison said.
Observe and try not to spontaneously combust. Got it.
Madison twirled her rod, shaping the glass. Then she leaned over. “Twist gently. Follow me.”
“Follow you?”Bébé, I’ll follow you into the Ritz-Carlton on Canal Street or The Roach Coach Inn on Claiborne Ave. But right now, I was ready to lift two fingers in the air and leave her with the man buns. I was pretty sure they weren’t checking for any beautiful ladies, no way.
“I’m done,bébé.” I was over here spraining my eyeballs. In my peripheral, I watched her manipulate fire using only a stick and her bare hands. Did she know how hard that was, watching her rework hell itself, while half my body had stretched itself out of the room.
My soul damn near faded when she leaned closer to me and whispered, “Wash, you barely touched it. You are one misstep from totally undoing a wealth of training I’ve done.”
Training?We should’ve started withIf the glob of fire comes near you, tuck, duck, and roll awaybecause I was ready to do all of that. But she stared at me, head tilted, having the nerve to look cute and curious. Again, my heart sped up, and my eyeballs stretched, glancing at that fire in her hands from the corner of my eye. “I don’t know what training you’re talking about, woman. If you haven’t forgotten, anytime you offered to take a beginner’s class with me, I flaked on your ass. So, this is a brand new me.”Woman, I’m fighting for my life!
And she had the nerve to smile. “I mean training as in my pursuit of you. And once I had you, shaping you.”
“Chère, I’m the one who flirted and tried to get you to talk to me.”
“You call it flirting, I call it training day. That cute face and muscular body worked on all the other girls on campus. They knew you were a hit it and quit it. Guess why I waited until I was eighteen to let you have the cookie?”
“Because …” I stopped and tilted my head.She played me.
“Yep. Make him wait, make him fall.” Madison chuckled under her breath. “Anyway, during all that waiting, I was training you, Washington. Had to eradicate your judgmental facade. You know the idiom, watching paint dry?”
I rolled my eyes. “Woman, gimme a break.”
“No, you weren’t that. You weren’t boring. Just tedious. Youwerethe paint if someone painted all the walls, the ceiling, floors. Everything. Everywhere. Youweredry. You had those judgmental eyes watching me. You even interrogated all my best friends.
“Interrogated. Oh, you’re funny now.”
“Yeah, and honest. You learned my favorite flowers. Color. The superficial crap, all because I didn’t give you any. But I thought it was sweet. Plus, I heard how you got down at Stanford. You and that,” she whispered, “third leg. You needed to distinguish me from all your others because I was born a princess. So, I trained you tosocialize and be funoutside of the bed.” She winked.
“Tell me more?” We had another forty minutes in this class, and she could use that mouth the entire time.
Days later, Momma had our Wednesday dinner at her Creole cottage right outside of Covington. I parked in front of her house. It wasn’t a bad size or anything, but Montana’s mansion dwarfed it, higher up the slope. As I closed the door to my car, I checked a text message from Madison.
“Not coming,” I grumbled, leaning against the door and breathing in the Bogue Falaya River. I dialed her number. She killed the call and texted again.
