Getting to the Good Part Read online

  I took a nice long, hot shower, threw on some jeans and a sweatshirt, tossed some things into a bag, and headed out into the streets.

  It was early. Only about 7 A.M.

  First, I went and had my braids redone at one of those African braid shops on 125th Street. The ones where you can barely get out of your damn car without the African women accosting you, begging, “Hair braided? Hair braided?”

  It only took the woman four hours to do what typically took eight to ten hours back home in Florida, even in Atlanta.

  The braids were so tight, my eyes were slanted. I wouldn’t need them done again for at least another month.

  Those African women were nots to be messed with.

  After that, I headed over to my appointment. The one I had called and had pushed back. I had set it up a couple of weeks before. It was something I had long been wanting to do for myself.

  Julian had a friend, a woman named Mina, who did spa treatments out of her brownstone in Park Slope in Brooklyn. She stayed booked up, but had called me a while back about a Saturday cancellation that she’d be able to fit me in.

  What was cool about Mina was that she only took care of one customer a day.

  Hell, I see why. She charged enough for it.

  So I rode over to Brooklyn after I got my braids done, and let her give me a total body pampering.

  I got my nails done (manicure and pedicure), my body waxed, a full massage, my brows plucked, a mud treatment—the whole shebang.

  She even had this soothing aromatherapy candle burning in the room and played a CD of the ocean washing up on the shore. All this to relax me.

  The scented candle was fine. But I brought my own CD. I asked her if I could have it played instead of hers.

  She, of course, said yes.

  (What else was she going to say? I was paying her behind $250 for the visit. I was going all out to treat myself that day.)

  Can you guess what CD I gave her to play?

  I’ll bet you can.

  I know what relaxes me. I wasn’t even about to mess around when it came to that.

  I was in heaven, lying facedown on the cushy massage table, a heated pad on my naked back, with a blanket thrown over it to cover me. My man Maxy was crooning to me strong.

  I drifted off to sleep, totally relaxed and stress-free for the moment.

  For once, it was a restful dream.

  When I woke up, I was totally at peace.

  When I walked out of Mina’s place at dusk, I had a spring in my step, my head was clear, and I was once again the proud, cocky bitch I’d always been.

  It was time to slay again.

  I was feeling a little ripe.

  I hopped in the Boxster and headed over to the Dean Street Cafe. It should be jumping tonight.

  Might as well stay in Brooklyn since I was already there.

  The Dean Street Cafe was a popular spot that was always thick with people, deep into the wee hours of the night. The food was great, and the atmosphere was pretty cool, even if it was a bit tight in there at times, what with all the people there.

  I rode by. The parking was ridiculous. People were parked all up and down the street. There was no room to spare.

  I drove by the restaurant slowly, looking through the window. As usual, the crowd was thick. Much too thick for me to want to contend with at the time.

  I thought of another spot and whipped the car around. A place where the food was always good, and a sistah was bound to see a fine brother or five, hanging out with his boys, just getting his grub on.

  I hopped back on Atlantic, zipped down the avenue a little ways, and found an empty meter in front of the restaurant.

  I peeked inside.

  True to form, I saw some cuties at various tables. Some were with women, some were not. And the crowd wasn’t so thick that I couldn’t deal.

  I checked myself out in the rearview mirror.

  My braids were kickin’, and I was looking and feeling totally hooked. I had on a short leopard slip dress with my patent leather go-go boots. On my legs, I wore a pair of funky black hose. Nuthin’ but net. My perfectly toned thighs were exposed for all the world to see.

  The weather was a little brisk, but not too cold, so I had a light wool jacket, black, thrown over my shoulders, just to get me inside. Then it would immediately come off.

  I’d brought the clothes with me to change into at Mina’s. Just in case I felt in the mood to go out afterward.

  I was glad I’d brought them. A sistah was feeling pretty darn good.

  And, as I stepped out of the car and walked into Cafe Brawta, from the way the brothers’ heads snapped in my direction, they were glad I’d brought them, too.

  Cafe Brawta was a cool Jamaican restaurant that was one of the trendiest spots in Brooklyn.

  The food was da bomb. Oversized decorative plates filled with healthy, delicious dishes like curried coconut shrimp with rice and peas and cabbage, jerk chicken, oxtails, and vegetarian fare. There was ginger beer, sorrell, sea moss, and an amazingly fresh fruit punch with honey in it. One sip, and it blew your mind.

  There were no carbonated beverages to be found.

  Nothing but pure, all-natural, good-ass eating.

  I pretended to ignore all the fine brothers at first. I noticed some of the sistahs who were there with their men giving me strange looks.

  “Welcome to Cafe Brawta,” the bright-faced waitress greeted. “Will you be dining in, or ordering takeout?”

  “I’m dining in, thank you,” I answered sweetly.

  “Are you meeting someone here?”

  “No, I’m not,” I said in a singsongy voice. “All I need is a table for one.”

  She gave the room a quick survey, then led me over to a table near the back, by the window.

  It was right next to a table with two very attractive brothers.

  I smiled my most saccharine smile, gave a quick hi, and flipped my braids back as I passed.

  I noticed both their eyes in my direction as I slid into my chair.

  They were waiting to see if my dress was going to ride up.

  I could tell. I’d seen that look a million times before.

  “Do you need a minute with the menu?” the waitress asked.

  “No. I know what I want. Let me have the buttered shrimp with rice and peas and cabbage. And a glass of fruit punch.”

  She scribbled away.

  “Will that be all?”

  “Yes. Thank you.”

  She hurried off, leaving me to look around the room, starting first with the two brothers to my immediate left.

  They both nodded. I quickly scanned their left hands to see if they were married, not that that was a true indicator. Brothers were always taking off their rings when they went out to hang.

  Besides, they could be, as Dandre’s profile said, Single, But Officially Off the Market.

  I quickly pushed the thought of Dandre out of my head.

  I didn’t see any ring outlines on their fingers.

  Well, there were at least two for me to pick from, for starters.

  I glanced around the room. There were more brothers together at a table near the bathroom. Four of them. Hip-hop hard-cores, or at least they were trying to be, with bubble jackets (even though it was no way near cold enough for them yet) and skullies.

  “’Zup, sexy,” one of them said.

  He was a cutie with a round brown face and a goatee. He looked real young. I wondered how young.

  I wondered what was too young for me to mess with. I’d been out of true circulation for so long, hanging around with Dandre, that I’d forgotten my own parameters.

  If he was at least twenty-three, then maybe I’d hit it. If he was any younger, I’d just have to walk away.

  “Wuzzup,” I nodded back.

  Just as I was cheesing at him, a couple came in through the front door.

  I saw them out of the corner of my eye, and I could tell that the brother was cute. I turned, full-face, to look in th
eir direction.

  He was cute.

  He was beyond cute.

  He was fine as hell. Just the kinda fine I liked.

  My jaw was wide open in utter surprise.

  It was Dandre.

  Every hair on my body was standing on end.

  The woman who was with him was beautiful. She was light brown with a very short haircut. She was practically bald. But her face was so pretty, she didn’t even need hair.

  She looked like a supermodel.

  In fact, I think she was. I had a copy of Essence magazine at home with that very same woman smack-dab on the cover.

  My chest began to heave a little as I sat at the table, unsure of what to do.

  Actually, I was not unsure. I knew exactly what I wanted to do.

  I wanted to go off on his ass, right there in Cafe Brawta.

  The nerve of him, being out on the town with some bitch other than me!!!

  That’s why his ass wasn’t answering my e-mail!!!!

  They didn’t see me because I was sitting back there in the corner. But it’s not like Cafe Brawta was all that big. All they had to do was turn their faces just half an inch, and I’d be right there in plain view, big as day.

  Dandre leaned close to her and whispered something in her ear. His hand was on her arm.

  I felt acid boiling in my belly and rising up to my throat.

  The woman threw her head back and giggled, like what he’d just said was the funniest fucking thing in the whole wide world.

  She touched him back.

  I was so full of steam, if it shot out of my behind, I would have taken off like a rocket.

  I wished I had a gun. An Uzi. I could have shot that bitch right there on the spot and left her pulpy ass spinning in a bloody messy heap.

  Stop it, Reesy, I said to myself. It’s not her fault. Don’t get mad at the woman. Get mad at the man.

  Bump that!!!!

  I wanted to KILL that bitch for being out with my man!!!!

  Besides, he had probably showed her my e-mail. She probably knew all about my ridiculous, pitiful letter asking him to reconsider.

  The waitress spoke to them for a moment, then began to lead them my way.

  Dandre saw me instantly.

  His face turned into stone.

  I couldn’t read his expression, but from the way my temples were throbbing, I knew damn well that he could read mine.

  The waitress seated them at a table one over from me. The supermodel grabbed her seat first, leaving Dandre the chair that was directly facing me.

  I glared at him. He looked at me blankly, then smiled and turned his attention to the Essence girl as she leaned forward to ask him something.

  The waitress came back with my fruit punch and food.

  “Excuse me,” I heard Dandre say to his date, nodding in my direction. “I see someone I know. Let me go speak to her for a minute.”

  She turned her head and looked back at me. Her eyes narrowed a little, as if she was trying to qualify who the hell I was. I saw her lip curl into a smile.

  She did know about my e-mail!!!!

  Before he could get up and come over to me, I rose from my chair. When he saw me getting up, he sat back down.

  I opened my wallet and quietly placed a wad of money on the table. I drank a quick sip of the fruit punch and walked away from the table, past him and Miss Essence without a word and right out of the restaurant.

  By the time I got into the car, my blood was on full boil.

  How could he do that to me? How could he just go out with another chick and be all pushed up with her like that? Apparently, what’d we had meant nothing to him for real. He had just moved on.

  From one coochie to the next.

  And what the hell was he doing in Cafe Brawta to begin with? What kind of ironic shit was that?

  Dandre and I had never been to the restaurant together.

  Besides, he lived all the way on the Upper West Side. He usually went to restaurants in Manhattan, claiming he wasn’t feeling Brooklyn the way everybody else was these days.

  Then, what that hell was he doing there? Tonight?

  What’s even wilder is that he’d never taken me to Cafe Brawta. I’d found out about the place on my own, one afternoon, in a quest for some good Jamaican food. Dandre knew I liked West Indian cuisine, but he had never once mentioned this joint to me.

  And I know he had to notice the Boxster when he pulled up at the curb. The evil bastard probably rolled up to the restaurant, knowing I was in there, just to drive home his point.

  (Of course, I knew that was a lie as I thought it. Dandre wasn’t one to try to lord something over you. When he left you alone, he left you alone.)

  Lording was my specialty. I was the queen of vengeance.

  And look at where it had gotten me. Behind the wheel of a fancy car, all alone, with shitload of egg on my face.

  What in the world ever made me send that e-mail his way?!

  As I cranked up the car and went to drive off, I noticed there was a full moon in the sky.

  That explained it.

  Full moons were my thang. One way or another. Whenever there was a full moon, which, obviously, was every month, something really weird and ironic always happened to me.

  Always.

  Without fail.

  The type of weird varied. It could be something wonderful, wild, and exciting.

  Conversely, it could be something so fucked up, it defied description.

  Any way you look at it, irony was always involved.

  Well, I guess tonight was my night for irony. And there’s no need to guess which kind of weird this moon turned out to be.

  I pulled away from the curb, heading down Atlantic, whipping a right turn at the light on Boerum Place just before it turned red, and zipping my pitiful behind toward the Brooklyn Bridge.

  I don’t even remember the drive uptown on the FDR. All I remember is pulling up in front of the building, being grateful that it was the weekend and the fact that I didn’t have to deal with Mayor Giuliani’s fucked-up alternate-side parking law, and going upstairs to my crib.

  I went from front door to sleep in less than four minutes. I didn’t even turn on any lights. I glided through the living room into my bedroom, along the way peeling out of my apparently-not-sexy-enough dress, kicking off my shoes, and flinging my purse down.

  I slid under the covers. I pulled them tightly over my head and around my body so that no manner of light could possibly manage to get in. Secure in the darkness, I squeezed my eyes shut.

  I wanted to block out the world and any thoughts of Dandre, like he’d apparently done of me. Forever.

  Who needed his sorry ass anyway?

  I knew the answer, as I felt myself drifting off to sleep.

  I did, that’s who.

  I was awakened by the constant ringing of my buzzer.

  I pulled the covers from over my head and glanced at the clock.

  It was only 1 A.M. I was surprised at how early it was. I thought I’d been out much longer than that.

  I was actually happy to be awake. I’d been having another one of those dreams.

  This time, Dandre was banging Salt-n-Pepa. That’s right, the entire group, including Spinderella.

  That, to me, was taking it just a bit too far.

  Perhaps if I’d slept a little longer, I would have gotten to the part where Treach from Naughty by Nature, Pepa’s man, kicked Dandre’s natural black ass.

  That would have made the dream worthwhile, I think.

  I dragged up, naked, from the bed. I blindly reached for my robe off the back of the door and slipped it on.

  I rubbed my eyes. My braids were hanging all over my face. I felt like I had been asleep for a hundred years.

  “Who?” I muttered, my throat scratchy.

  “It’s me, Reesy,” the deep, familiar voice bellowed. “C’mon, buzz me in.”

  “What do you want?” I asked plainly.

  This was so weird. I was
neither happy nor angry that he’d come by. I was so tired, my emotions hadn’t kicked in at all to register anything.

  “I wanna talk to you. Open the door.”

  I pressed the buzzer.

  I didn’t know why. I didn’t see why not.

  I was standing there with the door cracked when he came up.

  I didn’t know what I looked like.

  I didn’t care.

  Dandre was looking good, but what else was new?

  My heart, usually prone to leaping at his sight, stayed perfectly still. I didn’t know what he wanted, or why.

  I was just plain numb. The night, and that damn Salt-n-Pepa scene, had been far too much for me.

  He stopped in the doorway and studied my face.

  “You look tired. Did I wake you?”

  “Come in and shut the door behind you,” I said, and walked away.

  I went over to the couch and sat down. Dandre came over and sat next to me. There was about a foot of space between us. Which was fine with me. The last thing I needed was to be crowded right now.

  “Why didn’t you give me a chance to come over and talk to you?” he asked.

  “I wasn’t in the mood.”

  “Oh.”

  “Besides,” I added, “you’ve had plenty of chances to talk to me. You obviously weren’t in too much of a rush to do it.”

  He looked down at the floor as he rubbed his chin.

  “You’re talking about your e-mail.”

  “What e-mail?” I denied.

  “Oh, please, Reesy,” he scoffed. “C’mon now. Don’t go there.”

  I got up from the couch. He reached for my hand to try to stay me.

  I glanced at his hand on my hand. My natural reaction was to resist and put up some sort of fight. I wasn’t in the mood.

  So I sat back down.

  “Come closer,” he said. “What you doin’ way over there?”

  “Please. I don’t think that’s appropriate for us anymore. Isn’t that what you said?”

  “Reesy, I read your e-mail.”

  “I know you did. You read it seven days ago. And never bothered to respond.”

  Dandre sighed.

  “I didn’t know how to.”

  I leaned my head back against the pillows, too tired to even have the conversation.