Then his look revealed the depths of his bitterness. “Nobody turns me down. All these women out here that want my fine chocolate ass? But yet you rejected me?You?”
Maude was distressed. “I said we need more time. I said we need to get to know each other first. How is that wrong?”
“A turn down is a turn down, I don’t care what pretty words you slap on it! A no is a no is a no. And your no was it for me. As far as I was concerned we broke up that day we met, which was the day you said no to me.”
Now Maude was pissed herself. “It would have been nice had you let me in on the break up.” Then her anger flared. “How dare you sit up here and try to gaslight me! We slept together three nights ago, Johnny. Not three months ago. Three nights ago! But we had long since broken up, right? Are you telling me you were a married man for all these months?”
“No. Of course not. I wouldn’t do that to you. I got married the next morning in a small, private ceremony. Two days ago. And unlike you, she did it the right way. She kept herself until she got married. She was a virgin.”
That cut Maude deep. She used to believe fervently in waiting until she got married before she allowed a man to touchher too. But too many cards were stacked against her. She fell in love with the wrong guy when she was still in high school and was too weak to turn him down. But he cheated on her anyway. And every man after that, even though she fell for them hard and gave them her all, because they were always all she had, cheated too. Johnny, at ten months, was her longest relationship ever. She thought they were headed for the altar someday. She truly did. But according to him, that was over on day one. “Just because she was a virgin,” Maude said, “don’t make her better than me.”
“I agree. But she is better than you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I slept with you three nights ago as a sort of gift to myself. It was like my bachelor party without the fellars and the expense. It was my send off from bachelorhood without any fanfare. It was like my last night at the strip club, but without having to pay the stripper.”
Maude couldn’t believe his nasty-ass just said that about her. And her rage caused her to take her glass of gin and fling the contents into his face. Ice and all.
As soon as she did it, Johnny jumped up as if he was freezing as that ice-cold water hit his face like a block of ice, and then rolled down onto his expensive suit.
But Maude wasn’t done. She then took her now-empty glass and threw it at him too. His hands knocked the glass away. But just getting wet angered him. “This is a Versace suit, you bitch!” He yelled at her with clenched teeth, still trying not to make too big a scene because he was a business owner in town and many people that frequented that restaurant knew it.
He grabbed napkins and began wiping off his suit angrily. “I’m so glad I’m done with your trifling ass!”
Then he looked at Maude, ready to go at her even harder. But he saw the devastation on her dejected face. She wasn’t angry like him. She was sad. He had hurt her. Mightily.
And he exhaled. It was love at first sight when he first laid eyes on her ten months ago. She was small, but shapely. She had those high-cheekbones and that structured kind of face he admired. And her dark skin. Her beautiful skin. She was like his dream woman even though he knew he would have to spruce her up to bring her up to his standards. But when she turned him down cold, that was the end of the dream for him.
But he wasn’t trying to hurt her. That was never his intention. He sat back down. “Maude look. It’s not that you’re a bad person. You aren’t bad at all. Not in your looks, and certainly not in your body. And you’re an ethical, honest person. You’re somebody people can trust. All of that is a plus in your favor. And I’m sure you’ll find a brother that can put up with you. But I’m not that brother. I want a wife under subjection to me. I don’t want a quote-unquote ‘career’ woman chasing stories for eleven years and still looking for her first big break. I want a woman who does charity work around town. Who attends banquets in my honor. Who makes a name for herself simply because she’s my wife. You’re not that girl. I doubt if you ever was.”
“And you think that boss lady with that briefcase that just stood at our booth is that girl? You think she’s going to quit her career and be under subjection to you?” Maude shook her head. “You’re delusional. You don’t even listen to yourself talk. You just talk.”
Then she looked at him as if they were on different plains. He was speaking at a general level. She needed specifics. “I have a question,” she said in a voice so calm it scared him.
“What’s your question?”
“Since you claim we broke up when I turned you down, have you always been cheating on me?”
He paused. But answered her. “After the turn down? Yes.”
Which meant every single man she’d ever been with cheated on her practically the entire relationship. And every single time she was always clueless. As if she was groping in the dark thinking she was reaching for Mister Right when in that darkness wasn’t even Mister Right Now. “Why couldn’t I see it?” she asked him with such sincerity that it cut him deep. She was looking into his eyes as if she was searching for answers she wasn’t certain he could give her.
Her face was so sincere and so troubled that it did something to Johnny. And now this woman he thought he’d be glad to be rid of was showing that caring, compassionate, vulnerable side he once fell in love with. And a kind of regret came over him. “Your job is your life, Maude. It was easy for you not to see anything else. And since you don’t bother to have any friends who would tell you what’s going on, or bother to look around yourself, how would you know?”
“And you, like all those other men before you, knew I was distracted and you played on that distraction too?”
Johnny nodded. “We all played on it. We played it like a banjo, yes we did. And you know why we did it? Because we could.”
Maude’s anger flared again. Why did he have to be so nasty about it? “You are such a bastard!” she said.
But when she went there, his compassion for her flew out the window too. And all regret was gone. “Call me whatever you like,” he said as he stood up. Then he leaned over, and flashed his wedding ring at her. “But I’s married now!” Then he frowned. “And thankfully it’s not to your ass.”
There was a bitter finality in his tone as he threw those wet napkins up on the tabletop, look at her with far more hate than love in his eyes, and then he left. He didn’t look back either.
Maude just sat there. A few of the customers near her booth were glancing at her as if she was this pathetic, misbegotten woman, but she couldn’t care less what they thought of her. Because it wasn’t that her heart was all broken up over the likes of that arrogant Johnny Parks. She loved him, but she was still trying to get to where she could say unreservedly that she wasin lovewith him. Her heart wasn’t broken over him like that. But her great hope of someday being somebody’s number one was once again completely severed.
Although many more eyes were upon her as she got up and made her way out of that restaurant, she kept her head high as if it was nothing but a thang to her. Even when the waiter stopped her and insisted she pay the bill for those drinks, she didn’t hesitate to do that either. It was her gas money, but she paid it. She wasn’t going to let that episode with Johnny get the best of her.
