Page 44 of The Virgin Playboy

“Rugby, mainly,” I clarified.

“Rugby? They don't play that around here.”

“Well, it’s a popular sport where I'm from?” I noted.

“And where is that?”

“New Zealand.” That comment appeared to ring off bells in their heads, because it was like an instant interest was being taken on me all of a sudden. I think many of them had assumed that I was either Puerto Rican or a light-skinned Black guy.

The conversations that followed pretty much continued on from there until we were at the table sharing dinner with each other. “The food here has to be really different from what you eat, huh?”

“Um, I suppose naturally. I'm from an island, so we have the climate to grow things that would never survive here, but it's what I love about America. I get to experience all these really cool foods from really cool cultures. It's hard to make what I have back home, but with all this, I'm not complaining,” I beamed.

“Island boy,” Winston said, not masking his Bajan accent like most times. At least I had that we could relate to. “When I tell you there’s so much fruit and wild things that you just can't get in the United States, and if you can, the quality just doesn't amount to one you could pick off a tree. It’s why I try to take my family every once in a while, so they can experience it for themselves. “

“Aw, I remember you telling me you’ve been to Barbados, but you don’t mention much about it.” Turning to Jaq, reaching for the back of her hand to kiss.

“That's because I don't want my pics from Crop Over to get shared amongst the class. The more you ask, the more people tell,” Jaq choked out.

“Oh, now I have to see. I will pay anyone for pictures of that,” I teased.

“Do you miss anything about New Zealand, son?” Winston asked.

“More than I can say,” I uncomfortably laughed. “But time moves slower there. The things you could do there, feel disjointed here. It's kind of weird admitting this, but there were days when it would rain, and I don't know, I would just run out into the street or in a yard and just feel the rain on my skin. You can't really do that here. Folks will think you're nuts. But it is one of my better memories there,” I admitted.

“Speaking of folks, what do your parents do?” Jaq’s mom, who in time relaxed into letting me call her, Brenda.

Downplaying it, I gave my version of it, so it didn’t seem like I was bragging. “My folks own a farm back home, so growing up, I just helped them tend to it.”

“Oh, a farm. What's that like?” Brenda continued, curious.

“Honestly, a lot of early days and long nights. My life back home is vastly different than my time out here. Not better or worse, just different,” I added.

Here, I just lived for school, myself and my girlfriend. Back home, I would have been doing things for the church, my family, the farm, volunteering. It was nice to be in a full house where there was always family, but a rare treat to experience quiet sometimes.

“Excuse me, if I'm being rude for saying this—and don't come for me, Jaq. You are my daughter, you're the best thing your mother, and I ever created, and I could just feel you seconds away from defending yourself to the death. Because that's what we taught you⁠—”

“No, Daddy,” she said through gritted teeth.

“My daughter is beautiful, and it doesn’t speak to her value in any way⁠—”

“That she is,” I interrupted, kind of suspicious of where this was going.

“But you're still in school, correct?”

“Yes, I'm actually studying for my doctorate in Music,” I answered.

“So that would make you, how old?” Winston's eyes squinted.

“Daddy, please! Graham, you do not have to answer that⁠—”

“It's okay, Jaq,” as I squeezed her hand for support. “I don't actually mind answering. I'm twenty-eight, sir.” As the discussion of age widened a few of her cousin's eyes. I wasn't some nineteen-year-old with an underdeveloped prefrontal cortex. Granted, your mind still developed well into your 30s, but I calculated risk well enough to where this wasn't something I was being forced to do. I loved Jaq.

“Put yourself in my shoes for a sec. A handsome, talented man under thirty, is pursuing my forty-one-year-old daughter. I didn't raise her to be no one's sugar mama, so please assure me you're not a sugar baby,” he gently accused.

Jaq immediately covered her face, as her cousins laughing hadn’t made it any better. “Oh my god, this is so embarrassing. I swear, we can't even have a nice dinner, Dad. Just throw me off a cliff and sacrifice me to the jumbies like you wanted to at my birth.”

“You're so direct, Winston,” I smiled. “As someone with AuDHD, I love when others are so direct. I can totally see where Jaq gets her tenacity from. It's one of the things I like most about her,” I confessed.