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“Yes.” Ava smiled big and clicked the disco-ball clutch open again.
“Yeah, baby, you can show them the ring now,” Nathaniel advised. “Man, I made her take the thing off so we could surprise you. It was like taking a credit card away from my mother.”
“Married?” Charleston asked, looking at his friend.
From the gleaming, gem-covered sphere, Ava pulled the most perfect and precious emerald-cut diamond ring Tamia had ever seen. It was so big, so bright, Ava didn’t even have to push her hand across the table once she’d put it on. Tamia could see the entire thing. No need for questions. It was a Harry Winston. Baguettes on either side of the stone. A platinum band. Flawless on every surface. The kind of ring little girls dreamed of and big boys were proud to purchase. It said something about both of them.
Ava was dancing in her seat, moving the ring from Tamia to Charleston and then back again.
“Yeah, man,” Nathaniel said proudly. “I figured I’m a grown man—time for grown-up things.”
“Guess so.” Charleston’s voice was stacked with trepidation for his friend’s decision and everyone at the table, except for Ava and the dancing fish in her veins, could hear it.
While Tamia shared Charleston’s anxiety, her uneasiness came from a different perspective. Knowing everything she did about Nathaniel made the announcement more than predictable. He was rich, successful, and entitled, and all the men she knew like him, including her own father, married at a certain time in their lives and married certain kinds of women. Her father, like his father and most of the men in her family, married right after law school. He’d met her mother two weeks after getting news that he’d passed the bar exam. She was celebrating the same achievement, had a similar background, knew all of the same people, and came from a good family. They were engaged in less than a year.
Tamia had seen this story repeated so many times that it seemed that if any woman with the same credentials as her mother stuck around longer than that, either she was a fool for waiting or he was a fool who was never getting married. Those kinds of men made fast, studied decisions based on high-society law and the necessity to remain a part of it. Now Ava
, who seemed to have nothing in common with Nathaniel and his upbringing, and knew nothing about any of the circles Charleston and Nathaniel chatted about over dinner, presented a different kind of woman, whom more of the men in Nathaniel’s position were now marrying. She was beautiful. Not just pretty. Not just lovely. Beautiful. Model beautiful. Who cares what she has to say beautiful. Having given up on competing with the women in their circles they now labeled “independent” like it was a curse, the men cared little about where these new breathtaking beauties were from or where they were going. They simply drew up prenuptial agreements and put a ring on it. He’d have an attractive wife, and thus attractive children, and by the time she’d gotten tired of his cheating or had an affair of her own, her looks would be fading and he would need a replacement anyway.
Tamia hated to believe this circle of selfish, predictable decision making, but she knew it was more true than false. And while she knew that Nathaniel’s decision had nothing to do with her, she had to consider what it would mean for her in the future.
More out of duty than desire, Charleston ordered the best bottle of champagne for his friend and his new fiancée. They toasted and, a true sport, Charleston gave a speech as if he’d been practicing it for years. Ava was in tears, smiling and shaking her head in awe at Charleston’s well wishes before she returned to her mirror for a lip-gloss retouch. This was everything she’d always wanted, and she had the face in the mirror to thank for it all. She was never going back to Memphis, not ever.
“So, what about you guys?” Nathaniel asked, putting his arm around Ava like they’d been married for twenty years. “When are you two going to get married?”
Charleston’s eyes narrowed on his friend. Nathaniel knew better than to do that. It was against every man code they’d ever learned. Even mentioning the idea of marriage to another man’s woman was grounds for dismissal. But Charleston knew what his old friend was up to. It was simple. If Nathaniel was going to take the chain and walk into the boneyard, he didn’t want to do it alone. He wanted to take Charleston with him.
“Married? You know I don’t believe in that. It just doesn’t work today. It can’t…I mean, not for me,” Charleston said to burn Nathaniel’s bridge. Really, he knew it was coming. He’d been a player for a long time, but it couldn’t last much longer or he would risk being labeled gay or gauche.
“Ah, you know what they say—a man isn’t taken seriously until he’s married,” Nathaniel said. “You have to do it to stay on the right side of that staircase. Or people will start to question you.” He held out his hand all limp to imitate a stereotypical gay gesture.
“Please. No one will question my manhood. If they even think they should, they need only ask their wives how I’m rolling.” Charleston gave a stiff punch toward the center of the table and he and Nathaniel laughed.
“Really?” Tamia asked, surprised at his brashness.
“Oh, don’t get all serious,” Charleston said. “We’re just playing around.”
“What about you, Tamia,” Ava started, “do you want to get married?”
The question stung like a hot comb at the nape of Tamia’s neck. While Ava wasn’t her girlfriend, she had to know that in addition to the man law about questions concerning marriage, no woman should ever ask another woman how she feels about marriage in front of the man she’s dating. It could and would only cause conflict. Because no matter how he felt about the topic, he’d immediately think the woman was a tramp if she said she didn’t believe in marriage or was trying to manipulate him down the aisle if she said yes. Tamia couldn’t win.
“Well…I…uh.” She looked at her wineglass and then the champagne glass. Both were empty, so she couldn’t take a sip and use the time to think. “I do want to get married,” she said finally and immediately felt Charleston tense up beside her, “but not right now.” She played both sides—law school was paying off.
Charleston’s exhale was audible. His body seemed to melt in relief at the clause. He even put his arm around Tamia in approval. And while this was supposed to give her comfort, really she looked at the arm like the alien shelter it was. It meant so many things she hadn’t wanted to think about. To consider.
Ten minutes later, Charleston’s arm was still around Tamia as they rode up Sixth Avenue in the back of the Bentley. Charleston had been talking about Nathaniel and Ava since they’d gotten in the car, but Tamia was doing little more than nodding and agreeing. She was still thinking about the conversation in the restaurant. Charleston didn’t want to get married. Not ever. Charleston was happy and he didn’t want to get married. Not ever. It was becoming a poem.
“I’m doing that Negro’s prenup,” Charleston said. “It’s gonna be airtight—like a virgin’s legs in a fat man’s bed. She won’t get a dime.”
“Why can’t you just be happy for them?” Tamia asked.
“I am happy my man is getting married. One less hand in the pie. I’m very happy. And I’ll be even happier when I finish writing that prenup.”
“Oh, Lord.” Tamia moved away from Charleston.
“What’s wrong with you?”
“I’m just like, how could you talk about ending a marriage that hasn’t even started? They’re in love. That’s what’s important. Not when and if they split up—and who’s to say that will even happen?” Tamia knew she sounded ridiculous (a betting woman would give Nathaniel and Ava three years tops—five if she had a baby once she realized he was cheating), but something in her needed to hear and believe what she was saying. Sometimes it seemed like everyone she knew who was getting married seemed more concerned about the end than the beginning.
