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He cut his hair.
He, being Vann London.
Gone was the carpet of curly hair I knew for a fact was soft to the touch. He was bald, and I’d be damned if he didn’t look even more appealing. How was that even possible?! And he had two eyes! The other was a prosthesis, I was sure, but it was so realistic. But honestly, he was beautiful with an eyepatch. So it was no surprise he was beautiful without it too.
He wore a black suit. Black always looked good in contrast to his skin tone. A black suit, black shirt, black tie.
Damn.
Damn, damn, damn!
As I was sitting there at the table, Sharla’s table, thinking in Florida Evans’ voice while trying to act cool and not like my pussy was moonwalking in my lace panties, I found myself glancing at the table near the rear of the room. That’s where Ashley Montreaux, a graduate assistant in our department, informed guests of their table number and directed them to their seats. Vann was no longer there. No, he was on his way to the table.Sharla’s table. It wasn’t that this was news to me. It was just that he was him, and he was looking finger licking good!
I turned my attention to the program before me as if I hadn’t been the person who designed it and picked them up from Romey U’s print shop, so I about jumped across the room when V, Sharla’s and Vann’s mother, greeted me.
“Brooklyn!” she gushed, rounding the table to hug me.
I stood, accepting her warm embrace. Valley London, or V as she insisted everyone call her, was the definition of kindness and light. I hadn’t had the privilege of spending a lot of time with her, but I’d been around her enough to envy Sharla. Not that my mother was bad. She just wasn’t V.
Releasing me, she gave me a wide smile as her eyes swept down my body. “That dress! You are just as gorgeous as ever!” she said. “Red is your color, sugar. I’m so glad to see you! How’s that baby girl of yours?”
“Too grown for me. And you look beautiful, as usual,” I replied.
“Thank you, honey. Rabbit, come say hi to Brooklyn.”
I hugged and greeted Rabbit and then Sharla and Jovani since they’d all arrived together. By the time we’d all taken our seats at the table, Vann had disappeared. I figured he was checking on something for Messiah and was honestly relieved I’d avoided greeting him personally. Then I realized the only vacant seat at the table was the one on my immediate right.
Well, hell.
Soon, I was too busy people-watching and speaking to Nadia and everyone at her table which was next to ours to really think about Vann sitting next to me. Then I started people-watching as the room buzzed with activity. Many people were perusing the auction items and placing bids. There was a time when I would’ve been among them, but that was in the past, a past I admittedly missed. I once felt so comfortable at these events but had avoided them since the divorce. I still held some of my old memberships but was the definition of inactive. Now I found myself feeling out of place sitting at my friend’s table wearing a repeat dress.
I wanted to leave. No, I wanted to havenotfucked up my marriage.
I sighed, causing Sharla, who sat on my left, to ask me if I was okay. Before I could lie and say I was, Vann was back at the table. Settling into the chair next to me. If that wasn’t enough, I caught sight of my ex-husband, who’d evidently arrived, as he threaded his way toward me.
VANN
This woman smelled so good. Shealwayssmelled good and it wasn’t just the perfume she wore. I could recall being with her after marching around campus and dancing for hours and her damn sweat smelled good to me.
She wouldn’t look at me, but she knew I was next to her and all I could do was sit there and fight the urge to grab her pretty ass by the neck and stick my tongue down her throat. It’d been a while since I’d had the pleasure of being with a woman and it’d been forever since I’d been with this woman. Being with her was in a category all its own. Brooklyn had god tier pussy. Never experienced anything like it before or after her.
Nothing. Like. It.
I was supposed to be working. My client, a music legend in the making, was performing tonight, and although everything was in place from the bodyguards I’d found through a local agency that were outside his dressing room door to the special microphone I’d had overnighted from Messiah’s favorite artisan, I still needed to be alert. He could text me with an emergency at any moment and he was my bread and butter, my only client. And he paid me well.
However, the only thing I was focused on was the woman beside me and the memories just hearing her name evoked. Memories of her body covered in the most beautiful shade of brown skin. Her smile, the sound of her moans and sighs. It’d been a long time since the last time, but I never forgot. I couldn’t forget.
How does one forget their first love, theironlylove?
I also recalled how my disorientation of self, my confusion about my value as a person, ruined what could’ve been, and how, at the time, I was unable to be who she needed me to be. I could be him now, though, couldn’t I?
Trying my best to glance at her inconspicuously, I found her attention on the table, her pretty face screwed up in a frown. Her energy was off too. Instead of the discomfort I usually felt from her, she seemed…angry.
“Hello, Brooklyn, everyone,” a baritone, accented voice bellowed.
Turning, I saw an older dark-skinned man in a sleek tuxedo standing over Brooklyn. He wore round, wire-rimmed eyeglasses and a broad smile. Salt and pepper hair trimmed, a bowtie, Gucci logo pocket square peeking out of his tux pocket. This man was obviously rich and familiar to everyone but me, including my mother as she and everyone but me chorused a “hello,” in response to his greeting.
“Hello, Isaac,” Brooklyn replied tersely.
