Over. (This. Is. Not. Over. #2) (19 page)

“Blondie.” I say to him and then immediately look at Red. She doesn’t
even flinch. Badass. I’m right behind her, she had no idea I just flew in town, she’s looking at my picture on a TV screen, she suddenly hears my voice behind her and she doesn’t … even … flinch. Bad. Ass.

“Malcolm, right?” Blondie says.
Muthafucka, you know me. Now move your ass over
. I point to the TV screen and then smile.

“That’s what they tell me.” He nods and then takes a sip of his white wine spritzer.

“I was just catching up with Red.” Blondie called her Red. He’s trying to ruffle my feathers.

“
Red
huh?” He starts to grin. I look at Red and she takes a casual sip of her scotch.
Hell yeah, Danielle. Ignore my ass.

“
Well that’s what the news says your pet name is for her. So I figured it could be mine too.”

“Oh okay, so you
do
know who I am.” Blondie keeps his grin.

“What can I get you?” He points to the bar. Are you serious?

“I’ll take what you’re having.” I look to the bartender. “Martini, please.”

“Vodka.” Blondie say,
his grin starting to fade off his face.

“Vodka, huh?” I look back to the bartender. “What’s she having?” I point to Red.

“Double shot of whiskey.” The bartender answers as he dries off a glass.

“I’ll have what she’s drinking.” I look back at Blondie who’s in a full scowl at this point. “Damn you’re always here.” I gesture around the bar. “You live
out back or something?”

“I
own
this place.” He smirks, pleased with himself. Wupty-fucking-doo. Red takes a lazy sip of her drink.

“Bravo.” But I’ve been known to shut a bar down,
just ask Jon. “Now slide your ass over.” Play Time over.

“Who the fuck are you?”

“Are we going through this again?”

“You can talk to her, when I’m finished.” Uh, oh. Bad move, Blondie. I watch Red turn
towards him, her eyes shooting darts through his head. This makes me feel good inside, so I smile. Red doesn’t care about Blondie and I having a pissing contest but the feminist in her won’t stand for him passing her around. Watch this.

“Can you believe this guy, Red?
‘When I’m finished’
… who does this asshole think he is?”

“Shut the hell up, Malcolm.” She says.
Okay.
“Goodbye.” She says to Blondie. He’s holding onto his martini, giving me a nasty look.

“Damn,” I say to Blondie, “you’d think a business proprietor would treat their patrons better.
” I shake my head in disappointment. “Be nice, scoot over.”

“Fuck you.” He says as he
gets up. I give him a wink as I slide into his seat and he walks away.

So, this can go one of two ways, I can bullshit or beg. Let’s try bullshit first.

“Those were some badass cufflinks I had on right there.” I point to the TV screen showing Laura and me, both of us smiling, our faces inches from each other, my hand on the side of her face. You can’t say that I never tried with her. I did. I did try to feel as happy as I looked. Red looks at the screen and then cuts her eyes over to me. And I’m not exactly sure what I see in them. It’s not anger. It’s not hurt. Then what is it? We lock eyes and I try to figure her out. What is she thinking? She adjusts her earth pendant, making it perfectly center on her chain. Jim found it on the plane yesterday and I expressed it to the resort this morning. I have no idea why but if she would have lost that pendant, it would have crushed me. It didn’t cost me a ton but that pendant tells our story. Losing it would have meant that our story would have been lost forever. It would have meant that our story was over. And trust me: This. Is. Not. Over.

“Those are some nice cufflinks
.” She takes a sip of her drink and then grabs her purse. Reaching in, she takes out a few bills and tosses them on the bar. “For him, me and the girls,” she says to the bartender who brings me my double shot of whiskey. Okay, I wasn’t expecting this. I was expecting her to be mad, yell, or ignore me (she’s notoriously famous for doing that). I wasn’t expecting her to buy me a round of drinks. Ok, joke’s over.

“Red.” I say, as I grab her
hand. “No bullshitting, let’s just talk.”

“About what? About you owning Laura’s house still? About me being called an adulterer? About you looking like a Don Juan through all of this?” She points to the TV screens. “You know,” she says as she moves closer to me, “it’s a shame how the media flips everything on the women in situations like this. Now
I’m
an adulterer and
Laura
is a mistress. But tell me Malcolm, what the hell are
you
?”

“Red–”

“I’ll tell you, you’re the man who’s fucking one woman while trying to hang on to the next.”

“Laura and I were done before last summer, I can promise you that.”

“Then why did you still own her house!”

“She isn’t–”

“She isn’t what?”

“She has–”

“What? What does she have?”

“
Let me finish my sentence, Danielle. Please. She has problems. Serious problems. And I felt that she wasn’t responsible enough for her own wellbeing. She wasn’t responsible enough to take care of that home; pay taxes, pay home insurance.”

“What the hell are you talking about? She’s thirty
-two years old. I swear Malcolm …” she goes to turn around but I stand, take her by her arm and ease her back over to me.

“Danielle, she has problems.” I say as I lean down to her, our faces nearly touching.

“We all have problems.”

“No, not like hers. She’s off
, Red.”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s on medication for her moods, or at least that’s what we all call them. Her therapist has diagnosed her as
Emotionally Profound
but it’s more than that. She’s barely functional at times, even on medication, because her reality is warped. But that information can go no further than the family.” I can feel her arm relaxing inside of my hand as her eyes stay drilled into mine.

“What?”

“Listen, it’s pretty bad with her, okay? But her parents won’t take the time to get her the real help she needs, so they have a doctor prescribing her medication for her
profoundness
. The medication makes her relaxed, drowsy. Basically it keeps her out of everyone’s hair. Unfortunately for Laura, since she has status, she’s
profound
. If she was a nobody, her ass would have
problems
. And if she happens to miss a dose of her medication, she can become …”

“A handful. That’s what Winnie told me.”

“That’s putting it mildly.” I ease an arm around her lower back and pull her closer to me. We’re body to body. She’s looking up at me through her lashes and I run a hand over the earth pendant. No, our story is not over. “I swear that I’ll get you out of this fire and I promise that you’ll never have to worry about me and another woman. I’ve had women, plenty of women. That shit is boring.”

And I think I see her resolve weaken. I think I may see a spark of understanding in her eyes.

“Danielle, is he bothering you?” I hear Jasmine say. I turn my head and see Jasmine, Rena and Red’s mother standing there. I take a respectful step away from Dr. Rouge’s daughter. Jasmine looks like she wants to see me dead, Dr. Rouge has her arms crossed and Rena’s got a smirk on her face. That damn Rena. Just seeing that smirk makes me smile.

“Dr. Rouge, thank you for coming.”
I say to her as I reach out my hand for her to shake.

“Mmm
hmm.” She says as she shakes it.
What else you got white boy?

“And
don’t worry, I’ll have this all cleared up by seven a.m. central standard time on December seventeenth.” I smile and point to the TV screen. She looks at me like I’m dumb as hell. “Inside joke between Attorney Rouge and me.” I look between all of the ladies for a bit of encouragement. Everyone but Rena looks like they’re ready to smack the shit out of me. “I’m sorry about this.” I say to them all as I drop my smile, opting for a more serious approach since they don’t seem to be in the giggling mood. “And I
will
fix it.”

“This was a ladies night, Malcolm.” Jasmine says as she crosses her arms. “So, if you don’t mind …”

“I’ll see myself out.” I put my hands up in surrender. I get it, you ladies want to rag on me in peace. Point taken.

“Thanks.”
Jasmine says as she looks at Danielle’s mother and gives her a ‘can you believe this clown?’ face. Damn, Jasmine is
not
a Malcolm Blair fan. But this is the funny part, are you listening? Good, because this is sure to get you going. Twelve years ago at St. Bernadette, after Jasmine looked at my ID and found out that I was Red’s secret crush, she came up to me. I was in the hallway with Jacob and we all were between classes:

“So you like my best friend?” She said to me with a little smile on her face.

“He does,” Jacob said before I had a chance to answer, “and I like you, so where do we go from here?” He winked. She grinned. I walked away.

Yeah, y
ou would have never known that Jasmine and I go way back, back to when she was a sixteen year old at St. Bernadette and I was eighteen. Back to when she used to sneak into Jacob and my dorm room, towards the end of his and my senior year at St. Bernadette. Back when I used to excuse myself so that they could ‘make out’. Back to when she and I both stood on the steps of Red’s dormitory, the day of her and Red’s high school graduation, and she said:
I’ll slip this box of flowers into our dorm room for you.
Back to when she used to sneak up to Princeton and spend entire weekends at Jacob and my apartment. Back to when Jacob married Winnie and the next day, when I ran into Jasmine at the Starbucks on Tremont St., I sat with her for hours while she cried into her coffee cup. That was back around the time she began hating all things Blair.
Damn Jasmine, you and I go way back, and no one would ever know.
I grin at Jasmine and nod my head.
But I’ll keep that between us.

“Can we meet for coffee tomorrow Danielle?” I ask.

“I’m not sure, I’ll have to call you about that and let you know.” Her voice is so damn snooty, she almost sounds British.

Hell yeah ..
. I like when Red acts tough.

“Dr. Rouge, Rena, Jasmine, again I’m sorry.” I say to them and they of course say nothing.
(But Rena sneaks me a wink. I’ll tell you, I like that damn Rena.) “Danielle …” I give her a quick nod and then turn to leave.
Let us try this again in the morning
. I weed through the crowded bar and head towards the front door.

And guess who holds it open for me.

Monday

Malcolm

12:00 a.m.

I won’t lie; I’m a little stressed right now. So Jacob hired a cab to drive him, Nat and me to a guy’s night in Savannah, Georgia, without so much as a second thought … just to help me through this.             

“Damn, they
kicked your ass out the bar?” Jacob says. He and Nat laugh. Funny. “Damn dude, Danielle said that place wasn’t big enough for the both of you.” They laugh again. “Mac got kicked out the damn bar.” They laugh harder. “I mean look at your luck! Your house gets burned down, you head to the bar and then they kick your ass out of it.” They laugh again. Oh, by the way, we’re drunk.

             
“You’re cut off gentlemen.” Arthur, the bartender and owner says. Arthur’s as old as his name sounds. He scoops all three of our empty glasses up and pushes three glasses of water in front of us.

             
“Come on, Art!” Jacob yells. He and Nat break out into a tizzy of laughter again. Jacob gets like this when he’s drunk: loud as hell. Nat gets like this when he’s drunk: giggly as hell.

What am
I
doing this entire time? Well I’m sitting at a bar in Savannah called The Bar. Simple enough. Nothing too complicated for Arthur to try to remember. It’s loud, trashy, and has the nerve to have a drink limit. Fuck The Bar. Six drinks and Arthur’s cut me off. Fuck Art. But in all fairness, it may be because I look dazed: I’m staring at the TV screen behind him, the brim of my hat low enough so that my face won’t be seen. I’m plotting on how to smooth this over with Red. I’m not at the point where I’m trying to figure out how to get her back; I have enough hope that says I haven’t lost her yet. I’m at the point where I can see that she’s playing the I-don’t-give-a-shit card. And I have a feeling, that’s not the card I want. I dealt with that card for twelve years, I know what it means. Red has the gift of the fuck-off: she can wonder about you for over a decade and never even turn over your ID card. I don’t want the I-don’t-give-a-shit card. Anything but that card.