Fixin’ Tyrone (19 page)

“Hey, you guys want me to take your picture?”

“Yeah,” Tyrone said. “We want a picture!” He grabbed Mia’s shoulder and pulled her close to him. He smelled like Cool Water.

“C’mon, y’all. Get close.” He positioned the kids for a nice family photo.

“All right, everybody. Say cheese!” the teenager said.

“CHEESE!” everyone said, even Mia.

“How do we get the picture?” Tyrone asked Mia after the shot was taken.

“Before you leave, you can go to the gift shop and buy a keychain with the picture in it,” Mia said. “I think they sell mugs, too.”

“I want a mug!” Mica yelled.

“I want a keychain!” TC piped in.

“And so it begins,” Mia said and rolled her eyes.

“Naw, it’s all good,” Tyrone said. “I’ma hook y’all up. C’mon! Let’s get you on one of them roller coasters so me and yo mama can talk!”

But Tyrone and Mia didn’t get a chance to talk at the first attraction. The Mini Mine Train required an adult passenger, so all four of them buckled up for the ride. Mia and Mica shared a seat in the middle of the train, and Tyrone and TC took the spot behind them.

“You ever been on this before?” Tyrone ask TC.

“Yeah, it’s fun.”

“Is it scary?”

“A little bit.”

An attendant pushed one of the buttons behind his booth and the small train began to roll down the tracks.

“Hold on,” TC warned.

“For what?” Tyrone asked.

The cart clanked on what sounded like unstable tracks and then suddenly they took a steep drop and were engulfed in darkness. The ride was only two minutes long, but there was a lot of excitement packed in. The train shot out into daylight, made a quick right, then dipped back down into a darkened tunnel. At one point, it made a left that seemed to never end, as if they were sliding down a twisty straw.

The climax came when the cart began a slow, rickety ascent. They went up so high they were level with the branches of nearby trees. Everyone knew what was coming, but that knowledge left them ill prepared for the high-speed plunge back into darkness.

Mica and TC shrieked, but above them Mia heard Tyrone yelp like a little girl, and that was almost the best part of her day. When the train came to a squeaky stop back at the station, Mia turned in her seat and grinned at her son’s father. Tyrone was still wide-eyed, but he smiled back at her.

“You all right back there, hoss?” she asked him.

“You know that was scary. Y’all wasn’t scared?” he asked.

“That was a
children’s ride
, Tyrone,” Mia said.

“
I
thought it was scary,” he said. “I been gone six years. Doin sixty-five on the highway scares me!”

This cracked Mia up, and the kids as well.

* * *

The adults finally had a chance to talk when Mica and TC got in line for a twirling teacup ride. Mia sat on a nearby bench, and Tyrone took a seat next to her. He stretched out his left arm on the back of the bench and had the nerve to throw the right one behind Mia’s shoulders.

“Um, you need to move your arm,” she said.

“Oh, my bad.” He moved it and stared into her eyes. “You look good,” he said. “Got yo hair done today?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s, um,
stunning
,” he said. “Where’d you go?”

“Cut the small talk,” Mia said. “Go ahead and say what you want to say.”

“All right. So why yo boyfriend throw a brick in yo window?”

“He didn’t. His ex-girlfriend did.”

“Why she do that?”

“’Cause she wants him back, why else?”

“So he was cheatin’ on you with her? That’s why you broke up with him?”

“No. He wasn’t cheating on me.”

“How you know?”

Mia hadn’t considered that. “Anyway, I broke up with him because that crazy bitch was following me around. That’s the
only
reason I broke up with him.”

Tyrone nodded, then smiled. “So, you see how I was right, though? Everything happened just like I wanted it to.”

“You wanted a brick in my window?”

“Naw. Quit playin’. You know what I’m talkin’ ’bout.”

“Yeah. We broke up. Just like you said. Your prophecy has been fulfilled, oh great one.”

Tyrone didn’t say anything. She looked over at him and he was cheesing, flashing all thirty-two.

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Mia said.

“How come it don’t?”

“’Cause I’m still not going out with you, Tyrone.”

“Why not?”

“’Cause you’re not the type of guy I go out with. You are not my type. My ex-boyfriend was perfect. You’re nothing like him.”

“Damn, you just gon’ put me out like that? What make him so much better than me?”

“Well,” Mia counted on her fingers. “He had his own car.”

“Nah.” Tyrone shook his head. “I ain’t got one of those.”

“He had his own house.”

“Nope, ain’t got one of them either.”

“He had a good job.”

“I got an
all right
job.”

“Working for your uncle?”

“He got his own shop. Made me manager.”

“How many people you got under you?”

“Huh?”

“Who do you tell what to do?”

“Um, that one dude who sweeps,” Tyrone said.

“My ex-boyfriend has money in the bank, you know, ’
Shawty, what you drank?
’”

“Next,” Tyrone said.

“And he was romantic,” Mia said.

“Okay.” Tyrone lit up. “I got him on that one. I’m romantic as hell!”

“Wow, spoken like a true poet,” Mia said.

“Naw, for real. I
am
romantic.”

“Tell me something you would do for your girl on a romantic date.”

Tyrone thought about it for a second. “You mean
now
, or if I had some money?”

“If you could afford anything you wanted.”

He twisted his lips in a sneer, and even that looked good. “All right. When I show up at her door, I’d have
flowers
.”

“What kind of flowers?”

“Uh, roses. White ones,” Tyrone said.

Mia smiled. “What would you be wearing?”

He grinned. “You know, some G shit. Long-sleeved, blue Polo; button-down, straight out the cleaners. I’d have on me some Fubu jeans, like a light blue, lighter than the shirt. Have ’em long so I can roll ’em up a little at the bottom. They’d be starched down, too. Got my Polo boots on, ya know, looking fly.”

Mia thought about Eric’s three-piece suit. “Shirt tucked or untucked?” she asked.

“Prolly
un
tucked,” Tyrone said. “Straight out the cleaners, it look tight like that.”

“Where would you take her?”

“Hold on. First, I got a limousine rented. That’s gon’ be parked on the street waiting for her.”

“A limo?”

“Yeah. A white one.”

“Then what?”

“Then I’d take her to one of them
fancy
restaurants.”

“Which one?” Mia asked.

“I don’t know. One of ’em.”

“You’d take her to a fancy restaurant with jeans on and your shirt untucked.”

“Yeah,” Tyrone said. “We’d fall up in that bitch like 50 Cent and them. You know them rap niggas don’t never get dressed up when they go to fancy places. What that T.I. say in that song? ‘
Up in Benihana’s see me slang in dem chairs
.’ ”

“Wow,” Mia said. “That
is
romantic.”

“I’m just trippin’,” Tyrone said. “I would treat her like a lady.”

And Mia believed him.

“So, you gon’ let me take you out?” he asked.

Mia smiled, but shook her head. “Seriously, Tyrone, I can’t go out with you.”

“Why not?”

“I just broke up with my boyfriend
yesterday
. You don’t wanna be my rebound, do you?”

“Well, at least your reason has changed,” he noticed.

“What reason?” she asked, but the kid’s ride was done then. They rushed forward, as happy as hobos on Thanksgiving.

“Did you see me?” Mica asked.

“Yeah, we saw y’all,” Mia said.

“Did you see
me
?” TC asked.

“What did we do?” Mica asked.

“What do you mean?”

“You
didn’t
see us! Y’all weren’t even watching!” TC deduced.

“They were kissing,” Mica guessed.

“We were not kissing!” Mia said.

“Why didn’t you see what we did then?” TC wanted to know. “When we went sideways, me and Mica put our hands up in the air.”

“Were y’all kissing?” Mica asked Tyrone, and the bastard just grinned. Mia hit him on his arm.

“What are you grinning about?”

“I knew it!” TC said. He held his finger in the air as if he’d just cracked the Lindbergh case.

“We were not kissing,” Mia said again. “You’d better tell them we weren’t kissing.”

“Y’all want cotton candy?” Tyrone asked. He stood from the bench and pointed at a nearby vendor.

“Yeah!” the kids said in unison.

“Tyrone,” Mia said.

“C’mon, y’all, let’s go,” he said. His smile was infectious.

“I want a pink one,” Mica said.

“I want pink, too,” TC said. “I mean
blue
!”

“Tyrone!” Mia said.

He turned then. “C’mon, Mama. We finna get some candy. Don’t be mad. We can kiss some more later.”

“I knew it!” TC yelled again.

* * *

Mia wouldn’t let the kids have cotton candy until after lunch, so they went to Gator McGee’s Mountain Grill and had swamp burgers and chicken tenders. Tyrone insisted that he pay there, too, but Mia slid her Visa before he had a chance. Afterwards TC took them to the carnival grounds where, despite eleven attempts, Tyrone was never able to shoot a ten-inch basketball through an eleven-inch hoop.

The kids tried to throw darts at balloons and toss rings onto bottles, but they too came up short each time. Huge panda bears and cuddly Smurfs stayed on the racks as $5 bill after $5 bill yielded no fruit. Mia knew a bad business move when she saw one, so she directed them away from the carnies towards Looney Toons USA.

With only four hours till closing, the kids challenged themselves to get on thirty more rides, and they gave it a damned good shot. They got on sixteen more coasters, and an adult rider was required at most of them.

With all the time spent standing in such close quarters, Mia kept expecting Tyrone to accidentally brush a hand across her backside, but it never happened. Every time she looked back at him, he was enjoying a joke with the kids or simply staring at her, almost in awe, as if he couldn’t believe his great fortune. By the time a voice announced over the loud speakers that the park was closing, Mia was ready to ask Tyrone what the hell his deal was, but of course she didn’t.

The kids had to be in bed by ten, so Mia stopped at McDonald’s on the way home. She let them eat in the car, which was such a big no-no it was outlawed in the driver’s manual, but they were unusually neat nibblers tonight. TC tattled on Mica for dropping
one
French fry, and that was an all-time low.

When they got home, Tyrone helped get the children inside. He wasn’t really needed, but there was something Mia wanted to ask him all day, so she let him in. Tyrone hugged Mica good night and planted a kiss on her cheek, and Mica hugged him back. Mica didn’t even hug Crystal back half the time, but she threw her arms over Tyrone’s neck like she did with her mom. Tyrone gave TC a hug, too, then Mia shooed them off to their rooms.

“Thanks for letting me take them out,” Tyrone said. He was cheerful, but visibly tired.

“I’ll walk you to your car,” Mia said.

* * *

Outside, the moon was big and beautiful. There were a lot of bright stars in the sky. Mia reached into the house and turned off her porch light, but she could still see Tyrone clearly on the sidewalk. He had his hands in his pockets and his arms close to his body. A cool breeze rattled the leaves on Mia’s pecan trees.

“So, where’d you get the money?” she asked him.

“Oh yeah, thanks for reminding me.” He reached into his front pocket and came out with a fold of twenties. “I wanted to give you this.”

“What’s that?”

“Two hundred,” Tyrone said. He took a step forward and held the money out for her.

“Where’d you get that?” Mia asked. “You already spent about two hundred today.”