Fixin’ Tyrone (24 page)

He wasn’t.

She parked in front of a wooden fence made from knotted tree branches rather than flattened stakes. The kids jumped out of her SUV and ran immediately to the poultry. Mia rushed to get out herself; she was worried part of the house might fall on them, but Tyrone assured her the shanty had sound engineering.

“Everything here is old,” he said. “But it still works fine.”

He wasn’t kidding about the
old
part. Tyrone took her inside to meet his grandma, and Mia became more and more awed with each step. Everything in the house was antique, from the porcelain kitchen sink to the floor model television in the living room. Tyrone’s grandmother had a
real
record player. And it worked! A Tina Turner album was on, and the scratchy quality of the audio gave Mia a bit of nostalgia.

There were priceless figurines in the living room, a completely wooden ironing board folded in one corner, and as Mia passed the bathroom, she saw that the tub had four stubby legs with clawed feet.

“How long has your grandmother lived here?” she whispered to Tyrone.

“I think she was
born
here,” he said. “Literally. In that room over there.”

There were already dozens of people there, so Tyrone and Mia had to navigate through a massive crowd to get to his grandma. Each person they bumped into wanted to know who the pretty lady on his arm was. Tyrone introduced Mia as, “My baby’s mama,” but everyone assumed there was more to it than that. Mia didn’t mind their curious gazes.

Everyone called Tyrone’s grandmother Maw Maw, and she looked pretty much how Mia would have expected a Maw Maw to look. She was dark-skinned, frail, and as old as the dust on her Victorian nightstand. Paw Paw, her husband of seventy-two years, died just three years ago, making her the oldest member of the Story clan.

Maw Maw had no teeth, bad eyes, and equally aged ears. She never left her room, which explained the large crowd they had to fight through to get to her.

Grandma didn’t look like much of a conversationalist, but Tyrone gave it his all.

“Maw Maw!” he yelled. “How you doing?
Happy birthday
!”

“Oh, thank you,” she said. “You Erlinda’s baby, ain’t you?”

“Yes, ma’am! It’s me, Tyrone!”

“Tyrone? Come give me some sugar, boy.”

Tyrone leaned forward and hugged the old lady. He planted a kiss on her sunken jaw and then turned and pulled Mia forward.

“This is TC’s mother. You remember my son, TC?”

“
Treecie?
Oh, she’s pretty,” Maw Maw said.

“No, her name’s
Mia
, Grandma,” Tyrone explained.

“
Mia?
Oh, you’re a pretty girl. Come give me some sugar.”

Mia approached the fossil. “How you doing, ma’am? Happy birthday,” she said and gave her a peck on the cheek.

“The kids are outside playing with the chickens,” Tyrone said.

“Chickens?” Maw Maw looked confused. “Naw, baby, I don’t eat too much chicken. Unless it’s boiled. Doctor said I can’t eat it fried no more.”

“No, ma’am,” Tyrone agreed. “Fried chicken’s not good for you.”

He smiled at Mia, and then they left the room so other relatives could visit their granny.

Tyrone leaned close to whisper to Mia as they walked. “If we went back in five minutes,” he said, “she won’t even remember us.”

Mia giggled. “How old is she?” she asked.

“Today she’s a hundred and one.”

* * *

Mia didn’t think she would have a good time in such a modest environment, but her mood grew more festive by the hour. She met Tyrone’s uncles, great-uncles, aunts and great-aunts. She met first, second, and third cousins. Tyrone’s mother showed up, and Mia got a chance to hug her for the first time in ten years.

Most of Tyrone’s relatives lived in Overbrook Meadows, but a good number of them grew up in Cleburne and never left the town; these were the most countrified people Mia had ever met. When they spoke negatively of someone, they said he was
washed
, or
no ’count
. They wore tube socks with slacks, and a few of them had real-live Jheri curls. They slapped their knee when they laughed, and this was the heartiest laughter Mia had ever heard.

And they all said Mia and Tyrone made a
handsome
couple. They thought Mica and TC were well-behaved, intelligent kids. One of Tyrone’s uncles said Mica was
as smart as a monkey
, but Mia didn’t really know how to take that one.

The real excitement came when the food was served. Big women with big hands and big, strong arms laid out a spread in the kitchen that put Luby’s to shame. There was ham, fried chicken, meatloaf, hotlinks, deviled eggs, macaroni with rea
l
cheese, biscuits, rolls, potato salad, tuna casserole, green bean casserole, spaghetti, and six different vegetables. There were strawberry cheesecakes, pecan, pumpkin, and sweet potato pies. And there was a huge white cake that measured three feet from end to end.

Tyrone fixed plates for Mica and TC, then made two more for Mia and himself. The four of them ate at a picnic table in Maw Maw’s front yard. They wolfed down seconds and had dessert, too. The kids were as happy as a pig in a puddle of mud. Mia leaned back in her seat, as stuffed as a tick.

“These country folk can cook, can’t they?” Tyrone asked.

“I like it here,” Mica said.

“I want some more cake,” TC said.

“If I lived here, I would be
so
fat,” Mia said.

“All the women here are fat,” Tyrone noted. “It’s all good. You’d be the cutest fat girl in town.”

As night fell, bottles of alcohol showed up from everywhere. The more they drank, the livelier Tyrone’s relatives got, and soon the whole yard was filled with hoots and hollers. Two domino matches started, and a game of Spades kicked off on the kitchen table. Mia heard a rowdy woman call her husband a “jive ass turkey” for overbidding in their card game. She watched a snaggletoothed bumpkin holler out, “
Three piece, dark meat!
” when he scored fifteen in the domino match.

And not to be outdone by the glamour and glitz of city life, fireflies showed up just as the stars did. TC didn’t even know what they were.

“What’s that?” he asked Tyrone when one lit up three feet from his nose.

“That’s a lightning bug, boy. You ain’t never seen one of them?”

“No.”

“Want me to catch one for you?”

“You can’t catch one of those,” TC said.

“Boy, you got a lot to learn about the country.”

Tyrone caught the first one in his bare hands, but he went inside and found a mason jar for TC to use. It took him a while, but TC finally nabbed one of his own. Mica tried, too, but the elusive insects managed to zig or zag away from her at the last minute. Mia would have let them play longer, but the fireflies weren’t the only winged beasts on the prowl. Maw Maw had country-sized mosquitoes and not one drop of Off in the house. But that was okay. It was already after nine, and the kids had school tomorrow.

It took ten minutes to bid everyone a fond farewell, and when the foursome climbed back into Mia’s car, everyone was a little richer from the experience. TC met relatives he never knew existed. Mica touched her first
live
chicken, and Mia spent time with a big family for the first time in almost a decade. With her parents dead and her brothers all the way in New York, there were never any hooplas like this on her side of the family.

It looked like they were going to get home an hour later than expected, but the kids fell asleep as soon as they hit the freeway, so that was okay.

“Did you have fun?” Tyrone asked when they left the city limits.

“I did,” Mia said. “When we pulled up to that shack, I thought it was going to end up like the
Texas Chainsaw Massacre
, but it was nice. You have a nice family.”

“I knew you’d like them. They all like you, too,” he said.

“I think your uncle Ray
really
liked me,” she said.

“I know,” Tyrone said. “I thought he wasn’t never gon’ let go of your hand when he shook it.”

“I’m just glad he didn’t start kissing it.”

“I would have hit him if he did that,” Tyrone said.

Mia chuckled. “You would have hit your own uncle?”

“Shit, I would have kicked that fake leg right out from under him.”

“You’re crazy.”

Tyrone leaned back in his seat. “So, did you enjoy our first date?” he asked.

“That was a
date
?”

“Yeah. We went somewhere special, ate a good meal. We sat outside and looked at the stars. That wasn’t romantic?”

“That was
very
romantic,” Mia said.

“Better than your last date?”

“Leagues better,” Mia said and smiled.

* * *

They drove the rest of the way home in relative silence. Mia played R&B albums on her CD changer, and the mood was nice. When they got to her house, Mia carried Mica’s sleeping body inside, and Tyrone hefted TC. Mia put her daughter in bed and took off her shoes and pants before tucking her in. When she checked on TC, she was surprised to see that Tyrone had already done the same for him.

Mia left TC’s room looking for her baby’s daddy, but Tyrone was nowhere in sight. She thought he left without saying goodbye, but found him in the living room, standing quietly in the darkness.

“What are you doing?” she asked him.

“Waiting on you,” he said.

Mia smiled as she stepped forward to embrace him. His body was hard and rigid. She laid her head on his chest and thought his heartbeat was a little quickened.

“Yo sister here?” he asked.

“No,” Mia said. She didn’t know where Crystal was and didn’t know why Tyrone was asking, but he made his intentions clear right away. His hands were on her butt, without permission this time, and Mia couldn’t think of a better place for them to be.

They kissed in the living room. It started off softly; he pecked her top lip like before, and then the bottom one. When she kissed him back, Tyrone’s grip on her ass intensified. She darted her tongue a couple of times, and he caught it and sucked it like it was candy.

Mia caressed the back of his head, and Tyrone’s kisses trailed down her cheek until he was sucking the tender spot under her ear. Mia moaned softly, and Tyrone squeezed her ass tighter and pulled her hips forward. She felt his rigid member poking through his jeans, but it did not scare her. This time it caused a rivulet of moisture to dampen her own panties.

She broke the embrace. Tyrone looked panicked for a second, but her smile let him know everything was all right.

“Come on,” she whispered and headed towards her bedroom.

“Quit bullshittin’,” Tyrone said.

“Come on,” she said again and kept walking.

Tyrone caught up with her quickly. He put a hand on each of her hips and tried to kiss the side of her neck as they walked. The move was awkward, but he could put those red lips anywhere he wanted as far as she was concerned.

When they got to her room, Mia turned to face him and they kissed again, more passionately this time. As their tongues danced, Tyrone reached down and unbuttoned her shorts. He slid them down her hips with the panties still inside and then fondled her bare bottom with increased vigor. His touch excited her so much Mia thought her moisture would begin to drip down her thigh.

She pulled his shirt out of his pants and ran her hands from his belly button up to his massive chest. Tyrone’s stomach was chiseled and hard. His chest was like nothing she had ever felt. It was smooth, with no hair. There was clear definition on the bottom and down the middle. His pectorals protruded at least two inches from his torso. His nipples were soft, yet hard. Mia couldn’t resist; she ducked her head under his shirt and sucked one of them, and then nibbled it a little.

Tyrone backed her towards the bed and lifted her. Mia wrapped her legs around him and seemed to float in space for a minute before he laid her on her back. Mia looked up to him, and a quiver shot down her belly. Tyrone pulled his shirt over his head and a lump caught in Mia’s throat. He was like a painting, definitely a work of art. Tyrone’s torso looked like a Batman costume, only that really was his chest. Every knot and bulge was
his
and oh so sexy.

He unbuckled his pants and dropped them to the floor and there it was. His penis was huge, red, and throbbing. It actually pulsated. Mia wanted to touch it. She wanted to kiss it, actually, but the sight of his full physique had her spellbound.

“Scoot back,” he said. Mia was obliged to obey. She pushed back with her legs until her whole body was on the bed.

“Take off your shirt,” he said, and again Mia did as she was told. Tyrone came forward, and in the split second it took her to get the camisole over her head, something unexpectedly wonderful happened. Tyrone fell between her legs, with his
face
, and began licking and sucking like he was at a pie-eating contest.