Slow Burn (3 page)

We agreed to meet back at the apartment by six-thirty. Even though I’d assured Patrick where we were going didn’t require fancy attire, I still wanted to buy a new pair of shoes. 

Tonight feels like a new pair of shoes kind of night.
 

Patrick said he had a quick errand to run, which worked for me. I felt silly letting him know I was buying new shoes for the occasion. I charged the black strappy shoes on my credit card even though it was not in my monthly budget. I reasoned that if I got the promotion I’d be able to pay off three times the amount of the shoes next month with no problem. After a relaxing soak in the tub I was in my bedroom, trying to find the perfect outfit that said
taking it slow.
I had just settled on a black wrap-around dress with a flowing knee-length skirt when there was a knock on my bedroom door.

“Are you ready?”

I glanced at my bedside table. “It’s only six!”

“I know, but I’m ready. Where are we going?”

“Patience, Patrick, patience. Give me a few a minutes.”

“How many is a few?”

“Thirty!”

Though I hated to make him wait, I felt the need to look perfect. I took extra care with my make-up: pale pink lip gloss, minimal blush, and smoky eyes. My hair fell in full curls below my shoulders. When I entered the living room I found Patrick waiting on the sofa.

“I’m ready.”

He stopped drumming his fingers on the arm of the sofa and rose.

“It’s about time. I was about to—” 

I’ll never know what he was going to say because he just stared at me. I’d never been more aware of the fact that I was woman than at that moment with Patrick gazing at me from head to toe. I knew then that the shoes were worth every cent.

“Wow.”

That goes both ways, buddy.

Patrick was wearing black slacks and a midnight blue dress shirt. The color went well against his dark hair and hazel eyes.

“I thought I told you it wasn’t necessary to get all dressed up,” I said.

“Look who’s talking. You look… beautiful.”

Before I knew it, I was blushing.

We hailed a cab at the corner of our block and I gave the driver the address in Harlem. Uncle Troy was expecting us. I’d called while Patrick was out, and my Uncle was over the moon that we were coming. It had been months since we’d seen each other and, considering that he hadn’t been feeling well recently, I was ashamed that I hadn’t made an effort to see him sooner. Seeing as how Crystal had yet to respond to my card I was relieved to hear that she’d made plans for the evening, left Brianna with a sitter, and wouldn’t be working at the restaurant that night. Only one guess was needed to figure out whom her plans were with. There was no room for me to worry about that, though. I was more concerned with the adolescent-type tingles that danced down my spine as Patrick took my hand in the cab. 

When we pulled in front of Home Sweet Home I was overwhelmed by emotions both familiar and foreign. The restaurant had always been a place of comfort for me. Uncle Troy and my mother were extremely close siblings. They both found themselves raising children alone after Crystal’s mother died soon after she was born. Many special occasions and holidays were spent in the walls of the restaurant. There was no other place I’d want to celebrate in and no other person I wanted to be with that night. It was exciting and scary to share my childhood haven with Patrick, and on our first date no less. I was hoping that he enjoyed himself there as much as I always had.

Patrick took one look at the sign hanging above the entryway and stopped. “Chloe—” he began.

I cut him off. “Don’t even start with me. A little soul food never killed anyone. Okay, that’s probably not true, but I promise I’ll go to the gym with you tomorrow and work it off. You said any place I—”

“Chloe. No. It’s not that. It’s just… I feel honored that you would want to come here with me. I’m just pleasantly surprised, that’s all.”

“Oh.” It was all I could say because he smiled and I melted.

If Uncle Troy was shocked that my roommate/date was a white man he didn’t show it. Besides, I was sure Crystal had mentioned it by now. She and Uncle Troy were close, but apparently not close enough that she was ready to share her own secret about Jermaine. 

“Nice to meet you, Patrick,” Uncle Troy said as he showed us to a small table in the back of the dimly lit restaurant. Before I could sit Uncle Troy held me at arms length.

“You get more and more beautiful the older you get; traffic-stopper, head-turner, just like your mother was at your age.” 

“Oh, stop. How’ve you been feeling?” I asked, taking my seat across from Patrick.

“Never felt better. Sounds like you’ve been talking to my daughter, and I’m gonna tell you like I told her over and over again: Don’t worry about me. I been around a long time and I’m not nearly done yet.”

Said with such finality, I would have been a fool to argue. Though he was a bit thinner than the last time I saw him, Uncle Troy looked very much the same: tall, with salt and pepper hair and sparkling eyes. With a quick kiss on the cheek for me and a wave to Patrick, Uncle Troy went back to the kitchen, leaving us with strict instructions to order whatever, and as much as, we wanted.

“Now, let me warn you. The menu items may sound a little… unconventional, but they’re all standard home cooked soul food dishes.”

Patrick opened his menu and read aloud with a smile. “What do you recommend? The Baby’s Got Back Ribs or the Funky, Funky, Fried Chicken?”

“Hmmm, I was thinking more along the lines of the Ain’t No Jive Turkey Plate or Dog Eat Dog Catfish.”

Patrick said, “It’s impossible to say this stuff without laughing.”

“I know. That’s what Uncle Troy wanted. He changes the names every so often to stay current with the times. The ribs used to be called, “Stick-To-Your-Ribs Baby Back Ribs.”

Looking around Patrick said, “I can see why you enjoyed this place so much.”

“It’s special and the food is amazing. Let’s order.”

Everything about the evening seemed so easy. After weeks of not speaking, Patrick and I quickly picked up where we had left off, with a little something new added. While Patrick admitted how nervous he was with his upcoming audition it occurred to me why I might have been so hesitant and afraid to start a relationship with someone like him. I had thought the bulk of it was because he was my roommate, he was white, and I didn’t want to start something on the rebound. There was
some
trepidation because he was white. I’d never dated a white man before. There was this one guy in college from a psychology class who asked me out quite unexpectedly, and I was so taken aback I said no before I realized what had happened. Myra, of all people, joked that I’d set race relations back ten years. 

Of course, I was worried that Patrick and I would start something that would eventually end badly, and then what would that mean for our living arrangement? Even worse, what would it mean for our friendship? What it really boiled down to was that I’d never been around a man so unafraid to show his emotions. It was new and a little unsettling and, because I didn’t know how to handle it, I ran. The guys I’d dated before always kept their emotions tucked away in a secret location. Not Patrick. He wasn’t afraid to share with me his self doubts about the audition, his fear of losing his sister, and the resentment he felt towards his siblings for not getting as involved with Charlotte’s changes. 

How could I have ever questioned his motives when he kissed me? No man had ever looked at me the way Patrick did. It made me feel better than pretty. It made me feel special, like I was the only person in the room. I wondered what he saw when I looked at him. Could he tell how attracted I was to him? I tried to think back on how many white men I’d found attractive. There was Brad Pitt, of course. I suppose the guy who’d asked me out in college was okay looking, but not really my type overall. There was a white guy at work who was kinda cute, and even Myra admitted it; well, I believe her actual words were, “I can see where white women would find him appealing.”

They didn’t hold a candle to Patrick, though. He had the boyish good looks that people seemed to eat up on soap operas, but there was also something manly and virile about him. Patrick had strong hands that gave me butterflies every time he touched my hand from across the table. I found myself having to look away whenever we held eye contact for any length of time because I could easily get lost in his eyes, and I was quite certain he could get anything he wanted out of me when he smiled, though there was a trust there. I couldn’t imagine Patrick ever trying to taking advantage of that. It was all very new and scary as hell.

“Chloe, are we going to or what?”

“Huh?”

“Split a piece of Slap Yo Mama Pumpkin Pie?”

***

During the cab ride home, as we held hands, I decided it was time to be less afraid and a lot more willing to trust my instincts. 

“Patrick…”

“Yeah?”

Totally sober, without fear of rejection and completely sure of where I stood with him, I leaned over and kissed Patrick.

By the time Halloween rolled around, life was good. My audition had gone so well I’d gotten a callback for the first week in November and things between Chloe and me were great. It had yet to be defined, but it didn’t seem to matter. We’d fallen into a very different kind of rhythm in the weeks following our date. We almost always had dinner together, and when we watched movies at home it always involved some kind of cuddling, kissing, or just plain touching.

I couldn’t keep my hands off of her.

We’d agreed to take it slow, but it was getting increasingly more difficult to do. Concentrating at work had become an issue as I found myself counting the minutes until I would get home and see Chloe. Our text messages during the day would start off innocently enough...

What do you feel like having for dinner?

… but they would inevitably end with responses like…

I was thinking about having you.

I nearly dropped my cellphone when I read that one. 

The one aspect of my life that wasn’t going well, and, if anything, had gotten worse, was my relationship with Charlotte. Phone calls and emails from my sister were becoming more infrequent. My mother had called the school to try and find out how Charlotte was doing, but they wouldn’t tell her anything. It was college, not high school, and Charlotte was an adult. The night of Halloween I tried calling Charlotte on her cell phone. Amazingly, she answered.

“Hi, favorite big brother ever.”

“Char, what’s going on?”

“Oh, you know. The usual with the usual suspects.” There was loud music and voices in the background and her speech was slurred.

“Are you at a party or something?”

Charlotte giggled. “When am I not?”

“Charlotte, when are you going to see Ma and Dad? They’re worried about you. I’m going to see them—”

“Patrick, tell them not to worry. And you shouldn’t either. You’ll get wrinkles on that handsome face.”

And she hung up. I was two seconds from throwing the phone across the living room when I heard giggling behind me.

“Oh. My. God.”

I turned to face Chloe and my sword scraped the floor.

“Are you kidding me?”

“What?” I asked innocently.

Chloe was staring at me with her mouth open and shaking her head from left to right.  I was dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow from the
Pirates of the Caribbean
movies. The costume was expensive to rent, but Roman Glen’s annual Halloween parade was a big deal. I’d asked Chloe to go with me, but she’d already made plans to spend the evening with Brianna. Chloe was wearing faded blue jeans, black high-heeled boots, and a tight black turtleneck.

How the hell did I get so lucky?

“You’re not dressed up.”

“Uh, yeah. I don’t get dressed up on Halloween.”

“Why not?”

“How ‘bout ‘cause I’m not twelve?”

“Oh, come on! See, this is why you should be coming with me tonight. The whole town dresses up, not just the kids. There’s live music, good food, and my Mom’s pie.”

“That all sounds really great,” Chloe said as she walked into the living room and grabbed her keys off the coffee table. “Well, all but the part about dressing up. Not for me.”

“Oh, you’ll dress up next year. I promise you.”

I grabbed Chloe around the waist, pulling her close.

“Did you talk to Charlotte? Is she coming?”

Just that quickly I’d forgotten about my disturbing phone call with Charlotte. Chloe had that effect on me. “No, she’s not. It sounded like she was already at some kind of party and I’m sure she was wasted on something.”

“I’m sorry.”

Chloe ran an index finger across my lips and I kissed it. She smiled and said, “I would kiss you, but I don’t want to mess up your makeup.”

“Oh, you got jokes. Kiss me, woman.”

Chloe giggled and tried to wiggle out of my arms.

“No. It’s creepy! And you’re wearing my eyeliner!”

She kissed me anyway then called over her shoulder as she turned to leave, “Are you coming home tonight?”

Before Chloe, I would have stayed on Long Island after the festivities. I would have slept at my parents’ house and spent the next day, Sunday, with my friends. But that was then. As I watched Chloe walk away, all long legs, perfect hips, and bouncing hair, I replied, “Absolutely.”