The Blackbirds (11 page)

Destiny saw Ericka was alone, stealing her role as the antisocial pessimist, so she headed Ericka's way with two pieces of cake. Ericka adjusted her top, took the plate with the largest piece, dug in with a fork, and began stress eating.

Destiny asked, “You okay over here? Mrs. Stockwell and you, guess there was no reconciliation, no truce, and no olive branch. Would be great if you could make peace some way.”

“Stop it.”

“It's stopped. Moving on.”

“Olamilekan didn't stay long.”

“A man with many women can't stay in a spot too long.”

“You ain't never lied.”

“Indigo's dad is a sports fan and is probably glad his daughter has him as a part-time whatever. Her mother gave him the cold shoulder. She's not happy with Indigo seeing a Nigerian man who acts too American, and too American means she thinks he's uncouth.”

Ericka asked, “What did he buy Indigo?”

“Hot clothing. Sexy shoes.”

“Damn. New ride. New clothes. I wanna be African. Can I get a dual citizenship?”

“She's going to look real hot going out tonight.”

Ericka shrugged. “I think she expected an engagement ring.”

“I know she did.”

“She cool?”

“She acts like it isn't a big deal, and that means she's sort of pissed off.”

“She needs to stay where she is, in Singleville. Marriage Land is overrated.”

“Yeah, well hide your bitterness and put your angry on the shelf. It's a party.”

“No, that's based on the text argument she had right before Olamilekan showed up.”

“What did I miss?”

Ericka told Destiny.

Destiny shook her head.

Ericka said, “I'm surprised Indigo didn't sneak her bae upstairs for a quickie.”

“I think she did.”

“You're lying.”

“He carried her box up to her apartment so she could hang her stuff up.”

Ericka asked, “How long were they in there without adult supervision?”

Destiny shrugged. “Maybe ten minutes.”

“Door was closed?”

“It was. And I don't think her windows are open.”

“I didn't hear them.”

Destiny shrugged. “Maybe she talked to the mic.”

“Or they did it in the bathroom.”

“If he was hitting it, the building would have shaken.”

“Yeah, we've heard them trying to tear down the walls more than once.”

“I've only heard them once. Thank God for earplugs.”

“You work late and I think you missed the nights when it was crazy on that end. A few nights it was Kwanzaa with Brixton
and
Indigo with Olamilekan at the same time. Before that, when she was with Yaba, they both happened to entertain their men the same night.”

“I'm missing all the fun.
Not
.”

“You're out having your own fun on the other side of town.” Ericka chuckled and changed the subject. “So,
Kismet,
tell me about this guy you've been seeing.”

“I told you all I wanted you and the rest of the crew, the
Blackbirds,
to know.”

“Destiny, I want the details. Don't bullshit me.”

Destiny blushed. “He's special, but typical. Why are men so typical?”

“How so?”

“The questions.”

“Oh, yeah. That. The insecurities that arise when a man's emotions get involved.”

“Why do they want to know the details about every penis you've met before them?”

“My ex-husband was the worst. He wanted to know who was the biggest, where I did it, if I did oral, how I did it, why I did it, and all but made me put my hand on a Bible when I answered.”

“Is this what dating is like? Question after question about every penis your body has enveloped in some fashion?”

“This is what dating is like. At some point men take you into a small room that has no window, turn up the heat, and put a bright light in your face as they dig inside of your brain.”

Destiny asked, “And why do they always want to know if you've had a damn orgasm?”

“They are worried about their performance, their stats, not you, not your orgasm.”

“Just when I thought they cared.”

Ericka sighed. “It's irritating.”

“Well, it's hard to focus on coming when a man keeps asking if you have come. It's like a kid asking over and over, ‘Are we there yet?' I would think it would be obvious by the smile or frown on my face after we're done if I arrived at my destination, or if he needs to keep driving.”

Ericka said, “They will keep asking you over and over, so just say you did for his ego.”

“And why do they keep trying to slip a finger in your butt?”

“I like it.”

“You probably like everything.”

“Use a lot of lube. You might open up and find a brand-new heaven.”

“For real? Are you telling me that that is what I should add to the repertoire?”

“Not saying not to do it, or to do it, but if you do do it, make sure you do it properly.”

“And what's the obsession with having a woman swallow?”

“You don't?”

“You do?”

“I was married.”

“It's gross.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because when a man comes, it looks like his dick has a cold and mucus is coming out.”

“You're wrong for that. It's very personal. For me it is. It's an act of love.”

“If God wanted women to swallow come, he would have made it look like ice cream. Or taste like chocolate. As dark as Hakeem's dick is, seems like chocolate should come out.”

“He's dark?”

“He's not dark, but his dick looks like it should be on a darker man's body.”

“That cracks you up. All you have to do is make sure he's eating a lot of sweet stuff and keeping away from acidic foods and asparagus. Especially asparagus.”

“That intrigues me. Why is a man's dick so much darker than the rest of him?”

“Add that to the mysteries of the universe.”

“Anyway. Want you to swallow. Want to become booty bandits. Men are unique.”

“All look for something to do to you that no one else has done, or some position you haven't done, or some location, so they can make their mark on the territory in some way.”

“Yeah, that's true. Hakeem is trying to find the roads untraveled.”

Ericka nodded. “Men always want you to do the freaky things they see freaky girls do in porn.”

“But they don't want to do the freaky things the freaky guys do to get the freaky girls to do those things.”

“The only thing that's different between men is the credit score and condom size.”

Destiny smiled. “Even with all that, Hakeem is different where it counts.”

“Where it counts? Are we talking credit score, condom size, or, egads, love?”

“Butterflies. Tingles. Can't wait to see him. Think about him all day and night.”

“OMG. Are you in love, Destiny Jones?”

“I can be, could be, and want to be in love with him. Hakeem could be my destiny.”

Ericka laughed. “He's Destiny's
destiny
.”

Destiny laughed harder. “Or Destiny is his destiny.”

“Cute and corny. Your IQ is too high to be that corny. You're a bona fide Mensa.”

“I know, I know. I am such a geek. Corny stuff makes me laugh.”

“Being corny is the first sign of falling in love.”

“Yeah, I'm getting corny, getting all girly, so I am,
egads,
in love with him.”

“And there we have it.”

“Is that a bad thing? Am I going too fast? Is this going too fast?”

Ericka smiled. “It's not the speed of the music, it's all about the right dance partner.”

“The song feels beautiful and the music is at an unrushed tempo that feels right to me.”

Ericka asked, “When are you going to tell him your real name,
Kismet Kellogg
?”

“Let me escape reality and enjoy being Kismet Kellogg with him a little longer.”

“Is he attentive in bed? Is he a good lover?”

“I don't kiss and tell.”

“It's not like I'm asking if you suck and swallow.”

“My hand didn't go up when that girl confession regarding ingesting protein came up last weekend.”

“Oh, right.”

“But yours did. Kwanzaa raised both hands.”

“Well, I was married and Kwanzaa had been with her guy for six years.”

“And Indigo? Her hand went halfway up.”

“I guess she's trying to get that taste of lobster out of her mouth.”

“I guess that's no big deal for you freaks.”

“Eventually it will happen. If you stay with a dude, it will happen. You'll like it, too.”

“Maybe I should get it over with, but then again I don't want to create a new level of oral expectation. If I do it once, then he might expect me to be sucking on him all of the time.”

“Anyway. So is the guy boss in bed?”

Destiny laughed. “He was horrible the first time.”

“Like that first time with Dubois?”

“Nothing will ever be that bad. Or that messy. That was a wasted two minutes.”

“Most first-time sex is pretty bad and is to the point.”

“It's never like in novels. Damn romance novels messed me up. They all lied.”

“What went wrong with Hakeem?”

“It didn't really happen. He didn't get it up. It was soft and squishy and he kept trying to push it in and it just wouldn't go. I felt sorry for him and gave him a second chance.”

“I hate it when that happens. It improved?”

“I gave him a hand job and nothing happened. It was like overcooked spaghetti in my hand. Then it would start to get hard, and before I could get it in, he'd go soft again. For a moment I thought he was impotent or something. Wondered if I was even physically attractive to him. He almost got hard three times. I felt bad for him, but it pissed me off after the third time.”

“You had to be miserable.”

“I was so horny I wanted to scream. And his best friend and his jump off were over.”

“What does that mean?”

“We had gone on a double date. They stayed over and were busy in the living room.”

“The living room?”

“Yeah. The second bedroom functions as an office-slash-library. They use that bathroom, but do the do in the living room on the sofa. Or on the floor. Or in the dining area.”

“Who are they?”

“Eddie is a personal trainer. Nancy is a cute little Asian girl. They stay over a lot.”

“Eddie's black, white, Asian, or something else?”

“He's a brother.”

“What kind of Asian is Nancy?”

“Nancy is Chinese and Japanese on her mother's side, Korean on her father's side.”

“Okay. Now the picture is clear. Continue.”

“I could hear them in the living room going at it for an hour and a half.”

“You're joking.”

“Nancy screams. Eddie moans. With all the cussing, it was like a pornographic rap concert. Never heard a Buddhist say Jesus' name so much in my life.”

“For an hour and a half?”

“And I was sitting there frustrated and trying not to hurt Hakeem's feelings.”

“How did that turn out? You're still seeing him, so something went right.”

“I told him if he couldn't get it up, he needed to man up and go down, or I was leaving.”

“So he hooked you up.”

“I had to give him a few directions.”

“Directions? Did he need GPS to find his way south?”

“I pushed the top of his head and held his ears.”

“Okay.”

“He applied too much pressure and I felt his teeth. And he was sucking and making this sound that made me think he was down there making a cappuccino or something.”

“That's not good.”

“We really need to start slicing a slit in a mango and teaching men how to eat a woman out. If you leave teeth marks, you've done a bad job. Suck, don't chew me like a pork chop. Then we had a little talk about him not being able to keep an erection for
three
condoms in a row.”

“He's young enough to have a flagpole all night. What was the issue?”

“Get this. He said I intimidated him. He has a degree, is making paper, but I work three jobs, I'm confident and independent, ride a motorcycle, my dad's an engineer and my mom is an attorney. I am articulate and from time to time unintentionally use words he doesn't comprehend, and all of that added up and gave him erectile dysfunction. He was worried about being good enough for me. He worried about impressing me. He was scared to have sex with me. Crazy, huh? Can you believe that? I guess he was used to low-rent chicken heads and girls he had to play the role of Captain Save a Ho with, until he met me. He told me I was a real woman.”

“I take it that things have gotten better between you in the bedroom, or wherever you do it.”

“Better, but still has a lot of room for improvement.”

“Why didn't you tell us earlier, during our pre-Blackbirds era?”

“Don't we all like to pretend our relationships are a little better than they really are?”

“Yeah. It took a lot of chemo for me to admit my marriage had become a farce.”

Destiny laughed.

Ericka asked, “What's funny?”

Destiny confessed, “I was with Hakeem before I hurried home to go hiking the stairs.”

“That's funny?”

“No, but let me tell you the funny part.”

Destiny said she had almost laughed at Hakeem when they were
having sex. He was standing at the edge of the bed, had her legs around his neck. He pulled her up and down, like he was working a jackhammer, and as he moved her down and up, he had on a baseball cap, and when she looked up in between her
oooohs
and
ahhhs
, when she looked to see the need to orgasm etched in his face, the bouncing, the way her legs were around his neck, and especially that damn baseball cap, he had looked like he was a jockey riding a horse at Hollywood Park.