by Kennedy Ryan
The smell of whatever was in Joseph’s little stomach hits us as soon as we enter the room, and Kayla waves her hand in front of her nose. “You sure you got it?”
I pull my phone out and type a quick reply.
Me: I’ll be there!
“Yeah, I got it.”
Chapter Seventeen
Ezra
“You find any ripe ones, Noah?”
My son waddles into view from behind a tomato vine, dragging a huge white bucket overflowing with tomatoes.
“All these!” Noah strains to lift the bucket, raising it approximately half an inch. “Are we taking them to Aunt Mona’s cookout?”
“Some of them.” I lift my bucket of cucumbers and relieve him of his burden, too, then head down a row of the garden toward the house. “But we’re filthy. The Stern men need showers.”
When Noah begged us to plant a garden, it was the last thing I had time for, but he’s easily satisfied and doesn’t ask for much. When other kids wanted expensive tennis shoes or the latest video game, he asked for a garden in our backyard. How could we deny him? My only condition was that he had to help dig it, plant the seeds and maintain it. At one of the busiest times of my life, as the school was taking off, the garden became a way for Noah and me to connect every day.
My cell phone is ringing on the kitchen counter when we walk into the mudroom and remove our dirty work boots.
“Maybe it’s Mommy!” Noah yells, running inside ahead of me.
“Do not answer my phone until I know who it is.” I bring the two buckets of vegetables into the kitchen and let the door slam behind me. If it is Aiko calling, I’ll let Noah do all the talking. We spoke briefly a few days ago when she let us know she’d landed safely, and she said she would call back after they settled some. She and Chaz can have sex several times a day as far as I’m concerned, but it still feels weird talking to her and wondering if it’s happening. When she returns, we have a new reality for Noah to acclimate to. I can’t stand the thought of seeing him half the week while he’s at another house with Aiko the rest of the time. But when she comes home, we’ll figure it out.
“It’s Bubbe,” Noah says, looking up from my cell phone on the counter. “Can I answer?”
“Sure.” I turn on the tap and rinse tomatoes and cucumbers in the sink.
“And Daddy won the award,” Noah gushes a few minutes into his conversation with my mother. He hasn’t stopped speaking since he picked up the phone. “And his friend gave it to him.”
He finally draws a breath, pausing to listen to my mother. “The friend from TV. Kimba Allen.”
He holds the phone to me. “Bubbe wants to speak to you.”
I bet she does.
“Hey, Mom.” I trap the phone between my ear and shoulder while I slice a cucumber.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were receiving an award from the Allen Foundation?”
“Mom, it’s not that big of a deal.”
The silence fills with what she and I both know—it is. I never got the full story of what went so wrong in my parents’ friendship with the Allens, but we moved and, as far as I know, they never had contact with them again. That volatile night cleaved our life into two distinct parts. In one of those parts, Kimba Allen was my best friend. In the other, she and her family didn’t exist.
“Why would they…” Mom pauses, clears her throat. “Tell me how this happened.”
“I received an email saying I was being honored for excellence in education. I went to the ceremony.”
“And Kimba was there?”
“She was. She presented the awards. Kayla, Keith, Mrs. Allen—they were all there.”
“How was Janetta?” Affection softens her tone, something that hasn’t happened before on the rare occasions when we’ve referenced Kimba’s family.
“She’s good. She asked about you, too. She didn’t know Dad had passed. She said to wish you well.”
“Did she?” Mom chuckles. “I wouldn’t have survived those first few years in Georgia without that woman.”
“I know,” I say, determined to step through the rare crack in the door. “So what happened back then? You were all so close, and then—”
“It was a long time ago,” Mom cuts me off. “Kimba’s made quite a name for herself. Not surprising. She was always the most like her father to me. How was she?”
I don’t know how to answer that. She was twenty-four years older than the last time I kissed her. She’s someone I used to know at a molecular level, but now I couldn’t even tell you where she lives, or her favorite food.
“She’s fine. Mona invited her to this cookout tonight.”
The line goes quiet for a second. “Is Aiko still in Tanzania?” Mom asks, her tone careful and obvious.
“You know she is. Your point in asking at just this moment?”
“I’m not poking my head in your business, son. I just know how intense you used to be about Kimba. Seeing old…friends when we’re having trouble with our partners can be dangerous.”
My mother knows about the struggles Aiko and I have had. We’ve been open about it. I glance up to where Noah is playing a game on his iPad a few feet away. I would hate for him to overhear something prematurely. Aiko would be devastated not to be with me when he finds out. I’ll tell my mom the truth later.
“Mom, don’t worry so much.” I stow the sliced vegetables in the refrigerator. “How’s Stanley?”
“Ezra, I know you.”
“Good. Then you know I would never hurt Aiko. How’s Stanley?”
Cue heavy Jewish Mom sigh, laced with longsuffering.
“Okay, just remember what I said,” she replies. “And Stanley’s good. The doctor checked his stint.”
My mom went from marrying an African-American atheist lawyer to the most Jewish man in New York City, Stanley Ebstein. He grew up attending the same synagogue as my mother and lived two blocks from her family’s dry-cleaning business that dates back to the early 1900s. His family owns a chain of kosher delis.
“Put Noah back on the phone,” Mom says after she catalogs all of Stanley’s medications and their upcoming doctor’s appointments. “I need to make sure he’s ready for summer camp. You’re flying him up next week, right?”
“Yeah.” I walk over to Noah. “After his birthday party.”
“Are you still staying for a week? It’s been a while since you’ve seen everyone in the neighborhood.”
My reflex response is to confirm I’ll stay for a visit, but some traitorous imp reminds me that Kimba may stay in Atlanta for a few weeks.
“We’ll see. Here’s your grandson,” I reply, handing Noah the phone before my mother can berate me.
I’m cleaning up the small mess I made preparing vegetables when Mona walks through the door that leads to the backyard.
“It’s just me,” she says, our standard greeting as we flow in and out of each other’s homes.
“What’s up?” I spare her a smile while I’m wiping down the counter.
“Answer your damn phone. I was catching up on The Swamp People and had to drag my ass from the comfort of my home to come over here. Are you happy now?”
“So sorry to have inconvenienced you. How can I help?”
“You got any Sriracha sauce? I’m out.”
I nod toward the cabinet over the stove. “Up there, and Noah probably didn’t answer if you tried to call. When he and my mom get on the phone, it’s like a rerun of The Golden Girls.”
“Don’t I know it.” Mona chuckles and goes on her tiptoes to reach the spicy sauce. “Folks will start arriving around seven.”
“Need help setting up?”
“Nah. I’m keeping it basic. Just a few friends, some ribs, hot dogs, steaks, fried chicken, potato salad, watermelon, catfish—”
“Mona,” I laugh, interrupting her long list of menu items. “That doesn’t sound exactly basic. I’ll bring wine and some fresh vegetables.”
“Thanks, and Kimba confirmed she’s coming.”
Mona’s smooth skin crinkles at the corners of her eyes with an excited smile. “The Three’s Company crew together again.”
My ears prick and my muscles tighten at the news. I lean against the counter and fold my arms, going for casual and vaguely interested. “Oh, yeah? Cool.”
“Right?” Mona hops up onto the countertop and leans back on her palms. “What do you think about Barry?”
“Barry? Barry like Barry Burrows, the math teacher from school?”
“Yeah. I was thinking about introducing him to Kimba.”
“What?” I choke and cough. “Why?”
“Kimba’s young and beautiful and successful. She may be too busy to stop and smell the testosterone. As her friend—”
“Who literally hasn’t seen her in twenty-four years and has no idea what she wants in a guy…but go on.”
“People don’t change that much.”
“Yeah, they actually do from age thirteen to thirty-seven.”
“I think she and Barry could be cute together.”
“Cute?” I grimace and shake my head. “Kimba’s not cute, and any guy she would be cute with is all wrong.”
“You’re not saying that because he’s white, are you? Barry is literally and figuratively invited to the cookout.”
“Pretty sure I would be the last to disqualify someone based on them being a different race.”
“Oh, yeah.” Mona grins and grimaces. “True.”
“And I’m aware of Barry’s level of wokeness. I did hire the man.”
“I bet Kimba likes her some woke white dick.”
“Could you not do that thing where you forget I’m a grown man and say inappropriate things to me?”
Also avoid things that make me feel like the Hulk inside, like mentioning Kimba and someone else’s dick in the same sentence.
The possessiveness is irrational. Kimba and I haven’t been in each other’s lives since middle school. I have no claim on her, but the feelings that never got the chance to fully develop are still there. I felt it Saturday.
Did Kimba feel it, too?
“Sorry.” Mona laughs, obviously unrepentant. “Let me rephrase for your grown man sensibilities. What I meant to say is I think Kimba has had many, um…experiences, and would not be white boy averse.”
What about biracial Jewish boys? Think she’s into those?
“He doesn’t seem like her type.” I clear my throat. “Besides, she might already be in a relationship.” Okay, so I’m fishing.
“She’s not.”
“How do you know?” Now I’m probing.
“I asked her on the phone.”
“She called? You didn’t say she called.”
“Sorry, nosy. She texted me to say she was coming and I called her to scream about it. We got to talking. Turns out we’re both in a drought.”
“Drought?”
“Dick drought. She’s running through batteries fast as I am.”
“Dammit, Mona. I do not need to know how often you…” I glance over at Noah, who literally just said “oy vey” to my mother. “…do that.”
And the mental image of Kimba masturbating will not be easy to shake.
Well, fuck.
Make that a cold shower for at least one of the Stern men.
“Well, she’s doing that a lot, too.” Mona laughs. “And even if she and Barry just hook up while she’s here, it could—”
“No.” The word storms from my mouth before I have time to think about it.
Mona tips her head, a frown puckering above puzzled eyes. “You’re not like doing some weird, half-paternal, half-fraternal slut shaming thing, are you? Because Kimba will not appreciate that.”
“Fraternal?” Hardly. “No, I just think…” I think what? That if Kimba’s gonna fuck anyone on vacation it should be me?
“I hate we missed our formative sex years together,” Mona says, tapping the heels of her Chucks against the counter. “The three of us, I mean. I can just see Kimba and me talking about our first time and you rolling your eyes and covering your ears.”
Considering the huge crush I had on Kimba back then, I would have died inside. “Yeah, well, you hooking her up with Barry won’t make up for it.”
“You never know.” She hops down from the countertop and grabs the sauce she came to borrow. “She went off to make that big name for herself, but the man for her could have been right here back home in Atlanta.”
In a way, we both left this city to find ourselves. As much as I hated leaving Kimba, I found myself overseas. Kimba had to leave the city to carve out a space for herself, out from under the shadow of her family’s name. Now we’re both back where it all began. Where we began. I’m here to stay, but she’s not. What are the odds of her coming back to town when Aiko and I just broke up? When I’m, for the first time in a decade, free to pursue her.
Like I said. Sometimes what we think is a fluke is really fate.
Whichever it is, I won’t let it go to waste.
Chapter Eighteen
Kimba
Coming to Mona’s cookout was a bad idea.
On so many levels.
Level one.
I could quite possibly eviscerate her guest bathroom. I’ve been either sitting on or kneeling before the porcelain throne for the last two days, digestively prolific from both ends, and I’m about damn tired of it. Between diarrhea and vomiting, I’ve been chained to my mother’s house. There’s a reason I put several states between us. We love each other, God knows we do, but after a day or so, two alpha females under one roof is a whole-ass mood.
Not a good one.
In addition to Mama’s usual lecturing, advising and “guiding,” she’s also fussed over me, assuming I’m sick, a much more logical conclusion than the truth. The detox pills that may re-start my period arrived. The catch? They have run through my body like a typhoon.
Never thought I’d say this, but I better bleed.
Several of my homeopath’s patients have not only restored their cycles through this remedy, but have gone on to have babies.
Do I even want to have a baby? I was hoping that wasn’t a question I’d have to answer quite yet, but apparently, if I want to give birth naturally, the time is now…or at least within the next year or so…or never.
But first, my period has to come back. That’s pretty much square one with reproduction.
Level two for why coming to this cookout is a bad idea?
Ezra Stern.
He’s an old friend. A blast from the past. An all grown up, broody, brilliant, intense, tall and handsome blast from the past.
And he’s taken.
Let that sink in, Tru.
I can’t stop thinking about him, though. I keep seeing him, not just as he is now—handsome and towering and sex-on-a-magic-stick—but as he was then—kind, slyly witty, compassionate, and protective. He was my solace and my secret. No one else knew how amazing Ezra was back then, and I liked having him to myself. Now he belongs to someone else, and I have to respect that.
Our friendship always went deeper than connections I’ve had with other people. Aside from how I felt with Lennix and Vivienne, no one else came close. All my life I kept waiting to feel that kind of knowing with someone else. I mean, we were thirteen. But I never have. I thought, maybe hoped, we had outgrown that visceral bond, but it’s still there. At least, I felt it immediately. It’s the fiber of our friendship. You don’t blame magnets for being drawn to each other. But if they’re far enough apart, they can’t stick. For the last two decades, Ezra and I were far enough apart not to stick, but now…
This is a bad idea.
I pull up to the address Mona texted me, surprised at the long line of cars crowding the street and wrapping around the block. If all these people are here for Mona’s cookout, she would also call Coachella “a small gathering of friends.” I park as close as I can and walk back toward her place. The Old Fourth Ward has changed a lot in twenty years. Now there are coffee shops, a yoga studio around t
he corner, and every other house is a newly-constructed three-story with a van or an SUV in the driveway.
Ah, gentrification. Atlanta is not immune.
I went through our old neighborhood to get here. Driving down the streets where Ezra and I used to ride our bikes, seeing the old park, now upgraded, the old rickety swings replaced with new ones, took me back to those days. Mrs. Washington’s house, where she’d pretend to be watering plants so she could hear everyone’s business, is still there, but there’s a SOLD sign out front. Probably a close and doze. Our houses, mine and Ezra’s, still stand facing each other and look almost the way they did before, just with fresh coats of paint.
I shove aside old memories. Considering the awareness between Ezra and me, revisiting the past won’t serve me well.
I climb the steps to the wraparound porch, ringing the doorbell and taking in the swing, hanging plants and fairy lights while I wait. When the door opens, Mona greets me with hooping, hollering and hugs.
“Girl, get in here.” She drags me farther into the house, which is wall-to-wall with people eating, drinking and talking.
“You found it okay?” she asks, steadily picking her way through the crowd.
“I did. Thanks for inviting me.”
The last year has been dedicated to electing Maxim Cade president. There wasn’t much time for cookouts or hanging out. I was on the road and on television a lot more than I wanted to be, but hey. That’s the job, and God and Mateo Ruiz willing, I’ll be starting up the next cycle in a few weeks. This is a reprieve and a chance for me to reconnect with my family, and this city that used to be my home.
And with old friends.
Noah runs up to me right away, his dark blue eyes lit and excited.
“Kimba!” he says. “You’re here.”
“I am.” I’ve never been a kid person, but something about this one gets to me.
“Come play with me.”
Play? I’m definitely not one of those “aunties” who gets down on the floor and crawls around with small humans on my back. Not even my own nieces and nephews, though cleaning up after Joseph was quite the baptism.