The son of mr suleman, p.49
The Son of Mr. Suleman, page 49
CHAPTER 81
Gravity hugged me, held me up, then dropped me like a rock. I fell from the sectional to the floor, eyes wide shut until I was able to control my breathing and look around the living room until I found the widow. She was on the sectional, covered in sweat like I was. Exhausted, drops of hot whiteness against humid darkness, she slid off the sectional and crawled to where I had collapsed and all but balled up into a knot.
In West Indian singsong she sang, “You. Started it. I. Finished it.”
We heard a noise. She sat up, nervous, pulled her skirt back down, worried with her hair, then looked toward her front door again.
I tried to fix my clothing as I whispered, “Somebody there?”
She whispered back, “Heard something.”
She found the remote, lowered the volume on her television.
We listened. Something dropped.
She sounded relieved. “Mailman. She came early today.”
“So did you.”
“A time or two.”
Bills were put in her box; then the letter carrier moved on.
We were breathless. I picked up my rucksack to leave. She looked at me like I was nucking futs. I dropped my bag where I stood.
She struggled. “We’re not done having fun.”
“Don’t want to overstay my welcome.”
“If you’re one and done, we done at the end of one.”
“I can do two and through to please you.”
She chuckled, kissed me. “Make me moan again.”
The curtains were open. The front door was open.
Outside this front door the promise of hell waited for me.
In the widow’s house was the promise of heaven.
Serious, she said, “Somebody came up to my porch. I sensed it. And it wasn’t our mailman. Whoever it was didn’t call my name.”
“Would the doctor from TSU show up?”
“He came to my job. I called security. Sent him away.”
“Would he pop up over here this early?”
“I wouldn’t put it past him. Wouldn’t be surprised if that Walmart girl from Smackover came this way and brought a storm either.”
My eyes went to my rucksack as I inhaled the scent of roses.
Roses. One of the preferred flowers at a funeral.
Another sign.
She changed the channel on the television, went back to the local news. The Bitch from Brownsville stared at me, smiling over Russian Red lips. She was next to a large man who demanded dead-nigger soup.
CHAPTER 82
Widow Fatima bit her bottom lip as she spied outside. She checked to see who was watching, stood in her front window a minute before she closed her front door. I was near her, also checking to see who was observing. Grim and Reaper lurked. Like shadowy government agents.
The widow closed her curtains, then shut and locked her door.
She held my pinky finger and I followed her into her boudoir.
In her pristine bedroom, a room that smelled like lavender, the morning light made the light-red curtains glow and create a mood. The illumination fell across her queen bed in strong invitation. Donna Karan bedding. Hints of the day’s early sun kept it so we could see each other as plain as a new sin. This wasn’t being done in darkness.
I dropped my rucksack by her dresser.
We kissed until our rumpled clothes fell off, fell like leaves from a tree during a new season. She had on three pieces. I had on three pieces.
She whispered, “Oh, I’m definitely finna moan this morning.”
The widow pulled away her top covers. She got comfortable on the edge of the bed and pulled her legs up, kept her knees together until they touched her dank face, her lower limbs as straight as she could keep them as she held her own calves. Her pinkness was on display. It was the view of all views, had to be better than being in Paris at the Louvre.
I played with her erect nipples, sucked her breasts.
She held on to my rows of black cotton.
She whispered, “Put it in.”
I tapped her clit four times with my engorged blessing, drummed it.
“Put it in.”
I gave her the tip, made her flower start to bloom, opened her a bit.
She moaned, “I’m going to need more than that to keep from fighting you this morning. Don’t do me like this and smile about it.”
She tugged at her dreadlocks, overaroused, pulled at me harder, demanded my girth and length rush inside her, wiggled and moaned like she needed to be filled, like that itch was so deep, her breathing pure fire.
She held on to me, whispered, “You have scratches on your back.”
I whispered, “They’re old.”
“Must’ve been good to her.”
“All that matters is if it’s good to you.”
“Put it in; put it in.”
I took her back and forth, rocked in and out of her until she lowered her legs, moved her dreadlocks away, and she hooked my ankles with hers. Pulled me as deep as she could. She took the pain like it was the analgesic she needed to cure an unwanted heartbreak. I hit the spot of all spots and heard a vulgar hallelujah. She joggled, shimmied, danced, once again the wining specialist. My breathing was as measured as my strokes; with each hard exhale I fought to maintain control. Her choppy breathing was harsh, quick, in spurts, a runner suddenly doing sprints uphill.
Then someone banged on her door and rang her bell.
I rolled away so she could get up. She was off center, then rushed and pulled on fresh clothes, still barefoot as she went toward the front door. I went to my backpack, eased out my gun, stood by the doorframe.
It was UPS.
They brought her five dozen fresh roses, same as the ones I’d seen outside. She thanked the deliveryman, then carried her love offering straight out the back door to the trash. She washed her hands and came back to me. I was sitting on the edge of the bed, rucksack back at the foot of her dresser. She yanked her clothing off and hurried back to me.
“Sweet Meat.”
“You okay?”
“Fuck no.”
“What can I do?”
“Make me moan.”
CHAPTER 83
We fucked like we understood each other on an unseen level, until she slowed down, her breathing like a woman beginning to drown.
I whisper-asked, “Neighbor. Professor. Fatima. You okay?”
“I’m coming hard, fuck I’m coming so hard, fuck I’m coming, fuck.”
She jerked like people did on the first drop on a roller coaster, held me like I was her parachute, like she had become weightless, was parachute jumping from above the clouds and imagined she was an angel falling from heaven, this new sensation as arousing as it was terrifying.
She whispered, “Hold on a second.”
Sounded like someone was on her porch. She looked that way. We stopped, listened. No one knocked. I continued stroking as she danced.
We rocked the boat, then switched it up again.
She positioned herself doggy style, but I surprised her, got behind her and took my second meal. I did that thing that had had Gemma Buckingham tripping. Her face flashed in my mind. All Meghan Markled from head to toe. I did that thing, did it better now than I had with a Black woman goddess from London. It had the widow tripping hard and falling fast. Then I was on my back, like a mechanic under a car. Was so good she twisted and turned to get away, felt so good it made her try to stand up to escape a swelling orgasm. She surrendered and it felt like she swooned. I moaned. I moaned a lot. It wasn’t a quiet journey. Each sound I set free was like that intoxicating burn a man felt when he took a hit of good Tennessee whiskey. She was medicine for my fractured soul. Good sex always sounded like someone was being tortured. I was killing it. Killing it every way but softly. A dozen positions along with a dozen brands and timbre of succulent moans, manly and babyish, uneven and overlapping, at times her soft squeals, most of the noise my heavy breathing.
Phones rang and went unanswered.
Sirens blared down Kansas Street, the Doppler effect ignored by her.
The sirens jarred me, ruined my rhythm.
That wretched Faces of Death video played in my head.
It wasn’t my fault.
Like the president, this nappy-headed nigger took no blame.
The widow did a pelvic thrust, held it, tightened her abs, clenched and raised her sweet little butt, made her midsection rise like a mountain. I was on my knees, between her legs, and I held her thighs, kept her suspended. She closed her eyes and hummed as I went in and out.
She struggled to breathe. “That’s my spot. You’ve learned my spot.”
I double-stroked, then turned her over.
She reached back and put the palm of her hand against my stomach, made me chill. She crooned her anthem, “It hurts, you’re too deep, but don’t stop if I say stop, go harder and faster because I love it.”
“You sure?”
“It’s all in me. You done put it all in me. Feels so so so fucking good. Give it to me. Fuck me like you need to come. Don’t hold back.”
I repeated, “You sure?”
She laughed a little. “Shit, maybe I do have an anorexic cunt.”
“It won’t be when we’re done.”
“Come for me. Fuck me like you’re desperate to come.”
“Where?”
“Anywhere you want to. Any-fucking-where you want to.”
Then we let loose, stopped being polite neighbors, lost control, went into a frenzy, growled and released uncontrollable grunts, moans, mewls, and muffled screams of passion. It was a battle where no one would lose. Skin slapped like an enthusiastic standing ovation. Our chests were rising and falling out of sync. I slowed and cursed to God. She pulled at me like she wanted all of my body inside her. I tried to comply, did my best to crawl inside. The bed shook, the headboard was tested, the room rumbled. I’d never met a woman who moved like that. We’d been thrown overboard in a hurricane and were drowning. Couldn’t stop if we tried.
Nerves were on fire. The floor dropped from under our feet. We fell off the edge of the bed, tumbled into the weightlessness of orgasm.
CHAPTER 84
As I lugged my backpack and hurried across Blair Hunt Drive to get back to my house, the doors to both Grim and Reaper opened, and six white men spilled out. Six armed white men in shopworn MAGA caps.
Reaper had my back and suddenly I was in that scene from Boyz n the Hood. I was Ricky running, his back to his enemy, gunned down in an alleyway. Only it happened on Blair Hunt Drive and I was Ricky.
One of the MAGA boys stood over me, “Dead-nigger soup.”
I jerked awake, sat up fast on the widow’s bed, tried to get my nappy head of cotton oriented. I hurried to my feet, went to the front window.
Widow Fatima was knocked out. Dead asleep.
Naked as Adam the day he was created, I went to her back door.
She had light woods and the old train tracks behind her crib. I could sneak out the back, creep up to Sis’s small house, and climb over our shared fence and come in through my back door, come out locked and loaded, have the upper hand, not end up in a Faces of Death video.
It was time to man up. Was time for this southern gent to become as shred as a northerner. I reached for my T-shirt.
The widow opened her eyes, pulled it away from me.
She was woke. And grinning.
“Sweet Meat, we done run out of your sweet coffee, but I can offer you some tea. Citrus ginger. Matcha. Sweet peppermint. Or rose Earl Grey. I like to mix rose Earl Grey with Matcha and add agave.”
“I’ll try that.”
She groaned as she got up, staggered as she went to the bathroom.
Restless, ready for target practice, I asked, “You good?”
She called out to me from the bathroom. “I guess I need to take magnesium. After running ten miles and one more round of naughty with you, if you go like that the next go-round, my legs will cramp up.”
Psychological torture sent me to the front of her house, where for the sake of my mental health I went to the main window and spied outside.
She said, “You keep looking out my curtains.”
“Just being neighborhood watch.”
“You’re naked, and I like it, but don’t traumatize the five children across the street. Door still closed. Somebody knocked while we were moaning. People already going to be talking about us this morning.”
I turned on the television to see if I was part of the news.
She pondered, “If the judge knew she was a liar, why he just now calling her out? He died exposing her lies, one after another.”
“Love.” Again I was pulled across the pond. “When a man really loves a woman, her secrets don’t matter. He knows she’s a liar and lives with it. His choice. In his silence he was the protector of her secrets. He maintained her lie out of loyalty, did that to prove his love. Loved her.”
“Until he felt he was betrayed by her and a nappy-headed nigger.”
“He loved her, even if she didn’t love him.”
“Madness.”
“Love makes everybody a little mad. And blind. Love distorts. You see what you want to see, see it how you want to see it. You justify. They lie to you and you lie to yourself on their behalf.”
“It’s not supposed to kill you.”
“Neither will blowfish if you eat the right parts. All love ain’t good.”
“Guess I’ve been eating the bad parts. I reckon the judge did.”
I went back to her.
“You are one nasty man. Would’ve been happy with a kiss.”
“Now you tell me.”
“I actually gave you some and we’ve never been on a date.”
“Lord willing and the creek don’t rise, Sunday dinner.”
“Boy, that ain’t no date. Gave you my lemonade. I’m up in here acting foolish, like I’m seventeen going on twelve. I don’t want you thinking I’m just some kind of ho. Hope you don’t think that.”
“That’s funny. Was hoping you didn’t think that ish about me.”
“This forenoon I needed something palliative if not curative. I needed an orgasm that wasn’t done either by my own hand or by using technology from an adult store. And this feels more curative than palliative. Whatever was broken inside me, you’re fixing it good.”
“Same here.”
“Never would’ve thought you’d be so selfless and passionate in bed. Imagined you being a handsome and selfish lover.”
“Ouch.”
“Thought you’d be boring and stingy, if not quick.”
“You’re pretty naughty yourself, Professor.”
The widow purred like she was high on sativa. “Confession.”
“Confess.”
“I peep at you from my window. I used to ask God why he put a man so fine right across the street. And he was a professor. And he liked his momma and siblings. A family man. He was testing me. Just testing me. You never step out looking bad. Your hair. That beard. Never out of order. Not even when you’re all sexy cutting your grass.”
I scratched my itching left ear.
A sign.
She had made me come seeing shooting stars.
Another sign.
She called out, “Damn.”
“What?”
She yelled, “It’s confirmed. Dr. Stone-Calhoun’s heritage and my natural hair have something in common. They both have Black roots.”
The widow came back, dreadlocks hanging along her frame. She had hair-care products, got ready to oil her scalp.
I said, “Let me do that.”
She sat between my legs while I went section by section and put tea tree oil on her scalp. Her smile was never ending.
Her phone rang. She answered. “Yes, I furloughed the cheating doctor from TSU. Smackover. Walmart. I’m busy. Yes, a man. Bye.”
Soon we rested, television on, news about the Calhouns on blast.
Air conditioner hummed. Soca played.
Grim and Reaper stalked out on Blair Hunt Drive.
She checked mainstream Twitter. While we had fucked like rabbits, the bad news in Brownsville had made CNN, MSNBC, and Fox.
I got up to get dressed. Was time for my backdoor plan. She turned the news off, put her phone aside, pulled me back to the rumpled bed.
She said, “Alexa, play ‘Kissing You.’”
CHAPTER 85
We made it do what it do until her phone rang.
She answered it in front of me.
“What you want? He still here. Well, I’m booed up right now. One thing led to none of your business happened next. Girl, bye. I’m with my man of the morning. Well, he is now. Go mind your biz. Girl, bye.”
I asked, “Sorority sister up the street?”
“That was your Kansas Street sister being malicious. I called her last night to find out what you liked for breakfast. Now she’s being as nosy as Pokey. She talked my ear off when she did my hair.”
“You’re friends with Sis now.”
“I like your family. I never really had one. Y’all be over there all loud having fun Sunday dinners. Y’all a good crazy.”
We heard the roar of a semitrailer truck.
