Pardon my frenchie, p.14
Pardon My Frenchie, page 14
“Nothing! I mean, nothing bad. This is a good thing, I promise.”
“Before you tell me what you did,” Ashanti started, then she lowered her voice to a whisper and motioned for Kara to come closer. “Did Kendra mention something happening with the Literary Club? We were having a nice conversation for once, but when I asked her about the magazine she clammed up and raced off to her room.”
“I don’t know.” Kara hunched her shoulders. “She hasn’t told me anything. I swear, I would tell you if she had.”
Ashanti wasn’t sure if she believed her, but she couldn’t force either of the girls to share what they weren’t willing to share. She’d learned at least that much over these last six years.
“Okay, so what is this good thing that I’m not supposed to be mad about?” she asked.
“It’s not just a good thing, it’s an amazing thing. And the only reason you may be a little upset is because it’ll add extra work to your plate.”
“Really, Kara? Because two hours of sleep is too much for me?”
“I know, but this is amazing, remember?” Kara said. “So I was playing around online during Life Skills one day—”
“I thought you couldn’t use your phone during class?”
“It’s an elective. It’s not even a real class,” she said. “Like I was saying, I was playing around and ran across this site for Black entrepreneurs, specifically Black women entrepreneurs. They’re all about uplifting worthy small business owners, and we all know who my favorite small business owner is.”
“Kara, come out with it.”
“You’re messing up my big build-up,” she said. “Anyway, I nominated Barkingham Palace and you were picked as a finalist!”
“Nominated it for what?”
“It’s like a scholarship or something. I didn’t read everything, but I know that the grand prize is two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and mentorship by some bigwig business person.”
Ashanti set down the cookie she had been decorating. “Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars?”
“Yes! You also get an ad in several magazines across the country and other online promotion. It is a huge deal!” She started typing on her phone. “It’s a good thing Atilla sent that email the other day. I would have missed their response. Check your phone, I just sent it to you.”
She needed to get back to this order, but it would have to wait. Ashanti opened her email app and stopped cold.
“What is…?” Kara asked.
Ashanti read over the email that had come to her inbox a half hour ago. She brought her hand up to her mouth.
“Oh. My. God,” Ashanti said.
“What?” Kara asked, running to her. She tried to grab Ashanti’s phone, but she pulled it out of her reach. “Step back, Kara.”
“What’s going on? Is it the contest?”
Ashanti read through the short email twice before looking up at her sister. “Up Early with Leah and Luke! wants Duchess and Puddin’ on their show!”
“What! Ohmigod!” Kara screamed. “Ohmigod! Ohmigod! Let me see!”
Kendra came running down the stairs. “Who died?” she asked.
“No one died,” Ashanti said. “Everybody, calm down. Let me read over the email again.” The oven timer buzzed. “Shit! Kara, go get the treats out of the oven.”
“That’s three curse words from you in less than an hour,” Kendra said.
“No shit?” Kara said.
Ashanti ignored them and escaped to her bedroom. She closed the door and sat on the bed, reading over the email for the third time. Then she sent a text to Ridley and Evie.
Get here quick.
An hour later, Ashanti, Kara, Evie, and Ridley all sat around the living room, packaging Duchess Delights dog biscuits and hammering out what Ashanti would need for her national television debut. Kendra had returned to her room, once again a passenger on the surly teen train.
Unsure what Ashanti’s admittedly vague text was about, Ridley had arrived with wine, whiskey, and chocolate—the trio to cure all that ails, in her friend’s opinion. They’d tabled the alcohol for now so they could remain focused. The chocolates, however, had proved to be the fuel Ashanti needed.
“When do they want the dogs there?” Ridley asked. She stood in front of a poster board that had been tacked to the wall, a Sharpie poised in her hand.
“Friday morning,” Ashanti said, rubbing the spot on Duchess’s head that made her dog’s right hind leg shake.
Ridley turned to Kara. “I know you’re used to running point on marketing and promo for the daycare, but this is above your skill set, sugarplum.”
Kara held up her hands. “And above my pay grade. I know when to step back.”
“Good. Now, I have a friend who works in PR who owes me a favor,” Ridley said. “I’m going to bring Dom in on this. She is kickass at this kind of stuff. She’ll have an entire media blitz set up in less than a day.”
“How much does this Dom cost?” Ashanti asked.
“Stop worrying about what things cost,” Ridley said.
“Yeah, whatever it costs, it’s worth spending,” Evie said. “You have to capitalize on this, Shanti. Strike while the iron is hot and all that good stuff.”
“What about what’s his face.” Ridley snapped her fingers. “Come on, what’s Puddin’s fine-ass owner’s name?”
“Thad,” Ashanti said. “He’s required to sign a release for Puddin’ to appear on the show, but the producer asked if I thought he would also be willing to make the trip. I told them I would ask, but he’s never going to go for this,” Ashanti said. “He hates Puddin’.”
“That’s too bad for him, because he has to be there. There is absolutely no way around it.” Ridley made a gimme motion to Ashanti. “Do you have his number in your phone?”
She considered what it would be like to unleash Ridley on an unsuspecting Thad, and decided he didn’t deserve it. Yet.
Ashanti checked the time on her phone. It was a quarter to seven, after business hours.
“I’ll ask him first thing in the morning,” she said.
“No. Tonight,” Ridley said. “I’m about to call Dom right now. By tomorrow morning you’re going to have your boarding passes for your flight to JFK.”
“The producer said they would fly me up there on Thursday.”
“That’s because the producer is thinking about his show. You have got to think of every other outlet that will allow you to keep this story going.” She counted them off on her fingers. “Radio, podcasts, other local New York affiliates. Think of this as the media junket for the Duchess and Puddin’ Show.”
“That’s what I call it too,” Kara said.
Ridley winked at her. “You’re going to give Dom a run for her money soon.” She returned her attention to Ashanti. “Call him, or I will.”
“You don’t have his number.”
“I have my ways,” Ridley said.
Ashanti scooted Duchess into Kara’s lap and pushed herself up from the sofa. “I’ll be right back.”
She walked outside, took a seat on the front step, and pulled up Thad’s number, calling him before she could talk herself out of it.
“Hello,” he answered, his voice a bit unsure, yet still capable of doing… things to her.
“Um, hi. This is Ashanti.”
“I know,” he answered. “I saved your number the last time you called.”
That bit of information should not have sent a shock of heat straight through her body, and yet here she was, burning up.
“Is everything okay?” Thad asked.
“Yes. Sort of,” Ashanti said. “This is a very strange request, but—”
“I’m sorry. One sec.” He cut her off. Then she heard, “A second pry bar was delivered with the other supplies we got today. Check out back.”
“Are you still at the house in the Bywater?” Ashanti asked. She hadn’t referred to it as her house. Kara would call that hashtag growth.
“There’s a lot of work to be done,” was Thad’s reply.
Yet another reason he wouldn’t be able to fly up to New York on a moment’s notice. He’d told her that he was working on a tight timeline to get the house renovated. He wasn’t about to miss out on several days’ work to join her on a morning television show.
Unless…
“How long will you be there?” Ashanti asked.
18
Holding on to the end of the heavy tarp opposite Delonte Johnson, Thad helped him crab walk the load of plaster to the Dumpster that had been delivered earlier today. He’d figured they would need at least two loads hauled away during the course of the demo, but based on the rot they were finding as they sledgehammered the walls, he wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t fill it up twice that many times.
“Didn’t take long to reach the halfway point of this Dumpster,” Delonte commented.
“It means we got some good work done today,” Thad said. And that the inspector had missed a shit load of issues during his tour of the house. The structure was solid, but they had encountered several snags that could endanger their plans for opening by Veterans Day. Thad wasn’t willing to call this place a money pit yet, but it was getting close.
“You and Micah didn’t come to play around,” Thad continued. “I appreciate the hard work.”
Delonte and Micah’s approach to demo had been the unexpected highlight of his day. The two young soldiers required very little direction, and because they had been doing this kind of work longer than both Von and Thad, they’d offered advice that had saved them time and materials.
“Von mentioned you’ve been cutting hair on the side,” Thad said. “That true?”
“Nah, I’ve been doing construction work on the side,” Delonte said. “I’ve got a hundred apprenticeship hours to go before I can take the state licensing exam to be a barber. And you better believe The PX will be the first place I put in an application.”
“You’ll have a job waiting for you,” Thad said. He gestured toward the house. “Tell Micah that the two of you can head home. Von and I can handle the rest for the night.”
“You sure?” Delonte asked.
Thad nodded.
“At least let me help with the tarp.”
“I’ve got this,” Thad said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
As he watched the kid jog toward the house, Thad couldn’t help thinking about how that could have been him if he’d decided to leave the Army after putting in his four years. Yet, the more he thought about it, the more he realized that wouldn’t have been him, because he would not have had the option of going back to school to learn a trade. It was either the Army or joining his grandfather’s dry cleaning business.
Nothing illustrated just how much he’d hated the thought of becoming part of the Sutherland Dry Cleaning empire more than the fact that, when given the choice, he went with the option that could get him taken out by enemy fire. Thad had loved his grandfather more than just about any human being on the planet, and appreciated all he’d sacrificed, but he’d known the dry cleaning biz wasn’t for him from the first Saturday he’d spent behind the counter his junior year of high school.
Thankfully, Gramps had been more than okay with his career choice. Thad could still remember the pride on his grandfather’s face when he told him that he wanted to join the Army.
Thad had just finished folding up the tarp when Ashanti’s SUV pulled up in front of the house. He tucked the heavy plastic under his arm and braced himself for the impact of seeing her.
Denying that she affected him was pointless. Was it inconvenient? Fuck yes! But that’s where things stood. No use pretending her face didn’t pop up in his head a hundred times a day.
The worst game ever was the one he now played religiously, where he debated if things would be different between them if he’d never driven past this house. He’d earned the first mark against him by being a brash, ornery asshole the first time he’d met her, but Thad had gotten a sense that they were moving past that the day of the dog pageant. Buying this house had put the proverbial nail in the coffin of anything possibly happening between them.
Even so, she’d started to soften toward him over the past week, enough for him to believe that they could at least be friends. Maybe they could partner together for some type of function for military kids, like Grams had suggested.
The problem was he didn’t want to be just a friend to her.
Thad frowned as he watched her through the driver’s side window. She gripped the steering wheel tightly with both hands. It looked as though she was having an animated conversation, most likely with herself.
He usually found quirky shit like that to be annoying as hell. Why was it so fucking attractive on her?
She had been vague on the phone, only sharing that she needed to speak to him as soon as possible and that it would be better if she did so in person. He’d immediately checked in with his grandmother. Even though he was listed as her emergency contact, he wouldn’t have put it past her to reach out to her dog sitter before she called him. She and Ashanti shared a closer relationship than he first assumed.
But all was well with Grams. Well, other than the fact that she chewed him out for not bringing Puddin’ to see her on Sunday, and demanded he bring him tomorrow.
Ashanti finally got out of her SUV and, just as he had anticipated, Thad’s pulse started hammering on his carotid like Phil Collins pounding out the “In the Air Tonight” drum solo. But, as she approached, he noticed her smile was more apprehensive than friendly. It put him on edge.
“Hi,” she said.
“Evening,” Thad said. He tilted his head to the side. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong. I just—” She looked past him, and her smile grew a bit warmer.
Thad looked over his shoulder to see Von sidling up the stone walkway. He shot him a menacing look, which his business partner promptly ignored.
“Well, hey there, friend,” Von greeted.
Thad shoved the tarp at him before he could even think of reaching for Ashanti’s hand.
“Take care of this for me,” he said. “Ashanti and I have private business to discuss.”
“No, no, he can stay,” Ashanti said. “This affects him too. Well, in a way.”
“Really?” Von asked. “You looking to partner up with us, aren’t you?” He winked. “I’ve been thinking about ways we can work together. I told you I used to train dogs in the military, right?”
“Yes, you told her that,” Thad said. He turned his shoulders so that he was partially blocking Von. “Why did you need to see me so urgently?”
She took a deep breath, as if steadying herself. Thad braced for whatever she was about to throw his way.
“I received an interesting email today with a very interesting request. Do either of you watch morning news shows?”
“No.” Thad frowned.
“I’m usually running in the morning,” Von said. “I’ve had to add two miles to my daily run to combat all the great food I’ve been eating since moving to New Orleans.” He patted his flat stomach. “Gotta keep up this physique.”
“Why do you ask?” Thad directed at Ashanti.
“A producer from Up Early with Leah and Luke! contacted me this afternoon.”
“Whaaa?” Von said. “My mom loves Leah and Luke.”
“Everyone loves Leah and Luke. They have the highest-rated morning show in the country. They saw Puddin’ and Duchess’s viral video and want them on their show.”
“No shit!” Von said. “Those little dogs are making a name for themselves, huh? That’s crazy.”
“It’s absolutely bananas. The phones at Barkingham Palace have not stopped ringing since that video went viral. Someone even tagged our Instagram page with a Duchess and Puddin’ tattoo. We later found out it was only a temporary tattoo, but still, bananas right?”
Just then, Thad felt a couple of raindrops. He looked up at the dark sky. “Looks like that rain that’s been threatening to fall all day is finally here. Let’s take this inside.”
He wanted to send Von straight to his car, but Ashanti said this affected him too. Although Thad still wasn’t sure how.
They piled into the parlor. It was now just a hollowed-out space with several wall studs that would need to be replaced.
“Wow,” Ashanti said. “You all are making quick work of gutting my—this house,” she said.
“It turns out walls are easy to take down when they’re mostly rotted.” Thad grabbed several bottles of water from the ice chest they kept on the site. He offered her one, but she shook her head.
“No, thank you.”
“I’ll take one,” Von said.
He credited years of strict discipline drilled into him by the United States Army with stopping him from launching the bottle at Von’s head with the force of an FGM-148 Javelin missile.
Puddin’ started barking from the back room; he must have smelled Ashanti in the house. Their moldy, dusty surroundings couldn’t mask that slightly floral, slightly peachy scent that wreaked the most delicious havoc on Thad’s senses.
“Where’s Puddin’?” Ashanti asked, heading in the direction of the barking.
“He’s fine,” Thad said. “We keep him locked up to keep him safe.”
She opened the door to the downstairs bathroom that was just off to the right of the parlor. Puddin’ charged at her.
“Hey there, boy,” Ashanti said, rubbing the top of the dog’s poofy head. “I missed you today.” She looked up at Thad and Von, her expression both irritated and mournful. “I was at home making doggy treats all day. I didn’t get a chance to visit the daycare.”
She patted Puddin’ on the head, then ordered him back to the mound of blankets Thad had fashioned into a makeshift dog bed. Her choosing to leave Puddin’ in the bathroom was a clear indication of how important she deemed this conversation.
“Looks like the rain has stopped already,” she said, tipping her head toward the opened front door as she returned to the parlor. She clasped her hands in front of her. “So, about Up Early with Leah and Luke!”
