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  I’d worked hard at trying to put him out of my mind, and finally I’d succeeded. So I almost had a coronary when I turned to the voice that called my name and my eyes locked with the ones of Kendrick Greene.

  “Crystal.”

  He was propped up against a black Cabriolet convertible, dressed in a pair of jeans, brown loafers, and a white T-shirt that said DREAM.

  When I just stood there staring, he pressed his palm against his chest.

  “It’s me, Kendrick.”

  I knew who the hell he was; I was just caught in a state of disbelief. He was still as handsome as I remembered. He’d put on some weight, but it looked good on him.

  “H-hi,” I croaked, and took a step backward.

  Kendrick looked around nervously. He didn’t seem to know what to say.

  “Where do I begin?”

  You begin at the beginning, right?

  Kendrick took another step toward me. I didn’t move. I couldn’t move.

  “I guess it would sound real cliché to tell you that I’ve changed, but I have.”

  I could smell his cologne. It smelled good. It smelled damn good. I felt myself begin to swoon. God, after all of these years, this man still had power over me.

  “I spent three years in that federal prison trying to figure out how I would make it up to you when I was released. I got out on December sixteenth, and it took me from that day till now to gather up enough confidence to come here.”

  I waited.

  “To tell you the truth, I still don’t know how to make it up to you, but I figure maybe I can start by taking you to dinner.”

  Dinner?

  “What do you say?” Kendrick’s voice was warm, soft, pleading.

  What do I say to that? Let’s see, you move into my apartment under the pretense of the possibility of marriage, and then when you get settled in you stop working, which leads to you asking me for money—which I gave you—but apparently that wasn’t enough, because you begin to steal from me to support the drug habit that I am oblivious about.

  You stop bathing, yet I come home to a flooded apartment because you left the water running in the bathtub, leaving me with thousands of dollars in damages.

  And then I watch the evening news to see my man—my boyfriend—the high-profile investment banker that I had planned to marry and start a family with—being hauled out of an apartment in handcuffs.

  Later, I find out that you have assaulted your female drug pusher and tried to escape with her product—product with a street value of more than three hundred thousand dollars.

  But because you are the son of Aldridge Greene and the heir to Greene Investments, an investment company that has been a constant on the Fortune 500 list, because of all of that, you get a tap on the wrist: three years jail time and ten years probation.

  You practically ruined my life—and now here you are, proposing to fix all that with a meal?

  That’s what I should have said, but instead I said, “I don’t think it’s a good idea,” and stepped around him and started quickly down the street.

  “I’m going to keep coming back until you talk to me, Crystal,” he said as I hurried away. “I love you!”

  I was sprinting by then.

  Now here I was, lying in bed, replaying his words in my head and all the good times we had together.

  I curled my arms around myself and was instantly reminded of his touch and how he felt inside of me.

  I flipped over onto my side and forced myself to conjure up all the bad feelings he’d left me with. I made a mental list, two columns—good and bad—and somehow, I don’t know, the good column seemed to go on for miles.

  Geneva

  by the time I came out of the bedroom everybody was gone except Deeka, who was slumped over on the couch, snoring. Charlie was also asleep, stretched out beside him, one arm wrapped around Pooh Bear.

  I walked over and turned the television off and then lifted Charlie up and took her to bed. When I returned, Deeka was awake and stretching his arms above his head.

  “You feeling better, Geneva?”

  I felt ashamed. I’d planned the perfect day and then I’d gone and ruined it.

  I went and sat beside my man.

  “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I don’t know why I behaved that way.”

  Deeka wrapped his arm around my shoulder and pulled me to him.

  “Do you think maybe you should see somebody about it?”

  I snapped away from him. “See somebody like who? A shrink?”

  Deeka nodded his head and reached for me again, but I shirked away.

  “Do you think I’m crazy?”

  “I didn’t say that—”

  “Well, what are you saying!”

  “I just think that if you’re having these wild mood swings, something has to be wrong, and maybe you should—”

  I jumped up from the couch. “That’s what they told my uncle Albert, they said, ‘You’re depressed, go talk to somebody about it,’ and he did, and you know what the somebody did to him?”

  I was pacing frantically and wringing my hands.

  Deeka just gave me a solemn look.

  “They locked him up in a crazy house!” I screeched.

  “Geneva, calm dow–”

  “Get out!” I screamed and walked into my bedroom, slamming the door behind me.

  The following morning found me standing on the scale, the flat carousel of numbers spinning rapidly beneath the glass and then shifting indecisively back and forth beneath the needle until finally coming to a stop, dead center on 225.

  I’d lost three more pounds!

  Happy, I stepped off the scale and walked naked into the kitchen, where my bottle of Biothin pills was waiting on the table. I opened the top, plucked out two pills, and dropped them into my mouth.

  An hour later I was strolling into the diner, my head held high, imagining that my weight loss was visible to everybody.

  “Good morning!” I sang out as I rounded the counter and moved into the kitchen.

  Arthur, the cook, looked up at me and laughed. “You’re in a good mood, Geneva—what, you eat a cow over the weekend or something?”

  His comment stopped me dead in my tracks. Arthur and I had had a love-hate relationship for years. We were both overweight, although he was grossly obese and couldn’t take more than two steps at a time without wheezing. In fact, he’d grown so big over the past year that he was now using a cane to get around.

  But I had to give it to him—he knew how to burn some pots!

  Arthur had owned a restaurant in Harlem for a number of years, called Vesey’s. But when Bill Clinton moved into the neighborhood and the rents tripled, he had to leave the space he’d operated from for more than twenty years.

  Starbucks replaced him, and now he had to walk by it every day, jostling his way around yuppies and buppies carrying five-dollar cups of coffee.

  Progress.

  He joked about his weight all the time. Me, I never joined in on that humor. But he knew that I loved to eat, and every now and again he would make comments like the one that just sailed out of his mouth.

  “Drop dead,” I sang as I rushed past him and into the storage space that doubled as the employee locker room.

  He just stomped all over my good mood, I thought as I tied my apron around my waist. “I’ll show his fat ass,” I said aloud as I dug into my pocketbook and pulled out my pills.

  Noah

  i could hear the music a block away. I thought it was strange that someone was having such a loud party on a block filled with senior citizens.

  The closer I got to my house, the louder the music became until finally I was just three houses away and figured out that the music was coming from my new neighbors’ front window.

  What the fuck?

  I slowed when I got in front of their house; I half expected the front yard to be filled with people clutching forties and tightly rolled joints.

  But instead I found two young men sitti
ng on the front steps. Both were dressed in long white T-shirts and colorful pajama bottoms. Their heads were tied tight with red do-rags, and they laughed loudly as they passed a blunt between them.

  My eyes rolled from them and up to the open parlor window, where two large speakers thumped out Sylvester’s version of “You Are My Friend.”

  This can’t be happening, I thought to myself as I averted my eyes and climbed the steps to my front door.

  The music seemed louder inside my house than it did on the street. I walked in circles for a minute, trying to figure out what to do. I moved to the kitchen, picked up the phone, and started to dial 911, but just as the operator answered I chickened out and hung up.

  It would be obvious to them that I was the one who called. I’m sure they saw the look of disapproval on my face. I didn’t want any trouble from those people—and they looked like they loved trouble.

  Okay then, I would have to take care of it myself. Approach them like the mature adult I am and ask, very nicely of course, if they wouldn’t mind turning down the volume—just a pinch.

  Yeah, that’s what I’ll do.

  I headed back out the front door and down the steps.

  “Hey,” I said, pushing their gate open and stepping into their territory, “I’m Noah Bodison, your neighbor,” I said, extending my hand.

  The two men looked at me, my hand, and then each other, but said nothing.

  I slowly lowered my arm back down to my side. “I was wondering if you could turn down the volume some. It’s pretty late and I have to get up early in the morning.”

  The two men continued to stare, as if I were speaking a foreign language. After a while, one of them smirked and then turned to the other and picked up the conversation again.

  “Um, ’scuse me,” I said, raising my voice. “Can you please turn the music down?”

  I felt my patience slipping away, and I didn’t care that the two men were twice my height and weight and could easily snap me like a twig.

  They looked at me again, and the one who currently had possession of the blunt sucked on the tip and exhaled, sending a plume of smoke in my direction. “A’ight,” he mumbled.

  “Well, thank you,” I said, and started back toward my house. Once inside, I waited for the music’s decibel level to decrease, but after ten minutes, it remained the same.

  “Fucking motherfucking fucks!” I screeched into the air.

  This is just my luck, I thought as I climbed the stairs to my bedroom. I finally get rid of Chevy and now the entire cast of Meet the Browns is living next door.

  Crystal

  this is just great, I thought as I sat on the toilet, peering down into my underwear. My period had come and on a Monday morning. This was not the way I wanted to start my week.

  I slid off the soiled Victoria’s Secrets, stood, and stepped into the shower. I allowed myself to become lost beneath the powerful pulsating jets I’d had installed a year earlier. It had been a pricey investment, but my life had become so dismal that very often my morning shower was the best part of my day.

  After I got dressed, I popped two Midols and headed out the door.

  The day was starting off wonderful, and even though the weatherman had called for rain, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, which annoyed me to no end because I’d worn a raincoat and had lugged my long black umbrella.

  When I got to the Eighty-sixth Street station, the platform was packed with wall-to-wall people, which told me that the MTA was acting the fool again. Finding a small space, I turned the volume up on my iPod and allowed Kirk Franklin to wash over me.

  “Good morning, Ms. Atkins,” Sheria, my new assistant, greeted me brightly.

  I threw an unenthusiastic “Morning” at her as I started toward my office.

  Sheria jumped up from behind her desk and followed me. Her hands were full of papers as she briefed me on the meetings and conference calls I had scheduled for the day.

  “And oh, those came for you early this morning,” she said as she pointed across the room at the flower arrangement that sat on the glass table by the window.

  I moved toward them, and the closer I got, the lovelier they became. It was a beautiful arrangement of tropical flowers.

  “Oh, Neville,” I sighed as I reached for the card. Maybe this Monday my shower wouldn’t be the highlight of my day.

  “Can I get you a cup of coffee, Ms. Atkins?” Sheria asked as she placed the pile of memos and faxes on my desk.

  “Yes, please. Decaf, a little cream, no sugar,” I said in a faraway voice as I settled myself into my chair and lifted the small flap of the envelope that came attached to the arrangement.

  “Will do, Ms. Atkins. And don’t forget, your first conference call is in ten minutes.”

  I nodded as I pulled the card from the envelope and began to read.

  Crystal,

  I love you with all my heart. You are the one and only woman for me.

  Love,

  Kendrick

  Before I even knew what I was doing, I’d flung the card across the room as if it were laced with some deadly substance.

  I looked over at the flowers. Why was he doing this to me?

  I stood and wrapped my arms around myself. My stomach was tied into knots; there were goose bumps on my arms. I began to pace.

  Walking over to the window, I peered down at the people on the sidewalk.

  Was he down there, watching and waiting?

  My head began to ache.

  Hadn’t I made myself clear the other night? Could his persistence be considered stalking? Maybe I should call the police, report him. This behavior had to be in violation of his probation.

  Okay, girl, pull yourself together, I told myself. You’re becoming paranoid. It was one unannounced visit and now flowers.

  That’s how it starts, doesn’t it? a small voice echoed in my head.

  “Miss Atkins?”

  I spun around.

  “My God,” Sheria said, walking toward me. “Are you okay? You’re as white as a sheet!”

  Somehow I made it through the day. Three conference calls, two meetings, and a luncheon at Sapa, a ritzy Vietnamese restaurant on Twenty-fourth Street.

  I’d been distracted all day, and it showed.

  A number of times during the meetings when I was asked a question I had to have the person to repeat him-or herself because my mind was on my problem and not on the tasks at hand.

  I was jumpy too. I half expected Kendrick to come storming into the conference room, and at one point at Sapa, I thought he was one of the waiters.

  By six o’clock I knew I had become completely unfurled, because when my phone rang I nearly jumped right out of my chair.

  Sheria was gone for the day, so it was on me to answer the phone.

  I watched the red light blink on and off as the phone continued to ring. I knew on the fifth ring it would automatically go into voice mail.

  And that’s just what it did, but then the next extension lit up and started ringing.

  This went on for a good ten minutes, until finally I thought that I was going to lose my mind. Grabbing my purse, I bolted out of my office.

  I loitered in the lobby for a while until I was sure Kendrick Greene wasn’t lurking outside on the sidewalk. When I did gather up enough nerve to step outside, I headed straight for the curb and threw my hand up to hail a cab.

  This could get expensive, I thought as I shelled out the eighteen-dollar fare to the driver. “Do you see a black Cabriolet parked anywhere?” I asked as I peered nervously out the window.

  “What? Do I look like a detective to you or something?” he snarled at me.

  Climbing out of the taxi, I looked left then right before sprinting to the entrance of my building.

  “Ms. Atkins, welcome home,” the doorman greeted me.

  “Has anyone come by looking for me?” I whispered.

  “No, I don’t believe so,” he whispered back, obviously amused by my strange behavior, “but I just c
ame on at four.”

  “The cameras are still working in the elevators and in the hallways, right?” I asked, wringing my hands.

  “Y-yes, I believe so…Are you okay?”

  “I’m good. I’m good,” I said, and walked to the bank of elevators.

  A long, hot shower and a cup of tea later, I felt a bit calmer. Just as I was getting ready to put on some smooth jazz, the phone rang.

  Looking at the Caller ID, I saw that it was Geneva.

  “Hey, girl.”

  “I got fired today.”

  Geneva didn’t sound upset.

  “What…Why?”

  “I attacked a customer,” she said flatly, and I could hear her pulling on a cigarette.

  “You did what?”

  “He called me a cunt.”

  “Geneva, I—”

  “I’ll get unemployment, though, so whatever…”

  “Whatever”?

  “You sound really calm about it. You know, if you need some money—”

  “I’m fine. I just wanted you to know,” she said, and before I could say another word, I heard a soft click followed by a dial tone.

  I stared at the phone for a minute. Geneva was certainly acting bizarre. I started to call her back but then changed my mind. I had my own problems to deal with.

  Chevy

  if I could smell myself, I’m sure that the ten other passengers in the elevator could smell me too. It’s amazing what happens to your body after not bathing for seventy-two hours.

  I jumped off the elevator. The long hallway that led to the double glass doors used to be covered in white carpet. A geisha-like woman would greet you just as you stepped off the elevator and take your shoes.

  That was no longer. The white carpet had been replaced with an industrial-strength blood red, and who knew what had happened to the geisha girl. I guess that’s what happens when a privately owned company goes public.

  “Good,” I whispered to myself as I pushed through the glass doors, “I beat the receptionist here.”