Fool and Her Honey (9781622860791) Read Online Free PDF Page B

for him.”
    â€œGuess who he’s marrying,” she continued.
    I shrugged my shoulders, pretending to be preoccupied with engagement photos I shot of her and Bertrand that were spread out on my kitchen table. “It doesn’t matter to me,” I lied.
    â€œWell, I’m going to tell you, anyway. Girl, he is marrying Latrice Chambers.”
    â€œThat’s nice,” I replied without hesitation, instead of verbalizing my true thoughts.
    Latrice Chambers? Four-kids-having Latrice? Big belly, bigger booty Latrice? Twenty- eight-pounds-of-weave- and cat-claw-nails-wearing Latrice? Humph!
    â€œLook at this one. It’s so cute.” I pushed a photo across the table toward her and Celeste while I tried to digest what Dina had just said. First of all, I wasn’t sure if she was being a friend or a foe by telling me that news. Why would she want to share that with me? But, on the other hand, I was sure to hear it eventually, and I guess it didn’t matter whom I’d heard it from.
    â€œI think it’s serious this time, because I got an invitation to her bridal shower,” Dina added.
    â€œWhat do you mean, this time?” I couldn’t help myself.
    â€œYou know how Russell is. The same way he was with you. Noncommittal. This is, like, her third time setting a date, but she’s talking like it’s really gonna happen on this go-round.”
    â€œAre you going?” I asked, still not making eye contact.
    â€œI haven’t decided. I might.”
    â€œOh.” I had mixed feelings about Dina’s indecision. I wanted her to say, “Hell no, I ain’t going to that wench’s shower.” She knew my history with Russell, but maybe she didn’t know that sometimes I still thought about him . . . a lot. Never to the point that I’d picked up the phone in the past year and called him, but I would often wish I could. In my imagination he’d answer the phone and say, “Baby, I was just thinking about you, wishing I could hear your voice. Wondering how I could make it right between us.” But that would be a lie. Russell never did put too much effort into us being a couple. It just wasn’t what he wanted. I would have liked for things to have turned out differently. I’d wanted the whole marriage, two kids, a house, and a dog thing with him. Regardless of the many ways I tried to make myself “the one,” simply put, I just wasn’t the woman for him.
    â€œY’all want some more wine?” I stood and started toward the refrigerator to hide my face for a moment. The coolness from the fridge helped to keep my tears at bay, and I needed all the help I could get right now. I didn’t want to cry over Russell, and I really didn’t want Dina and Celeste to see it.
    To be fair to Latrice, she wasn’t really a wench. From what I knew of her, she was a nice girl, one of Dina’s hair clients. I just couldn’t believe he was marrying her instead of marrying me. What about me wasn’t good enough for him?
    â€œI’ll have a little bit more,” Celeste said, picking up her glass to sip the last little bit from it before she handed it to me.
    â€œNone for me. Thanks,” Dina answered. She never drank, so really the offer was solely for Celeste.
    Russell and I did what I called “dating” for about eighteen months. He called it ‘just hanging out.” I was such a dummy for choosing to believe he felt more in his heart for me than what his mouth was willing to say, instead of believing the truth that there was really nothing between us as far as he was concerned. Well, initially, I could understand there being nothing. We were just getting to know each other, and not everybody falls in love, or even strong like, at first sight, but I sure did.
    Everything about the man appealed to me, from his piercing gray eyes and gleaming smile to the way he was dressed in tailor-made suits, to his