I had a tremendous workload and clients were crawling up my ass. I picked up Lissa's contract and inattentively scanned the document. “She’s a beast in the way she handles her business. She’s probably a beast at everything she does," my tongue slid across the length of my lips. “She’s probably hard to satisfy too,” I added to ward off any thoughts of crossing the line that we’d just established as business partners. I had no plan to revisit love and end up with a woman who, no matter what I did, didn’t see that it was all for her. Love would have to wait for me, probably forever.
More importantly, I had to figure out how to stay relevant in my children’s lives while being so many miles away. I had to get Mr. Bromage’s software completed in a week. I didn’t have to rush, but I wanted to satisfy his request. Everything else, including whatever sparks I felt flow between Lissa and me; I didn’t have time for. I pushed back from my desk, stood and walked to the front of my office building.
“Montie, did your meeting go well with Ms. McDaniels?” Shalonda asked when I stood in front of her desk.
“It did. Working with Lissa is going to help a lot. She’s really impressive.”
“Uh huh,” Shalonda said and sat for a second staring at me. “Well, we know she’s qualified, because we checked her out. You wouldn’t have had her here if she wasn’t the best.”
“Yeah.” I paused and looked at Shalonda. “Why are you looking at me like that, though?”
“Like what?” she asked.
“Like that,” I said, causing her to gaze back at her computer screen.
“Oh, I was just agreeing with you, boss man,” she said as she tapped away on her keyboard.
“Sure.” I patted my pockets to feel for my car keys and took them out. “I have to make a few runs. I’ll be back in about an hour, maybe two,” I said.
“Got you covered boss,” I heard Shalonda say behind me as I walked out into the midday sun.
Spring was quickly fading away into summer, and the sun’s mean glare was proof of that. The heat immediately reminded me that I had donned a full Brook Brother’s suit that morning. I slid off my jacket and held it until I got into the car. I drove straight to the gym. I slept so terribly last night I didn’t feel like going when I woke up, but I needed to get some good energy working inside of my body before finishing off my day. It seemed like everything that could happened had happened to me in the past year. The gym had become my only source of energy to pull through.
When I pulled up, I was glad to see that the parking lot wasn’t full. Tuesdays weren’t usually that busy and definitely not in the middle of the day. I grabbed my gym bag from the trunk and strolled in. “Hey Mario. What’s up man?” I dapped up my friend and trainer. He had sweat running down the front of his T-shirt, so I knew he was getting it in already.
We ended our handshake with a snap.
“Man, just in here putting some work on these young boys. It’s good seeing you, Mont. I wasn’t expecting you since you ain’t been in in a while. You slacking today or are you ready to sweat blood?”
“I know I haven’t been in a while, but I have a lot of built up tension that I need to work off, so let’s get to it," I said, adding, "I need to relieve some stress."
"Did something new go down?" Mario asked.
“I don’t even want to talk about it.”
“Something else since last night?”
“Yeah, ole girl called me this morning playing games.”
“Who Justine?”
“Yeah man.”
“What did she want?”
“For me to tell Destiny about her and Jacob.” I shook my head. “But I’m not getting in the middle of that. I’m only concerned about my kids being in another state. I've been trying to be the bigger man, but it’s been working on me ever since I took them to Miami.”
“What you did for Destiny during your marriage and your divorce is more than most men would have the balls to do. Hell, going to the rehearsal dinner to see them practice for the wedding is more than I could handle,” Mario said, offering me a sincere look. “Don’t beat yourself up about the way things ended up. You did your best,” he added.
“I’m not beating myself up. It’s just getting used to the idea of having to visit my kids in another state. What if there’s an emergency?”
“Are you sure that’s all it is?”
“That’s the only thing that’s bothering me.”
“First thing you have to do is be honest with yourself, man. It’ll help you move past it much quicker. I’m telling you. I’ve been there.”
"I am honest with myself," I growled.