I was just about to ask them what was wrong with my clothes, but before I could even finish, Tania was walking out with what looked like one of the guys from the meeting.
“Shoot, trust her to get one of the good ones,” Cat sighed as Tiana waved her hand and started walking towards his car.
“If she brought one of her kids with her, then he would be back running inside!” Marta said as she tried to dig out my makeup from my purse.
We all laughed because it was funny. Then as soon as Cat moved out of my way. I shut the car door and realized that my group. the one that I had started two years ago and had grown from only five members to forty was turning into some kind of dating service. We never had a problem. Well, only one when Tiana joined six months ago.
“This isn’t makeup. One powder and lipstick!” Marta dropped my purse back onto the car seat and then slouched her shoulders. I would've felt more ashamed if I had told her that it took me six months to save up to buy that one powder and lipstick. It was for the same reason that I wore nearly the same clothes every week. They were my good set. The type that I wore to special occasions - which included church and weddings. I'd had the same set for nearly five years. No one saw me often, so they never noticed. My group me every week, so it was hard for them not to see the set.
“You don’t need makeup. We just need to relax and not get ahead of ourselves,” I said trying to convince Marta that everything was under control, but if they knew the truth about my life. What was going on underneath this charade that I put on every week? They would see the real me. An empty shell, one that Hunter could have filled if only he hadn’t broken my heart. I promised never to give my heart out again. I managed to get married without doing it, but I knew that I couldn’t do it after I gave birth to Alex, my son, and even that was difficult at times.
“What are you thinking about?” Cat stared at me with her dark eyes. She’d been my rock since I’d started the group. I would hate to admit that she had three kids and I looked at her and felt pathetic. She had her law office and still managed to get it all together. No problem. She always looked as if she was fresh out of the office and ready to take on the world.
“Nothing,” I whispered thinking that Cat should be the one running the group. She was successful, her only downfall was being single, but even then unlike most of us in the group, her husband died. He didn’t run off at first sight of trouble.
Marta took my hand and said, “I thought that after seeing your ex, you would dress differently.”
“There’s nothing wrong with the way I dress.”
They both exchanged glances and then looked at me. Then Lena, who I forgot was even the person that was standing in my space when I arrived says, “Next time we go out, I suggest that seeing as there’s now men in the group we go out shopping.”
&nbs
p; “Seriously, ladies, this is not a dating group. It’s so we can support each other.”
“Damn, Nia. We’ve been doing that for the last two years.”
Marta and Lena chimed in, “Uh-huh.”
“We’re single moms not dead moms.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Marta continued to drag me and said, “That means there’s nothing wrong with having some fun!”
I didn’t like her tone but most of all I didn’t like the way that they kept talking about my clothes. Especially, when I had told her about the problems that I’d been facing. I thought that I would get some respect from her. But that seemed to have been dead and buried the moment everything started to go wrong with the club that I had started up two years ago.
Chapter Five
Hunter
She walked in with her little Latina friend dragging her in by the hand. I must admit that this whole thing was nuts. I thought that the guys would spread the word and I wasn't even sure how many of them were single. By the look on some of the ladies’ faces, they wanted them all to be single. But this wasn’t the part of the group.
“Nia, I never wanted this.’
“What did you want, Hunter, to punish me?” she spat at me as soon as she saw me. Then she walked away.
I chased after her, “Look I wanted to be part of the group. I wasn’t expecting this. I just wanted to get…”
Before I could even finish my sentence, they started walking out, two by two's except Marta who had a man on either side.
“Hello! Hello, where’s everyone going?”
Everyone ignored her, so I decided to grab the loudspeaker at the corner of the table and repeat the question.
“Hey! Where’s everyone going?”
That’s when Marta decided to speak for the group. “Well, Harry…”