"She" Is Not Me

She made this bed.

And as I watched her lie writhing in it, restless, cold, stiff…my initial amusement later turned to sympathy.

I have a relentless habit of putting my feet in other folks’ shoes.

So when I saw her on Black Friday I wondered not if, but how much she regretted making the trip.

They walk into an upscale nightclub at the tail end of a private birthday party, just before the DJ would take over. Turns out the person throwing the party was his old football buddy. He walks into a sea of familiar faces, all foreign to her.

All except one.

She walks behind him, her steps subtly strained and reluctant. He is in his element, home, among friends, good people from his past. He’s greeted with genuine welcomes, daps, hugs and cheek kisses, and she watches from a step behind.

And as she rounds the bar, following him to a spot she hopes is beyond the crowd, she sees a face that is all too familiar. The face that haunts her memories of betrayal. The poster child of her insecurity and distrust of so-called plutonic friends.

It was her. The chick who had tried to take her place.

I saw her give the home wrecker the ice grill, a venomous mix of ‘I can’t believe this bitch is here,’ ‘did he know she was gonna be here,’ and ‘I wanna go the hell home.’ I saw her whip out her cellie and compose a flurry of furious text messages.

But she was stuck. Out of town, out of her element, out of place. I watched it all go down. The way the home wrecker used good discretion in turning her back when they entered, then reluctantly greeted him when he awkwardly approached. She sincerely explained that she was there for the private party of the football buddy, who ironically had been her Junior prom date. He settled in at the bar just past her. Just past her, but not far enough for the two women to avoid a direct line of vision.

Home wrecker played it as cool as she could. Downing Moet and ducking in the arms of her plutonic male friends, trying to persuade them it was time to go. But she was in no way being discreet. She was a bit extra flirty, her laugh a bit extra loud…just, extra! And she would not stop smoothing down her hair and checking her makeup. And none of it went unnoticed. Not by her or him.

Backstory:

She loved him. They’d been through a lot, a move among it all. He left her behind for work, and she remained by his side as best she could. It came easily, not because of her devotion but because they had been friends first. Little did she know, he had slowly come to see her as little more than such.

He was a good man, a great boyfriend, never a wanderer… so it came as a crushing blow when she felt his attention slipping away, focused elsewhere, she realized. The confrontation was severe, as was the blow induced by his honesty. Yes, he had been serious all those months that he had been expressing his uncertainty about their future. Yes, there was someone new…the Homewrecker.

She managed to convince him to give it another try. Despite her insecurities, despite the distance, despite their never ending battle about his bubbling social life, and abundance of plutonic female friends. Down South, where she was from, it wasn’t like that. Guys get phone calls and emails and text messages from girls who are giving it up. Plain and simple. She couldn’t get that out of her head…especially not after his one indiscretion.

She knew that there was a reason why he had drifted. They were of different breeds. He, a music-obsessed social butterfly…she, a more subdued homebody. Basically it was their past, a history of having the other’s back, that bonded them for another full unproductive year.

They ended it a while ago. Stopped speaking at her behest. But there were Thanksgiving plans, he reminded her, in an effort to get her to end the silent treatment. She finally spoke up two days before the holiday, and asked if she could still come to his hometown for the weekend as planned. She needed closure. In layman’s terms…another try. He said he’d think about it.

He called in reinforcements, but the decision was ultimately his. He says he feels like he owes her at least that after everything they've been through. Agrees when she says it shouldnt linger any longer. Would prefer to end it on a positive note rather than with the mess the last time they spoke, when SHE finally stuck a fork in it. They drove home on Wednesday after work.

And her plan might have worked had it not been for them pesky plutonic friends and that bitch. All night, he was mobbed by acquaintances, a good number of them women. Dancing and hugging and chatting them up. Sure, he and her were not together, but no doubt the point of this trip was to try to salvage what she could of this relationship. But this was overload. It was Thanksgiving dinner all over again… a constant barrage of overindulgence, and the subsequent nausea that followed. She was overwhelmed by it all and had nowhere to run. If he was still her man, she could demand they leave. Or at least if she was home she could drive herself or get a homegirl to come scoop her.

Instead she had insisted on taking this ill-fated trip, a last ditch effort to hold a man who was too polite, too indecisive, too sympathetic, too guilty, too scared to firmly end it. She exploited his wish-washy nature, and got trapped between the mistress and a hard place.

But it was the exact blunt trauma she needed to move the hell on.

Glad she aint me. I woulda never took that trip.

Me, He, and DC

Gilbert Arenas scores 45 points and I stroll into the arena with 5:43 left in the game, just as he’s taking his final bow. Lebron is already on the bench. Defeated.

Just my luck. A hunnid bucks on tickets squandered like I got it like that. I’m so sure it’s a sign of the night ahead. DC however, had other plans for me.

I’m thinking for sure I’d get back to the whip, parked on a side street just off Union Station, and the tires would be slashed or better yet my Club would be bent in half and left on the street in lieu of the truck.

Not tonight, the car’s all in one piece, unscathed and waiting for me and my boy Cartr. We hop in, thinking for sure there’s a liq store still open in the hood. What kind of town is ghetto azz DC if there’s no after hours liqa sto?? Ok cool, well at least this feels familiar…disappointment, that is. Cuz see that’s the type of luck I’m accustomed to. Much like the left side of my hair, which refuses to play nice like the pretty right side. *sigh*

We drive on in search of a club I had no intentions of ever revisiting.

Back story: Me and my boy drive to DC for the game, and plan to hook up with another *friend* who is in town for a bday party. I dressed for a classy lounge. At the bday boy's behest, I end up at Love.

“I can’t believe I’m waiting in line for a club that will charge me $15 to get in…all for a boy.”

That’s the text I send my girl Curly while waiting outside the spot, with the sound of drunk metrosex white boys humming in my ears. Nothing against Dream/Love/whatever name you know it by. It’s a beautiful club. But I’m not the mega-club every weekend chick. Nothing against those who are. I’m not a nightlife snob by any means…unless there are durags involved, and in that case I’m stayin in and watching somebody’s marathon on MTV2.

Get inside after waiting too long (NYers SWEAR they never wait online at home so they’ll be DAMNED if they do it out of town. I am of that belief.) ...and I am pleasantly surprised to find there’s no cover.

I don’t even head straight to the bar. Cuz I’m anticipating this to be a complete waste of an evening, longing for the reliable comfort of the remote.

But soon my anxiety subsides, as one after another attractive man in v-neck and tie, pin stripes and cuff links, neat tapered edge ups, in fly square-toes parades by. It feels like forever since I’ve been in the company of so many dudes who could get it.

First floor playlist: Beyonce, Jay, Sean Paul.

Me and Cartr make our way up a flight. Settle at the bar. More boys. More booze. More boom.

Beyonce, Jay, Sean Paul.

Third floor. Puerto Rican* night? I had no idea. Cute.

Daddy Yankee and them. And that one reggaeton beat.

“You in?” I text.

“Yeah, 4th floor.”

Bypassing the pointless velvet rope, we climb yet another flight. Smoky. White people. More Puerto Ricans. An (East) Indian contingency.

Beyonce, Jay, Sean Paul.

The bar. The usual. Sipping. I’m feeling content now. The club doesn’t suck. The crowd is cool. The three song rotation is aight.

I lose Cartr momentary.

I take a sip of the Goose.

And something happens.

They play a new song. Dare I recall it as Ole Skool.

I sip again. And this time it’s Timber.lake. I’m sexy.
Ok, this is cool.

I sip some more, and the whole scene changes, and I’m feeling the club and the DC boys and even the girls in their summer ensembles and enviable curls cascading onto smooth shoulders. Even the whites have rhythm here.

I sip some more and I’m actually enjoying myself, glad I came. Not so pissed that we missed free t-shirt night at the Verizon Center.

I sip again, and I see him. In his black button down and tight jeans. Cuban tight, not rock star tight. Shorty has thighs, you see. I make out his bald head dipping in and out of my view. He’s feeling the ole skool, too.

And he’s dancing with some girls, and I’m watching and smiling and taking notes. And he’s consorting with his rainbow coalition of boys, and enjoying himself, and thank God I am too or else this would not have worked.

I politely wait until he wears out some chick and moves on to a group dance. I sidle up beside him, behind him actually, and do that ‘back to back, guess who’s dancing behind you’ thing. And he feels me without looking and we immediately step into a familiar dance that we have yet to rehearse.

He turns to me, and does the ‘hit it from the back’ dance, and I oblige. He twirls me to him for a hug.

“So good to see you, Wise.”
“I’ve missed you.”

I meet his boys. Take the birthday boy by the hand and head to the bar for shots of Patron. Really cool guy I learn, and we exchange biz cards. He’s in Law School at American, and says, we shouldn’t be strangers.

“Where’d u go?” he texts me as I return to him, reading it in front of him.

“There you are,” he says.

“We’re finally dancing,” he says, smiling, shouting in my ear.

“We danced at my crib that time.”

“Oh yeah,” he says. Pulling me in, knowing I’m being bashful.

“Your hair is so long.” I respond by tickling his baldy, the way he always likes. He plays in mine, the way I hate, today. My hair's already a mess.

You ever see the girl in the club who is dancing with some guy, her arms wrapped tight around his neck, like a Christmas bow, her eyes closed, and she’s just swaying to the music? She looks like she’s either tossed, a hopeful ho, or at a 60s sock hop with her steady.

Well, maybe, just maybe she’s just enjoying the moment. Maybe, just maybe, his hands around her waist feel like rest... and maybe, just maybe, I was exhausted, and his shoulder felt like a down pillow and I didn’t care that there were 10,000 other people watching me daydream.

Maybe, just maybe, I had a great time. Dancing. From one floor to the next, laughing and sweating and gyrating, and not caring, and kissing, and singing along, and getting low to songs I normally hate, and smiling. For hours without interruption.

Every time he leaned in, it was like fitting in the last piece of a jigsaw. Our pecks are puzzlingly perfect. Despite a background that is less so.

“When you coming home for Thanksgiving?”
“I get in Thursday night,” I respond.
“Cant wait to see you again Thursday. That is if you can pencil me in.”

Ever the azzhole, I open my cellie, open the calendar and show him that I’m booked. He laughs and pulls me in closer. Kisses my forehead and calls me cute.

And as the Sean Paul morphs into Cham morphs into Elephant Man morphs into Marley...he looks me in the eyes and sings the words to me. So I do the same.

"I don't wanna wait in vain for your love."

If only he knew that that very song is his designated ring tone in my cellie.

Gilbert Arenas scored 45 last night, and so did I. It was an MVP night, on a day I thought couldn’t be salvaged.

Cuz I don’t have good luck. I just have nights like these, followed by early morning text messages, then calls from the airport just before departure.

I have lulls in the reality of a long distance fantasy world, in which I can enjoy the here and now.

Then why am I preoccupied with the ‘there and then’?

Why cant I just enjoy the moments?

Why I always gotta take the L?

Cuz I feel like I'm outta luck.

*In Upstate NY where I’m from all Latinos are Puerto Rican. I never met a Mexican or Dominican until college. So references to them as such are more regional than it is politically incorrect and short sighted, ok? Cool.

Fantasy Blogging: IF I WAS FCUKING WISE

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You want to fcuk me.

I get it.

I’m passionate.

Generous.

And well, I can fcuk.

Really well.

Lemme digress for a moment while you gather your bearings…

Wow, I’ve been wanting to say that for a while. Damn, due to my lil hiatus I feel so out of the loop. I missed the whole Truth or Dare phenom…there’s like, these new IT bloggers out of nowhere…and it may appear that I’m at a loss for words.

On the contrary. I have more to say than ever, just haven’t figured out how to manage the time.

Well, this post is inspired by my cyber desires for a certain trans-Atlantic scholar. He finds sport in emailing me when he’s bored (and that only slightly offends me)... and on one such occasion he asked, “Wise, what do you think about two people getting intimate too early on?”

I refrained from explaining that it’s never too early (or late) for him and I to blast a home run, but instead I told him to stay tuned…

If Trans-Atlantic were fcuking Wise, perhaps it would go a lil something like a situation that really happened to me not long ago. Check it…

So there’s this guy who we’ll call Lui.gi. I met him at a party, and gave him my card because he’s also Jamaic.an and he promised to put me on to some reggae spots down here. There was no, ‘I’m feeling you, call me.’ Nothing except a pleasant convo and a few inside jokes in patois.

Fast fwd a few weeks. We’ve spoken on the phone, and it’s…fine. I begin to wonder if he’s just not feeling me…but wait a minute, I’m not on the menu. This is not a ‘feeling you’ situation.

But dammit, I’m WAY hotter than him, and he truly oughta be feeling me. But he speaks to me more like he’s either nervous, socially awkward, or bored. He’s real regular, no outward pretenses about him. An Ivy Leaguer sans the Harvard ego-swag. A nerd sans the idiocy. He’s basically Rog.

So I’m confused, but not pressed. I just want reggae.

Fast fwd again and I meet up with Lui.gi at a show. He lives about 30 minutes outside of Bawtuhmore, so after the show we go to my house to drink and hang out.

We’re sitting on my couch, and he says, “Damn, your legs are the same length as mine.” Looking back, this was the corniest shit I have ever encountered, but at the time, as silly as it seemed, he was right. Dude is like 6’1”…I’m 5’8”… and when we both stood up to measure, sure enough our hips line up.

Wow, our hips line up… I’m standing in front of dude and for the first time I size him up…LIKE THAT. I had already accepted that he’s not particularly attractive. But he’s mature, very nice, and of sound intellect.

And by the looks of things, shorty is packin. I’m sayin. I’m standing hip to hip with him and I see this bulge emerge from his jeans. And all of a sudden, I’m on fire.

The next thing I know, dude and I are rolling around on my couch, skin to skin, like rabbits.

Weird thing is, I’m not even really dick obsessed like that. As magnificent a sight to behold… ya seen one big one, ya seen ‘em all, really (you don’t count Trans-Atl). But there was just something about the presentation of this particular pipe that…shall we say, caught my eye.

Nevertheless, who was to know that subtly unattractive Lui.gi had the body of a god. I played all up and through the curvature of his muscles like opening day at Fenway. I marveled at the reckless hair that lined his pecs, his thighs, his groin. And let’s face it, I’m a girl…I like positive feedback. Brownie points if it’s directed to my body. Shit, I got caught up…but not caught out.

“I’m not going to fcuk you, Luig'.”
“Okay,” he said, a bit defeated. With that bit of business out of the way I went about the task of being thoroughly satisfied…sixth grade style (I let Big Papi hit a triple with a few runs batted in, if you feel me).

I have since gotten together with Luig’ on several occasions, and I always preface the frolic by letting him know that there will be no rounding of my bases. I’m grateful that he’s cool with basically not talking to me on the phone ever, and then paying me courtesy visits and bringing the hot massage oil and a good strong pair of hands.

Thing of it is…I like the guy. He’s decent. He’s even starting to look attractive to me. We have a lot in common, like the same kind of hanging out, similar music, and he’s rather intelligent, which I love. Problem is he’s nothing but a big dick on a sculpted frame with a funny 80s sitcom likeness (he really looks NOTHING like Rog, but for some reason I just find the analogy hilarious)…who happens to be a very cool guy. In a perfect world, it would be the other way around…he’d be a great guy who happens to have a dope body.

But because of an imperfect sequential arrangement, he doesn’t stand a chance. Not because he’s ugly… (truthfully it’s more so because I literally had to teach the muhfucka how to kiss me…to the point where I was literally just pushing his head down to point his lips at my nibbles)…but because I began at the conclusion. Had I taken the time to get to know this guy before I got to know his bare azz, perhaps I’d have a bit more patience, and enough respect not to immortalize him via blogger.

Why read the book when you already know how the hell it ends?

He went out of town last week, and upon his return he sent me a text…”I’m back. Call me if you want some.”

If he was fcuking Wise, he’d not need to text me a cock coupon. He would have been summoned to come over straight from the airport.

Particularly if he was flying in from Heathrow.

*double sigh*

You see where this is going...

You want to fcuk me.

And I don’t blame you.

I’m logical.

I keep it "real".

I have all the (sometimes incorrect) answers.

So I invite you,my psecial reader firends to present me with your drama, your issues, your situations…and I’ll give you one possible outcome from the IF YOU WERE FCUKING WISE perspective (feel my double entendre). You may even do so anonymously if you prefer.

Ladies, I know I don’t have a penis…but I do have balls enough to try to mount you, too. So don’t feel left out. I can go both ways.

Ok, I really didn’t mean it THAT way...whatev.

I’m all ears.

IF I WAS FCUKING WISE: The Results Show

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