Sweet St. Louis, Page 3

  “Hey, Anthony. Who are you searching the crowds for? Does she look like me?”

  Dana Nicole Simpson was five foot three, slim, and caramel brown, with short-cut black hair and two dark daggers for eyes. She was so striking that looking into her eyes could paralyze a man as if he had been turned into stone, like the Greek legend of Medusa. Yet, Ant had seen, stared at, and sweated through every last inch of her, filling her up to full, like he did his ‘79 Chevy. Seeing her and knowing her like he did so well could just about make his already inflated head go POP! In fact, it was altogether dangerous. Too dangerous! So dangerous that Ant received the fatal message to his brain, somehow, and quickly, wisely, decided to take it down a thousand before he went bungee jumping with no damn cord.

  “You wanna dance?” he asked her. Dana was wearing a shiny silver dress with no sleeves, accompanied by a silver purse and silver shoes. What a complementary match they made, without even trying. If push came to shove, Ant figured he could take her home again for their usual late-night romping. Tone sure wouldn’t object to it. He absolutely worshiped her! “I would fuckin’ marry that girl in a heartbeat, man! What the hell is wrong with you?!” he questioned his partner whenever Ant decided to play her. “You can’t get no finer girl than her!”

  Again, he didn’t quite understand the game. Tone never played high enough. Despite the minor adjustments of Dana’s less than round ass and her less than sizable breasts, her damn ego was as large as Ant’s, and that was a major problem! So they played a game of who can out-think, out-charm, out-dress, out-sex, and out-control the other, deciding in the long run to just fuck and enjoy it. No mortal man like Tone could understand that. Ant and Dana were both on an unsettling level of wanting better, more, and all, and then having to settle for each other, but only sometimes, and never forever, because neither one of their egos would allow it.

  Ant thought of it all, fantasizing, and could already taste her slippery, small tongue on his. But then she brought him back to reality.

  “What if I’m here with somebody?”

  “That never stopped you from dancing with me before.”

  Dana laughed, fantasizing as well on their great sex-making. How sweet it always was, as they would try so desperately to out-climax each other.

  “But not tonight,” she told him tenderly.

  Ant read that as more danger, which only made him want her more.

  “You got a jealous one this time?”

  She smiled, touching his lower back, just enough, and not enough. A lesser man would have already wet his pants in expectations, brought on by daydreams that moved way too fast.

  “Why can’t I just be in love?” Dana asked him innocently enough.

  He grinned, like playing the devil on an oversized screen with digital surround sound.

  “Shit, you ain’t in love. You ain’t in love no more than I’m in love.”

  “You’re in love with your car. So why can’t I be in love with a man?” she hinted, bringing up memories of back-seat car romping. In a word, Dana’s mental foreplay was hot! Piping! And only the strong could survive under such intense heat. Then she had that stare and those dark eyes of hers. She was the ultimate temptation, begging you to fall for her and be swallowed alive.

  “You ain’t in no damn love,” Ant repeated, trying to snap himself from her trance. She couldn’t be in love. Because if she was, then that meant their game was over, and she had won. Hell, he felt lonely already. Titanic. He was crashing into a glacier, breaking in half, and falling into the cold, deserted sea with no rescue.

  She gave him one last pat on the back and said, “I gotta go now … before I get in trouble.” And why did she have to smile so beautifully when she drifted away?

  Dana had struck again, and Ant had been paralyzed, turned into stone, and was feeling cold, so damn cold. Some of those sisters had long-ass nails indeed. Raking.

  “Damn!” he huffed out loud. Then he composed himself and said under his breath, “That girl’s trying to ruin my damn night. Fuck her! I don’t need her.”

  Oftentimes, when we lie to ourselves, we end up telling the truth with the intensity, or the lack thereof, in our emotions. So Ant went back to his searching, with a dagger in his heart, finding something interesting.

  What the hell is she wearing?! He spotted a young woman who indeed could have passed for Dana’s younger cousin: same size, same look, same hair, but with much less fire, flair, and experience. Maybe that was why she was wearing a black net dress that showed straight through to her black bra and panties. It may not have been as shocking on Toni Braxton at an American Music Awards show, but in St. Louis, most of the brothers seemed too stunned by her boldness to even approach her. Or at least not until the drinks got heavy.

  Ant never needed any drinks to do his thing. That was only for men who needed to lose control in order to gain control, and would only end up being out of control, even when they did succeed. Then again, with the intoxication that he had just received from Dana, Ant was out of control his damn self, moving toward the sister with all body and no mind.

  “What’s your name, miss?” he pushed through her two girlfriends and asked.

  Surprisingly, despite her girlfriends’ obvious displeasure, his mark seemed attracted to his reckless authority.

  “Shawntè,” she answered him. She was pleased that someone was finally willing to talk to her after she’d gone to such drastic measures to make sure she’d be noticed that night.

  Before she could step out of range, Ant clenched her net outfit with his fingers and joked, “Shawntè, I guess I caught you in my net tonight, hunh?”

  It was corny, but what the hell? Although someone else may have thought of it, since no one else had said it to her, she laughed at it anyway.

  “I’m not even gonna respond to that,” she told him.

  “Well, my name is Anthony Poole, I’m twenty-seven, I got my own place, and yes, I’m single.”

  Her girlfriends figured, So what? Let’s go. But Shawntè could feel his persistence. She could sense his confidence. It surrounded him and floated up into the air like an exotic cologne. And he was choosing her and not accepting no for an answer.

  “You a mind reader?” she asked him. He was in luck. She happened to be independent, and immune to the peer pressure that was sending her several messages to move on.

  “I’m reading your mind” he responded to her. “That’s why I told you what you wanted to know. Now can I buy you a drink, and ask you a few questions?”

  It was an easy thought. Why not?

  “Okay.” As far as her girlfriends were concerned: “Um, I’ll catch up to y’all later.”

  Ant smiled, knowing that he had picked the one. The ringleader. But hopefully she wasn’t driving. When the ringleaders drove, more often than not, they ended up becoming baby-sitters after the party, breaking their necks to fulfill everyone’s needs, as well as driving them all back home. However, a ringleader without a car would take a taxi in a heartbeat. That’s just how much Ant knew about women.

  So he asked her, “Are you driving tonight?”

  “Unt-unh, my girlfriend drove,” she answered as she slid onto a bar stool. Ant preferred to stand, so that he could remain sharp and up on his mental toes. Sitting down may have made him too comfortable to work things the way he wanted. Besides, he was still pumped with energy. Dana Nicole Simpson had made sure of that.

  “What time is your curfew then?” he asked Shawntè with a straight face. He wanted to see what her thoughts would be to staying out late. All night if possible.

  She was tickled by the question, as well as a bit offended. She realized that she was younger than most of the other women in the club, but she could hang, and she was nowhere near being a baby.

  “You can’t be serious,” she said to him. “I haven’t had a curfew for six years.”

  She was telling him too much information, letting him know that she was an amateur.

  “You about twenty-two, twent
y-three?”

  She smiled, realizing she had told on herself. “Does it matter? I’m legal. That’s all you need to know.” Then she looked to the bartender. “I’ll have a sloe gin fizz.”

  “And you?” the bartender asked Ant.

  “I want whatever she got,” he answered. “Unless it’s harmful to me. Is that sloe gin fizz safe or what?”

  He was asking Shawntè more than the bartender. The muscle-bound brother just smiled and went on about his business of making the twin drinks.

  Shawntè grinned and responded, “It’s safe. It’s always safe. But it’s not always available. Especially when it’s in a new place.”

  Ant wasn’t expecting that. Maybe she was a little more experienced than he thought. So he laughed it off.

  “Oh, I see. It’s like that?”

  She nodded, “Yeah, it’s like that,” and took a sip of her drink as soon as it hit the napkin in front of her.

  He read the speedy sip of her drink as nervousness. He watched her every move, listened to her every word, and collected her vibes, like an interrogation expert.

  “So what’s the most important quality that you look for in a man?” he asked her, taking a sip of his own drink.

  She damn near choked on hers to respond to him. “What happened to just a regular conversation? God, I feel like I’m being interviewed,” she complained.

  He didn’t even flinch when he told her, “You are.”

  She smiled. “For what position?”

  “That depends on how well you interview.”

  The nerve of this guy! Who in the hell does he think he is? she thought to herself. Yet, she was intrigued like hell by him. Exactly how far was he planning to go with it all? By then, she was totally into him. No other man in that place would mean a thing to her. Ant had her undivided attention. But she didn’t have his. Not really. He was still thinking about Dana. That’s what made his game so uncharacteristically bold with Shawntè. He didn’t exactly care if he failed or succeeded, because his mind was preoccupied with something else. Who in the hell could Dana be in love with in here?

  Then he began to wonder, searching the room again with his drink in hand. He noticed the many eyes that were slashing back and forth at him and Shawntè. Even his partner Tone had spotted them. But were they all peeking because she was fine, and they were envious? Or was it more because she looked like a freak in her black net outfit, and they couldn’t help themselves. Oh, men will stare at a freak, but few of them would respect her. Even fewer would want to be seen out in public with one, especially while in the presence of so many other fine women. It tended to make a guy look desperate.

  All of a sudden, Ant grew self-conscious about it, and no longer wanted Shawntè’s company. Shit! What if Dana saw me with this damn girl? What the hell was I thinking? he questioned. He could easily lose all of his cool points with Dana by lowering his standards and entertaining a freak. He didn’t know Shawntè’s reputation. He didn’t know her from a dead-end street.

  Before he realized it, Ant was drifting away from the bar area, fully conscious of every peeping eye, hoping and praying that two of them were not Dana’s daggers.

  Then he spotted her, all wrapped up and cheesing under the arms of a slim brother who looked at least six foot three. Maybe he was a baller for St. Louis University. But he couldn’t be, because Dana was twenty-six and not at all into the youth movement. Most young guys couldn’t handle her anyway. And judging from the guy’s expensive style of dress, he obviously had some money. Yet, Dana was not into street hustlers either. She hated the insecurity of it all. It was a racket for reckless gamblers. Fast money led to fast failure. That had always been Ant’s strong point with Dana; he was stable. Not rich, but stable. Not that glamorous, but definitely glamorous enough. And once she gave him an hour of opportunity to show what his one hundred seventy-five pounds of solid brown flesh was made of, he gave her all that she could handle and had her always pleased to slip and slide back to him for more. However, while she was wrapped up under supposedly loved arms at the club that night, it was as if Ant had never existed.

  DAMN!

  A shattered ego was a terrible thing to have.

  “Hey, I’ll be right back,” Shawntè told him in his ear. “I have to use the restroom.”

  He barely acknowledged her, which only made her more intrigued by him. She was hooked, and he didn’t even care anymore. What a shame. Now he had to figure out what he wanted to do with her. Would he just walk away and start all over? … He didn’t have a clue. Until he took another look at her net outfit as she slipped through the crowd. Without any control, he could feel a hard-on coming. When all else fails, a new woman was always the answer. So even if he had to pay for it, somebody was getting penetrated that night. Why not Shawntè? She had Dana to thank for it. And as far as all the stares were concerned, they can all go home and jerk off!

  “So how long do we have to stay here?” Ant boldly asked Shawntè when she returned to her seat.

  She couldn’t believe her ears. He was getting bolder by the minute. Too bold! I barely know you, she wanted to tell him. If she could.

  Instead, she asked, “Where are you trying to go?”

  He hunched his shoulders. “You wanna go to the casinos?” He was saying anything that came to mind.

  “I don’t gamble,” she answered. And she didn’t.

  “I don’t either. But right now, I’m just …” He lost ail of his composure and said, “Bored. Bored to death.”

  Wrong comment. That changed everything. It gave Shawntè an easy way out.

  “Is that what this is? Boredom?”

  He tried to cover up his tracks with philosophy. “Look, in this world, you either go out there and try something new and different, or you end up just watching it spin by you. So what do you want to do?”

  He was too hasty.

  “I’m chillin’,” she told him.

  End of game. And he knew it. Or at least for that night. It made him so frustrated that he had to get away from her for fresh air.

  He sighed and told her, “I’ll be back,” as he headed for the front door.

  However, Shawntè knew the deal. She knew it when he first asked for her name. He wasn’t coming back. He couldn’t take no for an answer. She knew that already. But that didn’t stop her feelings from being hurt.

  Damn! No phone number. No good-bye. No nothing…. Guys are a damn trip. For real!

  Ant had ruined Shawntè’s night, and Dana had ruined his. The dominoes of love were falling over.

  Ant walked outside onto Martin Luther King, and looked up into the dark sky, wondering why he was being punished. Was it payback for all of the girls and women that he had screwed over in the last ten to fifteen years of his dating life? Or did he bring it on himself over time, by never committing to love any of them? Either way, the emptiness was finally creeping up on him. It was finally running him down and taking him prisoner.

  “Ant! What’s up, dawg? What’s up?” Tone asked, joining his partner outside.

  Ant looked back and said, “I’m ready to get the hell out of here. It’s just the same old shit.”

  Tone wasn’t budging. “Yeah, well, that’s your opinion, ‘cause I’m stayin’.” In fact, he didn’t have any more words for the matter. He simply stepped back inside the club to continue enjoying himself. He wasn’t a damn kid! He could take a taxi home. As for Ant, he was stuck somewhere between his desire to leave and his curiosity to stay. That’s why he even bothered to go in the first place. Curiosity. What could happen? But his curiosity died a fast death each time that nothing did. Yet, he could at least use a new phone number. If only to keep his life interesting with fresh conversation from a woman. So he walked back in with that singular purpose in mind. A phone number. He just had no idea how easy it was going to be.

  “Call me,” Shawntè said, pushing her number into his palm as soon as she spotted him. She wasn’t taking no for an answer either. She had chosen him. Whether he wante
d to be chosen by her or not.

  Ant felt sorry for her. It wasn’t her fault that he was displeased with his life. It wasn’t her fault at all. He even thought of apologizing to her. However, she seemed fed up with him for one night, and was only reaching out to him so they could start over again. All he had to do was call and act interested. So he left it at that. And he left the club. He left his parking space, behind the wheel of his car. And he left his friend Tone, to be alone again with his thoughts and wishes of fulfillment. He was still searching for a meaning of life in the American city of St. Louis, and in the world. And he realized that he would never find it amidst the dizzying lights and the human posturing that goes on inside an average nightclub.

  Sometimes it’s funny how one person’s world can be so parallel to another’s. Not parallel in another universe, or all the way around the other side of the world, but parallel in the exact same city. Someone else was looking for fulfillment and for a meaning of life as well, in St. Louis, while on a double date at the movies.

  And the thing with double dates is, you always feel like an ice-skating couple, trying your best to impress the judges while hoping not to fall flat on your ass and have to cover it up with fake smiles to hide the embarrassment. Simply put, it’s more like walking on eggshells than a fun date. Because if your man has any flaws, they suddenly become amplified: too short, too boring, too ugly, too immature, or too something. Or then, he’s never enough of this, and never enough of that. Yet, you go through with it anyway, knowing damn well that you should have gone solo instead. Unless, of course, you were really with the man of your dreams. But on most of these double dates, you’re absolutely not with Mr. Dreamboat! He ends up being more like Mr. Twoleftfeet, and can’t quite catch the rhythm of your dance like you would like him to.

  Sharron made her move, excusing herself in the middle of the featured film to fake a trip to the restroom. “I’ll be right back.”