“No such thing. You’re a Morehouse man.”
We gave each other dap and just like that, I was in my car and on my way home to end things with Coreen. Damien was a lot of things, but he wasn’t stupid. He was one of the smartest people I knew and I had to respect his opinion. And it didn’t help that the little voice inside me was saying the same thing. “Run like hell, brother,” the voice kept saying. And now Damien had put it on full blast. He was right. The whole thing was exciting and the sex felt good, but that feeling of emptiness I felt inside from lying to and cheating on my wife when she hadn’t done anything made me want to vomit.
Kerry was sitting on the couch in the living room when I walked in. The lights were all off and when I switched a lamp on, she turned to me and I could see that her eyes were red. I knew she’d found out then. She’d been suspicious and asking me all kinds of crazy questions for weeks, and now she’d found out. Had Coreen called the house? Had she called? Was she waiting in the bathroom?
“Kerry, I can explain,” I said, rushing over to her.
“No, I want to go first,” she said.
“But it’s nothing you did,” I said.
“No, it’s what we both did.” She opened her arms and wrapped them around me tight. “We’re pregnant,” she whispered in my ear.
“What?”
“A baby,” she cried. “We’re pregnant.”
“What!”
She hugged me tighter and even in my disbelief I started crying too. We’d been talking about it, but Kerry and I hadn’t had sex in weeks. She’d been cranky, had some kind of flu and was feeling bloated, so I had to take up residence on the other side of the bed. We weren’t exactly working on a baby. But damn if the news didn’t sound and feel good. I was going to be a daddy. This was just what I needed.
“What is it?” I asked.
“We don’t know yet, silly,” Kerry laughed and kissed me on the cheek and I swear it was the softest kiss she’d given me in months. It was so soft and real that we caught eyes and kissed each other hard on the lips.
“I love you,” she said.
“I love you too, Kerry.”
After we called our mothers, we sat down in bed together and Kerry was moving full speed ahead as usual with her planning. I tuned out somewhere when she was talking about ordering a crib from some store in Los Angeles. Something about a valance and a celebrity stroller and I was sitting there nodding, but not really listening. While I was still excited about the baby, my mind had gone back to remembering what I was doing and where I was headed when I walked in the door. I was going to break it off with Coreen to save my marriage and now I had more reason. I needed to save my family.
When Kerry got up to take her nightly shower, I went into the office to call Coreen. I picked up the phone, but every time I did, I realized that I had nothing to say that would sound right. Any way I said it, I would sound like a heartless jerk. One thing I knew was that women always claimed they wanted to hear the truth, but when it came out and it wasn’t in their favor, they hated it and usually flipped out. Now Coreen hadn’t shown me that side of her personality just yet, but some of the stories she told me about her husband and her past suggested that she was a bit more of a firecracker than Kerry. Coreen was a sweet girl, but she was also very emotional and had a temper. But I had to do what I had to do. Call me a punk; call me a buster, but sitting in that office alone with the sound of Kerry singing “Rock-a-Bye-Baby” in the shower in the background, I decided there was only one way out. I had to end the thing quick and clean. I decided to write her an e-mail. I knew it was wrong, but shit, she wasn’t my wife. I didn’t owe her anything. We both agreed that there’d be no strings attached. She said she was a big girl.
Coreen wasn’t exactly okay with the news about the baby, but I figured she’d get over it. In fact, I forwarded most of her e-mails to Damien and he said they were all pretty normal for a breakup. He said not to respond and just let it go. I listened to him, but the messages kept going. Every day. Every night. There was either a phone message or e-mail from Coreen. And then they started getting sadder and sometimes just dark. She accused me of lying to her. Said we were meant to be together and that Kerry was no good for me. That she would wait for me and didn’t even care that I was married. It sounded so crazy. I mean, I liked her, but love was a big word I reserved for one person. And her feelings for me just sounded too deep. I didn’t know what they were based on. We’d had laughs and sex less than a handful of times. I hadn’t given her any romantic gifts or claimed I was doing anything with her other than what was happening. I did complain about Kerry from time to time, but I never said I was going to leave her. Sometimes I felt like maybe Coreen’s feelings for me, or what she’d claimed she’d had for me, were from somewhere else. That maybe she was struggling with losing her husband or the fact that her life wasn’t at the point where it needed to be. I actually e-mailed her that one time, breaking my rule of silence, but Coreen ignored it. She just kept saying I was lying and that I really wanted to be with her but I was scared to leave Kerry and wanted to be there for my son. Damien laughed and said he had so many girls claiming he was a liar when he said he didn’t want to be with them that it was pitiful. He said to stand my ground and not contact her.
But then, one late night I got an e-mail from Coreen that scared the shit out of me. It was maybe two, three, or four nights before Tyrian was born and she sounded like she’d just given up hope on life. This both worried and frightened me. I didn’t want anything to happen to her, and I was afraid she was going to do something to herself. I didn’t even want to mention the word suicidal , but damn if the letters didn’t sound that way. Her anger had gone from me to the world. And she was talking about checking out altogether.
I read the e-mail a few times. I didn’t want to respond. Kerry was acting very erratic with her hormones and I didn’t want to do any
thing to piss her off. But then I kept having these visions of Coreen hanging from a rope in her kitchen with some note about me leaving her on the table and I knew I couldn’t just sit back and do nothing. I didn’t know much about Coreen. I had no way of knowing how to handle her emotions, but I knew I couldn’t let something happen to her when I was a part of her pain.
I called. But she didn’t answer. I called again. No answer. Then I decided to write. I figured she would at least respond to that. But nothing. The silence was killing me. And walking around the house all day, all I could think of was that body swinging in the kitchen. Her giving up and my being involved.
It was after 7 PM on Thursday when I decided to roll over to Coreen’s house. I hadn’t heard anything from her and I had to make sure everything was okay. When I got there, her car was in the driveway, but the house was dark. It was late, and every other house on the block had a light on but hers. I tried her cell from the driveway, but there was no answer. Then I went to the door and peeked inside. I couldn’t see anything, but I knocked anyway. I stood there for five minutes knocking, then I decided that maybe I was overreacting. The girl could’ve been on vacation for all I knew. Maybe she’d moved on to another man. Good for her. I headed back to my car, ready to leave. But then I heard her voice.
“Jamison,” she said. I turned to find her standing in the doorway naked. I ran over to Coreen to block her from the street and push her into the house.
“What are you doing?” I asked, noticing that her eyes were red, her face was sunken in and her skin was ashy. She looked like she hadn’t eaten in days. “Get in the house. I’ve been calling you. I was worried.”
“I’ve been here,” she said weakly. “I’ve just been thinking about things.”
“Are you okay?” I sat her on the couch and headed into the bedroom to get a sheet or something to wrap around her. When I pulled it from the bed, a bottle of pills rolled from beneath the pillow. It fell to the floor and pills scattered everywhere. I walked over to see that they were sleeping pills.
When I came back into the room, Coreen was crying and rocking herself on the couch.
“I love you, Jamison, and I can’t let you go,” she cried.
“Coreen,” I said, sitting down beside her. I didn’t know exactly what I was going to say next, but I knew I had to say something. Something to comfort her. “I told you how I feel. But I don’t want you to be like this. I want more for you.”