Take Her Man

“Feeling like silk, that’s what, Troy,” Tasha said, zeroing in on me. “Did you forget rule number two?”

“Change, Change, Change,” I said. “I need to remain completely fabulous and look even better the next time Julian sees me. Right?”

“Exactly,” Tasha confirmed. “So how are you going to do that looking like a crazy prep-school stalker? I mean, look at you. Your hair looks a mess, your clothes are all jacked up, and you have some kind of chocolate stuff on your upper lip.” I wiped my lip to find traces of Rocky Road. “Now, how are you going to be stunning when you see Julian if you look a mess?”

Tamia came rushing back into the kitchen carrying a slinky black nightgown from Victoria’s Secret. It was my favorite and she knew it. We’d picked it up at the mall during one of our monthly shopping trips to Long Island.

“I don’t know, guys. I was just having a bad day. I was feeling down,” I said, more embarrassed about the evidence of my Rocky Road binge than about my outfit.

“Well, that’s why we’re here.” Tamia slipped the T-shirt off over my head. “We figured you were lying in bed, sad and crying—thinking about that Negro. And hadn’t eaten anything. So we picked up some Chinese food for nourishment, and wine to wash away your sorrows. We’re here to cheer you up.”

“Cheer me up? I just want to be alone, you guys,” I said, putting the nightgown on. I sighed as it fell over my body. Julian loved how it looked on me. “I really just want to be alone.”

“See, that’s the problem with women during breakups.” Tasha put the last of the Chinese food on my kitchen table. “Men, they stay busy after a breakup. They get out with the fellas, buy a car, invest, date…They stay out and about, refusing to admit that they feel any pain,” she said, opening the other bottle of wine I’d left sitting on the counter. “But the female species, we like to wallow in our pain, lie in bed sleeping and eating, gaining weight and feeling bad. It’s just all really sad and it just puts us at a breakup disadvantage.”

I sat down at the table and took a sip of my wine.

“Do you guys think he misses me?” I asked.

“Of course he does,” Tamia said. “He probably misses you just as much as you miss him. But he just won’t let himself feel it and you know it.”

“Exactly, girl,” Tasha said, giving Tamia five. “We on the same page.” They laughed. “But, really, it’s just like I said, he’s handling it differently.”

“Well, what’s up with you guys? I’m tired of thinking about my drama.” I shoveled a big spoonful of lo mein and hot mustard into my mouth.

“Well,” Tamia started, “following in your footsteps, I’m going to do a spring cleaning.” She sat back in her seat. “I just need to clean off my entire roster and start anew.”

She was referring to our male clean up. We made up the term when Tasha, out of complete disgust with all the losers she was dating, decided to cut them all off. Afterward, she told Tamia and me how free she felt that she didn’t have to talk to any of those losers again. No more wondering where the relationships would go, if they were going to start acting right, none of that. It was Splitsville…three times over. Out with the old, in with the new. A true spring cleaning.

“But I thought you liked that guy…what’s his name, the marketing guy from the record label,” Tasha said.

“Jeremy?” I asked. “Yeah, I thought you liked him, too, Tamia.”

“Well, ladies, we finally had sex,” Tamia said, skewering a tiny shrimp with her fork.

“And? Was it good?” Tasha asked.

“I don’t know, ask his penis, Mr. Shrimp.” She waved the shrimp in front of us and we all started laughing hysterically. “I think he had a disease or something—infantile penis. I don’t know.”

“It wouldn’t have been that bad if brother man knew how to work it, but he was just lame,” Tamia said.

“I know that’s right,” Tasha said. “For some reason men still think that size is the only thing that matters.”

“Please, I’ll take a little man who’s going to smack it up, flip it, and rub it down over some ten-inch brother who’s just going to sit there thinking he’s God’s gift to the bedroom, any day!” Tamia said, placing the salt shaker next to a bottle of wine.

“So Jeremy didn’t even try?” I asked.

“Please, I was lying there just mad that I had to add his ass to the list of men I’ve had sex with. What a damn waste of a space.”

“Oh, his ass doesn’t even count,” Tasha said with a wicked laugh. “If it was that small, it was just like making out anyway. Like using a tampon.” She held up her chopstick.

“Oh, you’re wrong for that.” I snatched the chopstick.

“No, he was wrong for getting me all excited about Santa and then sending one of his little elves.” Tamia snatched the chopstick and handed it back to Tasha.

“Damn, girl. Well, what about Alex from class?” I asked, referring to Tamia’s recent walk on t

he wild side, dating a white guy.