The Moment You Realize 'This Ain't What You Want'

We were in this relationship now. Since we no longer had sex to fall back on, we were getting to know each other outside of the bedroom. What is the saying, be careful what you ask for? Although I had (or thought I had) wanted to be in a relationship with him for the last two years, I had not envisioned it being this way. He, on the other hand, seemed to have given it plenty of thought. He had ideas about how we would split up chores and time with the children, and of course there was that baby he had been wanting. He also had this weird idea of us being married or in a committed relationship, but not living together. Where they do that at?

For my part, I discovered I really didn’t like being called all day every day. Give me some time to miss you! He didn’t really watch the news, so I couldn’t discuss politics or world events with him. He spent most of his time alone, with his mom, or talking with his best friend. And his days revolved around his TV shows, unless he had a performance. The conversation was getting stale, and I got quiet. He felt I wanted him to entertain me, but really I was just bored. Somehow over the years I had missed that his topics of conversation mostly revolved around 5 things: cheating, women and our faults, his motorcycle, music, and his health. He was taking his blood pressure and temperature every hour since his diagnosis and asking what I thought any slight change might mean. Although, I am not a doctor, but work in public health research, he has always called me to get my opinion on any and everything that he thought could be an issue. It was starting to annoy me.

I spent Christmas with my children and he spent Christmas with his mother all the while continuing his streak of excessive calling. “If you’re going to call this much, you might as well come over,” I told him. But he didn’t and I went on to enjoy my time with my children. And then one by one they left me to finish out their holiday break with friends or family. I had been asking for some alone time but I never like being without my children during the holidays, but I was just going to have to make the best of it.

He invited me to his New Year’s Eve gig. I almost didn't go because of a mix up with my oldest daughter’s plans. He called his mother and his sister to find out if one of them could watch her because he wanted his kiss at midnight. They both agreed, but my daughter was not too interested in spending NYE with strangers and so made other plans to hang out with one of her friends.

After attending church services with my daughter, I met up with a girlfriend and brought her along to keep me company while he played. She and I sat at the bar and made fast friends with the couple next to us. We ate and had drinks while we watched the 20-something crowd circulate through the lobby of the hotel on their way to the club. Oh the days, of clubbing. Now, I was the ‘older woman’ wondering where that child was going in that dress or how long that girl expected to stay in those shoes. When did I become the older chic at the bar passing judgement?

In between sets we took group pictures and ‘couple’s pictures’. He and I snuck away from prying eyes to have a little alone time before they went back on. They played until the countdown to midnight; “10, 9. 8. 7, 6...,” everyone yelled in unison. He motioned for me to come over and as the clock struck midnight we kissed. Such the cliché, but I was hoping that maybe it could be the beginning of a new chapter together. Soon after, my girlfriend and I left. I texted him to let him know I had made it home and he called me later once he was home. I didn’t realize how sleepy I was and ended up falling asleep on him while on the phone.

On New Year’s Day I cooked the traditional meal: fish, greens, black eyed peas. He was late arriving, which pissed me off since in the process of trying to keep the food warm the fish got over cooked. I am a woman serious about my craft and I do not like serving an unworthy dish. When I opened the door, he brought in his guitar and a bag big enough to hold his whole house. He ate up my food like it was the best thing ever so I didn’t worry too much about the overcooked fish. Afterward, we went to the store and when we returned, I cleaned up the kitchen, he took out the trash and we settled in for a night of movies. Then around 1am, he abruptly decided he needed to go home.

“What? This was supposed to be our time together and your first night staying over here.” I said.

“I know, but you know I’m just not that comfortable staying at someone else’s house.” He said.

“Really? Well, I’ve told you I’m not all that thrilled about being at your house in the cigar smoke sharing space with the inches of dust all over everything, but I did it anyway. And we discussed this! If you weren’t staying why did you bring all this stuff? Why did you have me drive you to the store because you forgot your toothbrush?”

“Because I wanted to be comfortable while I was here. And I needed to brush my teeth after I ate, just in case.”

"Just in case what?" I asked. I walked over and opened the door for him to leave. “Good bye.”

He walked over and grabbed my waist, “Don’t be like that. I’ll call you when I get home.”

I started attending the CLEAR (Choosing Life: Empowerment! Action! Results!) counseling sessions the HIV counselor had recommended for me. I was hoping it would help me to understand the choices I had made in the past and present, so that I could make better choices in the future. We discussed the pros and cons of my relationship. The counselor suggested I write them down and have a conversation with him about what I wrote, as well as about this hypothetical situation of two separate households. The counselor also suggested I really think about what I wanted in a partner and a relationship and whether or not that was what I was getting.

I went home and wrote out my lists. I started with what I wanted in a relationship. I had plenty to write about. Then I wrote out the cons of our relationship. Again, I had plenty to write about it, but when I got to the pros I had less than 10 things on the list. I left the door open for me to come back and write more. After all, I wanted to be fair.

VIII

The Decision

I never got proof of Tasarah’s test results, and he probably never asked. I decided to let it go and just focus on taking care of me. It was the holiday season and I had a lot on my plate. In the meantime, he was calling me every hour on the hour, and if I didn’t answer, he would just call back every 5-15 minutes. It got to the point where even the kids were irritated each time my phone rang. I decided I had had enough and I needed to get out and do something for me.

I went to my favorite Friday night hang out. I hadn’t been there in a while and I needed to see my people and have a drink, or maybe two or three. It felt good walking in and seeing smiling faces and feeling the love from the crew. Dang, how long had it been since we had all gotten together?

Somewhere around my second drink I spotted George. He had been coming here probably as long, if not longer than I had. One night I was standing at the door with my girls and I saw him at the bar with several women around him. I had seen him before posted up at the bar a different woman each time. He stood out because he was pretty much the only white guy in the place on a Friday night, so I was curious. “Who’s the older white guy with all the black women?” I asked Kelly. “Oh, that’s George. He’s a really nice guy.” She replied while dancing. I didn’t speak to him that night, but a few months later when I was there celebrating my birthday, the band announced that he was also celebrating his birthday. I went over and wished him a happy birthday and we hit it off from there. We actually had a lot in common so from time to time we would go to dinners and football games, or make plans to meet each other at Zona’s. Since that introduction, we made it a point to celebrate our birthdays together.

George was sitting at the bar talking with a woman. They appeared to be together so it was my intention to just say hello and keep it moving, but that didn’t quite happen. He was keeping her company until her girls arrived and we, instead, had a long conversation about ‘us’. I told him that I saw the picture of him and the woman at the last Falcons game. That took us down a rabbit hole I wasn’t expecting. My sister had already told me that I needed to get over myself and not say anything to him about it, but I’m not exactly known for holding my tongue. He told me that he knew I had feelings for someone else, but he loved me and if I would just give him a sign that he had a chance with me, he would drop everyone else and be there. His sincerity made me want to cry. He was genuinely an all-around good guy. Why couldn’t I love him the way that he loved me? Clearly, I had some sort of feelings for him because I was jealous when I saw that someone else was giving him attention. At the same time, I had all this shit going on with dude and I didn’t want to involve George in that. I wanted him to be happy and if the girl in the picture made him happy, then that’s who he should be with, and I told him as much. That didn’t stop him from buying my drinks and a to-go order of shrimp to take home to my daughter. He was thoughtful like that. He always asked how my son was doing in college, and when we went out, would make sure that I took something back for my girls. Unfortunately, I could never give him my all because of a few reasons, not the least of which was the fact that I was dealing with this one over here.

On my way home, I called him. It was time for me to make a decision, piss or get off the pot. We talked for hours about the status of our relationship. The conversation was intense. We were clearly not exclusive, and our situation was now complicated by his status. We both had expectations, although he would like to believe that his maleness prevented him from being able to formulate such things. However, when he asked how I saw our relationship going and I didn’t answer in the manner he wanted, he became upset. He went on for at least an hour telling me how I should have answered his question. Clearly, he had an expectation. After another hour, we finally agreed that we were saying the same things, we just expressed them differently. Soon after, I went to bed. I needed to get some sleep so I could be on time for my massage appointment.

That massage was everything. Those 50 minutes were the most relaxing 50 minutes I had had in the last two weeks. I wished it didn’t have to end. Before I left, I made sure to book my next session. I ran some errands and then went to his house. When we went to the clinic he had asked if we could spend some uninterrupted time together. It took a couple of weeks, but I arranged for my children to spend the weekend with their godfather so I could spend the weekend with him.

Over dinner, we recapped the phone conversation now that we were both fully awake and sober, to be sure that we were on the same page. And we were. We both wanted a supportive, caring, long-term relationship. We spent the rest of the night cuddled up on the sofa intermittently watching TV and talking. While we talked, he would sometimes pace the floor as he sipped on a glass of wine and smoked a cigar. He was fearful and somewhat remorseful about the decisions he had made. He told me he was afraid that one of the women would out him once she was contacted by the health department. He asked if I thought he should post his status on Facebook first. I told him he didn’t need to do that. He still needed to be able to work and I didn’t think any of the women would out him anyway since outing him would out them.

I asked him pointed questions about his behavior and why he did what he did and he opened up to me about things in his past. He confided in me that he really didn’t like himself and even considered suicide since his diagnosis. I told him he should really go to the counseling session at the health department or find a private counselor who could help him. My heart went out to him.

“Before you walked into the club that night, I was thinking about how I was going to tell you. I mean, I knew I had to tell you, but I wasn’t ready when I saw you walk in the door. I wanted to wait until Monday when you could do something about it.”

“Thank God for Saturday testing sites.” I interrupted.

“Why do you think you didn’t test positive?” He asked me.

I didn’t hesitate, “Grace, plain and simple. I ask God every day, or almost every day, to protect me and my children from harm seen and unseen. This was the unseen harm.”

He silently sipped on his wine and puffed on his cigar as if he were mulling that over in his mind. “You should have been pregnant.” He said from out of the blue.

“What are you talking about? Last summer?” He had been asking me to have his child for some years, and I had always said no because the situation wasn’t right. We weren’t in a relationship then, and we were nowhere close to getting married. I was already a single mother to three children. I had no desire to add another child to the mix. And then we had “the scare” after seeing each other after one of my trips overseas. “Do you really think that would have made a difference?” I asked.

He shook his head yes. He thought that if I had become pregnant that would have changed him and his life course and we would not be dealing with this diagnosis now. I wasn’t as confident. I felt having a child would have just increased the number of people affected.

The next day we lounged around and he played some of his new music for me. The songs weren’t complete, but there was one in particular that gave me chills when he played it. I told him that one would be his number one hit, his moneymaker. He said it was inspired by me. Of course, that made me feel good. We smiled at each other, and then he looked thoughtful.

“If you're still negative three months from now, will you leave me?”

“I’m not going to leave you because I’m negative. If I leave you, it will be because of something else.”

VII