Chanel

 

 

As much as I wanted to cry, I couldn’t let myself do that. I just kept replaying the conversation with Veronika and Antonina and it had my blood raging. I was hurt, but I was even more pissed. All my life, without people knowing me, I’d been judged. It was why I was such an overachiever. I felt like I had to prove something at all times! It was only when Rai came into my life that I stopped feeling like I had to prove shit. He brought me full circle. It was me and him against the world and I beat the odds and made sure that I wasn’t going to become a failed statistic. Yes, I was a statistic, but one with a success story, and I refused to let that woman, or those women take me back to a time where I felt less than—and damn sure not for the color of my fucking skin.

“Chanel, talk to me,” Dario said, after having driven for a long period of silence. “We need to talk about how you’re feeling.”

I shook my head and closed my eyes. I really didn’t want to talk for fear that I might shed tears while doing so. I didn’t want to give emotion at that level.

“Not right now, okay?” I said, my voice low and leveled.

“If not now, when?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Well, you need to be. I may be new to the whole relationship thing, but even I know that communication is key. So, that’s what we need to make sure that we have at all times.”

I snapped my neck toward him and rolled my eyes in frustration. “And I’m communicating to you that talking about this shit right now is not what I want to do.”

When I felt the car accelerate to a higher speed, I knew that there were now two of us that were angry. As far as I was concerned, that was just what it would have to be for now because talking wasn’t something I could pull off without yelling and cussing. I half expected Dario to ask again, but he didn’t. Instead he gunned the engine, maneuvered two lanes over, and took the next exit.

“What are you doing?” I asked angrily.

Of course he didn’t answer me. I expected as much. When we pulled over into a Walgreen’s parking lot seconds after getting off the freeway, I knew that keeping quiet was no longer an option.

“Listen, Chanel,” he said, cutting the engine and removing his seatbelt to turn towards me. “I don’t do well with attitudes. Never have and I’m not gonna start now. This thing that we entered into isn’t just your relationship, it’s our relationship. So stop the shit and let me know what the hell is going on.”

“Dario, you walked in on the tail end of that conversation. You heard what was said.”

“I heard you imply that my mother had an issue with you because of the color of your skin. That’s what I heard. So, now I’m asking you what led to that? It’s gonna be the difference between me taking you home and coming inside with you, or taking you home and going back to have a discussion with my mother. If you weren’t in such a damn hurry to leave, we could’ve done this there, but I saw your discomfort and wanted to honor that. So, now is the time for you to return that damn favor so we can move past this shit.”

“This shit? Pssh. It’s more than that, Dario!”

“Then tell me how that is! How many different ways do I need to ask you?”

I smacked my lips in frustration and defiantly folded my arms across my chest. “She was asking me all kinds of questions about my son! Where is his father? Don’t I think it’s important that every child has his father? Dario has a career that he needs to tend to!”

In the middle of my yelling, I realized that tears were pouring. I couldn’t stop them and that made me even angrier that I’d lost that kind of control. My chest heaved with emotion before I had a chance to reel it in.  I had my face buried inside my hands when I heard the driver’s side door open and close. Moments later, my door opened, and I felt Dario softly grab onto my wrist.

“Come here, baby,” he requested.

Through my sniffles, I struggled to get out, “I-i-it’s c-cold . . .”

But he pulled me anyway and before I knew it, I was wrapped inside of his arms against the car and sobbing relentlessly into his chest. I stood there and cried my soul out. So much so, that after a while it no longer had anything to do with Dario’s mother. I was crying because her words did ring true—every child does need their father. I thought I had found that in Tyler, but when he couldn’t have me the way he wanted, he transferred the treatment onto Rai and that should never have been.

I never even believed in ‘forever’, because I hadn’t ever experienced it, but what I did believe was that a man would always be a man regardless, and Tyler had proven me wrong and dogged my son out in the process. He made me look like a liar. Like I lied to my baby about the life I could give him and that fucked me up, wholly!

Dario’s light kisses to the top of my head as he comforted me, was soothing, but the thoughts arrested me, leaving me chained to the pain that refused to let me go.

“Get it all out,” he urged. “I’ll hold you as long as I need to.”

Suddenly, hearing Dario’s voice and knowing that he cared, my voice emerged. “It was so fucked up when he did that to him, Dario!” I cried. “I trusted that he would keep his loyalty to Rai even though I wasn’t with him! That’s what hurts! That’s what hurts! Maybe your mother didn’t mean it the way it sounded, and at this point I don’t even know! I just know it struck a nerve because of the mark that he fuckin’ left! My son didn’t deserve that!”

“Shhh,” he consoled, as he rubbed my hair with one hand and across my back with the other. “It’s okay, baby. You can’t hold onto that. You can’t think you failed because of some shit that he did. And by all accounts, Rai seems like a well-rounded kid to me. You’ve done an amazing job and don’t ever let anybody or any situation make you feel differently. I’m still going to talk to my mother and I need you to trust that. But as far as Rai . . . you being a good mother to him is just one of the many things that make you so beautiful to me. Look at me,” he requested, pulling back slightly. “You are as good as it gets. I’ve seen it and so has everyone else. If that kid is lacking anything in the way of love and guidance, it does not fucking show. Okay?”

I nodded at his words of encouragement. It surprised me that I was even in my emotions at the level that I was. But maybe I needed that cleanse. Yes, I needed that cleanse. And after I’d gotten it, I calmed all the way down, and managed a smile.

“I think it’s time to go now. I can feel the tip of my nose becoming numb and we’re out here hugged up against a car in the Walgreen’s parking lot like we sneaked out of our respective homes, away from our spouses to meet up. I’m sure people are—”

Before I could finish my sentence, Dario silenced my attempt at speaking with a kiss as soft as cotton—a kiss so soft and so hypnotizing that I forgot everything before the kiss. It was what I needed and so I readily fell into it.