Love, Honor or Stray:. E.N. Joy
really stopped and asked God exactly what He wanted her to do. She didn’t ask just in case she didn’t like His reply. She was giving new meaning to the term ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.’ If she didn’t ask God about her situation, then maybe He wouldn’t tell her.
“Look, Mother, I have to go. I’m sorry I snapped at you and all.”
“It’s okay. I know this is hard for you, dear. Seems like you get over one bridge and another is waiting. But we’ll get through it. With God’s help, we’ll get through it.”
“Thanks, Mom. I love you.” Tamarra ended the call then said to herself, “I don’t want to get through it. If at all possible, I’d prefer to go around it.”
Chapter Ten
Everything Literary: To answer your question, Mr. Born, if I were to write the greatest love story ever told, my ideal leading man would be, first and foremost, believable. The tall, dark, and handsome thing is played out. How about a tithing, delivered, and holy man? What about you, Mr. Born?
Born2Write: Well, I’m two out of three.
EverythingLiterary: LOL. That’s not what I meant. I meant what about you as far as if you were to write the greatest love story ever told, what would your ideal leading woman be?
Born2Write: Hmmm. Well, like your leading man, she’d have to be believable. I can’t do the fake thing. Like God, she’d have to be the same tomorrow as she was yesterday and today.
EverythingLiterary: Are you saying she has to be perfect like God? No woman could meet those standards without being fake.
Born2Write: No, I’m saying that I want her to be herself whether she is at home, at church, with her friends, with her momma and daddy, with her man, or without her man. Some women have a different face and personality for every place they are or for the different people they are with.
EverythingLiterary: Sounds like you speak from experience.
Born2Write: I do. I’ve met women before who are absolutely nothing like the people they presented themselves to be the first month I met them. By month two, I feel like I’m with a stranger, or auditioning for the remake of Fatal Attraction.
EverythingLiterary: Had your share of crazies, huh?
Born2Write: Don’t get me started. What about you? I’m sure a woman like yourself has had her share of relationships gone bad.
EverythingLiterary: Wait a minute… I thought we were talking fiction here. How did we go from make believe characters to ourselves?
Born2Write: And what’s so wrong with that? Getting to know a little bit about each other? You never know; the two of us just may have a lot in common. For example, I like to write; you like to write. Maybe we can get together sometime and brain storm. Who knows? Between the two of us, we may just get that greatest love story ever told written ourselves.
EverythingLiterary: Sorry, Mr. Born, but I’m not in the habit of meeting up with guys I meet over the Internet.
Born2Write: So you’ve NEVER met up with a guy you’ve met over the Internet before???
EverythingLiterary: Well, only for business.
Born2Write: Who said it would be about anything other than business? The last I checked, we were talking about writing. That is your business, right?
EverythingLiterary: To some degree, but something tells me, Mr. Born, that your idea of business and mine might not be the same. And just like my two main characters, if I were to write the greatest love story ever told, they’d have to be equally yoked.
Born2Write: What makes you think that we aren’t—I mean, that they aren’t?
EverythingLiterary: You ever heard of something called spirit of discernment?
Born2Write: I might have heard of it a time or two. What about it?
EverythingLiterary: Mine tells me that I like my eggs boiled until the yoke is that greenish color. It tells me that you like your eggs over easy.
Born2Write: Actually, I like mine scrambled with cheese.
EverythingLiterary: See, you don’t get my point, Mr. Born. And, unfortunately, I’m really busy today. Still have a lot of catching up to do.
Born2Write: I see. Well, thank you for taking time from your busy schedule to chit chat with a wretch like me.
EverythingLiterary: Cute.
Born2Write: Thank you. I think it’s the new haircut. I got my Rick Fox thing going on.
EverythingLiterary: I meant your comment was cute, not you.
Born2Write: Wow. That hurt. That was a… What would you call it? An un-Christlike thing to say.
EverythingLiterary: LOL. I didn’t mean it like that. I apologize. But I hardly believe your feelings are the least bit hurt. You don’t need me validating how handsome you are. I’m sure every day when you look into the mirror-mirror on the wall and pose your question, it gives you the reply you long to hear.
Born2Write: Are you calling me vain?
EverythingLiterary: Your words, not mine.
Born2Write: Ouch.
EverythingLiterary: Put a Band-Aid on it, Mr. Born. I’m sure it will be okay.
Born2Write: You’re relentless.
EverythingLiterary: Says the pot calling the kettle black.
Born2Write: Okay, I bow out gracefully. You’re the champ.
EverythingLiterary: Nobody likes a quitter, Mr. Born.
Born2Write: Trust me, I’ll keep that in mind.
Good day. Hope you get caught up.
“OMG, what am I doing?” Deborah laughed out loud as she spun around in her home office chair.
For the past few days, she and Lynox, a.k.a. Mr. Born, had been sending e-mails back and forth. Even now that it was out in the open that Lynox was the infamous Mr. Born, the two, in an unspoken agreement, decided not to make mention of it. They continued the charade, sticking to literary topics of discussion. They’d managed to talk about everything from the increase in African American New York Times bestselling authors over the last few years to the untimely deaths of some of the more popular African American authors such as Octavia Butler, BeBe Moore Campbell, and E. Lynn Harris.
Today was the first time they had ever come this close to veering off course into personal matters. “Maybe I should just nip this in the bud now before it goes too far and he starts getting the wrong idea,” Deborah told herself as she stood up and slowly paced the floor. But she really couldn’t see the harm in just a little fun on the Internet. Besides, she had to admit that she had never really given Lynox an honest chance to woo her, and he must have really found her to be someone he could see himself being with, considering nothing she did or said convinced him to give up on her. “Just like you, God,” she thought out loud. “The same way, in spite of myself, you have never given up on me, neither has Lynox.”
Perhaps that was a sign from God that maybe she was supposed to give Lynox a chance at love. She plopped back down at her computer to check her other e-mails, secretly hoping that the next one to pop up would be from Born2Write. After all, as she saw it, she had nothing to lose and only a possible future soul mate to gain.
Chapter Eleven
Paige had to admit that she’d been thinking about the accidental kiss she and Norman shared ever since he laid it on her. She’d been thinking about it a lot. She was thinking about it now. When she should have been thinking about her husband’s show of affection, she was lying on the living room couch thinking about Norman’s. Perhaps if her husband had been showing her any signs of affection lately, that wouldn’t be the case.
She hadn’t even realized her mind