I laughed. I liked the original Candyman myself and didn’t care much for the revision. I guess we agreed on that.

  I said, “But you’re not gonna write anything without the money first?”

  He looked at me and sighed. “Maybe . . . if my lady finally decided to give me some . . . I might feel inspired enough to do something without the money.”

  I eyed him across the table and continued to grin. He had me thinking all kinds of things that I didn’t want to admit.

  “So . . . sex is that important to you? It’s worth more than money? Really?”

  Tyrell was perfectly calm about it, the calmest he had ever been while I was around him.

  He said, “Sex is how we all got here. And down here in Atlanta, what they call the new ‘Black Hollywood,’ we got millionaire rappers and athletes from all over the country and the world, who go to these strip clubs and throw money in the air to make it rain for the illusion of sex. Imagine that.”

  “But that’s only one-dollar bills,” I argued. “That ain’t real money.”

  Tyrell frowned. “That ain’t real money?” he repeated. “Can them strippers pick it up and spend it? What the hell are you talking about? They ain’t throwing up fake money.”

  “I mean, it’s not like significant income,” I explained. “Especially if you’re talking about millionaires doing it.”

  Tyrell said, “Money is money. And people blow a whole lot of it for sex. But you don’t see anybody in here making it rain over this food.”

  He tossed his hands in the air with imaginary money and said, “Damn this macaroni and cheese is banging! Who made this spaghetti? And the barbecue sauce on this chicken is the shit! Bring the chef out here, I got something for him.”

  I laughed again. The man was hilarious.

  I said, “So, if your woman broke down and gave you some, you would be inspired enough to write something for me for free?” I had to get him back on topic.

  Tyrell said, “For free? Naw, I didn’t say that. You’re eventually gonna have to pay me. You just won’t have to pay as much up front,” he explained.

  I took a deep breath and exhaled. I couldn’t believe what I was about to say and where I was about to go with it. But the truth was the truth.

  I said, “Well, does it have to come from her?”

  He nodded rather quickly, as if he had already been thinking about it. “I mean, I’ve invested a lot in her,” he stated. “A lot of time, emotions, ideas, energy, frustrations. We ain’t new. So, it means more from her.

  “But I can still go out and get some random ass, right now. That’s nothin’ to me,” he boasted. “The hard part is getting the woman you want to submit. Otherwise, why would any man choose to be in a committed relationship? Especially for guys who got it like that. You could just have a rotating-fucking-door of women,” he concluded.

  “But why do you ask?” he questioned.

  That was the hard part for me. Where was my mind going?

  I said, “Well . . . if you just needed some, then . . . I’m still a woman,” I hinted.

  Tyrell saw my point and started laughing. He said, “So, you would give me some just for your movie?” That was the elephant in the room. It all sounded crazy. But I had to clarify it.

  “Not just for my movie,” I told him. “But . . . I like you. I really do,” I admitted with a slow nod. I said, “There’s a lot of fake people out here in this world. But there’s nothing fake about you. You are who you are. And I appreciate that.”

  There was silence in the restaurant. Tyrell looked at me with moistness in his eyes that he refused to succumb to, as he nodded back to me . . . diligently.

  “You have no idea how that makes me feel just hearing that validation of my manhood,” he told me. “It’s almost like . . . we can’t be men anymore. So, I gotta apologize for how I was raised. And how my dick still gets hard when I want a woman. So, I appreciate you for saying that. And I thank you. Because it sounds like you understand me. And that means a lot.”

  Then he smiled at me. “So . . . we gon’ work on this movie of yours,” he told me, right as our server made it back to the table with the water.

  The Asian college girl sat our glasses of water on the table and asked us, “Are you ready to order?”

  Tyrell looked at her and smiled with confidence. “Yeah, we ready.” And he made his order.

  CHARLES CLAY

  Reflection 28

  BEFORE GETTING BACK TO DARK & MOODY WITH AN UPDATE ON her role in creating the soundtrack music, I needed to check in on Charles. I had left him alone for a minute while he healed his head and his ego. I figured he needed a bit of time and space to think about things.

  “Hey, Charles, how’s it going?” I asked him when he picked up. “I hadn’t heard back from you. I wanted to make sure you were all right.”

  “Yeah, that was an embarrassing night,” he responded. “Now the girl’s trying to sue me?”

  “What? Really?” That caught me off guard.

  He said, “Yeah, she served the paperwork right after the incident. And my attorney contacted me about it.”

  I paused. I still didn’t know enough about the situation and hadn’t gotten a chance to ask him more detailed questions about it. But I needed to.

  “On what grounds?” I asked him.

  “Sexual misconduct,” he answered. “She claims she hasn’t been able to work or focus on getting jobs, while going through psychological counseling and all of that. She also claims her relationship has suffered with her fiancé.”

  I was still hesitant to ask, but I had to. “Well, what happened?”

  “Of course, I can’t talk about it now. We have lawyers involved,” he told me. “And unfortunately, it also puts the breaks on some of the new film projects I had on the table until we get this all worked out.”

  Shit! I thought. Do you believe this?

  “Well, do people know about it?” I asked him.

  “Yeah, the first thing she wants to do is take it public. So, we’re trying to get out in front of that, so it doesn’t negatively affect my career,” he answered.

  “But if you’re already putting some of your projects on hold, then it’s already affecting your career,” I commented. Including the film I’ve been planning with you, I thought.

  “Not necessarily. It would only be a minor delay if any,” he assured me.

  “If it gets handled correctly, right?” I assumed.

  I wasn’t even thinking about the victim or the truth of the matter. Obviously, Charles had done something with her. Was it all consensual? Either way, they both had a story to tell.

  He said, “I’ve been thinking that I needed a break anyway. I’ve been going really hard for the past few years. Maybe I need some time off to reevaluate things.”

  He was right, of course. He was just saying it at the wrong time for me. Which was selfish on my part.

  I took a deep breath and stated the obvious. “So, I guess I can’t count on you to direct my film idea anytime soon, huh?”

  “When were you realistically trying to get it done?” he asked me. “It wasn’t gonna happen this year. You don’t even have a screenplay.”

  Instead of spilling the beans too early about my deal with Tyrell Hodge, I told Charles, “I’m working on that right now.”

  “Exactly. So, that’s not gonna be ready for a few months, at least,” he predicted.

  He didn’t believe in Tyrell’s writing skills like I did. So, I bit my tongue and didn’t say anything. I figured it was best to hand a screenplay over to him once we had a first draft to read.

  Charles was probably right about the time period. Tyrell was pretty busy making money driving PDS, and I didn’t have the budget to pay him yet. Nevertheless, instead of me sweating it all, I moved on. I had other calls to make and other preparations, including building an outside production team. I was initially going to lean on Charles and his team, but maybe it was good for me not to do that. I didn’t want to give one person too much influence over my efforts anyway, particularly with the potential of Charles and Tyrell knocking heads. Maybe it would be best for me to have a neutral mediator between them.

  I took in all the information he presented to me and sighed. “Okay, well . . . if there’s anything you need to talk to me about on a professional level, I’m still a psychologist and it would all be confidential,” I reminded Charles. I didn’t want him to forget what my profession was, and I was still able to help him in what he was going through.

  He said, “I know. But right now, I just need time to pull back and reflect on everything, and allow the lawyers to do their job.”

  I nodded. “Okay.” There wasn’t much more to say about it, at least on my part. But Charles’s production partner was a whole other story.

  * * *

  Jacqueline Clark already had issues with Charles’s ego and careless sexual appetite. Now his uncontrollable vice threatened to sabotage her career, reputation, and income after she had jumped through a dozen circus hoops to set up multiple film deals for them to execute without setbacks. But Charles had now presented her with a full load of embarrassing drama to overcome.

  Jackie called him shortly after we hung up and asked him another heavyweight question. “Who is DeAndra Kittles?”

  Charles froze before he asked her, “Why?”

  “Because she just filed a second sexual misconduct suit against you. Now who is she?”

  Charles’s heart nearly jumped through his chest. He was busted again and at a loss for words.

  That was consensual! he fumed to himself.

  In anger, he blurted, “This is ludicrous! You know what this is, don’t you? It’s the Me Too movement,” he accused. “Once one person starts it, others jump on the bandwagon to get paid. And it’s just sad.”

  “No, what’s sad is your dumb ass!” Jackie snapped at him. “And you still refuse to take responsibility for your actions. I thought you told me you were gonna get help? What happened to the psychologist you were seeing from New Jersey? Did you fuck her too?

  “I am sick of you!” she shouted. “Call the fucking lawyers! You’re gonna have to pay me too for this shit! So, put me on that long, damned list you’re building!” And she hung up on him.

  Charles felt as if he had been hit by a tidal wave. He had no idea what to think. He even thought about calling Jackie back to try and save himself. But instead, he took her advice and called their lawyers. He was curious to know what they had on him.

  “Hey Jeffrey, this is Charles. What’s going on? Jackie told me to give you a call.”

  There was a pregnant pause over the line before the attorney responded to him. He said, “Charles . . . I need you to come into the office.”

  Charles chuckled nervously. “Is it that bad?”

  “Yes, it is,” Jeffrey confirmed. “This young lady claims you handcuffed her to the bed.”

  Charles froze again. But she asked me to! he yelled in his own mind. Instead of voicing it, he asked his attorney, “Have you ever seen the movie Fifty Shades of Grey?”

  There was another awkward pause. “This is not the movies, Charles. You make them, but you’re not in one,” the attorney told him. He said, “This is your real life. And you need to come down here so we can figure this out. ASAP! And don’t talk to anyone until you talk to me.”

  Charles nodded, slowly. “Okay.” There was no more to be said. He had to gather himself together and head to his attorney’s offices downtown.

  Yet . . . he found that he couldn’t move. He just sat there at his desk in his office, staring into empty space, as if he had gazed into the eyes of the Greek Gorgon Medusa, and he had turned into stone.

  DESTINY FLOWERS

  Reflection 29

  LIKE CLOCKWORK, WHILE IN THE MIDDLE OF MAKING MY MOVES and more phone calls, this crazy woman Destiny Flowers caught me right in between my appointments. But I was ready for her.

  As soon as I heard her voice on the line, I told her, “Excuse me, Destiny, but I still haven’t seen where you’ve made an effort to sign onto my schedule, or to finally meet up with me. So, if you don’t mind, I’d like you to stop wasting my time with these random, noncommittal phone calls of yours.”

  I expected her to bullshit me again with what she planned to do, while I planned to ignore it all and move on with my day after hanging up on her. But she immediately threw a curveball.

  “It looked to me like you fell hard for somebody,” she commented. “I guess you do like guys.”

  I stopped my rant and said, “What? What are you talking about?”

  She was digging into my personal life again.

  She said, “I’m talking about your lunch date. It looked like you were enjoying yourself. Sounded like it too.”

  I winced and thought about it. She had to be talking about Tyrell, because he was the only lunch date I had—if you really want to call it that. But it was business more than personal. Was she in the restaurant with us that day?

  “Well, how come you didn’t come over and say hi?” I asked, leading her where I wanted the conversation to go. If she had been stalking me at the Midtown Cafeteria, I wanted her to give me the evidence.

  She said, “I didn’t want to break up y’all talk. It looked like you were really going at it.”

  “And you say you were close enough to hear us?” I questioned.

  “I wasn’t that close. But y’all were loud, talking about fuckin’ and carrying on,” she told me.

  Now I knew she was there. But she didn’t know all of the facts.

  “Well, if you’re gonna eavesdrop, then you at least need to get your information right.”

  Meanwhile, I began to think of where she could have been sitting. I was so knee-deep in my conversation with Tyrell that I couldn’t remember anyone else around us but our Asian server.

  “Did you have the same Asian girl serving you?” I asked.

  “Yup,” she answered easily. “And whatever y’all said had that poor girl blushing. Poor, little thing.”

  I forgot about the stalking for a minute and laughed. “You must have ordered a lot at your table then, because it took a while for that girl to make her way over to us, even for our water.”

  “It wasn’t my table that slowed her up. She had a whole table of college girls who did that,” she responded. “You didn’t hear them talking all loud and laughing?”

  Honestly, I really hadn’t. To my recollection it had been a quiet day.

  On cue, Destiny said, “It’s funny how you don’t hear nothing else when you’re with somebody you really like. You can end up putting all your focus on them. So, you must really like him, huh?” she asked me.

  I paused again. That was none of her damn business. So, I avoided answering the question.

  “We were there for business and for business only,” I told her with emphasis.

  “Not with you smelling all good like that, you wasn’t,” she commented.

  I frowned. “You were close enough to smell me?”

  That sounded a bit extra. She had me on alert again. Did this woman walk past me or something? I asked myself. I even started thinking about who was in the bathroom with me.

  “How do you know how I smelled?” I asked her.

  “Duuuhhh, because I could smell you.”

  “You were sitting that close?”

  “No. I walked right past you when I came in. But you were so busy hugging the man, you didn’t even notice me.”

  I snapped and said, “I don’t even know what you look like. How am I gonna notice you?”

  She ignored my rant and said, “If this lunch date was all about business, why you try to come in there looking and smelling all good?”

  “Because I have an image to upkeep,” I argued. “I always look and smell good.”

  “Well, what you think his woman would say about that?” she asked me.

  “How do you even know he has a woman?” I asked back.

  “Every grown man has a woman. They may not be on good terms all the time, but he definitely has one.”

  “Oh, so, now you know him like that? Really? Well, tell me something I don’t know about him. Since you know so much.”

  This woman knew how to get under my skin like she was a damn relative or something.

  She said, “I know he don’t like your ass. He likes younger women,” she blurted.

  “How do you know what he likes?”

  “All men like younger women. And you pushin’ fifty now. So, he don’t like your old ass,” she insisted. “He would fuck that li’l Asian girl ten times before he even looked at you.”

  I don’t know how or why, but that shit actually hurt my feelings. So, I snapped and said “Fuck you! You don’t know what he likes.”

  “How do you know what I know?”

  “Because you don’t know him. You just saw me out there with somebody, and now you’re assuming shit.”

  She said, “I’m not assuming nothin’. I do know. You don’t fucking know. But I know everything you do. And the people you deal with. That’s why they’re getting all fucked up now. Because you don’t know what you’re doin’. Try’na call yourself a psychologist. Girl, please.”

  I hated when this woman did that shit! That old, condescending tone of hers made me feel like a child. But I was older than her. So, I had to remind myself to act my age.

  I said real calmly, “You obviously have some mental problems. So, once you finally schedule some time to come in and see me, we can handle that and get to the bottom of this. But until then, I need to let you go and be crazy somewhere else. Because I have things to do.”

  Before I could hang up on her, she caught me on it. “Don’t you hang up on me,” she warned. “I ain’t done talking to you yet.”

  “Well, I’m done talking to you.”

  “You don’t need to talk. I’ll do the talking.”

  “About what? Because you obviously don’t have anything to say. You just call up to aggravate me,” I barked at her.

  “I’m just try’na warn you not to crave people’s significant others,” she told me.

  “What does it matter to you? You’re not involved in it,” I argued.