Joel & Ayesha – One Late Night

Joel pressed his knuckles against his chest, but it wouldn’t do a thing to soothe the burning ache. Sydney was dating. He hadn’t been able to so much as take another woman seriously and there she was, at one of their favorite restaurants, laughing and smiling with some handsome, bald motherfucker. 

He’d gone to pick up takeout to go back home and eat alone, but after spotting her moving on with her life so effortlessly, he hadn’t the stomach for it. Now, he was at Dez and Larke’s, and he was pretty sure the last thing the newlyweds wanted was his melancholy ass in their den.

The door behind him opened.

“Actually, Dez,” he turned, “I probably shouldn’t even be her—Ayesha. Hey.”

Ayesha stared at him from Dez and Larke’s foyer, her eyes filled with pity. It was how they all looked at him, how they’d started looking at him ever since he and Syd announced their split. Everyone else’s relationships were going strong despite their careers, but Joel Lattimore hadn’t been enough for Sydney Donovan. Couldn’t keep her happy. 

Hell, who knew? 

Maybe she’d been faking her orgasms.

“Hey, Joel.” A soft smile touched Ayesha’s lips. “Dez and Larke aren’t back yet, but you can come on in.”

“I, uh, didn’t know you were in town.”

“For a little while. Sometimes, being on an island feels…well, like being on an island.” She stepped back. “Come on in.”

Attached to her side was her son, Theo, tears on the baby’s round cheeks and Theo’s hazel eyes assessing him. As if they weren’t already the best of friends. He and Theo became best friends when they first met. He fed him a piece of fresh pineapple, and that sealed their bond.

Joel bent. “Hey, little guy. You okay?”

Theo stared, his mouth arched downward and his face flushed.

Ayesha looked down. “I left the room. He didn’t see me and had a small heart attack. Or something. He’s going through a clingy stage.”

Joel stepped inside, closed the door, and set the food on the nearby entryway table. He then turned to give Ayesha a hug and kiss on the cheek, and she held on longer than usual. 

They all did these days.

More pity.

“Mama? Mama, I lost Theo.” Josiah peered into the entryway. “Oh, never mind. Hey, Joel!”

Josiah dashed over, and Joel folded him into a hug.

“You wanna watch movies with me, Mama, and Theo?” Josiah asked.

It was a better option than the nothing he’d had planned. 

“I’d love to,” he said.

“Look, Theo, it’s your bestie,” Ayesha said. “Want to go to Joel?”

Joel held out his arms.

Theo leaned toward him.

He lifted Theo from Ayesha’s embrace and gave him a gentle squeeze. “Are you still my friend?” He pressed a kiss into the curls on Theo’s head. “You’re still my friend.”

Ayesha grabbed the takeout bag. “I’ll carry this.” 

They headed to the TV room where an animated movie was paused on the giant screen television. The restaurant had loaded him up with food, so he shared his rice, noodles, egg rolls, and sweet and sour chicken with Ayesha and the boys. 

Two and a half movies in, Josiah fell asleep, and he’d replaced Ayesha as Theo’s surrogate comfort. Theo stayed glued to his side, eyelids drooping, fighting sleep. He smelled like Pampers and baby powder, and it was hard to admit how refreshing it was to feel needed with the way Theo clung to him. For the last several weeks, he’d barely felt seen.

Ayesha stared, her smile proud and full of love. He’d hoped to know that feeling one day, of looking at his son or daughter and feeling what he could see on Ayesha’s face. Now, he wasn’t sure what the future held.

“He’s barely holding on,” she whispered.

“I can set him to sleep, if you’d like.”  He moved Theo to his chest. Theo closed his eyes and stuck his middle and ring fingers into his mouth. 

Ayesha cringed. “I’m still working on that.” 

As a mother, Ayesha was a thing of beauty to watch. How she managed, alone, with two small boys, he’d never know. Once he got his life together, he would be around more for her. Everyone else felt guilty about not being able to due to building relationships or trying to start families, but he’d be able to step in. It wasn’t like he was doing either. 

“He’ll grow out of it.” Joel burrowed further into the sofa cushions and lightly tapped Theo’s back. “It’s a comfort thing. My mother said I used to play with the fuzzies on her nightie.”

It took Theo only a few minutes to fall asleep, and Joel was hit with an unexpected rush of emotion when he looked down into the little guy’s face. They were such cute freakin’ kids. He’d only seen pictures of Curtis, but he’d been a good-looking guy. Their mother was gorgeous. 

He wanted a wife to treasure, kids for his parents to spoil. At no point in his life before this would he have ever anticipated wanting a family this much. Weren’t men supposed to want huge tits in their faces, a rotation of women in their beds, and all sorts of sinful debauchery? Then settle down at fifty-five with a twenty-five-year-old?

Not him.

Whenever he slipped on a tie, he looked for graceful fingers to adjust it. At night, he wanted warm and familiar to hold and slip inside of, over and over. The house wasn’t the same with only his clothes, his scent, and his shoes on the bench by the front door. He’d already closed on a condo in Penn Quarter, but he hoped the house sold in less than a month to be done with it for good.

“Joel…”

His eyelids fluttered. 

On the TV, credits rolled. 

Theo snored, rising and falling in time to his breaths. At some point, Ayesha had tossed a blanket over them.

“I can take him,” she said, taking a seat on the cushion beside him. “Thank you. It’s been a while since he’s fallen asleep on something other than Mama’s chest.” 

“Who was it, Gage?” Joel asked.

“Yeah.”

“Gage and his Superman pecs.” He yawned. “I almost bench-pressed myself into a stroke trying to measure up.”

Ayesha laughed. “You look fine. All of you look amazing.”

She kissed the top of Theo’s head and lifted him into her arms while Joel walked Josiah to bed, steering him by his sleepy shoulders. 

Once they were tucked in, he asked Ayesha to join him on the back patio, not ready to be alone. It was selfish of him, but he couldn’t be alone. Not tonight. With the way he felt, he didn’t trust what he’d do without supervision.

“A date?” She turned to face him on the outdoor sectional. “I’m sorry, Joel. That’s…I’m sorry.”

He tried his best attempt at a smile. “It’s not like it’s your fault. I mean, I want her to move on. It’s just—”

“Quick.”

“Yeah.”

“Joel,” she covered his hand with hers, “it’s okay.”

“I don’t even know where exactly I messed up.” He cleared his throat and shifted, eyes burning. “I love her, Ayesha. Syd’s the only woman I’ve ever loved. Literally.”

Ayesha edged closer, as though she sensed the breakdown he felt coming.

“Fuck.” He swiped his hand down his face. “I’m sorry, Ayesha. I didn’t come here to do this.”

“It’s fine to hurt. You went through something painful.”

“I know it makes no sense, but I have this feeling like this is it for me. Like…I’ll never have a Tayler or a Theo.”

“And you didn’t realize that until now, and it feels too late to start over.”

He met her eyes. “Exactly.”

“You’re also pretty certain there’s no getting over this. No moving past this.”

“Fuck, I’m being insensitive. It’s not like Syd’s no longer walking around, you know?”

“This isn’t a grief competition.” She inched even closer. “I just…understand. I had more kids with Curtis in my version of the future. I wanted a baby girl with him. I’ve never loved anyone the way I love Curtis, and it feels impossible to do it again.”

It reminded him of pain thresholds. Once he felt his first knife wound, he welcomed paper cuts and the scratches he’d gotten both from playing basketball after work with other agents at the Bureau and underground fight clubs.

“Tonight was hard,” she said. “And that’s okay.”

She opened her arms. He lowered his forehead to her shoulder and wrapped his arms around her. They were all so supportive. So there. Ayesha, who lived in Hawaii, was there. Her arms were there. There had to be something about him that made his friends want to keep him in their lives. Something that made him worthy of that kind of dedication.

“Joel, I’ll be here. If you need me, when you need me.”

That, somehow, made the ache better and worse.

After an indeterminate amount of time—too long for his heavy ass head to be weighing down her small shoulder—the ache abated. 

He started to move away until he felt Ayesha’s fingers in his hair, and he’d needed that specific comfort for much too long, but it wasn’t like he could ask for it. Gage would gut him if he ever asked Tayler to play with his hair. Mo and Giorgio’s relationship was still unclear, but it was obvious she was off-limits, and any requests of that nature were punishable by death and dismemberment—and not necessarily in that order.

Syd used to start off playing with his hair. Then, she’d end up on her back, flushed and thoroughly fucked. At least, he assumed. Fake orgasms and all.

“Can I ask you something personal, Ayesha?”

She nodded. “Sure.”

“Curtis was the love of your life. Doesn’t it say somewhere that we can’t have two of those?”

He made a sound. 

In the past, it would have been a laugh. 

In the past, it wouldn’t have hurt.

Ayesha twirled a lock of his hair, and he got a distinct feeling she had no idea she was doing it, but at no point did he want her to stop. It was selfish of him, but he needed this. Tonight, talking to Ayesha and holding Theo and being part of something reminded him that he still meant something to someone.

“I think I can love again, but it would have to feel like someone Curtis himself handpicked him from heaven. He’d have to feel like a father to my boys, and they’d have to love him like one.”

It would have been harder if Sydney had died. He couldn’t imagine the pain Ayesha had dealt with after getting Curtis’ death notification, while pregnant. With enough time, logically, he could move on from his divorce. It was harder to imagine what would have happened if Sydney had died.

Ayesha smoothed his hair. “Don’t think about that right now. You’re not anywhere near the mindset of moving on. Get through this part first.”

He was a man in his very early thirties who wanted a family but lived a life not conducive to them. For him to move on, the woman would have to be unique. Special. And, in his opinion, a man didn’t go looking for a woman like that. She found him, someway, somehow, and she was a woman that, no matter how much he tried, he would never see coming.