Getting to Happy by Terry McMillan Read Free Book Online

and I’d really like to know who you are and how you got my number and why you’re calling my house.”
    “He’s both of our husbands, sweetheart. I got your number off of one of his cell phones last night right after he called you. He did call you last night, didn’t he?”
    “Yes, he did.” Bernadine pressed the OFF button on the remote, swirled her legs off the side of the bed and stood up. She didn’t think this shit was funny.
    “From D.C.?”
    “Yes. But what business is it of yours?” Her voice dropped an octave.
    “Well, I hate to lay so much on you at once and completely out of the blue and everything but I have not been able to figure out a decent way to tell you this: his name is Jesse Hampton.”
    Bernadine inhaled but couldn’t breathe out. She started fanning herself to generate some air, even though the ceiling fan was whirring on high right above her.
    “You still there?”
    “Is this some kind of prank?” Bernadine asked after finally being able to exhale.
    “What would I get out of it?”
    “I don’t know. But I don’t believe this bullshit. Maybe this is some kind of scam. What is it you really want?”
    “He’s the scam artist, honey, not me. I just accidentally found his other wallet under the front seat of the car when I took it to the car wash, and there was the name James Wheeler on all kinds of credit cards. So, I realized this son-of-a-bitch has been playing me, too. How much has he hit you up for and how long have y’all been married?”
    “You know, I don’t have time for this,” Bernadine said as she got up from the bed and started walking around in circles. Her head was beginning to feel like it was full of cotton. And what if she just hung up? She flopped back down on the edge of the bed, dug her toes into the pale gray carpet and decided to listen, if for no other reason than entertainment.
    “How long have you been married to him?”
    “That’s really none of your business. Why don’t you tell me, since you seem to know so much about us.”
    “Not us, him,” she said. “I can prove this is no childish prank, sweetheart. Ask me something about him. What’d he tell you about his family?”
    Bernadine thought about this for a minute, but it was all too surreal. If, however, this woman was telling the truth, then she really did want to know. Even still, Bernadine was praying this was just one big misunderstanding and in a minute, she was going to get to the bottom of it, cuss this woman out for wasting her time and playing a game that wasn’t even close to being funny. But for some reason, she heard herself spew out: “He takes care of his elderly mother because his five brothers are all trifling and in prison.”
    The woman actually started laughing. “What a dirtbag. First of all, Jesse’s mama’s been dead and gone since I988, okay? And all six of his brothers are college-educated and some of the most well-respected black men in D.C. Jesse’s the black sheep.”
    Bernadine felt a lump the size of a walnut forming in her throat. This had to be somebody else’s nightmare she’d been dragged into. But she was beginning to realize it could in fact be hers.
    “Bernadine?”
    “Yes,” she said, more to let this woman know she now had her undivided attention even though Bernadine was becoming fearful of just how much personal information this woman had about her and her husband.
    “You mind if I call you Bernie?”
    “Yes, I do mind. I don’t know you. Do you mind if I call you Billy?”
    “No, I don’t mind. In fact, that’s what my friends call me.”
    “Are you almost finished, Belinda, because I’ve got things to do.”
    “Not make dinner for your husband, that much I do know. I’m sorry. That was mean. Anyway, what’d he tell you he does for a living? I’m dying to hear this.”
    “He’s a civil rights attorney.”
    “Right. Well, let me tell you this. He not only isn’t anybody’s lawyer and has never been to anybody’s law school,