Getting to Happy by Terry McMillan Read Free Book Online Page A

Jesse didn’t even finish college.”
    This was almost too much to handle all at once, but now Bernadine’s curiosity had been aroused and she wanted to know just how much this Belinda did know about James. If she could cause her to stumble, then Bernadine would know this was some kind of premeditated scam, even though she couldn’t for the life of her imagine why a grown woman would want to pull something as heartless as this. “What about his wife who died from cancer? The white one.”
    Belinda laughed again. “Jesse doesn’t even like white people. Girl, he really had you believing all this mess, didn’t he?”
    “I guess he did.”
    “Well, he’s a charmer, that’s for damn sure. And he’s good at getting people to believe just about everything he tells them. He’s a pathological liar, and I think they call people like him psychopaths or something. What’s really sad is he’s got genius genes that just got all mixed up. Which is why he’s probably like this. It’s still no excuse for what he does to other folks, but especially women. I’m a hard bitch to fool, and you sound like you could be smart, too, but smart doesn’t have a damn thing to do with it.”
    “And how long have you been married to him?”
    “Five years, and I’ve got two of his kids to prove it.”
    “You know, I’m having a real hard time believing this. You have some nerve just calling my house out of the blue with this kind of outrageous bullshit, and this isn’t funny.”
    “Want me to prove it?”
    “How?”
    “I can do a three-way. I really am finally glad to bust him because he’s been doing this shit a long time and he needs to be stopped.”
    “Is he close by?”
    “He’s just across the bridge in D.C. I’m in Alexandria. Virginia. Just stay on the line and I’ll click back when he’s on, but promise me you won’t say anything until you can hear for yourself what a sleazy human being he is, okay?”
    “Okay.” It felt like her heart was about to explode. While she waited, Bernadine ran downstairs to the kitchen and got a Corona out of the fridge. She drank half of it in one long swallow. When she sat the bottle on top of the center island, her hands were shaking and she knocked it over. The gold liquid flowed over the edge of the counter and between her toes. Bernadine grabbed a dishtowel, dropped it on the floor, stepped on top of it and just stood there.
    This whole ordeal was downright frightening. This was the kind of stuff you saw in movies or on soap operas. Not in real life. Not in her life. Not in anybody’s life she knew. Of course there are the cheaters, like her ex-husband, John—but this kind of deception and betrayal was light years beyond cheating. This was just plain evil. And if it turned out all of this was really true, who in the hell did James think he was and what gave him the right to use her life like she was a damn coupon?
    John had been bugging her for years about something being a little “off” about James. That he fell too hard for her too soon. That his civil rights work was suspicious, especially since she’d never been in his local “field” office because she couldn’t get “security clearance.” His so-called required travel back and forth to D.C. twice a month. Why it purportedly took him a year to take the Arizona bar. It had taken a few years for her to realize she had confused his sense of self-importance for confidence. John may have been demanding, but James expected her to prove her love by how much she was willing to tolerate. Ironically, John was the one who insisted Bernadine not marry him without a prenuptial agreement. James signed without any qualms.
    “Hey, baby,” she heard Belinda say.
    “Hey back.”
    “What time do you think you’ll be home?”
    “I’m running a little behind schedule. It’s been crazy. Are the girls asleep already?”
    “I’m putting them to bed in a few minutes. You know what I’ve been meaning to ask you,