Excerpt from Her Ideal Husband

Fun loving and free spirited Nina DeVille was the LAST of the SistaGirlz to WANT to settle down. Hypnotized by the aloofness of her non-committal lover Yusuf Williams, Nina has to decide if “shacking up” is really the way she wants to live her life.

You shouldn’t have to drop down to my level. I need to step up to yours and I’m not there yet. I don’t know how long it’ll take but until then, I can’t be with you.

And with that, he was gone.

Sitting there in tears, I replayed that night over and over in my head. Where had we gone wrong? We were having a nice dinner to celebrate our one-year anniversary of living together. Wine was flowing. Music was playing.

Then I suggested that we take a vacation together.

“Baby, you and I need a getaway so I’ve been looking at vacation packages in the Caribbean,” I beamed before taking a bite into Yusuf’s mouthwatering roast beef and skin-on red potatoes. The flavors danced on my tongue as I went on and on about all of the fun my boyfriend and I could have in the islands.

“I’ll think about it,” Yusuf replied quietly as he finished his meal.

“Baby, is everything OK?” I asked with concern. “You sound a little down.”

“It’s nothing,” he stated firmly.

“Baby if something’s bothering you, it bothers me,” I said as I reached across the table to hold his hand.

“I don’t think I should go on vacation right now,” Yusuf said plainly.

Waiting for his explanation, I sat and watched Yusuf. When no answer came, I asked, “Why not? Baby, in the year we’ve lived together, I’ve never seen you take any personal time off from work. Scheduled days off don’t count,” I added with a giggle to help lighten the somber mood.

“Look, I just got this job and I don’t have the time or money for a vacation!” he snapped, yanking his hand out of mine to grab his glass. Gulping down the last of its contents, I flinched as Yusuf slammed the stemware onto the glass tabletop.

Taken aback by his tone and actions, I replied, “I haven’t even said when. As for the money, you know we got it.”

“No, you have money. I don’t,” he pointed out as he abruptly rose from the table to take his plate into the kitchen.

Confused by the entire conversation, I followed my boyfriend to get clarification. “Yusuf, what is going on?”

Holding his head down as he stood at the sink, he replied, “Nina, when we met, you had everything I dreamed of. A nice home. A working vehicle. A stable job. I didn’t have none of that but when you asked me out, I wasn’t gonna say no!” Turning around to face me, he continued, “I figga’d if nuthin else, I’d take you out and show you what I’m capable of. I wasn’t gonna tell you that I’d just lost my job, my ride was on its last legs and I was sleepin’ on my boy’s couch.”

“Well, no, I wouldn’t expect you to tell me that on our first date but did I leave when you told me?” I asked as I walked over and hugged him. Laying my head on his chest, I smiled nervously as I listened to his rapid heartbeat.

I wonder if his heart was beating this fast that night I asked him out. I just wanted someone to hang out with and since we were both in Oscar’s playing pool alone every Friday night, why not get to know if there’s more to this cutie other than his fine ass is almost as good a pool player as I am?

“Then three months of dating later you ask me to move in with you,” Yusuf continued. “I said no and you threw a fit.”

“Hey!” Laughing as I stood at arm’s length away from my man, I said, “That wasn’t a fit. I simply pointed out that you had no good reason to say no! You mean you would rather sleep on that lumpy smelly ass couch at Victor’s place?”

“Yes!” he laughed back.

“Wait… What?!?” I snapped. “Hold up, Yusuf. What are you saying?”

“Listen,” he said firmly adding a look to let me know I needed to stay silent. I hated when he did that but I couldn’t get any answers until I stopped asking questions. Calmly, he said, “I said no because we were just dating and still getting to know each other. If you needed help with anything, I was a phone call away.”

He’s right. He didn’t have to drive back and forth in that hooptie when he could have just as easily stayed overnight after “getting to know me”. I lived closer to his job and he knew he could drop me off on his way to work. But he eventually saw my side and moved in.

“On the night we celebrate our one year anniversary of living together, you telling me you’d rather live elsewhere isn’t going to go over well. You do realize this?” I said coolly.

His crooked smile was his attempt to let me know that he was wrong for that. “Dammit Nina!!” he laughed, mimicking Martin Lawrence’s famous line from his self-titled sitcom. “My point is we both need a vacation but I’m just getting on my feet and I don’t want to hold you up if you trynna do this anytime soon.”

“I wasn’t thinking anytime soon because I wanted you to help me plan our vacation,” I said, pulling closer to him, nudging him against the kitchen counter. “As for the money, if you want to do it 50/50, that’s fine. We can figure out who pays for what later. We don’t have to do it tonight.”

“I don’t know when I’ll be able to take a vacation, Nina,” Yusuf replied with a hard tone.

Not wanting to turn this into a shouting match, I replied, “OK, Baby.”

As Yusuf proceeded to clear the dining room table and start the dishes, I retreated to our master bedroom to retrieve his gift from our walk-in closet. Walking back toward the living room, I found my sexy boyfriend lounging on the leather sofa with the TV tuned to a sports show.

As many times as Yusuf has tried to get me to sit down and watch a game with him, they all looked alike to me. I couldn’t tell you the difference between a touchdown, a home run or a triple-double. I only know a sports star if they end up on the news. I’m not talking during the allotted sports segment but instead because of some hook up with a non-sports celebrity. Other than running into them at various nightlife events, I didn’t even know any sports players to root for!

Before interrupting his viewing, I watched the widescreen television long enough to discern that my Baby was catching up on the highlights of tonight’s NBA Finals game. If I wanted to root for his team with him, the least I could do was see what the score was. Never hurts to do a little homework. If his team was winning, I was almost assured our evening would go well into the night. If his boys were losing, I would be prepared to console him.

Slowly, I brought Yusuf’s gift from behind my back and sat it on his lap.

“Babe, what’s this?” he said, looking up at me in confusion. “I thought we agreed we weren’t doing gifts.”

“I thought you were kidding!” I replied in genuine surprise. “I mean you made your melt-in-my-mouth roast beef and skin-on red potatoes. You only do that on special occasions!”

“Yeah, you wanted to celebrate and I knew you wanted me to cook that tonight with all of the hints you dropped this week,” Yusuf pointed out.

“Oh… well, actually this is a gift for the both of us,” I smiled sheepishly. “Happy Anniversary!”

I held my breath as Yusuf slowly opened the gift-wrapped box containing a large manila envelope. As he pulled the documents from the envelope, I said, “You don’t have to sign it now. Go over it, check the spelling, ask questions. I just couldn’t wait another day to give it to you!”

Yusuf quickly flipped through the pages. “It looks like your condo lease with my name added to it.”

Dumbfounded that he wasn’t as excited as I was, I said, “Yeah, remember when you moved in and said that if we’re still together after a year, you’ll make this permanent?”

“Whoa!!” he cried out as he leapt off the couch. “Are you proposing to me?!?”

Stifling my laughter, I replied, “Did a ring fall out of that envelope? No. I’m just asking you to move in permanently. You moved all of your stuff in, didn’t you?”

“Nina…” Yusuf slipped the lease back into the envelope. “I didn’t have that much to begin with. Most of what’s in my closet came from you.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” I frowned, unsure where this conversation was heading.

Walking over to me, Yusuf held me in his arms. “Practically everything I have is because of you. My home. My job. My car.”

Looking up at him, I said, “I did all of that because I love you and want you to be happy.”

“And I thank you for everything but I can’t do any of that for you,” he replied. “This is your home that you asked me to move into. I’m driving because you loaned me one of your cars. The job I have is because my boss is a friend of yours.”

“And the problem is?” I asked in exasperation.

“If you lost your job, I couldn’t support us. Hell, I’m still trynna catch my breath from all of the shit I got into before I met you!”

“Baby, I told you I can help you with that,” I offered again, sensing Yusuf’s tension increasing. “And if I lost my job, my savings and investments could support us until I found something else. You know I wouldn’t have a problem with that.”

“Nina, stop! Just stop!!” Yusuf pulled himself out of our embrace. “You can’t fix all of my problems!! Some of this doesn’t even concern you! I’m not gonna let you pay for my mistakes!”

“OK, fine! Sorry I offered but that’s no reason to yell at me!” I snapped back.

“A raised voice is not the same as yelling, Nina,” Yusuf stated in a more gentle tone. “No matter how I try to explain it, you just don’t get it!”

“So what are you saying, Yusuf?” I asked nervously, not emotionally prepared for his response as I followed him to the front door.

Sighing as he opened the door, he said, “You shouldn’t have to drop down to my level. I need to step up to yours and I’m not there yet. I don’t know how long it’ll take but until then, I can’t be with you.”

One of the things I loved about Yusuf was that he usually said exactly what he meant and had I been listening the first time, I would’ve heard him say that although he wants to be, he’s not where I am in life. But I didn’t care that he didn’t have my money or possessions or that he couldn’t get them for me. I loved Yusuf just the way he was!

The next day when I returned home from meeting up with my girls for our weekly Sunday Brunch, I found my condo not as I’d left it. None of Yusuf’s belongings were where I’d last seen them. His Jordans weren’t cluttering up the doorway from me tossing them out of his closet. The hallway was clear of his clothes that I’d flung out of the bedroom hamper. His closet was empty of everything he’d moved in with. Only the clothes I bought him were on the hangers.

Quickly, I dialed Yusuf’s cell phone number. Growing impatient as each ring went unanswered, I visually searched my residence of any sign of my lover but nothing was to be found.

“The person you have called is unavailable right now. Please try again later.”