The Art of Diplomacy

Chapter 2

Anaya lay in bed, looking at the view outside her second floor window. It was a Tuesday and kids headed to school were on the move. Her bedroom window gave her a view of the street and the bus stop which only a few people used. It was Park Slope, after all. Everyone usually had a car. Anaya had none. Why would she need a car for going nowhere?

She turned off her 7:45 AM alarm seconds before it rang. The alarm was just a fail-safe anyway. Anaya had no trouble waking up early. Moving into her apartment in Park Slope had finally allowed her to pursue a healthier lifestyle than the one she had had before. She and Leona would laugh at anyone who said money can’t buy you happiness.

“It can buy you things you need to be happy”, Leona had said.

“Money is just another kind of privilege. But people hate to admit it”, Anaya had said.

They had both drank to that. The conversation had taken place when they were both single Black women, hoping for more than just survival. Leona and Jeremy had married a year after. It was another year before Leona popped out the twins. And they were six months old now as Anaya got out of bed to start the day.

Anaya would have loved to sleep in her underwear and then roam about the apartment in the morning wearing nothing else. Watching too many crime movies had soured the idea for her, of walking around undressed in her own home. A pervert/killer could be watching her with binoculars for all she knew. To her friends, those were irrational fears. But all fears were realistic for Anaya.

The first thing she did on getting out of bed was look for her cat, Chickpea. Anaya called to her.

“Chickpea?”

She made the “phss-phss” sound which cats seemed to recognize universally. But Chickpea wouldn’t come. She was found sitting in the balcony, enjoying the morning sun. Anaya stopped walking to watch her fluffy bundle of love basking in the sunlight. The sight of her senior cat, with an amputated paw, always filled Anaya’s heart with love and gratitude for finding Chickpea when she did. The vet had told Anaya that she had saved Chickpea, a diseased shelter cat who would have had to be put down soon. But Anaya knew it was the other way around.

“Hey precious”

She cooed and approached a thoughtful looking Chickpea. The cat allowed Anaya to lift her and kiss her on the head.

“It’s a beautiful day, isn’t it? Why don’t you have some breakfast, then come back to look at it?”

Anaya gave her cat more scratches and rubs as she carried Chickpea to her feeding station. Chickpea lapped up some water with her tongue while Anaya emptied a can of cat food in the bowl next to the water. She watched Chickpea switch enthusiastically from the water to the smelly cat food. After fixing the cat’s food, it was time for her to fix her own.

Unlike rich people, or at least the ones she had read about, Anaya did not have a household staff. She had been raised like any ordinary Jewish kid by her parents. She had grown up believing they were middle-class, slightly better off than other Black folk. With her teenage years came the realization that her parents were much richer than they cared to show. They never flaunted their wealth to the world. But it had become pretty obvious that not everyone could afford to have a beach house in rural Britain.

When she turned 18, she had packed her bags and moved to the dingy apartment Leona shared with another girl. A loss of faith and parental disgruntlement had prompted her move almost fifteen years ago. But she was glad for it. Her life in Brooklyn had made her a better, more thoughtful person. And Mom and Dad didn’t stay mad at her for too long anyway.

“A side of bacon because I have earned it…”

Anaya made herself eggs and bacon for breakfast, looking over her shoulder through the peeping window between her kitchen and drawing room. Chickpea was chowing down breakfast the way she always did.

“…and some cilantro as garnish, to pretend this is a healthy breakfast”

She looked around at the kitchen counter wondering if she had missed something. Anaya talked to Chickpea (okay, herself) as was her habit.

“What did I miss?”

The shiny coffee machine on her kitchen island caught her eye.

“Coffee. Yes, I knew it”

As she approached the coffee machine, she smiled to herself.

“I’m having black coffee today, Chickpea”

The smile and the coffee choice were both products of a fresh nostalgia Anaya was feeling. The day before, black coffee had brought her ideal type of man to her table at Starbucks. And though she was not in a mood for coffee after all, she still chose to have it as a means of reliving yesterday.

The solitude wrapped itself around Anaya like a comforting hug. Mornings in her apartment were so quiet that she could always hear the sound of Chickpea scarfing down her food, or licking herself clean after eating. The ticking of the wall clock she had received as a present once upon a time, a steady hum of her dishwasher and the fridge. It allowed her to think. That morning, as she sipped her coffee and had her breakfast, Anaya was thinking of Chayton.

It still amused her how different Chayton was from every other man she knew. She was not the kind of dreamer who would let romantic ideas cloud her better judgment. You had to be wide awake around people, Anaya knew. They rarely ever lived up to the dreams you so lovingly construed. Chayton was dreamy indeed but he was also very human. Anaya would have preferred if he wasn’t rich. She just didn’t connect very well with rich people.

‘As if you connect at all with people’

Well yeah, but at least she had more in common with people who had to live modestly. For as long as she could remember, she had always existed on the boundaries between two worlds. Rich enough to always have nice things, but not to go to private school. Jewish, but the only Black Jewish family in the neighborhood. A girl who liked boys but also liked people from other genders. She had never really found herself as part of a team, a camp, a clique. But then she found art. And she threw herself into it.

“Speaking of art, Chickpea”, Anaya got up with her empty dishes in her hands, “We need to find some work soon. Or it’s back to non-grain-free cat food for you”

“Mrow!”

Chickpea’s stunned expression made Anaya giggle. She liked to think her cat understood English pretty well, and Chickpea had indeed demonstrated the same. She just seemed to ignore the parts she wasn’t interested in hearing.

“Do you know any rich people who might want some custom art done, Chickpea?”

Chickpea, looking disgusted, went back to cleaning her paws. Anaya watched her with a smile as she cleaned her dishes. She then wiped down the breakfast table and island, humming as she did.

“Mrow-owr!”

Chickpea shrieked her discouragement towards Anaya’s humming.

“Hey. I’m not that bad”, Anaya defended her humming.

Chickpea did not dignify that with a response.

In the afternoon, Anaya came back into the drawing room and turned on her workout videos on the TV.

“Tuesday’s yoga, Chickpea. You wanna join me?”

Chickpea didn’t seem to care. She was watching pigeons. Shrugging, Anaya placed her yoga mat on the floor and started her workout. The white woman on her TV screen was talking about the importance of being mindful when doing yoga.

“Easier said than done”

Anaya stretched her arms and lowered them to the floor, standing straight up from below the waist. Her mind was rarely ever in the moment. She liked to think of it as a child captivated by butterflies. One colorful thought followed another and the chase continued.

Colors.

‘I’m not a fan of the suit Chayton was wearing. Not his color’

The yoga instructor on the TV prepared her viewers to sit down for the next few poses. Anaya sat down with her legs folded, wondering if Liam had poor taste in clothes.

‘He can definitely rock a suit. I guess the one he was wearing was a little too…’

Formal? She didn’t think so. No tie. Not the right cut for a formal suit.

‘It was definitely a business suit though. Business casual maybe? I wonder what he does for a living’

It took Anaya a moment to realize that she was much behind on the workout video. She had missed a couple of poses, thinking of Chayton’s fashion sense. She reached for the remote and hit rewind.

“Now, we will get some energy flowing through our whole body by…”

She paid attention to the yoga lady this time. The woman was pretty bend-y.

“You ever wonder, Chickpea, why it’s always the white women teaching yoga and not Indian women?”, she thought about it, “Or maybe I should have looked for videos by an Indian instructor instead of picking the most popular one”

She mentally noted that she ought to google later the “origin of yoga”. Obviously, it would be India but… Indian was still a word used for Native and Indigenous peoples in North America. Was Chayton Native American? Chayton was a Native American sounding name.

‘He speaks with an American accent but he said he isn’t American. Canadian maybe?’

The yoga instructor on the TV was about to end the session.

“And that’s all you need to do for today…”

Anaya almost yelled at her.

“What? No, that was too fast!”

Yoga lady didn’t care. She waved and the video ended. Anaya gaped at the screen in frustration. She stood up with a huff and turned off the TV.

The couch was the most expensive thing in Anaya’s apartment. She needed it to be as comfortable as a couch could get, seeing how that’s where she spent most of her time anyway. Chickpea, however, preferred her human’s thighs over the expensive couch. She lay curled up on Anaya’s thighs, catching a nap, while Anaya lay on the couch. Her laptop rested on her stomach and Anaya used it to virtually snoop on Chayton.

‘Why didn’t I ask his last name?’

It hadn’t occurred to her, that’s why. Most of the guys who hit on her usually asked to be linked through a social network right away. It was just a thing. No one seemed to think twice about it. But Chayton hadn’t mentioned his twitter, his insta or heck, his f*******:.

‘Is he married? God, I hope he’s not married’

None of the Chaytons that came up in her internet search was the one she was looking for. It was as if Chayton had no internet presence. Anaya couldn’t get within five meters of a stranger without feeling short of breath but she had an internet presence. She had accounts on all the major social media platforms.

‘But I only use those to spy on others’

Yes. And the name wasn’t hers either. Aside from her professional website and her tumblr where her career had picked up, each one was a fake account under the name of different female painters throughout history.

“Is this a red flag, Chickpea?”

As if on cue, Chickpea started snoring. Anaya assumed her cat didn’t want anything to do with discussions about relationships. But she knew someone who would want to discuss that.  

Anaya teased her cat.

“You know what, Chickpea? I have a best friend who would love to weigh in on this. I don’t need your attitude”

She dialed Leona, knowing she would answer the call within the first four rings.

Fifth ring.

‘Maybe she is busy’

Seventh ring.

‘I might as well hang up. I don’t want to be a bo…’

“Hello?”

“Hey, it’s me”, Anaya said.

Her best friend Leona sounded frazzled and apologetic. She said from the other end of the call,

“Hey honey. You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m good. I just needed your opinion on something. You busy?”

“Kind of. Sorry. I’m alone at home with the twins, and Damien is crying his head off. Everything’s okay there, Ann?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it is. Don’t worry. You take care of the kids. Do you want me to come over and help?”

She hated the idea of getting out of her apartment even as she made the offer. But Leona understood.

“No need, thank you, sweetheart. I can handle it. And Jeremy will be home for lunch soon. You sure you’re not having an emergency?”

“I’m sure. I promise. Don’t worry, okay?”

“Okay. Gotta go. Love you. Take care”

“You too”

Leona hung up. Anaya stayed in the same position, holding her phone to her ear for another whole minute. The call was nowhere near as long as she was expecting. Usually, Leona would have yelled at her in her high, bat-like sound which could only be heard when she was over-excited. She would have demanded to know why Anaya hadn’t called her the second she got into that taxi after meeting Chayton.

‘She is a mother. She has more exciting things in her life now than knowing who I want to sleep with next’

For lunch, Anaya tried for the umpteenth time to get Chickpea to eat with her at the table. The cat had made her disapproval of this ridiculous thought crystal clear before. She did so again by smacking the bowl of chicken and liver pate right off the table. Anaya watched her cat eat the gooey mess off the floor and from the leg of the dining chair. Before she could lose her appetite, she took her seat at the table and focused on her own bowl of food. No sooner had she put the first morsel of food in her mouth did Anaya’s phone vibrate with a text from her mother. She opened the text –

Hi, baby. I’m on lunch with Auntie Sarah. Having chicken pot pie, thinking of you. Love you

Her mother, Dr. Kerry Coleman, knew better than to send her daughter texts that needed a reply. Anaya wasn’t surprised that her mother remembered one of her daughter’s favorite dishes from childhood. Her parents were great – attentive extroverts who allowed her the freedom of making her own choices, though they sometimes had trouble understanding some of those. Over the last few years, her parents had come to terms with the fact that leaving their texts on “read” didn’t mean Anaya was ignoring them. She just didn’t have the emotional energy at the moment to have a conversation. And having little energy for conversations meant she only had herself to talk to.

‘I have Chickpea’

Yes. Chickpea, of course.

After lunch, Anaya whiled away her afternoon doodling some sketches. She did a couple of sketches of Chickpea, while the cat slept in a goofy position with her nose against the wall. She did a self portrait of herself, wearing an haute-couture dress she had seen online the day before. Then she started doodling a man. And she knew the moment she etched the shape of that strong jaw that it was Chayton she was drawing.

“Hello, good-looking”, Anaya smiled.

She let her mind and her hand take over. There was the set of broad shoulders. There, the tall, lean frame.

‘He is easily over six feet’

The thick eyebrows, which she found cute on such a friendly looking face. The regal features, the prominent Adam’s apple.

Anaya couldn’t help grinning at the sketch. She had drawn him in a plaid shirt and jeans. The more details she added the sexier he looked.

‘Especially those arms’

Chayton had an athletic frame. No huge muscles to distract from his natural appearance, but toned ones to enhance it.

‘Damn’

Anaya put the rear tip of her stylus to her lips, eyeing Chayton’s sketch with ever-growing appreciation. She could feel the slight quickening of her own heartbeat, a sudden sensitivity all over her body, and a gentle yearning between her thighs. She felt a tingle run down her back at the thought of being touched by Chayton.

Slowly, keeping her eyes on the sketch on her drawing tablet, Anaya got up and headed for her room. She was about to indulge in one of her favorite perks of living alone.

The drawing tablet, which Anaya lovingly referred to as Drawlette, lay on top of Anaya’s pillow. Chayton’s sketch was still on the screen across from Anaya whose face was looming over the tablet.

“Hhh…”

Wearing nothing but her bra, bent over on her knees in bed, Anaya’s gaze lingered on Chayton’s sketch. It only wavered when she closed her eyes in pleasure.

“Ah…”

Anaya gasped and moaned, slowly running her fingers along her slit. Moisture coated her fingertips more and more. She imagined it was Chayton’s hand between her legs instead of her own, teasing her, enjoying making her moan. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine how good it would feel to have him behind her like this, breathing on her neck, kissing it gently, only to follow that up with a little bite.

“Ohh”

She heard his voice in her mind, whispering her name as if the name itself aroused him. His other hand could be on her breast, squeezing and tugging as he pleased.

“Holy…”

Looking at Chayton’s form in the sketch made her raise her butt higher. As she pictured Chayton’s tongue licking up her spine, Anaya shivered. Her pleasure was intense. She closed her eyes again, to feel him enter her from behind, and her knees wobbled on their own.

“Yes… oh god yes”

Anaya rocked back and forth in bed on her knees, rubbing her c**t and fantasizing about Chayton taking her from behind. Her pleasure coiled inside her like a tight knot as she rubbed faster. Chayton’s voice echoed in her mind again, saying her name.

“AH!”

Throbbing between her legs, trembling all over, Anaya lay limp on the bed. Her searing orgasm washed through her for minutes.  Drawlette’s screen locked itself and Anaya eventually fell asleep.

Evening came and annoyed Chickpea because there were barely any birds outside anymore. The cat trotted off towards the door to Anaya’s room. Inside, having just woken from a nap, Anaya was blissfully relaxed and smiling. She picked up Drawlette from the bed and put her on the night stand. She got out of bed and put her clothes back on, watching her reflection in the mirror. With a content smile still on her face, she walked out of the room. Chickpea took Anaya’s place on the bed. But Anaya remembered she had left her phone in there and went back to retrieve it.

‘A text?’

When she read the text, she had to stop herself from giggling. She felt a little embarrassed, but mostly happy. Her excitement made her start to grin as she wondered about what words to put in her reply.

‘Hello, Anaya. How are you? I hope it’s not too soon to text you but I couldn’t wait. My stay in New York has been extended. I want to see you again. Let me know if you want the same. :) – Liam’