Four: Stories of Marriage Read online

  “Give it some thought,” Liv or Livia said. She shrugged and shoved back from the conference room table with surprising confidence. “Janica has my number.”

  As she left the room, both Shawn and Janica watched her go. She was wearing cut-off jeans shorts and a black t-shirt with black, washed-out Converse sneakers. When the door clicked behind her, Janica gave a wry smile.

  “That’s journalism today for you,” she said with raised eyebrows. “Can you imagine showing up for a business meeting dressed like that?” She shook her head.

  “And you want me to invite her into my house for a week?”

  “Not your house, Shawn. Your business life.”

  “I do business out of my house.”

  “Then start going in to your office. I know you have one.”

  He shook his head. “Yeah, but …”

  “Here’s the deal, kiddo,” she said. “Olivia Kincaid is what they call nowadays an influencer. She has a gazillion followers on social media and her articles get shared and liked at a rate that far exceeds anyone else in the Lifestyle & Entertainment section. If she says someone’s cool, there are thousands of people out there who will take that as gospel. Just because she said it.”

  “Not to brag on myself, but plenty of people already think I’m cool.”

  “Oh, so I guess you don’t need me,” Janica said.

  “I wouldn’t go that far.”

  “Good. Take my advice. The expensive advice. That you pay for.”

  “And your advice is that I should feel lucky this Olivia chick wants to write about me?” Shawn scoffed, and shook his head.

  Janica didn’t smile. “That’s what I’m saying.”

  Shawn exhaled a sharp breath.

  It wasn’t that he fooled himself that he was hottest thing on the market any longer, but he had something that couldn’t be taken for granted in this business: staying power. Rappers came and went faster than in any other genre. They got killed, went to prison, lost their edge, lost their money, found religion … the causes of death of a career in hip hop were plentiful. But K Smooth as a brand was a mainstay, and he knew it. That was something to capitalize on.

  When he walked away from the mic, he was still at the top of the game. But there was no getting around the fact that more than ten years ago, when he first hit his stride, the units the industry measured were CDs and radio play. Now it was downloads and streaming rates. Now it was ‘follows’ on Instagram and Twitter. Things moved much faster, and artists could see their Q rating plummet practically overnight with one unfortunate video clip on TMZ.

  Chris was always talking about how the entertainment business was becoming a much younger man’s game. Or at least a game for the seasoned but indefatigable, like Turner and Brendan. Attention spans were shorter, and the trajectory of a career could be as well, if an artist didn’t master, and learn how to manipulate new media.

  “It’s one week of annoyance,” Janica said, tapping a pen on the table. “Take her to a few meetings, let her see you in your element at home, and then move on. Believe me when I tell you a piece from her will yield the dividend-equivalent of ten pieces in all those traditional print magazines that no one buys anymore.”

  Shawn said nothing.

  “And you may want to activate your manager once again,” Janica added, shaking her head. “I can’t even believe you showed up for this meeting alone.”

  “You know I’m not about an entourage.”

  “Not an entourage, Shawn. A team. You’re going to need one. And call Liv. She’s the perfect springboard.”

  “A’ight. Gimme her number.”

  “Kincaid!”

  Shawn looked around to see Turner heading toward the edge of the court, still palming the basketball. He had stopped in the middle of a pass and was looking toward the crowd that was always gathered near the chain-link fence, just to watch their Saturday game.

  Squinting against the sun, Shawn saw that it was the reporter. He had called her the day before to let her know that the piece was a go, and when she asked whether they could meet today, he told her he had his weekly game with his boys.

  I’ve heard about those, she said.

  But she never said she would show up unannounced. The fact that she had annoyed him. It meant that she was prepared to make her own rules about what spaces and places she should be permitted access to. This was going to be a real pain-in-the-ass.

  “Who’s that?” Brendan sidled up next to him.

  “The reporter I told you about.”

  “Her? She looks like somebody’s baby sister.”

  “She probably is somebody’s baby sister,” Shawn said dryly. “But according to Janica, she’s also an … influencer.”

  “Yeah, well, she definitely seems to be influencing Turner.”

  Over at the fence, Turner was directing her around to the gate, presumably to let her in past their security detail. Since the park was a public one, there was nothing except respect for boundaries that kept swarms of fans from storming the court for autographs every weekend. But the security guys stood sentry, burly disincentives for people looking to get too close.

  Once Livia Kincaid was on the other side of the fence, Turner beckoned for them to come over. Chris remained at the far end of the court, arms folded, obviously irritated at the interruption to their game.

  “What I meant about her being somebody’s baby sister is that she reminds me of …”

  “Brendan!” Turner’s voice broke into their conversation. “C’mon meet my girl, Kincaid.”

  Brendan didn’t get to finish his sentence, because he had started over toward Turner and the reporter, but Shawn paused. Suddenly, he knew what Brendan had been about to say.

  Olivia Kincaid, with her coffee-with-cream complexion, dark curly hair and tomboyish I-dare-you-to-say-somethin’ attire was reminiscent of a younger, pre-marital Riley Gardner.

  4

  Egged on by Turner, “Kincaid” bunched up the hem of her skirt and knotted it to one side. She stashed her messenger bag in the bundle of bags and towels they had all set to one corner of the court and took Shawn’s place on Brendan’s team. She couldn’t play ball worth a damn, but he had to admire her willingness to get out there and try.

  She missed shot after shot, and her lay-ups were nothing short of comical, but she didn’t care, with her little five-foot-five self. Shawn smiled, watching her grunt with each shot, sending air-balls barely a foot above her head. And he especially enjoyed the frustration on Brendan’s face as he watched his “team” lose 12—2 against Chris and Turner. Chris didn’t care that he was playing against a girl. He fouled her almost as hard as he would have a dude, sending Kincaid down to the ground more than twice.

  “A’ight, c’mon now. We ain’ tryna kill her, are we?”

  Turner helped her up from the last drive, and Kincaid shook off the fall, tossing the ball toward Brendan before standing and checking her knee, which looked like it might have been skinned a little.

  Chris, seeing that he might have been a little too rough, went over to join Turner in helping her up. He clasped her other hand like he would have if she was a dude and gave her a half-bodied homeboy hug.

  “You good?” he asked her.

  “Fine,” she said. “I guess I should’ve known you wouldn’t go easy on me.”

  “Oh, you thought I would let you win?” Chris seemed to find the idea amusing.

  “No.” Her voice was firm.

  Feeling a grudging surge of respect for the scrappy little reporter Shawn headed over to the cluster.

  “How ‘bout we all go get somethin’ to eat?” he suggested. “This is already a blow-out so we might as well release the court.”

  Kincaid looked quietly grateful, but he didn’t meet her gaze. She was still, as far as he was concerned, an unwelcome guest.

  They went to a midtown steakhouse, a place that was all dark wood paneling, with the odor of cigars and strong liquor baked into the furniture. The wives hated the p
lace, so it was a convenient and well-frequented refuge for Shawn, Brendan and Chris, and more recently Turner who was as good as married himself these days. Today, because they had Kincaid with them, they asked for a private room, which they got, just because of who they were, and because Chris alone spent thousands of dollars in the place, favoring it for almost all his business lunches and dinners.

  It was early in the day yet, but still, they ordered beer, steak and lots of pitchers of water. All of them ripe, and still sweaty from their time on the court, legs sticking to the red leather of the seats, and a mist of male musk hanging in the air—none of it was commented on by the waitstaff, nor by the manager who came in to greet them personally and let them know that he was at their disposal.

  Shawn couldn’t lie, this was the kind of thing that made being who he was, cool as shit. He wasn’t so jaded that he didn’t remember the days when this very same manager might have turned up his nose, and claimed not to have a free table, if he happened into a place like this.

  Kincaid looked around with wide eyes, and Shawn watched her take in the brass sconces on the walls, the heavy mahogany chairs as a host pulled one back for her, and the overall air of solid, immovable prosperity. Clearly, she was impressed. But the way she handled it was to make a smart-ass comment, saying that the pub’s décor should be called ‘retro-misogyny on steroids’. That had pretty much been Robyn and Riley’s reaction as well, the only time Shawn and Chris had taken them here for dinner. It wasn’t woman-friendly, and the truth was, that was probably the point.

  “Is this what all y’all’s Saturdays always look like?” Kincaid asked as they waited for their orders. “Basketball and red meat?”

  “You want to make something of it?” Turner asked.

  She laughed. “God no. I’m just geekin’ that you let me into your little boys’ club. Even if just for a day.”

  “We didn’t let you in, you bogarted,” Shawn pointed out.

  “Okay, okay, let’s stop pickin’ on her,” Chris said. “I already beat her up on the court.”

  Sitting directly across from her, Shawn could see that beneath all her brashness, she was a little overwhelmed. Their group didn’t easily welcome outsiders. Chris in particular, preferred to keep all prying eyes far away from anything that hinted at his private life. With his first son’s mother, he had had enough of tabloids and rumors and messy public drama. And Shawn had sure enough had plenty of that himself.

  “So, are you a granola, or what?” Brendan asked. “You see we all ordered about six pounds of meat between the four of us, and all you havin’ is creamed spinach and charred brussel sprouts?”

  “I eat meat sometimes.” Kincaid seemed uncomfortable at having the spotlight trained on her yet again. “Just not a whole lot of red meat.”

  “You might have to avert your eyes when the food gets here then,” Turner said. “Because we definitely about to have ‘a whole lot of red meat’.”

  “I think I can handle it.” She smiled, but her lips were a little tremulous, and Shawn could still see the anxiety still in her eyes. Even if she was used to writing about celebrities, it was unlikely she had ever been invited to a table as exclusive as this one.

  The food arrived, carried on the shoulders of two female servers in short black skirts and white shirts. The plates that were set in front of each of the men were less plates and more the size of serving platters. Three-inch thick porterhouse steaks, bleeding onto white, with garlic mashed potatoes and a few stalks of afterthought-asparagus were what they all had. Kincaid’s food came in much smaller bowls, because they were meant to be side-dishes. When she picked up her fork to begin her meal, they were reaching for steak knives.

  She didn’t speak much while they ate, instead listening to the conversation among them, her head turning right and left like someone following a game of tennis. Occasionally, Shawn saw her shoulders heave, as she sighed to relieve what was probably pent-up nervousness and tension. She was definitely young, he thought. Maybe even less than the twenty-five that was his first estimate when he met her.

  When the meal was over, and he offered to give her a lift back to her place with him and his driver, she smiled her gratitude. Gone was all the brash confidence. Now, she just seemed exhausted. Everyone parted at the curb, going their separate ways, each of them back to their uniquely privileged lives.

  “That was a lot.”

  Shawn turned to look at Kincaid, sitting on the opposite side of the backseat of the SUV in which they were being driven. They were heading along Central Part West, so that Shawn could be dropped off at home before the driver headed further north to take her to Washington Heights.

  “All the way uptown,” she’d said when she gave him her address.

  Shawn sensed that there was part of her that was a little embarrassed by where she lived, just off W. 173rd Street. He wanted to tell her not to be but knew that it would only embarrass her more.

  “What was a lot?” he asked.

  “All of you. In one place. It was just … a lot.”

  Shawn shrugged. “I guess.”

  “Y’know what it made me wonder?” she said. “When you’re a big deal, like all of you guys are, do you know you’re a big deal? Do you feel like you are?”

  At that, Shawn turned to look at her a little more closely. The unexpectedness of the question threw him a little. That, and the fact that he had been asked something like this question only once before, a long time ago. Then, he had been flip with his answer. Flirtatious. Then, he had been walking on a Manhattan street in the wee hours of the morning. It had been after a heavy, delicious dinner with a pretty reporter who he was feeling, and wanted to take back to his hotel, and to his bed.

  “I can’t speak for anyone else,” he said.

  “You’re being evasive.” Kincaid smiled. “Just speak for yourself then.”

  “I don’t think I’m a big deal,” he said honestly. “I don’t feel like I am. I feel like …” He shrugged. “I don’t feel like I’m a big deal.”

  “You were going to say something else.” She leaned in, her eyes fixed on his, as though trying to read there whatever he might not say.

  “I was going to say …” Fuck it. “I feel lucky. Like I stumbled across a life, a wife, a career, a family that lots of other dudes could have had instead of me. Maybe even should have had instead of me. I feel like everything I am, and everything I have, is an accident of fate.”

  At that, Kincaid leaned back into the seat again, and there was something in her eyes Shawn couldn’t read. And a smile on her lips. She was about to respond, when the SUV pulled up at the curb.

  He was home. And not a moment too soon. Maybe it was the beer, the heavy meal, and the bone-achiness that followed every Saturday morning game, but he had for a moment let his guard down with this virtual stranger. And what was that ‘accident of fate’ bullshit? Riley was rubbing off on him.

  Or maybe Kincaid was a better reporter than he had imagined she would be, by asking the one question that had to be central in the minds of everyone who had ever been given as much as he had. She had proven that a week with her would be much more than annoying. It could be downright problematic, if he kept shooting his mouth off like he had just done.

  “Anyway. You enjoy the rest of your weekend, Kincaid,” he said, reaching for the door handle.

  “Livia,” she insisted. “I know Jamal calls me by my last name. But I’d prefer it if you’d call me Livia.”

  5

  The sound of Cassidy’s excited screams greeted Riley when she opened the apartment door. At the end of the hallway, just inside the living room, she saw her daughter rolling around on the rug in a ball of curls and tulle and black patent-leather Mary Janes. And with her was someone else, a stranger. Putting her tote-bag on the foyer table, Riley headed to investigate. Just as she was about to get to her destination, Shawn emerged from the hallway to the left that led to his in-home studio and tugged her by the arm.

  “Hey,” he said, kiss
ing her fleetingly, almost absentmindedly. “Look …”

  “Who’s that with Cass?” Riley asked, cutting him off.

  “That’s what I wanted to tell you. She’s a reporter. I’m getting a …”

  “A what?” Riley said.

  They had a rule about reporters. A simple one. Never around the children. Never. Ever.

  “Don’t get all excited. She won’t be taking any pictures or writing about them. She’s doing a profile on me.”

  Riley’s shoulders relaxed. “On you? Okay. For who?”

  Hearing the name of the news organization, Riley pursed her lips and nodded. It wasn’t insignificant. Though Shawn didn’t pay much attention to trends in the news industry, she did, and this was no small thing.

  “I told you I talked to Chris about getting back in the studio, right? The way he sees it, before I put any new work out there, I should do some slow re-introduction types of things.”

  Riley nodded. “That makes sense,” she admitted. “But does this reporter … what’s her name?”

  “Olivia Kincaid.”

  “Does she have to be here, in our house?”

  “That’s what I have to tell you. She’ll be around for a minute.”

  “What’s ‘a minute’, Shawn?”

  “A week. Shadowing me.”

  Riley groaned. “Does that mean she’s going to be here every day I get home for an entire week?”

  “What’re you getting so salty about? You never get home this early, so I don’t think you need to worry about it. She’ll probably be gone by the time you get here.”

  “Is that a dig?”

  “Nah. It’s a fact.”

  They stared at each other, the tension between them rising like a slow boil. Since his revelation that he wanted to make music again, they hadn’t discussed it at length. In the moment, Riley had said the only thing she could say, that she would support whatever he wanted to do. But they both knew she was basically in ‘fake-it-till-you-make-it’ mode.