The Last Time We Met - #Completed

Chapter Twenty-Four

“Wow, you two are really…special,” he says, setting the box down where it first sat on the entertainment center, below the TV. He reached in the back of it and pulled out a short black cord. “Did you guys ever consider plugging it in?” he asked and walked over to the wall to plug the cord into the outlet. Immediately the box lit up and the channel on the tv changed to the image of a movie menu. I sighed in relief, glad I’d be able to watch my Jerry Springer after all, but irritated that Kingsley could figure out something so obvious before my supposedly-intelligent friend and me.

“And what is this anyway?” He asked incredulously as the background music for the menu blared with the extra added touch of “Jerry, Jerry, Jerry!” chanting along with it. “Jerry Springer?” His face contorted when he picked up the blu-ray box and tried to hold back an even bigger laugh.

“You actually watch this show?”

“Of course,” I say defensively. “Watching other peoples’ dyfunctionality makes me feel a lot better about my own. I’m not even afraid to admit.”

“It’s true,” Natty chimed in. She grabbed her bowl of semi-melted ice cream and sat down next to me on the sofa.

“You’re insane,” he tells us, laughing my reasoning off with a shrug. “You both are.”

“And you don’t know anything,” I say, refusing to let him have the last word in this debate. What is he talking about anyway? Jerry Springer is a legend. He’s the only white guy I know who can talk that much trash to his guests without being dead. Serious, the way he has come at some of these peoples’ lives---it must be in the contract not to punch him or something, because I’ve never seen anything anymore reckless.

I clicked a random button on the remote and somehow (thank goodness) I managed to select a video to play. Jerry announced that today’s segment (which was like, twenty years ago), is called “My mother slept with my boyfriend” and I prepared to tune Kingsley out completely, except he took a seat in the reclining chair right next to the sofa, on my side. How annoying. He can’t even appreciate it properly, but about fifteen minutes later we were all getting amusement out of the stupidity of it all. It’s exactly this show’s ridiculousness that has kept it on the air for so long.

“Man, I could have sworn her hair was real,” Ted said after a five minute brawl between three sisters, a boyfriend, two strippers and an uncle.

“Na uh,” Natty said. “I knew that was fake from the moment I seen those tracks, honey.”

I looked between the two of them and chuckled. Only these two…

“Ohmigod!” I say and turned my head around as a SUPER old woman pulls down her shirt for her jerry beads. “Natty, did you have to get the uncensored version? I’m scarred for life. Ugh.”

“I can’t see,” Kingsley complained. “I’m blind.”

“Really you guys, it wasn’t that bad. And that lady is in good shape for her age. I’m guessing at least seventy-five and she still had some bounce left in her.”

“Natty, when I projectile vomit, I’m going to aim it in your direction,” I warn, causing her to erupt in evil laughter. Sometimes I wish I could find normal people as friends.

“Shut up and eat your ice cream,” she told me, waving a spoon my way after shoving some into her mouth. “This stuff cost me big bucks because of your weird eating habits. The lady who checked me out asked me if I was pregnant. “

“Are you?” I teased. “No baby-making with Ben, yet?”

Okay, so maybe I tend to put my foot in my mouth sometimes. I shouldn’t have said that. Natty looked away from me for a moment and I could see a sad glint in her eyes.

Whenever she talks about Ben her eyes get all big and she gets this cheesy smile on her mouth. She acts as if they’re a match made in heaven, so why is she getting so emotional all of a sudden? Maybe she’s still thinking about what I told her about him, but you know, I could have been wrong, right? Maybe?

“I’m going to use the bathroom,” Kingsley said out of nowhere. I think he was sensing one of those moments that are awkward for men if they stick around for it.

“I’m sorry, Natty, I shouldn’t have--” I begin, but I don’t know how to end it. “I—I—“

“You were right,” she told me, saving me from my lack of articulation.

“What are you talking about? You are pregnant?” Omigod, I’m going to be the godmother/aunty of a child by an evil sonofabitch.

 “No!” She exclaimed, flushing. “Gosh, you are so dense, Jesse. “

She took the remote from me and turned down the volume on the tv. “I mean, you were right about Ben. About everything. He’s a cheater and I never should have trusted him from the start.”

Natty told me all of her problems and I listened. She told me how she caught Ben cheating, and in her own apartment of all places, and how she kicked his ass before kicking him out of her life. Kingsley never came back into the room to finish watch the episode with us, which is a shame, because he missed Jerry’s Final Thoughts, but I’m glad I got the time alone to hold my best friend and make sure everything is alright. It’s nice to be on the giving end every once in a while, and tonight Natty and I caught up with each other’s lives and feelings. Even though Natty did most of the talking, that was okay. Everything was okay.