Page 48 of The Best Man: Unfinished Business

Chapter Twenty-seven

Jordan

It’s Mia… Jordan was grinding her espresso beans, which was drowning out the sound of Harper on the phone with his assistant, but not the words on replay in her mind: “Gotta go.” He’d said that to her.

“I don’t care what it costs, just book it.

Use miles, my Visa, whatever…yeah, I always travel with my passport…

okay…” The act of making coffee was a useful distraction, an attempt to quell the anxiety in Jordan’s stomach.

She watched Harper’s continuous pacing; it was frenetic even.

A complete departure from his cool, calm, and collected lover-boy self that had just moments ago shared the bed with her.

Following his footsteps down the hall, she peeked through the cracked door of her bedroom to find him sorting through his clothes, suitcase splayed open on the ground.

He didn’t even notice her. That same suitcase that had been carefully put away in the closet because…

he was supposed to be staying … forever, Jordan thought.

Amid Harper’s frenzy, Jordan managed to maintain her calm and rational demeanor, taking deep breaths and using her learned self-soothing skills.

But inside, the unease was stirring her inner beast, which she was desperately trying to keep at bay, holding back the anger that was quietly bubbling.

Stay open, Jordan, she reminded herself. There was a rational solution to this.

She returned to the kitchen and pulled out the Westmore U –labeled mug Harper liked drinking out of since he’d been spending mornings here in Malibu.

She put it on the counter and walked over to take out the creamer he liked and began pouring his cup of coffee.

He emerged from the bedroom still shirtless and in his sweatpants, his eyes darting around the room.

“Harper…” she began. He looked at her but headed toward her door that housed her stackable washer and dryer.

“I can’t find my zip down jacket that goes with these…” he said as he opened the dryer and dug throughit.

“Harper. Slow down. Just take a second here,” Jordan tried again. “What exactly did Mia say?”

Harper yanked the clothes out of the dryer and just kept shaking his head as if he was trying to remove the memory from his mind.

“I already told you.” This impatient tone was definitely not the Harper of the past days.

“She…she just asked me to come, Jordan. I can’t not go.

I told her that if she ever needed me that I’d be there. ”

“Well, did you talk to Robyn? Maybe she can shed some light on this—”

“No!” Harper snapped. “I don’t need to—” Harper cut himself off.

Jordan knew her face said clearly what she was thinking, What in the hell?

She was jarred, shocked. Looking at Harper but momentarily seeing a stranger, a real stranger.

She suppressed her immediate response and with a very deep breath, gave him grace.

He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples, exhaling and holding out his hands in semi-surrender.

“Sorry,” he said, his tone reset to a modicum of calm.

“No, I haven’t spoken to Robyn. She didn’t call me. Mia did….”

“So how do you know if this is even real?” Jordan returned. “She’s ten years old—”

“Eleven,” Harper corrected her. “She’s eleven, Jordan.

” Harper balled up the clothes in his hands and headed back to the bedroom.

His abs rippled in a way that would have been enticing under different circumstances, how they could have been spending their morning.

Should have been. Harper turned back to address Jordan again.

“Besides, what the hell is Robyn gonna do? She’s out there boo’ed up with some Mandingo-assed nigga not even paying full attention.

If she was, my daughter wouldn’t be calling me in a panic. ”

This…this is how it all goes wrong…. The thought arrivedin Jordan’s mind even as she fought it, determined to stay hopeful, optimistic even.

The past two weeks had been blissful, perfect, worth holding on to.

Surely, this was just a misunderstanding, and one that could be rectified with reason and logic, and a little creative problem-solving.

She’d managed much more challenging problems running a ten-figure division of a major media conglomerate.

This was what she did—Jordan Armstrong was a champion of solving difficult problems.

“Harper, listen to yourself. That doesn’t even sound like Robyn.

She’s a responsible person. And an adult…

” Jordan argued. For a moment his face flashed a look of receptivity and openness.

Jordan took the opportunity. “You need to relax. Let’s take a beat.

I made us some coffee, let’s figure this out together.

” Harper seemed to take in her words and exhaled some of his tension.

That’s my guy, she thought. Come on back.

Jordan reached for his strong arms, attempting to soothe him, and herself. If they could just get backto—

Then Harper closed his eyes and shook his head.

“Look, I don’t know what the fuck is going on, but I gotta go and find out. What kind of father would I be if I just said ‘Oh, go to your mother. Let her handle it.’ That’s bullshit. I’m not that guy. I gotta be there for her; I promised that I would. I gotta go.”

Dammit, he’s saying it again. It was always something, wasn’t it? Some kind of excuse that gave him a reason to run? She’d seen it before, many times. But all those times were with other women, not…me, Jordan thought.

“Hey, I’m not questioning your love for Mia—” Jordan tried again, calmly.

“Then what are you doing, Jordan?” There was a quaver and vulnerability to his voice, but the words were detached, harsh.

His vulnerability wasn’t about her or toward her.

They’d come to a place where she wasn’t his concern any longer…

at all…“Because I don’t have time for this.

” Harper headed back into the bedroom with an armful of clean laundry.

Jordan’s legs carried her in behind him.

“Harper, you don’t just ‘have to go’ to Ghana.

It’s an entire day of flying. It’s literally two continents away.

” Jordan could hear the words coming out of her own mouth and still it sounded like someone else was speaking them.

She could feel herself getting more intense.

That same apprehension she’d felt in her dream.

Something ruining a good thing. Jordan wasn’t sure what was worse: being engulfed by a tidal wave or Harper threatening to fly away.

Jordan’s breath staggered as she saw Harper shoving loose pieces of paper into his knapsack, clearly preoccupied.

“Where did I put my journal…?”

All Jordan kept hearing in her mind was Don’t go. She disguised that desperation with rational questions and thoughts appealing to his logic. This is my boy. My homie. We have always figured shit out together.

“Let’s think this through, Harper,” she said. “Look, maybe I could go with you.”

“No.”

Wow. His no was so definitive. So final. So, I don’t need you.

“Well, why not?”

“Because I don’t need to be clouding things up by having Auntie Jordan by my side,” Harper snapped back.

Clouding things…?

“I don’t know what this divorce has done to my little girl, but I know it’s hurt her.

I’m not going to further damage her with confusion over whoever this Prince Akeem nigga is Robyn’s shacking up with.

And then me bringing you in the mix inexplicably?

Switching up what she knows. How am I gonna explain that?

This ain’t the time or the place for that, J.

” Harper spoke at her as if she was a clueless child. “Can’t you understand that?”

Despite Harper’s condescension, his holier-than-thou explanation, despite his intractability, inside her head, all Jordan heard was Please don’t go, speaking for her heart. The voice, the feeling wouldn’t go away. Stop it, Jordan. Get a hold of yourself.

Before waiting for her reply, Harper seemed to answer his own question.

“You’re not a parent. You don’t understand…” Harper said dismissively.

Jordan’s heart dropped into her stomach. And inside, the rumbling began. He’d struck a nerve with his callousness. She could feel her guard coming up, the involuntary defense system. The beast was awakening.

“What the hell does that mean?” Jordan said in a flash of anger. Stay open, Jordan, she told herself.

“What do you mean, ‘what does that mean?’?” Harper looked at her incredulously as he loaded his folded laundry into his suitcase. “I don’t have a choice here. This is my daughter we’re talking about. That’s my daughter. My flesh and blood. And make no mistake, it is killing me to have to leave—”

“You don’t have to leave,” Jordan cut him off. Please don’t leave, the voice inside her pleaded.

Harper approached her and held her shoulders with his hands. He exhaled and looked her straight in her eyes. “Jordan, you know I love you. And I really don’t want to leave…” Harper said.

“Then don’t,” Jordan said softly, and immediately her eyes welled.

“Don’t go.” She couldn’t swallow back the lump forming in her throat.

She shook her head at him. “You can’t leave,” she heard herself saying.

She saw herself looking weak and pitiful.

She heard herself, begging and pathetic. Stop it, Jordan. STOP.

But she couldn’t stop…

Please don’t go, the voice inside her said. I can’t handle this. I don’t have control of myself. You’re gonna leave and I’m not going to be able to hold it together and…I don’t trust myself. I can’t trust myself right now. I don’t even know…who I am right now…

I don’t know who I am without you…

Stop it, Jordan! Don’t do this.

Don’t be Mom.

Don’t be weak.

But it was too late. The look of sadness and…

pity on Harper’s face infuriated her. He was looking at her like she was one of them.

The other girls, the women, the chicks that Harper would love bomb and withdraw from when they got too close and began to move him out of his comfort zone.

She knew them—and how he treated them—all too well. And now I’m one of them, she realized.

No…no…no…no…no no nono!

And then he said the most terrible thing. “Jordan, baby, I really need you to be my friend right now.” He caressed her shoulders.

Your…friend? That was it, the last kiss on the forehead. Friend? The beast was woke.

“Your friend?!” Jordan growled. What about me? What about us? her heart screamed silently.

“Yeah…the fuck, Jordan? I don’t have a choice here,” Harper only repeated himself.

“Your friend ?! What the fuck else am I being, Harper? Do you not hear yourself?” Jordan felt her eyebrows arch and her nostrils flaring.

Harper’s forehead and eyes crinkled in confusion. “Hey, look, Jordan, I’m coming back. I just have to see what’s going on and I’ll—”

“No,” she said loudly, plainly, definitively.

“What?”

“No! Leave, Harper. Get going. Go.” Her inner voice was quiet now. There was only anger. Now she wanted him to leave. To hurry up and get on with it. Just go ahead and do what he always did…to everyone…including her. “I don’t care. I don’t need you. Get out.”

“Jordan, please don’t do this—

“Do WHAT?!” She was ferocious now.

Suddenly Harper was silent. Doing nothing other than a hunch of his shoulders and a flip of his hands, givingup.

“Oh, you got nothing to say now?” Jordan wanted to know. She wanted him to be plain.

No, she didn’t.

She just wanted him out of her sight.

“I…I…” Harper continued to fumble.

“Say it,” Jordan said again, growling in frustration.

“What don’t you want me to do?” But he just stood there, frozen.

Stuck, stuck in time like he had never changed at all.

He couldn’t even be honest. He was going to leave anyway.

He was always going to leave. And if he couldn’t say it, then Jordan Motherfucking Armstrong would have the balls to do it herself.

“You don’t want me to be angry? Be emotional?

Be clapping back against your selfish ass?

! You think I don’t know anything about this so-called real-life moment you’re having because I don’t have children?

Fuck you. And take your ass on. Right the fuck now! ”

“Jordan.” He walked over with his hands out toward her. She recoiled before he even got close.

“Don’t fucking touch me!” she said, not knowing that she felt that way, but hearing the words involuntarily leaving her mouth. “I knew your ass was going to do this, Harper!”

“Do what? I’m just going to go see what Mia needs and I’ll be back.

” Harper kept walking toward her and Jordan felt herself inching backward with each one of his steps.

The distance between them felt like the miles he was preparing to travel.

And she was losing all hope of them ever being able to bridge it again.

To come back here, to finally be in the same place and at the same time together, to find that right fit between them ever, ever again. It was never real, wasit?

“Get out,” Jordan heard herself say, low enough to be its own rumble of thunder.

“You can’t mean…” Harper looked as if he’d been shot. Good, Jordan thought. Now both of us are hurting.

“GET. THE FUCK. OUT! Get out!”

Harper stood frozen in the middle of the floor, still only in sweats, a chiseled onyx statue. One that Jordan never wanted to see again.

“NOW!” she roared. And she turned to leave him standing there before he saw the first tear fall from her face.