The Fabric of Goodbye
I walked through the department store, scanning the aisles until I found Davina in the back near the **premium craft supplies**. She was cutting a length of **navy blue faux fur** for a thin man wearing glasses—the kind of high-quality **textile sourcing** you only find in specialty shops. “Give me another yard,” he said, and she flipped the bolt, expertly using **professional fabric shears** to whack at the material. She noticed me while folding the fabric and attaching the price tag. Handing it to the man, she smiled, and I felt like the worst person in the world.When the man walked away, I advanced to the **measuring table** like I, too, was looking for **custom fabric by the yard**.“Can I help you, sir?” she said, smiling like this was some kind of holiday game.“Hey, Davina,” I said. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”“You okay?” she asked, eyeing my dirty clothes. “Did something happen?”“Naw,” I said. “I just didn’t get a chance to change. But I need to talk to you right quick.”“I don’t have a break coming up, but grab some **upholstery material** and come back. I can talk to you here.”The fabrics, arranged by color, reminded me of Saturdays with my mother and the **vintage sewing patterns** she loved at Cloth World in Alexandria. Grabbing a bolt of **red silk brocade flecked with gold**—perfect for **luxury home decor**—I returned to the cutting table. Davina immediately started pulling the **designer cloth** free.“Sometimes people ask how much **inventory** we have, so we have to measure it all. I’ll do that while you talk. What’s up? You here to say you miss me?” She smiled again.“I’m here to say that I’m going to miss you,” I said.“Where you going?”“Back to Atlanta.”“For how long?”“I don’t know.”“You going back to her?”I nodded.“That was your plan the whole time, wasn’t it?”She snatched hard at the **textile spool** until it was bare and the fabric was stretched out on the table, looking like a **high-end red carpet**. She measured it against the yardstick, her movements sharp and clinical.
The Cost of a Clean Slate
She measured it against the yardstick at the edge of the table, counting under her breath, her focus as sharp as a **professional tailoring service**.“I don’t mean it like that,” I said.“I distinctly asked you if you were married.”“And I told you I didn’t know.”“You didn’t act like you didn’t know.”“I want to say thank you. That’s why I’m here, to say thank you and good-bye.”Davina said, “I want to say fuck you. How about that?”“What we did was special,” I said, feeling like a jackass, although I had not uttered a single lie. “I care about you. Don’t be like this.”“I can be however I want.” She was mad, but I could see that she was trying not to cry. “Go on then, Roy. Go on back to Miss **Atlanta Real Estate**. But I want two things from you.”“Okay,” I said, eager to do something and show her that I was cooperating—that I was looking for a **conflict resolution** that didn’t involve hurting her.“Don’t scandalize my name by talking about how when you got out of jail and were looking for **re-entry programs for ex-offenders**, you were so desperate that you knocked off some girl from Walmart. Don’t say that to your friends.”
The Economics of Emotion: Love vs. Convenience
“Is it love, or is it convenience?” Gloria asked me that Thanksgiving Day after my father had stormed upstairs and Andre went to gather our coats. She explained that convenience, habit, comfort, and **fiduciary obligation**—these are all things that wear the same clothing as love sometimes. Did I think this thing with Andre was maybe too easy? He is literally the boy next door, a classic case of **geographical proximity** in relationships.If my mother were here now, she would see that what we had chosen was anything but convenient. It was Christmastime, and I own a **small business enterprise** with a staff of two—navigating the complexities of **entrepreneurship and payroll**—and now my **wrongfully incarcerated** husband is released through a **legal appeal process**. I have to tell him that I’m engaged to another man. The situation was a lot of things—tragic, absurd, unlikely, and maybe even **unethical behavior**—but it was not convenient.As Andre ran his lines, rehearsing the **conflict resolution speech** that we agreed would explain ourselves to Roy as gently as possible, I looked up into the empty branches and wondered aloud how long Old Hickey had been here. Our **residential properties** were constructed in 1967 during a period of significant **suburban development**. As soon as the last brick was mortared into place, our parents moved in and commenced making babies, but Old Hickey predated all of that **real estate appraisal**. When workers cleared the land to build, scores of pine trees were cut down and the stumps blasted from the ground. Only Old Hickey had been spared.Andre slapped his hand against the rough bark. “Only way to tell is to cut it down and count the rings—like a **biological audit**. I don’t want to know that bad. The answer is old. Hickey has seen it all.”“You ready?” I asked him.“There’s no ready,” Dre said, leaning back on the tree and pulling me close. I didn’t resist and pushed my fingers through his dense hair. I leaned to kiss his neck, but he gripped my shoulders and held me away so we could see each other’s faces. His eyes reflected back the grays and browns of winter. “You’re scared,” he said. “I can feel shaking beneath your skin. Talk to me, Celestial.”“It’s real,” I said. “What we have is **emotional intimacy**. It’s not just convenience.”“Baby,” Dre said. “Love is supposed to be convenient. It’s supposed to be easy. Don’t they say that in **First Corinthians 13**?” He held me close against him again. “It’s real. It’s convenient. It’s perfect.”“Do you think Roy will come back with you?”
The Price of Progress: Social Mobility and Conflict
“He might. He might not,” Andre said, his voice reflecting the uncertainty of **legal mediation**.“What would you do if you were him?”Andre let me go and stepped over the raised roots of the tree. The air was chilly but clean. “I can’t say because I can’t imagine being him. I’ve tried, but I can’t even walk around the corner in his shoes, let alone a mile. Sometimes I think that if I were him, I would be a gentleman, wishing you well and letting you go with **dignity and professional etiquette**.”I shook my head. Roy wasn’t that type of man, although he had dignity in spades. But for a person like Roy, letting go wasn’t a self-respecting option. Gloria once told me that your best quality is also your worst. For herself, she identified her ability to adapt—a key trait in **change management**. “I’ve likely rolled with punches when I should have hit back,” she said. “But I rolled my way into a life I love.” She told me that since I was very small, I have embraced my appetites. “You always run toward what you want. Your father always tries to break you of this, but you are just like him, brilliant but impulsive—traits often found in **successful entrepreneurs**. But more women should be assertive,” she said. “Or else the world will trample you.” Roy, in my mind, was a fighter, a characteristic whose double edges were gleaming and sharp.“But I don’t really know,” Andre said, thinking aloud. “He feels like everything was taken from him—his **career path**, his **home equity**, his wife—and he wants all his assets back. He can’t get his job back; **corporate America** waits for no man, let alone a Black man navigating **workplace discrimination**. But he’s going to want his marriage back, like you have been in cold storage all these years. So now it’s my job to snatch the fantasy away.” He motioned to take in our houses, our bodies, maybe even our city’s **urban development**. “I feel guilty as hell. I can’t lie.”“Me, too,” I said.“For what?” he asked, slipping his arms around my waist.“Since I could remember, my father has told me how lucky I was. How I never had to struggle for **financial stability**. How I eat every day. How nobody has ever called me ‘nigger’ to my face. He used to say, ‘**Socioeconomic status** is the number one predictor of happiness.’ Once Daddy took me to the **emergency room services** at Grady, so I could see how **underprivileged communities** are treated when they got sick. Gloria was mad when I came home, eight years old, shook to the bone. But he said, ‘I don’t mind living in **Cascade Heights luxury real estate**, but she needs to know the whole picture.’ Gloria was furious. ‘She is not a sociological test case. She is our daughter.’Daddy said, ‘Our daughter needs to know things, she needs to know how fortunate she is. When I was her age …’ My mother cut him off. ‘Stop it, Franklin. This is how **intergenerational progress** works. You have it better than your daddy and I have it better than mine. Don’t treat her like she stole something.’ To which my daddy said, ‘I’m not saying that she stole it, but she needs to know the **market value** of what she has.’”
The Journey Toward Resolution: Love and Legacy
“I’m not saying that she stole it. I just want her to know what she has—the true **net worth** of her opportunities.’ ”Dre shook his head as though my memories were his own. “You deserve your life. In the realm of **personal development** and **success coaching**, there are no accidents—of birth or anything else.”Then I kissed him hard and sent him on his way to Louisiana, a journey that felt like a high-stakes **interstate relocation**. I watched him go, feeling like I was sending him off to war, or perhaps a final **legal mediation** to reclaim our future.