In the Light of Love. Deborah Fletcher Mello

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СКАЧАТЬ of women, varying in shades and sizes, was duly impressed.

      Talisa and Mya rushed to their table, greeting the rest of their party who sat waiting for them.

      “What took you two so long?” Benita Rivers asked, rising from her seat to give them each a quick hug and kiss on the cheek. Her café au lait complexion was flushed with color that highlighted her reddish-brown afro.

      “We were beginning to think your old butt wasn’t coming,” Leila Brimmer added, gesturing for them to take a seat.

      “Who are you calling old?” Talisa said as she settled herself comfortably against the cushioned seat.

      “I’m calling you old,” her best friend responded teasingly. “Happy birthday, woman!” Leila twirled one of her ebony curls around her index finger. Laugh lines pulled at her thin face, her mahogany complexion shining with glee.

      Talisa grinned. “Thank you. And I’m not old. I’m just aging nicely. Like fine wine.”

      “Like she can talk,” Benita interjected. “Who turned twenty-five last month?”

      “I’m still twenty-one and I’ll deny anything else,” the other woman laughed.

      Benita rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right. Just like you’re still a virgin.”

      The women laughed again. Talisa’s gaze scanned the perimeter of the room, noting the landscape of primped and perfumed women, each dressed to the nines, hair and nails meticulous. “What did we miss?” she asked, taking a mental note of the elderly piano player who sat in the left corner, his fingers skating easily over the piano keys.

      Leila shook her head. “Not much. I picked up our tickets for the champagne reception in the VIP suite. We’ll get to mingle with the bachelors before this thing gets started. Spend some quality one-on-one time as we decide which ones will be our future husbands.”

      “We should be so lucky,” Mya responded as she peered into a compact mirror pulled from her purse.

      Talisa shook her head. “How’d you swing tickets for the reception? I heard it was by invitation only.”

      Leila shrugged. “The only invitation we needed was the required five-hundred-dollar donation for the tickets.”

      Talisa spun around in her seat, her mouth falling open in shock. “Five hundred dollars? You spent five hundred dollars for reception tickets?”

      Leila laughed. “No. I spent two thousand dollars for reception tickets. We needed four of them,” she said, pointing to each of them in turn. “I told you we were going to celebrate your birthday in high style.”

      “You’ve lost your mind,” Talisa exclaimed. “I can’t believe you!”

      Her friend laughed again. “Well, let’s head on up so you can believe me.”

      Mya patted at her lipstick. “I hope you don’t expect me to pay you back, Leila. You know I’m broke. I don’t have a high-powered lawyer’s job like you do.”

      Leila rolled her eyes. “It’s a gift, Mya. A gift for all of us. Just make it worth my investment and find yourself a man. Please, do us all that favor.”

      Talisa laughed. “I declare! For five hundred dollars, they should give us a private reception, an engagement ring, and the two point three kids with a dog.”

      “Please, don’t act poor when we get upstairs, Talisa,” Mya admonished. “Just pretend we at least know what money is.”

      “You mean just pretend we have money we don’t,” Talisa said, her head waving from side to side.

      “It’s all tax-deductible and I need as many deductions as I can get,” Leila said. “Besides, we’re here to support the cause, remember?”

      “I’m here to catch me a rich husband.” Mya laughed. “You can be here for any reason you want.”

      Crossing through the lobby, the four women made their way to the elevators on the south side of the building, pushing the button to the upper-level suite reserved for the occasion. Excitement filled the space around them as they traveled the quick distance from one floor to another. Talisa smiled warmly at the three women who stood beside her.

      She and Leila had been best friends since kindergarten, when Talisa broke the red crayon in her Crayola box and Leila had offered her own in replacement. They’d been inseparable after that, even following each other to Georgia Tech when they graduated high school. Mya had joined the duo when they’d been in the fourth grade. They’d met her in church two weeks after her parents and twin brothers had moved from Baltimore to Atlanta. Mya had captivated them with her vocal cords, bellowing big hymns out of her tiny body that had made them all stop and take notice. She’d also been the more daring of the trio, enticing them to get into more trouble than any one of them cared to remember. Benita had been Mya’s college roommate, evening out their threesome as they’d moved into adulthood.

      Leila had graduated college a year early, moving right on to Harvard Law School for her law degree. It had been the first time she and Talisa had been apart, the telephone and e-mail the lifeline between them. Talisa had marveled at her friend’s dedication and commitment to her career, still having no idea what she wanted to do with her own life, despite her degree in journalism.

      Benita was working her Spelman College marketing degree by running a small advertising agency. Her business was growing rapidly and Talisa envied her ability to build something out of absolutely nothing. Free-spirited Mya was her sister-friend most intent on marrying well, believing that the right union would lift her well above her family’s days of food stamps and government housing. Talisa sighed as they giggled beside her, energy flowing from one to the other.

      As they stepped inside the tastefully decorated suite, handing their tickets to the woman at the door, their excitement level rose tenfold. Forty good-looking, well-dressed men turned their attention to the entrance as the women stepped inside. Scanning the room from one corner to the other, Talisa felt as if they’d just experienced sensory overload, one human confection more delectable than the other. Every nerve ending in her body was tingling with anticipation and as Mya pushed her way past them, extending her hand toward three men who stood in conversation in front of the bar, Talisa looked to Leila for support. The woman stared back at her and grinned.

      “Happy birthday, girlfriend.”

      Talisa laughed. “I owe you big-time, my friend.”

      “Just make sure I don’t have to wear pink ruffles at your wedding and we’ll call it even.”

      “Ditto for me,” Benita said before turning to say hello to a man with a linebacker’s build who’d stepped in to greet her.

      Talisa suddenly stood alone and nervous as Leila disappeared into the crowd. She followed the clear path toward the buffet table in the center of the room, a smile pasted on her face as she brushed past one good-looking man after another.

      “Hello, my name’s Charles, Charles Barrow,” a voice said from behind her as she reached for a clean plate and a canapé.

      Talisa turned to stare up into the dark brown eyes of a heavyset, mocha-colored black man. He reached to shake her hand, then gestured to the green-eyed blond beside him. “And, this СКАЧАТЬ