I drop to the floor and hunt for my underwear under the bed.
I do a quick scan and sweep with my hand.
There they are.
Next to my Nike Air Jordans.
I snatch my Sean John boxer briefs and stuff them into my back pocket.
“Chase! Shush! Be quiet,” Eric says, bug-eyed, with his finger to his mouth. “Just calm down, she doesn’t know I’m really here and she can’t get in.”
“Calm down! Calm down!” I’m jamming my feet into my sneakers. “There is a woman banging on the door and you’re telling me to calm down.” I grab my Apple iPhone off the nightstand.
Eric pushes me and I fall back onto the bed.
“Just stay here in the bedroom. If we keep quiet she will go away,” Eric says. He’s in his blue and gray plaid boxers. His six-foot-four, two-hundred-thirty-five-pound, pure muscle body is standing sheepishly hunched over, peering out the doorway.
His olive brown skin is rich and silky.
His thighs are massive and muscular.
His enormous biceps are like ripe cantaloupes.
Chest broad and solid.
His body has me going.
Okay, focus.
Regroup.
“What!?! Man, you’re bugging.” I push past Eric and storm toward the living room.
“Please, don’t go out there.” Eric rushes after me and tries to grab my arm, but I slip out of his reach.
As soon as I get to the door there is a loud BANG!
It sounds like a gunshot.
Frightened, I dive to the floor.
Eric runs and cowers next to me. “Come on!” He grabs me by the arm.
We both run back to the bedroom with our arms over our heads.
“Yo, get in the closet,” Eric says.
“What?” I look at him like he is crazy. “What the hell I look like, cowering in a closet?”
“Chase, please, get in the closet,” Eric says, his hazel eyes pleading as they always do when he wants to suck my dick.
Eat my ass.
Fuck.
And, I give in.
“Man, this is some fucked-up shit,” I say and hurry into the closet.
“I’ll handle it.”
“You better handle this shit.”
I crouch in the closet and crack the door open.
I see Eric easing out the bedroom on his tiptoes.
“I’m calling the police!” he yells with his phone in his hands.
I see him pushing the buttons.
“I don’t give a fuck! Call the motherfucking police,” the woman screams.
BANG!
BANG!
“Hello! Hello! Yes, this is Eric Sanderfield. I play for the New York Giants. There is a woman trying to break down my door. Please get the cops here fast!”
There is a pause.
“I am at Twenty-seven East Seventy-seventh Street. The penthouse apartment.”
Another pause.
A long pause.
Then BAM!
BAM!
“Please hurry!” he yells.
“I know you got another woman in there. Does she know you got a wife and three kids?”
I know she didn’t say wife and three kids. He told me he was divorced, I say to myself.
I crack the door wider and peek around Eric’s massive bedroom for any signs or pictures of a family.
There is nothing.
No pictures on the maroon-colored walls.
The nightstand.
The long cherry oak wood dresser.
The windowsill of the ten-foot windows.
No pictures anywhere.
The only thing prominently displayed is the team autographed brown pigskin football in the center of the dresser.
Encased.
When I met Eric four months ago he presented himself as a recent divorcé trying to get custody of his three kids from an angry and drug-addicted baby momma.
“It’s been a long battle in the courts. The system doesn’t look out for men. I just want to take care of my children,” Eric told me with sadness in his eyes.
Commendable.
Upstanding.
He had his shit together.
I fell for it.
Why would he lie? He had nothing to prove to me.
Besides, he was a tight end for the New York Giants.
Whatever that is.
I am not a football fan.
I only know the basics about the sport, and if given the choice I’d rather watch the Cartoon Network on Monday nights.
Family Guy.
American Dad.
Hell, even King of the Hill.
But, it was his dazzling smile.
Thick succulent lips.
Beautiful perfect white teeth.
And charming personality that won me over.
We were at the New York Urban League’s annual dinner. He asked one of his down-low friends, Omar, to introduce him to someone.
Someone nice.
Cool.
Easy-going.
Omar called me.
Me and Omar have been friends for a little over three years. I met him when I used to date the reality television star Dexter Holmur. He was a contestant on the show Survivor. He almost won, too, but in the end it came down to him and the beautiful blonde from Oklahoma. America, and the other Survivor contestants, decided to give the bubbly, breast-enhanced blonde the million dollars.
“Okay, Omar. I trust you. I hope this is not some favor you’re doing for a lonely, depressed, and bitter gay man. I can’t do it anymore. I am not at that place in my life.”
“No, trust me, you will like him.”
Omar refused to give me any details about Eric.
I begged.
Pleaded.
“Just show up. I guarantee you’ll thank me,” Omar said.
Yes, oh yes, oh yes.
When Eric walked in.
No, he strolled.
That black man confident walk.
Slight pep in his step with a pimp.
Hands controlled.
Dipping slightly behind his back.
I felt my body shiver.
Every reactive hormonal cell in my body cheered.
Standing ovation.
Eric was everything I’d