The Baby They Bonded Over

“I heard that!” a woman laughed. They all started to chat, laugh, and bombard Nadia with all kinds of questions about Jeremy. She answered a few, brushed off the insulting ones, and blatantly ignored the rest. She even told them a few bits and pieces about last night when Paul showed up banging down her door. Nadia knew she couldn’t just tell them he showed up and then not go into detail. So she let them in a bit, and even revealed that her Jeremy came to the rescue.

“They didn’t come to blows or anything but I wish you guys could have seen the look on Paul’s face,” Nadia laughed.

“Speaking of Paul, I think I just saw him parking his car,” Megan said staring through the large front windows. She watched Paul get out the car and one her regulars get out the car behind him. She rolled her eyes at his classlessness. He didn’t even open the door for the young woman to get out. She stepped away from the window to approach Nadia and whispered in her ear, “Don’t let him come in here and disrupt you again. This is a business, but let’s see what he wants. He’s bringing somebody in with him.”

“Okay,” Nadia nodded.

Paul walked into Babes and Bosses with a huge smile spread across his face. He greeted the women nicely but rolled his eyes and refused to say anything to Nadia. The woman in his car was the same woman from dinner Friday night, Madilyn. He’d brought her into the shop to make up for the way he acted with her at the restaurant. She stared at the women around the shop who all stared back at her, some with their mouths wide open. By the expressions on everyone’s faces, and seeing Nadia with her client, she could tell that the events of Friday night have been discussed. But, what she didn’t know was if she had been brought up in the conversation.

Paul proceeded to order a whole slew of beauty treatments for Madilyn with the receptionist at the front desk. It was then that it finally hit Nadia that she knew this woman from right here in the shop. She’s one of Megan’s regular customers. She couldn’t believe he was in here showing his ass again.

Paul had always been sloppy about his cheating but he was even more obvious when he was trying to make Nadia jealous. He began to speak extra loud with the receptionist, “Please give my BEAUTIFUL girlfriend here the most EXPENSIVE package you have because I LOVE HER more than ANY GIRL I’ve ever loved before.”

“Why are you yelling?” the girl behind the desk questioned with a puzzled look on her face.

“I’m sorry,” Paul chuckled. “Just wanted to be sure you HEARD me tell you about the MOST EXPENSIVE package for my GIRLFRIEND, Madilyn.”

“Seriously?” Madilyn questioned him this time. “Don’t play these games with me Paul. I told you that you’re not going to use me in whatever sh*t you got going on with Nadia. Now if you want to be with me fine, but if not then you need to leave me alone. Am I here to really get this hair and facial or are you just trying to make her upset again?”

The receptionist snickered under her breath as Madilyn checked Paul for his foolery. Paul couldn’t stand it as he whipped out his credit card to pay for the services. The card was declined.

“Your card didn’t go through, sir,” the receptionist rolled her eyes, and so did Madilyn.

“Are you sure? Try it again!” Paul demanded.

The receptionist swiped the card through the credit card terminal once more, and once more it was declined. This time her screen showed her a message to use a different card for payment. Megan overheard the conversation regarding the declined transaction and walked up behind the receptionist’s desk.  The receptionist pointed out the message to her and shrugged her shoulders. Megan handed Paul his card back and leaned over the desk to whisper that the payment wasn’t going to go through and that he needed to give her a different card because her system wouldn’t allow them to swipe it again. He couldn’t bear the embarrassment and he started patting his pockets down pretending to search for another card to use. Madilyn shook her head and told Megan to just put it on her tab. She told Paul to come back in a few hours to pick her up and not worry about it. Megan escorted the young woman to a back room for her facial.

Paul was upset, humiliated, and most of all irate that Nadia seemed unaffected by him traipsing his new girlfriend all over the shop. He yelled out to Nadia across the shop, “Oh yeah, and Nadia, make sure you don’t burn my lady’s scalp like you do the rest of your clients!”

Nadia sucked her teeth, “You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about! Get out of here! You know damn well I ain’t the one gonna be doin her hair! You just starting sh*t, as usual. Go home and come back to pick her up later like she told you too!”

“So what you trying to say?” Paul asked turning back to approach Nadia.

“I ain’t trying to say nothing! I’m just repeating what you were told to do. I mean, at least you listen to her and do what she asks of you. Sh*t I couldn’t even get you to take the trash out,” Nadia replied sarcastically. She tried hard to focus on getting Charlene’s hair done but Paul knew how to push her buttons.

Paul walked up to the women and whispered low, “That’s why I was always out here with these women, because all you know how to do is nag, nag, nag me. At least Madilyn never nagged me! Even when I went to LA for that business trip. She ain’t nag me not once. Just sat home like a good little girlfriend.”

“That’s because I was your girlfriend when you went on that trip!” Nadia got upset and yanked Charlene’s hair back.

“Ouch!” Charlene yelled grasping her hair. “Paul you need to get out of here and stop messing with my girl before you make her give me a bald spot!”

“Shut up Charlene!” both Paul and Nadia shouted.

“I can’t believe you were going out with her after you promised me! You swore to me that you were done! You‘re always lying! You were never a good man to me and you’re never going to be good for anybody else!”

“What the hell is going on out here?” Megan called as she came out of the back room with Madilyn following close behind.

“Nothing,” Paul exclaimed. “I was just leaving!”

“Nah, don’t leave now that your girlfriend’s out here. Oh wait I meant your side chick!” Nadia snapped.

“Excuse me?” Madilyn stepped up to see what was being said.

“Oh you don’t know? Paul said y’all was together when he went on that trip to LA last year!” Nadia told the woman.