Acacia: Acacia

Chapter 8: Things fall apart

- 38 I had noticed before leaving for winter break that Taylor was behaving oddly. Nothing major, but definitely dodging me here and there. I was disturbed, but I didn’t want to pry. It wasn’t anything I could put my finger on so I simply let it go. I got back to New York late on a Friday night. Saturday morning, I sauntered to Taylor’s apartment to catch up on holiday happenings. He was there, clearly not busy. “Want to grab a cup of coffee at Dean & DeLuca?” I bubbled, perhaps a little too eagerly. I hadn’t seen him in a couple of weeks and I realised then that I really missed him. My expectations had grown impatient in his absence. “Sorry. I can’t. I have some errands to run,” he replied rather sketchily. Hey. Errands are errands. I let it go.And after unpacking, I headed to Dean & DeLuca on my own to catch up on some reading. Just as I sat down with my coffee and pulled out my book, who should enter but TaylorWolf. Taylor and a girl I did not recognise. At first, I smiled in their direction, not comprehending the scene playing out before me. He didn’t see me. As they perused the menu board,I slouched deeper and deeper into my seat, my body taking on the form of a question mark as I watched them giggle in each other’s ears. I tried not to stare, but I couldn’t.The sound of their laughter mocked me.When had I become the joke? - 39 Whoever she was, she was obviously beautiful – on display. Hip and fresh – thin and hungry-looking. A queen bee. Attractive in a way that makes guys salivate with stupidity. Sexy in a way that robs other women of their shabby elegance, making it impossible, painful even, for them to feel feminine. The kind of girl who wakes up looking like a cover girl while the rest of us look like guerilla warriors. I was torn between admiration and something akin to self-loathing. Mum’s skin was a dark chocolate espresso delight. I was the half-caste child of a New Africa. My mongrel genetic make-up had rendered my complexion café au lait. A vanilla-mocha fusion of races. A daughter of two lands, yet somehow strangely homeless. Aside from our skin tones, though, Mum and I actually looked very similar. I, however, had never reconciled myself to the idea that, perhaps, like Mum, I was a woman worth looking at. My anorexic appraisal of myself led me to conclude that I fell piteously short of Taylor’s standards of female beauty. And in that moment, I desperately wanted to be beautiful. Beautiful toTaylor. I felt like a simpleton, small, and low. Painfully ordinary. Sinister sentiments ransacked my mind as a funereal gloom settled in my heart. I wanted to hate them. Her for being desirable to him, and him for desiring her. But, even in that nightmare, my sense of justice revolted at such prejudice. I didn’t know her. My unpronounced anathemas instantly pickled within me, making me feel all the more wretched and rancid. In one monstrous moment, my dream collapsed. A torpedo to my heart. Scoundrel! How couldTaylor do this to me? Dean & DeLuca was the first place Taylor and I had been to together, a few days after we met. Just the two of us. Just to be.To explore SoHo, which we were fascinated to discover stood for “South of Houston” Street – the first official acronym given to a NewYork City neighbourhood, and to enjoy Manhattan before school got crazy. It had been a perfect day.We walked along cobblestone streets,admiring the cast-iron architecture of buildings that housed groovy boutiques and galleries,below obscenely expensive lofts.We felt young and buoyant and - 40 immortal , our hearts beating to the same pulsating rhythm of the city we would come to call home. Our conversation flowed seamlessly from one delicious moment to the next. “When I introduced myself to you as ‘Wolf’ I was perfectly serious,” Taylor informed me. “Wolf is your surname though, right?” “Yes. But all my friends call me‘Wolf’. Or‘TheWolf’, if you prefer,” he clarified, with that smug, half-smile of his playing on his lips. I snorted. “Let me guess. These friends are a degenerate lot of underachievers who...