Suddenly Fallen

The Queen's Dinner was one of the fanciest restaurants in town. It was large and beautiful, decorated with crystal chandeliers, round tables with pure white table cloths, and beautiful paintings and art, and the food so delicious. Jason Miller couldn't think of a better place to take the beautiful woman he had suddenly fallen for, Layla Bentu, for what was going to be their first date.

Layla gazed at him from the opposite side of their table. She seemed perfect. She wasn't just beautiful but also had an outstanding personality. Jason wondered if it wasn't because of her culture that she had so much stability of character, modesty, and discipline.

He looked at the woman across from him at the table. She was adorned with a matching diamond jewelry set of earrings that dangled from her ears, a necklace, and a bracelet. Her hair was pinned up. She wore a tight, black, dress, and black high heels. Her makeup was flawless. But even without those adornments, her beauty was like that of diamonds.

Jason noticed that her lipstick was the same as the lipstick that was on the glass of Merlot that he'd seen on another occasion. That occasion had been over half a year ago. Where he was then made now seem even more unbelievable.

Over Half A Year Ago.........

The glass of Merlot sat so lonely at the empty table. The restaurant was empty except for Jason Miller who sat there looking at the nearly full glass of wine which sat on a table that was to the left of him. A lipstick stain was around the rim of the glass showing that someone had taken, at least, a sip or two.

His date had ended hours ago, tragically. And he was left there to his thoughts and imagination.

There was a note just in front of the glass of Merlot. Jason grabbed it. It said:

Not that I blame you at all

for your stances; but how can you

love me when you

believe that women like me are, mainly,

unattractive and unintelligent.

Goodbye, Dear.

Jason kept the note.

Jason had to admit, himself, that he was an attractive young man.

He was among the darkest of the African American race even though he would not date a woman who had that complexion, nor any Black woman who didn't look White. He would never date an African woman and, definitely, not an ugly woman. None of those women were ever attractive in his opinion.

Jason had an awesome personality, a decent sense of humor. He was intelligent; and, as for his career, he was a lawyer.

He was 30 now and had made the decision that it was time for him to settle down. He had the utmost respect for women and valued true love. He was looking for someone out there who he could relate to. But, of course, she had to be as beautiful as he was.

Lin Shin was new at the The Office of Legal Justice establishment, an establishment that housed the offices of multiples of lawyers. She'd be the secretary of Jason Miller. They met in his office to discuss her duties; and he could not help notice she was gorgeous - a gorgeous Asian woman with a lovely accent.

Jason's day at work that day went well. Lin seemed perfect for the job. Still, while he had maintained a professional attitude, Lin had flirted with him. He'd catch her looking at him every now and then. And there was that incident when he'd said, "You seem hot. Would you like to turn on the air conditioner." And she'd said, "It's not the air that's making it hot." Then she'd lowered her eyes blushing.

He wondered whether or not to give her a chance and ask her out. Eventually, he did only to find that she was the woman of his dreams.

After two months of dating, Lin and Jason found they enjoyed sitting at his desk just gazing into eachother's eyes with coffee in between them in the morning. It was during one of those occasions that his sister Heather called him up for the umpteenth time about an African woman who lived next door to her who she thought would be perfect for him.

"You have got to be out of your mind if you think I'm dating some, black, African woman!"

He rolled his eyes as Lin still stared in them affectionately.

Heather Martin was a very light skinned Black woman; but she wasn't mixed - just had that yellow color. She was, definitely, not the color of the women her little brother, Jason Miller, disliked the most. Not that she liked his views. But, these days, she had too much to worry about to worry about her brother's views.

Next door to her there lived an African woman who called herself Missy.

Missy was a, recently, widowed woman with five, minor, children to feed and no job, or babysitter. Heather made it her business to help her.

Now, Missy was the color that Jason was not attracted to. She was what Black people call black. That meant, she was among the darkest skinned of the Black race. And she was, unmistakeably, gorgeous. Large, egg shaped eyes, round thick lips, a fair sized and shaped nose, a neck like a swan, and a body shaped like an hour glass. Just, unmistakeably, gorgeous.

She made Jason's claim that dark skinned women were never attractive seem ridiculous.

Lin and Jason had been dating for a couple of months when they decided it was time for them to meet each other's family. Lin's parents invited them to dinner. Jason drove the both of them thirty miles to Lin's parents' home.

The minute Lin's parents appeared in their front door an awkwardness filled the air. It was, immediately, obvious that something was wrong. And a heavy, distressful, feeling filled the pit of both Jason and Lin's stomachs. After staring at Jason and Lin for a while with hard expressions on their faces, Mr. Shin grabbed his daughter's arm, aggressively, saying something in his own language, and dragged her in the house. Ms. Shin slammed the door in Jason's face.

Jason heard their angry voices inside the house. Once or twice he heard the word Nigger. He turned and walked towards his car to go home.

Heather was nearly crying with Jason as he cried to her over the phone telling her that Lin's parents had slammed the door in his face and called him a Nigger.

"Why don't you come over and have some tea with me? Do you mind if my friend Missy's in the other room?"

Jason arrived to his sister's house to find the door wide open with children going in and out. He walked past her livingroom couch where an African woman was reprimanding the children in her own language probably for running in the apartment.

He met his sister in the kitchen where she had a pot of tea on the stove.

"That was my friend Missy and her kids you just passed by."

Jason didn't respond but grabbed a chair and sat down.

Heather grabbed some mugs and poured some tea. Then she sat down to talk with her brother. It broke Heather's heart when she saw him sit there and cry.

After a few months passed, Jason found that, contrary to his prior belief, he was over Lin. But he was still frequently at Heather's. He wasn't sure why; and he didn't want to believe it was the answer that he suspected.

As he knocked on his sister's door after work one day, Missy was just coming out of her apartment with her kids. He was now pretty well acquainted with her; and after all the time he'd spent being totally disinterested in dark skinned women, he couldn't believe she sparked his interest so much. He couldn't believe how much he always wanted to just see her.

It wasn't just her outstanding beauty. It was her personality and attitude, her stability of character, and her modesty.

When Missy turned and saw Jason, a bright smile crossed her face; her eyes lit up so cheerfully. "Good afternoon. How are you?" she said.

"I'm fine; and you?" Jason responded.

He never made obvious the pitter-patter in his heart, or the way his knees seemed to weaken, the way he'd begun to feel every time he saw Missy. He decided it was time to tell Heather. Her eyes were so wide that it seemed like they could fall out when he told her.

"Do me a favor and find out what her real name is."

"It's Layla Bentu."

Back To The Present...........

Jason was so handsome that Layla didn't want to take her eyes off of him. He had the most beautiful color and reminded her of the men from her home.

"When I found out your name was Layla, I couldn't believe you were hiding it," he said.

"Why not?"

"Because, it's such a beautiful name."

"Well, I'm used to American's who have a hard time pronouncing African names. I didn't want to make it hard for them."

After dinner, Jason drove himself and Layla to the beach. As they walked, Jason didn't realize he was staring - not until Layla lowered her head blushing.

"I'm sorry. I didn't realize I was staring. I'm not used to seeing dark women as beautiful as you. And I'm not used to seeing ones as nice as you."

"Really?"

"Yes."

Layla's facial expression had changed. She seemed to have become depressed, or upset, suddenly. But, though he noticed, Jason didn't pay as much attention to that as he paid to the next thing he wanted to say.

"I don't date dark skinned women. And, you know, a funny thing happened to me. I was sitting in a restaurant months ago. I saw a glass of Merlot with a lipstick stain on it. I imagined that it belonged to a gorgeous woman. I dreamt her up and longed for her to desire me. There was a note in front of the glass of wine. What it said sounded a lot like the man who was the woman's date was going through something similar to what I'm going through, right now; but it didn't end so well for him. I kept the note dreaming that the woman who wrote it was the woman of my dreams. I want to show you the note. Wait here."

Jason ran off in the direction of his car. He came back with the note. He handed it to Layla.

As she read it, her eyes seemed to want to pop out of their sockets as she widened them in surprise. "That's my note. I wrote this note. I was dating a White man who said the same things you're saying right now."

"Jason I...."

"You wrote this note?" Jason's eyes widened and his heart was pitter-pattering in affection.

"Yes. I did; and........."

"Then it was our fate to be together."

"No. It can't........"

"I hope you're not going to say that you're not going to give me a chance; because, I feel like I'm in love with you."

Layla hadn't expected to hear that. "In love?" she said.

"In love, Layla. And I don't believe that you're going to be the "different dark skinned woman" for me. You're not going to be someone who was just different from every other dark skinned woman. You're going to be the one who made me realize how beautiful you all are. And all the ones that can't be who you are are that way because of circumstances."

Layla smiled, her eyes brightening; and tears came to her eyes. Soon, somehow, her and Jason's bodies met together; and they kissed.

A year and a half later, Jason and Layla were married. And it changed Jasons views about ugly women, too. If they were here, they had a valuable purpose.