What Tiffany Wanted

Let me tell you about Tiffany. Not the version Junior tells people. Not the villain he made her out to be after the divorce. The real Tiffany. She was a woman who knew what she liked and refused to settle. She liked handsome white men. That was her preference and she owned it. She married Junior, a black man with money and status, but that was never going to be enough because desire does not care about your bank account.

The man she cheated with was not rich. He was not powerful. He was just good looking in exactly the way that made Tiffany lose her judgment. Some people might call that shallow. I call it honest. Most people suppress what they want and live miserable lives pretending they are satisfied. Tiffany refused to do that. She went after what she wanted and let the pieces fall where they fell.

Now here is where it gets complicated. After the divorce, Tiffany did not disappear from Junior’s life the way most ex-wives do. She stayed close. Too close. And that proximity created a whole new set of problems. Because Hem, the second wife, started noticing Tiffany in ways that had nothing to do with jealousy or rivalry.

Tiffany carried herself with a freedom that Hem had never allowed herself. Hem was disciplined, dutiful, devoted. Tiffany was wild, unapologetic, untamed. And that contrast was magnetic. Hem found herself drawn to it. Not to Tiffany the person exactly, but to what Tiffany represented. Permission. To want something you are not supposed to want.

A woman who has spent her whole life being good will eventually crack. And when she does, she does not crack halfway. She goes all the way through. That is just human nature. Tiffany was the crack in Hem’s armor and neither of them saw the consequences coming.