“No thanks,” Kerry said, now more stuck in her head on Val’s words. “I’ll be fine. I can handle them.”
“I’m sure you can,” Val said, then hung up.
* * *
The morning was awkward as hell, and Jesse could feel the eyes of his brothers on his and Kerry’s every move. Still, they got a lot of the finishing touches done on the shop and even agreed on the TV idea and where it should be put without too much of an argument.
After color-coordinating the fall sets of wools and cottons in the bins where they would best be shown off with the new wall colors, Kerry took more promotional photos of them, hashtagging to her heart’s content, and then they decided on where to put the new yarn tree.
“Ma Joy would love this,” Lucas said as he anchored the tree securely to be sure it wouldn’t fall if knocked into by a passing customer. “This was a great idea, Jesse.”
Jesse was surprised by the compliment. “It wasn’t much.”
“No, he’s right, she would love it. And it turned out beautifully.”
Jesse turned around when he heard Kerry sniff. She was blinking.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
She wiped quickly at a tear before it could fall. “I’m fine. I’m getting hungry, how about you all? I’m going to head up and make some sandwiches. I’ll let you know when they are ready.”
As soon as Kerry hit the top of the landing, all three of his brothers pounced on him quick as flash.
“What the fuck did you and your randy ass do?” Damian yelled before looking around and lowering his voice to a hiss. “I mean, seriously, with Kerry.”
“Our Kerry!” Lucas added.
Jesse’s head swiveled Lucas’s way. “How is she our Kerry? You all saw her—she was sleeping with me last night.”
“Yeah, but in my bed,” Damian said. “On my good sheets.”
“Once again, fuck you and those cheap-assed sheets. You know those sheets are from TJ Maxx at best, so stop going on about it.”
“Fuck you right back. Don’t put down the Maxx!” Damian countered.
“Are we really on the damned sheets right now?” Lucas said. “We need to talk about Kerry and what you plan on doing about her.”
“Also we need to talk about how you’d better not mess shit up before we get this shop up and running.” Damian said. “Don’t forget how much we need Kerry. Now you owe us for the loan and my fucking sheets. Shit, I should charge you for the whole damned bed.”
“Could you not right now, Dame? Just for a minute?”
“I could not if you could have kept it in your pants. This is serious. Yes, the improvements are looking good and we’ve paid off a little with the insurance, but we still need thousands. The opening has to be huge. We need buzz. Our reputation is going to be everything. In the end, this is a yarn shop, not your personal fiber-arts Tinder.”
“It’s not going to be looked at that way,” Jesse said.
“Oh really? Have you seen some of the comments we’re getting on social media?”
“I have, and they’re positive. We’re starting to get some traction, and it’s great. People are even checking for your ass.”
“Yeah, that’s great. And lots of woman are talking about you. Namely some of your past conquests.”
Jesse sighed. “Everyone has a past. Some skeletons in their closet.”
“Okay, Bones, you go with that. Just don’t let it bury all of us.”
Lucas groaned now and Jesse turned his way. “What is it? I know you’re dying to get your dig in.”
“It’s not a dig,” Lucas said. “I just want to know what you intend to do with her.”
Jesse looked at Lucas. His normally pretty easygoing brother looked like he was ready to fight him. Shit, what was really going on here? “What are you so worried about her for? Talking intentions and all that. Why?” Jesse asked, instantly putting his guard up.
“Of course you know why,” Lucas said.
“No, I don’t. And what’s with the ‘of course’?”
Lucas seemed like he was fighting for control of his breath and searching for the right words. “Kerry is not like the other girls you’ve been with.”
“And how would you know that?” Jesse shot back. “Were you there last night? No. Maybe she’s exactly like the others I’ve been with.”
“Watch it, Jesse.” This warning came from Damian. What the hell had he gone and done? Jesse paused, remembering Kerry’s words from this morning. Damian was right. He’d better watch it. Kerry was worth more than his snide rebuttals. He let out a long sigh. “No, she’s actually better. Kerry knows me for who I truly am.”
Lucas sighed while Damian grumbled.
“That’s great,” Noah said.
Jesse looked at Noah, his smile, he knew, weak at best. “Yeah, it is. I’m lucky. She knows me and still wanted to fuck me, no strings attached. See, she’s under no illusions like any of the other women that I’ve been with that I’m truly worth a damn to love or invest something as precious as her heart in. So you all don’t have to close ranks and get all up in arms over our Kerry Girl. She’s a smart and strong woman. She’s going to be just fine. Now help me out and let’s get the last of this yarn unboxed.”
* * *
God, he hated his brothers. Hated them just as much as he loved them. Why did they have to go and be so right, right fucking now? Was it too much for him to have a moment of normal happiness in his life?
Of course he knew that Kerry wasn’t his forever, no matter how much he wished she were. How much he wanted to fight for her to be. But shit, couldn’t he at least get some time to play pretend? Mama Joy was gone and he was alone. Didn’t he deserve that?
They were all gone and Jesse had closed up the shop, their reno work finished for the day, nothing else to be done, and with Kerry gone to work at the center he honestly didn’t feel like staying in. Damian’s words stung, and Lucas’s judgment burned. As Jesse walked the avenue, though, he couldn’t let go of what Damian had said about Kerry’s hashtag. He knew he had to check. Turning and heading toward the park between the projects and behind the firehouse, he leaned against the back of a bench and pulled out his phone.
Most of the posts had lots more likes than he had anticipated, and there were lots of comments from people looking forward to the opening. Each of the posts with photos of them brought lots of likes. Kerry was smart and a great photographer as well as a marketer. His brothers were photogenic, so why not use them? But as usual, Damian was right. There were some comments, way too many to just brush off, talking about him being a noncommittal dog. Whew. Blunt much? He could take the “dog,” but the “noncommittal” might lead to what people would think about the business.
Jesse frowned. The post with the most traction was one with an old picture of Mama Joy with him and his brothers when they were young. He knew the picture. It was from their kitchen, and the comments were full of complimentary things about Mama Joy and how much she was missed and how many great things she’d done for the community.
Kerry had captioned it, “Come on out to the grand reopening and make Strong Knits stronger than ever!” He let out a long breath, then looked up the street. The hour was getting late and the sun was shifting, preparing to make its exit, though you wouldn’t know it from the bustling Harlem block. Stronger than ever, huh?
He knew then he needed to do more to repair his reputation if that would ever be true. First stop: Bird’s and Blue. He flipped to the contacts in his phone. Next was Remmy’s Florist and Devon, and he’d work his way further uptown from there.
23
The past week and a half had been stressful—hell, the past few weeks had been the most emotionally draining of his life, and his life had been nothing if not an emotional roller coaster—but this was it. The time was finally here. Today was the day. The official Strong Knits reopening day
. Scary and exciting, but mostly scary, without the assurance of Mama Joy at their backs. Jesse told himself to put those fears on the back burner, as Mama Joy used to say, where they could simmer down or boil out. But either way, today was still the day.
He had Noah help him pull the old iron bench from out back and put it in front of the shop, and after flipping the front door sign from closed to officially open, Jesse took a seat in the warm August sun, hoping for everything but expecting nothing.
Damian said he’d let some woman he knew from the local paper know about the reopening and she might come by to interview them, but it was only a firm maybe. He could only hope. With the loan coming due, it was make-or-break time, and Jesse knew they could use any additional media attention they could get. As long as it was positive, that is. Dammit, Damian was right about that. Though the store looked great and Kerry had taught him how to run it, he knew he still needed the community behind him and to stop the negative comments online.
His “Sorry I was a shithead” tour was going about as well as could be expected. Most of the women he’d apologized to for ghosting were pretty much over him. The hostile ones acted skeptical but were still receptive to news about the shop’s reopening. Yeah, it might have gotten a little sketch with one or two, but he’d made it clear that he was focusing on getting the family business up and running. That seemed to be enough to quiet things down online and in his DMs.
Still, Jesse had to admit he felt hollow. Though Kerry had made her feelings clear and he’d gone along with it, Jesse wanted to be able to say he was taken. Because the fact was he was. Taken, that is. Whether she knew it or not, Kerry had taken his heart, and there was no way, right now at least, that he could even consider anyone else by his side. Not that his feelings on the matter mattered.
He’d woken that morning with Kerry in his bed. Over the past two weeks, Kerry had taken to using Damian’s room more in line with the way Damian had, like an expanded closet, and she spent her nights with Jesse.
She’d worked with him at the shop during their soft opening, showing him the ropes. Mostly they’d knitted, their little hat display now proudly hung in the window. Kerry had finished four sets of coordinated mittens, which he’d never figured out how she’d finished so fast. They’d knit, then make love almost every night and make plans for the shop, but somehow in those plans, Kerry never used the words “we” or “us.” It was always “you” and “your brothers,” creating a clear distance and a space for her to make her exit. He guessed he should be grateful for that, but his heart couldn’t let him be.
“I can’t believe you beat me downstairs this morning,” Kerry said, coming out of the shop and sitting beside him. Her smile came soft and open, her eyes sparkling, and his heart thumped harder. Shit. How was it her smile always did that to him? It was brighter than the freaking sun that was rising over the East Side tenements. “You could have slept more,” she said. “You didn’t sleep so well last night.”
He frowned. She was referring to the nightmare he’d had last night. He’d thought he was done with them, but obviously he wasn’t. This was the second time he’d embarrassingly woken with a start, shaky and sweaty. Even worse, he’d woken Kerry up too, and she’d seen his state.
He knew why, of course, but admitting it sucked so hard. It was because she’d leave him soon, and he hated it, but better to let her go sooner rather than later. It would end up the same anyway. Why draw out the pain? And the dream, it was the same as his old one of years ago. Him coming back into that room and his mother, always his mother, walking out. And away from him forever. Too bad the reality was so very different. A walkout could somehow be better. It wouldn’t hurt so much if she’d left him under her own power, by her own choice. But that wasn’t how it was. No, his mother hadn’t walked out but checked out, the drugs finally taking her and her warm-as-sunshine smile away from him in an overdose when he was six.
She’d always told him she loved him, more than anything, she said. But still, it wasn’t more than that. He knew he was wrong. Mama Joy taught him he was wrong. That she had no choice and she did love him, but that kid, he still didn’t know.
Kerry smiled again, and it didn’t fail to both mend and shatter his heart all at the same time. He felt guilty for the way he’d handled things last night. Owed her an apology. She’d tried to soothe him. Tried to get him to talk, but he shut down. Told her it was nothing, and when he’d seen the look of hurt in her eyes, had soothed her in the only way he knew how without words, but was that enough?
It was for him. Almost. The way she’d tightly wrapped her legs around him. Her hands had threaded through his hair, her eyes searching his for answers. And he’d almost given them. Almost given in. He had been so close. So close to an “I love you,” but it had been stuck. Stuck in her searching eyes and his cowardly throat as instead he’d only kissed her and taken, and, as usual, she’d given.
Jesse opened his mouth to say something just as Noah walked up, saving him. Seeing his brother reminded him of another goodbye soon to come. He’d be leaving for his tour and had been staying at home the past few nights, having given up his sublet in Brooklyn. “You two were awfully quiet last night,” Noah teased. “Don’t go turning into old married folks on me, now.”
Jesse looked at Kerry. “Don’t worry. No chance in that,” he said.
Noah shot him a look. “What are you talking about? Don’t eff it up, little brother. There are plenty who would like to make an old married one out of this one. Kerry is lucky I’m about to go on the road.”
“Yeah, right,” Kerry said. “The whole lot of you are nothing but big teases.” Kerry looked up the block in time to see Lucas. “And here comes another one.”
Lucas smiled at her and took her into a hug, kissing her cheek. Tease for sure. He gave Noah a dab and only nodded Jesse’s way, which was fine by him. Jesse didn’t want to hear another one of his speeches or get another judgmental look, which was all he’d been getting since the day he and Kerry had been found out. It was as if Lucas really thought she was their Kerry, as he said.
Screw that.
Like Kerry had made perfectly clear to him, she belonged to no one, and just like he had to figure it out, his brother had to also.
Damian came walking up the block carrying balloons, looking like that Shadow dude from American Gods mixed with that deadly damned It clown.
“Thanks, but it’s not my birthday?” Jesse said.
Damian rolled his eyes. “What’s a grand opening without balloons? We have to let people know in any way possible that we’re here, right? Might as well shout it out. Can’t let you jerks say I’m not doing my part.”
Kerry took the balloons with a smile and a nudge to his side. “And who would dare say that? Thanks, Damian. I think they’re lovely. We should put them on the edge of the bench and in front of the door.”
As they tied the balloons, Jesse looked at her in her pretty skirt and multicolor knit tank, her brown skin glowing with a soft shimmer.
“Now come on in. I made pancakes. Hopefully we’ll be crazy busy today so let’s eat while we can,” Kerry said.
And she was right. They were busy, with folks lining up to come in even before they were officially open. Starting with the Old Knitting Gang, who showed up and brought with them not only potluck for the party, including Ms. June’s carrot cake, but thankfully, some extra folks from the neighborhood, including a few elderly men who may have had less of an interest in knitting than in some twisted hookup. But they also had nimble fingers and deep pockets, so Jesse was grateful to have them.
Strong Knits reopened to brisk business. Jesse put his looming fear aside as he and his brothers posed for photos with the well-wishers from the neighborhood, Lucas telling the OKG jokingly that the photos were free, but it would be a five-dollar charge for each muscle feel-up.
Suddenly there was Ms. Cherry, though, silencing the increasing raucous
group. “I’ll do you one better, Lucas Strong,” she said. “How about one thousand dollars for a hug?”
Lucas was momentarily dumbfounded, his eyes going wide as he looked at a straight-faced Ms. Cherry, who only shot him back a raised brow.
“You’re not outdoing me, Cherry,” Mrs. Hamilton jumped in, yelling. “I got a grand on sweet Noah here.” She put her arms out to Noah, who gladly slid forward. “Come here, baby, and don’t worry, I’ll slip you a little something extra for your trip,” she added when she gave his bicep an extra squeeze.
“Stop being cheap now and bring out the big bucks and the big guns,” Ms. June said then and cocked a finger at Damian, who dropped his fork down on his plate midchew. He shrugged, putting his plate aside and coming over to give the woman a huge bear hug.
Jesse shook his head. “We can’t take this kind of money from you. It’s too much.”
“You can and then some,” Sister Purnell said, reaching into her bra, because of course her cross-body floral purse wouldn’t do in this case, and pulling out a wad of bills. She stuffed the bills into Jesse’s hand.
“Why can’t you?” Mrs. Hamilton said. “Don’t block our blessing by trying to refuse, Jesse.”
“That’s right,” Ms. Cherry chimed in. “Blocking is not an option in this case, and if you have a problem with it, then consider it our club rental fee or call us silent angel investors.” She blinked quickly, and suddenly the lump in Jesse’s throat was too large to ignore. “Joy was like a sister to us,” she said. “And that means you boys are family, and we take care of family.”
Jesse swallowed at the memory of Mama Joy laughing and sharing with these women over the years as he sailed in and out of the shop with a quick quip and hardly a backward glance. What he wouldn’t give now to be able to go back to just one of those days. To take time to stop and sit and knit with them. To see his mama happy and smiling with her friends once more. He didn’t deserve this, like he didn’t deserve her. But then he blinked and there was Kerry. She was smiling and looked happy. That smile, these women, this money. It was hope. Could this actually be working out? God, he was scared to think so.
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