“That’s not in the now,” he pointed out.
“It isn’t, you’re right,” I replied. “But it’s still true.”
We stood there, staring at each other.
Two sinners.
He’d been redeemed.
But I was so destroyed by the experience, I needed to be reborn.
“Be happy,” Darius whispered.
“I’m trying.”
“And I’m glad.”
With that, as was his way, Darius ended it without another word, moving to the door to the inner sanctum.
He stopped at it and turned my way in order to give me another word.
“Wished I’d killed him myself, what he did to you.”
I shook my head. “Don’t matter, son. Bottom line, he’s dead and it’s good it wasn’t at your hand.”
“I still wished it was.”
I got that.
I felt that.
Sometimes, in my darker hours, I thought the same thing.
So I nodded.
My nephew didn’t nod back.
He punched in the code to buzz open the door and he walked through.
I stood there watching as the door closed him from sight.
My worst mistake.
Shit.
It was time to go shopping.
I sat, booted up my computer and virtually went to my happy place.
In other words, I hit Nordstrom.
“Okay, lay it on me. What’s on your mind?”
It was that evening and we were having a phone conversation, me and Moses.
The boys were at the NI offices, not pulling a shift but working out with Mace in the down room. They’d be home soon and they’d be hungry, which was why I had the hamburger patties already formed, the deep fat fryer out ready to be plugged in to prep for the crinkle cuts, and the tomatoes sliced, the lettuce leaves cleaned, in hopes they’d get some vegetables by dressing their hamburgers with them.
And I was hiding in my bedroom because Moses had called, and when the boys had caught him checking me out at the grocery store, they hadn’t liked that much.
They also both gave the roses dirty looks, but I just pretended I bought them myself.
So now I was worried about them coming home to catch me on the phone with him, putting the one of the roses together with the one of me hiding in my room talking on the phone and getting Moses.
But this was only part of the heavy weighing on my mind.
Heavy it was weird that through the miracle of wireless communication, Moses had caught.
“I’m not sure I want to talk about it,” I told Moses.
“This is the beauty of the early dating phone conversation. You can talk to me pretending I’m one of your girls.”
He seemed sage about this beginning-to-date shit.
But even I hadn’t been out of the game long enough to know that was seriously not right.
“My man, ain’t no way I can pretend you’re one of my girls.”
“I know. But I had to give it a shot because I wanna know what’s on your mind.”
You had to hand it to the brother, he didn’t beat around the bush.
“My nephew Darius and me had a convo this morning, and it just . . . it . . .” I couldn’t finish because I didn’t know what to say.
“It just what, sweetheart?” he pressed gently.
“We never talked about some things we probably should have talked about a long time ago.”
“And you talked about those things this morning?”
“As much as Darius would let me,” I shared. “He isn’t a big get-your-feelings-out-there-and-process kind of brother.”
“Just in case you haven’t figured this out yet, there aren’t many brothers who are that kind of brother,” Moses pointed out.
I knew that was the truth.
“Though I got no problem with that shit,” he added.
Fantastic.
“I know you aren’t cool with it, but did he seem cool with it when you got done talking?” he asked.
“We both got regrets.”
“Everyone has regrets.”
I heard that.
It was just that some were more extreme.
“We both got guilt.”
“Shirleen—”
I cut him off. “I know you’re gonna say be in the now, but that’s my boy and I fucked him up. He was Roam and Sniff’s age when it happened and now I got a second chance, and what if I fuck that up?”
“You and your nephew are both on the righteous path and those two boys you got under your roof, Shirleen, you know if their path was going to be different, they would have gone down it by now and they’d be in a different place. Not manning the control room at Nightingale Investigations or goin’ grocery shoppin’ with their momma. They’d be dealers, rent boys or dead.”
I had nothing to say to that, mostly because it was true.
And it gave me the shivers just to think about it.
Moses, however, still had shit to say.
“You say you fucked one up, but he’s still standing and he made it to the other side, and he did that with you. But straight up, you saved two so I think your record’s pretty fuckin’ good, baby. Think on that.”
I would.
I’d think on that.
Because I liked the way he saw it and I hadn’t seen it that way.
“They don’t know about you yet,” I blurted.
The smile came through when he replied, “I didn’t figure you shared about your ambush date over Cream of Wheat this morning.”
He could give it straight, I needed to do that too.
“I’m not sure they’re gonna be super hip on you.”
“They’ve had you to themselves for a while, Shirleen. But neither of those two struck me as momma’s boys, and they might be protective in the beginning, but if this works, I’ll win them over in the end.”
“I don’t think I’m gonna say anything for, you know . . . a little while. Just, you know . . . to see. No reason for any drama if there’s, uh . . . eventually no reason for that drama.”
“I’m doing the same thing.”
I nodded. “Wise.”
“When the time comes, though, the girls are gonna love you.”
I was not thinking about this.
This was not in my now.
I had enough scary shit in my now. I didn’t need to add to it.
“Mm-hmm,” I mumbled.
He chuckled.
“I like your laugh,” I whispered.
“I like yours too, sweetheart,” he whispered back. “Need to get you to a place where I hear it more often.”
“I laugh a lot.”
“Not around me.”
“That’s because you’re scary as hell.”
“That’s the place we gotta get you around to get you to the right place.”
I tipped my head to the side. “You got this shit down, how many women have you dated since your divorce?”
“I didn’t keep track.”
“Is that another way of saying you lost count?”
He chuckled again, but did it as he said, “No.”
“This is not an answer to my question, Moses.”
“I haven’t been celibate, but I’m not a player. Promise that, Shirleen. That answer work for you?”
“I ’spose,” I mumbled.
“No offense, just getting it out there, but you haven’t hidden you’re out of practice.”
Fabulous.
He kept going, “So we’ll take this at your pace, baby. Just as long as we’re moving forward for as long as that works for both of us, I don’t care how slow we go.”
“You know the scariest part about you, Moses?” I asked.
“Hit me with it, Shirleen.”
“You seem too good to be true.”
There was a weighty pause before, “I’m human. I’m gonna fuck up. Tick you off. Annoy the hell out of you. I’m not givin’ you the good stuff and hidin’ the bad to
get in there. This, where this is at right now, I’m takin’ as indication that we got something good to work with. Normally, the red flags fly right off. That said, there’ll come a day when you won’t feel that. I just hope that day you still feel this foundation we’re building and wanna use it to work whatever it is through.”
“I can be . . . a bit much too,” I admitted.
Another smile in his voice. “Yeah, and how’s that?”
“I can be . . . stubborn.”
That didn’t get me a chuckle. He out and out laughed.
“You find that funny?” I asked.
“Baby, you refused to call me, but wanted to, so your boss set us up on a date. But I got the stubborn thing even before that happened.”
Well then.
“I sometimes talk about myself in the third person.”
Moses was silent.
“It’s my thing,” I went on.
“And?” he asked after I shut up.
“Some people find that weird.”
“So?”
I grinned. “Shirleen’s happy you don’t find that weird.”
He started laughing again.
My phone sounded in my hand telling me I had another call just as I heard shouted by Sniff, “Shirleen, we’re home!”
See?
Told you that’s how it went down.
“I’m plugging in the deep fat fryer!” he continued.
And see?
Told you they’d come home hungry.
I took the phone away from my ear, saw it said Daisy calling, ignored it and put the phone back to my ear saying, “Hold on a sec.”
Then I took it from my ear again.
“I’ll be out in a minute!” I shouted.
“Awesome!” Sniff shouted back.
I put the phone to my ear again. “The boys are home.”
“That was my guess.”
I smiled again.
Then I frowned.
“Means I should let you go,” I said. “They were working out with Mace. I gotta get the burgers goin’.”
“Then I’ll let you go, baby. And I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Okay, Moses.”
“Do you want me to fire up the grill?” Roam yelled.
I put my hand over the phone and yelled back. “If you wanna grill, won’t stop you! But I was gonna fry!”
“Grill!” Sniff bellowed.
“I’ll fire it up!” Roam shouted.
“Great!” I yelled.
I took my hand off the phone and heard Moses chuckling again.
“Sorry, that was rude,” I mumbled.
“Yep, ain’t nothin’ foster about that, sweetheart. Sounds just like a family to me. Now I’m lettin’ you go. See you tomorrow at my place. Six.”
“Okay, Moses, see you then.”
“’Bye, baby.”
“’Bye, uh . . . Moses.”
He disconnected mid-chuckle again.
I took my phone from my ear and engaged texts.
I then texted Daisy, Rock Chick freeze out still in operation. I’ll tell you about the date and the movie we’re watching tomorrow night LATER.
That’d get her. Her big-haired head would explode knowing we already had a second date planned before she knew one thing about the first.
I got up from my bed and padded in my dress from the office that day but with my slippers on my feet to the door. I opened it, went through and walked down the hall toward the open-plan kitchen that was in the middle of the great room.
During this walk my phone sounded with a text.
Daisy.
You know it don’t work that way, sugar.
An extra freeze out day for every text, I replied.
Those three dots that said she was typing didn’t even form.
Daisy Sloane knew when I meant business.
Spread the word to the Chicklets, I ordered.
I sent that off and hit the kitchen to see Sniff shoving Doritos in his face.
“Shouldn’t you be eating a banana?” I asked.
“Maybe,” he answered.
I put a hand on my hip. “You missed this, but every time I say that, that’s my way of saying put the junk down and eat a banana.”
He grinned at me, teeth filled with Dorito goo, which he knew worked my last nerve.
Then he kept eating Doritos.
I could have no idea if this was universal teenage boy or his last hold on rebelling against authority.
My boys were good boys. Even in the beginning, they did what they were told. That had never been a battle.
Of course, at the time, Sniff was with me first since Roam was in the hospital recovering from a gunshot wound. Then Roam was home, with me all over his ass to make sure he recovered from that gunshot wound. And then, I figured, they were so happy to have three squares, a roof over their head, and their precious Jules still alive, they didn’t bust my chops, but instead followed my rules and did as told.
Roam didn’t openly rebel. Roam was more man than most grown men I’d known by the time I got him at fifteen. Definitely now. He did his chores with no backtalk, and now he did them without me even asking. Ditto with his schoolwork. He didn’t mouth off. And he was smart enough not to let me catch him eating Doritos when he knew I’d want him to eat a banana.
Sniff mostly did the same.
Except in times like this.
I’d always wondered about times like this.
But I’d never asked.
Now, I asked.
“Are you just bein’ a teenage boy or are you rebelling against authority?”
“Isn’t that one and the same?” he asked back.
I added one more choice. “Or is it that you’re just a smartass?”
“That last one,” Roam answered for Sniff, coming in from outside where he’d been firing up the grill.
He already had the spatula in his hand even if no meat was over the heat.
My boy was on a mission.
I stared at him as he sauntered into the kitchen, all long legs, loose hips, eighteen and entirely in control of his own body.
And so handsome.
Lord.
He was beautiful.
I looked at Sniff.
He’d put away the Doritos but now his hand was on the side of the deep fryer, checking the temperature even though the light went off to tell us when it was ready and that light was still on.
He got all As.
Didn’t even try. Studied, but didn’t like it much so did the least he could.
I wondered what he’d do if he’d try.
I wondered if he’d be a doctor or an engineer or an architect.
But I knew in my bones, whatever he wanted, he’d be able to do it.
Roam got As too, but some Bs. He was a reader. He got math and science stuff that was way beyond me.
But he had no patience for writing. English Comp irritated the hell out of him. And if he had a report to write, Lordy. Watch out. That put my boy in a mood.
But they were so much more than good-looking.
So much more than sharp.
Smart.
They were funny.
They were loyal.
They were mine.
Right then, in my kitchen, it was not the first time I wondered about their parents, even if I knew the greatest penance they could endure was never knowing the men they’d made.
Never knowing how beautiful those two boys turned out.
Never knowing the goodness they put on this earth.
And worst of all, not caring.
But that was what I was thinking right then in my kitchen.
Somehow, some way, I got the chance to know all that.
Feed it.
Nurture it.
Hold it in my heart.
“Sniff,” I whispered.
“Yeah, Shirleen,” he answered the deep fat fryer.
“I love you, boy.”
His body shot straight and turned to me.
I felt the
air in the room go electric.
I also felt Roam’s attention hone in on me.
So I looked to him.
Right in the eye.
“I love you too, Roam. You’re the best thing to ever happen to me. In my entire life.” I included Sniff in my look. “Both you boys. Blessings. I can count my blessings on two fingers. But they’re the best ones I coulda ever got.”
“You okay, Shirleen?” Roam asked quietly.
“You’re in my kitchen, son, and so’s your brother. So yeah. I’m the best I’ve ever been,” I replied.
Sniff looked to Roam.
Roam didn’t take his eyes off me.
Sniff stopped looking at Roam and moved my way, muttering, “Gonna hit the shower real quick before dinner.”
But as he was about to walk by me, he leaned in and down and kissed my cheek.
Then he hit the stairs to the basement where both the boys had their big TV room and bedrooms.
Roam just went to the fridge, got the platter of burger patties, closed the fridge and walked right by me to the doors to the outside.
He stopped inside them after he’d opened one.
And he turned to me.
“You know we love you too, yeah?” he asked.
I clenched my teeth together real hard and nodded.
“Yeah,” he said and walked out the door, sliding it closed behind him.
I watched through the windows as he moved to the grill, plate of burgers in one hand, grill spatula in the other.
I wasn’t sure I’d saved them.
Jules was on a mission to do that before I came into the picture.
But I had a hand in that.
A good strong hand.
God gave me that shot.
So maybe He hadn’t given up on me.
Maybe He believed in me enough to give me a second chance.
And then, when I refused to let Him down . . .
Upon me He bestowed His blessings.
Wonders
Shirleen
THE NEXT NIGHT, as the Uber came to a stop at the curb in front of the walk up to Moses’s front door, I checked out his place.
Newish build. Three stories. Attached on both sides to other units. Since we drove by the alley that ran behind his place, I knew the bottom floor was the garage, so the top two floors had to be the living area. The trees around the development had not filled in yet.
Still, it was nice. Neat. Attractive.
And Moses had some big pots on his front porch, already filled with flowers.
I started up the walk as the Uber driver took off and Moses’s front door opened.
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