“I don’t know who you were, sweetheart,” he continued. “But every day I see kids who someone doesn’t think will amount to much and even if that shit is not right, they’re convinced of it just because the asshole adults around them feel the need to share. And you know what?”
“What?” I whispered.
“In most cases, it’s got fuck all to do with the kid. It’s about the asshole adult feelin’ less, understanding their limits, and the kid’s got smarts or spirit or a big personality or a sweet disposition, and they gotta do what they gotta do to shut that down because they’re jealous as fuck and they know deep inside they’ll feel even smaller than they already are because that kid is gonna be something. So they not only gotta drag the kid down, they gotta smother the life out of them.”
Suddenly, I was breathing funny.
“Half the problems in Gilliam are kids with parents who don’t give that first fuck, or who are so messed up it’s a miracle they can get themselves out of bed in the morning, and some don’t even try,” he bit off. “The other half are kids with parents or adults in their lives who are determined to do one thing in their miserable lives and that’s finding a way to make damn sure that child doesn’t show them up by making something of themselves when they didn’t have what it took to do the same thing. You know that shit people say where a kid is just misunderstood?”
I nodded.
“Well in a lot of cases, that shit is right. It is very rare when a kid is just a bad seed. For the most part, someone planted that seed and put a lot of effort into forcing it to grow and in a kid, that ground is fertile. It’s so much easier to think bad of ourselves than it is to think good. And that shit blooms fast and out of control.”
“I had a good momma, Moses. A good family. Not a good daddy, but the rest? They didn’t deserve what I did to them.”
“If they made you feel less, Shirleen, then they got what they made. It’s the woman standing across from me right now that you made and that has nothing to do with them.”
“I love that you think that way but—”
“Fuck, baby!” he exploded, tossing both his arms wide and leaning toward me even as his outburst shocked me so much I leaned back. “Do you not think I see young Shirleens every day of my life? Do you not understand that I know more than maybe anybody how hard it is to pull yourself free of the shit you let yourself get bogged under and find your way clean? Do you not get how huge what you’ve done is?”
“He lives in me,” I said weakly.
“You let him,” he clipped.
“Everything you do, I compare to what he did.”
He leaned back and crossed his arms on his chest. “Well, shit, sweetheart. You’re human. You had a man who did you wrong and you found a man you like that you might want in your life, so you’re comparing the old with the new so you can make sure you don’t fuck up again. I’m not sure I can cope with you bein’ smart and lookin’ out for yourself so you don’t make the same mistake twice. Best get on calling Uber so you can take your sweet ass and your common sense home.”
At that speech, I couldn’t stop myself from cracking a smile.
His eyes narrowed. “You find something funny?”
“Well, uh . . . yeah.”
He uncrossed his arms and planted his hands on his hips before he rumbled warningly, “I’m not bein’ funny, baby.”
I decided to shut up again.
“In time, you will learn I’m not him,” he said low.
“Okay,” I whispered.
“Now I told you we’d go slow and you may have forgotten that, so I’ll remind you, Shirleen, this is at your pace. As long as we’re movin’ forward, I’m good. So next time I take shit too far, you don’t bolt out of my arms and hold up your hand to me like I’m causin’ you harm. You say, ‘Moses, honey, I need you to slow down,’ and that will happen. I swear it.”
My God.
I could fall in love with this man.
No.
Damn.
I was falling in love with him.
“Shirleen, you hear me?” he prompted when I said nothing.
“I hear you, honey.”
“And you are not fuckin’ Ubering home.”
I nodded.
“Your boys won’t be watchin’ for you, will they?”
I shook my head.
“Good,” he muttered.
“Are we done making out?” I asked.
“I don’t know, are we?” he asked back.
I pressed my lips together, tight.
“Get over here, woman,” he ordered.
My breath caught.
I’d heard one of the Hot Bunch demand that of one of his Rock Chick so many times, I’d be able to buy Roam and Sniff top of the line Mercedes if I had a dollar for every time I heard it.
And I always just shook my head, sometimes mentally, sometimes physically, thinking if I had a man who told me to walk my ass to him, I’d walk my ass the other way.
That man being Moses, I walked my ass right to him.
He wrapped his arms loose around me.
I placed my hands on his chest.
They felt good there.
Under my right one, I could feel his heart beating, strong and true.
“You gonna read me the riot act every time I freak out?” I asked.
“Only when the situation warrants it,” he answered.
Hmm.
“I’m gonna be some work,” I told him something he couldn’t have missed.
He confirmed my suspicion by saying, “I didn’t miss that.”
I slid a hand up and curled my fingers around the side of his neck.
His arms grew tighter.
“I don’t want you to think I didn’t love him. For some reason, that’s important to me. In my way, the girl I was, not yet a woman, I loved him,” I admitted.
“Okay, baby,” he whispered.
“Before I hated him,” I finished.
He nodded before he dipped his head, his cheekbone brushing against mine as he pulled me even closer to give me a hug.
A hug.
He held me to him in his living room like he intended to do that all night.
And I could stand there all night.
I could stand there for weeks, held in Moses Richardson’s arms.
Eventually, he asked, “You want ice cream?”
“Yeah.”
He lifted his head and looked in my eyes. “You wanna make out some more before, after or in the middle of ice cream?”
I shot him a grin. “All of the above.”
He grinned back.
When he dipped his head that time, it was to capture my mouth.
He kissed me soft before he slid his tongue inside.
I wrapped my arms around his neck and pressed against him.
He angled his head and took the kiss deep.
I cupped the back of his head with a hand to hold him right where he was.
It didn’t feel good being held to him like this, feeling his strength pressed against me, his tongue stroking mine leisurely, taking it slow, giving, sweet.
The wonders of all that had no words to describe them.
And I lost myself to whatever that was.
Since I was lost, happy where I was, in his embrace, connected to him, Moses gave me all I was willing to take.
He did scoop out some ice cream for us.
He just did it . . .
Later.
Choices
Shirleen
AFTERNOON THE NEXT day, I was sitting in my Navigator, staring at the high school, my phone in my hand, my heart in my throat.