He raises his hands up in defense. “Okay, okay, but Lucy really is asking for you.” He slides his hands into his front pockets. “Think she might like you more than me.”
Jahlani lets out a soft laugh. “Well,” she says, sighing dramatically. “I do tend to have that effect on people.”
He smiles, and even though he’s at least six feet away from her, her body lights up as if he’s right next to her. His thumb on her mouth,got it, his front pressed against her.
“I can’t,” she says, exhaling shakily. “I have plans.”
His eyebrows draw in, and she realizes how that sounds. She feels the sudden urge to reassure him thatno, she’s not going to get railed by some guy,so she quickly amends her statement.
“With my mom,” she says, feeling her chest flutter when the dark look passes from his face. She feels pleased and then wants to scold herself for doing so. “Rain check?”
His smile is small and doesn’t quite meet his eyes. “Sure.”
She sends him a small wave, slipping into her car and peeling out of the lot, trying—and failing—not to watch his figure disappear in the mirror.
Jahlani hears the faint sound of laughter from the kitchen as she slips her shoes off and sets them on the rack. She sets the incense that’s slid off the holder back into position, swiping the ashes into her palm to dump them out. Another bout of laughter is heard, and she swings around the corner into the kitchen to find her mother perched at the table with an older man. The house reeks of weed, and her eyes bounce between her mom’s glazed eyes and the guy’s beady gaze as she opens the trash can.
“Mom, I thought we were having dinner tonight.”
“We are,” her mom says a little too loudly. “But Dick will be joining us.”
Dick stands. “Richard, but everyone calls me Dick.”
His hand is dry and cracking as he extends it, but Jahlani shakes it, giving a tight smile.
“Yeah, she’s real pretty, Yolanda,” he says, moving to the fridge to grab a beer. “Just like you said. She takes after her mother.” He gives her mom a wink.
Jahlani watches as her mom breaks out in a fit of hysterics, a new wave of realization washing over her as she takes them in because it’s high school all over again.
“I only have enough food for the two of us,” Jahlani bites out, pressing her hands to the counter.
Her mom waves a hand, kissing her teeth. “It’s fine, just share it out for you and Dick.”
Jahlani works her tongue into her cheek as she watches Dick move to sit opposite from her mom. Her eyes narrow as he lights his joint, smoke filling the air.
Her mom coughs, waving her hand in her face. “You know I don’t like it when you do that,” she says, in a small voice.
Jahlani purses her lips, shaking her head at howdocileher mother sounds. How weak.
Her mother is not weak.
She watches with tense shoulders as Dick does it again, this time intentionally exhaling in her direction, a glint in his eyes.
“She said she doesn’t like that,Dick,” Jahlani says, sending him a pointed look, her skin flushing.
Her mom’s wide eyes snap to hers and she sees something shimmer in them that she can’t quite place.
“Jahlani, baby … it’s okay?—”
She shakes her head, suppressing the urge to scream back at her thatnone of this is fucking okay. Not the way she treats Jahlani, not the way she gets treated by men, and most of all, the way she treats herself.
Jahlani inhales deeply, clearing her throat. “You know what? It’s fine. You two can have it. I have plans with a friend anyway.”
Jahlani is catastrophically terrible with directions, with reading maps, with finding landmarks. So, it’s concerning how easily she gets to his place. It’s useless, really. She’d be better off memorizing a route to the emergency room. Not the house of Roman Hayes.
Straight on the expressway for eight miles, left on Galen Way, past the dog park, and the first right on Leeland Street. She maneuvers the car into park, stepping out with the bag of food, smoothing down her hair. She doesn’t get to knock because the door swings open, and he’s there.
Hair dripping with remnants of soap, a faded tour shirt, and gray-washed shorts that move with him as he braces an arm against the doorway, blinking down at her.
