“The fuck y’all doin’?”
I jump in my skin, heart lurching.
Celie’s towering over us, arms packed with two giant-ass brown paper bags.
I clutch my chest.
“Jesus, Celie.
“Make some fuckin’ noise next time.”
She raises a perfectly sculpted brow. “I did, you just ain’t hear me over the sound of your souls leaving your bodies.”
She eyes Diggs. “You good, Mick Jagger?”
Diggs is hunched forward,
hands tangled in his hair.
He peeks up at her, his face half-shadowed under his hood. “Nah.” He clears his throat and sits back. “She dragged me through the bloody mix and dumped my soul on the floor.”
He’s a wreck, insomnia wearing skin,
eyes bloodshot and raw,
shadows hanging heavy under them.
He hasn’t slept in weeks,
the cost for not walking away sooner.
That’s when it hits me:
Andrew will end up like him if I don’t cut him loose.
This is Andrew’s future.
A hard lump climbs into my throat.
I swallow, but it doesn’t go down right.
“We call that gettin’ Taylor’d, braddah.”
Ace laughs.
“Walks you right into the track.
“You don’t ever get used to it.”
I turn to Ace. “So thoughts?”
Ace rubs his hands together.
“Let’s cut it open, see what spills.”
Celie dumps the bags, knocking a notebook out of the way with her elbow. “While you nerds over here astral projecting, I brought empanadas.”
For the next hour, we eat, we talk.
