“Girl, get up. Don’t you have a long-ass day today?”
Coffee groaned into the phone. “I cleared my schedule. Not feeling it today. It’s the luxury of having employees. They’ll survive without me.”
“Mmhm. Don’t even get me started on that boss talk. I just told Kairo this morning he doesn’t act like a boss. He makes all these sacrifices for work like he’s getting paid hourly.”
Coffee let out a breathy laugh. “I barely got any sleep.”
I frowned. “What’s wrong?”
She paused for a second. “I was just up last night… drinking wine… and I realized how quiet the house was. I’m about to be thirty-four, Khloe. I think I’m ready for kids.”
I was stunned. Coffee never talked like that without making a joke right after.
“You’re ready for kids?” I repeated, trying to make sure I heard her right.
“Yeah,” she said, voice barely above a whisper. “I think so. I mean, it’s complicated… the whole situation is. But I think I’m ready.”
I knew what she meant by “situation.” Her relationship wasn’t exactly picture-perfect and the fact that they had frozen embryos from a time when things were more aligned made it messy as hell now.
“Have you talked to him about it?”
“Not yet,” she said. “I will today. I’m just mentally preparing myself for whatever he says. They’re our embryos. No matter what the situation is, it shouldn’t be a big fuss.”
I didn’t know what to say. Coffee was always the rock. Unshakable. But she started to sound like me. Like someone waiting on the other person to show up in a partnership that had slowly stopped partnering.
“I don’t really know what to say, babe,” I admitted. “Just talk to him. See where his head is. Then… go from there.”
“That’s probably the only thing that makes sense right now.”
We were both quiet for a minute. Just breathing through our realities.
“Well, if you feel like getting on the road and driving,” I said, turning into the shopping mall parking lot, “I’m free today… and I’m sure Marquinton would love to see you if you come to town too.”
Coffee groaned dramatically. “Girl, please.”
Marquinton wasn’t just anybody. He’s one of Kairo’s best friends.. But more than that, he was Coffee’s high school sweetheart. We were inseparable back then—me and Kairo, her and Marquinton. The two popular couples in our senior class. We all won “Favorite Couples” in the yearbook, side by side on the same page. While Kairo and I stayed together, Coffee and Marquinton didn’t make it past college. He ended up marrying someone else and Coffee never really forgave him for that.
They divorced a couple years ago, and ever since then, every time Marquinton sees me, he never misses the opportunity to ask about Coffee.
“She was definitely the one that got away. How is she?” he always asked.
“She’s doing good,” I’d always reply, even if she wasn’t. He didn’t need to know the details. And Coffee always played it cool, but I knew a part of her still wonderedwhat if.
I smiled. “You already know that man would drop everything.”
“Yeah, and I already dropped him,” she shot back. “That sounds like a hard pass. He got left on read again last week for checking on me too much.”
I laughed, genuinely. “Girl, what?”
She sighed like I was the one being ridiculous. “He should be grateful I was even texting him again in the first place. But asking me if I’m fine every damn hour is aggravating. Like, damn, let me breathe and miss you a little bit. You didn’t care if I was fine when you married that hoe from law school that I couldn’t stand.”
Whewww. She wasn’t lying. We all hated that girl. Loud, smug, and constantly in competition with Coffee without even being in the same lane. Still…
“Didn’t you break up with him before all that though?” I teased.
She ignored me like she always did when I made a good point. “Are you ever going to let the past be the past?”
“No,” she said without hesitation. “Selective healing, baby. I pick what I get over.”
