“She’s the same…but kinda different,” he muttered when I shuffled past. “I know you said to stay out of it, but you think weoughta call AJ? I’d hate for him to think he can’t talk to us just because she might be mad at him or something.”
A car door slams in the distance and Aunt Faye huffs while jingling her keys. “Get!”
I glance out of the corner of my eye at a stray dog trotting off with a downtrodden expression.
Rich lives ten blocks away from us in the Bottoms of Bayou Crest where Joliet Street intersects with Pine Lane—right behind Lockwood where the bayou splits the neighborhood in half. It’s where Uncle Kenny hangs out when he doesn’t want to come home on Friday nights and where Mama and Aunt Faye lived with Grandma before she died. Growing up, I only ever came this way when Terrica or Meechie were fucking a boy they weren’t supposed to or when Aunt Faye wanted to stop at Lucky’s for gas.
I shield my eyes from the bright morning sun and squint at the two metal folding chairs on Rich’s porch.
His house is the only house Aunt Faye has ever cleaned in the Bottoms. She always said she’d never clean houses over here.
I side-eye her pulling her caddy from her trunk, then glance over at the driveway. It’s white and perfect, like somebody just laid the concrete. The smell of freshly cut grass tickles my nose while I look at the little manicured bushes that line the front of the house.
“I tried calling your phone when I left to pick up breakfast. It kept going to voicemail,” Aunt Faye says, marching past me.
It sounded like something she’d been holding in since she tossed the Shipley’s bag on my bed as soon as I opened my eyes this morning.
“Oh yeah. I got a new phone. I’ll text you my new number so you can save it.”
“A new one, huh?”
“Yeah. My old phone was…was giving me problems.”
“Problems so bad you had to get a new number too?”
“It was just easier that way.”
“Is that so? Never heard of anything like that before.”
“Yeah, well, you’re the same person who called every cellphone an ‘iPhone’ up until a year ago. I even had to teach you how to send voice messages.”
“I’m also the same person who can pop you in your smart mouth if I need to.”
My shoulders tense as I wait for her to pry more or for AJ to pop out of Rich’s bushes and barrel toward me for thinking I can fly to another state and go into another man’s house without him knowing.
I gulp while Aunt Faye jingles her keys again.
“I’m gonna let you in. Call if you need something. I shouldn’t be long in Manvel. You know how I am about consults—either you need a deep or partial cleaning. Ain’t nothing difficult about deciding that,” she rambles before whipping around and staring at me. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah. I’m…I’m okay.”
“Okay,” she mutters, looking me up and down. “Well, let’s get you inside.”
I follow her up the porch steps where she pushes her key into the lock on the freshly painted front door. I hold my breath because this Rich dude isreallya dude—a single one I presume.
“Ignore the craziness inside. He’s renovating.” She nudges the door, and it lets out a squeal, then settles against the doorstop.
“Is this some new thing you’re starting?” I ask.
“What you talking about?”
“Getting so involved in Uncle Kenny’s projects that you’re cleaning up after them?”
She drops her caddy inside and looks at me over her shoulder. “Rich pays me.”
“In U.S. dollars?”
“Don’t be a smartass.” She huffs, rolling her eyes. “If Rich wants me to clean his house sometimes to help ease his load, then so be it. He’s a paying customer and you need to treat him as such.”
