“But you can be more than just his legacy,” I murmur, pulling his head into my chest like he does to mine. “And the funny thing about family legacies is that they can always be rewritten. Did you know that?”
“I never thought about it.”
That crack in his brain sneaks back open just enough for me to ease back through it.
“Apparently there’s a lot you never thought about before I became your best friend, but that’s okay,” I whisper. “I wouldn’t be a good friend if I didn’t challenge you to see yourself and the world differently.”
“Which teacher told you that?”
I sputter out a giggle. “My third-grade teacher, Mrs. Johnson.”
“You and those damn teachers at those fancy schools.”
I giggle harder while the fireworks Aunt Faye had me dig out of our garage light up the sky and shake his truck. I reach up and rake my fingers through his hair, following the calm pattern of his waves. I nudge his head back, savoring this freedom I have when his brain is open, and he’s ready to accept whatever I give him during my short time inside it.
“Can I tell you another secret?” I ask, pushing my nose against his and stealing a soft kiss from his moist lips.
His pupils grow into dark disks that make my breathing shallow, and I think he unlocked a part of my brain too. It’s the part AJ always pounded on but could never get into.
His eyes veer toward my right hand that’s balled into a fist on his shoulder. “You balling your fist up, baby?”
I smirk. “Maybe…yes.”
“Well, what you waiting for? You supposed to just hit me with it. Tell me your secret. You know I don’t judge.”
I laugh as a gaggle of butterflies flutter around in my stomach, tickling all the emotions that oozed out while we made love.
“Do you know I’ve been on hundreds of planes and tosomany states I’ve lost count…but it doesn’t feel like it. It feels like I’ve been nowhere at all. What do you think about that, stupid man?”
“I think…that’s sad,” he whispers. “Thinking about you being in those places all alone, far away from me and not enjoying any of them because of some stupid man makes me sick to my stomach. I want you to be happy anywhere you are in this world.”
I drop my chin on top of his head and snort out a low laugh. “Congratulations, Mr. Lovelace. I think you’ve finally mastered empathy.”
His silky laugh fills the truck. “What about New York? How you felt living there without me?”
I bury my nose in his hair, inhaling that rosemary scent with a smile. “Sad…lonely. It felt like being on an island in the middle of the ocean while ships full of people passed by, living their best lives while I lived my worst one. I needed you, Rich. I needed yousomuch.”
He sucks in a breath, digging his fingers into my skin and squeezing me tighter.
“He watched my every move through the security cameras, the concierge, the cleaner, the chef. I couldn’t go anywhere without telling him why I needed to go and for how long. He wanted to pay a driver to chauffeur me around and I fought so hard against it until he gave up. Then, after a while, maintenance days were my only days outside—the nail salon, the hair salon, and the spa. That was it. Those were my default locations, and he knew how long I stayed at each place. If I was just a minute late walking through the door, I had better have a damn good excuse. I had to constantly share my location because he swore I’d meet some other man…or woman…or thing that would take me away from him. And I coddled his insecurities. Pathetic, huh?”
“Nah…you were doing what you had to do to survive. Keep goin. I’m listening.”
I take another whiff of his hair, smiling to myself. “I realized that even though he was tracking my location, he could never tell how I got to and from the places I went, so I walked and took the subway everywhere because I learned that nothing in New York is predictable except people’s commutes. The sidewalks and the subway were the only places in the city where I could see the same people over and over again at the same time, Monday through Friday.”
“Why’d you wanna see the same folks?”
“I don’t know. There was something comforting about seeing the same bleach-bottled blonde run down into the subway entrance on our street and seeing the same Dominican girl sipping her Starbucks in front of the doors on the M train.” I snort. “I accidentally spilled her coffee on her one morning, and then she became the closest thing I had to a friend there. Her name was Yesenia. It took five sneaky train rides for her to ask me about the black eye I kept hiding under my makeup.”
“Hm. So Yesenia saw you too?”
“Mhmm, but not like you do. She saw me in a way that only other women like us can see each other.”
He hums back as if he understands exactly what I mean, and there’s a part of me that’s convinced he just might.
I don’t know what I love more—feeling him pulsating inside of me or the space we always find ourselves in where we settle into a natural flow and vomit all the sad stories that make up our lives without cringing at how ugly they are.
He pulls me closer to him while the bright red and green fireworks light up the park.
