He wipes his hands down the sides of his shorts and casually taps me above my bruise with two fingers. “Lemme show you. Stand up straight and poke your chest out.”
I thrust my shoulders back and push my chest forward because it’s impossible to defy Rich when he’s in “doctor mode” even if it feels like that bruised rib will pierce right through my flesh.
“C’mon, poke it out more. You tough.” He flattens his hand against my side and looks down at me through long lashes while I laugh.
“When you get home, I want you to get a pillow and put it right here,” he says, strumming his fingers against the bruise in featherlight strokes that make my limbs loose. “After that, you take deep breaths for as long as you can. Then whenever you feel you can do it, you take another deep breath and cough real, real hard—as hard as you can.”
I swallow, nodding.
“You ready to show me how you gonna do that?” he mutters, making my middle throb.
I nod again.
“A’ight. Show me. Take the biggest deep breath you can take for me.”
I inhale so hard that it feels like I might implode.
“Now cough.”
A loud hack shoots from the deepest depths of my chest and comes out in a nasty wet rattle that makes him lean in closer like he wants to study every strange noise that comes from my body.
“That’s how you keep the mucus out your lungs and keep away any infections since you can’t breathe deep like you need to. ‘Cause it hurts when you do that, right?”
“God, yes…”
It hurt so bad that I slept upright while AJ lay beside me engulfed in a sleep so deep that he gasped out the quietest snores throughout the night.
Sweat dots the top of my forehead from all the work I just did, and Rich’s eyes graze it. I see the moment where he decides he shouldn’t swipe it away even though I want him to. I want to feel the rough pads of his fingers on another part of my body again.
“You still breathing?” he murmurs, smirking.
I nod.
“Good. Congratulations on leaving, by the way.”
I try to focus on the painful deep breaths instead of the giggle that wants to come out because only Rich could make light of that crazy argument we had on Joliet.
“You did the right thing,” he adds as I let out an ugly snort through my nose that makes him press his palm harder into my body.
“You did anamazingjob of letting that nigga live to play another game of football…”
I gulp. “How do you know he plays football?”
“I found out the same way you found out what I am—people,” he murmurs. “People will tell you whatever you need to know as long as you just listen.”
I swallow the ball in my throat and lean closer into his hand.
“He a thrower or a catcher?” he asks.
“He’s a catcher. He…he catches.”
“Ohhh…a wide receiver, right?” he hums to himself.
“Who told you that?”
“I told you…people talk, but you ain’t listening, though. He any good?”
“People say he is.”
