“Hey, Ms. Frankie,” I called, returning her grin. “What you got in the bag?”
Ms. Frankie had been a friend of my grandmother’s and had known me since I was a young boy. One day, when I first returned to work after Teagan’s funeral, she stayed after tai chi class and prayed for me. She said she felt the familiarity of the pain rolling off me. She was a widow, just like I was widower. She called herself adopting me after that talk. She prayed for me, brought me food when she made extra (which she did on purpose, just to have something to bring me for lunch), sent me inspirational things she saw on social media, and she didn’t try to matchmake, which was one of the things I appreciated most about her. She even supported Braveheart Brotherhood when we did community events.
She hugged me with one arm and held out the bag with the other. “Hey, baby. You know I brought you some of last night’s dinner. I’m trying something new. I think it’s called controlling your portion or something.”
“Portion control, Frankie,” Ms. Irma corrected. “You doing portion control.”
“Yeah, that’s it. I can’t have but one spoonful of food.”
I laughed because Ms. Frankie stayed exaggerating. “Only one spoonful, Ms. Frankie?”
She rolled her eyes. “That’s how it feels. I eat the little bit my doctor says I can have, and I’m still hungry. So, I eat another plate ofportion control. I told her little young tail that she might as well let me have one regular sized portion, because all I’mma do is eat two or three portion-controlled helpings. Which one is better for me?”
“You have a point,” I told her.
She waved her hand. “But little Miss Know-It-All keeps insisting that I eat those itty-bitty portions. Anyway, I felt like cooking last night.” She gestured toward the bag. “That’s some short ribs I made in the oven. I had a taste for cheese grits, cabbage, and cornbread.”
“Come through, Ms. Frankie,” I mumbled, taking the bag.
“My friend, Mr. Rufus, comes by to fix things in my house. He had dinner with me last night. I told him he better not get into my grandson’s food.”
I smirked but kept my thoughts to myself.Fixed things around her house. Yeah, right. That nigga was probably her best eater.
She must’ve caught the look on my face, because she blushed. “You’d better make peace with finding you a little friend, grandson.” Her eyes raked over my body. “They say if you don’t use it, you lose it.”
I couldn’t stop myself from guffawing. “Stop giving me sex advice,” I said soft enough so only she could hear.
She laughed too.
After I left work, I made a quick stop at the home improvement store to pick up the things I knew I would need to get the guest bedroom painted. I made it through the door with my purchases, dropped them on the console table that sat in the foyer, then beelined to the bathroom for a much-needed piss. I had barely washed my hands before I heard the chime from my security alarm alerting me that someone had pulled onto the property.
I pulled out my phone and navigated to the app. There was Eastley climbing out of her truck with noticeable pep in her step. That caused me to smile. Eastley in a good mood was a beautiful thing. She didn’t deserve the state of despair she was living in.
I opened the front door as she bound up the stairs with a smile. “Hey.” She greeted me with a quick but tight hug when she made it to me.
“What’s up?” I noticed the scrubs she wore. “You just coming from work?”
Her smile brightened. “Yeah. I assisted one of the midwives on a birth. It was beautiful. Mom was the MVP of labor and delivery, and the baby wasplayer of the game.”
We both chuckled as I stepped to the side and let her enter the house. “You hungry?”
She shook her head. “Nah, the birthing center is in Londynville. I stopped and picked up something before I got on the highway. Ate it in the car. I’m just ready to get started with this painting. The quicker we get the room painted, the quicker I can move in.” Her smile was radiant.
I nodded my head. “Let’s do it.”
I grabbed the bag of stuff I picked up from the store off the console table and started down the hall. She followed me into the guest bedroom. My eyes immediately went to the area where the wall met the ceiling. There was absolutely no tape there. “I thought you said you taped? Unless you plan on painting the ceiling, you missed a spot,” I joked.
“I couldn’t reach up there, sir. All of us aren’t giants.”
I had to chuckle because I wasn’t all that tall. At six feet, two inches, I was just a little taller than average. But I was an entire foot taller than Eastley, since she was five feet, two inches. “And all of us aren’t munchkins, either. I’ll grab the ladder and tape that off.”
We worked together to arrange the plastic drop cloths over everything we wanted to protect.
I’d never been around Eastley like this—working with her, moving around her. I never noticed her like this. Like how thepants of her scrubs held the curve of both her ass and thighs. Like how she smelled fresh, like powder or soap or something.
I did what I could to compartmentalize all the . . . awareness I was experiencing. I was around women all the time. Saw them, smelled them, talked to them. I couldn’t pinpoint the effect that Eastley was having on me, but it was tripping me out.
“There’s a nail hole up there,” she told me, pointing, as I finished taping off the ceiling. “Can you fill it before we start?”
