“No,” she admitted. “I’m… scared. I talk too much shit about kids to end up pregnant on accident.”
Fee started laughin’. “Oh, this karma.”
“Shut up,” Charlee said, but she was laughin’, too. Then her face got serious again. “If I am… that’s gon’ change everything.”
We all fell quiet, lettin’ her sit in that.
I watched her face.
Loud-mouth, wild, reckless Charlee looked… small for a second.
And in that moment, lookin’ at my friends, one belly big and scared and excited, one glowy and half-stressed about weddin’ vows, one maybe pregnant and shakin’ under all that toughness, I felt somethin’ shift in me.
Life was movin’ us whether we was ready or not.
Fee was about to be somebody mama.
April was about to be somebody wife.
Charlee might be both before the year was out.
And me?
I was still sittin’ here swearin’ up and down that me and Roman was “nothin’,” while he moved like he’d already decided I was everything.
“You quiet,” Fee said finally, lookin’ at me. “What you thinkin’ about?”
I stared at my shrimp and grits for a second, then at them.
“Honestly?” I said. “I’m thinkin’ I might be the last holdout.”
Charlee snorted. “Girl, please. You the first one deep. The rest of us just catchin’ up.”
“I’m not deep,” I argued, but it sounded weak even to me.
They all laughed.
“Okay,” April said, smilin’ soft. “So when you leavin’ here, you goin’ home or to Roman’s?”
I opened my mouth.
Closed it.
“…Home,” I said.
Fee tilted her head. “He got a key?”
I hesitated.
“…He know the gate code,” I whispered.
“Aht,” Charlee said, pointin’ at me with her fork. “Exactly. Y’all not a thing, but he get past security.”
“Shut up,” I said, but a laugh slipped out anyway.
They laughed with me, but underneath that, there was somethin’ else sittin’ in my chest.
Fear, yeah.
