Chapter 26 KELLI VARRARI
Trill-Land, ’LoLux Estate
I sat out back with a cigarette burning slow between my fingers, just staring out at the garden like it had somethin’ to say back to me if I looked at it long enough.
The air felt different out here and was clean in a way I wasn’t used to, and the smell of the flowers mixed with the smoke in my lungs and the heat from the coffee in my hand had me sitting still longer than I usually would.
It had been a minute since I let myself just sit like this without thinking about what move I needed to make next or who I needed to deal with, and for the first time in a while, I ain’t feel like I was waiting on somethin’ to go wrong.
Trill-Land had a way of doing that though. It slowed shit down without making you soft, and I respected that. I ain’t come out here expecting to get comfortable, but somewhere along the way, that’s exactly what happened.
Kay’Lo, Pressure, Renza, all of ‘em… they took me in without making it feel like I owed ‘em somethin’ for it, and that wasn’t no small thing. I had people I shared blood with who ain’t never moved like that for me, so I knew what it meant when I saw it.
I took a pull from the cigarette and let the smoke out slow while my eyes stayed on the flowers, but my mind didn’t stay there for long and ended up right back where it always went when I let it… straight to Harlow.
My jaw tightened without me meaning to, and I reached for my coffee, taking a sip like that was gon’ push the thought back where it came from, but it didn’t.
It never did. Too much had happened for that shit to just fade out clean.
Too much time, too much history, and too much damage that ain’t have no chance to heal right.
My phone buzzed on the table beside me, and I already knew it was Harlow before I even looked, but I still glanced down at the screen and saw her name popping up again.
I stared at the screen while it rang, letting it sit there like I had been doing all mornin’, because this wasn’t the first time she’d called and it damn sure wasn’t the second.
She had been blowing my phone up like she forgot everything that happened, like she could just call enough times and I’d pick up and act like none of that shit mattered.
I ain’t answer the first call or the second one.
But now the third one sat there buzzing against the table, and I could feel somethin’ in my chest starting to shake in a way I didn’t like.
I exhaled slow and leaned back in the chair, running my thumb along the edge of my phone while it kept ringing, and for a second I told myself to let it go like I had been doing, but my hand moved before I could talk myself out of it.
“Yeah,” I answered.
It was quiet for a second, and I could hear her breath on the other end before she said my name like she wasn’t sure if I was really there.
“Kelli?”
I closed my eyes for half a second, then opened ‘em back up.
“Why you keep calling me?” I asked, keeping my voice even.
She let out a shaky breath like she had been holding that shit in. “Because I want to fix this. I just… I don’t understand why you won’t talk to me.”
I let out a low laugh that ain’t have no humor in it.
“You don’t understand?” I asked, sitting forward a lil’. “You serious right now?”
“Kelli, please,” she said quick, her voice breaking. “We don’t even have to be together. I just don’t want it to be like this between us.”
That right there made me shake my head slow while I looked down at the ground.
“You don’t want it to be like this,” I repeated. “So what you thought it was gon’ be when I walked in and saw you with my goddamn brother?”
She started crying then, soft at first but it picked up quick.
“That’s not what it looks like—”
“Don’t,” I cut in, my voice low but sharp enough to stop her. “Don’t do that.”
She went quiet for a second, then tried again, softer this time.
“You were in jail, Kelli. I was by myself. I didn’t want to raise a baby alone.”
I laughed again, but this time it came out colder.
“You wouldn’t have had to,” I said. “You made that decision because you wanted to. Don’t put that shit on me.”
“That’s not fair,” she cried. “You don’t know what I was goin’ through—”
“I know what I saw,” I said, cutting her off again. “And I know what you did.”
She started talking over me, trying to explain and justify herself. It all blended together into noise I ain’t feel like sitting through while footsteps came up behind me and pulled my attention off the call.
I turned my head just enough to see Sha’Nelle walking toward me with a bowl in one hand and a cup in the other.
She had on something light that clung to her body just enough to remind a man what was there without her trying too hard, and the way she moved through the space felt natural, like she belonged in it.
I exhaled slowly and looked back down at my phone.
“I can’t do this right now,” I said.
“Kelli, please don’t hang up,” Harlow rushed. “We can at least talk about—”
“Figure that shit out on your own,” I said, and ended the call before she could finish.
I dropped my phone on the table and looked down at my cigarette, realizing I let that bitch burn all the way down without hitting it.
I shook my head and reached for the pack, sliding another one out and putting it between my lips while I grabbed the lighter.
“You good?” Sha’Nelle asked from behind me.
I lit the cigarette and took a pull before I answered, then nodded like it wasn’t nothin’.
“Yeah.”
She stepped closer, setting her bowl down on the table before she leaned her hip against it and looked at me.
“It don’t sound like it,” she said. “Whoever that was, though… they deserved that shit. I don’t never hear you go off like that.”
I let out a low laugh and leaned back in the chair.
“Just an ex,” I said. “It ain’t nothin’.”
She picked up her fork and took a bite of her salad while she watched me.
“She Black?” she asked, casual as hell.
I shook my head. “Nah. White. Blonde hair, blue eyes.”
She raised her brows a lil’.
“I ain’t surprised,” she said, then took another bite. “But… I’m surprised.”
That made me smirk. “I get that a lot.”
“What?” she asked.
“That people expect me to be with a Black woman,” I said, taking another pull from my cigarette. “Like it matter.”
She snorted softly and shook her head.
“Bein’ white don’t mean shit,” she said. “All I ever see you around is niggas anyway.”
I laughed under my breath. “Yeah, I hear that too.”
She shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal and kept eating, but I kept my eyes on her a second longer than I needed to, watching the way she moved, and the way she sat in her body like she was comfortable in it.
I guess she felt my gaze. I saw it in the way her hand paused just a lil’ before she took another bite, and then she looked off to the side like she wasn’t about to give that attention too much space.
I leaned forward, restin’ my forearms on my knees.
“That look good,” I said, noddin’ toward her bowl.
She looked back at me and raised a brow.
“You want some?” she asked.
I tilted my head a lil’.
“You mind if I eat off your fork?”
That made her pause, and I watched the way her lips pressed together for a second before she lifted her eyes to mine and gave me a look that sat somewhere between playful and serious, like she was testing how far I’d take it. “It depends,” she said. “Where your mouth been?”
I smirked while I held her gaze.
“Nowhere that should make you second guess handing me that fork,” I said, my voice low and easy. “You safe.”
She held that look on me a second longer like she was weighing it, then her eyes dipped.
“A’ight then,” she said, handing me the bowl anyway.
I took the bowl from her and grabbed the fork, taking a few bites while she watched me like she was waiting on somethin’.
“That’s good,” I said, handing it back.
She took the bowl back, and her eyes stayed on me a second longer before she looked down at the fork in her hand and turned it around slow, dragging her tongue over it and licking the ranch off like I wasn’t sittin’ right there watching her do it.
I let out a low laugh and leaned back again, shaking my head a while I took another pull from my cigarette.
“Yeah,” I muttered under my breath.
She glanced at me. “What?”
“Nothin’,” I said, looking back out at the garden.
But it wasn’t just nothin’...
I finished my cigarette slow, lettin’ the moment sit the way it was without trying to turn it into somethin’ else, and when I crushed it out, I leaned back in the chair and looked out over the yard again.
Trill-Land had been good to me.
But lately…
I was starting to feel a lil’ more interested in the island than I planned.