Chapter 12 #2
“You so fine,” he whispered, again. “But it ain’t just that. It’s…you.”
Her brows kissed her fuzzy edges. “Me?”
He nodded, licking his lips again. “You got this way of talkin’ to me… lookin at me…checkin’ me when you need to. Ain’t nobody ever treat me like that, Ain’t nobody make me feel…” he trailed off.
“Feel what?” she asked, leaning in without realizing.
“Seen.” One simple word felt like a four page love letter.
Meadow’s heart dropped and rose at the same time.
He wasn’t trying to charm her. He wasn’t showing off, either. Zaire was just being his honest self.
She could tell, because her heart told her so. Being around him felt like a fairytale she never knew the name of. One she had never conjured up to tell Magnolia. One that made her stupid head dream.
“I see you,” she whispered.
“You sayin’ that,” he groaned, chewing on his lip a little, “gon’ make me forget every reason I been tryin’ to keep my hands off you.”
“Then why haven’t you kissed me?” she asked.
His smile was slow, pained, and tender. “’Cause I don’t wanna ruin this.”
“This?”
“Whatever this thing is we slidin’ into.” He tapped his chest lightly. “This shit feel different. And I ain’t tryna fuck it up by movin’ too fast.”
Her body betrayed her, leaning even closer, eyes dropping to his mouth. “You think you could ruin it?”
“I know I could.” He nodded with a distant look in his eyes. “Especially with where my head be at…and how my life look right now.”
His fingers brushed a curl behind her ear.
Meadow stopped breathing, like full on stop. Her whole body lit up too.
Zaire’s thumb grazed her cheek. She was something he didn’t think he’d ever be allowed to touch. “If I kiss you right now…I ain’t stopping.”
Meadow’s eyes fluttered. “Zaire—”
“Nah - listen.” He brushed her jaw with the back of his hand. “We kiss, it’s over. You gon’ know exactly how bad I been wantin’ you. You gon’ feel all the shit I don’t say. And I ain’t about to do that if you ain’t ready.”
Her lips parted. Her thighs squeezed tighter. “I’m…” she swallowed. “I don’t know what I’m ready for.”
“Yeah,” he whispered, “me neither.”
Their foreheads hovered inches apart, not touching but close enough that she felt his breath mix with hers. Close enough to know that if either of them moved a millimeter, they’d be gone.
Zaire pulled back first, just enough to breathe. He stared at her like she was a sunrise he wasn’t supposed to watch. Like something beautiful he didn’t trust he could hold.
“I want you,” he confessed. “More than I should.”
Meadow’s heart burst open in the best way possible. “Me too.”
“If I kiss you, baby,” his voice trembled in that masculine way that told a woman he wasn’t trying to game her. “It’s gon’ change everything.”
She whispered back, “Maybe everything needs to change.”
Zaire closed his eyes because she had no idea what she was silently begging him for.
Still…he didn’t kiss her.
He stood up, offering her his hand again, the same gentle grip that held her steady earlier. “C’mon. We should walk back.” His voice was deep but careful, like he was afraid of what he’d do if he sat next to her a second longer.
Meadow took his hand, electricity running through her like his touch revived her again. Love had never been in the cards for her, at least no time soon. She’d dated but none of them moved past sex or stupid dates. Zaire made her want to really try…now.
And even though they didn’t kiss, the air around them felt kissed, touched, tasted…claimed in a way neither of them could undo.
They walked back to the house in a slow cadence. Hands brushing…hearts thumping…breaths unsteady.
By the time they reached the porch, Meadow’s knees felt weak in that way she wasn’t ready to claim.
The walk back should’ve settled her, yet it did the opposite.
Every step brought her closer to a truth she could feel rising up between them like heat.
She stopped halfway up the steps and turned to face him.
“What if I want to kiss you too?” she whispered.
Zaire froze. Not like he didn’t hear her. Like he heard her too well. His tongue pressed the inside of his cheek. He dragged a slow breath in, hand brushing across his nose the way men do when they’re trying to choke down something.
“Don’t say that,” he told her.
“Why not?”
“’Cause if you kiss me, Meadow…” His eyes dropped to her mouth, then rose again. “I might give you more shit to carry.”
She grabbed her chest. “What does that mean?”
Zaire leaned one shoulder on the porch beam, head dropping low as he spoke. “It means I don’t want my demons to get familiar with you. Don’t want them knowin’ your name…or how you taste.” He shook his head. “You too soft for that…too good…too mine…” He cut himself off, jaw locking.
“If I’m yours then kiss me…let me know it’s real.”
“C’mon, baby…you gotta trust me when I try to warn you.”
She huffed, pushing her hair out her face. “You can’t say one thing then take it back. Am I yours?”
“Meadow…”
“No, Zaire,” she pushed forward. “You don’t get to get me in my head then just walk away. Don’t be a scaredy cat.”
Zaire laughed, his eyes rolling over her. “That’s some lame ass shit…don’t say that again.”
“Don’t be scared, then.”
He looked away then back to her. “Can I trust you?”
“Yes.”
“With heavy shit? With my demons?”
Zaire hated himself for what he was about to do. No one knew the demons he carried inside him. They didn’t understand why he was who he was because he locked that shit up and never wanted to unleash it. Never wanted to show them that red door full of skeletons…literally.”
Meadow shifted her hips from one side to the other. “Zaire…what demons?”
He laughed, but it wasn’t humor. It was a man swallowing the grief he’d carried alone for too many years. “You really wanna know?”
“Yes.” She stepped closer.
He lifted his head. His eyes glistened in a way he tried to hide but couldn’t. “Everybody think my Pops inside for some street shit he did.” Zaire rubbed his nose. “But that’s not how it happened.”
Meadow’s heart dropped. She didn’t speak or move, waiting to see where this confession was going.
Zaire stared out across the land like he was seeing another life superimposed over this one.
“When I was five…we had a home invasion. Niggas in red. My Pops was with the Sixties heavy back then, knee-deep in it. Flags, blocks, wars, all that shit. And when you live that kinda life, somebody always comin’ for you.
” His voice shook as his mind took him back to the night he was told to forget.
Meadow stepped off the porch with him, slow, like approaching a wounded animal that still had fangs.
“They ran up in the house. Had my Pops on the floor with a gun to his head, my Mama was screamin’. I didn’t know what was happenin’… I thought…” he swallowed. “I thought they was gon’ kill him right there.”
Meadow’s eyes burned and the speed of her heart picked up. It felt like she was running a marathon. Like she was in Zaire’s childhood home seeing everything from his eyes.
“So I ran,” Zaire whispered. “I ran to their room. My mama kept a gun in her dresser. No safety. One in the chamber. I grabbed it. My little ass could barely hold it.”
His voice cracked so he had to sit down before his demons knocked him on his ass.
“I walked back into the hallway, my hands shook, everything felt so loud like I couldn’t think right.
Then I saw the man standin’ over my Pops.
” Zaire lifted his trembling hand like the child-version of himself still lived there in his bones. “And I pulled the trigger.”
Meadow covered her mouth as a cry burst through her.
“The body dropped,” he remembered, “like somebody unplugged him. The other two niggas ran out. My Mama grabbed me…my Pops grabbed me…the police came. Pops took the charge.” Zaire closed his eyes.
“It was his third strike…his third strike should’ve been my first. My Pops been locked up for twenty years behind somethin’ I did. ”
Carefully, Meadow stepped closer, tears gathering in her eyes. “You were a child.”
“I was a murderer,” Zaire corrected. “And I been livin’ with that on my hands ever since.
” He held his palms up like there was blood still there.
“These the hands people cheer for….the hands they call blessed. These the hands the league wanna use to build their ratings. They don’t know these hands were covered in blood before I even learned how to tie my shoes. ”
Meadow didn’t think as she crossed the space between them, and knelt in front of him as his back hit the porch rail and his legs folded under the weight of the memory. She eased herself into his lap…slow, and gentle, like she was cradling the pieces of him he’d kept shattered and hidden.
Zaire stiffened. “Meadow…”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and held him with a strength he didn’t expect.
“Come, on, cuh…” he eyes misted.
“You were five,” she whispered into his shoulder. “Five, Zaire— a baby. You didn’t murder that man. The streets murdered him the moment they brought war into your home.”
Zaire’s breath broke against her collarbone.
She cupped the back of his head speaking life and reasoning into him. “You saved your father, and he saved you back.”
He swallowed hard, chest shaking. Zaire was trying so hard not to cry but the softness of her had his resolve melting like ice cream on a summer day.
Meadow pulled back just enough to look him in the eyes. “You think a little boy deserves to carry guilt for something grown men created? You think five-year-old you was supposed to understand flags and enemies and fear?”
Tears rimmed his whispy lashes. He didn’t let them fall, but they glittered.
“You think I don’t know what weight looks like?” Meadow assured, her thumbs tracing love against his skin. “You think I can’t recognize a soul that’s been holdin’ too much for too damn long?”
His hand slid up her waist without thought, fingers pressing into her skin like he needed to confirm she was real. He wanted to kiss her so bad, his lips hurt. “I can smell you, baby,” his voice came out strained.
Her breath stuttered. “Then do something about it.”
His forehead dropped to her cheek, breathing her in like he needed her lungs to help his work. “I want to…” he rasped. “So fuckin’ bad.”
“Then do it.”
He shook his head against her skin. “You ain’t ready, and I’m not here for just this.” He pulled back enough to stare at her mouth. “If I take you like this, Meadow…I won’t let you go, I won’t be able to, and you got a whole life to protect.”
Her lips trembled. “Maybe you in it.”
His jaw clenched so hard she felt it. “This ain’t just sex to me. Not with you.” He stared into her eyes where he wanted to get lost but knew he shouldn’t. “This is…somethin’ else… somethin’ I don’t even know how to carry yet.”
Meadow cupped his face with both hands, thumbs brushing the dampness at the corners of his eyes. “Then let me carry some of this weight for you. Just a little. Just enough until you strong enough to carry it yourself.”
Zaire inhaled, letting out a sound between a sob and surrender. He rested his forehead against hers, breathing in her slow, deep, careful breaths.
“You gon’ ruin me,” he whispered.
“No,” she breathed back, lips hovering over his. “I’m gon’ rebuild you.”