Chapter 4
Chapter four
“You live here?”
I turned from juggling two grocery bags and the slip of paper with the front-door code Chase had given me. A guy holding a stack of pizza boxes stood at the bottom of the steps.
“Yeah,” I said. “I can let you in to drop those off. I assume they’re for Chase Crawford?”
“Yes, ma’am.” He hurried up the steps and somehow took my grocery bags from me without dropping the pizzas. I keyed in the code, shielding the numbers with my hand—just in case the pizza guy wasn’t quite the gentleman he seemed.
“Where you want me to put these, ma’am?” the guy asked.
I glanced around the lobby, looking for other tenants, but no one else was around. “Uh, just there on the desk, I guess.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said with a nod, setting the boxes on the corner of the desk, casting a nervous look around, then handing me back my grocery bags and rushing for the front door. “Y’all have a good night.”
“Weird,” I murmured, thrown by his urgency. He’d looked like he couldn’t wait to get out of the house as he raced down the steps “like his hair was on fire and his ass was catchin’,” as my elderly neighbor Ms. Reba used to say.
I could relate. Maybe he sensed something, too. Unfortunately, unlike him, I couldn’t run away.
Determined not to let my imagination run wild in the old house, I took Henry’s hand and headed toward the elevator. Henry reached for the button just as the doors slid open, revealing a young woman dressed in workout clothes and running shoes, dark coils of hair framing a beautiful face.
She offered Henry and me a friendly smile as she removed her earbuds. “Hi there!” she greeted, stepping out of the elevator. “You must be Zellie. Chase told me we had new folks moving in.”
I returned her smile. “Hi. Yeah. I’m Zellie Dupont, and this is my son Henry.”
“Would you like some help with those bags?” she asked, taking one from me before I could respond and stepping back inside the elevator. “You’re up on the fourth floor, right?”
I shook my head as we stepped into the elevator, delighted and a little confused, not used to having help. “Yeah, thanks.”
“I’m Merilee Vaughn, by the way,” she told me after Henry pressed the button. “I live on the third floor, right below you.”
“I thought Mr. Dean lived below us,” I replied.
Merilee offered me a mischievous grin. “Met him already, have you?”
I laughed, deciding I liked Merilee, particularly the playful twinkle in her eye that made me think she was the kind of person everyone would want for a best friend.
“Came banging on my door earlier,” I admitted.
“He wanted to make sure my ‘crumb-snatcher’ wasn’t running around all night.
Because that’s what five-year-olds do—run around all night. It’s quite a party at our place.”
Merilee chuckled. “That sounds like Mr. Dean.” As the elevator doors opened, she added, “He likes to complain about everything, but he’s harmless.”
“Have you lived here long?” I asked.
Merilee shrugged slightly in response to my question. “Hmm, long enough. Seems like forever.”
“Mr. Crawford told me you’re a nurse,” I said. “And that you care for a woman who lives here.”
Merilee shook her head with a grin. “That’s our Chase—he’s quite the talker. Give him an audience and he’ll jaw all day.” She strode toward my apartment, calling over her shoulder, “But, yes, I look after Ms. Netty. She’s a handful sometimes.”
I unlocked the door and was a bit startled when Merilee walked right in like we hadn’t just met and headed straight for the kitchen.
“Mama, can I go play in my room?” Henry begged, clearly bored.
I nodded, distracted by the woman currently putting away my groceries. “Um, yeah, sure, baby. Go ahead.”
When he scampered off, I made my way to the other room. “Thank you, Ms. Vaughn, but you don’t have to do that. I can manage.”
Merilee closed the refrigerator door and smiled. “First, it’s Merilee. Second, I’m sure you can.”
The warmth of Merilee’s kindness seemed to fill the room, and the uneasiness that had hung over me like a storm cloud lifted. For the first time since we’d arrived, everything felt a little…lighter. “Thank you. I do appreciate it.”
“That’s what neighbors are for, right?” Merilee asked. “Help each other now and then? Now, I’m gonna get my run in before Ms. Netty wakes up. You need anything, I’m just downstairs.”
After Merilee left, I went looking for Henry. As I stepped into the hallway, I heard him chatting away and rubbed my arms to smooth the goosebumps rising on my skin.
“But she seems nice,” Henry said as I neared his door. “I like her… You shouldn’t say that. Mama says no one should say ‘hate’.”
I leaned against the wall, listening, curious to hear what was going on in Henry’s imagination.
“I won’t,” Henry whispered. “I’ll be careful.”
At this, I shoved off the wall and strode into the bedroom. “Careful about what?” I asked, grinning so Henry wouldn’t think he was in trouble.
He still started, guilt flickering across his face. “David says that I need to be careful around Ms. Merilee. He doesn’t like her.”
I sat on the bed and pulled Henry to me. “Well, that’s just silly. You saw how nice she was to us and how friendly.”
Henry nodded. “Yes, ma’am. But I want to still be careful.”
“You, know, Ms. Merilee is a nurse. Is David maybe just afraid she’ll give him a shot?
Or a transfusion?” I asked, knowing well Henry’s nervousness about this very thing every time he had a doctor’s appointment.
Unfortunately, thanks to his chronic anemia, both shots and transfusions were common occurrences. “Maybe he just doesn’t like needles.”
Henry pressed his lips together as if considering the possibility but then slowly shook his head. “No, that’s not it. He won’t tell me anything else. He doesn’t want to talk about it.”
I gave him a quick hug. “Well, that’s okay. He doesn’t have to until he’s ready. Now, let’s go grab some of that pizza and meet the rest of our neighbors.”
When we entered the game room, Chase was already there, handing out slices of pizza to several people I hadn’t met yet.
A tall, slender woman with stark-white hair pulled up into a ponytail immediately came forward, hand outstretched.
Her complexion was fair and flawless, and her blue eyes sparkled with vivacity.
She was dressed in jeans and a simple white button-down but if I had to guess, that “simple” outfit cost more than my entire wardrobe.
“Come on in, darlin’,” she said, her voice soft and filled with warmth. “You must be Zellie.”
I shook her hand, a bit taken aback by her effusive welcome. “Yes, ma’am. Hi.”
The woman took my hand in both of hers and gently patted it. “So good to have you here. We miss having young folks around. I’m June.”
My brows briefly knit together. Young folks? Chase and Merilee couldn’t have been that much older than me.
Before I could think more on it, June gestured toward a handsome, fit man with steel grey hair and chiseled features who was reclined casually in an easy chair, highball already in hand. “That’s my husband Earl.”
In chinos and a golf shirt, Earl looked like he belonged at the country club, not the game room of a historic apartment building. He got to his feet and raised his glass in greeting. “How do, honey. You come on in and make yourself at home.”
I glanced between them, astonished at how youthful the couple seemed. If not for their hair, I would’ve put them thirty years younger.
“Nice to meet you,” I finally managed. “This is my son, Henry.”
June bent and placed her hands on her knees so she was at Henry’s eye level. “It is so nice to meet you, Henry. You’re going to be visiting us during the day while your mama is at work. Won’t that be fun? My granddaughter Adelaide will be so excited!”
“Where is Addie?” Chase asked. “I thought she was just in here.”
June waved a hand dismissively as she straightened. “Oh, she’s outside. Can’t keep that girl indoors! Henry, would you like to take your pizza outside on the patio and eat with Addie?”
He glanced up at me to gauge my reaction before nodding. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Henry, stay in the yard,” I ordered, nervous about letting him out of my sight so soon.
“Don’t worry, Zellie,” Chase said, taking my elbow to guide me over to the table. “You’ve got lots of eyes to watch out for him. Time for you to rest easy for a bit.”
The tension slipped from my shoulders. I hadn’t realized how tightly they’d been bunched into knots until that moment. “Thank you,” I said, tears in my eyes, suddenly feeling less alone for the first time in a long while.
He gave my arm a squeeze before handing me a plate. “All right now,” was all he said before stepping away.
I couldn’t say why that simple phrase almost undid me. Maybe because, for just a few minutes, I wasn’t carrying the weight of everything on my own.
“You all getting started without us?”
I looked up from my pizza to see an older couple entering the room. The woman who’d spoken was probably close in age to June, based on her close-cropped, white hair, but she too looked ageless.
Oversized, gold earrings, a statement necklace, a tennis bracelet, and an enormous diamond ring glinted in the early-evening sunlight, creating a halo of light around her.
There was precisely zero chance that any of it was high-quality costume jewelry.
No gold plating in that room. And the loose, flowing ensemble she wore was in a bright print every bit as bold as I imagined she was.
If June carried herself with graceful poise, the woman who’d just entered commanded the room like a queen.
“We know better,” June said with a bright grin.
She greeted the woman with a hug as if she was a long-lost friend and not a neighbor who lived just down the hall.
She then turned to me and gestured with a thin, pale hand.
“Pearlie, honey, this lovely young woman right here is Zellie Dupont. Zellie, this is Pearlie Johnson.”