8. Sha’nelle Harper #2
I kept noddin’ and touchin’ things like I was fully present.
I ran my fingers over the bathroom counter, looked inside the closet, peeked out the bedroom window and smiled when I was supposed to.
The house really was beautiful, and that made me feel worse.
It would’ve been easier if somethin’ was wrong with it.
It would’ve been easier if I could say the kitchen was ugly, the rooms felt small, the neighborhood looked off or the price sounded crazy. But none of that was true.
The truth was that Couture had picked a good house…
The truth was also that my heart started runnin’ the second I realized he had been thinkin’ this far ahead.
When we came back downstairs, Ms. Ro’Chelle gave us a few details about the neighborhood and said she would step outside so we could talk. I smiled and thanked her, then watched her walk out the front door before I turned back to Couture.
He was already lookin’ at me.
“You don’t like it, do you?” he asked.
I squeezed his hand. “I do like it.”
His eyebrow lifted a lil’. “You sure?”
“Yes, Couture. It’s nice. I just ain’t know you was lookin’ at houses already.”
He looked around the livin’ room, then back at me. “We gettin’ married, Sha’Nelle.”
I stared at him and nodded. “I know.”
“So I been thinkin’,” he said, his voice calm. “I don’t want us startin’ a marriage cramped up in that one-bedroom apartment. I’m outgrowin’ it anyway, and if we gon’ do this, I want us to have somewhere to come home to. Somewhere that feel like ours.”
I stared up at him, and for a second, I ain’t know what to say.
He was standin’ here tellin’ me what he wanted with me, and that should’ve made me feel safe.
A part of me did feel somethin’. I felt cared about.
I felt seen in the way a woman feels when a man ain’t just talkin’ marriage but actually makin’ moves toward it.
But another part of me felt sick…
I hated that both could be true at the same time.
Couture stepped closer and took both of my hands. “I ain’t sayin’ we gotta put in an offer today. I just wanted you to see it.”
“It’s beautiful,” I said.
“You can tell me if you don’t like somethin’.”
“I’m tellin’ you I like it,” I said, and I leaned into him a lil’ so it wouldn’t sound empty. “I’m just surprised.”
His face softened some, and he rubbed his thumb over my ring finger. “I wanted to surprise you.”
I laughed and replied, “and you did.”
He smiled, and I smiled back ‘cause I couldn’t stand here lookin’ like my whole insides was fightin’ each other.
Couture leaned down and kissed me, and I let my hands move up his chest while his arms went around my waist. His mouth was warm, and the kiss felt good in a way that made me want to stop thinkin’.
I kissed him back and let my eyes close, tryna hold on to the part of me that wanted this to be simple.
He pulled me closer, and my back touched the wall near the livin’ room entry. He kissed me again, deeper this time, and his hand slid to the side of my face.
For those few seconds, I let myself be here with him in this pretty ass house with the clean floors and the backyard and the future he was already tryna build. I let myself feel his mouth on mine and his hands on me without makin’ a mess of it in my head.
When we finally pulled away, he rested his forehead against mine. “Spend the weekend with me.”
“I will,” I said soft.
Later that night, I was at Couture’s apartment helpin’ him pack for the next week.
His suitcase was open on the bed, and he had clothes folded in lil’ stacks while I sat beside it puttin’ socks and shirts where they needed to go.
He moved around the room grabbin’ things, talkin’ about what time he had to leave, what he still needed to pick up and how he was gon’ call me once he landed.
I listened and helped without sayin’ much.
The apartment looked smaller to me now, even though it hadn’t changed.
His one bedroom had never bothered me before.
I had stayed over here, slept in his bed, ate with him on his couch and left clothes in his drawer without thinkin’ too hard about it.
But after walkin’ through that house, every wall in the apartment felt like a countdown.
Couture zipped one side of the suitcase, then looked over at me. “You quiet.”
“I’m tired,” I said.
He came over and stood between my knees, then lifted my chin with his finger. “You still spendin’ the weekend with me?”
I looked up at him and nodded. “Yeah. I told you I was. I’mma pack tonight and be back after work tomorrow.”
He leaned down and kissed me, and I kissed him back. His hand touched the side of my neck, and mine went to his wrist while the room stayed quiet around us. I could feel how much he trusted the moment, and I could feel how normal it was supposed to be.
After I helped him finish packin’, I stayed a lil’ while longer. We talked on the couch, kissed some, and when it got late, I told him I needed to get back to my mama’s house so I could get ready for work tomorrow. Couture walked me to my car and kissed me again before openin’ my door.
“Text me when you make it,” he said.
“I will.”
He kissed my forehead, and I got in the car before my face could tell on me too much. I pulled out of his apartment complex with one hand on the wheel and the other pressed against my stomach like I could calm whatever was happenin’ inside me.
By the time I hit the main road, my thoughts was everywhere.
The house kept comin’ back to me. The front porch, the kitchen, the backyard, the rooms upstairs and Couture standin’ in the middle of all of it talkin’ about somewhere for us to come home to.
My heart was beatin’ too fast for somebody just drivin’ home.
My ring kept catchin’ lil’ flashes of light every time I passed under a streetlamp, and every flash made me feel like I was runnin’ out of time.
Couture hadn’t done nothin’ wrong by wantin’ a future with me. But I couldn’t sit there and pretend the thought of movin’ into a house with him ain’t make my feet start gettin’ cold.
I grabbed my phone at a red light and called Toni.
She answered after a few rings. “Wussup, cousin?”
I let out a breath and looked at the road when the light turned green. “Couture took me to look at a house today.”
Toni got quiet for half a second. “A house?”
“Yeah.”
“For y’all?”
“Yeah.”
“Umm… okay,” she said, and I could hear her tryna figure out which way to take it. “How you feel?”
I shook my head even though she couldn’t see me. “I’m bookin’ a flight to Trill-Land.”
Toni ain’t answer right away, and I was glad she ain’t rush me. I drove with my hand tight on the wheel, waitin’ on her to say what she was gon’ say.
“You sure?” she asked.
“I need to see Renza.”
“Sha’Nelle.”
“I know,” I said, my voice gettin’ lower. “I know how it sound. I know who I’m engaged to. I know all of that, Toni.“
Toni was quiet again, but she ain’t judge me. That was why I called her. Toni could fuss, but she knew me. She knew what Renza was to me even when I wished nobody did.
“I just need to see him,” I said. “If he tell me to leave him alone to my face, then I’ll have to figure out how to live with that.
But I can’t marry Couture with Renza still in my heart like this.
I can’t move in no house and act like I don’t feel what I feel.
I just need him to tell me he want this and I will leave all this shit behind. I just need to know he still care.”
Toni breathed out. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Okay. If you comin’, then come.“
My hand tightened on the steerin’ wheel again, and this time the tears did come, but I wiped ‘em fast before they could fall too far.
I ain’t know what the hell was waitin’ on me in Trill-Land. I ain’t know if Renza would look at me, talk to me or walk right past me like I was somebody he used to know. I ain’t know if I was about to make everything worse.
All I knew was that Couture had shown me a house today, and instead of my heart settlin’ into the future he was buildin’, it had started runnin’ straight toward the one nigga I couldn’t get out of it.
“I’mma book it tonight,” I said. “Couture leave on the seventeenth, so I’ll book for the eighteenth.”
Toni’s voice got softer. “Send me the flight when you do.”
“I will.”
We stayed on the phone until I pulled in my mama’s driveway, and after we hung up, I sat in the car with the engine still runnin’.
The house in my mind was beautiful. Couture had been beautiful in it. The life he wanted with me looked good enough from the outside for any woman with sense to step into it and be thankful. But my heart ain’t care about how good it looked.
My heart wanted answers from a man who had stopped givin’ me any. My heart wanted to stand in front of Renza and see if what he felt was still there when he was right there breathin’ the same air as me. My heart wanted one chance to say what all them calls and texts hadn’t been able to say.
I looked down at the ring on my finger and swallowed around the tightness in my throat.
Then I picked my phone back up and opened the airline app.
My hands was shakin’ a lil’ while I typed in Trill-Land, but I ain’t stop.
I was tired of callin’ Renza from numbers he wasn’t answerin’.
I was tired of textin’ words that sat there with nowhere to go.
If I was gon’ fall apart behind that nigga, I needed to do it where he could see me, hear me and tell me whatever he needed to tell me to my face.
So I booked the flight…
Once that confirmation came through, I sat back against the seat, stared at it for a long second and let out the first real breath I had been holdin’ all night.
I was goin’ back to Trill-Land.
One week later…
It was early as hell but I was already up, movin’ around my room with my nerves sittin’ so high that I barely felt like I had slept.
The sun wasn’t even all the way up yet, and the house was quiet.
I had been layin’ here for a while before I finally got up, starin’ at the ceilin’ and tryna talk myself through what I was about to do.