Chapter Thirty-One #2
“Sanaa, it’s me!” I barely caught the wooden staff in my hand.
“Oh my God, Sanaa, it’s just Kain!” Monique called frantically from behind her, rushing to grab at her arms, repeating, “It’s just Kain!”
“Kain!” Sanaa screeched, dropping the broom handle on the ground by her side. “Kain, what the fuck is your problem! You scared the shit out of us. Why didn’t you just knock?”
I huffed out in frustration, annoyed. “Because. You. Never. Lock. Your. Doors.”
This was an ongoing issue between my sister and I.
She made it so easy to break into her house.
I’d muddled over the idea of leaving Lauren at Sanaa’s before deciding on The Bayside.
The one reason I could not leave Lauren with my sister who liked her best was because Sanaa clearly lived in a different universe than the rest of us, a universe that was unrealistically safe.
Rarely did she ever operate with caution in anything she did.
“What are you doing here?” Monique asked, a slight hint of suspicion in her tone.
Sanaa read my mind, replying, “Damn, Mo. Kain can’t come visit his big sister every once in a while? Why are you here? To see me, right? So is Kain.”
Ever since the dinner with Lauren, where Monique found out Lauren was the daughter of Joshua Caplan, she had visibly lost a little faith in me.
Sanaa, though… Once she decided she liked someone, she liked them.
So even though I was sure that time had allowed for Sanaa to get the full run down about who Lauren was and everything that came with that, it didn’t stop her from genuinely asking, “How is the girlfriend?”
Behind her, Monique released an uncomfortable sigh.
I understood her discomfort. Dating the daughter of Miami’s most crooked prosecutor was really high up there on the list of things I absolutely shouldn’t do.
“Oh quit your loud sighing, Monique.” Sanaa’s head snapped back. “If we were all judged on what our daddies do, then none of us would stand a chance in this world. How’s the girlfriend?” she pressed enthusiastically.
I could always count on Sanaa’s optimism.
“She’s alright.” I didn’t mention Dad’s threat to Lauren’s life looming over my head. Actually, I didn’t say anything. I had no words, just confusing knots twisting in the pit of my stomach that made me want to be around some people who understood me.
I’d never felt this way before.
Going over Marlon’s just didn’t cut it. Watching Marlon and Jay deal with their grief with weed and Hennessy just wasn’t my coping mechanism, and I wasn’t in the mood to join them, either.
After that talk with Silas, I wouldn’t complain if I had to go without another glass of cognac for at least a few months.
Monique broke the silence, nodding me over to the couches in the living room. “Amir’s funeral was this morning. How you holding up, K?”
I could always count on Monique’s perceptiveness.
Given the reminder and finally noticing what I was wearing, Sanaa remembered. “Oh right, that was today.”
I took it neither of them had been told about Cierra’s big reveal to Silas earlier.
Knowing they’d give her hell for it, I kept to myself.
I was pissed as hell at Cierra for what she’d done, but somehow I got the sense that whatever I was feeling about Amir’s death was hitting her five times as hard.
Knowing how fucked up my emotions were, anything worse than this was sure to drive a person insane.
And that’s what Cierra’s behavior was today—insanity driven by grief.
“Kain, are you okay?” Monique’s voice grew soft as though she was talking to one of her patients.
“Yeah,” I replied after a long pause. I don’t know why I lied. I could’ve told the truth, that I wasn’t okay at all, and no one would’ve been surprised. Still, I lied again, “Yeah, I’m fine.”
“You know,” Sanaa said the words slowly.
“When I was in college, my best friend in the whole wide world died in a car accident. I cried for months. I was always picking up my phone to call her at random hours of the day, only to realize I couldn’t anymore.
It crushed me.” Something in my chest twisted.
My sister’s words were extremely relatable.
She had me until she said the words, “I know how you feel.”
“Do you?” I asked dismissively. “Who was drivin’ the car when your friend died? Was it you?”
“Well no, but—”
“Then you don’t know, Sanaa.”
“Kain.” Monique laid an assuring hand on the back of my shoulder, waiting for me to meet her eyes before she said, “You know we love you, right?”
I nodded, somehow feeling like this exchange only created distance. Something about Monique’s words made me feel like I was making my problem everyone’s problem, and so I reeled back. I took in a deep breath and checked my watch, deciding now was a safe enough time to head over to The Bayside.
“I gotta go,” I announced. My abrupt statement drew confusion out of them, and so I simply lied again. “I was only stoppin’ by ‘cause I was in the neighborhood.”
I shook Monique’s hand off my shoulder before rising to my feet, offering my sisters halfhearted smile before beginning my trek to the door. Of course, they followed after me, keen to walk me to my car.
Eager to not end the visit on a depressing note, when I got to my car door, Sanaa asked, “What are you doing for your birthday?”
I shrugged, not caring because it actually hadn’t crossed my mind that I was turning twenty-one at the end of July. Clearly I had more pressing matters to think about. Besides, it was still June. This was far from important.
Not according to Sanaa, though. As a professional event planner, she was absolutely appalled I hadn’t made plans.
“What?!” She practically shouted. “But it’s the 30th of next month! Twenty-one is a party birthday! You can finally drink alcohol.” She thought about what she’d just said and amended it, “Well… you can finally drink alcohol legally.”
“It’s really not that deep.”
“Noooooo.” She wasn’t having it. “Monique, tell him that twenty-one is a party birthday.”
Monique brought up her shoulders, spreading out her arms like she couldn’t dispute this. “It’s not just a party birthday. It’s the party birthday.”
Sanaa’s eyes grew wide as she nodded. “Seriously.”
I could see where this was going. Sanaa wasn’t just trying to get me to celebrate my birthday, she wanted to use this as an opportunity to plan a party with a big budget. It was more for her than for me when I sighed and said, “Do whatever you want, Sanaa.”
“You mean it?” She was beaming, and so I had to nod. “Get me Lauren’s number. I want her input on this.”
Like me, Lauren didn’t have a phone right now.
“I’ll have to get back to you on that.”
“Kain, your birthday is in thirty-five days!” Sanaa stressed as if this wasn’t nearly enough time.
Given Sanaa’s behavior, I was already beginning to get the sense that this party was gonna be unnecessarily extravagant. If Lauren was in on the planning, at least she’d know to keep this low key. I would be giving Sanaa her number for that reason alone.
“Yeah, I’ll get it to you as soon as possible,” I promised, in a rush, and reaching for the door handle of my car. Just before I could get inside, Monique stopped me for a moment, eyeing me carefully. I paused, turning to face her worrisome dark eyes.
Her hands came up to meet my shoulders, not letting up on the eye contact when she asked, “And you’re sure you’re alright?”
Effortlessly… I lied.
“Yeah, Mo,” I replied with a nod. “I’m fine.”
***
The door to The Bayside suite had barely cracked six inches before it swung open wider, revealing Lauren to be standing on the other side.
At the exact moment that her arms clasped around me, circling my neck in an almost desperately firm hold, the bags in my hands dropped.
My hand came around her, both to return her hug, and because it wasn’t until her arms were around me that I realized that this—her—this was what I’d needed all day.
You would’ve thought Lauren hadn’t seen me in days from the tightness of her grip. Though I didn’t mind. On a day when it just felt like everything about me was falling apart, as long as she continued to hold tight, I could keep it together.
It was several seconds before Lauren finally pulled back, her big eyes seemingly scanning every inch of me for out of place hairs. If I so much as got a papercut today, she would find it.
“Are you hurt anywhere?”
“No, I told you I was fine.” Like I told everyone else.
“Yeah, but you’re the type to lie about that.”
A crease formed between my eyebrows, the only hint at my surprise to be read so accurately. I didn’t bother lying. Instead I reached back, finally shutting the room door behind me. Even as I slid the luggage I’d brought up out of the way, Lauren had yet to let me go.
Honestly, I didn’t want her to.
The therapeutic quality of her vanilla-scented hair always did well to ease something inside me.
As I tucked a stray curl behind her ear, Lauren eyed me carefully, her eyes moving along every detail of my face, and somehow I got the feeling that even though I was keeping a perfectly straight expression—she knew.
“Are you okay?” Lauren asked, her tone conveying that even though she was asking, she could already tell what the answer was. My knee-jerk reaction was to lie, but the one-word response stopped at the tip of my tongue, and I could only look at her. Lauren tried to ask me again. “Kain, are you—”
“No.” It was an odd mixture of relief and pain that settled at the base of my chest then.
Pain because acknowledging the emotions coursing through me almost had an amplifying effect on them, but relieved because, one look at her and I knew I wouldn’t have to deal with them on my own.
I shook my head in resignation, finally being honest about it out loud. “No, I’m not okay.”