2. Lee #4
JB didn’t answer, and the silence made my stomach twist. “How many, JB?”
He looked down for a second before meeting my eyes again. “I don’t know.”
I stared at him, searching his face like a number might somehow be written there. “That many, huh?”
“I ain’t keep count.”
That answer hurt worse than any number he could’ve given me. I looked away, but my mind was already running through all the questions I probably had no business asking.
“Who was the last one?”
JB stayed quiet, and when it became obvious he wasn’t answering, I turned fully toward him. “How long ago?”
“Leona.” He let out a breath. “It’s your first night home. Let’s not do this.”
I laughed because of course he didn’t want to do this. He’d had five years to live whatever life he wanted while I sat in prison trying not to imagine it.
“I hate you.”
JB didn’t argue. He stayed near the doorway with his hands hanging at his sides. “I figured after all this time you would.”
The calm way he said it pissed me off even more. “I don’t need you. I don’t need this apartment, the money, that purse, that car. I don’t need none of it.”
JB stood there and let me get it out before he finally asked, “Then how you gone get back on your feet, Lee?”
My mouth opened, but nothing came out because I hated the answer even more than I hated him for asking.
Whether I wanted to admit it or not, JB had made sure I didn’t have to worry about where I was sleeping tonight, what I was driving tomorrow, or how I was going to pay for anything while I figured my life out.
Without everything he’d given me, all I had was the little money left on my prison debit card, a plastic bag full of my shit, and nowhere I wanted to go. I hated needing him, but I hated even more that he knew I did.
JB watched me for a second before looking toward the bedroom door. “I’m about to dip.”
I frowned. “Dip where?”
“I got work.”
I stared at him. “You not staying here tonight?”
JB looked back at me. “You want me to stay?”
“That ain’t what I asked.”
“Lee, I got work.”
Something about that didn’t sit right with me. I watched him more closely. “I thought you left the streets.”
“I did.”
“Then what work?”
JB gave me a look like I should’ve known better than to assume the worst. “I own a trucking company now. Couple of my drivers got loads leaving before daylight, and I need to be at the yard.”
I blinked. “A trucking company?”
“Started with one truck. Kept buying more.”
I stared at him, trying to understand how something that big had never come up in five years of calls and letters. “Why you never told me that?”
JB leaned against the doorframe. “Because you know all them calls recorded, and they read all them letters before y’all get ’em. I ain’t want them folks all in my business trying to figure out how I got the money to start a company and shit.”
I stared at him. “You couldn’t just say you had a trucking company?”
“And have somebody start digging because they wondering where the money came from?” He shook his head. “Nah. I already had them people watching everything tied to me. I wasn’t giving them nothing else to look into.”
His reasoning made sense, but it still bothered me that I was just now finding out. Standing there looking at him, I realized I didn’t know a damn thing about the life he’d built while mine had been standing still.
JB pushed away from the doorframe and started toward the hall. “If you need anything…”
“I won’t.”
He looked at me like he already knew that was exactly what I was going to say. “Aight.”
Neither one of us moved for a few seconds. I didn’t want to ask him to stay, especially after finding out he’d been sleeping with other women, but I didn’t want him walking out either. Apparently, being home hadn’t made my feelings about him any less confusing.
JB finally nodded toward me. “Goodnight, Lee.”
I sat on the edge of the bed and looked away from him. “Goodnight.” He stayed in the doorway another second before his footsteps disappeared down the hall. I didn’t move until I heard the front door close.
Once he was gone, the apartment got so quiet I could hear the air kicking on.
I walked through and cut off the lights before climbing into a bed that smelled like fresh laundry detergent.
The mattress was softer than anything I’d slept on in years, and the room was dark except for a little light coming through the blinds.
I should’ve been comfortable. Hell, I had a whole bed to myself, nobody doing count, nobody yelling down the hall, and no Patrice snoring loud enough to shake the bunk, but sleep still wouldn’t come.
I stared at the ceiling, thinking about how the last thing I’d seen every night for years was the chipped gray bottom of Patrice’s bunk.
I’d spent all that time dreaming about sleeping in a real bed again only to finally get one and realize even freedom could feel strange when you’d been without it long enough.
I rolled onto my side and pulled the blanket higher, thinking I’d never admit it out loud, but I kinda missed Patrice’s loud ass snoring above me.