13. And Yet, We Stray #3
“My grandfather gave me my first notebook when I was eight.”
The whole room changed. You could feel it. Even Matthew seemed to shift behind the camera.
“He told me words were seeds,” she said, a small smile pulling at her mouth. “If something hurts, I should plant it on the page instead of carrying it around in my chest.”
Trevor felt his shoulders drop a fraction. Just hearing her settle into herself did something to him. The day had been scraping at his insides for hours, but watching her speak, watching the tremble leave her voice as memory took over, reminded him why he’d fought so hard for this piece to stay.
“I didn’t understand what he meant back then. I just liked the way the notebook smelled.” She laughed softly, and a few people in the crew smiled with her. “But eventually I realized writing gave me somewhere to put things that didn’t make sense yet.”
Her posture loosened as she kept going, like the truth itself was making room in her body.
“My parents had very specific ideas about what my life should look like. Poetry wasn’t one of them.
I kept writing anyway. When things were hard.
When I was grieving. When my body felt like something the world expected me to apologize for.
When relationships didn’t work out.” She glanced toward the window where evening had gone soft and blue.
“Poetry gave me a way to tell the truth without asking permission.”
Trevor swallowed against the sudden tightness in his throat.
“And then recently…something changed.”
Aniyah’s eyes flickered toward Trevor before she could stop them, and that one look landed harder than if she’d pointed him out by name.
“Falling in love changes the way you write,” she said quietly. “You start noticing light in places you didn’t even realize were dark.”
That hit him like a hand to the center of his chest.
Matthew smiled behind the lens, “Cut.”
Aniyah let out a groan and covered her face with both hands, “Well. That slipped out.”
The crew laughed softly, the tension easing as equipment started coming down and conversation returned in low bursts.
Trevor stayed where he was, not trusting himself to say anything yet.
Because what was he supposed to do with that?
She’d just cracked him open on camera, and he was standing there with an apology still drying on the walls.
When the last case was zipped and the last thank you exchanged, the condo had gone quiet again. Aniyah walked everyone to the door with her usual warmth, and Trevor waited near the entryway, bag in hand, feeling the shape of what he wanted to say and knowing none of it should be said tonight.
“Aniyah—”
She leaned her shoulder against the doorframe, arms folded loosely now, watching the elevator numbers change down the hall instead of looking at him, “I need some space tonight.”
Her voice wasn’t angry. If anything, that made it harder. Angry he could’ve fought through. Tired meant the damage had weight.
Trevor nodded, “Okay.” He kissed her on the forehead before moving away.
He picked up his bag and stepped into the hallway. The door closed gently behind him, but her voice stayed with him all the way back to Brooklyn.
Falling in love changes the way you write.
Yeah . He thought, rubbing his hand over his mouth as he headed for the elevator. It also changed the way a man heard his own mistakes.
Leon was sitting on the stoop when Trevor pulled up in front of the brownstone, the porch light casting a warm glow across the brick and the quiet stretch of sidewalk.
The block had settled into its usual nighttime rhythm, laughter drifting from somewhere down the street, a car rolling slow past the corner, somebody’s music muffled behind a closed window.
The house itself felt steady, though. Familiar.
The kind of calm that made a man realize how loud his own head had been all day.
Leon glanced up as Trevor stepped out of the car, and his eyes narrowed almost immediately, taking in the set of Trevor’s shoulders, the way he shut the door a little harder than he meant to. “Evening, you look like shit.”
Trevor climbed the steps and dropped into the chair beside him with a tired exhale, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. “You ever have one of those days where the universe decides you’re the main character in a disaster movie?”
Leon chuckled low, rocking once in his chair. “Son, you look like you wrestled a hurricane.”
“Feels like it.”
They sat in silence for a moment, the kind that didn’t need help.
The night air carried the faint scent of somebody grilling late, and the porch steps still held a little warmth from the day.
Trevor leaned forward, elbows on his knees, staring down at the concrete like it might offer up a better version of the evening if he looked hard enough. “I messed up with Aniyah today.”
Leon didn’t ask what happened. He rarely needed to.
Trevor told him anyway, because the story had been sitting in his chest all night and he was tired of hearing it only in his own head.
He told him about London falling through that morning, about the network trying to gut pieces of the project he cared about, about Katelyn showing up at the office like grief and bad decisions had learned how to wear lip gloss.
When he got to Aniyah’s condo, to the setup she had made for him, to the look on her face after he snapped—his voice had dropped lower and the shame in it was plain enough that he didn’t need to dress it up.
Leon listened the way he always did, quiet and patient, gaze drifting down the block while Trevor talked himself all the way through it. When he finished, Leon leaned back and looked up at the sky like the answer might be written somewhere above the power lines.
“How you treat your woman in your angry moments shows a lot about how you value her in your relationship. Do you honor her enough to still speak with love even when you’re upset? Today it looks like the answer was no to that, Bunny.” Trevor's head hung low at his father’s words. Shame engulfed him.
“You know,” Leon said after a while, “you’ve always been the one who noticed things first.”
Trevor frowned and glanced over. “What does that mean?”
A small smile touched Leon’s mouth. “You figured out I had a crush on Miss Teri before anybody else.”
That pulled the first real huff of laughter out of Trevor all night. “That wasn’t hard.”
“Probably not,” Leon shifted in his chair, resting both hands on his stomach like he was deciding how much truth he felt like handing over. “Teri and I have been seeing each other.”
Trevor blinked once, surprised even though maybe he shouldn’t have been, “Seriously?”
Leon nodded, porch light catching the silver in his beard and at his temples. “For a little while now. ”
Trevor sat back and let that settle. He thought about all the little things he’d clocked and never pushed on.
The way Teri lingered after dinner. The low conversations in the kitchen.
The ease that had started creeping back into his father’s face.
Of course he’d noticed. That man had always looked at life like a puzzle he could solve if he sat with it long enough.
Trevor learned half his own observation from him.
“She’s good for you,” Trevor said.
Leon smiled faintly, “She’s good company. Makes the house feel less empty.”
The words sat there for a second before Leon looked back out toward the street, and when he spoke again his voice had softened in a way Trevor only heard when his mother’s memory was somewhere near.
“Your mother was my soulmate, Trevor. Ain’t no way around that.
Della was the love of my life, and nothing in this world is ever going to replace what we had. ”
Trevor swallowed against the sudden tightness in his throat. Hearing his mother’s name like that would do it every time.
Leon rubbed his jaw, thoughtful. “Teri and I talked about it before anything happened. We had a long talk too. We both had to sit with what it meant to feel something again after losing somebody who meant that much. It’s sad, but I’m happy she knows exactly how I feel…it makes this easier”
“And?” Trevor asked quietly.
Leon let out a low chuckle, more reflection than humor. “Turns out love doesn’t come back the same way.”
He shifted, glancing over at Trevor now,“It’s quieter.”
Trevor raised an eyebrow.
Leon shrugged, “Feels like sitting down on a soft couch after standing all day. Peaceful. Like your shoulders finally remember how to relax.”
Trevor laughed under his breath, “That is the most Dad description of love I’ve ever heard. ”
Leon grinned. “Doesn’t make it less true.”
The grin faded into something gentler as he looked away again, “I’ll always love your mother. Always. But this here? This feels like a second chance at something good. At my age, you don’t waste chances like that.”
Trevor nodded slowly, thinking about Aniyah’s face in the doorway tonight. Thinking about the way she’d looked tired more than angry. Tired enough to ask for distance. Tired enough not to argue when he left.
“You told Jackson and Lou yet?” he asked.
Leon snorted, “Not a chance.”
That pulled a smile out of Trevor, “Yeah, they’d be insufferable.”
“Exactly. I’ll tell them when I feel like being annoyed on purpose.
” They sat in that for a minute, the kind of lightness that only really worked because something heavier was waiting underneath it.
Sure enough, Leon turned his head and fixed Trevor with a look that let him know the soft part of the conversation was over.
“That girl hasn’t left you.”
Trevor exhaled slowly. “I know.”
“But she saw a glimpse today of what loving you could look like if you don’t get a handle on your hurt.”
Trevor winced and looked down at his hands.