12. Josiah #2
Dinner loosened us. She told me about Celestial Crowns and the women who came in carrying work stress, church news, blood pressure updates, and secrets tucked beneath bonnets. I told her about the first time I shocked myself at fifteen because confidence had convinced me instruction was optional.
Celeste covered her mouth. “You? Mr. Safety First?”
“I was fifteen and stupid.”
“What happened?”
“Pops made me write a two-page reflection titled Electricity Doesn’t Care About Your Ego.”
She laughed so hard she put her fork down. “I know you lying.”
“I wish I was.”
“Did you learn?”
“I learned not to tell Mama first. She made me write a prayer too.”
Her laugh came full that time, rich enough to make me forget the food cooling between us.
After dinner, she helped me clear the table despite my objections. She washed. I dried. She hummed under her breath without realizing it. The rosemary watched from the window. Her creamer sat in my refrigerator. Snacks for her children waited on a shelf.
The house felt different with her in it.
She handed me a plate. “You keep everything where it makes sense.”
“I try.”
“That must be peaceful.”
“It is now.”
Her eyes lifted to mine.
I put the plate away and rested both hands on the counter.
She folded the towel slowly. “Now?”
I looked toward the dark window. “There were years where peaceful wasn’t a word I could use.”
She leaned back against the counter and waited.
I wiped a drop of water from the edge of the sink. “You remember at The Blooming Room when I said I had to learn the difference between loyalty and surrender?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“That story starts with my Uncle Zeke.”
Her brows drew in.
“My daddy had a twin brother. Jezekiah Brooks, but everybody calls him Zeke. He’s family in every loud, complicated, loving way family can be.
Funny. Slick-mouthed. Protective when he’s right.
Dangerous to himself when he’s wrong.” I looked toward the dark window over the sink. “He wasn’t always the man he is now.”
Celeste set the towel down and gave me her full attention.
“I was nineteen. Young enough to think family instructions didn’t need questions and old enough for the law to stop treating me like somebody’s child.
Zeke handed me some keys one afternoon and asked me to take a car to the wash for him.
Simple errand. Ten minutes there, ten minutes back.
I got in, turned the music up, pulled out too fast, and forgot to signal at the light. ”
Celeste’s face shifted.
I nodded once. “Blue lights.”
“Oh, Josiah.”
“I wasn’t worried at first. I had my license. I wasn’t speeding. I was irritated more than scared.” My hand tightened around the edge of the counter. “Then they searched the car.”
Her voice went quiet. “What was in it?”
“Enough.”
She closed her eyes for a second.
“It wasn’t mine. I didn’t know it was there. But I was the one behind the wheel. I was the one with the keys in my hand. I was the one standing on the side of the road while officers pulled somebody else’s choices out of a car I had no business driving.”
Celeste whispered, “Did Zeke know?”
That question sat between us for a long moment.
“I asked myself that for years.”
She didn’t move.
“I know what he told me. I know what I wanted to believe. I know what the lawyer said we could argue. And I know what my family looked like when his name came up in that courtroom.” I looked back at her.
“That’s where loyalty got ugly. It wasn’t just the car.
It was the silence after. It was everybody scared of what truth might cost. It was me thinking I could carry it because I was young and strong, and nobody had taught me yet that strong people can still be used. ”
Her hand went to her chest. “You did time for it?”
“Three years.”
Her mouth parted. “Three years?”
I nodded. “Three years.”
“For an errand?”
“For possession. For being in the wrong car with the wrong last name and too much loyalty sitting in my throat.”
A tear slipped down her cheek before she could stop it.
I shook my head. “You don’t have to hide that.”
She whispered, “I hate that happened to you.”
“I hated it too.”
“And Zeke?”
I breathed through my nose. “Zeke had to live with what his mess cost me. Whether he knew exactly what was in that car or not, he knew the life he was close to. He knew what could happen when you let dirty things sit too near clean people.”
Celeste wiped her cheek. “Do you still love him?”
“I do.”
“How?”
“With boundaries. With truth. With forgiveness that doesn’t pretend nothing happened.” I leaned back against the counter. “He had to earn his way back into my life. He did. Not with speeches. With years.”
She nodded slowly, tears still bright. “That’s why you’re so careful.”
“It’s part of it.”
“Domonique too?”
“Yes.”
“And your daddy?”
“Yes.”
She stepped closer and placed her hand against my chest, right over my heart.
I covered it with mine.
She looked up at me. “Thank you for telling me.”
“You don’t look scared.”
“I am,” she said softly. “Just not of you.”
I lowered my head for a moment.
That one got inside me.
Then she gave a small laugh that broke at the end. “I came over here thinking we were going to eat, flirt, and watch a movie. Now I’m crying in your kitchen.”
“You want me to fight whoever made you cry?”
“It was you.”
“I’ll speak to myself.”
That got me the laugh I wanted.
She wiped under her eyes. “Please do.”
I dampened a paper towel and handed it to her. “For your face.”
She took it. “You keep making me cry, then providing supplies.”
“That’s not my ministry.”
“It might be.”
She pressed the towel beneath her eyes, then leaned back against the counter. “Can I say something without you thinking I’m being dramatic?”
“I already like dramatic women.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Excuse you.”
“Say it.”
She looked toward the rosemary before she spoke. “Sometimes, I think I don’t deserve this.”
“This?”
“You. Dates. Laughing. Being looked at like this. Having somebody think about my kids before he even meets them properly. Being prayed over. Being wanted.” She swallowed.
“I had a great love already, Josiah. A pure one. A real one. And sometimes, it feels selfish to ask God for that again when some people live their whole lives and never get loved like that once.”
I stayed quiet.
She needed space more than rescue.
Her voice softened. “What makes me so special that I get to be loved twice? What makes me different from the women still waiting? What makes me worthy of that much tenderness again?”
I looked at her and let the easy answers die before they reached my mouth.
Then I held out my hand.
“Can I pray with you?”
Celeste blinked. “Right now?”
“Right now.”
She stared at my hand.
I said, “Before I answer you with my mouth, I want to cover you with something stronger than my opinion.”
Her face changed.
Slowly, she placed her hand in mine.
I led her to the small table near the kitchen window. The rosemary sat between us and the night. I held both her hands, waited until her breathing steadied, then bowed my head.
“Father, thank You for Celeste.”
Her fingers tightened.
“Thank You for the love she had, for the life she built, for the children You trusted to her, and for every day You helped her stand when standing cost more than people could see. Thank You for Jamal’s love and the way it still bears fruit in this family.
Thank You that remembrance is not rejection, and new joy doesn’t dishonor old love. ”
Her breath caught.
“God, be gentle with every place in her that still flinches. Remind her that tenderness isn’t a limited resource in Your hands.
Remind her that being loved before doesn’t disqualify her from being loved again.
Teach her heart that she isn’t greedy for wanting warmth.
She isn’t selfish for wanting companionship. She isn’t betraying anybody by living.”
A soft sound left her.
“If You’re allowing me to stand near her, correct me before I mishandle her.
Slow me down when I need wisdom. Strengthen me where protection requires patience.
Give me clean hands, a disciplined heart, and love that knows how to serve without trying to own.
Cover her children. Cover her home. Cover every memory that still aches and every hope that’s scared to lift its head.
Let peace meet her here tonight. Not pressure. Not confusion. Peace.”
Her tears hit our joined hands.
“In Jesus’ name, amen.”
For a few seconds, neither of us moved.
Then Celeste lowered her head, and her shoulders shook once.
I stepped closer, but I didn’t pull her to me.
She came on her own.
Her forehead pressed against my chest first, then her hands curled into my shirt. I wrapped my arms around her and held her like something entrusted. Her tears soaked through the cotton near my sternum. I lowered my cheek to the top of her hair and closed my eyes.
She whispered against my chest, “I don’t know what to do with you.”
“You don’t have to do anything with me tonight. Just breathe.”
“That sounds like instructions.”
“It is.”
“You bossy too.”
“I’m structured.”
She lifted her face, eyes wet, mouth soft, cheeks flushed from crying and trying not to. “You prayed for Jamal.”
“I did.”
“Why?”
“Because loving you means respecting who loved you before me.”
Her face nearly crumpled again.
I touched her cheek with my thumb. “Celeste.”
“I’m okay.”
“You sure?”
“No,” she said, laughing softly. “But I’m not bad.”
“I can work with not bad.”
She glanced toward the living room. “Maybe we should watch that movie before I flood your kitchen.”
“I have towels.”
She pointed at me. “Don’t.”
I smiled and grabbed the cobbler from the counter. “Movie it is.”
In the living room, she noticed the throw blanket on the sofa and smiled to herself.
“You planned for me to get comfortable?”
“I hoped you would.”
“That was honest.”
“I’m learning your suspicious face.”
“It’s hereditary.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
She sat at one end of the couch, careful at first, knees tucked slightly beneath her. I sat with space between us and handed her the remote.