She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Long as it ain’t you cookin’, I’m good.”
I laughed under my breath and shook my head at her, already knowin’ that was gon’ be the answer every time I asked.
That’s how it stayed between us though; just talkin’ shit back and forth, keepin’ it light without tryin’ too hard and findin’ small moments to laugh even with everything that had happened.
‘Nelle still had that same gorgeous energy about her. She was still jokin’, runnin’ her damn mouth and still bein’ herself even with that shoulder botherin’ her more than she let on. I could see it though, even when she tried to play it off, and that’s why I stayed on top of what I needed to do when it came to her.
Every day, I made sure her wound got cleaned right and wrapped up the way it was supposed to be.
“Sit still, girl, damn,” told her one time when she shifted.
“I am sittin’ still,” she replied, lookin’ at me like I was annoyin’ her.
“You just moved,” I replied, keepin’ my hand on her shoulder. “Relax for a second.”
She rolled her eyes but leaned back anyway, lettin’ me finish, and I ain’t miss the fact that she trusted me enough to let me handle her like this without questionin’ it.
That mattered more than she probably realized.
We stayed in separate rooms the whole time, and I kept it like that on purpose, but I was never fully checked out on her, not even when I was in my own space.
A couple nights, I caught myself wakin’ up and walkin’ down the hallway, just to make sure everything was quiet on her end before I went back to lay down.
I ain’t knock or make it obvious. I just needed to know she was good.
Pressure and Kay’Lo stayed callin’ me. Every time my phone rang, I already knew what they was on.
“Y’all niggas be doin’ too much,” I told them one afternoon, sittin’ on the couch with ‘Nelle while she had a movie playin’ in the background. “She straight. I got it.”
“Make sure you keep it like that,” Kay’Lo said.
Toni and Pluto stayed on her phone the same way. Her phone would go off, she’d answer, talk her shit for a minute, then toss it somewhere like she was done dealin’ with it for the day. She ain’t shut them out, but she wasn’t sittin’ here entertainin’ it all day either.
Outside of that, it was just us in the house.
We watched whatever she pulled up on Netflix. We went back and forth about what was trash and what was actually good.
I realized I ain’t have to overthink nothin’ with Sha’Nelle, and she ain’t make me feel like I needed to explain every move I made.
That alone made a difference, and if I’m bein’ real, that’s part of why I stayed.
It wasn’t just about her gettin’ shot, even though that was enough on its own. It was the fact that I knew what kind of time this city was on, and I knew what Toni had already told me about her people. I ain’t trust that shit enough to leave her by herself while niggas who crossed that line was still somewhere out there movin’ around. So I stayed.
By the fifth night, everything felt calm on the surface, but I knew better than to think that meant Sha’Nelle was really good, ’cause I knew she her moments.
I was in my room with the TV low, not really payin’ attention to it, but just listenin’ to the house when I heard ‘Nelle’s voice.
It wasn’t loud, but I could still hear sounds comin’ from down the hall that made me pause and listen a lil’ closer. Then it turned into cryin’, and that’s what made me get up.
I walked down the hallway and pushed ‘Nelle’s door was open. The lamp was on with the light hittin’ the side of her face while she sat up in m bed with tears fallin’ like she couldn’t stop ’em.
She had been holdin’ it together this whole time, keepin’ it light, jokin’ and actin’ like she was good, even though I knew better. This was the part she ain’t wanna show but I seen it anyway.
I ain’t say nothin’ at first. I looked at her for a second, then turned and walked back to my room, and grabbed my gun.
I already knew wasn’t nobody in the house, but that wasn’t the point. The point was what Sha’Nelle needed to feel when I walked back in the room.
When I walked back in, I set my gun on the dresser right beside the bed. It was close enough where I could reach it without even thinkin’.
