“It’s all good.”Then he handed me an unopened bottle of water from the backseat.
“You have everything in here,” I commented, unscrewing the cap.
“I’m a dad.Can’t be caught without the essentials.Especially not with my type-A, autistic child.I’d never hear the end of it.You need pads?A granola bar?Maybe some hand sanitizer?I got you covered.”Then he lifted the center console lid to reveal his stash of goodies, with indeed, half a dozen period pads.
His little preparedness kit only endeared me to him more.
“Do you have a mint or some gum?”I asked after drinking half of the water bottle.
“Spear or pepper?”
“Pepper,” I said with a smile, watching him dig around the center console until he came up with a metal container of peppermints.He opened it, and I took one.“Thank you.”
“I’m sorry for unloading that on you.It’s never easy to hear.”
“It can’t be easy to retell either.”
“It’s not, but … it’s gotten easier.I know I did nothing wrong.I was a victim of so many different kinds of abuse.I was a child, and my father and Kyla treated me horribly.”
“Where did you go after they were sent to prison?”
“My best friend’s parents were foster parents.Caleb wasn’t a foster kid.He was their bio kid, but they had other foster kids.Kai, being one of them.He’s a friend of Spencer Paxton’s here, and that’s how I heard about the job opening.But Dawn and Irv saved me.They took me in and treated me like their own.Then, when Mabel was born, they helped me get custody and raise her.I was able to continue playing basketball, and I got a full scholarship to Florida State.We already lived in Tallahassee, so I could live at home, raise Mabel, and go to school.Then I got injured in my second season—’jumper’s knee’, they call it.Add in my already bum elbow …” He pointed to the same arm his father had broken, and where he had screws.“Good ol‘ Dad.Even with the screws and plate and surgery, my elbow was never the same.I still have a limited range of motion with it.It was also when we started to notice things with Mabel’s behavior and began the process of assessments for her.I knew that I couldn’t have a kid like Mabel, go to school, and play basketball.Something had to go.My dreams of the NBA were gone because of my injury, so I chose my child and my education.I quit the team, but switched my major to education.”
“Have you …” I cleared my throat.“Have you seen your father or Kyla since …”
“Since I was brought onto the stand at thirteen years old, my arm in a cast, with the hospital x-rays and doctor’s notes as some of the submitted evidence?No.I haven’t seen either of them.”
We sat there in silence for a little while, watching the birds and waves.What was I supposed to say after all of that?What words could come even remotely close to being any source of comfort?
“Thank you for listening,” he finally said, wrapping his arms around me.
I spun to face him and took his cheeks in my hands.“You are, without a doubt, the strongest person I have ever met.And I live with three women who escaped a fucking cult.Lennox, the shit you have had to overcome … and now you’re raising this bright, beautiful daughter, and doing a fantastic job of it.Thank you for trusting me with this.Your secret is safe with me.”
His throat moved on a swallow, and his lips twisted into a bashful smile.
I swept my thumbs across his cheekbones as if he had tears there, but he didn’t.I wasn’t ready to let go of him though.I wasn’t ready to stop staring into those gentle, brown eyes and the unwavering strength and resilience behind them.
“I want to kiss you again,” he rasped.
I shook my head.“I just puked.”
“Then you drank some water and had a mint.I don’t mind.”
“You’re sure?”
He nodded.“Completely.”Then he cupped my cheeks in his hands, while I cupped his, and we slowly, cautiously pressed our lips together.
It only took a second for the awkwardness to dissipate and for us to smile against each other’s mouths.He wrapped his arms around my waist, and I looped mine around his neck, and we started to make out.
There was no grinding, no heavy petting.Just two adults, acting like teenagers—because we didn’t get the chance to do this in our teens—making out at a lookout.
Even though the mood had been dark, it quickly shifted.Weshifted it.
Kyla, Ephram, and Lennox’s father had no place in this truck with us.They didn’t deserve our energy.So, we pushed them out.We pushed them off the cliff onto the rocks below.
His kisses were playful.He skimmed his lips across my cheek, down my jaw and neck, then back up the other side.I smiled and tilted my head to the side a little to give him better access.
Trailing his hands up my sides, he tugged on the elastics at the ends of my plats, then gently unfurled my braids so he could thread his fingers into my hair at the scalp.
