Page 213 of Buy Back My Love

“We almost done,” I told him.

“Too slow.”

Then he ran back toward the other kids.

Lee laughed against my chest.

“He’s yours.”

“Now he’s mine?”

“He’s been yours since he learned how to get on my nerves.”

I laughed and kissed her just as the song started fading out. Everybody around us clapped, and Lee took my hand as we moved off the dance floor.

I watched Myles run back to JJ, Jaliyah, and Zuri.

JJ was five now and took being the oldest seriously whenever it benefited him. Myles followed him around like everything he said was law, Jaliyah stayed right there with both of them, and Zuri, Anika and Trevon’s daughter, chased behind all three on her little short legs determined not to get left out. Watching them run through this yard still got me sometimes.

After Poppa died, Skye asked if I was keeping the house. I told her I didn’t know because a place this big deserved kids running through it, and at the time all I had was Snoop.

Now somebody’s toy was always under my foot. JJ and Jaliyah were over enough that nobody thought anything about seeing them here anymore. Lee and Hannah had figured out how to make that work for the kids. They still weren’t friends, but they could be around each other now without dragging all the old shit into every conversation.

Most of what they talked about was kid stuff anyway. Birthdays. Pickups. Somebody getting sick. School. Whatever needed handling. That was about it.

The kids got to know each other, and that was what mattered.

JB wasn’t around to complicate things anymore. The federal investigation involving his trucking company ended with him taking a plea and getting twelve years. Hannah never married him. By the time he was sentenced, the ring was gone, and she was back running House of Hannah full-time.

His plea also forced him to finally put something on paper he should’ve admitted years earlier. The drugs and money found inside Love-Lee had belonged to him.

Lee’s lawyer took that admission and went back after her conviction. I was at the shop the day her lawyer called. Lee stood behind the front desk with the phone pressed to her ear, barely saying anything besides a few quiet yeses. At one point she asked him to repeat himself. When the call ended, she lowered the phone and stared at the screen for a few seconds.

“It’s vacated,” she said.

Then she broke down.

I barely made it around the desk before she covered her face and started crying like a baby. Her knees gave out and I caught her. She grabbed onto my shirt while I wrapped both arms around her.

I didn’t say much. There wasn’t much to say. Five years were still gone. The call didn’t put them back. It didn’t undo everything she lost while she was locked up or everything she came home and had to deal with afterward.

So I just held her. She cried against my chest until she could finally breathe without another sob coming out, and I stayed there until she was ready to pull away. After that, she called Maisie and Anika, then sat back down and cried some more.

I couldn’t give her those five years back. But I could hold her through that part.

Another song had started by the time Lee leaned into my side, and I looked past her toward the house.

Poppa and Memaw’s pictures were still inside. A lot of their old things were still there too, mixed in with everything me, Lee, and Myles had added over the last two years.

Holly had somehow taken over our bed. Snoop was getting older and had less patience for Myles climbing all over him, but every night he still slept near his bedroom.

The house didn’t feel empty anymore. Neither did my life.

Love-Lee had outgrown Malcom’s back suite before Myles turned one. Lee stayed there a little longer because she liked the space, but eventually she found a storefront she wanted and signed the lease herself.

The first time I saw LOVE-LEE NAILS across the front window, I pulled in even though I knew she was working.

She looked up from somebody’s nails when I walked inside.