Page 87 of When a Soul Cries

This time it wasn’t as heavy.

I looked toward the hallway where Halo slept, then at my best friend beside me.

She looked exhausted.

Still scared.

Still carrying too much.

But she wasn’t carrying it alone anymore.

Even if she didn’t know exactly how much I could carry.

My eyes drifted toward the eviction notice one more time.

Soon.

I was going to have to tell her.

Maybe not tonight.

Tonight wasn’t the night to drop another bomb in her lap.

But soon.

Not because I had known she was struggling.

I hadn’t.

Because now that I knew, I couldn’t pretend the money didn’t matter.

I had kept it hidden to protect myself from the past.

I had kept my lifestyle the same to keep people from noticing.

I had kept working my part-time job so nobody would wonder what changed.

But Sol wasn’t the past.

She was my family.

And watching her drown while I stood on the shore pretending I didn’t have a life jacket was something else entirely.

I couldn’t do that.

Not to her.

I stood and stretched.

“Come on.”

She looked up at me. “Where?”

“To bed.”

“I’m not tired.”

“Girl, you just cried yourself damn near dehydrated.”