“J,” I said coolly. “It’s been a while.”
“Yo, Shawn, you guys get out of here. Me and my girl gotta talk.” I internally flinched.
His girl.
He still thought of me as his girl. But I hadn’t been his girl since the day I left Fallowfield Heights.
His guys moved around him, ready to disperse into the party but I said, “They leave. I’ll talk to you if they leave.”
Jermaine’s brow rose. “It’s like that, huh?”
“It’s like that,” I deadpanned, folding my arms over my chest and glaring at him.
“A’ight. I’ll meet you later,” he said to them, and they all filed out of the house.
“I see you got yourself some lap dogs.” I didn’t want to think about what he’d done to earn their respect.
“Come on, My, why you gotta be this way? I thought we could talk.” He swaggered toward me. “Talk, kiss… make up. You owe me, girl.” His hand reached for me, but I swatted it away.
“I owe you nothing more than an explanation.”
“So it’s like that, huh?” Jermaine rubbed his jaw.
“Let’s go outside, I need some air.” I couldn’t breathe with him looking at me like that.
Shouldering past him, I slipped into the cool night. Shona lived in one of the nicer parts of the neighborhood, so we were afforded some privacy. I moved around to the side of the house, where I knew there was a bench, and sat down. Jermaine followed but he didn’t sit. Instead, he towered over me. He seemed taller. Older in the face somehow. No signs of the young man I’d left behind.
“How’s your mama?” I asked, breaking the silence. “Bet she was real disappointed you dropped out of school.”
He clucked his tongue, shrugging. “I did what I had to.”
“Bullshit. School was the only thing working for you.”
“So what? I could look forward to a life of working at the Seven Eleven or collecting glasses for Keelan at the bar. Fuck. That.”
“At least it’d be safe. At least it’d be an honest job.”
“Shit, Mya, three months in wherever the fuck you been and you already talking shit. They brainwashed you out there? Filling your head with dreams of a better life?” He snorted. “I got news for you, baby girl. This is all we got. Life ain’t never gonna be no different.”
My heart ached at his words. For the boy I once knew. Jermaine was blinded by the promise of money and status. He couldn’t see there was another way, like too many men in our neighborhood.
“It didn’t have to be like this,” I whispered, tipping my head back against the cladding.
Jermaine took my hand in his, sliding our fingers together the way he had so many times. But where it once brought me peace, it felt wrong now.
“It was always you, Mya. You were my anchor in this fucked up place we call home. As long as I had you nothing else mattered.”
Tears pricked the corner of my eyes. “We both know that’s not true. I was never enough. If I was, you would have stopped.”
“You left me, you fucking left me,” he repeated, again and again, his voice cracking with pain. I wanted to console him, to give him comfort the way I had so many times before. But I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
“I left because I knew if I stayed, I’d never get out. And I want more, J. I want to go to school and get a degree. I want a house and a family and a job. I want more than... than this.”
“You always were too good for this place.” He stared off into the darkness.
“I’m sorry I ran, I am. But I had no other choice. I watched you get beaten within an inch of your life and then I was assaulted. They assaulted me with your blood on their hands. Do you have any idea what that was like? I thought they were going to…” The words lodged in my throat as the hazy memories flooded my mind.