“Aren’t you?”
“Maybe I just don’t want what you’re trying to have anymore. Have you ever thought of that?”
“I have, but then why keep letting me come here if that’s how you feel, Joseph? You don’t seem like the kind of man who plays games, so why?”
“Joyce, I am dealing with a lot right now and even though I haven’t let the possibility of being permanently paralyzed make me bitter, I am scared. So, I haven’t spent much energy outside of that thinking about what this could be,” I tell her.
“I understand,” she says so quietly I had to strain to hear her. Before I could say more, Atlas walks in.
“It looks like you have another visitor, and you have an appointment soon so be ready,” he says.
“I’ll get out of your hair then,” she says as she begins to clean up lunch, but I stop her, telling her it wasn’t necessary. She grabs her purse and heads to the door.
“Good-bye, Joseph,” she says. She does not ask if she can come back tomorrow like she has done every day since the first day she came here. When she opens the door to leave my suite, Bree is standing there, obviously the other visitor here to see me. Joyce speaks and walks out. Bree and I visited until it was time for me to get ready for my appointment.
“What are you doing, Joseph?”
“What do you mean, Atlas?”
“Don’t sit there and act like you don’t know what the hell I am talking about. For months you walked around here like a pissed off wounded bear because you wanted to be with this woman, and she was making it hard for you. You, Josh, Jaasiel and Jabarri have always had things come to y’all easy. You never really had to work for anything. You’ve never really had it hard and because of that I think y’all forget that for some people shit is just hard. I never forget; the scar on my face never lets me forget. But so the fuck what if you had to wait and work for something? And so what it took you almost dying for her to recognize how much you mean to her? If you were doing me the way you are doing her, I wouldn’t have come back the first time Bree showed up while I was here. You gave me some good advice when I was in my feelings about True and I am going to return the favor. You better decide and quickly who Joyce is to you and go get her ass and stop acting like a bitch, cause the look she had on her face today when she left said she’s not coming back. If you can live with the fact that she is most likely leaving Mississippi and you won’t see her again, then let her go, but if that possibility makes you feel like you can’t breathe, stop this bullshit game you are playing and go get the woman you love!”
He says nothing else on the subject and helps me get dressed so we can get to my appointment. Lennox has some x-rays done and we head back home. Once she looks at them and consults with a doctor friend of hers, she will come by the house to discuss my options, if I have any. In the meantime, I have a call to make.