I don’t answer, but in some ways, she is. I don’t want to hurt Iris, but before she found her husband, August, she chose badly, and that man hurt her. He trapped her. He kept her, and by the time she escaped, it was almost too late.
“We all make mistakes,” Iris finally replies when I don’t.
“Is that what you call what Mama did?” I ask, a serrated edge to my voice. “I’m here feeling this, living this because of her ‘mistake’? No, thank you.”
“So what are you gonna do about it?”
“I’ve sworn off dick.”
Iris chokes on the other end. “We’ll see how long that lasts,” she says. “What about that photographer you brought to the Christmas party?”
“Chase?” I suck my teeth. “Just a fuckboi.”
I don’t want to tell her I cried the last time Chase and I had sex. There are limits to what I can expose.
“You haven’t met anyone?” Iris asks. “Gorgeous girl like you in New York living the glamorous life. Surely there’s a guy.”
Glamorous? At this moment, my life is restricted to this closet, and in the life beyond that door, I haven’t met many guys worth my time. Definitely not many guys who’d put up with the train wreck I am right now. Except . . . maybe . . .
“There’s a guy. Maybe,” I admit reluctantly, unwilling to tell Iris it’s Kenan. She’s been encouraging me to consider him since that day in the hospital. “But I think he could be the worst option of all because he seems too good to be true. That usually means they are.”
“But you like him,” Iris says, a smile re-entering her tone.
“Yeah, I like him,” I admit. “But I won’t trust him.”
“Well, trust has to be earned. I’m living proof. August took his time getting me to trust him. Proving I could. Maybe if you give this guy some time, time to watch him, to know him, maybe he’s the real deal.”
“Maybe. He asked if we can keep it simple and get to know each other over the su
mmer.”
“Well you can decide to give him a chance, or not, but . . .” Iris draws and exhales a breath quickly. “But either way you need to talk to someone.”
“Huh?” I sit up straighter. “I don’t need to talk to anyone.”
“So you think you’re better than me?”
“What? Course, not, Bo.”
“Well didn’t you tell me I needed to talk to someone? When I was struggling with my past, isn’t that what you told me?”
Damn, I did tell her that. Advice is so much easier to follow when you’re giving it to someone else.
“I’ll think about it.”
“And what about Mr. Too Good To Be True?” Iris asks, her voice lighter. “You gonna think about him, too?”
I grin and chastise my heart for skipping a beat at the thought of Kenan Ross. “Not if I can help it.”
6
Kenan
“You’re going soft, Glad.”
No one in the NBA could get away with that lie, but considering my sister plays in the WNBA, she can.
“Oh, yeah?” I ask adjusting my earpiece and stripping off my sweat-drenched shorts and shirt. “I’ve been up since four-thirty and worked out for the last two hours. You?”