Page 50 of The Perfect Verse
Kaleela sighed, then touched the link Shonasia sent to her cellphone. It was a woman, but not a face she’d recognized. What pulled her in was that she was at a concert. She’d posted a few pictures, some alone and a few others with two other women, but when she slid to one that had a familiar face, she’d damn near dropped her cellphone. It was Donovan. She picked it back up and clicked on the uploaded live with shaky hands.
“I know y’all see me! It’s your girl, Seritaaaaa,” the girl sang. “Front row seats so that nigga can see me. Scooter, baby, you made it! I love you! Y’all hoes could never!” Kaleela began to hyperventilate, her cellphone falling through her fingers on the floor.
“Kaleela, who the hell was that? Kaleela!” Chaney reached for her cellphone and picked it up, following the link. She was horrified, especially when she realized the man that Kaleela had to be dealing with was none other than Scooter himself.
Chapter 22
Verse Twenty-Two
Chaney woke up, her eyes swollen yet dry from crying all night. She rolled over and saw Shonasia sitting there with Kaleela’s head in her lap as she slept. The house was quiet, too quiet for two little boys she’d expect to be up and about. She swung her legs around, gripping the cover over her legs as her head pounded.
They sat in silence. Chaney mostly because she didn’t know what to say. Shonasia because she knew if she said how she felt, it would only make shit worse. Chaney couldn’t believe that was what had become of all three of them. She looked up to Shonasia like a big sister at one point, a friend who poured into her when Kaleela was the source of her tears. A shell of her sat, staring at the wall as she comforted her sister.
“Hi,” Chaney whispered, not wanting to wake Kaleela up. Shonasia lifted her brow, giving her her attention. She didn’t hate Chaney. She hated that Chaney wasn’t strong enough to walk away long before her heart opened up to a man, and not just any man, but a man she’d fallen in love with.
“Right.” She realized quickly that it was pointless. She didn’t need Shonasia’s forgiveness anyway although she thought theywere cool. What she needed to do was figure out her own life and why she kept choosing people who never chose her.
“I’ll be on my way. Tell them boys it was great meeting them.”
“They’re not here,” she spoke, then smiled as she rubbed Kaleela’s blond mane. “I had X come pick them up early this morning before you two woke up. I used my key.”
“Oh.” Chaney grabbed her tights and eased them beneath the blanket that shielded her. She slid them up her thighs just enough before she stood. After she folded the blanket, she paused. “I need to use the bathroom, wash my face at least.”
“You know the way. You practically lived here before.” The shade she’d tossed didn’t go unnoticed.
She was close to cursing Shonasia out. She’d done nothing personally to her except move on with her life. Leaving her salon wasn’t just for her own sanity but to provide for herself. She was talented, and while she was grateful that she took her under her wing, she refused to kiss her ass.
“On second thought, never mind.” She reached for her clutch when Shonasia kissed her teeth. She was over Chaney and Kaleela. They both had gotten on her nerves, and she was at her wits’ end. “I won’t come back. I get it. I’m the enemy, the one who broke your sister’s heart.”
“She needed that,” Shonasia revealed, surprising her. “Until that happened, she was pretending that all the shit that happened to us, to her, from our childhood, was behind us.”
Shonasia’s orbs filled with tears. She tilted her head back and dabbed each corner. If she could carry her sister’s pain, pull it out of her chest, and place it inside her own body, she would in a heartbeat.
Since she couldn’t, she coddled her like she was still a toddler with the cutest smile and gums with a few teeth, looking for her to hold her hand as she attempted to walk. All she ever wanted for Kaleela was to walk on her own.
“It’s not, since we both carry it everywhere with us, pouring our fucked-up sins on motherfuckers. The ones who get to clean it up are the people who don’t even know the half as to why we are so fucked up.”
“I know,” Chaney confessed, twisting the bottom of her shirt as she lowered her head. “Some of it at least.”
Shonasia shifted just a little, wondering what all of Chaney knew. There were things she still hadn’t shared with her husband-to-be just yet. It was shit she was ashamed of, shit that made her feel dirty. She figured Kaleela had hidden some from her, too. While trying to protect the other, they let the shit that happened to them fester inside, in secret.
“Then you haven’t even touched the tip of it. She drowns it in liquor, pills, and pussy. I drown mine in work, controlling her every damn move or try to and leave just enough for X to love.” Her eyes lifted and locked in with Chaney’s. “Scooter was the first man she ever showed interest in, like reciprocating it.”
She grinned when Kaleela mumbled and frowned in her sleep. She knew her baby sister. She was kicking Scooter’s ass.
“See, she wants to beat his ass even now. Crazy damn girl.”
“I still can’t believe it.” Chaney tucked her lips. She shouldn’t have felt a way, but she did. Still, she shelved her feelings because no matter how she felt, her heart was still with Donovan. “What were the chances we’d both end up with cousins?”
“Tell me about it.” Shonasia laughed. “Y’all are a glutton for damn punishment. And I was just starting to like his ass.” She huffed, knowing at some point, she needed to clean up the mess Kaleela had made. “I knew she had to be under some kind of spell to tear her shit up. I’m still wondering how the boys slept through that.”
She knew how, though. It was easy after they’d slept on park benches, in alleys, and on sofas, in spaces that weren’t fit foreven animals to live in, in between running away from one home to the next. Poverty was like white noise—the look of it, the smell of it, the feel of it. You get used to it even though you shouldn’t.
“I’m sorry,” Chaney whispered, her voice shaky. “I never meant to do anything to put anyone in harm’s way, definitely not her. I tried, though. I did, but each time I saw him, it was…” She shrugged and smiled before she took a seat next to Shonasia. She glanced at Kaleela, willing her hand not to touch her.
“I already know.” Shona wrapped her fingers around Chaney’s hand. She still didn’t like how things ended, but she didn’t love her any less. “That was me with Chico… the way you are with Kaleela. You couldn’t tell me he wasn’t mine and I wasn’t his. Months could go by, no words, no contact, nothing, and our paths would cross, and I’d fight him tooth and nail, only to give in.”
She felt her jaw tighten, rage coursing throughout her body from the last and final time she’d allowed Chico to touch her body. She was at her lowest when he should have been at his highest. He was in love, married with children and all, and she was alone, left to pick up the pieces while dealing with a sister who loved the taste of liquor more than herself.
