Page 12 of Do You Right

We stopped to look at the choppy water. The wind was picking up, and thunder rolled in the distance. I wasn’t sure if we would make it back home before the sky opened up, but getting back on good terms with Chai was important to me. I really couldn’t go another day being ignored, or I might’ve actually lost my mind.

Chai got excited when she saw a family of ducks playing in the water below us. My eyes were on her because her smile made life worth living. Everything she did intrigued me and made studying her worth it.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” she asked, snapping me out of the trance her beauty had me in.

“Just wondering how a woman so beautiful knows how to fight so good.”

Her laughter spilled out of her, even though she tried to clamp a hand over her mouth to stop it. She leaned up from the railing and slowly turned to look at me. My eyes never left hers, so I could see the wheels in her mind spinning. “I spent five years in prison,” she shared, rocking my entire world.

I shot up straight as a board. “Wait, . . . what? You?”

Without a response, she spun around and raced to the fruit stand behind us. I had to silently wait for her to get what she wanted. All the while questions burned my tongue for a chance to get out. I followed behind her like a dog on a leash as she led us over to a bench. She sat down fully indulged in her mango slices with tajin while I desperately waited to hear more about her past.

“I had a boyfriend . . . my first and only one, to be matter fact. I was studying at Julliard and met him during one of the summers when I came back home on break. You couldn’t convince me that it wasn’t love. He was the classic bad-boy type, but to me, he was still a good person.” Hearing her talk about another man had my fist balling up in jealousy, but I managed to keep my mouth closed. “My parents hated the earth he walked on, and my relationship with him was my first time ever going against them. I kept trying to convince them that he was a good guy, and they didn’t need to judge him so harshly, but unfortunately, I learned the hard way that they were right.”

I watched her chin drop to her chest in defeat. Unsure of what else to do, I reached for her free hand and held it tightly so she’d know she wasn’t alone. I was thankful she trusted me with this part of her story. I could tell it was heavy, and she was still working through her feelings about it. “Does this boyfriend have something to do with you ending up on the streets and in prison?”

She nodded sadly. “Yeah. I’ve only been home for a few months. I happened to be with him during a drug bust, and they were not lenient with me, even though I claimed not to know anything. I had cut my parents off for him, and by the time I came home, they’d moved. The only thing they left behind was my violin with a neighbor. Initially, I wasn’t playing for money on the streets. I was just doing what I loved to help ease the pain, and one day, people started dropping money into my case.” She swiped at her teary eyes before casting them on the water in the distance. “I never expected to be separated from my parents, but I know I disappointed them. They poured everything into me and my career, and I let it all go to waste behind a man.”

My instincts took over as I wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her into me. I placed a soft kiss on the side of her head that made her cling to me a little tighter. Even though she’d cut them off first, I was angry with her parents for moving on with life without her. Everyone made mistakes. How could they leave their daughter out here like this on her own? I couldn’t see myself doing my child like that no matter what they’d done.

“Well, if you want some parents and a little sister, I will happily donate mine to you. They already love you, so it’s not even a problem. Actually, they might love you even more than they love me.”

I was happy to hear her laugh because what she’d shared with me had turned her serious. Since moving in, I’d gotten to know her real smile, and it was too beautiful to be buried by worry and sadness. “Oh, please. Mrs. Carter would never give up her baby boy.”

“True. I am one of a kind.”

She nodded as her eyes slowly made their way to mine. I saw sadness in their depths, and I prayed that, in time, it would go away. After hearing a little more about her story, I understood that Chai was on her own in this world. But with a nigga like me in her life, she never would be again.

“Yes, you are . . . Thank you, KC. I actually had a lot of fun with you this evening. I can admit the last few years haven’t been easy, but since meeting you, it finally feels like things are looking up for me.”

“Because they are. Look.” I pointed to the sky filled with big, dark, and menacing looking clouds. “Right now, it looks like once it starts storming that it’ll never stop, but it never rains forever. The sun always finds a way to break through one way or another. All you have to do is hold on.”

She shocked me when she tossed her arms around my waist and hugged me tightly. I smiled, feeling overjoyed by her close proximity, and after the shock wore off, I hugged her back. Something about the gesture honestly made it feel like everything was right in the world. “If talking ever gets too hard, let me be your shoulder to cry on. If you ever get tired of crying, just hold me. Whatever you need and whatever it takes, I’m here for you, Chai.”

“Why?” she asked with tears on the verge of spilling over. “We’re strangers. Why do you care so much about me?”

“Shit, at one point, me and my mama was strangers too. And I cared about you way faster than her. You should feel special, beautiful.” I smiled, hearing her laugh the way I wanted her to. She whacked me across the arm, and I hissed like I was in pain. “But to answer your question, I just like you. Your companionship has also been a breath of fresh air. And honestly, underneath that tough exterior, I see a girl who just needs someone to remind her that she is not her mistakes. Yeah, you trusted the wrong nigga in the past, but it doesn’t have to control the rest of your life. Bury that shit and go find your joy.”

Out of nowhere, she hopped up and ran to the railing by the riverwalk. “I’m finding my joy!” she shouted loud enough for everyone nearby to hear. She got a few questioning glances, but for the most part, people kept going about their business. However, I was stuck watching the girl who was quickly taking up all the space in my life and my heart. I didn’t know why her joy was so important to me, but I planned to do everything in my power to not only help her find hers but to keep it for a lifetime.

“Oh my goodness. Look at those cheeks.” I cooed before pulling KC’s baby pictures closer to me.

Yesterday, Mrs. Carter had mentioned having a photo album of KC when he was a baby, so I’d asked to see it. She showed up with it today, when she came to drop off Kava. Instead of a proper tutoring session, we’d been busy fawning over his photos for the last hour while Kava practiced scales in my bedroom.

“Stop, this is too stinking cute,” I said about the photo of him with a do-rag and pacifier in his mouth. He was holding a baseball in his hand which got me to thinking. “How old was KC when he first started playing?”

Mrs. Carter fanned her eyes that began to tear up. “Seems like just yesterday my little baby was stumbling around my feet, and now he’s a grown man. He officially started with T-ball when he was three years old. My husband always loved baseball and wanted him to play. He wasn’t going to force him to be the best or anything like that, but KC took a liking to the sport, and the rest is history. Look here.”

She flipped deeper into the album to the section labeled Baseball Files. The first photo was KC in his little T-ball uniform, and each photo from there showed him growing over the years. My favorites were the ones where his front teeth were missing. As he grew older, you could see his confidence in the way he went from smiling to smirking, as if he knew he was the best player on the field.

There was one photo I got a flash of while she was flipping, so I asked her to go back. “Is that JoJo?”

Mrs. Carter sucked her teeth with a nod. “Yes, that’s his ass. Josiah’s been in KC’s life since his very first team.”

Glancing to the left, I noticed the frown she sported. “Why do I get the feeling you don’t like him?”

She patted my hand with a grin. “Is it that obvious?” I nodded, trying my best to hold in my laugh. “I’ve tried to get to know him, but the more I do, the more I don’t like him as a friend for my baby. I don’t trust him and have always got the feeling he’s jealous of my son. Oh, and don’t get me started on the way he lives off him and takes advantage of KC’s kind heart.”