Page 21 of You Deserve Good Things

Her hand flew to her mouth. “Oh my God . . .”

“I know, sis,” I said proudly. “No CeilingsJacory. Ice Cream Paint Job Jacory. Pull up like,I got her, you don’tJacory. He still looks like he’d knock over a table if somebody called you out your name in a Target.”

She was shaking now. Not scared—overwhelmed.

I stepped over, kneeled in front of her, and took her hands.

“Stop hiding from love because you think you ain’t worthy. You’ve been through hell, yeah. But you came out like a‘I wipe my tears with dollar bills, now I smell like Chanel’type bad bitch. You built yourself back up from ashes. You walk like strength and cry like softness, and that balance? That’s beauty.”

She sniffled, and I wiped the tears off her cheeks like a mama.

“Shaniya Stiles, you are not just worthy of love—youdeserveit. All of it. Messy, deep, real, loud, protective, shout-it-from-the-rooftop love.”

She looked at me with all the heartbreak she’d been carrying.

And then, she nodded. It wasn’t big. It wasn’t loud. But it was the beginning of her saying, “I’m ready.”

I stood up, winked, and threw her a hoodie.

“Put this on. Let’s go get your man.”

Because “6 Foot 7 Foot” said it best?—

“I speak the truth, but I guess that’s a foreign language to y’all.”

And love? Love is always gon’ sound like home when it’s spoken in your name.

Because some people? Some people were the kind of homes that weren’t made of bricks—they were made of love. And Jacory? He was her address, her roots, her redemption. I was just the GPS tryna get her there.

Houston,TX

Some people said time healed everything. They fucking lied.

Four long-ass years since I last saw her. Four damn years since she left without a damn word. Since I had to stand there like a damn fool watching my whole world drive away. And still? She was in my bones. Deep. Like marrow-deep. Her name was carved in every breath I took, and her memory lived in the pauses between my heartbeats.

I tried to move on. God knew I did. I tried to drown her out with work, ambition, and distractions. I let the streets pull me into motion so I wouldn’t feel the stillness she left behind. I tried different faces, different names, different bodies. But none of them tasted like her laugh. None of them smelled like the vanillaand brown sugar she wore on her collarbone. None of them had that energy, that soft thunder that only Shaniya could carry.

She was the dream I couldn’t wake up from and the nightmare I couldn’t sleep through.

I left Chase so fast to head to the area where the university Shaniya attended was located without any real plan. I just hoped I would see her or catch her in passing, so when I received a DM from the same Daniale chick that Chase showed me in the picture with my baby, I never responded to something so fast in my life.

She gave me the third-degree on not playing with her “sis” first, but eventually let me know that Shaniya frequents the bookstore on campus. She also told me to let her know if I needed her assistance because my baby was a track star. I appreciated her for real and was happy Yaya found somebody to look out for her like I used to.

And now, outta nowhere, she was just there. Standing right in front of me. Like she hadn’t ripped my heart out and took it with her to Texas when she left. Parading around like she wasn’t the reason every damn love song made me mad. Simply existing as if she hadn’t haunted my damn prayers every night since.

She didn’t see me at first. She was walking through the bookstore, fingers gliding across covers like they were silk. The way she moved—calm, graceful, like poetry before it’s read aloud in a dimly lit lounge. I didn’t even know why I walked in there—I had just been killing time. However, life had a funny-ass way of showing you mercy when you had given up on it. And there she was.

Same caramel skin—glowing like the sun kissed her just ’cause it missed her.

Same long lashes that curled up like they were praying for something.

Same mouth. Soft. Full. The kind of lips you write poems about and then pretend you weren’t soft enough to write no damn poems.

She was wearing this little sundress. Cream and butter yellow. Simple. Modest. But on her? Baby . . . she might as well had been the goddess of warmth. She didn’t need no makeup, no jewelry, no extra shit. Just existing was enough to knock the breath outta me.

And just like that, my legs moved. My heart moved. My soul damn near leapt out my chest. I was across that store in seconds, walking toward her like she was a magnetic field and I’d been made of steel this whole time.

When she turned toward me, our eyes instantly locked.

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