Page 40 of Only for the Week
When Luz brings out our package, we carefully put it in the basket on Janelle’s bike and make our way back to the hotel.
We continue talking about her ideas for Labor of Love until it’s time for her to head to her cooking class, leaving me with nothing to do. I download the second book in the series she put me on to and dive in.
Me: My room tonight?
The bubbles start and stop on my screen several times for quite a few minutes before a reply finally comes through.
J: I’m struggling
Me: With what?
J: I want to tell you no that I’m staying in my own room by myself tonight bc it’s been a shitty night and I’m in a bad mood
Me: So what’s the struggle?
J: I don’t want you to suffer my attitude but I know you’re the only one who can make me feel less shitty and I promised you my yes’s
I hate that she had a terrible night, no doubt a result of whatever bullshit Amerie must’ve been on tonight, but I do love that she knows I can make it better. Even if she’s trying to fight it.
Me: Doesn’t seem like a struggle at all then. Come to my room. Let me take care of you
I don’t receive an answer to my text. Instead, I get a soft knock on my door five minutes later. I open it to find Janelle looking beautiful as always in black wide-leg pants and a pink, white, and black floral embroidered crop top. Her hair is pulled back into an intricate ponytail with a pink headpiece adorning her head like a crown. She looks exquisite but the one thing missing from her attire is her confidence. She’s practically hunched over with her eyes firmly planted on the ground, no trace of the bold woman I’m quickly becoming addicted to.
I pull her inside and kiss her temple. Her eyes squeeze shut upon contact. “Want to tell me about it?”
“I-I think she hates me,” she whispers then jumps, shocked to hear the words come out of her own mouth.
“Amerie?” I hold out a bottle of water to her and she absentmindedly takes a sip.
“All night—all night she just kept throwing digs at me. About every fucking thing. My cooking, my outfit, my career, my love life. It was nonstop. Dani even got in her ass about it, and you know she’s normally on some keep the peace shit with us. What did I do?”
“You didn’t do anything, J.”
“No. I must’ve done something because this isn’t us. This passive aggressive hostility. It’s not how we operate, and I am trying to understand where the fuck we went wrong.”
I plant my hands at the base of her neck to keep her from going too far into her head. “Tell me what you need right now.”
“Honestly? I wanna beat her ass. I think that might make me feel better right now,” she sighs. “But I know I’ll feel like shit about it in the morning. Maybe I should leave.”
“Leave Tulum?”
“Yeah. Maybe she should make Dani the maid of honor and I should just go home.”
“And you wouldn’t feel like shit leaving before your sister’s wedding? Come on, J. You know yourself better than that.”
“I don’t know what else to do. I am losing my sister and I don’t know how to make it stop.”
“So lose her.”
Her neck snaps back and she glares at me. “What?”
“Sometimes the people who are supposed to love you the most are the ones who hurt you the worst. They don’t get a pass just because they’re family. Choose yourself.” I’ve seen the damage holding on to a toxic relationship of any kind can cause and I don’t want that for her.
She takes a moment to mull that over and I want her to think very carefully about it. Arnold is my boy and I respect his and Amerie’s relationship but what I won’t do is tolerate disrespect shown to Janelle. She has become far too important to me for me to watch her lose herself trying to save a relationship that isn’t serving her.
“I don’t want to give up on my sister.”
I can’t make her cut off her sister. All I can do is be there for her through this and hope that eventually she sees the people who are worth her time and the ones who aren’t. “Then allow me to take away the pain tonight.”
