Page 128 of Tangled Hearts
When it came to Knycole, Hov was always willing to bargain. He’d give this to gain that.
She tapped her finger against her thigh, wondering if she should just let her intrusive thoughts stay in her head. Throwing caution to the wind, she blurted, “you think I can be a doctor?”
The silence that followed made her heart race. She fiddled with the corner of her blanket, chewing her lip.
On his end, Hov cleared his throat. She caught the sound of him shifting again, his chain clinking faintly against his chest. “What kinda question is that? Fuck yea, you can be a doctor.”
Hov thought she could be anything she wanted to be. She was super smart in both the books and the streets.
“You say that, but I don’t know if you mean it.”
“Kid, I ain’t wasting my breath if I don’t mean it. You smart as hell, got the grind, and you care about people even when they don’t deserve it. If that ain’t doctor shit, I don’t know what is.”
Her chest warmed, and she grinned despite herself. “You really think so?”
“I just said it, didn’t I?” He smirked through the phone, and she could hear it.
She giggled, laying back on her pillow. “You irritating.”
“You called me, remember?” He chuckled, the sound rumbling low.
For a moment, neither of them spoke. The silence was comfortable this time, filled with faint background noises—her AC kicking on, his lighter flicking before he took a drag.
“Hov,” she said softly, twirling a strand of hair around her finger.
“Yea?” Smoke slipped from his lips, though she couldn’t see it.
“You ever think about us? Like, really think about what it’d be if we wasn’t so… messy?”
The line went quiet again, just the sound of him breathing heavily in the receiver. Then his voice dropped. “All the time. That’s the shit that keeps me up.”
Her stomach flipped. “So what we doing?”
“I’m trying not to lose my mind waiting on you to figure it out.” His tone was blunt, not angry—just laced with his truth.
He knew he was contradicting his self because he told her he wasn’t waiting for her anymore but the truth was, Hov would always be waiting for Knycole.
Her lips parted, no words coming right away. His blunt honesty always made her anxious. She pressed the heel of her hand against her eyes. “You make it sound so simple.”
“It is. You either gon’ let me love you the way I been wanting to, or you gon’ keep finding yourself. But don’t play with me in between.”
Knycole’s throat locked. Her eyes watered, though she forced a laugh to break the weight of it. “Why you always gotta turn shit into a lecture?”
“You asked, didn’t you?” he chuckled back.
Their voices overlapped with small laughs, easing into the comfort they’d always had. He asked her about her latest exam, she teased him about his diet, he clowned her for still watching corny medical shows for “research.” Before long, they were laughing hard enough to forget where the call started.
But when the laughter died down, the quiet that followed held something deeper. Something both of them were too scared to touch yet.
“Good night, Quameek.”
“Night, kid. Call me tomorrow.”
She smiled against the phone. “We’ll see.”
“Kid,” Hov had something else sitting in his chest that he needed to say. “Therapy must be working.”
“I think so.”
