Page 31 of Cuffed By Your Love
“I just got out of something messy, Nelly.”
She nodded. “He isn’t trying to get in your bed, baby. He’s trying to get into your peace. I’m just saying.” She shrugged her shoulders. “That man came in here acting like he doesn’t raise his voice or use his hands. He relies solely on his credit score. And you looked like you wanted to be the reason he keeps his peace.”
I exhaled as if I had been holding my breath since I walked away from Elias earlier. I didn’t respond, because I couldn’t, not with how fast my heart was tapping its own Morse code behind my ribcage.
The truth was, I had been stuck in survival mode for so long that I forgot what it felt like to be seen by a man who wanted nothing from me but honesty, no manipulation, no performative interest, just genuine presence.
Elias didn’t even try to be slick. He asked how I was, and he genuinely meant it. He called me beautiful without actually using the word. He didn’t focus on my body. He looked at my badge first, then my eyes. Afterward, he allowed me to breathe in peace.
“Do you think I’m being silly?” I softly asked her.
“Feeling all this… whatever it is?”
Jonell fell silent, extremely silent. She looked at me as if she was finally seeing all the jagged pieces of me that I had been trying to hide behind pride and sarcasm.
“I think you’ve been scared to feel anything real for a long time because whenever you did, it came with bruises, lies, or some traumatic plot twist.”
I blinked intensely, struggling to hold back my tears as she continued. “But, Twinnie Pooh, what if he’s the kind of man who leaves the doors unlocked and the lights on, just so you know you’re safe to come home to yourself again?”
That struck me deeply in a way I didn’t want to name. I had already felt the urge to text him back simply because I wanted to hear his voice again. My soul didn’t jump when I saw him; it exhaled.
“But what if I ruin it?” I whispered, looking down at my hands.
She smiled, her eyes gentle this time. “Then at least it wasn’t with Kam, and it wasn’t for nothing.”
She reached over and tapped the screen on my phone, where his message thread was still open. “You have a man saved as Detective Fine Shyt, and the only crime he committed was making you feel like love doesn’t have to hurt.”
The night didn’t tiptoe in gently. It stomped through the blinds as if it had a grudge, crashing into my peace like a furious ex without keys but full of nerve.
I lay sideways across my bed, wrapped in a blanket of frustration and fuzz, staring at the ceiling fan as if it could rewind time with each lazy spin. My soul felt like a cluttered inbox filled with unsent prayers, unread love letters to myself, and junk from men who swore they’d changed.
Then, like clockwork, my phone buzzed on the nightstand with the disrespect of a debt collector who didn’t care that you were trying to rebuild. Kam.
Moonlight—Still sitting in my phone like a bad decision I hadn’t fully managed to unsubscribe from.
I should have ignored it. Hell, I meant to. But curiosity got the better of me. She was chaotic, wearing hoop earrings and speaking in “I just want to see something real quick” tones. I opened the thread, already clenching my jaw.
When I opened the thread, I could already feel my jaw clenching. That man had the audacity—no, the gall—to send me a long message as if he was trying to finesse a second chance through APA formatting and delusion.
Moonlight :
I know I hurt you, but you have to understand I’m going through some things too. People make mistakes, and what you saw wasn’t even what it looked like. You were never there for me emotionally. Taleah was just a shoulder. I didn’t mean for it to go that far.
I still want this. I still want you. Don’t let one moment define us. I know you still love me. Nobody else is ever going to hold you down like I do. You were trying to change me, and I wasn’t ready. But I’m ready now. For real. Let’s talk. Don’t give up on me. Please.
Please?
Nigga, please descend to the lowest pits of hell and burn eternally! That word hit differently coming from the same lips that used to kiss me silently and dismiss me loudly.
I sat up slowly, my bones cracking like old secrets finally stretching out. The lamp on my nightstand casted a soft glow across my thighs, my journal, and my lavender-scented trauma, highlighting the ash I hadn’t moisturized and the dignity I was fighting to keep intact.
Kam’s message sat on my screen like spoiled milk, still whole but sour from the inside out.
You were never there for me emotionally.
Sir… I was the pillow you cried into when your cousin got locked up. The one who stayed up and listened to you talk about suffering at the hands of your abusive mother before your uncle took custody of you. The one who made sacrifices, my peace, my plans, and even my period sometimes, so you could feel like a man.
Taleah was a shoulder?
