I couldn't help but laugh. Jen joined in and sat back down with me. "You're so secretive," she said, patting my leg. "You got your heart broken by this guy, and then you made a silly mistake because emotions were running high over the situation with his mother. If you ask me, he looked pretty heartbroken himself when he showed up here."
"That was because his mother-"
"Was it? I mean, obviously he was upset about it, I'm not denying that. But the way he looked at you, Tasha. I don't know, I'd be willing to bet you broke his heart just as badly as he broke yours."
"Really?" I asked, pathetically hopeful.
"Yeah, really. Didn't he try to see you again before he left? I thought you said he texted you and called you a few times."
"Yeah..."
"Well? What do you think that means? That it's just some casual thing to him? You realize that Kaden Barlow could be sleeping with a whole team of supermodels, right? So why's he texting you over and over if it's just for sex?"
"I told you," I said. "He was upset about his mom. They thought she was going to die for a little while, you know. And we know each other from high school. Middle school, actually. I actually feel guilty about not seeing him again but it was just impossible, you know? I would have slept with him again and made it even worse than it was. I was protecting myself."
"Yeah. You do that a lot."
Jennifer was right. "I know," I said. "It's just how I am. I don't know how to be any other way."
"Yeah, I get it. It's just, Tasha, I don't want to think you're trying to be Miss. Super Strong I Can Handle Anything all the time if you don't have to be. You have me, you have your other friends and your family. I just want you to know that we're here for you. If you need us."
I told her I appreciated it - because I did. But I wasn't sure I was ever going to be one of those people who could just accept help easily from others. And I probably would have spent more time brooding on it if I hadn't arrived home that night to Ray standing in the kitchen with a huge grin on his face. Everyone was there, too. Alisha, my mom, CeeCee, Rosa .
"What's going on?" I asked, smiling suspiciously. It wasn't my birthday. What were they up to?
"I don't know!" My mom said, throwing her hands in the air. "Your crazy brother demanded we all meet him here in the kitchen and wait for you."
I looked at Ray and raised my eyebrows.
"Yeah," he said. "Something's going on. But I wanted to wait until we were all here until I told you."
I looked at Alisha. Even she looked baffled.
"Did you win the lottery?" I asked.
"Nope," Ray grinned.
"What then?!"
Ray made me sit down with everyone else and then he stood up.
"We've been working really hard the past few years, haven't we? And mom-" he nodded at my mother - "you've worked hard your whole life. And it's been discouraging, hasn't it, that feeling that no matter how much we do we're still just treading water?"
I nodded, wondering what Ray was about to spring on us. By the look on his face, it promised to be something good. Was Alisha pregnant again? No. He wouldn't have announced it that way, with all the talk of hard work and struggle.
"Well, I went to see someone at the bank a couple of years ago - just after you graduated high school, actually, Tash. And no one needs to lose their damn mind because I haven't actually done anything yet, but we now have enough in the family savings account to buy this house, if we want."
For a few seconds, everybody just looked around at each other, not quite believing it.
"But," I said, not allowing myself to get too excited without all the details. "What about mom's credit? The medical bills? What about your credit?"
Ray beamed. "My credit is fine. I've been working on repairing it for years and the bank manager said if you, me and Alisha all co-sign, that with a down-payment we can get a mortgage that will cut our monthly payments in half."
"Really?!" Alisha squealed, jumping to her feet and throwing her arms around Ray. "We can buy this place? Oh my God!"
I looked over at my mother. Tears were streaming down her smiling face. A few seconds later, everyone else noticed, too.
Ray went to her and hugged her. "Mom," he said, kissing the top of her head. "This can be our house now. We can stop worrying about making rent every month, we can paint the walls yellow like you wanted to."
My mother took a labored breath and the oxygen tank hissed. Then she looked up, making a point to make eye contact with each one of us and whispered: "Thank you."
"No, mama," I said, getting up and hugging her from the other side, because Ray still hadn't let go. "Thank you. You held us together. When Daddy left, when you made sure we always had food on the table even if meant you went without. When we all could have scattered in different directions, you held us together. You did that. And now it's our turn to look after you."