Maurice stood immediately and started gathering their paper plates.
“You don’t have to run,” Justin said.
“Not running. But I don’t want her coming home and finding me in her kitchen without her permission.” He stopped. “I want to respect her space. Her home. I’ll see her tomorrow.”
Jasmine walked him to the door. “Thank you,” she said. “For the furnace. For the pizza. For showing up.”
“Of course.” Maurice stepped onto the porch. Cold hit him again.
“Maurice?” Jasmine called. He turned. “She’s gonna lose it when she sees you tomorrow. In a good way, I think. I hope.”
Maurice smiled. “Guess we’ll find out.” He walked to his car and drove back to the hotel. But not before writing down the address and making a mental list of everything that the house needed. Everything he could fix for her. If she’d let him.
CHAPTER 24Monique
Waking up in her own bed was bittersweet.
This Chicago January morning stung harder than others. The gray light seeping through her bedroom curtains felt accusatory, like it knew she’d abandoned something precious in Puerto Rico and was demanding an accounting.
Monique stared at the ceiling, counting the cracks in the plaster she’d been meaning to fix for three years. Fourteen visible from this angle. Fifteen if she counted the hairline fracture spreading from the corner. She should get up. Get dressed and face the day.
Chickie’s funeral started in a few hours. Her stomach churned. The nausea was not from treatment anymore. This was pure grief, thick and oily, coating everything.
Downstairs, something clattered, voices murmured. The twins.
Monique closed her eyes. Of course, they were up. Of course, they were already handling things. Because that’s what happened when your mother spent two years teaching you that needing help was weakness, that asking for support was a burden, that the only safe position was being self-sufficient and alone.
Cancer had taught them all the wrong lessons.
She forced herself upright, feet finding the cold wood. Her robe hung on the back of the door where it always did. She pulled it on, the flannel soft from decades of washing, and made her way downstairs.
In the kitchen, Jasmine stood at the stove with an arsenal of tea paraphernalia spread across the counter like she was preparing for battle.
The kettle was already heating.
“Morning, Ma,” she said without turning around. Then she opened the fridge with the efficiency of someone who’d been planning this. “Lemme get that for you.”
Monique squinted at her daughter. “Why are you up so early?”
Jasmine had another couple of weeks before going back to school. Usually, breaks were filled with parties and reconnecting with old friends. Sleeping until noon and other regular college-aged activities. The kind of life nineteen-year-olds deserved. Not this.
Jasmine didn’t look at her, instead she pulled eggs and sausage from the fridge. “You should eat before you go.”
The kettle whistled.
“Get your tea and sit down, Ma.”
Something in her daughter’s gentle but immovable tone made Monique’s chest tighten. She didn’t want to sit down. She didn’t want tea. She didn’t want any of this careful choreography of care—she knew what it was. Love was a costume. Underneath was pity or duty. Sometimes it was both.
“What is going on here?” Monique’s words came out sharp.
“Justin!” Jasmine called over her shoulder, not answering. “Come get your mother so I can fix her something to eat.”
“Don’t you try to put this on your brother, lil girl.” The world felt like a spinning top that was close to stopping, all wobbly and uncertain. “Tell me what’s going on here.”
Justin’s deep voice rumbled behind her. “Nothin’s going on, Ma.” He moved past her with an easy grace that he’d inherited from his father—all long limbs and quiet confidence. He prepared her tea with practiced efficiency: one bag ginger, one bag green, one sugar, steeped for exactly three minutes.
He’d been watching her. Learning her rhythms. Preparing for this.