Fifteen Years (29 page)

Quiet reigned for what felt like forever before she finally managed to say, “Fifteen years is a long time.”

What was that supposed to mean? Josiah wondered. Was she saying that the years had changed her feelings too? He didn’t want to read more into it than was there, but Josiah couldn’t help but be hopeful. Hopeful and excited. His heart raced within the walls of his chest, and he wanted to ask her for clarification.

Patrice almost became one with the railing when Josiah finally rose to his feet and began approaching her. It was so quiet that the soles of his shoes sounded like a hammer tapping in a deliberate tempo against the wooden floor beneath him. Patrice’s hands gripped the railing with such firmness that he could see her knuckles turn white under the moonlit skies. Josiah reached out and gently pried her fingers loose from the banister, careful not to make her get a splinter in the process. He held her hands in his and felt her trembling. He wanted to pick up where he left off in the park; latch his lips on to hers, but Josiah thought it was best to take a slower route. He’d learned his lesson the first time.

“Tell me what you’re thinking,” he challenged. “Why are you shaking? What are you’re afraid of?”

“You.” Unlike her earlier response, this one was quick. And it caught Josiah off guard. The last thing he wanted to do was scare her.

“Me?” He needed an explanation. Did she think he was capable of doing to her what Bo had done? Rape victims were known to
have long-term issues like that. “You’re not afraid of me, Peaches. Please tell me that you’re not afraid of me.”

“Yes, I am. Not afraid as in frightened. I’m afraid as in terrified.”

“Oh well, that makes it a lot better.” Josiah tried to laugh, but he wasn’t yet sure that it was a laughing matter. What was she trying to tell him?

“Aren’t you terrified?” Patrice asked. Her eyes were waxed with concern. “We were raised as siblings, JT. Doesn’t it scare you to have these kinds of feelings for me?”

These kinds of feelings for me.
Josiah swallowed the bitterness of her words. She didn’t ask, ‘Doesn’t it scare you that
we
have these kinds of feelings for
each other
.’ Patrice’s choice of words indicated that this whole deal was a lopsided one. Still, Josiah wasn’t ready to give up. He hadn’t made it this far in life by being a quitter. All of his life, challenges had only made him stronger, more determined. This one was no different.

He responded with a slow nod, and then said, “It did at first. When I was denying what I felt, it did. And when I was in a place where I couldn’t seem to grasp the fact that we aren’t actual brother and sister, it did. But now … no, I’m not scared. I’m not terrified. At least, not about what’s going on in here.” He tapped the left side of his chest. “The only fear I have now is that you won’t be able to separate what we were fifteen years ago from what we are today.” Josiah added emphasis every time he said the word
we.
He didn’t care what Patrice said; he didn’t believe for a minute that she didn’t share his feelings. He’d seen the way she looked at him; he’d felt the way she touched him; he’d tasted the way she’d kissed him. “If you can’t separate our past from our present, Peaches, then there can’t be an
us.
And I really would like there to be an
us.
I believe you want there to be an
us
too.” Josiah took a breath, feeling a bit more confident. He released her hands and brushed her cheek with the
tips of his fingers. Once again, he pleaded with her. “Tell me what you’re thinking, Peaches. Can we be something more?”

Seconds turned into minutes. Or at least it felt that way to Josiah.

Patrice began shaking her head slowly, and the elongated silence that followed was riotous. It said what she couldn’t get her lips to express, and Josiah’s heart sank in spite of his hopes. Feeling that she’d made her choice, he stepped away from her and shoved his hands in the pockets of his slacks. He didn’t like what he had heard… or
hadn’t
heard, but Josiah was determined to be a man about it.

“It’s okay, Peaches. I understand.” He didn’t mean a word of it, but it was the only way to save face. He’d taken a huge risk and lost, but he couldn’t let her see his metaphoric emasculation.

She continued to stare at him in silence. Not in his eyes. She was avoiding them again. If Patrice’s eyes were drills, they would have bored a hole in his chest. Josiah couldn’t take it anymore; he could feel his countenance falling, and if she noticed it, it would be a dead giveaway that his soul was withering under the drought of her quiet rejection.

“I’m gonna get ready to go,” he whispered. “I’ll be here for another couple of days, so I’m sure … I’m sure we’ll see each other again.” He took several steps backward, praying that Patrice would snap out of her trance and say something to stop his exit, but she continued to shatter his eardrums with her silence. Sighing, Josiah turned on his heels, and then headed down the steps that led to the parking lot.

In the darkness of his car, he took a moment to look at the space where he’d just been. Patrice was still there. She hadn’t budged. Her back faced him now. Josiah wanted her to go inside. Leaving her out on the porch at this time of night just didn’t seem gentlemanly, but what could he do? His pride had been stripped naked,
and right now, he didn’t have enough confidence in himself to go back to her and insist that she return to the security of her apartment. Josiah couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so inadequate. Nothing like the silent rejection of a woman to put things into perspective.

The drive to Patrice’s house seemed a whole lot shorter than the ride back to Stone Mountain. Josiah rarely drove with his windows down, but tonight, he needed to. The night air offered just enough consolation to keep him from jumping on to the highway and heading back to North Carolina. Everything in his hotel room could be replaced. Leaving it all behind might help to erase the sting of his ousting.

Josiah nodded a greeting toward the unfamiliar man who stood behind the front desk of the hotel as he entered. The elevator ride to the third floor was brief and uneventful. Every step that brought him closer to his suite was heavier than the one before it. Fatigue, embarrassment, disappointment, hurt, misery… all of it was beginning to mount. By the time he slid the card key in his door, Josiah felt like he had run the Peachtree Road Race, carrying Mickey Colt or some other overweight executive on his shoulder.

He began the task of pulling the hotel linen off of the bed so that he could replace it with his own. When his phone began vibrating, the time couldn’t have been worse. Then again, maybe it couldn’t have been better. Josiah needed a distraction. He looked at the caller ID and a weak smile appeared on his face. If anybody could lighten his mood, Craig could. Josiah pressed the button on the Bluetooth that was still attached to his ear from the ride back to the hotel. Before he could say anything, Craig spoke up.

“Hey, JT. What’s going on? Is everything okay?”

Josiah’s eyebrows furrowed. “Huh? What are you talking about? What do you mean?”

Craig sighed like Josiah’s ignorance had brought him relief. “Oh … nothing. I was just wondering.”

The explanation didn’t make sense to Josiah. “Why would you just out-of-the-blue suddenly wonder if everything was all right? Did you have some kind of nightmare or something?”

Silence.

“Craig?” Josiah stopped stripping away the covers and stood still on the floor at the foot of his bed. “Craig?” he repeated.

“I’m here,” his friend answered. “I may have said something I shouldn’t have said. Maybe you weren’t supposed to know anything. I don’t know …”

When Craig’s voice trailed, Josiah jumped in. “Know what? Don’t play with me, Craig. Tell me what’s going on. Has something happened at MacGyver? Did somebody break into my house? What?”

“No no no. Nothing like that.” Craig hesitated, and when he spoke again, his voice was lowered. “It’s Patrice.”

Josiah’s heart slammed against his chest. He’d just left Patrice. She was fine when he pulled away from her apartment complex. His heart pounded even harder when he thought about his bruised pride and how he had allowed it to stop him from making sure she made it in the apartment safely. It was nighttime. He knew better than to leave her outside alone while her daughter slept inside. No doubt, Patrice had left the door unlocked while she talked to him outside. If some criminal had seen her there alone and attacked her, and then went into the house and violated Arielle, Josiah didn’t know how he would live with himself. He wanted to pump Craig for more information, but as long as he didn’t know what had happened, he could pretend that all was well.

“Do you know why she called Dani?” Craig asked when the thick silence lingered.

Called Dani?
The words brought mobility back to Josiah’s legs. Patrice called Danielle. That was way better news than what his mind had begun thinking. But why did Craig think the call was a cause of concern? “She called Danielle? When?”

“Right now,” Craig whispered. “We were sitting here watching one of these crazy Tyler Perry plays on DVD when Dani’s phone rang. She answered and was talking for a minute, and then she asked me to excuse her. While she was walking down the hall into the bedroom, I heard her say, ‘Don’t cry, Patrice. It’s gonna be okay.’ Then right before she closed the bedroom door, she said, ‘So where is JT now?’”

“Oh.” It was all Josiah could say. Apparently Patrice was confiding in Danielle. He wondered how much of what had gone on over the past couple of days had been made known to his best friend’s fiancée.

“What’s going on, JT?” Craig asked. “Has something happened since the last time we spoke that you haven’t told me about?”

Josiah sighed. “I just left her house. We—”

“I gotta go,” Craig cut in. “Dani’s coming back. If I can find out what’s up, I’ll call you right back.”

Josiah pulled the Bluetooth from his ear when the call disconnected and placed it on the nightstand along with his phone. Just as well. He didn’t really feel like talking about it anyway. By the time he finished removing the hotel covers and replacing them with the ones he’d brought from home, he was tired. Being compulsive—or anal, as his mother used to call it—was sometimes exhausting. Josiah pulled his car keys out of his pants pocket and tossed them on the bed. Then he stepped out of his shoes and turned on the television, increasing the volume. He didn’t want to watch anything; he just needed to rid the room of the excruciating silence, and in the process, he hoped to drown out the strong desire he had to pick up
the phone and call Patrice. He hated knowing that she was crying. Not knowing why she was crying was even more maddening. Did it have something to do with him?

His phone vibrated again. Craig must have found out from Danielle why Patrice was in tears. Josiah hovered over the night-stand and looked at the caller ID on his cell screen. When he saw the name that illuminated, he scrambled for his earpiece.

“Peaches?”

“Did you know that they used to be foster siblings?”

Patrice’s abrupt words dazed him. “What? Who?” was the only reply Josiah could readily offer.

She sniffled and her voice trembled like she was still crying. “Daddy told me yesterday. He said that he and Mama were foster children. For about two years, they lived in the same foster home.”

Foster home? Josiah wondered how he could have lived with the Smiths for so long and never have known that Thomas and Joanne had grown up in the care of the state. Through the phone, Patrice must have seen the lines of confusion that were etched on his face.

“I know,” she said. “That’s the same way I felt when he told me about it.” She went on to share the full unbelievable story with Josiah, and in case he still didn’t believe her, she concluded with, “True story. If you want the firsthand version, you can ask Daddy yourself.”

Josiah didn’t even know what to say. He sank onto his mattress and smoothed his hands over his bald head. “I wonder why they hadn’t told any of us this before now?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he didn’t feel a need to until that moment.”

Josiah’s back stiffened. “What
need
pulled it out of him last night? What made him open up like that?” He didn’t want to jump to conclusions, but Josiah had a gut feeling that he already knew
the answer. For good measure, he rephrased the question for a third time. “Why did Dad tell you about this, Peaches?”

“I …” She stopped, and then started again. “He knows what happened in the park. I told him everything.”

Just as he’d thought. Josiah remembered that even as little children, Patrice would be the one to break down and tattle first. But maybe this time it was for the best. No sense in hiding it from their foster parents. Josiah wondered what Thomas and Joanne thought of him now that they knew what happened between him and Patrice, but what
they
thought of him wasn’t his greatest concern.

Last try.

“Peaches.” He closed his eyes. “How do you feel about me?”

This time he didn’t have to wait long for a response.

“I know it’s asking a lot,” she started, “but can you … can you come back over? We can talk about it when you get here.”

Thoughts—some righteous, some not—streamed through Josiah’s head. He reached for the keys he’d earlier tossed on his bed, and at the same time replied, “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”