Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 81488 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 407(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 272(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81488 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 407(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 272(@300wpm)
“Roman, by the grace of God, your father, at least for right now, God willin’ of course, has another chance at life. He might be physically in prison, but his mind doesn’t have to stay there. He’s made mistakes—he can’t go back in time, but he can do some things right going forward. Some son of a bitch tried to take his life, but God said, ‘Not today, son.’ Now his son, Roman Wilde, is here waiting for him. Ain’t life ironic?”
“I don’t understand you sometimes, Genesis, and then, after a second or two, I understand you completely.”
She tossed him a sad smile from over her shoulder, then her attention went back to the TV screen.
“I saw you cryin’ in your sleep on the plane, Roman. It broke my heart. You ain’t even know you was crying. You were sound asleep, but the tears poured. I started crying, too, because you were crying. I couldn’t help myself. I grabbed a napkin and wiped your face. And you kept on sleeping. Talkin’ real low, in a whisper, in your dreams… I heard things…”
His heart thumped hard within his chest. What had he said? What guts did he spill? He was afraid to ask her, and he had a strange feeling, she’d never tell him anyway.
“You reached for my hand, in your sleep, baby, and squeezed it. At one point, you said, ‘Daddy, don’t die,’ in a louder voice. The flight attendant heard you. She approached us to make sure everything was alright, then she started cryin’, too. She whispered in my ear, asking if either of us needed anything. I told her we needed her petitions to the angels, and God, and she’d already done her part by helping us be flown as high to heaven as she possibly could so that God could hear our prayers all the better. We were above the clouds, baby… Praise Him.”
Genesis’ voice shook as she raised her arms in the air, swaying them, crying softly as she spoke. “She and I hugged each other. Me and that little White lady with soft blond hair and baby blue eyes. She smelled like roses. When we touched, wasn’t no such thing as race, gender, sexual orientation, inequality, hatred, woke vs. being asleep, Roman. None of that. Wasn’t nothing but love and understanding. One human being speaking to another human being. Empathy and sympathy. It was unexpected. It wasn’t logical, but it felt right. We never know what somebody is going through, Roman, but we have to respect their pain, their pleasure, their process and their growth.”
“…How did God know that I needed you? I didn’t ask for you, but you arrived right on time.”
She turned to him just long enough to kiss his nose. They were quiet a long while.
“My brother is hurting.” She paused, snatched a tissue from her pocket and blew her nose. “Tony done found out Penny did a lot more financial damage than he initially knew about, all in order to impress her family, to compete with the Joneses. She has a hole in her heart she’s tryna fill, and she’s almost single-handedly destroyed this man’s business because of it. She took out lines of credit in his name, makin’ it virtually impossible for him to open a second coffeehouse now. She’s been giving her sisters, brothers, and mama my brother’s money.
“I’m so disappointed in her. Meanwhile, Tony always offered to buy me a house, a new car and stuff, but I turned him down. I’m not saying that to say I’m better than Penny, ’cause I’m not. I’m saying that money is temporary, Roman. It’s fleeting. Money won’t save your father’s life. It won’t fix my best friend’s relationship with her ex-husband or make him be a better father, and it won’t get my jewelry business further off the ground, unless I put in the work and time, too. We have to respect money, or it will make us respect it, by tearing us apart from the inside out. See, my dislike of Penny was because I saw her true nature. And yet, I felt sorry for her, too. She’s not evil. She’s lost.”
“I don’t think they’re a good fit, but,” he shrugged, “it’s none of my business. I just wanna support my friend, and that’s it.”
“Yeah, I know. See, Penny ain’t never had a man really love her for her, at least not the way my brother did, and she went from not believing she deserved him to taking advantage of that. The lure of money sank its hooks into my daddy, too.”
“How so?” He reached for her now, rubbing her back, giving comfort, the way she’d given it to him.
“My daddy needs to retire, but he won’t, Roman. He’s a workaholic.” Genesis’ father was a meteorologist and worked for the news, as well as several papers and online media sources—something that their family was so very proud about. “My mother is a good woman, but she’s also a hypochondriac. Always thinks she’s at death’s door. I think what upsets her most is that she believes her last good years on this planet will be spent alone ’cause my father won’t slow down and spend time with her. She jokes and says she’s single. He’d rather keep talkin’ about the damn weather, instead of witnessing the seasons change in his own marriage. He’s missed the Spring, Summer, and now the Fall. Winter is here…