13
Rosemary didn’t kill me when I walked through the door. I think she thought I was already dead. Or maybe our mother standing there cramped her style.
“My car?” Rosemary asked.
I burst into tears. My mother rose to the occasion, folding me into her arms despite the grit and grime of being drive-by shot at. I was too tired to cry long. My mother mopped me up, question marks becoming prominent in her fine eyes when Rosemary brought me the telephone.
“Bel?” Kel’s voice in my ear was as heady as a New Orleans pastry. “You made it home, then?”
Tiny tentacles of warmth began to dispel the chill in my bones at the relief in his voice.
“Why did you run out on me?”
“You seemed busy…and I was tired.” Questions tried to break through exhaustion. Questions I couldn’t ask. My mother was standi
