“I see.” He sounded tired. “Cora is my friend, Mer. That’s all.”
“I know. But she would like to be more. You know it, and I know it.”
“What would you do if I kissed you?” Noah asked softly. He took several steps toward her and looked down into her face.
“Don’t.” Her heart was racing but her voice was firm. Calm.
“Why?”
“Remember Bob?” she said.
“Huh?” Noah wasn’t following.
“Remember how he and Heather used to smoke together out on her balcony?”
“Yeah?” he drew the word out, curious.
“She talked to him. They were friends. And then—”
“He wanted more,” Noah finished, his tone flat.
“Yep. And do you see Bob anymore?” she asked.
“Bob’s gone.”
“Exactly.”
Noah’s shoulders slumped in dejection.
“We keep our friends. But girlfriends and boyfriends . . . we exchange those, we cut them loose. I want to keep you, Noah. The only way I can do that—keep you forever—is if you and I stay friends.”
“I don’t know if I can do that, Mer.”
“Why?” she gasped.
“I like you too much.”
Without asking, without warning, he leaned in and kissed her.
His lips were soft, his breath sweet, and the tips of his fingers were light on her cheeks. But it wasn’t a kiss between friends. It wasn’t a kiss goodbye. It was a desperate hello. Her heart grew and grew, filling her chest with both terror and triumph. But she didn’t push him back or pull away. In the darkness, she returned the press of his lips, and when he deepened the kiss, she opened her mouth to him without hesitation.
She knew kissing him was a mistake. She knew it would make everything harder. But she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t turn away, and when his arms wrapped around her, lifting her so he could straighten his back and hold her against him, something snapped inside her. She kissed him with a fury and a fervor that had him pulling back and panting her name, before they were lost again in the sweet slide of their lips, the tangle of their tongues, and the shared sighs that kept them coming back again and again.
They clung to each other, her arms wrapped around his shoulders, his arms wrapped around her waist. His hands didn’t roam, and they didn’t sink to the floor. They stood in the darkened alcove, kissing like they would never get another chance, like kissing was life itself, and the moment they stopped, the world would stop too.
And stop it did.
“Will you write, Mer? Please,” Noah panted.
“Of course I’ll write,” she whispered.
“And take care of Cora. She’s not as strong as you are.”
Cora’s name was like cold water down her back. Mercedes pulled away. Staggered away. Noah’s hand shot out to steady her, but she stepped out of reach.
She’d tried to take care of Cora. When Noah was gone the first time, it wasn’t so hard. They were all still friends, still unattached, still equally connected. Noah came home when his mother died but left soon after for Kuwait. Mercedes had asked him if he was running away. He told her he was just trying to figure out where he was going, but he’d left her and Cora behind. He’d left the Three Amigos behind.
Mercedes had just finished hair school, Cora was in college, and with Noah gone and high school over, the three of them became separate islands in their own seas. Or so she thought. In actuality, she’d been the only one adrift. Cora and Noah grew closer during the time they spent apart, and Cora didn’t need Mer to take care of her.
When Noah was deployed to Afghanistan in 2002, he’d made the same request of his oldest friend. “Take care of Cora, Mer.”
It was harder the second time.
Cora had been distant and dissatisfied. She was excited about her pregnancy one day, despondent and disinterested the next. Cora started avoiding Mercedes only to show up at the salon out of the blue, crying and asking her why she’d abandoned her when she needed her most. Cora was either high as a kite, full of energy and glowing with life, or completely bottomed out, struggling to brush her hair and teeth. Mercedes went over several times during Noah’s nine-month deployment just to make sure Cora made it to work. When she was going to work, sticking to a routine, she did better. Toward the end of her pregnancy, she leveled out only to plummet again after Gia was born. When Noah came home he stepped right back into his old role of caretaker. It was like his mother died, and he replaced her with someone who needed him in exactly the same way.
The thought made Mercedes wince.
“I’m sorry, Cora,” she whispered to herself. “That isn’t fair. But I don’t know what you’re trying to tell me. If it is what I think it is, then I don’t want to know.”
If something happens to me, you’ll take care of them, won’t you?
Mercedes pulled into a gas station and filled up the Corolla’s tank, standing in the cold, her hands shoved into her pockets. She felt the drawing she’d hastily folded and tucked away at Montlake. She pulled it out and opened it, smoothing the lines that marred the faces staring up at her from the page. Keegan Tate. She’d recognized him immediately. Why had Moses drawn a picture of Keegan Tate with Cora and Gia? It could only mean one thing.
If something happens to me, you’ll take care of them, won’t you?
“I’m trying Cora,” Mercedes murmured. “But I can’t take care of them if I’m covering for you.”
Eight
1989
She’d noticed him. He smoked on his balcony—like everyone else did—but he liked to watch the kids. He watched Mercedes sometimes. She stared back once, jutting out her chin and putting her hands on her hips. She even swore in Spanish, a whole string of filthy words that she was certain he didn’t understand. He understood. She heard him chuckle and blow out a long ribbon of smoke that curled back around him like a pet snake.
“He thinks you’re pretty Sadie.” Cora said one day, watching the man as he watched them. From his balcony he had a straight view of the basketball court, and Mercedes didn’t think he could hear them, but she wished he would go inside. She couldn’t concentrate on the game, and he made her skin crawl.
“Gross, Cora,” Mercedes growled.
“He watches you.”
“He watches you too,” Mercedes huffed. She didn’t want to be the only one.
“He looks a little like my dad.”
“No he doesn’t, Cora.”
“He’s probably lonely. I think I’m going to go talk to him.”
“Don’t you dare. Cora, he’s probably a child molester.”
“We’re not children anymore, Sadie.”
“We sure as hell are!”
“You don’t have to come with me.”
Mercedes wasn’t letting Cora go alone, and Cora seemed determined to talk to the man. She marched across the grass and stood beneath his balcony, shading her eyes as she smiled up at him.
“Hi,” Cora called. The man smiled.
“Hi there, Red.” He snuffed out his cigarette and smoothed his hair.
“What’s your name?” Cora asked.
“Payton,” he said, smirking around his cigarette.
“Well . . . Mr. Payton. How long have you lived here?” Cora asked.
“Just Payton. You know how long. You been watching me, girl.”
“You have?” Mercedes hissed, staring at her friend.
“You look like my dad, Mr. Payton. He died,” Cora explained.
“You don’t look anything like her dad,” Mercedes scoffed.
“That’s too bad about your dad, Red.” Payton ignored Mercedes. “What’s your name?”
“I’m Cora.”
“And my friends call me Nunya Damn Business,” Mercedes interjected. She pulled on Cora’s arm as the man laughed.
“Come up, Cora,” the man said. “We’ll talk about your dad. I’ll get you a soda. You been playing ball so you’re probably thirsty.”
“We don’t want a soda.” Mercedes shook her head and folded her arms.
“Okay,” Cora said, eager. The man’s balcony was two levels up, and Cora trotted toward the stairs that would lead her up to the second-floor apartments.
“Cora!” Mercedes yelled, incensed.
“I want to talk to him, Sadie. I told you, you don’t have to come.”
“The hell I don’t.”
Payton was waiting for them, his door open wide, sodas in hand. He stepped aside and bid them enter, and Cora pranced inside like she’d known him all her life. Mercedes stood in the doorway and kept one hand on the frame, one hand on the door. Cora took the grape Fantas from Payton’s hand and handed one to Mercedes. Mercedes took it, ready to chuck it at Payton’s face if he made a wrong move. It was cold and slick, and Cora immediately popped the tab on her can and took a long pull.
“You look kinda like my little girl too, you know that? She had the same red curls.” Payton reached out and touched the lock of hair laying against Cora’s left breast. She stepped back, and Mercedes stepped forward. Payton stepped between them.
“You have a little girl?” Cora whispered, and Mercedes groaned.
Payton made a sorrowful face. “She died. I miss her.”
“Bullshit,” Mercedes hissed. She was truly afraid. Cora was acting as though she were in a play, as though someone was about to yell “cut!” and she had to sell the scene.
“Now that’s not nice, Nunya,” Payton said, sly. It took Mercedes a minute to realize he was talking to her. “Cora and I are gonna talk for a minute. You go on home.” He tried to push Mercedes out the door.
“Cora!” Mercedes clung to the frame, refusing to leave without her friend. Payton picked her up, but not before his hands cupped her bottom and slid up her sides. He plopped her down in the hallway beyond.
“Go home, Nunya,” he said.
Suddenly Cora was shoving past Payton, wrapping her arms around Mercedes and wrenching her from Payton’s grasp. Mercedes’s grape soda smashed against the pavement and burst, spraying their feet and legs with sudsy purple, and Payton swore and made a grab for Cora’s arm. Her cheeks were pink and her eyes wide, like she’d suddenly woken up to the danger she’d placed them in, and she wriggled free, pulling Mercedes with her. Then they were running, streaking down the stairs and across the stretch of grass that led past the concrete slab and basketball hoop to the apartments on the other side.
“I’m sorry, Sadie,” Cora panted as they reached the hallway that spanned their front doors.
“What in the hell were you thinking?” Mercedes cried. She wanted to shake her friend, to slap her, to open up her head and look inside. Her stomach hurt, and she thought she might throw up.