What's Mine and Yours(61)

“So how were they?” León asked.

“They were the uppitiest black people I’ve met in my life.”

“Ever?” León laughed, disbelieving. His hair and beard were all silver, a fan of lines around his lips and temples. He had clear green eyes, little amber orbs around his pupils. She loved to look at him.

“You’re too far in now, no? Gee will want to be seeing them again.”

“How do you know what Gee wants?”

“Weren’t you saying he needed a mentor?”

“All that teacher wants is to try and get him to prove he’s just as good as those white kids in his school.”

“That doesn’t sound so different from what you’ve been trying to teach him.”

“It’s one hundred percent different,” Jade said. “I’m teaching him how to live up to his own standards—not anybody else’s.”

“Ah,” León said. “My mistake. Still, he’s at an age where he’d benefit from a man in his life.”

“Don’t start,” Jade said, and she tried to pull away. León held her tightly. “What would you have me say? This is Dr. Henriquez, I sleep at his house sometimes?”

“How about, This is León. I’ve known him for many years, and we care about each other very much?”

“Gee doesn’t need any more challenges.”

“Don’t you think it would bring the two of you closer if he knew the truth?”

“I’m his mother. We don’t need to know every little thing about each other.”

Jade crossed her arms to show that she was displeased and done with the conversation. She could be petulant with León, and it wasn’t just that he was thirteen years her senior. He wasn’t afraid of her moods, even the ones that were infantile. She could be petty or fussy or ecstatic, and he would look at her, every time, as if there were no piece of her that he couldn’t enjoy.

“I suppose I’m jealous.” León tilted her head upward, kissed her chin. “They got to have dinner with you and your son, and I still haven’t had the pleasure.” His voice turned low and serious. “One day he’ll go away, and you’ll have to start living your own life again.”

“I can’t see the point of looking that far ahead.”

“Fine,” he said. “Then let me preoccupy you with the here and now.” He kissed her throat, used his tongue to trace a curve along her neck. Jade capitulated eagerly. Why argue when there was this?

León carried her into the library, set her atop a cabinet filled with books. When they were together, he played the role of devourer, and it felt good to surrender to him, to rest. Jade shut her eyes and leaned back, turned all her attention to the feeling of León, what he was doing to her body. Her head scraped against the wall, and he sank into her, the books rattling inside the cabinet. She came first, León after, and when she opened her eyes, he was staring at her, stern and resolute. She left for the shower, and he followed.

They stood under the water, soaping one another. His body was lean and golden, patterned with hair along his thighs and chest. His severe expression was gone, and he was grinning, exultant, ready to approach the same topic, as if this time she’d change her mind.

“Maybe you could come live here after Gee leaves.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Are you worried about Linette? She’s welcome, too.” He winked, but Jade couldn’t play along. She had to speak so he would hear.

She knew she wasn’t very old. By the time Gee left, she’d still have years before she turned forty. She could conceive a child. She could marry. She knew women doctors her age who were just beginning to get engaged, to plot their lives. But it was the openness of her life after motherhood that she liked to envision. She knew she couldn’t pick up where she’d left off as a teenager with her fishnet stockings and heavy metal albums, but she wouldn’t remain standing still either. Gee would enter his future, and she hers.

“The life you want, I’ve already had it, even if it didn’t last long.” She kissed him. “Maybe if I’d met you first,” she said, even though it was blasphemous.

“I’m not talking about you becoming some kind of housewife. I want you to have your own life. I am so proud of you, and all you’ve done.”

“I think when Gee is gone what I’ll mostly want is to be alone.”

“We could be alone together.” He smiled at her, unflappable, even as she was turning him down.

She cupped his face in her hands. “Hear me, León. I can’t see it. I won’t live the same life twice.”



The clinic was two floors, brick, and a gray-tiled roof. If not for the reflective windows, it could have passed for a squat and sprawling house.

The building didn’t unnerve Noelle until she entered the lobby and saw the receptionist encased in bulletproof glass. She slipped her ID through a shallow trough, waited to be buzzed in. It was only when they were in the waiting area that Noelle realized the security wasn’t to protect the staff from patients; it was in case someone came in with a gun, shouting about the sanctity of unborn life.

Ruth seemed unfazed, fishing through a stack of magazines for something to read. She was dressed in her scrubs so that she could go straight to work after she dropped Noelle off at Central. The appointment wouldn’t take long. She’d be back before sixth period.