“Don’t change the subject, Zeke. Why won’t you come to Florida with me?”

“Because I don’t need a fucking babysitter.” The stool scratched the expensive tile flooring as I pushed it from under me.

I was almost out of the kitchen when I felt her cool fingers grip my arm. I wanted to shake her off and yell at her, but instead I just stood there and let her speak.

“You once said you wanted us to take care of each other. I don’t want to babysit you. I want to take care of you. And honestly, I need you there to take care of me. I’m all alone in that apartment, Zeke. It’s lonely and sometimes I feel afraid. I wake up from awful nightmares and wish more than anything that you were there beside me. Please come home with me. I need you more than you need me. I promise.”

There was once a time in my life when a woman’s pleas did nothing to me. Females were just my solace, a place for me to drop my load. I never worried about what they needed or wanted, and I could think of a million different comebacks for a female who said she needed me.

I’m not sure what happened to me when I was younger to make me that way. Maybe it was the weekly ass beatings the old man gave me. Perhaps it was seeing the way my father treated my mother before the cancer weakened her.

I used to attribute it to the loss of my mother. Maybe in the back of my head I blamed her for leaving me, and treating women badly was kind of like my payback. Either way, I was a fucked-up example of the male species. I knew it and every woman who’d ever crossed my path knew it—all of them except Snowflake.

Go figure she’d be the one I couldn’t say no to. It’s just my luck that I’d fall crazy in love with the one female in the world that had me by the balls. She knew what she was doing when it came to me. And so an hour later, I booked two one-way tickets to Florida.

Eleven

Patience He was just out of my reach again.

I remembered how cut off he was when I first met him, and he was slowly transforming back into that guy. Leaving and going back to Florida when things felt so weird between us wasn’t something I was willing to do, but I was running out of the magic pills that kept me from freaking out and I couldn’t afford to miss anymore school and practice.

Zeke coming to Florida with me was the only solution, and I could hardly believe it when he agreed. I hated using his worries about my getting hurt against him, but it was the only card I had up my sleeve.

Aunt Sarah picked us up from the airport and we went back to her house for dinner. Sydney was her usual ball of happiness and even with her, Zeke didn’t respond in his normal playful way. I was starting to miss him, yet it was my fault he was being this way. It was my fault he felt so useless, and I’d do anything I could to give him purpose until his hand healed and he could go back to work. Hopefully we’d get some good news once he started therapy.

“So how long are you staying in Florida, Zeke?” Syd asked around a mouthful of chicken.

Her mouth and hands were covered in BBQ sauce. It was pretty adorable. I handed her a paper napkin and she smeared it across her face even more. She thought she was so grown, yet she hadn’t mastered BBQ chicken.

“Just until my hand’s all better. I’m not doing anything back home right now anyway. The least I could do is come and make myself useful for Patience.”

I was quickly missing my nickname. Hearing him call me Patience over and over again was getting on my nerves. It sounded strange on his lips, and even though it was my name, it sounded so impersonal.

When we finally got to my tiny one-bedroom apartment, it was close to midnight. It was the perfect place for me. I was thrilled when I happened across the small space located directly above an exotic coffee shop. Not only did I get delicious coffee anytime I wanted it, but my apartment always smelled great.

The rent was cheap and it included water and sewer. I couldn’t very well pass that up. I decorated it to fit my taste, buying most of my stuff from Target, and I settled right on in. It felt like home to me. Sydney even came to stay the night on some weekends when I wasn’t slammed with schoolwork.

Zeke helped carry bags upstairs the best he could, and I didn’t say anything when he cussed himself for not being able to carry more. He was such an independent guy. I hated seeing him struggle so much. I moved quickly up and down the stairs with more bags than my poor arms could handle just so he wouldn’t have to try so hard.

He looked like a giant in my tiny space. When I first rented the apartment, I remember thinking how big the living room space was, but the minute I shut the front door and took a look at the space including him, I knew I’d been wrong about the size of the room.