Kenney: Still Waters Part 2

Chapter 52

"Hey sis."

Charity stopped writing and looked up when I walked in and sat down on Sammy's bed beside her. "Hey."

I pointed to the door. "Wallace let me in."

"Kenney..." she put her hand over mine like something was wrong. My heart raced as I ran through ten scenarios that may have happened to Angel while I was gone, in the ten seconds that it took for her to spit out what she had to say. "I'm sorry that I said what I said to you, Kenney. You belong here, too, just like the rest of us."

I shrugged. I already had enough people against me to start a brand new beef with my sister.

She scrunched up her nose. "It still smells like crack in here." I nodded. "I can't get it out." She eyed me. "Wallace didn't say anything to you?" I shook my head no. "He was pissed."

I stared at her for a long time and wished that everything, everything, could have been different.

"I'm sorry about that, sis. Some shit went down and I just...needed a place to sleep."

Charity looked at me sympathetically. I know it killed her to see me doing what I was doing. It showed in her eyes every time she looked at me.

"I heard about the bodies."

"Yeah." I nodded and pulled my hand away.

"They were all over...everywhere..." I nodded again. "That was you or Rico?"

"Me."

She sighed deeply and broke eye contact with me. I looked away, too. Then she looked back over at me.

"Y'all clean 'em up?" I looked into her eyes and nodded. "Good." She was staring at me like she was trying to figure out who the hell I had become.

"Sorry I didn't pick Angel up yesterday. More...shit went down..."

She just shook her head and went back to writing. I leaned in to look over her shoulder and see what she was doing.

"So...what's the haps, kid?"

Charity looked back at me like I had just told the funniest joke, but she just didn't have time to laugh.

"You're such an old man, Kenney. Why can't you just be a kid? Like...a regular kid."

I shook my head and looked away. "I don't know how."

It was the truth. I didn't. I wasn't around any kids my age, except for the youngins, and they just...talked about dumb shit. All the time. It annoyed me, so I tried not to be around them too much when I could help it. They liked to be around me, though. Like I was a superstar. Probably because I was Rico's son, and they wanted to get next to the top.

I looked back over at my sister. Charity and Tiana were the only kids my age that I could relate to, and really they were both older than me, too. I looked down at the giant purple binder in her lap.

"What're you doin'?"

She blushed and also looked down at the binder. "Writin' a letter to Sammy."

"Word?" I grinned like I would have teased her if I had the energy.

"Yeah. I've been writing her for years. Every day." She fanned the pages out to show me. "They're all in here." She gave me a long, tired look. "It helps. You should try it."

I nodded. "Y'all still pray every night like we used to?"

She nodded. "Yeah. Wally B prays with us. You?"

"Yeah." I looked at her. "But Jazz stopped praying with me a while ago. When she started smokin' all the time, I think." Charity just shook her head. "But I say prayers from the both of us. Until she gets better..."

Charity smiled at me. "Of course you do."

I nodded again and stood up. "Where's Angel?"

"In the room." She pointed down the hall to the room that used to be mine, which Melissa and Faith now shared.

"Aight. Thanks, sis."

I winked at her. She grinned and went back to writing.