This made me stop and slowly approach, still waving.
Only then did she move, but not because she saw me. Because her head dropped down in a disturbing manner to rest on the wheel between her hands.
Damn, something was wrong.
I thought quick, made a decision, moved to the passenger side and rapped on the window.
“Hey, Krys!” I called.
Her head shot up and she turned it to me.
Mascara running, just beginning, not yet a mess but on its way—she’d dropped her head to start crying.
Shit.
I’d been around her once and you would blow me over with a feather if you’d told me she was a crier.
This did not say good things.
She did not call back a greeting. Instead, her hand went to the ignition.
Shit, shit.
I pulled open the door.
She again jerked her head my way.
“What’re you doin’?” she demanded to know as I angled my ass into the seat.
I slammed the door and turned to her.
“You okay?” I asked.
“Yeah, I’m okay,” she totally lied.
She’d done a quick swipe as I got in, this I knew because she had mascara wings at the sides of her eyes.
“You’re crying,” I pointed out.
“I don’t cry,” she retorted.
I looked to her temples and said softly, “I saw you, Krys.”
Her lips thinned, probably in order not to confirm or lie again.
I shrugged one shoulder. “You want me to go, I’ll go. I get needing your space when something is up. You don’t know me very well and I get you wouldn’t want to lay anything on me if something is going on that’s deep or heavy. But you’re also pregnant, upset, you’re a sister and I don’t want you driving until you’re together. So you can take this time to get it together and then I’ll leave you alone so you can go where you’re going. Or you can take this time to lay it on me and I’ll listen and then leave you alone.”
She stared at me.
I stared back.
Eventually, she snapped, “I’m pregnant.”
“I know,” I replied.
“Pregnant bitches do stupid shit, like cryin’ for no reason.”
“I’ve never been pregnant,” I told her. “But I’ve heard that. Let’s just not let you do more stupid shit when you don’t have it together and you’re behind a wheel.”
“I can drive my own ass home,” she declared crabbily.
“I’ve never been in a car with you so I don’t know that for certain, but I’m guessing it to be true. Still, I think I need about another two minutes of you being nasty for me to know you’re all good so I can let you drive home.”
She glared at me until all of a sudden the glare melted and a tear washed a black streak halfway down her cheek.
“Krys,” I whispered.
“I’m pregnant,” she whispered back.
“I know,” I repeated what I’d said before, but this time did it gently.
“Got no call to have a baby,” she shared, her voice unravelling.
Where did that come from?
I leaned forward a bit and asked, “Why on earth would you say that?”
“My momma was a bitch. Fucked-up, crazy-ass, selfish bitch. Treated me like shit, total shit, you would not believe. I didn’t even fuckin’ believe it, until I had no choice. That is, she treated me like shit when she remembered I was breathin’.”
I nodded, said nothing but felt a lot, pissed and sad that Krystal had gone through that.
“That’s what she taught me,” she declared.
Ah.
There we go.
“You’re not your mother,” I replied.
“I’m fucked-up, crazy-ass and selfish and there are few in these parts who would shy away from using the b-word when it comes to me too.”
This, I did not doubt.
I also didn’t confirm it.
What I did was think of Tate Jackson watching Bubba and Krystal while they played their roles of local good ole boy and hard-ass bitch and doing that watching with obvious affection.
“You babysit?” I asked.
“What?” she snapped.
“You said your man volunteers you two to babysit your friends’ kids all the time. Do you do it?”
“Of course,” she answered immediately.
And still, she did not see.
“You a fucked-up, crazy-ass bitch to your friends’ kids?” I pushed.
“They aren’t mine twenty-four-fuckin’-seven,” she informed me.
“Babe,” I said quietly, leaning closer. “Just the fact that you’re a good enough friend to babysit your friends’ kids says everything about you. Hell, the fact you have friends says everything about you and that isn’t getting into the fact that they want you to babysit. Your mother do anything like that?”
She looked to the windshield.
I didn’t know her as far as I could throw her.