pants should be banned from public wear.”
She stifled a chuckle. “Don’t, okay? I know he’s a little different, but he’s nice. Really. And right now I just need someone to be nice to me.”
There it was, the bottom of the bucket, what this talk was really about. “I’m sorry Jordan pulled that stunt today. I know how you must feel.”
“You can’t know.” Rochelle stared at the floor, drawing my eyes to black-and-white tiles.
My heart skipped a beat. Anger shrilled in Rochelle’s voice, but jealousy echoed just underneath it, mixed with something else. Love? No wonder she’d stayed in the choir stand. My brother had humiliated her all over again. I swallowed. “I hate to ask this, but do you still have feelings for Jordan? Now, I mean?”
Her head snapped my way, but she didn’t answer.
I didn’t need her to. She loved him. While Mama had stirred a daily brew of resentment for us girls to drink, Rochelle had managed to hold on to her love? “How could you?”
It wasn’t what I meant to say. I meant to speak of grace and forgiveness. To tell her I loved her, that I understood…But my inner madness reared its head. It was okay for me to love my brother, but Rochelle loving him seemed another slap in the face. Another betrayal.
“This is not about you, Dane. It’s about us.”
Us? Where was “us” when the diapers had to be changed and the bottles warmed? Where was us when I stayed up all night with Jericho and went to school all day? “It’s about me, too.” What “us” was she talking about anyway? The guy had shown up this morning with another woman and she didn’t look like a friend.
“Just stay out of it, okay? The last of the money went to helping you with your shop. I invested some, used some for design school and to start the shoe shop.”
“I’ll bet. I can’t even afford an ankle strap in that place. I love how that Italian leather smells though….”
“Oh, Dana. You know I’ll make you a pair whenever. I just hate making them and then you never wear them. It’s a waste.”
“I don’t wear them because you make them for you, not me.” Sort of like my life. Save her favorite lime strappies, Rochelle’s idea of a cute shoe was chunky-heeled mules. No toes showing. I paid good money for my pedicures and I meant to make my toesies earn out every dime.
We stood quietly, contemplating following this safer tangent of conversation or diving back into the unexplored depths of our relationship—both with each other and with my brother. Neither option looked promising.
“Be right back.” I stumbled into one of the stalls behind us, trying to digest it all. Mama’s place in the whole plot would require my singular attention later.
“Come out, will you? I know you’re just standing in there.”
“So,” I whispered over the door, wishing for once that she and Tracey didn’t know me so well. My lifelong fear of public bathrooms wasn’t exactly a secret, but only those two knew to what extremes my phobia ran.
“I truly am sorry. I have nothing to say for myself,” she said. Another stall clanged shut beside me, just the barrier between us, the walls around our hearts seemed to come down. “Forgive me?”
“Of course I do.” I pulled back the stall door, wondering whether it was best to come out of this little truth booth. Can’t hide forever. I stepped forward. “So that’s it? Nothing else you aren’t telling me?”
Rochelle turned and walked to the sink. I followed, choosing the basin beside her. “There’s more.” Her words were close, almost brushing my face.
God, You’re really pulling out the stops, huh?
Tracey’s presence would have been wonderful right now. The baby thing brushed against my mind, but I pushed it back into the box where I’d locked it. This was no time to trade secrets.
I turned to my sink and rolled her words over in my head. It hit me, like the roar of the ocean in a seashell. The truth had always been there, I just hadn’t been listening. My fingers clutched Rochelle’s shoulder. “It was you, wasn’t it? You sent the money to Mexico. You…kept him alive. Why wouldn’t you tell me?” I paused as this wave of new truth crested in me. “Why didn’t you tell Mama?”
Two old ladies behind us leaned in closer, no longer concerned with their turn in the stall. A six-year-old joined us at the sink, pushing me aside