Page 13 of Omar

"Supreme something or your-own-self something?"

"My-own-self."

She made a small sound that wasn't quite a laugh and wasn't quite a sigh. "A'ight. We'll talk."

She let me leave it there. That was the other thing about Nene. She knew when to push and when to step back, and right now in front of a salon on a Bed-Stuy stoop with my next client on her way over from the train wasn't when to push.

We went back inside.

The rest of the day passed in the rhythm I'd built my life around. Heads in chairs, washes, rollers, blow-outs. Nene drifted between her cousin's books and the front window. Tasha cussed out a courier on the phone for ten minutes about a delivery that hadn't arrived. The college girl Kaya showed me a TikTok of a style I had to politely talk her out of, and we landed on something better that took her an extra forty-five minutes but came out looking like a magazine cover. By the time I locked up at six I'd made just under five hundred dollars in cash, hugged Nene at the door, and almost let myself believe last night had been somebody else's problem.

I got home at six.

Supreme was on the couch with a glass of bourbon, ESPN on mute, his phone face down on the armrest. When I came through the door he looked up and his mouth curved into that little smile he gave me, half pleased husband, half something else. There was a private little smile underneath the warmer one he turned up for me. I'd been around long enough by now to know which one was the truer of the two.

"There's my baby," he said.

"Hey, Premie."

"Come here."

I crossed the room and let him hook an arm around my hips and pull me down onto his lap. He kissed the corner of my mouth, slow, holding me against him a moment longer than he needed to, his hand spread flat on my thigh. I gave him the smile he was waiting for.

"How was the salon, mama?"

"Busy. Mrs. Anders, the college girl I told you about, and two new bookings."

"Mmm, that's what I like to hear. My baby out here doin' her thing."

"I'm tryna."

"Don't tryna me. You out there doin' it." He kissed me again, brief, then patted my thigh. "I got us a reservation at Negril tomorrow night."

"Yeah? What's the occasion, Premie?"

"Occasion is I wanna take my woman out and have her looking like new money on my arm. That's the occasion."

I laughed despite myself. "Aight. The black dress?"

"You read my mind."

He looked at me a moment longer. Reading. He always read. By now I knew exactly what he was looking for and exactly how to give it to him.

He kissed me one more time and let me up.

In the kitchen I took the chicken out, salt-and-peppered it, set a pan on the burner and put the rice on. The TV came back up out of mute behind me, basketball commentary low and easy, the sound of Premie shifting on the couch, his phone buzzing once on the armrest.

Footsteps. He came up behind me at the stove, slid an arm around my waist, rested his chin on top of my head.

"Look at my woman doin' her thing in here," he said into my hair.

"It's just chicken, Premie."

"Mmhm. My woman cookin' for me in my kitchen. Don't get no better."

I shook my head, smiling. "Boy, sit down."

He laughed against my temple. "Aight, aight. You need anything?"