I woke up and Wallace was standing over me. I almost jumped out of my skin and pulled the needles out of my arms trying to get away from him.

"What tha fuck, man?" My eyes were huge and I was staring at him. My heart was about to pop out of my chest. The machine started beeping out of control.

"Sorry." He put a hand on my shoulder to calm me. "Sorry." He gazed at me directly and didn't even trip on me cussing at him.

Wallace didn't really trip on most things as far as I could tell. I watched him a lot while I was in the hospital, and the more I watched him, the more I found myself doing little things like him. Like trying to stay calm and not be so stressed all the time.

Getting shot was helping a lot with that, too, I'm not even gonna lie.

"Wallace." I said his name like it was its own sentence. Everyone else called him Wally or Wally B, but not me. I said his full name.

Every time.

He was aight, but he also had full access to mama and my sisters, so I wanted him to be clear that we weren't that cool.

"Your aunt's here." He nodded over to the chair by the door, where Jazz always sat. She never went too far into small rooms. She didn't like to feel blocked in.

"You alright?" He still had his hand on my shoulder. I looked down at it. He moved it.

"Yeah. Thanks...thanks for bringing her."

He dropped the bag that was slung over his shoulder onto the floor.

"Want me to stay?"

"Nah. We're good."

He looked over at Jazz, and then back at me. Then he leaned in closer and asked me again.

"You sure?" I hated being asked the same thing twice, and I'm sure my face told him so because he backed up and nodded. "Aight then. Call me if you need me."

Then he looked over at Jazz and back at me one more time. I could tell he didn't think it was a good idea to leave her there. I wasn't exactly sure why. They were all acting really weird about my aunt for some reason. That's why I needed to get her alone to find out what was going on.

Eventually, he left. I watched him walk out of the door, and then I watched Jazz. I observed her. She was fidgety and kept looking from the hospital room door to the bathroom door. She looked haunted. And afraid. Terrified, actually. Even when she looked at me. Like she was just waiting for me to jump up and choke the shit out of her, even though she knew damn well I couldn't get up out of that bed, even if I wanted to. Forget about the fact that it was me. She knew I would never put my hands on her like that.

She looked pale. And sick.

"Jazz." She jumped at the sound of my voice. I hated to see her so scared all the time. It made me want to kill someone. Anyone. I didn't give a fuck who. I just wanted to hurt people every damn time I saw her that way. "Are you high right now?"

She stared at me with wide eyes. Her voice was barely a whisper, like she was afraid to speak.

"No."

"When was the last time you got high?"

"A few days ago." That explained why she was sweating so bad.

"Where did Wallace find you?"

"Up the way."

"I know that. Where?"

"In the cut."

My shoulders slumped all the way down and so did hers. That was exactly who I never wanted her to be. And she knew it. I gave her rocks while she was pregnant to keep her from turning into that. I didn't want my Aunt Jazz to be the one that they took back in that alley with them. The thought of them...doing that...to her...made me just...

...I just couldn't take it.

I fought the urge to just go back to sleep.

Fuck this.

All of it.

"Jazz..." I didn't really have anything else to say beyond that.

"I thought you would be dead by now." She was serious.

"What?"

"Rico's gonna kill you." She sounded so creepy, all whispering and shit. Like a shell of the person that I used to know.

"Says who?" She just stared at me like I was a ghost. "Jazz." She didn't answer. "Says who?" When she still didn't answer, I got angry. "If Rico wanted me dead, he would have set my ass on fire."

By the time I realized what I said, it was too late.

I saw her eye twitch from all the way across the room, and then her face went...animalistic. I hadn't seen that in a while. It had been a few since I had seen her give a shit about anything at all.

"Don't say that to me." She meant it. And I was sorry. "Don't you ever say that to me." All of the blood drained from her face and she looked...too worked up. "Don't you ever say that to me, Kenney. Don't you ever talk about that to me again. To me, to anyone." She looked at me like she was about to come at me. "Don't you ever talk about that again." She was whispering, but to my ears and to my heart it sounded like she was yelling right in my face.

She went even paler.

Oh shit.

I thought she was about to check out on me like mamA. Out of all the people that I knew, Jazz was the only person that I had ever needed. Like needed, needed. I needed her to...stay with me. Keep it together and stay in touch with reality. That's all I needed her to do, because my real mama had checked out on me a long time ago.

"Jazz..." she didn't answer. "Aunt Jazz..." She still didn't answer. She wasn't focused on anything at all. She was staring at some horror movie inside of her own head, and I could almost guess what it was, because I had seen the real horror with my own eyes. I had touched it. Smelled it. Picked Angel up and carried her out of that fucking house my damn self. We had done so much dirt in that house. So many horrible things to so many people. And that's where I found my baby...

God...help...

It all came back. Full circle. Landed right at my feet. Everything that I had ever done landed right into my arms, and when I held her for the last time...

Now I was about to check out, too. I could feel it. Sammy was right. It was all up to me to hold it down for both of us. Or we weren't going to make it. Neither one of us were going to make it. There was just too much to deal with. Too much to handle. I had to hold both of us down from this bed. A bed that I couldn't even get out of on my own.

Fuck life.

All this shit.

Fuck all this shit.

"Jazz, look at me." She did. "Are...you ok?" I tried to stay calm.

Her face went white. Totally white. I had never seen her look that way before. I started to call the nurse. Or Wallace... Or Charity...

"Aunt Jazz," I held out my hand. "I need you." She came back to me a little bit. I knew she would. She would never just leave me out there. "Come over here for a second, Jazz, I need your help."

She looked at me for the longest time, like she was willing herself to come back to the conversation, to what was going on around her. Then she focused in on my hand, and then on my face. She stood up slowly and walked over to me, but she still looked afraid of me. Of everyone. I felt like I was watching her try to swim to me through a swamp. This was literally the strongest woman that I knew, and I didn't think she was going to make it.

If she didn't make it, I wouldn't make it.

"Aunt Jazz," I grabbed her hand when she got close enough to me and she almost jumped out of her skin. I let her go right away and tried again. "Aunt Jazz...hold my hand." And then I let her take her time putting her hand into mine.

"Aunt Jazz, why won't you go outside?" She just stared at me. "Jazz...listen...I need you. I need you to pull it together. Please..." A couple of tears dropped out of my eyes. They caught her attention. I was tired of all this damn crying. I wasn't that dude. I hadn't been that cry baby kid in a long time. "Jazz...come back to me...stay with me. Keep it together, Jazz. I...I can't walk. I don't know...what's going to happen to me. I need your help."

She focused even more in on me and nodded her head.

"I'm scared, Jazz." I was. I was scared as shit that I would never walk again. And she knew it. She reached up to touch my face and stepped even closer to me. Then she wiped my tears away with her hand. "Jazz...it's all fucked up."

She nodded and didn't even fuss at me for cursing. "Yeah it is, Kenney."

"I need you."

"I know." She stepped even closer to me. Her eyes were hollow. And the whites were turning a yellowish-brown. Her cheeks were sunken in and her teeth had a slightly red tint to them. It had been a while since I had looked at her this close up. Thankfully, her lips weren't burned and blistered, but she still looked like death. Smelled like it, too. I can't describe the smell. It's not anything that...most people would pick up on. But I had smelled it a million times and knew exactly what it was. I was fucked if Jazz died.

Fucked.

I swallowed back panic, because I didn't want my aunt to panic, and held her hand tighter.

"Aunt Jazz...we're gonna be ok."

I was saying that to keep both of us calm, not just her.

Her eyes were so big.

Wide.

Just...wide.

She was terrified. Haunted. And I was the only one in the room. And she was looking at me like I was the one who did that to her.

It hurt me so bad.

It hurt my soul.

"Jazz...come here." She took one small step closer and wiped away more tears from my face.

She looked so bad. Like she was sick. It killed me. She used to be so beautiful. The most beautiful one of all her sisters. I reached out to touch her face and she flinched. Like she thought I was about to hit her. Me. She knew damn well that I would never hit her. I would never do that to any woman. Not after what I had seen Rico do to her. She knew I wasn't like that. She was the one who raised me not to be that way.

Fucking Rico.

I pulled my hand away and then more cautiously tried again. "Aunt Jazz...I need your help. Pull it back together, Jazz. Help me. I need you to get clean, and I need you to help me. Promise me. Please, Jazz. Promise me that you'll pull it together. I can't make it without you. Jazz...listen to me..." I couldn't tell if she was hearing me or not. Her face never changed. "Promise that you'll stay with me." Jazz kind of blinked, and then wiped more tears from my face. Then she nodded her head silently. I put my thumb against her lips and she kissed it. Our secret pact. "Aunt Jazz, I can't...move my legs..."

Her eyes widened and she started to shake. She shook all over and I didn't know why.

"Come here." She just stared at me. The blood was gone from her face again. "Come here," I repeated and held on tighter to her hand. "It's ok." I held out my arms to her and she took a step closer. "It's ok." I put my hand on her back and gently moved her in toward me. When she was close enough, I tried to pull her into me, as carefully as I could, because I knew if Wallace found her in the cut she could have bruises...anywhere. "It's ok, Aunt Jazz. It's ok..."

She just stared at me, shaking and white, looking like she was already dead. I thought about Tiana and how I didn't even know whose eyes I was looking into. More tears dropped. And then more...and more. From her eyes and mine. We were just staring at each other, trying to keep each other alive, just like it had always been, and I pulled her even closer to me. She put her head down on my chest and was shaking so hard it actually shook the bed. I rubbed my hand slowly up and down her back, trying to calm her. Her heart was beating too hard and too fast against me. I wondered if she was about to have a heart attack. Again, I thought about calling the nurse.

I pulled back and stared into her eyes. She wanted to die. I could tell. I had seen that look before. On TianA. I had to think of something, quick.

"Jazz..." I said the only thing that would come to mind. "The Lord is my Sheppard, I shall not want..." She stared at me like I was something that she had never seen before. "Aunt Jazz," I stroked her face slowly, like Sammy used to do mamA. "Jazz...He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still waters..."

Jazz stared mouthing the words silently to me. She knew this one. She had taught it to me.

"Jazz, say it with me." I took her hand into mine. She looked down at my hand, and then back up into my face. Her face softened. "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil..." I put my hands on her face again. "Come on, Jazz."

She watched me, read my lips, mouthed her own lips silently.

"...for thou art with me, thy rod and thy staff they comfort me..."

She couldn't get the words out, and I understood that. So I said them for both of us. I said the whole thing, and then I started it over again. Halfway through the second time, her color started coming back. By the end, Jazz was saying it with me.

We got to the end and I started over again.

This time, when we got to the end, I paused and Jazz said, "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever."

We said "Psalms 23: 1-6" together.

"Aunt Jazz?"

"Yes."

"Are you ok?"

"Yes." And she went to sit back down in her chair by the door.

I called the nurse in then, and introduced her to Jazz, so that Jazz wouldn't freak out if she came into the room while I was sleeping. Then I asked her to bring Jazz a blanket and a pillow, because she would be sleeping in the room with me. The nurse kind of eyed Jazz, but didn't say anything slick about how she was looking or acting. I offered Jazz some of my food when they came in with my meal, but she wouldn't eat anything. I called the nurse back in and asked her for some water. She brought in a whole pitcher and sat it by the bed. Jazz wouldn't drink any of it.

After another nurse came in and checked all my machines, then wrote a bunch of stuff down, everything was quiet. After a while, Jazz started looking nervously from the hospital room door to the bathroom door again.

"Aunt Jazz..." she jumped like she forgot I was there. "Close the door." She did, and she closed the bathroom door, too, after peeking inside. Then she sat tiredly back down. "Jazz, we're safe here...we're safe."

She nodded and started trying to stretch the blanket out wide enough to cover her whole body. I watched her struggle, and wished with everything I had that I could just go over there and do it for her. The more I thought about it, the more I felt the panic rise up inside of me. I really couldn't fucking walk. Not even from the bed to the door.

Shit...

I closed my eyes and tried to relax my face, like I was asleep, and hoped that she would do the same. Eventually it worked. She stopped fighting with the blanket and just let it fall over her. Then she rested her head against the pillow and closed her eyes. I watched her, and tried to move as little as possible until she finally fell asleep.

Then I closed my eyes and prayed that she wouldn't start feening and leave in the middle of the night.

After that, I fell asleep, too.