Page 8 of The Fire We Make

The tight set of her lips told of a woman who hadn’t had a reason to smile in months. The bags under her eyes that the thickest of concealers couldn’t cover told of the tears she’d cried until she was dehydrated. The veil of dark energy that covered her told of her mourning.

She scoffed.

Lathering on her cocoa butter lotion, she thought of all the ways she’d tried and failed to capture the elusive peace of mind Lauryn sang about since being cast out of her organization and home.

She meditated and drank calming tea. She read self help books and watched sermons. She went to multiple therapists and even took the medications they prescribed that turned her into a hollow shell of herself. None of them seemed to be able to point her to the peace she’d been searching for. All she felt was pain that sharpened into something far more dangerous if not numbed by weed and alcohol.

For almost 20 years, her mind had been on one track and she took orders from one man. To be shoved out of the only world she knew because she was no longer useful, had hurt her to her core.

To have an empire taken from her that had been built on her back—with her blood, sweat and sins—had filled her with a burning anger that wouldn’t be extinguished by yoga.

Cleaned and moisturized, Joy tip toed down the stairs to retrieve the ice packs and bandages she kept prepared. To prevent her hands from swelling and bruising, she secured the ice to her knuckles. She couldn’t start her new job looking like a street fighter.

She looked up from ice pack and athletic tape to see Melody coming through the door.

“Hey, Jo Jo,” her cousin greeted her with a smile as soon as she walked in, dropping her duffle bag and pleaser heels at the door.

Joy smiled back. “Hi Mel. How was work?” she asked. Only then did she realize how much time had slipped away from her. A glance at the clock confirmed that it was well past three in the morning.

Mel walked closer with a hand at the meeting of her slim waist and flared hip. Melody Turner had a body that was grown in the south and refined by years of classical training as a dancer.

She’d performed with many well known artists and had choreographed for them too. In her “off-seasons” when she wasn’t on tour or working on a video, she performed at a local strip club to maintain her conditioning and allow for more creative freedom.

Mel’s gaze fell to Joy’s wrapped hands and her smile faded. “Joy,” she sighed.

“What?” Joy snapped, the judgement in Mel’s voice erecting defensiveness in her own. “It was just the gym.”

“You didn’t put gloves on?”

Joy scrunched her face up, repulsed and offended by the question.

Mel rolled her eyes but chuckled.

“Listen, I know old habits die hard but…” Mel started.

But she didn’t have to finish. Joy already knew what she’d say. They’d talked about Joy’s habits and tendencies in length already.

But what do you do when an “old habit” is embedded in your DNA? How do you simply stop being who you are? How does someone just stop doing what they’d been taught since they were a child simply because someone said they shouldn’t anymore? Just because she’d taken it “too far”.

Mel may as well have been asking Joy to forget her ABCs or colors. To unlearn how to walk.

Joy sighed. “Mel, I don’t wanna hear that shit right now. I know you don’t get it but this is who I am. I’m doing my fucking best, okay?”

As much as Joy loved Mel, and as close as they were, there were some things she would never understand.

Mel didn’t know everything that had led to Joy’s breakdown but she knew enough about the life she lived to make inferences.

Byron and Mel’s father, Jerome, had been best friends since they were kids and did everything together, growing up more like brothers than friends. When Jerome went to Byron about a way for them to make fast money and get themselves and their families out of Third Ward, they both jumped off the porch and into the drug game ten toes as teenagers.

Years later, the two had made a name for themselves and had expanded their reach beyond the streets of Houston to the entire state. However, a rivalry gone bad left Jerome with a fatal gunshot wound and Byron sitting in a cell waiting to see a judge.

With the heat of impending charges and the mourning of his brother, Byron concluded that his pursuit of running the state had been stifled. After being released from his three year incarceration, he met a woman, got married and moved to the suburbs with whatever he had left. He got out of the drug game and started his life over but never disconnected from it fully, always keeping loose contact with his old associates.

However, after his wife’s death and years of playing the reformed role, Byron became unsettled and when his second child, a daughter, began showing signs of having everything needed to help him get it all back, he jumped on it.

Whereas Mel was only privy to their fathers’ old lives through stories and cautionary tales, Joy was raised to pick up where they left off, using the lessons that their fathers learned as a guide.

“I hear you and I’m not trying to discount the progress you’ve made. I just…I don’t want you to do anything that’ll flip that switch again.”