Page 1

CHAPTER 1

DEJA MCCOY

Ihated that I had to call my mom, but I needed to. I had to get in contact with her so that I could have a better understanding of what I needed to do. Where I needed to start. I didn’t have a location on Nari’s phone because she cut her phone off. All my calls were going straight to voicemail, and my messages weren’t delivering, and that’s how I knew she’d powered off her phone.

I can’t tell you the last time I picked my phone up to call my mom. I didn’t call her. She never called me, either. I was one of those people that liked to change my phone number all the time, so I doubt my number was even saved to her phone.

Rushing out of the club, with Lyric right on the side of me, I dialed my mom’s number, keeping the phone on speaker, so that Lyric would be able to hear everything. The phone rang about seven times before it went to voicemail. I called again, and the same thing happened. I never had too much pride in calling someone, so I continued to blow her phone up. There was no pride right now, especially since I was trying to figure out what was going on with my sister.

She didn’t answer my call until the 10th call that I put in.

“What? Who the fuck is this? Why the fuck you keep calling my phone back-to-back like this?” she snapped.

I could hear loud music in her background. I wasn’t surprised that she was out. She was always out. She enjoyed being outside.

“Where is Nari?” I went ahead and asked her.

I was sitting in the passenger seat of Lyric’s car, but Lyric hadn’t pulled out yet. She didn’t know where to go. I also didn’t know where to tell her to go because I wasn’t sure where my sister was.

“Why you calling my phone back-to-back like this⁠—”

“Bitch, where the fuck is my sister? She sent me a fuckin suicide message, and I’m trying to get to her before she does something stupid! Where the fuck is my sister?” I screamed at her, my voice shaking, and cracking.

Tears were falling down my face. I don’t think I’ve ever been this scared about anything.

“Nari is home and⁠—”

“What about Nico? Where is the baby?” I wanted to know, at the same time, pointing with my finger, telling Lyric to head in the direction of my mom’s house. She knew the way, so she quickly pulled out of the parking spot.

“She took Nico with his fuckin daddy. You can let Nari get you all worked up if you want to. That girl had a baby, and now she’s miserable. I had to go through that same stage. Millions of mothers around the world had to deal with postpartum. She’ll be okay!” her words were coming out a little slurred, and that’s when it hit me that she might be drunk.

Even if she wasn’t drunk, she might have still chosen to say this dumb ass shit because she’s proven to me years ago that she really didn’t give a fuck what came out of her mouth.

“Nari has never in her life sent me the kind of message that she just sent me tonight. That girl told me she was tired, and that she wanted me to raise Nico for her. You know that she doesn’t talk like that. I fuckin hate you. I know I tell you this shit all the time, but I fuckin hate you! You stood your stupid ass there, and you told Nari to have that baby, lying to her, telling her that you were going to help her out, and you didn’t. You stay on the move like a bitch in their twenties. Your daughter has been suffering for months, crying out loud for help for months, but you were too busy outside that you never saw it. I don’t have a key to your house, so if I get there and Nari is inside, I’m kicking the door in. You better hope that my sister is alive. I need somebody to blame, and bitch Ima blame it on you!” I spat, hanging the phone up, and tossing it in my lap.

I’d managed to throw my sweat suit on in the locker room before we left out. Since my sweat suit was on, and I didn’t want Lyric to witness me having a moment like this, I buried my head into the hoodie and broke down. I was screaming and crying for my sister. Already picturing a life with her not in it, and that was breaking me down.

I was in a state of needing someone to blame, and even though I was putting the blame on my mom, I was also putting it on me, wondering if there was more that I could have done. I thought I was doing everything that I could. I sacrificed my sleep during the day on those days where I had to watch Nico, so my sister could go to school. If I had the weekend’s off, I would typically try to get him again, so she was able to get a break. I sent money, so my sister wouldn’t have to struggle with him. I called her every day, pouring into her, letting her know how much I loved her, and that life was going to ease up on her eventually. I thought I was doing everything right, but I guess I wasn’t.

“Deja, she’s going to be okay. I’m rushing to get us there. Nari wouldn’t leave you like that. You know this,” Lyric said to me, putting her hand on my back, massaging it in a circular motion, as she continued to zoom through traffic.

I wanted to respond back and express my doubts. I wanted to scream at her, telling her not to say these things to me because she didn’t know if it was true, but I didn’t. I continued to sit here and sob, thinking about my little sister, with horrific images of her filling my mind. My mind was going so far left that I’d already mentally prepared myself for what I might possibly walk into once I made it to my mom’s house.

“Come on. We going to manifest that she’s inside, and well,” Lyric said to me about twenty minutes later.

She’d just pulled her car into my mom’s driveway.

The second we stepped out of the car, that’s when my mom’s Mercedes came flying down the street. She tried to pretend that everything was going to be okay with Nari over the phone, and that she wasn’t bothered, but I could tell that I’d shaken her up with my words. If I didn’t, she wouldn’t have flown down the street the way she did.

She sloppily pulled her car into the driveway, turned it off, and I could tell by the way she was staggering that she was indeed drunk, just like I was able to gather over the phone. The dress she had on was very short, so she was pulling it down, as she made her way up the driveway. There was so much distain in my eyes as I looked over at her. She looked at me the same way and then led the way to her front door. The bitch was so drunk that when she got a hold of her keys, and tried to insert it into the lock, the keys ended up falling out of her hands.

“Move! Let me do it!” I said, bending down, picking up the keys that fell to the floor. I was swift with using the key, granting us access into the house, and I took off.

Nari’s bedroom was on the second floor. Her bedroom was at the end of the hall. Once I was on the second floor, I could see her room door, but it was closed.

I approached the door, turned the handle, but it was locked. I took a step back, inhaled a deep breath, and proceeded to picking my foot up, so I could kick the door in. With all the force I used, immediately the door opened, cracking up top at the hinges.

It was pitched dark in the bedroom. No idea what I was walking into, but I walked, and when I did, I tripped over a figure, causing me to fall forward.