a small dot on the horizon
until she disappears.
CHAPTER 25Lyric
LIP OF THE DAY:
N/A
I am two years old. I don’t really remember his face, but I know that his voice sounds like honey, moving slow and sweet through a jar. I know that when he enters the room, it fills with the strong smell of motor oil and cigar smoke. I know he’s my daddy, because he and Mama kiss one another and then kiss me, and then I hear them giggling when I try to fall asleep in my trundle. I know he’s my daddy because I call him that and he picks me up and spins me around until I’m screaming with laughter. I am too little to remember how or when exactly he dies, but I know one day he’s there and we are a family, and the next day he’s gone. I know that Grammy Viv bounced me on her knee during the funeral—only because there is a picture of us in her house fromthe day. I know that Mama never was the same after that. Grief mixed with her already faulty brain chemistry changed the way she saw the world—herself—and then, by the time I was three, we were homeless. Mama and me on a great adventure, so she’d say, never staying in one place long, never going back to that little bubble of life I remember like a dream. We never spoke of him as I grew up. And then she left. Gave me up like it was nothing. Like I was just a stranger, a painful reminder of when happiness seemed possible.
As I stomp back toward Juniper’s house, I am determined to get Grammy and me as far away from here as possible. I check Facebook for an update on our heat. Of course it’s not back on. The latest post from our building manager just saysworking to resolve the issue. I’m not actually going to take Grammy home to a freezing apartment, so as soon as I’m back inside, I mutter an excuse for leaving to Juniper’s moms, pack our bags, then text Kiana. Kiana is horrified to hear about our heat situation.
Kiana: Oh my god, Lyric. Why didn’t you tell me?! Go to my house now. We won’t be home until around eight p.m., but here’s the code to the garage. I’ll get my dad to turn the alarm off. The back door should be unlocked, once you get the garage door open.
Me: Thanks. You’re the best.
Kiana: Is everything else OK? You never called me last night.
Me: Everything is fucked.
Kiana: Whoa—OK. I need to be caught up. Hang in there, boo, OK?
Me: K.
After a hurried goodbye to Alice and Mara, I drive me and Grammy to Kiana’s in silence.
“Lyric, baby. What happened?” Grammy tries, but I put up my hand.
“Please, Grammy. Not now. I just need—I need a minute.”
When we get to Kiana’s, I punch in the garage code and slide my car inside. I help Grammy out and get her seated in the living room with the TV on Bravo so she can catch theReal Housewives of Potomacmarathon that’s on. I make us some pastrami sandwiches with ingredients from Kiana’s expansive three-door fridge and try not to be mad about the ham we were supposed to be enjoying today, that I left behind at Juniper’s in my rush to leave.
“Merry Christmas,” I say, placing Grammy’s food next to her and giving her a soft kiss on the cheek. “Sorry it’s such a mess.”
“That ain’t your fault, honey,” Grammy says, patting the spot next to her on Kiana’s couch. “Don’t take this on. Sometimes things just happen and life goes to hell. I would know. But you know what? I bet it can be fixed. With a little time.”
“Are you talking about our heat? Because the building manager is now saying tomorrow afternoon, at the earliest. We better get a discount on rent this month, is all I’m sayin.”
“No, I’m not talking about the damn heat. I’m talking about your little girlfriend. The one that has you so in your feelings.”
Don’t cry, don’t cry, DO NOT CRY, I say in my head as I sink down next to Grammy. Everything is so messed up, and I know I need to ask Grammy what the hell she meant about my mom being back in the picture, but I’m so tired of keeping it all together, of acting like nothing can touch me, like I’m unbreakable. I’m not. I am a mosaic at best—thousands of broken pieces held together with time and pain and survival. Sometimes I just want to fall apart—destroythe delicate glue holding me together and scream and cry and throw a tantrum.
“Oh, baby,” Grammy says, pulling me close. “Cry it out. It’s OK. I got you. Love is the scariest and hardest and most beautiful thing. It ruins and remakes the best of us.”
“It’s not love,” I blubber.
“It is. And it’s OK to feel it. Feel it all, baby girl.”
I cry harder then, because maybe she’s right. Maybe I do love Juniper, but it’s all over now. What I said to her, how she responded—hurling my most vulnerable parts back at me. How all of this was just supposed to be some simple, cute scheme to make money, and now it’s just slush and mud and the worst parts of the winter blues.
“This is why I don’t let people in,” I choke out. “Everyone always lets me down.”
“I know it feels that way right now, and I know your mom did a number on you… and me. But you are not alone. Even when I’m gone, Lyric, you’ve got so many people in your life who adore you, and that’s only going to grow. I know it. You’ve got big things ahead of you, baby girl. Don’t lose sight of that. It’s my favorite thing about you. Your ambition, your fight.”
“It is?” I sniffle. “But it gets me into so much trouble.”
Grammy laughs then. “Sometimes, yes. Lord—you get so mad sometimes, I think a whole wildfire is burning in you, and you have a lot to be angry about. But—anger, it can be useful too. It can fuel you, make you more honest and keep you focused on what matters, what you value most in life.”
