“Not bad.” Prime nodded, standing up to adjust Yusef’s stance. “But you’re dropping your shoulder. Keep your guard up even when you slip. Soon as you drop that guard, you’re open.”
“Like this?”
“Better. Again.”
I watched them work through the movement a few more times, Prime patient but precise with his corrections, Yusef eager to get it right. This man had given my nephew somethingI never could—confidence in his own body. The belief that he could defend himself if he needed to.
“Y’all hungry?” I called out, finally pushing off the wall. “I can throw something together.”
“YES.” Yusef’s head popped up over the back of the couch so fast I thought he was gonna give himself whiplash. “Can you make that jerk chicken? With the rice and peas? Please please please? I been thinking about it for like four days straight, I’m not even exaggerating.”
“Boy, that takes forever.”
“So?” He hit me with those puppy dog eyes that he knew good and well I couldn’t resist. “We got time, right? We ain’t got nowhere to be.”
I looked at Prime, who just shrugged, that little smirk playing at his lips. “I could eat.”
“I got you.” But I was already pulling pots out the cabinet, digging through that fancy refrigerator that cost more than my car. “Fine. Jerk chicken. But somebody better be on dish duty later because I’m not doing everything.”
“I got you,” Yusef said, already turning back to the TV. “After I finish destroying Prime in a game of chess.”
“You ain’t destroying nothing, lil man. I’m about to cook you.”
“That’s cap and you know it.”
I shook my head, smiling to myself as I started pulling out ingredients. Chicken thighs. Scotch bonnets. Thyme. Allspice. Soy sauce. The rice and peas would take a minute, but I had time. We all had time tonight.
The next couple hours passed in a kind of haze that felt almost… peaceful?
The penthouse filled up with the smell of jerk seasoning and coconut milk, spices so fragrant that even the fancy ventilation system couldn’t keep up. I found myself humming while Icooked—actually humming, like I wasn’t standing in the middle of about seventeen different crises with more on the way. I smiled, stirring the rice.
By the time I called them to the table, I’d made a whole spread. Jerk chicken glistening with that spicy-sweet glaze. Rice and peas cooked in coconut milk the way my grandmother used to make it. Fried plantains because Yusef loved them. A little cabbage on the side because SOMEBODY in this house needed to eat a vegetable.
We sat at that big walnut dining table—the one designed to seat twelve people but only ever held the three of us—and ate together. Like a family. A real one.
Yusef loaded up his plate like he hadn’t eaten in a week, which was typical. He grabbed a plantain before I could even finish saying grace and bit into it immediately.
“HOT! Hot hot hot—” He started fanning his mouth, eyes watering, but he didn’t spit it out. Just kept chewing through the pain like a soldier.
Prime started laughing. “What did you think was gonna happen? She just took them out the oil two seconds ago.”
“I thought they would’ve cooled down!”
“In what universe do fried plantains cool down in two seconds?”
“I was hungry!”
“You were being greedy. There’s a difference.”
I was laughing too, shaking my head at him. “Drink some water. And maybe wait thirty seconds before you shove the next one in your mouth.”
“Yes ma’am.” He grabbed his glass, still fanning his tongue, but he was grinning. Looking like a regular kid dealing with regular kid problems. Not a traumatized twelve-year-old who’d caught a body and watched his whole world fall apart.
This. This right here. This was what I wanted for him. What I’d been fighting for since the day I walked into that apartment in California and found my sister dead on the floor.
Normal moments. Safe spaces. A chance to just be a kid.
Dinner conversation flowed easy after that. Yusef talked about school. His piano teacher saying he was ready for more advanced pieces. A project he had coming up in history that he was actually excited about.
