“Justice won’t even take my calls. Quest… I haven’t heard from him in months.” She shook her head slowly. “I made mistakes, Serenity. I know that. But I’m still their mother. I carried them. I raised them. And now I’m sitting in here and not one of them can be bothered to drive forty minutes to see me.”
I didn’t point out that her “mistakes” included orchestrating the arrest of her son’s pregnant fiancée and decades of manipulation and cruelty that had fractured the entire family. I didn’t point out that the reason she was in here wasn’t because of India, but because her own sons had decided she’d done enough damage. I just sat there and held her hands because that was my role. The daughter who showed up. The one who loved her mother even when her mother made it almost impossible.
“How’s everything with you and Mega?” she asked, shifting gears with the ease of a woman who’d been controlling conversations for forty years.
“It’s good. Really good. We just got back from Miami.” I heard myself performing the happiness and hated how automatic it had become. “And we’re planning a trip to Hawaii soon.”
“Hawaii. That sounds lovely.” Vivica smiled but her eyes were doing something else, something quieter, cataloging the information the way she cataloged everything. “He’s treating you well?”
“He is.”
“Good. You deserve that after everything with Julius.” She said his name like it tasted bad. “Speaking of which—have you seen your brothers lately?”
“Not really. I’ve talked to Quest a few times but we’re not as close as we used to be. You know how they are, always in my business, always trying to control everything.”
“They get that from their father.” She paused. “How’s the casino coming along? I saw something about it on the news. Grand opening soon?”
“Yeah, it’s in a couple of weeks. Quest and Justice have been working around the clock on it.”
“I bet they have. That’s a big deal for the family. For the city.” She nodded like a proud mother, which she probably was underneath everything else. Vivica had always taken pride in her children’s accomplishments even when she was actively trying to undermine them. “Is the whole family going to the opening?”
“I think so. And Rita’s eighty-fifth birthday is coming up too. Everyone’s going to be at that for sure. It’ll be at a private room in the casino before the opening.” Technically Grandma-Rita wasn’t my grandmother. Me and my brothers had different fathers but she accepted and loved me as her grandchild. AndI loved her as if she were my real grandmother. My father’s mother had passed away before I was born.
Vivica’s mouth twitched at the mention of Rita. The two of them had never gotten along. Rita saw through Vivica before anyone else did and Vivica resented her for it. “Everyone? Prime too?”
“Yeah, Prime and Zainab and the twins. Quest. Justice and the girls. Probably some of other cousins too. You know how Rita does it. The more the merrier.”
“Sounds wonderful.” Vivica’s voice was light but I caught something behind her eyes that flickered for half a second before it disappeared. I dismissed it because my mother’s eyes were always doing something and I’d stopped trying to decode every flicker years ago.
“Listen, Mama, I need to ask you something.” I shifted in my chair. “Have you talked to a lawyer recently? About the trial?”
“My lawyer is bleeding me dry.” The warmth left her voice and the politician replaced the mother. “I had to mortgage the house to pay for the defense. A house I bought with thirty years of public service. Do you know how that feels? To watch everything you built get liquidated to pay a man in a suit to tell you there’s a chance you might spend the rest of your life in here?”
“I’m sorry, Mama.”
“Don’t be sorry. Be useful.” She said it without malice but also without softness. “Can you put some money on my books? The commissary prices in here are criminal and I say that as someone who’s been accused of an actual crime.”
“I got you. I’ll do it today.”
“Thank you, baby.” She squeezed my hands again and her face softened back into something resembling the mother I wanted her to be. “You’re a good daughter, Serenity. Better than I deserve.”
“I love you, Mama. But you fucked up crossing Prime. You know that, right?”
Something passed across her face, not guilt, not regret, something more complicated than either. Something that looked like a woman who knew exactly what she’d done and would do it all again if the circumstances required it.
“I know,” she said quietly.
I hugged her, told her I’d be back next month, and walked out of the visitation room into the parking lot where the air smelled like freedom instead of regret.
In the car, I put the money on her books through the facility’s app. Three hundred dollars. It would last her a few weeks if she was careful, but Vivica had never been careful with money or with people or with anything that mattered.
My phone buzzed as I pulled onto the highway.
Quest:I need to see you. Today. It’s important. Meet me at Grandma’s house at 4.
My stomach dropped. Quest never texted like that unless something was wrong.
Me:Is Grandma okay??
