“I told Keyvon not to go to that casino,” Bryce said, his voice tight. “I told him and Jerome both. They didn’t listen. They wentin there hot because of Dimonte and now they’re locked up. That’s not on me.”
“He’s my brother!”
“And he shot up a building full of innocent people! What do you want me to do about that?”
Samaya turned her face away and crossed her arms over her belly. The room was quiet except for the sound of traffic outside and the hum of a refrigerator that probably didn’t have much in it.
I sat down next to Bryce at the kitchen table and lowered my voice. “What do you need?”
“I need a job, sis. For real. Mega’s dead, the Vipers are done. Whatever was left of the crew scattered when word got out. I got no income, no connects, and a baby coming any day. I can’t keep living off what you bring me.” He looked at his hands. “Can you ask Quest if he’s got something for me? Anything. I’ll do warehouse work, deliveries, I don’t care. I just need something legit.”
I looked at my little brother. He was asking me to ask the man he’d robbed and burned for a job. That took more courage than anything he’d ever done with the Vipers. Courage or sheer stupidity.
“I’ll talk to him,” I said. “I can’t promise anything but I’ll ask.”
“Thank you.”
“And take that gun out of your pants before you shoot your dick off. You’re gonna need it.”
He almost smiled. Almost.
Samaya made a sound from the couch that wasn’t part of the argument. A sharp intake of breath followed by a groan that came from somewhere deep. She grabbed her belly with both hands and her eyes went wide.
“Bryce.”
“What?”
“It’s time.”
“Time for what?”
“THE BABY, BRYCE. IT’S TIME.”
The next twenty minutes were chaos. Bryce couldn’t find the hospital bag Samaya had packed two weeks ago because he’d moved it to make room for something and couldn’t remember where. Samaya was cursing him out between contractions while I found the bag in the closet behind a stack of Jordan boxes. Luke drove us to the hospital because Bryce’s car was out of commission. And Samaya was gripping my hand in the backseat so tight I thought she might break my fingers.
They took her back and I sat in the lobby and waited. I texted Quest: “Samaya’s in labor. I’m at the hospital with Bryce.” He responded: “Tell lil bro congratulations.”
Three hours later Bryce came through the double doors looking like a different person. The fear was gone, the tension was gone, and what was left was something I’d never seen on my little brother’s face before. Wonder. Pure, unfiltered wonder.
“It’s a girl,” he said. “She’s healthy. Seven pounds, four ounces. We’re naming her Skai.”
“Skai.” I stood up and hugged him and he held on tight. “That’s beautiful, Bryce.”
“You wanna see her?”
He took me back to the room. Samaya was in the bed looking exhausted and softer than I’d ever seen her. Whatever anger she’d been carrying at the apartment had been replaced by something bigger. She was holding a bundle wrapped in that white blanket with the pink and green stripes, while staring down at it with an expression that told me every fight she’d ever had with Bryce and every fear she’d ever carried had just been made irrelevant by seven pounds and four ounces of baby girl.
“She’s perfect,” Samaya said without looking up.
I walked over and looked down at my niece. Skai Ali. Tiny face, full head of dark hair, fists curled up by her cheeks. She was sleeping with that newborn frown that babies make when the world is too bright and too loud and they haven’t decided if they like it here yet.
I touched her hand and her fingers wrapped around my pinky and something inside my chest shifted. Not broke, not cracked. Shifted. Like a door opening into a room I didn’t know was there.
I thought about the world this baby was entering. A world where Shayla hid bruises under concealer and went to class pretending to be fine. A world where Khadijah couldn’t leave a house in Baltimore because of secrets she couldn’t tell. A world where Serenity spent her twenties being passed between men who used her body as currency. A world where I shot my ex-husband five times and still had nightmares about what he did to me before I pulled the trigger.
And I thought about my own daughters. The ones I didn’t have yet but could feel waiting for me somewhere in the future. Girls with Quest’s stubbornness and my fight. Girls who would grow up in a world that wasn’t safe for them unless somebody made it safe.
I was tired of watching women get hurt. Tired of being one of them. Tired of surviving violence and calling it strength when what it really was is exhaustion dressed up in resilience. I didn’t just want to survive anymore. I wanted to build something that kept other women from having to fight to survive.
