Sena sat on the couch in Celia’s office with her thumb already working the hem of her sweater, the fabric rolling between her finger and the pad of her thumb in a rhythm her hand had picked up before the door closed behind her. The light came in through the window behind Celia in a thin morning wash, soft on the glass, the heat of the day not yet pressed against it.
Celia sat across from her with the leather notebook open against her knee. She uncapped the pen and tested the tip against the margin, then let her hand settle.
“Last time we ended on a question I asked you that you didn’t answer.”
Sena’s thumb slowed on the hem. She nodded. “I know.”
“Have you thought about it?”
“Yeah, I’ve thought about it.”
Celia uncapped her pen and rested it flat against the page, the cap pinched between her thumb and the spiral binding. The tip held a single dot of ink against the margin where her hand kept it steady.
Sena’s eyes moved off the rug and up to the watercolor above Celia’s shoulder.
“I think the reason I haven’t been able to let her in fully is because I keep going back to the fact that she stripped for me before she ever told me what she does. It’s like she’s always trickling out information. Every time, I sat with it and told myself it didn’t change anything. And every time, it changed something.”
Celia’s pen tapped once against the spiral binding. A short metallic sound, absorbed by the room.
“It changed something for you, or something between you and her?”
“For me. She’s been the same the whole time. Or the same for what I know of her.”
Celia nodded. “What changed for you?”
Sena’s thumb pressed harder into the hem. The weave compressed into a thin ridge under her nail.
“What I was waiting for. After the pole, I was waiting for her to tell me she was a stripper. After she told me, I was waiting for her to tell me something else. I keep moving the line.”
“And what’s the line now?”
Sena pulled a breath through her nose. Her eyes stayed on the watercolor.
“I don’t know. That’s the problem. I can’t name what I’m waiting for anymore. I just know I’m still doing it.”
Celia let a beat pass. “When we last spoke, I asked you what you had to lose by trusting her. You looked at the watercolor and didn’t answer.” Her eyes held Sena’s face. “I’d like you to answer now.”
Sena’s thumb stopped on the hem. The fabric held pinched between her finger and the pad, the weave bunched, the seam pulled taut across her knuckle. She kept her eyes on the watercolor for another beat and then brought them down to her lap.
“Being wrong about her. Picking the same person Alex was, just with a different face.”
Celia’s pen made a small mark in the margin. Her eyes stayed on Sena’s face.
“You’ve told me Mireya hasn’t done what Alex did.”
“She hasn’t. Not yet.”
Celia’s mouth pressed flat for a beat before she spoke. “Sena, you can spend the rest of this relationship hedging against a version of her that hasn’t shown up. You can do that for years. The cost of doing it is that you’ll never actually be in the relationship you’re sitting in. You’ll be in the one you’re afraid of. Does that make sense?”
Sena let the words sit. Her hand came off the hem and settled palm down against her thigh, her fingers spreading once before they pressed flat into the denim. The pulse in her wrist worked against the seam.
“What would it look like to trust her without waiting?” Celia asked.
Sena’s shoulder lifted and dropped. “I don’t know. I’ve never done it.”
Celia nodded once. “There’s something else I want to ask you about.”
Sena’s eyes came up.
“She’s getting close to delivery. A couple of months out, by your last count.”
Sena nodded.
“Have you thought about what it means to commit fully to a relationship with someone who’s about to have a baby, with a man who isn’t out of her life and won’t be?”
Sena’s breath came in slower this time. Her ribs pressed out against the sweater and held there before she let it back out. Her thumb went back to the hem and started again.
“That’s the other thing I’ve been sitting with. I keep going back and forth on whether I can do it. Whether I’m someone who can do it.”
“What’s the back and forth?”
“Some days I think I want it more than anything I’ve ever wanted. Some days I think I’m going to wake up six months in and realize I signed up for something I didn’t understand.”
Celia’s pen tapped once against the margin. “Both of those can be true.”
Sena’s thumb stopped. Her eyes pulled off the rug and found Celia’s face. “That’s not helpful.”
“It’s not meant to be helpful. It just is.”
Celia let the pen come to rest against the page. Her cardigan shifted at the shoulder as she settled into the chair, her forearm coming forward an inch on the notebook.
“Going all in here is going to ask a lot of you. The baby and her daughter are going to be the center of her life. Caine is going to be present. You’ll be navigating a configuration that doesn’t have an obvious template.”
She let a beat pass.
“Are you prepared for that?”
Sena’s eyes moved off Celia’s face and went back to the watercolor. The cordgrass bent in its single direction. The flat water at the base of the frame held its line. The smear of pink sat in the pale sky, the brushstroke too deliberate to be accidental and too loose to be anything specific.
“I don’t know.”
Celia nodded. “That’s an honest answer.”
Sena sighed, her eyes still on the cordgrass.
~~~
Caine sat at one of the tables outside a food truck, his back against the metal of the chair, the sun pressing into his shoulders through the cotton of the hoodie. The truck idled at the curb behind them, the generator humming low under the steady scrape and clack of the prep work going on inside, oil hissing each time something new hit the flat top.
Cam sat across from him leaning on his forearms, a half-eaten burrito on the foil in front of him. Derron had the third seat, chair tipped back on two legs, his head already going back as Cam built into the punchline of whatever he was telling.
“So I’m telling y’all, this bitch husband walks in the front door and I’m in the back of the closet trying to put my fucking pants on.”
Derron’s laugh broke open over the top of his words, his chair coming back down on all four legs as his hand hit the edge of the table.
“Why you ain’t just go out the window, nigga?”
Cam’s eyebrows climbed. He spread his palms over the foil. “Because we was on the third floor, my nigga. Do I look like fucking Spider-man to you?”
Caine picked up one of his tacos and turned it once between his fingers. The salsa shifted toward the open end of the shell. He brought it to his mouth, chewed, swallowed before he spoke.
“That’s why you gotta make sure that she tells you when the fucking husband is going to be gone and go there right when he leaves, not when he coming back.”
Cam waved him off, his hand cutting across the table. “She told me the nigga was out of town and I left it at that. Everyone ain’t a wife-fucking expert like you, nigga.”
Derron tipped his head, his chin coming forward.
“Her man was out of town and her man’s car was in the driveway, huh?”
“I didn’t see no fucking car. I parked down the block like I always do.”
Caine set his taco down and reached for a napkin from the dispenser between them. He pressed his fingers against it once.
“That’s why you was running down the fucking street with your ass out. Just park your fucking car in front the bitch house. Unless you ready to shoot it out with her husband while Fido trying to bite you in the ass.”
Cam held his hands up, palms out, his head shaking once.
“What I’m saying is I had to make a choice. Go out that window and break both my legs or hide in the closet and hope this nigga goes back downstairs. I chose the closet.”
Derron leaned in on his forearms, the chair creaking under the shift in weight. “And then what?”
Cam picked up his burrito, took a bite, set it back down and chewed while he talked.
“Then she comes in the room and starts talking to him like everything’s normal. While I’m in the closet. With my shirt in my hand. Holding my breath, thinking about that fucking R. Kelly song.”
Caine snorted, the laugh pushing through his nose, his shoulders dropping a fraction in the chair.
Cam waited until he had both of them again before he kept going.
“He left. She came back. Told me to go out the back. I had to run through her backyard with my fucking draws in my hand, nigga. Draws in my hand.”
Derron put his palm flat against his face, dragged it down past his chin, and shook his head.
“So, you were just running through these people backyard committing felonies?”
“Man, I found my shirt first, so I had that bitch on. I was out there looking like a bad bitch.”
Caine cracked up, shoulders shaking. “All that from some pussy that was probably mid as fuck, too.”
Derron’s eyes came off Cam and moved to Caine. His chin lifted toward the hoodie, the gesture small, a one-beat point that traveled from Caine’s collarbone down to the cuff of his sleeve.
“This nigga over here ain’t never running out no back doors no more.”
Caine’s eyebrow climbed.
Derron laughed. “He a rich nigga. Ain’t nobody getting him to go to their house.”
Caine shook his head and reached for his cup. The condensation caught against his palm and he wrapped his hand around it.
“Y’all not gonna let that shit go.”
Cam laughed, his head tipping toward the back of his chair.
“Nigga, you were dressing like all us two months ago when you touched down and now you wearing Amiri.”
“A man can’t get some new clothes?”
Derron pointed at him with two fingers, the rest of his hand curled into a loose fist. “Nigga a kept man now.”
Cam picked up his burrito again and gestured with it before he took the bite. The foil crinkled against his fingers.
“His girl had a stylist come to that nigga shit and tell him to stop dressing like a broke, dirty Louisiana nigga.”
Caine took a bite of his taco and chewed for a beat before he answered. He wiped the corner of his mouth with the back of his thumb.
“Y’all dragging it.”
Cam pulled a plastic fork out of the cup of beans on his tray and pointed it across the table, the tines aimed at Caine’s chest.
“But if we keeping it a buck, you need to plug us in with her line sisters or somebody. Get one of them girls to come fix my shit.”
Caine waved his hand. “Y’all on your own.”
“Nigga, that ain’t right. You gotta take care of your receivers.”
Derron shook his head, his eyes moving across Caine’s tray. “Not only that. Her girl Jade was feeling a nigga that one time we all kicked it. But she only wanted to give me her fucking IG.”
Caine looked at him across the table, his cheek shifting as he chewed. “Damn, brudda. She got you commenting on her images and shit while some other nigga punching dick in her?”
“Nigga, fuck you. You ain’t never gonna catch me in some bitch comments talking about ‘you pretty.’”
Cam pointed the fork at Derron, then back at Caine.
“That’s probably how he got his girl.”
Caine took another bite and shook his head.
~~~
Ramon leaned against the hood of his car on the curb side of the street with one ankle crossed over the other and a hand on the metal beside his thigh. The block ran narrow on both sides, shotguns set back behind chain-link, a couple of porches with old men out on them watching the street with their forearms on the rail and no particular interest in pretending they weren’t.
Tyree leaned beside him, his weight on the hood, his shirt pulled away from his waistband at the back where the grip of the pistol pressed against it. The toothpick had come out of his pocket the minute Ramon told him where they were going and it had been working between his teeth since.
The sedan came up the block from the other end. It rolled past Ramon’s car and parked behind it. The engine cut. Three doors opened on the same beat.
Yola came out first. His chain swung forward off his neck and dropped against his shirt as he stepped up onto the curb, his keys looping once around his finger before he closed his fist on them. Shad came out the driver side. Scotty came out the back. The two of them fell in behind Yola and the three of them crossed the strip of asphalt toward Ramon’s car.
Ramon stayed on the hood. Tyree stayed beside him. The toothpick rolled once between Tyree’s teeth and stilled.
Yola held his hand out to them. “What’s good, lil’ niggas?”
Ramon’s eyes moved across Yola’s face and stopped there. His hand stayed flat on the hood. His other hand sat loose at his side. “When y’all gonna do it?”
Yola’s palm came up, open, the gesture small and put-upon, his head tipping a fraction.
“Damn, nigga. We just walking up.”
“I see that. When y’all gonna do the shit?”
Yola’s eyes cut to Shad. Shad’s eyes cut to Scotty.
Scotty dragged his hand down across his jaw and let it fall back to his side, his fingers curling once before they straightened. “We waiting on the right moment. Nigga keeps his head on a swivel.”
Tyree snorted, the toothpick shifting at the corner of his mouth. “Y’all niggas been waiting on the right moment since March. It’s a fucking moment every day if you ain’t a pussy.”
Yola’s chin came up. “Nigga, ain’t nobody scared.”
“Y’all sound scared to me. I’d been popped that nigga.”
Scotty’s hand came up at Yola. Yola’s mouth pressed shut.
“It ain’t being scared. It’s the connect. Ant ain’t introduced nobody to the Mexicans yet. We pack him up before he do that, all that shit dries up.”
Ramon’s eyes moved off Scotty and onto Shad. Shad lifted one shoulder and dropped it, his hand pulling out of his hoodie pocket and dragging across the back of his head, his fingers running through the short hair there before they came back down to his side.
“He right. Trell had everything in his fucking head. Ant got it now. We gotta make him hand it over.”
“And how y’all planning to make him do that?” Ramon asked.
Scotty’s hand had dropped back to his side. He brought it up again, a beat slower.
“We working on it.”
Tyree spat a laugh through his teeth. “Y’all niggas got a plan to make a plan to make a plan a plan to make a plan. That’s what y’all telling us.”
Yola’s shoulders pulled back. “Nigga, fuck you mean? We out here putting it together.”
Tyree pushed off the hood. The metal ticked once under his weight as he left it. His feet found the asphalt and his hands came out of his hoodie pocket, loose at his sides.
“Y’all out here jacking each other off like some fucking ponks is what y’all out here doing. You said you was gonna handle it. Handle it.”
Scotty’s right hand started toward his waistband. The motion was slow, deliberate, slow enough to be seen.
Ramon’s weight came off the hood.
“Scotty.” Shad shook his head.
Scotty’s hand stopped. His fingertips sat against the front of his shirt, not yet at the band, the line of his arm holding the angle.
Scotty let a breath out through his nose. His hand dropped back to his side. “I ain’t doing nothing.”
Tyree shook his head once. “Pussy ass nigga.”
Ramon’s hand came up. Two fingers pressed against Tyree’s chest, light, the contact mostly placement. Tyree’s eyes moved off Yola and onto Ramon’s face and stayed there for a beat before he stepped back. The toothpick rolled to the other side of his mouth.
Ramon’s eyes came back to Scotty. The two of them held the look across the space between the cars.
“I’m gonna tell y’all how it is. Y’all sat in front of me in and said y’all was gonna pack that nigga up. I took that to Duke. Duke is waiting on the call that says it’s done. Every week it ain’t done, Duke’s looking at me like I was on some fuck shit.”
Scotty’s chin dipped once. “We hear you.”
“I ain’t sure you do. Because if I gotta come back here and have this conversation again, it ain’t gonna be a conversation. It’s gonna be us telling Duke that y’all niggas ain’t built for what y’all said you was built for and we gonna reach out to Ant ourselves. Bring him in the fold. Cut y’all out.”
Yola’s mouth opened. Shad’s hand came across the gap between them and landed on Yola’s arm just above the elbow. The fingers closed around the bicep. Yola’s mouth stayed open for a beat and then closed.
Shad’s eyes stayed on Ramon. “We’ll get it done.”
“When?”
“Two weeks.”
Ramon’s eyes moved to Scotty. Scotty nodded once. Ramon’s eyes moved to Yola. Yola held his look back, his jaw set, the chain catching the sun.
“Two weeks, nigga.”
Ramon nodded. “Two weeks.”
He pushed off the hood and turned and walked around to the driver’s side of his car. Tyree pulled the toothpick out of his teeth and flicked it onto the asphalt at his feet. He walked around to the passenger side and pulled the handle.
~~~
Mireya was curled into Jaslene’s side on the sofa with her head against the curve of Jaslene’s shoulder and her knees tucked up under one of the throw pillows. Jaslene’s arm ran along the back of the cushions behind her, her hand resting easy past the line of Mireya’s shoulder, the weight of her wrist riding warm against the cotton of Mireya’s shirt.
From the kitchen behind them, a cabinet eased open and shut. A glass came down on the counter with a soft thump. Diego’s voice carried in Spanish, the pitch low and steady, the words not quite reaching the living room as anything more than register. Whoever he was talking to had him laughing every few sentences, the laugh short, the sound dropping back into the rhythm of the call without breaking it.
The blinds were tipped half open, the slats holding strips of light against the carpet that had moved a few inches across the floor since Mireya had laid down.
“I hate that I can’t fucking work.”
Jaslene’s thumb moved once against the cap of Mireya’s shoulder.
“I know.”
“Stasia ain’t even let me come in and do VIPs. She’s acting like the whole floor’s gonna fall through if I walk in there pregnant.”
“No le falta razón, mi amor.”
Mireya lifted her head an inch off Jaslene’s shoulder. Her hair caught against the cotton of Jaslene’s shirt and pulled with the motion before it released.
“I could still do the floor. I could still do VIPs. I ain’t a fucking invalid.”
Jaslene’s head tipped a fraction to the side. Her hand left the back of the cushion and came around to rest along the back of Mireya’s neck, the fingers settling against the skin, the thumb finding the spot just behind the ear where her hairline started.
“And what happens when you’re in the room with a guy who wants you to ride him for an hour and your back gives out halfway through? What happens when you can’t get on your knees without your stomach pressing into your fucking ribs?”
“Me las arreglaría.”
“Mi amor. You can’t figure your way out of biology.”
Mireya’s jaw shifted against Jaslene’s collarbone where her cheek had pressed back into the cotton.
“Don’t fucking start.”
Jaslene’s fingers stayed where they were on her neck. The thumb moved once, slow, across the skin behind her ear and settled again.
“I’m not starting anything. Ya está. Stasia made the call. There’s no use sitting here making yourself sick over a decision that’s already been made.”
Mireya let that sit. She let her head come back down against Jaslene’s shoulder and her eyes go past the TV to the line of light on the carpet.
“I just feel useless.”
“You’re not useless. You’re growing a fucking person.”
“That ain’t a job.”
“It’s the only one you got right now, baby. Take it.”
Mireya’s hand had come to rest on her stomach without her thinking about it, her palm flat against the curve through her shirt, her fingers spreading once before they settled. She let her hand stay where it was.
Jaslene’s fingers worked at the back of her neck. The pressure was small and even, the rhythm finding the same beat the thumb had taken behind her ear.
“Hace tiempo que estoy pensando en ir a Puerto Rico. Spend some time with my sister.”
Mireya’s head came off Jaslene’s shoulder. The space between them opened a few inches as she shifted her weight to look at her.
“When?”
“I don’t know yet. Soon. Maybe a few weeks. I haven’t booked anything.”
“How long?”
“A couple weeks. Maybe a month. Depends on how it feels when I get there.”
Mireya pushed herself upright. The pillow under her knees fell against the cushion beside her and she turned on the seat. Her legs folded under her, the soles of her feet pressing flat against her thighs. Her hand left her stomach and found Jaslene’s knee, her palm settling against the bone there through the leggings, her fingers curling once into the fabric.
“A month?”
“Maybe. It would be good for me. I haven’t been home in a long time, mi amor. I need to see my sister. I need to be somewhere that isn’t this fucking city for a minute.”
Mireya’s thumb pressed into Jaslene’s knee. The pad of it against the cap, the pressure even.
“Ojalá pudiera ir contigo.”
Jaslene’s hand crossed the small space between them to cup her cheek. Her palm settled against the line of her jaw, her thumb finding the cheekbone and moving along it, the pad warm and dry against the skin.
“After you have the baby. We’ll go. Take the baby. Show my sister your little one.”
Mireya pulled her face back a fraction. Jaslene’s thumb stayed against her cheek.
“I could fly. I could fly now. I’m not dying.”
“The doctor told you you should barely be walking, mi armor. You’re not getting on a plane.”
“Don’t fucking do that.”
“Do what?”
“Make me sound weak. Like I’m some fucking glass figurine that’s gonna shatter if I stand up too fast.”
Jaslene’s thumb stilled on her cheekbone. Her eyes held on Mireya’s face. From the kitchen, a drawer pulled out and slid shut. Diego’s voice went on, the cadence steady, the laugh coming through again on the back of whatever the person on the other end had said.
“I’m not making you sound like anything. I’m telling you what your doctor told you. The same doctor you told me told you to stop being on your feet so much.”
“That’s not the same as I can’t fly.”
“It’s the same enough.”
Mireya’s hand pulled off Jaslene’s knee. She brought it up to her hair and ran her fingers back through it from the temple, her thumb catching at the ends past her shoulder where the curls had matted against the cotton. She kept her hand there, the heel of her palm pressed against her scalp, her elbow held out from her body.
“You’re treating me like I’m fragile.”
“I’m worried about you. That’s all.”
“Don’t be. I’m fine.”
Jaslene’s hand left her cheek and dropped to the cushion between them. Her fingers spread against the fabric and pressed flat, her wrist taking her weight where she’d turned to face Mireya.
“You’re not fine. Your blood pressure is up. Your body is failing you in ways it never has. Your mother showed up at your house. You’re carrying a baby that’s already trying to kill you. No estás bien, cariña. Y tengo derecho a decirlo sin que me trates como si fuera tu enemigo por darme cuenta.”
Mireya held there. Her hand stayed in her hair, the fingers spread against her scalp, the elbow holding its angle. She let a breath out through her nose, the air pushing slow past her lip.
“Lo siento. Me estoy portando como una perra.” Mireya rolled her lips into her mouth for a moment then looked back at Jaslene. “It might be good for you. To go.”
Jaslene’s mouth pulled at one corner, the movement small enough to barely move her face.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. You’ve been carrying me for months. Go see your sister.”
“I haven’t been carrying anything.”
Mireya’s hand came down out of her hair and settled in her lap. Her fingers curled around the seam of her leggings at the knee, her thumb pressing once into the fold there.
“You have. You just don’t say it.”
Jaslene’s hand came back up off the cushion. Her thumb found Mireya’s cheekbone again, the pad of it tracking along the bone in the same slow line it had taken before.
Jaslene leaned forward. Her free hand came up to the back of Mireya’s head, her fingers settling into the hair there, and she pressed her mouth to Mireya’s forehead then to her lips.
“Come here.”
Her hand left the back of Mireya’s head and came down to her wrist. Her fingers closed loose around the bone there. She tugged. Mireya let her body follow the pull. Her legs unfolded out from under her and she shifted back into Jaslene’s side. Her head returned to Jaslene’s shoulder. Jaslene’s arm came back around her. The hand settled along the line of her back and rested at her hip.
~~~
Autumn stood behind the folding table set up outside the front entrance of the community center with two stacks of registration forms pressed flat under her palms. The wind off the lot kept lifting the top sheets and she kept settling them back down. The banner zip-tied to the front of the table caught the breeze in long pulls. REGISTER. KNOW YOUR RIGHTS. VOTE. The block letters white against navy, the corners flapping where the ties hadn’t fully caught the fabric. A pen tied to the table by a length of twine swung against the leg every time someone leaned on the edge.
Fifteen feet down the walk, Denise and Tasha worked the second table. Denise had her sash on over a fitted tee, her hair pulled back in a clip, her hand moving as she walked an older woman through a clipboard. Tasha sat behind the table on a folding chair with a laptop open in front of her, the screen tilted toward her chest, her thumb scrolling.
Garrison stood a few feet behind Autumn in a charcoal suit. His phone was at his ear and his free hand had come up to gesture at something on the call, the fingers cutting a small horizontal in the air before they dropped back to his side. Past his shoulder, Miles had his clipboard out and was going through a checklist with a young woman from his office.
The line in front of Autumn’s table held six deep. Two women with kids on their hips, the smaller of the two children fisting a handful of his mother’s sleeve and pulling. A man in a Dodgers hat with the brim curved sharp and the bill faded along the front. An older couple holding hands at the back, the woman’s thumb running over the man’s knuckle. A young man on his phone, head down. The line shifted forward as the woman at the front stepped up to the table.
Autumn slid a form across the wood toward her. The paper caught at the lip and she steadied it with two fingers.
“Fill out everything in blue or black ink,” Autumn said. “If you’ve moved in the last two years, you’ll need to use your current address, not the one on your ID.”
The woman nodded. She shifted the bag on her shoulder and set her purse down on the table beside the form, her child shifting on her hip to look at Autumn over her mother’s arm.
“If your ID address doesn’t match, that’s fine,” Autumn said. “They’ll mail your sample ballot to where you actually live. Just write it clear.”
The woman picked up the pen on the twine and bent over the form. The line moved a half step forward and Autumn turned a fraction to the next person.
The older man with the cane stood at the front now. His hand was wrapped around the curved grip and his weight was shifted toward it, the rubber tip pressing into a crack in the concrete. His shirt was tucked clean into slacks that had been ironed at some point that morning.
“Good afternoon, sir,” Autumn said. “You registering today?”
“I’m already registered,” the man said. “I’m just trying to find out if my address got updated when I moved last year.”
“We can check that for you,” Autumn said. “Step over to my colleague Tasha, she’ll pull up the registrar’s portal and look it up. If it didn’t update, she’ll print you a change form right there.”
The man nodded once. He lifted his cane and set it down a foot to his left and shuffled the rest of his body after it, then again, and again, until he reached Tasha’s end. Tasha looked up from the screen and smiled at him as he arrived, her hand already coming off the keyboard to wave him into the chair beside hers.
Autumn turned to the next person. The line moved. She worked the woman in the second spot through her form, then a young man who wanted to confirm his polling location, then a couple updating their addresses after a move from Inglewood.
Garrison ended his call. He slid the phone into the inner pocket of his jacket and his hand came down to his side. He crossed the gap to Autumn’s table and put his hand on her shoulder. The squeeze was brief, the warmth of his palm pressing through the fabric of her sweater before he eased the grip.
“How we doing, baby?” Garrison said.
“Forty-three through the line in the last hour,” Autumn said. “Eleven new registrations, the rest are address updates or sample ballot requests.”
Garrison nodded. His hand stayed on her shoulder, the weight even, the thumb resting in the dip above her collarbone.
“That’s good work,” Garrison said. “Keep that pace and we’ll have over two hundred by close.”
His chin lifted toward the line. The older couple at the back had moved up two spots and were talking in low voices to each other, the woman’s hand smoothing the front of her blouse as if it had gone wrinkled in the wait.
“I’m gonna walk down to the senior center and check in with Pastor Hollis,” Garrison said. “He’s got some folks over there too nervous to come over here without somebody walking them in.”
“Take Denise with you,” Autumn said. “She speaks slow.”
Garrison laughed, a single low sound that pushed out of his chest and landed against the suit before it carried. He squeezed her shoulder once more and let go.
He walked down the line, his stride easing into the practiced one he kept for events. His hand lifted at a woman two back who had recognized him and his voice pitched into the warmer register he used for constituents, the words carrying over the table as he stopped beside her and asked after her mother. She answered. He nodded and moved on, his hand finding the shoulder of the next person, his face arriving open and ready for whatever they said.
Autumn watched him for a beat. Then she turned back to her table.
The woman with the kid on her hip was still working through her form. Autumn handed forms to the next two people. A new registration. An address update. Another new registration. The line thinned to two and then to one and then she had a gap. She stepped back from the table and rolled her shoulders, her hands coming up behind her to press into the spot above her hips where the standing had started to settle.
Miles crossed the gap from Garrison’s setup. His hands were in his pockets, the jacket open, the watch catching afternoon light at his wrist. He stopped a foot off the corner of her table, his weight settling back onto one heel.
“You always look good when you’re all passionate about something,” Miles said.
Autumn kept her eyes on the form in front of her, her hand smoothing a corner that had curled in the wind.
“Miles, you are annoying me,” Autumn said.
“Persistence is how all our grandparents got together back in the day,” Miles said.
Autumn turned her head a fraction toward him. Her chin stayed level.
“Persistence is how some forty year old got our grandmothers pregnant when they were twelve,” Autumn said. “That’s not a flex, nigga.”
Miles’s smile held for a beat. The corner of it shifted, pulled, and settled into something flatter.
“Damn,” Miles said. “Alright. Fair.”
He shifted his weight a fraction. His hand came halfway out of his pocket and went back in.
“Let me take you out one time though,” Miles said. “Just one time. Dinner. We were good together back in the day. That flame still burning.”
Autumn turned and looked at him fully. Her shoulders squared toward him, her hands coming off the table to rest at her sides. Her eyes held on his.
“Let me ask my man what he thinks,” Autumn said.
Miles held where he was. His mouth opened and closed once. His chin lifted a fraction, the angle small, the motion landing somewhere between question and recalibration.
“Your man,” Miles said.
“My man, nigga.”
Miles nodded. The motion came slow, his head moving once, then again, his eyes staying on her face through the second nod before they cut off and went past her shoulder toward the banner.
“Alright, Autumn,” Miles said.
He turned and walked back toward Garrison’s table. His hand came out of his pocket and ran once across the back of his neck, the fingers pressing into the muscle there before they dropped to his side. He kept walking.
Autumn watched him go. The wind pulled at the corner of the banner again and she reached down and pressed the zip-tie flat against the table edge. Her thumb worked the slack out of it until it sat snug. She turned back to her table.
The next person in line was a young woman with a stroller. The baby was asleep against the strap, his cheek pressed flat to the padding, a small fist curled near his mouth. The mother stood with one hand on the handle and the other holding her phone, the screen turned dark.
Autumn’s smile arrived easy. The corners of her mouth lifted and held.
“Good afternoon,” Autumn said. “You registering today?”
~~~
Mireya sat cross-legged on the rug in the living room with a coloring book open across her thigh. Camila lay on her stomach beside her with her own book open on the rug in front of her, her elbows on the carpet, her chin propped on the heel of one hand. The box of crayons had tipped over between them, and the colors had spread in a loose arc across the weave, some of them rolled to a stop against Mireya’s ankle, others scattered toward Camila’s shoulder.
Camila had a green crayon in her fist. She was dragging it across the body of a frog on the page in long working strokes, the wax going thicker where her hand had slowed against the outline. Mireya had an orange crayon in her hand and was filling in a sun on her own page with the side of it, the strokes loose, her eyes drifting up to Camila every few passes. The TV ran low across the room. Something animated. The colors changed on the wall above the console at a pace nobody was tracking.
The knock came at the front door. Three flat raps that landed even.
Mireya’s head turned toward the foyer. Camila kept coloring, the green crayon dropping a heavy spot where she’d pressed too hard at the curve of the frog’s back.
Mireya pushed herself up off the rug. One hand braced against the small of her back as she came up, the other pressing into the curve of her belly where the weight pulled forward. Her thighs took the rest of the lift. She steadied on her feet for a beat before she crossed the rug to the hall and walked down it toward the front door.
The peephole gave her two figures on the porch. An older woman, white, with a lanyard hanging from her neck and a manila folder pinned under her arm. A younger woman, Black, behind her. The younger one held a tablet flat against her chest with both hands.
Mireya’s jaw shifted at the hinge. Her thumb pressed against the deadbolt for a beat before she turned it. She pulled the door open six inches and stopped it with her foot wedged behind the bottom corner.
“Can I help you?” Mireya said.
The older woman’s expression arrived practiced, the corners of her mouth lifted into the small fixed shape that came before the words. The lanyard caught the porch light at the laminate edge.
“Ms. Rosas? I’m Linda Mathieu with the Department of Children and Family Services,” she said. “This is my colleague Dana Williams. Do you have a few minutes?”
Mireya kept her foot where it was.
“What’s this about?” Mireya asked.
“We received a report of concern regarding the welfare of your daughter, Camila,” Linda said. “We’re here to follow up.”
Mireya’s grip tightened on the edge of the door. The wood pressed against the pad of her thumb where her hand had wrapped around the molding.
“What kind of report?” Mireya said.
“Allegations regarding exposure to harmful environments and concerns about supervision,” Linda said. “We need to come in, speak with you, and see Camila.”
“Who made the report?”
“I’m not able to share that information,” Linda said.
Mireya’s thumb pressed harder into the door. “So, somebody can just call y’all and tell y’all whatever and you show up at my door and I don’t even get to know who said it?”
“I understand this is upsetting,” Linda said. “The reporter’s identity is confidential by law. What I can tell you is that we have a responsibility to follow up on every report we receive.”
“And if I don’t let you in?”
Linda’s expression held where it was. Her hand shifted on the folder under her arm and she resettled the grip without breaking eye contact.
“You’re within your rights to refuse entry,” Linda said. “If you do, we’ll return with officers from NOPD and a court order. That will be more disruptive for your daughter than this conversation will be.”
The tablet was still flat against Dana’s chest. Her eyes had been on Mireya’s face since the door had cracked open and they had moved twice. Once down to the curve of Mireya’s belly under the shirt, the look holding there for a beat. Once back up to Mireya’s face. They were on her face now.
Mireya looked at her. Dana held the look. The two of them stayed there for the space of one breath. Dana’s expression held. Her chin held its angle. Her eyes stayed on Mireya’s.
Mireya pulled a breath in through her nose and let it out slow, the air pushing past her lip in a thin stream that broke when her mouth closed.
She stepped back from the door. Her foot came out from behind the corner and she pulled the door open until it cleared the frame.
“Come in then,” Mireya said.
Linda crossed the threshold first. Dana followed a step behind her, the tablet still pressed against her chest, her eyes moving as soon as she was inside. Her gaze went to the hardwood first. Then up the wall to the light fixture. Then down the hall toward the kitchen, where the late afternoon was sitting heavy through the window over the sink. Linda’s eyes traveled the same path but ahead of Dana’s. Hers moved faster, the pass clipped, the look finished before Dana’s had even started.
Mireya closed the door behind them. She left the deadbolt where it was. Her hand stayed on the knob for a beat after the door met the frame, her fingers around the cold brass, her thumb resting against the lock.
“We’d like to walk through the home first if that’s alright,” Linda said. “Then we’ll sit down with you and we’ll speak with Camila separately.”
Mireya’s hand came off the doorknob. She gestured down the hall with it, her palm turning open and her fingers spreading once toward the kitchen.
“Go ahead. Don’t sound like I got a choice.”
Linda nodded to Dana. Dana stepped forward and started down the hall, her tablet still against her chest, her pace measured. Linda followed a step behind her, the folder shifting under her arm, her eyes already on the walls.
Mireya stayed in the foyer until both of them had rounded the corner into the kitchen and were out of her line of sight. The sound of their shoes on the kitchen tile started a beat after. Linda’s came down first. Dana’s came down second.
Mireya turned and walked back into the living room.
Camila was still on her stomach. The green crayon had been set down on the page and a yellow one was in her hand now. She was working at the frog’s belly, the strokes shorter than they’d been with the green, the wax sitting lighter against the paper.
Mireya crouched down beside her. Her lower back pulled and she pressed her palm flat into the rug to take the angle. Her other hand stayed against the curve of her belly.
“Mi amor, ven aca un momento,” Mireya said.
Camila looked up from the page. Her eyes came up first, then her chin, the yellow crayon staying in her fist.
“¿Por qué?” Camila said.
“Porque te lo estoy pidiendo,” Mireya said. “Ven.”
Camila looked at the page for a beat. Then she set the yellow crayon down on the open book, careful, the tip placed against the white margin so it didn’t touch any of the colors she had already laid down. She pushed up onto her knees, then onto her feet, and walked the few steps over to where Mireya was crouched.
Mireya took Camila’s hand in hers and pulled her in. Her arm came around Camila’s back and her other hand came up to the back of Camila’s head. Her fingers spread into the curls at the nape and smoothed them back. Camila settled against her shoulder, her cheek pressing into the fabric of Mireya’s shirt where it bunched at the collarbone, her small body folding into the space Mireya had made for her.
From the kitchen came the sound of a cabinet opening. The hinge gave a low pull and stilled. A drawer slid out a beat after that, the runners ticking. A soft murmur passed between Linda and Dana, the voices too low to make out from the living room, the cadence flat and procedural.
Mireya kept her hand on the back of Camila’s head. Her other hand stayed at Camila’s back, her fingers spread against the small ribs there, the bones moving under her palm with each breath Camila took.
Her teeth gnashed against one another.
The cabinet closed. The footsteps moved from the kitchen tile to the hardwood again and started toward the dining room. Linda’s came down first. Dana’s came down a beat after.
Mireya held Camila against her and stared at them as they worked.
~~~
Caine stood at the rail of the VIP platform with a glass of something dark in his hand and the platform under his shoes catching the low pulse of the bass coming up through the structure. The floor below ran the length of the club, packed shoulder to shoulder, a single body of people moving against itself in slow shifts. The bass came up through the metal at the bottom of the rail and through the soles of every person leaning against it. Rio Santana’s voice ran through the speakers off a track Caine had heard out of Cam’s system in the Wraith for the last three weeks, hook circling on a beat that hit twice and breathed once.
The projection screen across the back wall ran the album cover in slow rotations. Rio in profile against a desert horizon, the title across the bottom in red block letters. A strobe rig came on at the chorus and caught faces in the crowd, dropped them, caught them again. Bottle sparklers worked their way through the room on trays held overhead, the fire small at the wick, the sparks streaming sideways with every step the server took.
Tatum stood beside him in a fitted black button-up with the collar open at the throat, a chain tucked under the second button, his sleeves at his elbows. He leaned his forearm on the rail and looked down at the floor.
“How you feeling about it?” Tatum said.
“It’s a party,” Caine said. “I’m at a party.”
“It’s not just a party. Two of the labels with the deepest pockets in the city are in this room tonight. The Hennessy people are here. The Cîroc people are here. Somebody from Don Julio sent their head of marketing.”
Caine brought the glass to his mouth and took a sip. The whiskey sat hot on the back of his tongue for a beat before he swallowed.
“What any of that got to do with me?”
“It’s networking. That’s the job. But yeah, they know you’re up here. I made sure of that.”
Caine looked down at the floor. A woman in a green dress was near the front edge of the crowd with her phone tipped up at the platform. Her eyes caught his for a beat and she turned her face away, the corner of her mouth lifting before her chin came down.
“Then what am I doing besides standing up?” Caine said.
Tatum’s mouth pulled at one corner.
“That’s exactly what you’re doing,” Tatum said. “The face shows up. The face circulates. The face has a drink with Rio. The face leaves and go have a nice night cap with some B or C list model.”
Caine snorted a laugh, the sound pushing through his nose.
“I think I could get at least an A model.”
“Not yet in Los Angeles, kid,” Tatum said. “We’ll get you there by the end of the season though.”
He turned his head toward Caine. His chain caught the strobe at the V of his collar and the gold pulled bright for half a beat before it dropped back into shadow.
“Listen. I’m gonna tell you straight because that’s what you pay me for. We’re running out of these. Once camp opens, Riley’s not gonna want you out at album release parties on weeknights. Once the season starts, you’re done with this kind of thing entirely. Saturday’s a game day, Sunday’s recovery, the week’s tape. The window for you to be photographed standing next to Rio Santana while his album drops is now.”
Caine nodded. His glass came up and he took another sip. The whiskey sat on his tongue for a beat before he swallowed.
“Alright.”
“Alright meaning what?” Tatum said.
“Alright meaning I hear you,” Caine said. “I’ll stand up here and be the face.”
“That’s what I needed to hear.”
Tatum lifted his drink toward the floor.
“Rio’s coming up. Show that charm for the cameras.”
Caine turned. Rio was on the short set of steps leading up to the platform, two of his people a half step behind him, a chain over the front of his shirt catching every pass of the strobe rig. His shirt was open two buttons and a small stack of gold caught at his sternum each time the light moved across him. He took the last step and crossed the platform with his hand already coming out from his side.
Caine met it. They dapped, shoulders bumping once, and separated.
“What’s up, homie,” Rio said. “I was wondering if Tatum was gonna pull through with you.”
“He told me it’s how I get to the bag,” Caine said.
“He always knows what to say.”
Rio’s eyes moved past Caine to Tatum.
“Speaking of which. You and me still gotta talk.”
“You said next week,” Tatum said.
“I’m saying it again next week.”
Tatum laughed and lifted both hands, palms open. Rio’s mouth held its line for half a beat longer before it pulled at the corner and he turned his shoulder back toward Caine. His drink lifted a few inches and his chin tipped toward the floor below the rail.
“What you think? My shit fire?”
“All my potnas been playing this shit all week. Still talking about that underground feel, you know?” Caine said. “It ain’t no New Orleans shit, but that one track? Six, I think.”
Rio’s head tipped back. His face opened, the corners of his mouth pulling wide, the chain shifting against his chest with the motion.
“Track six. That’s the one. Everybody been saying that. I almost cut it. Tatum told me leave it on.”
Caine looked at Tatum.
Tatum held his hands up, palms out.
“I have ears too,” Tatum said. “Once in a while I use them.”
Rio laughed. The sound rolled out of his chest and stopped against the wall of bass coming up from the floor. He shifted his stance and turned his shoulder another inch toward Caine, the angle of his body closing the conversation in, his back coming a fraction toward Tatum without pushing him out of it.
“So you from New Orleans, right?” Rio said.
“Yeah,” Caine said.
Rio nodded once. His eyes held on Caine’s face for a beat past the answer.
“I knew it was somewhere down there. Y’all got that slow brudda brudda lil’ bitch shit about y’all.”
Caine’s glass came up. The whiskey moved across his tongue and dropped into his chest.
“That’s one way to put it,” Caine said.
Rio nodded again. “I’m sure y’all think us West coast niggas do shit weird too so it’s all love.”
He lifted his glass. Caine tapped his against it. The contact made a small flat sound that died inside the next beat of the bass.
“You good people, lil’ bro,” Rio said. “Stand up here with me for a minute. Let them niggas downstairs see you next to me. That’s gonna do something for both of us.”
Caine nodded. Rio turned and leaned his elbow on the rail beside him, his drink hanging loose between his fingers off the edge. He brought his free hand up and waved down at someone on the floor. A woman two rows back from the rail waved back, her phone already coming up. The flash caught the side of Caine’s face. He held his eyes on the floor and let it pass.
Tatum settled back against the rail on Caine’s other side. His drink rested on the metal beside his elbow. His eyes were already moving across the room. They worked through the bodies on the floor and found the next person he needed Caine to be standing next to.
