“I don’t think you want to hear about that rumor. It’s crazy as shit.”
“I asked, so I want to hear about it.” I moved closer and Solana was right in step with me. She drove me fucking crazy sometimes because she was so fearless.
“He said he wanted to hear it so tell him,” the other guy said, nudging his friend with his elbow.
“Okay, but don’t say I didn’t warn you it was crazy. The rumor is that your mom paid Toni’s boys to beat your ass the second you stepped foot outside the house. They said she knew you wouldn’t turn down the fight because you’re so fucked up in the head. So they took the money and sure enough you stepped your stupid ass out of the house and well…you remember the rest, right?” Solana dug her nails into my forearm as a warning for me not to lose my shit. It was hard because everything in me wanted to fuck him up right where he stood. I drew in a deep breath and nodded my head.
“Thanks.” I turned around, ready to leave, then I paused and stalked back over to him, leaving Solo a few feet behind me. “And if you ever disrespect her or call me defect again, I will bust your fucking head wide open.” I didn’t give him a chance to respond because I knew it would end in a fight. I wanted to get the fuck out of there. I had to clear my mind. There were too many dueling thoughts running around.
“Wanna put on some music?” Solana asked once we pulled out of the parking lot.
“Yeah. Put on something. I need to zone out for a minute. No offense. I don’t feel like talking right now.”
“None taken. We don’t have to fill every second with words, Ezra.” I didn’t think it was possible for her to touch my heart any more but she proved me wrong all the time. She scrolled through her phone and settled on something after a few minutes.
When Kendrick Lamar started thumping through her speakers, rattling the door panels in her tin can with way too much bass, I looked at her like she was a stranger. “Solana, what the fuck are you doing listening to rap? I thought you were going to put on some kind of Buddhist chant music or something,” I laughed. Even in the most fucked up situations, she managed to make me laugh. She was like Everett in that way.
A pang of sadness hit my heart like a sour note on a piano.
She smiled at me and shrugged. “I like rap. The vibrations from the bass help cleanse my energy.” She put the window down and let her hand ride the waves of wind while I drove. She was full of the best surprises. I needed something good and pure in my life and right then it was listening to Solana rap along with every curse word, not missing a single beat. I felt my brother’s spirit in the air right then. You couldn’t pay me to believe he wasn’t smiling.
…
When we got back to Radcliff, we drove to Sun Goddess instead of Solo’s house. “You sure you feel like working right now, Ezra?”
“I need to do something to get my mind off this shit, so why not?” I shrugged.
“Because you’re bottling everything up. You were hit with a lot of heavy shit today and you need to let it out.” Worry knitted her arched brows together.
“I don’t know how to let it out, Solo. Let me work through it.”
“Okay, but working through it sounds a lot like pushing it out of your mind. That’s not how you need to deal with this.”
“Let me work on this the way I want to! I don’t need you telling me how to deal with it. If I want to bottle it up for right now then let me do that, okay?” My skin turned hot and needles prickled every surface of me. Solana drew her head back in shock then nodded slowly with narrowed eyes.
She didn’t say another word to me. She got out of the car, slammed the door and went inside the studio. I watched her from the car for a few minutes. She looked at the computer then went into the back. When she emerged, she’d changed into a pair of leggings and her hair was pulled up on top of her head in a bun.
She was about to go teach yoga at the college.
When I got out of the car and went inside, the energy in the studio felt icy and uninviting. I’d never felt that come from Sun Goddess. If anything it was always warm and welcoming. I got the feeling that I’d royally fucked up by yelling at Solana like that.
She moved past me surrounded by a cloud of ice and walked out of the front door without uttering a word to me. She got in her car, started the engine, and backed out of the parking space bumping loud rap music as she drove off.
I fucked up.
Majorly.
…
SOLANA
If Ezra wanted space, I was going to give it to him. He never hurt my feelings before when he snapped at me but the way he blew up on me in the car was different. I knew he was avoiding dealing with everything that was thrown at him between Doctor Chin and finding out his mother possibly paid for him to be jumped. I knew he didn’t want to talk about it right away but I couldn’t let him stew in it. I didn’t expect to be yelled at though.
I left him at the studio and I went to teach my classes for the afternoon. I thought about him the entire time I taught my classes. It made for stiff movements that weren’t flexible or fluid and meditation that wasn’t genuine because my mind was overrun with Ezra.
When I was done with classes, I went straight to Amaris’ house. I needed to vent. I needed to vent in a safe space to someone who would hear me. I still had the keys to her house because she told me that no matter what was going on, I was always welcome to crash at her place. She was a good big sister like that.
I walked in, washed the few plates she left in the sink then took a shower. I stole one of her shirts and a pair of her shorts for when I got out. They were cute and blue and still had the tag on them.
“Solana, where are you?” Amaris called when she walked through the door. My yellow bug in the driveway was a dead giveaway that I was there.
“In the den,” I called out with a sigh. I was showered and clean but my spirit was still dull.
“What’s wrong? You sound sad,” she frowned. She dropped her bags and sat beside me on the couch. I handed her the glass of wine I’d already poured for her and she took it gladly. “Well, if you pour me wine when you come over then I don’t mind your breaking in and…” She looked me up and down and her frown deepened. “Wearing my clothes.”
“I forgot my duffle bag. I usually carry another set of clothes.”
“Right. Now, what’s wrong? Did you get in a fight with Ezra?” The fact that used his name and didn’t call him my teenage lover showed me she was taking our relationship seriously. It also made me even sadder that Ezra and I weren’t speaking.
“How did you know?” I asked, finishing off my wine.
“Because lately he’s been the reason you’ve been so happy and you’re not happy right now.”
“There’s so much shit going on in his life right now.” I slid the hair tie from my bun and let my hair fall over my shoulders then I ran my fingers through it a few times. “His mother has been lying to him about his brain injury. She told him he’d never have a normal life, remember I told you?” I sat up a little straighter and pulled my knees up to my chest.
“Wait…she was lying? He didn’t have a brain injury?”
“He did but it wasn’t anywhere near what she made it out to be. I did some digging and found out what hospital Ezra was at after his accident. I found out everything down to the doctor that worked on him.
I set up an appointment with the doctor because once again, Ezra was spewing shit about how he’d never be able to live a normal life and talking about me having to help take care of him for the rest of his life. It was ridiculous. Anyone can look at Ezra and tell he’s fine. Not that you can look at people and diagnose them but you know what I mean. You’ve talked to him and been around him. He’s fine. I sensed it.
I was fully prepared to deal with the news if he wasn’t but I wanted to hear it for myself not from his mother and not from the warped seeds she planted in his head. When we went to the hospital and met with the doctor.” I shook my head on the brink of tears. My heart ached for
Ezra. Amaris reached over and rubbed my shoulder.
“He was fine, Amaris. He’d been healing ever since they released him from the hospital. He would have healed faster if his mother told him about the opportunity for recovery therapy.”
“Munchausen syndrome by proxy,” she said in a matter of fact tone.
“What?” My face twisted in a frown. “You can have Munchausen by proxy?”
“Yes. Whenever a caretaker or parent makes up an illness or exaggerates a non-life threatening ailment to keep the person dependent on them. That’s exactly what his mother did.”
“Fuck…I don’t know why I didn’t think about that.” I chewed on my bottom lip and shook my head.
“How is he?” She asked.
“I don’t know. I know he’s pissed at me and I stormed away from him without a word. We haven’t talked all day. I don’t know where he’s at and I know he’s out of class by now.” I checked my phone and my heart sank when I saw I had no notifications.
“What the hell happened, Solana?” I took a deep breath and told her all about our encounters at the diner today. By the time I was done telling her about everything her jaw was nearly on the floor. “His mother is off her fucking rocker. That’s flat-out child abuse. I know Ezra is grown but that’s abuse. She paid people to jump her son. She lied to him about…everything.”
“I know. He was doing everything not to talk about it today. He kept avoiding the topic every time I tried to bring it up. He told me he didn’t want to talk about it on the way home and that was fine. He blew up when we got back to the studio though. I told him he couldn’t just throw himself into work and bottle everything up.”
Amaris looked at me with big eyes and shrugged her shoulders a little. “I mean, sis he told you he didn’t want to talk about it. I could see if he’d been avoiding it for days but he just found out about it. That’s serious, Solana. Let the man breathe. I know you love him and you hate seeing him hurt but you can’t force him to heal when you want to because you hate seeing him in pain.”
Fuck.
She was right.
Her words were swift and they hit me so deep that my eyes watered.
“I was wrong as fuck,” I said.
“Yeah. You were wrong on this one. Ezra has to handle this in his own way. You can’t dictate that. I’m sure after being controlled by his mother the last thing he wants is for you to control him too.”
“Oh my god, you’re right.” I rubbed my chest because my heart ached for him. I was the closest person to him right now and I was being pushy and controlling at the worst possible time.
“Look, he’s a levelheaded guy. Let him cool off and stop acting like you can do no wrong. When some time has passed, go apologize to him. Now, would you like for me to fix dinner while you pout?”
“Yes please,” I pouted. Amaris shook her head at me and went to change her clothes then she started cooking. “I didn’t get to see Malachi today, how is he?” I asked.
“He um…” I didn’t like the deep breath she took. “He had bruises this morning. I’m not going to lie to you, Solana.” My stomach twisted.
“I should have come to the school this morning.”
“You do realize that you can’t be everywhere at once right? You can’t save the world, sissy. I love how big your heart is but you literally cannot put on a cape and come to everyone’s rescue.”
“How bad were the bruises?” I asked. I sat at the kitchen table while she stood at the stove cooking black beans and sautéing onions. She was making meatless tacos and my stomach growled ferociously.
“They were bad enough for me to have to report them. Not bad enough for CPS to take him immediately. They’re doing an emergency visit tomorrow though.”
“Why didn’t you tell me, Amaris?” My voice rose and my back stiffened.
“Well, I just got home from work where I was filing reports all evening. Then when I walked into the house, you were on my couch drinking wine and in your feelings about Ezra. I’m sorry I didn’t get the chance to blurt it out.”
I rested my elbows on the kitchen table and let my spine go slack. “I’m sorry for blowing up. I’m so stressed out right now I feel like screaming.” My energy was all over the place. I was high and low and left and right. It was everything but centered.
“I’ll be at the school tomorrow,” I told her.
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea, Solana.”
“Why the hell not? He needs me and I’m going to be there for him.”
“I want the caseworker to see everything that Malachi goes through. I don’t want them to see how happy he is after he sees you.” She turned to look at me. Her eyes pled with mine. “You have to believe I know what I’m talking about. You can’t interfere. The more you do, the longer it’ll take to get him out of that situation. I want to put fire to Vince’s ass. This should do it.”
I was so upset my hands were shaking. I hated thinking about Malachi getting hurt and not being there to help him. “Why didn’t he text me?” I wondered out loud.
“I don’t know, Solana but it’s good he didn’t. I’m not going to let anything happen to him.”
“You can’t stop Vince from hurting him. Nobody is there with him right now. We don’t know what the hell he’s doing.”
“I know. You don’t think I know that?” Her shoulders tightened and she rested the heels of her hands on the counter. “This is a tense time right now but you have to know I’m doing everything in my power to help him. Let me see where this next in-home visit goes and I’ll let you know what you can do to help.”
I sat at the kitchen table feeling more helpless than I’d felt in a long time. I couldn’t help Ezra, I couldn’t help Malachi, and my heart couldn’t handle it. I nodded in response to Amaris and sat in silence while she finished up the tacos.
“Please don’t be sad. I hate when you’re sad. You’re always the little ray of annoying sunshine in my world. I hate when you’re gloomy.”
“I can’t help it. I’m at my best when I can help the people I love. I can’t do that right now.”
“You have to realize it’s okay. In the moments you can’t help those around you…help yourself. Nobody likes when you’re down. Go do something for yourself to bring your energy back up.”
“I guess you’re right,” I said.
“I’m your big sister. I’m always right.” She smiled at me but I didn’t feel like smiling back. She was right though. I had to get my energy up.
After I ate dinner and let Amaris love on me for a little while, I went back home hoping to run into Ezra. I knew better though because I didn’t give him a key to my house. I found myself regretting that. I hoped he wasn’t in the house with his mother. She was toxic for him.
When I walked into my bedroom, I missed Ezra so much looking at the broken bedframe pushed against the wall and my queen-sized mattress on the floor. My chest felt heavy going back and forth worrying about him and Malachi. I sat on the floor of my bedroom and meditated until my mind cleared like a blank page.
Then I did the only thing I knew to do to keep my mind from running wild.
I went to sleep.
…
I woke up groggy and missing the feeling of Ezra’s big arms around my waist. I sat in the lotus position on my mattress and scrolled through bed frames online until I found one I could afford that would withstand Ezra’s bulky body. No more wooden frames for me. It would have to be only metal from now on.
I picked out one, paid for it then got up and ready for work. I showered and washed my hair letting it curl up in the hot water. When I got out, I blow dried my curls, pulled them up in a fluffy ponytail, and got dressed in my usual outfit.
I itched to go to Malachi’s school but I tried to listen to Amaris and stay put. It hurt that I couldn’t go to him. I couldn’t take him fresh clothes or give him a hug and let him know I loved him. I couldn’t pour positivity into him from the depths of my soul. I had to let him get abused. I had to stand
by while his stomach rumbled and he wore torn and tattered clothes.
God, I was off kilter.
I couldn’t wait to get to the studio and practice. I needed major stress relief yoga. Rarely did I practice at home before I started my day. I usually started my day with yoga at Sun Goddess. I needed an emergency session though.
I got into the cattail position for five minutes per side, breathing deeply and pushing all the pain out of my heart. Then I sat in the dragonfly position for five minutes paying attention to my breathing and the way my heart thumped. I felt some stress lift from my chest but not enough. I sat up straight and pulled my left leg forward while pushing my right leg back then I bent all the way over at the waist, resting my forehead on the floor.
My limbs burned but it pushed my focus to them instead of all the other chatter going on in my brain. After a few seconds, the light burn in my muscles settled and I was able to breathe through the pose for a while. I came out of the position and sat still for a moment.
It was time to start my day.
…
I walked into the studio and immediately lit a bundle of sage. I walked around the main areas waving smoke into the corners then I sat behind my desk to look at emails. I couldn’t stop thinking about Ezra though. Normally, he beat me to the studio in the morning if we didn’t spend the night together. He was nowhere to be found.
I stared at my phone and finally gave in, tapping his name in my messages.
Me: Hey. Are you okay?
In the Reiki room, a loud ding sounded. I frowned and stood up, following the noise. I pulled my phone out and sent Ezra another text.
Me: Ezra?
I heard the ding again.
I pushed the Reiki room door open and found all six-foot-six inches of Ezra Fredericks asleep on the floor with his phone by his head. I rested my hands on my hips and shook my head at him. I couldn’t help smiling though. At least he was safe.
I dropped to the floor beside him and stroked the top of his head gently. His eyes opened slowly. He took my face in and sat up quickly. “I uh…”
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