"I can dig that," Pierre chimed in. "I just want a lil' boy, then I think I'll be aight." Amina shot him a look over the rim of her glass.
"Well, I tell y'all what," Chiana slurred, laughing. "I'm done with that shit. I just want a whole lotta loveeeee." She grabbed Juste's face and kissed him over and over, making him smile like a man who knew he was chosen. Everybody was talking about what was next. I was still trying to understand what had already ended.
Amina's smile softened as her eyes drifted to me. "What about you, Nia?" she asked quietly. "What you want?" The circle went still. Even the music seemed to lower itself. Everybody knew the last year had chewed me up and spit me back out changed. I'd been holding myself together with routines and silence and obligation. They knew better than to expect an easy answer.
I felt Jules' presence before I looked at him. He sat back in his chair, arms crossed, watching me from across the table like he was bracing himself. "Honestly?" I said, my voice steady even though my chest felt tight. I looked around at them. They were my people, my family, the ones who'd seen me before everything fell apart and stayed anyway. "To find Nia," I said, my name like it belonged to me for the first time in a long time. "To figure outwho I am outside of the mom, the wife, the grief." The words hung there. I breathed out slow, surprised by my own honesty. I hadn't said that out loud before. Not like that. Not without dressing it up or shrinking it down to make it more acceptable. I heard Jules snort. Just one sound, but it was just enough to remind me that he didn't understand me anymore. The room shifted. It wasn't loud. Wasn't aggressive. Just... dismissive. Like I'd said, something selfish. Something unnecessary. Something that made him uncomfortable.
Amina didn't look away from me. "That makes sense," she said gently.
Ayida nodded. Chiana looked at me and smiled without saying a word. I didn't look at Jules again. Because I knew if I did, I'd see that same look from the boat. The one that saidyou mine, notI see you. The one who wanted to claim without understanding.
I sat back in my chair and let the conversation move on without me. Let laughter rise again. Let glasses clink. Let life continue the way it always did. But something inside me had already shifted. I thought about how long I'd defined myself by who needed me. How often I'd swallowed my own questions because there wasn't room for them alongside everybody else's pain.
I thought about Julise, watching me the way I once watched my own mama, measuring what silence meant. I thought about Jules and how, by loving him, I had slowly learned to disappear without leaving. I thought about how long I had lived for everybody else. How natural it had felt to disappear inside love. Inside motherhood and survival. The ocean moved the same way it always had.
Forward.
Back.
Forward again. No hesitation or apology.
I didn't yet know what finding Nia looked like. Didn't know who she would be when I met her. But I knew this, I wasn't going to spend another year pretending I didn't exist. The night carried on around me. Laughter. Music. Life. Things had shifted. I wasn't holding everything together. I was letting something new begin.
JULES
"Jules!" I heard Nia calling my name in my sleep. I didn't open my eyes, too stuck in what I was dreaming about. My body felt heavy, like I was pinned under something I couldn't see. "Huh," I mumbled, sticking my hand in my pants. I could hear her smack her lips and blow out a breath, that sharp one she did when she was already past patience, before she hit me.
"Jules get the fuck up now." She snatched me up by the t-shirt I had on. I snapped my eyes open, vision blurry, heart jumping into my throat before my mind could catch up.
"The fuck Nia?" I said, prying her hands off my shirt.
"Your grown ass daughter is not in her fucking bed. That's what the fuck."
The room felt too quiet after that. No TV. No movement down the hall. Just that hum the house made at night when everybody was supposed to be asleep. I rubbed my eyes, making sure I was hearing her right, then slung my feet off the bed and stood up in front of her. "Fuck you mean she not in her bed?" I said.
"I meant exactly what I said. Juelz said he heard her go out the window a couple of hours after they laid down to go to sleep." She ran her fingers through her short hair like she was trying not to lose her mind. That motion hit me harder than her words. Nia only did that when she was scared and pissed at the same time. I snatched my phone up off the nightstand, the screen lighting up the room too bright. Three A.M. "Don't bother calling her ass. She left the phone here," Nia said,already walking out of the room. That wasn't careless, that was intentional.
That sat wrong in my chest. I followed her down to the kitchen, then out on the front porch. The night air hit me heavy, damp, like it was pressing in instead of opening up. "What the fuck going on?" I said, still trying to piece shit together.
"I'm not about to keep explaining to your muthafuckin ass. Just shut up and get out my face, Jules, before you piss me off," she snapped.
"Chill out, Nia. I'm just tryna figure out what the fuck make this girl feel so comfortable to sneak out of my house." My nostrils flared without me meaning for them to. Every second ticking by made the picture in my head worse. Every dark thought I worked hard not to entertain started creeping back in.
"I'm scared as hell, Jules," Nia mumbled. "I know this is just Julise being grown, but I can't imagine losing another child due to her bullshit. I just can't. It's no reason for this shit." Her voice cracked. I could hear it even before I saw her face. She rocked in the chair, arms wrapped tight around herself like she was holding something together. "Crazy part is her ass don't give a fuck."
That's when it hit me hard. Fear didn't come with sirens. It came quiet. Slipped in through memories you never asked for. Juliana's laugh. That hospital room. That phone call. Before I could say anything, headlights shined through the yard. A red car pulled up slow. Nia moved quick, grabbing the two switches she had bound together and sitting there on the porch.
Within seconds, she was off the porch and walking up to the car. When Julise opened the door, the light came on, showing a nigga with a low haircut and chains around his neck.My chest tightened. I moved off the porch fast, anger sharp but controlled. "Who the fuck is this pulling up in my yard, Jul, this lil nigga got you sneaking out the house and shit?" I said, pointing my finger as I walked toward the driver’s side. Before I could reach for the handle, the young nigga pulled off, tires spinning gravel all through the driveway. Coward didn't even look back.
By the time I turned around, Nia had already lit into Julise's ass, cussing her out and hitting her everywhere she could with that damn switch. "You think you muthafuckin grown, huh? Ima show your ass grown." Julise cried out, covering herself, but Nia kept swinging. I stood there for half a second too long, watching something old and ugly rise in Nia's face. That wasn't just anger. That was fear dressed up as rage. "Ma, stop hittin' me!" Julise screamed.
Nia didn't stop until Julise reached out and grabbed the switch, snatching it out of her mama's hand. That was the wrong move. I saw it the second it happened. Nia's face hardened. She grabbed Julise by the chest, ripping her shirt, pulling her close. Julise started shaking. She knew it was too late. "Everything I do to take care of your ass and give you what you want, and you keep spitting in my face. I'm done with that shit. Nice mama is gone," Nia roared.
That's when I moved, stopping it before shit went too far. I grabbed Julise by the arm and pulled her back. "Get to your fuckin room now!" I said, pushing her toward the house. She ran, and the Door slammed behind her.
The porch felt empty again, but the air was thick, like it was holding onto what just happened. Nia stood there breathing hard, chest rising and falling fast. "I'm done with all of this shit, Jules. Y'all wanted me to be a bitch, y'all got it. Ima whop her assevery time she get out of line with me." She brushed past me and went inside.
I stayed where I was. Didn't chase her. Shid, what was I to follow her and say? I just stood there in the dark, listening to the house settle back into itself. Somewhere inside, a door closed. Somewhere else, a light flicked off. I thought about that cell. How quiet it got at night. How you learned to keep your feelings tight, locked down, because once you let them loose, you couldn't reel them back in.