Page 203 of The Coldest: Stay Dangerous Part 2

The back door slides open, and Pilar pops her head out. “They’re playing the Tamia song, Pooh! Let’s show them how it’s done!” She’s gone just as fast as she appeared, and when I turn back toward Pooh, he’s still looking where she was. Smitten is the only word I can use to describe him.

“You gon’ make her an honest woman?”

He stands, grabbing his empty cup and placing the roach in it. “First place we went to when I showed up on her doorstep is the courthouse.”

“And she went for that?”

He winks at me. “That Alvarez charm, son. Few could ever resist a real nigga.”

Pooh stops to let Nan outside, before going in and closing the door behind him. For a brief second I hear that damn song and my family arguing about the steps to the line dance.

“They gon’ twist they damn ankles in here,” Nan grumbles, before sitting down next to me. She’s moving slower, enough for me to notice, but I don’t say anything. I already told myself I’d make her go back to Belize after the holidays. The warmer climate is good for her.

“You ready to tell me whatever it is you need to?”

“Mhmm,” she grunts, twisting until she’s all the way back on the bench, so far back her feet don’t touch the ground. “I wanted to tell you a story.”

“A story, Nan?”

“Oh, don’t act like you got places to be. Part of the reason I’ve been giving you the runaround is so the doors can close for Snowball’s lil’ shindig. You really pissed her off.”

Of course. Niggas can’t even track down the last nigga on their kill list without some pushback.

Good thing I have Snow’s new elevator code, since she’s playing hardball.

“Anyways… okay. So, there was this boy. Charming boy. So charming that women were always giving him money. These women lived with him in his house, and it was known all in the city that he took care of his girls. So, one night, this one girl, beautiful girl, she went to the charming boy’s house with her little sister, and asked for work. The charming boy thought she was too young for the type of work he did, even though he wasn’t much older than she was. But he didn’t want to turn her away completely, so he brought the beautiful girl and her younger sister to his mother’s house, where they’d be safe.

“So somewhere through the years, the charming boy and the beautiful girl fall in love. She’s unlike anyone he’s ever met. Strong, yet soft, not hardened by the things she’s been through. She saw a different side of the charming boy. The charming boy could be vulnerable, a dreamer, an actual boy with her, when to the world, he’d been a man damn near since he was a baby. Sounds familiar, huh?” She winks at me, her lips pulling at the corners.

“Go on with the story, Nan,” I chuckle, though my heart begins to pick up the longer she talks.

“Okay, okay… so as soon as the beautiful girl becomes a woman, she marries the charming man. And soon after that, they have little charming, beautiful babies. They were happy, but not everyone around them was happy… an evil woman, someone who had been around the charming man, and wanted him for herself, set the beautiful woman up. Had horrible, unspeakable things done to her. Things that ruined her body, fractured her mind… she lost the ability to have any more children, couldn’t leave the house without having panic attacks, couldn’t stand to be touched, and had horrible night terrors every night. But the beautiful woman was still strong through it all. She pressed charges, and planned on taking all of them down. But, it never happened. See, the men who hurt her were very powerful men. The kind of men that were above our laws. They thought they’d won, but they didn’t know the beautiful woman was connected to the charming, powerful man. Once that link was made known, the powerful men, in an effort to stay in the charming man’s good graces, threw huge sums of money at her. Overnight, she amassed millions. They were too powerful to be taken down through the justice system, but she took solace in knowing that she’d never have to struggle again. She took the money to her charming man, and begged him to get out of his line of business.

“But the charming man had other plans… he waited until the last check cleared, rounded them, the evil woman, and the beautiful woman up. He had a thought, a silly one now that I think about it. He thought that if his woman could watch her tormentors perish, that she’d be okay. So one by one, he carved them up, and made her watch.”

Even the crickets are quiet, waiting on bated breath for the rest of this fucked up story. My fingers dig into the wooden bench so hard that I’m surprised it hasn’t splintered. A red haze creeps in on my vision, as I’m assaulted with memory after memory of my mother. Every smile that didn’t reach her eyes. Every vacant look, when she thought no one was paying attention.

“Stay with me, Ricky.”

Snap out of it, Rick. This is important.

I blink a few times, focusing on the birch tree closest to us in the backyard.

Nan’s weathered hand finds mine on the bench, and I flip mine over to hold hers.

“It was the first time the beautiful woman saw what the charming man was capable of. His mask more than slipped, and what was left of her mind fractured beyond repair. She couldn’t reconcile loving someone who could do such unspeakable acts in her name. That, and her touch aversion, alienated them. His refusal to give up his line of work, citing his presence as keeping other men from harming other beautiful girls, kept them permanently on different pages. But neither of them could ever be away for long, even as the beautiful girl broke more and more as the years wore on.”

My mouth is too dry to lick my chapped lips. My breaths are so shallow that they’re not even visible in the cold winter night. Nan gently presses on my fingers to keep me grounded, and my vision shuffles between Ty-Ty’s deck and Nan’s old apartment in the Birch, calling Pooh, begging him to pick up.

“The charming man had enough. He decided to put his selfishness aside, and set the beautiful woman free. By then, she had experienced so much loss, and was a shell of herself, yet he knew she’d never leave him. So he told her he was letting her go, and had planned to end his own life. He’d set up accounts for their charming, beautiful babies, his mother, and felt he couldn’t bear to live without the beautiful, broken woman, but couldn’t keep watching her waste away either. So he turned off his phone, not realizing his beautiful, broken woman couldn’t live without him either. His plan went awry, and when he turned his phone back on, he found out what his beloved did. He’d heard his son was there, having witnessed the act, and decided to find some will to live, for their children, but by then, both of their sons hated him. And he could never disparage the version of the beautiful, broken mother they had. He felt they’d blame him anyway, since he blamed himself, so he grinned and beared it for years.”

“So why now?” The words are out before she’s done. I nearly punch myself wiping my nose, as angry tears spring from my eyes. “Why you telling me all this shit now? Why he still ain’t said shit?”

Nan pats my other fist, humming. “Why, after all that time had passed, you let Snow come to Belize, and get her sober? Why do you keep Ju’s secrets? Let everyone believe it was your call to keep Mars, instead of mine? Let Ty-Ty knock you on your ass? For all his faults, your father loved your mother. And as much grown business as he had you in, he was never going to tell you hers. He’d rather you think the worst of him if it meant thinking the very best of her. But I’m not Winslow, and you have a chance at something real and good with Snow. She has seen the ugliest parts of you, experienced them, just as you’ve done the same with her, and you’re both still standing. Still choosing to love each other. I didn’t think you’d let her bloom. We actually had a pool on it.”

I cough out a laugh, wiping my nose and mouth.

“But you did, Ricky. You have your quirks, but the man you’ve become… you are the glue that holds us together, not me, not anymore. So I’m going against my son, and giving you this last lesson before I go–”