Note: Here is a little teaser of the Remedy (full fic). This all takes place 6 months before Part II of the oneshot I did of them previously. Let me know what you think…☺️
Oneshot Part I Oneshot Part II
The night air hit her before the fatigue did.
Annie stepped out of the staff entrance into the parking garage, tugging her hooded jacket tighter against the breeze. The weight of the day still clinging to her. Her back ached, her feet pulsed inside her sneakers, and her stomach reminded her loudly that she hadn’t eaten since lunch. If a half-warm protein bar and a Sprite even counted.
Twelve hours on her feet. Four codes. One combative psych eval. And a nurse short the whole night.
She was past tired.
She was don’t-talk-to-me-unless-you-bleeding-out tired.
She needed a shower. Real food. A full night of sleep.
Just the thought of her bed—soft, quiet, and all hers—made her shoulders sag. She could already picture herself diving into it, all cozy, nothing pressing on her but the comforter.
But she stopped short halfway to her parking spot.
Someone was there.
Leaning against a black car near the far end of the row, the paint swallowing the yellow light overhead. His shoulders were set, chin dipped, eyes tracking her.
He didn’t move. Didn’t speak.
Just watched—like he’d been there long before she showed up, and he wasn’t leaving until she did.
Her breath hitched. It was him.
Elijah.
For a second she wondered if she was imagining him, if her brain had conjured him up, a hallucination shaped from sleep deprivation and whatever dream she’d had the night before. The one where he said her name like it belonged to him.
But no.
He was real.
And he was right there.
Her eyes darted around instinctively—empty rows of cars, flickering overhead lights, the distant sound of someone dragging a trash bin across concrete. Nothing else. No threat. Just him.
And her heart was pounding so hard she could hear it in her ears.
She took a cautious step forward.
Then another.
Slow. Reserved.
She hadn’t seen him since that night. Since he left the hospital without a word and took something invisible with him.
Now here he was. In the flesh. In her path.
They reached speaking distance at the same time.
“Hey” he said.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
The words collided in the space between them—his calm, hers unsure.
Neither of them said anything for a beat.
Annie crossed her arms over her chest, not out of attitude, but protection. Her voice came quieter the second time.
“Elijah… why are you here?” _____________________________
Smoke had timed this down to the minute. Warren—the skinny kid who ran errands for him and pulled shifts as an orderly—had slipped him Annie’s schedule earlier that day, no questions asked. He knew exactly when she’d clock out. All he had to do was be here.
On the way over, he told himself it was nothing. That he was just killing time before the night’s business started. But the truth sat heavier in his chest than he liked. He’d been running through names, numbers, things that needed doing, but she kept cutting through all of it. Annie. The nurse with careful hands and eyes that didn’t flinch. The one who patched him up and let him walk away like she didn’t expect him to come back.
He didn’t chase women. Not ever.
But here he was, leaning against the car under the yellow wash of the lights, waiting for a woman who wasn’t his.
He was irritated—at himself more than anything.
The sound of footsteps reached him before she came into view. He straightened just enough to watch her emerge from the automatic entrance doors, bag slung over one shoulder, head tipped down against the night air. She spotted him, slowed, but didn’t stop.
By the time she reached him, he still didn’t have an answer for why she was in his head. Just a tight pull in his chest that had nothing to do with the cold concrete around them.
He didn’t answer her question right away. He was too stunned. She remembered his name…remembered him.
But he played it off, just looked at her—steady, unmoving, still figuring out what he could say out loud and what he needed to keep inside. Then he shifted, took a single step toward her.
“I been thinkin’ ‘bout you.”
Annie blinked. Dropped her arms at her side.
Smoke’s voice was low, even. But there was something under it.
“I wasn’t expectin’ to. Shit, I tried not to. But after that night…” He paused, jaw tightening. “You ever have a moment just… stay on you?”
She didn’t answer.
He rubbed the back of his neck once, eyes flicking down, then back to hers.
“You stitched me up and didn’t ask for nothin’. Didn’t flinch. Didn’t act like I was a problem.”
Then he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a thick roll of bills, held together by a rubber band. Nothing flashy, but heavy enough to speak for itself.
He held it out to her.
“For what you did for me.”
Annie stared at the money.
Then at him.
Her body went still.
“You serious?” she asked, voice low.
Smoke nodded once. “I repay my debts.”
That made something flicker across her face—offense, annoyance, sharp and sudden. She let out a short, humorless scoff and stepped back, folding her arms.
“I don’t want your hush money.”
Her words hit the concrete hard between them.
“I was doing my job. Caring for a patient. Something I love to do. I don’t do it for the money.”
Smoke’s hand lowered a little, the roll still gripped in his fingers. His mouth opened, then closed again—just for a second.
Then he said, quieter, “It ain’t hush money. I just… wanted to say thank you.”
Annie’s mouth tightened. She nodded slowly and gave a quiet, half-hearted, “You’re welcome,” as she turned like she was ready to leave, walking back toward her car.
But before she could reach the door handle, his voice followed her.
“…Can I take you to get somethin’ to eat, then?”
She hesitated, back still to him.
“I ain’t mean to offend you,” he added, a little softer now. “I just want to thank you and I—I thought maybe we could talk. Eat. Somethin’.”
Annie turned around then, staring at him, opening her mouth to say no.
But right then, her stomach betrayed her—let out a loud, traitorous growl that echoed off the concrete.
She froze.
Smoke chuckled, deep and low. “Well… your stomach says otherwise.”
She turned halfway, eyes narrowing. “That’s not funny.”
He smiled—just a flicker of it. “Didn’t say it was.”
She looked at him again. Really looked.
This man she’d patched up three weeks ago… was standing in front of her now. Still guarded. Still hard to read. But not hiding.
And for some reason, her body relaxed before her brain did.
“…Okay,” she said quietly. “But I pick the place.”
“Fair.”
“And I’m not staying out late.”
He nodded. “I’ll drive.”
She sighed, shaking her head as she pulled her keys out of her pocket. “Let me lock my car.”
A BLOSSOMING LOVE: part one; part two; part three; part four; part five (completed).
NSFW! ALPHABET: one part.
DEVIL IN A BLUE DRESS: one part.
NIGHT TIME LOVIN’: one part.
HER GOOD GIRL: part one; part two.
KISSIN’ YOU: one part.
a blossoming love universe
RAISING FLORA: one part.
BIRTHDAY WISHES: one part.
annie x smoke
STRONGER THAN PRIDE: one part.
BIG BROWN EYES: one part.
PAPA’S HERE: part one; part two; part three; part four; part five; part six; part seven; part eight (ongoing).
text threads
WHILE AWAY: part one; part two; part three; part four; part five; part six; part seven; part eight; part nine; part ten; part eleven; part twelve; part thirteen (ongoing).
summary: after returning home from Club Juke’s opening night, annie and smoke have a real conversation about their years spent apart and the pain and tears shed.
cw: angstyyy, mentions of childhood trauma, mentions of the death of a child
a/n: here y’all goooo. i’m so torn apart by their love like goddamn. inspired by Sade’s “Love Is Stronger Than Your Pride.”
masterlist
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The air in their home felt heavy with uncertainty and draining emotion. The home Annie had made her own after seven years without the love of her life felt different now that he had found his way back. It was like the walls could sense his presence. Like the hardwood floors were buzzing under his footsteps—knowing he would so easily fall back into the routine he held seven years ago.
Smoke had been gone so long, but Annie hadn’t forgotten anything about him. About their life together.
It was like her mind paused when he left her, conserving every emotion, memory, and conversation they ever shared. She wanted to hate him, wanted to stop living when he tore their family apart, but now that he was back, she realized that no matter how hard she tried to feel that way, she couldn’t do that to him.
She wanted and needed that man like she needed air to breathe. When he was gone, nothing felt the same. Her spiritual life faltered as she put every ounce of her body and soul into keeping him safe until he was to return.
Him being back made her body reverberate again. It felt like she had confidence in her power again.
Elijah’s body moved through the house, stronger and wilder than it was seven years ago. His form was stormier than she remembered, but it didn’t overwhelm her. As she eyed the way he moved in a calculated and routine manner, ridding his upper body of his pressed, sweat-drenched button-up and throwing it over a chair, she vowed to quell those storms in him like she once had.
She promised—quietly—to take care of her man and cast out every one of those demons in him.
“I ain’t ever been good at forgiveness, Elijah,” Annie spoke up after staring at him boldly. Her eyes were cloudy with every emotion she had felt over the course of their relationship:
Devotion.
Shame.
Pride.
Heartbreak.
Love.
She didn’t know how to quiet the litany of swirling thoughts in her. He looked at her, confusion etched into his face—and something close to sorrow.
“Annie,” his bottom lip quivered, hands shook violently at his sides. He tried to reach for her even in his trembling, but she pulled back sharply. Hurt flashed across his face, but she was just trying to not give in as easily as she had earlier. She was so embarrassed that she let him back into her body so quickly—that she had facilitated the entire event.
Their bodies craved each other, and not once in their time apart had she thought to find solace in another hot, needy body.
“Don’t,” she warned, pushing past him and to the tin wash basin tucked into a corner of the front room. She drenched her hands in water as a distraction from the conversation they needed to have, trying to wash away her pain. “I wanted ‘tah hate you so bad, ‘Lijah. I wanted ‘tah forget you the way you forgot me. I wanted ‘tah curse you. Put roots on you so bad that you wouldn’t be able to rest well without me hauntin’ yo’ mind.”
She huffed, turning to face him sharply. She roughly raked her hands against her haint blue velvet dress to dry them. Annie’s eyes burned with fire as she made him trembled under her hardened gaze.
“You ain’t have to put no roots on me, woman,” Smoke blew out a heavy breath of air. “Thoughts of you haunted me day and night for seven years. Didn’t let up on me ‘til I stepped foot in that yard earlier.” He gripped violently at his own hands to calm the tremble. He had never seen her so mad. Not when he admitted to killing his father. No when he admitted to enlisting in the military. Not even when he left her during the heat of a Mississippi night.
Annie always gave him the benefit of the doubt, but here, seven years and a bunch of heartache later, things had dramatically changed.
She laughed exasperatedly, shaking her head in disbelief.
“So you mean to tell me you left me, left our home, left our baby girl just for you ‘tah come back talkin’ ‘bout some I was hauntin’ you?” Her voice shook with anger, tone carried very bit of pain she had held in just waiting for him to be standing in front of her again. “You left our baby to rot in that ground without her daddy here—”
“Don’t you dare say that,” Smoke challenged, walking into her heaving body. It was like smoke blew out of his ears and nose as he pressed his chest to hers in an attempt to intimidate her. “Don’t say that about her,” he tried again with a more steady voice, but he didn’t realize that there was nothing that could stop a grieving mother from saying her peace.
Her head reared back at his audacity to limit her speech. He knew better than to keep her from doing anything she had set her mind to.
“Don’t say what, Smoke,” the use of his nickname made his heart break just slightly, “that she dead? That you left? That I go out to that grave everyday to sit with my baby? That I remind her that her daddy love her even if you ain’t here?” Annie fumed; Her voice raised, threatening him to come at her crazy again.
“Please,” Smoke broke down, tears spilling from his eyes and a sob tearing his throat apart.
The quietness he had developed over the years had only worsened in his time in Chicago. He sat within himself everyday blaming himself, cursing his own name, finding dishonor in the man he had become.
He never wanted to be a man that left his family and couldn’t deal with his emotions so much so that he neglected the people he vowed to be committed to. He saw himself as worse than his father. He didn’t beat his wife, and he didn’t utter a foul word her way, but he left her. His body was ridden with cowardice, and he didn’t know how to contend with the truth in words she was spitting.
Annie bit her bottom lip, trying her damndest to not break out in a mirrored cry. She had cried so much in the past years that she hated the idea of letting him see her cry now. She bowed her head, shielding her eyes from his trembling form.
The man she knew was a crumbled lump of sadness. Emotions passed over him that she had never seen before. His pride had collapsed. The sure fire man she knew wasn’t standing before her any longer.
It made her own pride and ego chip away ever so slightly.
“I’m sorry, Annie, baby. I swear wanted to come back,” he cried, kneeling before her with thick tears streaming down his face and across his dimpled cheeks. He gripped at her hips, bunching the fabric of her dress as he pleaded and cried bloody murder for his words to pierce her ears. “I just ‘bout left Stack up there ‘bout twenty times ‘cause you all I ever wanted.”
Annie rolled her eyes. She didn’t point out the irony in him wanting her but still leaving her or the heartbreak in him not departing from his twin even with her constantly on his mind. She watched him fall apart at the seems and fell apart right beside him.
“Elijah,” she uttered, pulling his body up off the floor. His feet scrambled but he stood before her—back slouched, eyebrows draw together. He still didn’t look at her fully—he couldn’t—forcing her to grab ahold of his face and stare directly into his eyes. “As much as I want to hate you, you all I ever wanted, too.”
Their bodies shook against each other as the house ran quiet again. The rising sun was beginning to peek out from behind the horizon. It marked a new day full of possibilities and lost chances.
Their minds ran wild.
Smoke thought about the first time her ever saw Annie: big, brown eyes looking through his body like she saw everything he was and could be. Annie thought about the day their baby girl was born: Smoke smiling wider than she had ever seen, toting around their tiny, eight-pound baby in his big arms.
They didn’t think about the fights they had.
Or the nights they spent crying over their sick child.
Or the agony it was to bury her little body before she had even surpassed that newborn weight.
Or any of the lonely nights spent apart for seven whole years.
They just thought about the love they shared—the good times and how they could create so many new memories together.
“I love ya’,” Elijah chirped, voice clipped but full of hope. He rested his forehead against Annie’s, attempting to search her brain for what thoughts she was having, coming up unlucky. She was as hard to read as he was.
But as her arm began to stroke up and down his arm, Annie slowly let the rest of her pride slip away. Nothing was gonna ever keep her from her man.
“I love you, too, Elijah.”
That had him smiling a melancholy smile. He had waited so long to hear her utter those words again. He thought that he’d never get to have a place in her heart after the foolishness he had done.
“I vow to make it up ‘tah you every day of my life, baby,” he assured. He punctuated his words with a gentle squeeze to her waist, eyes refusing to leaves hers. “My love for you is stronger than everything. Stronger than the depth of German trenches. Than the thousands of miles of the Mississippi River. Than any level of pride in my body.” Annie finally let her tears flow. He placed a warm hand on her cheek to steady himself. “You my everythin’, Annie.”
summary: no matter how hard he tries to reject your advances, smoke always gives in. after all, you know his body like no other.
pairing: smoke x reader, platonic stack x reader.
warnings: use of the n word, allusions to sex, making out.
notes: first time writing in a couple months !!! literally had no plot with this one i just went straight off the bag lmao. also this isn't proofread at all!
It wasn't uncommon for you to find your way to his arms. Usually it would all be under his control; he'd call on you, he'd tell you what to do and you'd happily oblige. It went on like that for some time.
Only, you never got used to Smoke's hard exterior.
You thought that with time, you'd be able to read him better, but it seems it only become more difficult as time went on.
You and Smoke had been messing around for some time now, ever since he first laid eyes on you at a neighbourhood event he and his brother were "just passing by". But when he and Stack left for Chicago, all that went away.
You didn't expect the invite to the twins' new juke joint to find you, but there you were at the train station with Pearline when Stack found you.
"I ain't seen you in hot minute," he grabbed at your hand and twirled you towards him, ever the flirt. Your light pink sundress spun with you, frilly and light with air.
"Alright, Stack, let me go," you laughed, pushing at his chest. You turned around to check on Pearline, seeing her smiling at the twins' cousin, Preacher Boy. "What brings you back? Chicago too hard for you?"
"Girl, ain't nothing too hard for us," Stack waved you off, kissing his teeth. "We jus' wanted something a lil' more... familiar."
You rolled your eyes at him, whatever that meant.
"Say, we're having us an opening party tonight. Smoke and I got ourselves a new joint," a smirk graced Stack's face as you held a more quizzical look.
"Oh really? And whose pockets did you pick to get that new joint?"
"You want an invite or not, 'cause the way you goin', you gon' get blacklisted before it even open," he tilted his head to look down at you, his hat shadowing his face a bit.
"Alright, alright," you laughed. "I'll be there."
"Damn right," he smiled. "Imma tell Smoke too, that nigga sure could loosen up a bit."
Now it was your turn to roll your eyes at the mention of his brothers' name, whom you haven't seen since the night he told you he was leaving for Chicago, more like the night you found out rather than got told.
*
It was around 10pm when you got to the joint, the sound of music and laughter drawing you in. You couldn't lie to yourselves, the boys had outdone themselves on this one. Cornbread was at the door when you arrived, a smile on his face as you walked closer.
"Well, if it ain't lil' missy herself!" He laughed aloud.
"Hey Cornbread," you smiled, wiping away a curl from your face.
"Go on in, Stack an 'em expecting you."
By 'them' you assumed he meant Preacher Boy, who was with Stack when he extended the invite to you.
Walking in, the smell of food hit you straight away. The lights shone on everyone, illuminating faces and figures, some that you knew, some you didn't. Your eyes were looking for a certain someone's, never seeming to find them.
"I knew you'd come," you heard Stack before you even saw him. He swung his arm over your shoulder, a drink in the same hand. "You look good."
"You don't clean up too bad yourself," you patted his chest, a bright smile on your face.
He smiled back at you, gold caps glinting when they caught the light. "Aight, let's get you a drink, hm?"
He didn't give you tike to respond, walking you towards the bae section of the joint. You saw Annie behind the counter and a few others behind her.
"Hey Annie," you greeted her with a civil smile, to which she returned. Things between you and Annie weren't the best, but they weren't bad either. You knew better than to blame Smoke's personality towards you on the other woman in his life, especially because she'd been with him longer than you had.
You pulled out a few crumpled notes from your bra, but before they could even hit the counter, Stack had snatched them.
"Man, get that pocket change outta here," he said, pointing the cash back at you.
"Huh— I'm buying myself a drink, Stack, give it back." You huffed when he held it away from you again.
"It's on the house," he nodded at Annie, who grabbed a cup and filled it, handing it back to you.
"I thought y'all ain't do charity?" you laughed, accepting the drink nevertheless.
"It's a special night, and plus, you one of the few I like," he kissed your cheek, leaving as quickly as he found you, not before he stuck your cash under the strap of your dress on your shoulder.
You shook your head, moving through the crowd with your drink, smiling back at those who greeted you.
You found yourself a little corner to watch the stage and everyone else, leaning against the thick wood as you let the drink flow through your body. As you tipped your head back to drink more, your eyes caught his.
Of course, he was upstairs, watching over everyone else. His eyes stared right back at you as he took a drag of his cigarette, the smoke he exhaled wafting through the joint. You didn't break the eye contact, staring back at him as you drank from your cup.
It felt like you were staring at each other for ages, but seconds later he tipped his head to the side, gesturing for you to come up. Then he disappeared into a room.
Your breath hitched, your hand taking to your collarbone to ease the burn of the alcohol. You didn't know what to expect, things with Smoke were almost always unpredictable.
Regardless, you put the cup down and made your way slowly up the stairs to where you last saw him, adjusting the silky navy blue dress that you wore as you went.
The music was quieter upstairs, slightly muffled by the foundations and thickness of the room's doors.
You stood outside the room before knocking twice on the door, opening it shortly after.
His back greeted you, toned arms begging to be relieved from the slightest tightness of his shirt and waistcoat. He still had the cigarette, though when he turned to you, you knew it was only a matter of time before he ashed it.
You didn't say anything, leaning on the back of the door as you watch him.
He studied you for a bit, and that's when you really saw him for the first time in what felt like forever. His chiseled face, sculpted with time and effort. Those eyes that never seemed to soften, only at times when you got him loose enough to let go, just for a bit.
"Whatchu doin' here?" He said, startling you from your thoughts. You didn't expect that to be the first thing he said to you, but then again this was Smoke, he didn't care what he said to who.
"You told me to come up here, didn't you?" you smiled back sweetly, enjoying the feeling you got when you got under his skin.
"Stop sassing," he mumbled, ashing the cigarette at the end of the wooden desk.
He took a seat on the same desk, folding his arms across his chest.
"How you been, then? Didn't hear much from you these past days," you couldn't care less about how he was, and he knew that. You just wanted the truth and the honest truth.
He didn't answer you right away, simply allowed himself to eye you up and down. The way the dress hugger you perfectly, the navy blue on your melanin skin, the way it was cut low on your chest to expose just a little cleavage... he was enjoying it. Almost like it was just for him.
"You ain't got no where better to be?" He changed the topic again, much to your annoyance.
You let out a bitter scoff, already regretting following Smoke into the room. "You told me to meet you in here. Don't act like you didn't, Smoke," you kissed your teeth.
One thing about Smoke, he didn't do attitudes, regardless of whether or not he deserved it.
"Come here," he spoke to you softly, which should've alerted you if anything. Instead, you allowed your legs to take you to him standing right in front of his taller figure.
His hands rested on your waist, pulling you into him. Now, you stood between his legs as his eyes stared into yours.
"Why'd you leave, Smoke?"
He sighed but didn't act surprised, like he knew this was where the conversation would go. Your hands made their way to his broad shoulders, massaging gently.
"You already know why I had to go, business don't wait for no one."
You huffed at his answer, pulling back as much as you could whilst still in his hold.
"That's not what I'm talking about, and you know it."
"What else you want me to say?"
You look at him then, really looked at him. "I want the truth. Why'd you leave me? When you was just saying all that stuff about wanting to be better for me an' all... It makes no sense."
Smoke looked away from you when you said that, but you still felt his fingers dragging up and down your waist, almost like he was making sure you were real, that you were still in his hold.
When a few moments of more silence passed, you pushed away from him, ready to go back down and pretend none of this even happened.
But Smoke didn't let you. He turned you back around in his hold, your chest against his back. His head dipped down to your bare neck, kissing along. His beard tickled, but you found yourself too busy almost melting into him to register it.
"You scare me sometimes," he mumbled, so quiet you almost missed it.
"What?" you whispered, eyes fluttering closed. "When was you scared of anything?"
"You're too... good. I'on know how to handle that." He was speaking honestly now, and it made sense why he turned you away from him to say this. Smoke never shower any vulnerability. You thought he was immune to it but it turns out he just never wanted anyone to see that side of him.
"Smoke..." you trailed off when he began to suck and bite at your neck, eliciting the faintest of moans from your lips. You pressed back into him, needing to feel more.
"I had to leave. Not because of you but you know I ain't good for you... I'on know why you can't understand that." He brought his left hand to your throat, tipping your head back into his shoulder as he spoke. Your eyes closed, suppressing the lewd sounds threatening to escape. He was barely touching you yet already had you like this? Insane.
"I don't care about that, Smoke." You managed to get out.
"Yeah, well you should." The way he said it sounded almost like a laugh. "You don't make no sense, baby."
He was right. Smoke wasn't the type of guy that a lady should keep chasing if she knew he didn't have what she wanted. Yet you, you kept trying. And that's what confused him.
He did everything to throw you off of him — use you when it pleased him, shut you out, literally everything he could think of. But it seemed to only make things between you stronger.
You forced yourself out of his grip and turned around, now looking him right in the eyes. He could see how hot and flustered he got you.
"I do make sense. I always tell you what I want, it's you who acts like he don't know what he wants." Your hands caressed his face bringing his forehead to rest on yours.
Smoke closed his eyes, his hands cupping your ass as he held you against him. He shook his head, seemingly about to say something before he pulled away.
"Stop," you frowned. "Stop forcing yourself away from me."
"I have to," he grunted, looking anywhere but at you.
Still, you pulled his face back to your, making him look back at you.
"You know you want to," you whispered, dropping a hand from his face and down to his pants, stroking over his clothes bulge. Smoke groaned lowly, throwing his head back. "Give me a lil' something, huh, baby?" you asked sweetly. How could he deny that?
He brought his hand back to your neck, pulling you in til your lips touched his. You moaned almost immediately, it had been way too long.
Smoke kissed you like he would never get the chance to do it again, pulling you impossibly closer to him whilst one of your hands held the nape of his neck, the other still palming him.
He lowly moaned into your mouth when you pulled away slowly, biting his lip. You left him do what he did best, take control.
He turned you around, lifting you up to sit on the desk, his hands roaming all over your body. "You're something else," he whispered against your lips as you fumbled at the buttons of his waistcoat and shirt.
"Yeah, you love it, don't you?"
You felt him smile against your lips, just ever so slightly. If anything, that told you he wasn't ready to let you go. Not just yet. And that was enough for now.
He broke away from your lips to kiss along your neck, your head thrown back in pleasure as your legs wrapped around his body. "Smoke..." you whispered.
"Yeah, baby?" he kissed along your jaw, your hand wrapped around his throat as you pulled him closer to your face.
summary: as your man, stack knows his role — give you all you want and make sure you're happy.
parings: modernau!stack x blackfem!reader
warnings: mentions of sex, established but not specified relationship, descriptions of reader.
notes: short fic based off of this!
"You got your bag, baby?" Stack called from downstairs, sending a quick text back to Smoke. The two of you were in Miami running a few of Stack's errands, and he brought you along for a little getaway from your busy schedule.
"Yeah, give me a sec." You did not, in fact, have your bag, which is why Stack smiled when he heard your footsteps retreat back to the shared bedroom of the villa, finding it on the bed.
Your sandals hit the floor with soft clacks every time you took a step, and you got hit with that feeling of being on holiday, at peace with the world for a period of time.
He glanced up and pocketed his phone when he saw you come down, his eyes shamelessly eyeing up and down your body.
You wore a beige tube top that complimented your skin perfectly, hugging your body in the right places. You paired it with a brown denim mini skirt, your legs on full show, something Stack was down bad for. You chose a honey blonde dyed wig for today, curls neatly styled in.
He let out a whistle as you approached him, twirling you around by your hips. "Who you lookin' this good for?"
"Myself," you winked as you checked yourself out in the mirror.
"I know that's right."
Stack took your bag in one of his hands, the other reaching for yours as he opened the door, leading you to the car.
Ever the gentleman, he opened your door for you, placing your bag on your lap. Just as he was about to head to the driver's side of the cat, you held onto his bicep, prompting him to turn back to you.
"Wassup?" he tilted his head, smiling when you puckered your glossed lips. He bent down to kiss them, his free hand subconsciously sliding up to your throat. He pecked your lips three more times before he pulled away, heading to his side.
"Where are we going today?" you asked as you opened the camera app on your phone, checking your hair and makeup whilst taking some pictures.
Stack pulled out of the villa's designated parking spot, his hand around your headrest as he reversed. "To Bailey's. Smoke said he got something for us. Then we can go do whatever you want."
Bailey was a common name that you'd learnt since getting with Stack. He was one of the twins' closest friends and partner, so you were used to seeing him.
"Whatever I want?" you smirked, looking up at Stack. He looked back down at you with the same expression, nodding his head.
Music accompanied your conversation with him as he drove through the blazing heat, the breeze barely touching you even with the windows down.
Soon enough, Stack parked the car in a spot in a building complex, one you've never seen before. "Give me a second, mama," he kissed your cheek as he undid his seatbelt, leaving the car. You watched as he crossed over to the office in the parking lot, talking to the man behind the glass window.
Shortly he came back, leaning his arm above your door. "You wan' come up with me or you're good here?" He asked.
"It's okay, the air's cool down here, I'll wait for you."
Stack looked around for a moment, his eyes squinting slightly like they did whenever he was on edge. "Nah," he shook his head, opening your door and undoing your seatbelt. "I'on like leaving you alone."
See? Ever the gentleman.
You wrapped your arm through his, your handing resting firmly on his exposed bicep as he walked you through the building with familiarity.
"'Sup, J?" he dapped someone up as you walked through the double glass doors of the complex, heading for the elevator. Once in, he pressed the button for the sixth floor, standing behind you as the doors closed.
You faced the mirror on the wall of the elevator as Stack faced the doors, like he usually did when you were out together. His arm held the front of your waist as you snapped pictures til the door opened.
Stepping out, he turned to you, holding your hand in his. "We won't be too long, baby. Just gotta pick some shit up."
You nodded, happy to even be in his presence.
Once you entered an office like room, he led you to a couch just outside another set of doors. "Sit here, I'll be back in a bit. Don't talk to anyone." He adjusted his belt slightly, the piece he held peeking through his waistband.
"I won't," you rolled your eyes. Stack always thought you had a tendency to be too friendly, and that it led to a lot of problems most of the times.
"I mean it. If someone looks at you, look the other way. I can't keep letting off bullets in people's places."
You laughed as he walked away, remembering the time he let off almost a whole round in a diner because the waiter kept flirting with you, though you merely saw it as 'holding conversation'.
He was back within the next twenty minutes, a small briefcase and white envelope in his hand. "Aight, let's go baby."
Back in the car, Stack put the briefcase in the backseat. He opened the envelope once he did his seatbelt. revealing a lot of cash.
"Here," he handed it all to you after counting it.
"Huh?" you frowned, seeing that it was at least $50,000 in there. "Why are you giving me this?"
"'Cause you look pretty today," he shrugged like it was nothing, opening up your purse and shoving the stacks of money in it.
"Elias," you smiled. "You don't need to keep giving me money. Especially not for reasons like that."
"Girl, I can do what I want," he sassed back, kissing your lips before backing out of the driving spot.
He spoiled you in so many ways, it never failed to bring a smile to your face. Besides, this wasn't his first time doing it anyways. The other night after an intense session of love-making, he emptied the pockets of the joggers he wore that day, handing you about four bands, telling you to "go buy something nice."
He drove with his hand on your bare thigh, humming along to the Tupac songs playing on the radio. Your arm rested on his shoulders, manicured nails scratching gently at the nape of his neck.
"You keep doing that and I'ma park this car, right now," he glanced at you, a mischievous glint in his eyes.
"I mean," you shrugged. "You said we could do whatever I want when you're done."
My small contribution for my shaylas, Annie x Smoke. Still getting a feel of their characters.
Modern Smoke x Annie.
Warnings: none. Fluff?
Excuse any errors (👀)
The ghost of a faint kiss tickled Annie out of her deep slumber. She couldn’t distinguish if she was dreaming or not. She refused to open her eyes so as to not cut her sleep short, in case she was just dreaming. Her eyebrows slightly furrowed trying to concentrate on the soft lips against hers.
A soft but deep voice whispering in her ear coaxed her out of her sleep. “Good evening my love. Won’t you open your pretty eyes for me?” A small kiss accompanied his words.
Eyes opening in slow motion, she blinked the sleep away trying to focus on the most beautiful pair eyes. When his whole face came in to view, a tired smile appeared on her face.
“There she goes. My beautiful woman. Hi.”
“Good evening handsome. What time is it?” She asked while stretching her body. This pregnancy has taken a toll on her body. Sleeping like a koala any time of the day. Her body required frequent rest.
That’s why her husband reasoned with her to take her maternity leave earlier than the expected time. He was more than capable of taking care of his household.
He wanted this pregnancy to have as little complications as possible.
It wasn’t easy convincing her to leave the job space. Annie is a hardworking woman. Passionate about what she does. Plus she knows the kids would miss her when they won’t see her.
Explaining to them what a maternity leave entails was a challenge it only made the kids even more curious and have a million other questions. Some about the subject and others just random, asking the first thing that came to mind. She loves those little kids. The rest will do her good so she can have a little kid to call her own.
Checking his Patek Philippe , he read the time “it’s 18:37.”
“You and this military time of yours. What’s that in normal people time Elijah?”
“6:37.”
A gasp left her lips. “Already? Wow I wasn’t planning on laying down for that long.” She took his wrist just to make sure it was indeed the indicated time on the watch.
“How long you been laying down here?”
“Um, well, I was just planning on laying down a bit before starting dinner and I didn’t want to go all the way to the bedroom. Because I was only going to lay down for -
Her rambling came full force when she knows her husband had caught her doing something wrong. He is real strict about this pregnancy and wants to follow all the doctors recommendations to a t.
Whenever she thought of dismissing the doctor’s advice, Elijah was there to make sure she was doing everything as told.
Whether it was her diet, hydration or exercise habits, Elijah made sure everything was done well.
“How long Annie?”
At the sound of her name, she looked up at him with a pout forming on her lips. She wasn’t used to him uttering her name. Normally a term of endearment was used to in lieu of her name. ‘Annie’ sounded foreign at times. Of course he still used her name but most of the time ‘Annie’ was reserved for when she was giving him an out of body experience or when he was scolding her.
Like now.
“Since 4:00, I think.”
His silence made everything else go silent with him. She could feel his hard stare but refused to meet his eyes. She hated whenever he was disappointed with her.
He sighed. His eyes wandered to the side landing on the water bottle he bought her to help keep track of her water intake. The bottle displayed the different hours of the day accompanied by words of encouragement for each hour.
That was strike two in Elijah’s book.
“So you’ve been laying here for at least two hours. And, from what I can see, you haven’t hydrated yourself since 2:00.”
“I forgot.”
“How you forget to drink water Annie?”
“Can you stop calling me that?”
They way voice came out so small, like a whisper, only indicated one thing lately. She was about to cry.
Her feelings have been all over the place lately. Changing like the colours of the aurora borealis.
“Come on mama, don’t cry. I’m sorry. It wasn’t my intention to sound mean. Just want to make sure this journey will be as smooth as possible, yeah?” He says wiping away her tears. Pressing small kisses all over her face.
“Let me go get you something to drink.”
He goes to the kitchen, fills up a cold glass of water before bringing it in front of her. “Drink up.”
After she’s done, he accompanies her to the bathroom to run her a bath. His hand finding it’s rightful place at the small of her back. Rubbing soothingly, absentmindedly.
“Go on and sit as I get the water started.”
Before he could leave, she pulled on his arm bringing his head down to her level and kissing him softly.
He left for the bathroom. Opening the tap a little getting the temperature less hot than normally because their doctor advised so.He opted for the epsome salt since they couldn’t use her regular bath bombs. He lit her tulip shaped unscented candle to add to the ambiance.
“You okay sweetheart?”
So lost in her thoughts, she didn’t hear him enter her space before he spoke. She looked up at him with sad eyes. “I feel bad.”
“You feel bad? Where.” His hands instantly finding her protruding belly. Rubbing it. She lightly slapped his hands away.
The panic in his voice caused her to roll her eyes slightly.
“No Elijah, calm down, I mean I feel bad.”
“Why, love?”
“Because-” Her voice came out louder than intended. “Because I-I’m the one who’s supposed to be taking care of you. You just came back from work and instead of resting you’re here taking care of me. I feel so lazy.”
“Nah baby, you ain’t lazy, stop that.”
He wiped the tears escaping from her eyes. A kiss on her forehead.
“Besides who said you have to take care of me? Hmm? You’re my wife, carrying my child. Our baby. Your body is accomplishing one of the most amazing tasks. Of course you’re going to feel tired. Lemme take care of you while you take care of our baby.”
She sniffles, “I guess..”
He felt like something deeper was was bothering her. He was going to tend to whatever it was after but for now, he just wanted her to relax.
“Come on. Let’s get you in that bath before the water runs cold. We gon have a talk later.”
Thank you for reading 💋
🏷️ @browngirldominion
If you’d like to be added to the tag list pls let me know
Pairings: Elijah "Smoke" Moore x Annie Moore (Sinners)
Warning(s): Mentions of Hoodoo, Explicit Sexual Content, Romance, Violence, Angst, Smoke's POV, Pre-Sinners movie.
Series Summary: Smoke Moore has returned from WWI with his twin brother Stack and meets Annie for the first time. Smitten immediately by the young Creole beauty, Smoke longs to make Annie his own. But he has to get past his brother and another rival suitor first.
Word Count: 10.4K
Masterlist HERE.
"I love you baby so please don't you
Leave me here all alone
I can't stand it baby when you
Leave me here all alone
So wherever you decide to go baby
Just don't stay gone too long"
Keb Mo – "Love Blues"
Smoke drove his father's car with Stack on the passenger side.
They traveled through the cluster of shacks that made up a close-knit community near a river tributary run-off not too far from their mother's home that everyone called Gator Walk because of the occasional sightings of alligators. The fearsome beasts often climbed out of the water to sunbathe on the banks before crawling back to their liquid sanctuary, floating downriver toward the swamplands to lay their clutch of eggs in nests of sticks and mud. Stack wanted to pass by Annie's home to catch her leaving if he could…and to see who with.
Her residence was a modest dwelling that rested on short wood stilts to help protect it from sudden river floods that could spill over into the shacks during the rainy season. Surrounded by tall, sweet-scented lilac bushes, the home appeared empty of occupants.
"Slow down, Smoke," Stack said, lowering his black fedora to hide his face.
"If she sees me driving, she's gonna know it's you right next to me," Smoke said.
"Shut up! Pull over there where she caint see the car…between those trees over there."
Smoke drove where he asked, and they watched for signs of Annie.
"Maybe you should go knock on the door," Smoke said.
"Nah, her daddy might be home. He real strict with her. Shotgun strict. I tried sneaking by her bedroom window one time—"
"When was this?"
"Last Sunday. There's an old tree stump by her room and you can step up on it to tap the shutters. Ain't no glass on it. I thought I could sneak in without the neighbors seeing me while her parents were at Sunday evening prayer service with Uncle Jed."
"What happened?"
"Her parents didn't go to service and her daddy caught me talking to her. I told him I was walking through and seen her looking at the lilac bushes and wanted to know if I could take a few flowers home to my momma. He told me to keep steppin'. But man…the way she smiled when her daddy chased me off. I only got to speak to her for a few minutes. She told me how I could chew on lilac leaves to treat a sore mouth, and all I could do was stare at her mouth while she talked to me. Her lips look so soft. I caint figure her out. She likes me…I know she does. I mean really likes me…but she won't let me get to that next step."
"Maybe she's figured out that you only want her for one thing."
"That's not true. Okay…in the beginning it was…but now…"
"Now?" Smoke asked.
Stack sighed and took off his hat.
"She makes me think about things. Asks me so many damn questions about myself that I never thought about before. She talks to me like the fellas do…like a regular friend."
"Maybe that's all she wants."
"She stares at me sometimes like she wants me. When I try to get close to her…going in for the kiss, cuz you know I knock 'em out with a good kiss…she always pulls back. Ain't no woman ever turned down a kiss from Big Stack. I kinda like it though. It builds up anticipation and shit. I just wanna get her alone and on her back… hear her talk all that Creole to me while I'm stroking my way to glory. Shit gets my dick hard."
"Alright…you ain't gotta share all that."
"It's true! I caught her walking home once from our place and she's telling me about something momma showed her and she stopped talking English, like she's too excited to get the words out and forgot we ain't in New Orleans. I'm listening to her and lookin' at them big ol' hams she got for titties. That girl got me all twisted. My pecker started swelling up and I had to leave her before she caught me pokin' outta my pants. She real different, Smoke."
Stack glanced over at the shack again.
A restless unease settled in Smoke's chest. He toiled with telling his brother the truth of his own attraction to Annie.
"Don't get your hopes up tonight or get mad if she avoids you. We don't need to hear y'all fussing and messing up the mood," Smoke said.
"I ain't talkin' to her. I made up my mind that she gotta come to me first if this thing between us is going to happen."
"What if it don't happen?"
"Oh, it will. Once she gets a gander at me with other women. She'll get jealous. Miss Annie Belizaire will come jiggling over to me, speaking all that sweet Creole in my ear, and I will sweep her off her feet. Watch and see."
Stack stuck his hat back on his head.
"Let's go," Stack said. "Ain't nobody here."
Smoke shifted gears and drove out of Gator Walk, headed for the jump up. A soft breeze bathed their faces in the late summer air. Fall would come soon. He thought of projects that needed to be done around his mother's property and calculated a budget for him and Stack to live on that would carry them over into the New Year and beyond.
Arriving at the secluded location, Stack leaned over the door of the automobile, catcalling the young women that strolled toward the old abandoned barn where Cornbread's party awaited them. Six horse-drawn wagons rolled in, one at a time, filled with young people. A couple of field trucks loaded with more revelers arrived, and the rest traveled on foot. The sun slanted to their left, keeping the temperature bearable. The excitement of being around a host of other young adults crackled the atmosphere with a vibrant energy. Smoke couldn't wait to submerge his entire self in good country fun. It would be the twins' first post-war party with their own people.
Cornbread's elder uncle Lodie and his older brother Matthew took on the important task as barbecue pit masters for the event. They lorded over two ground pits covered with tarps and held down with large stones where two huge roasted pigs had slow-cooked for hours overnight. The men pushed away the big rocks and yanked back the tarps. Heavy white smoke drifted across the main set-up area in front of the barn where a giant fire pit waited, piled with chopped wood for the bonfire later in the evening. Smoke sniffed the heavenly scent of smoked pork and almost salivated thinking of eating it with red sauce and white bread.
"Slow down, Smoke. Let's give these pretty women a ride so they can rest them nice thick legs," Stack cajoled, waving for the two women, Geeshie and Mayola, to come over to him.
Smoke slowed down their all black Model T, and Stack hopped out, opening the side door for the women to climb in. Geeshie grinned and Smoke couldn't help but glance at her slinky orange dress and enticing wide hips. Mayola carried a svelte frame and her Marcel waves framed her oval face like a movie star.
"That's it ladies, make yourselves comfortable as we escort you to this here jump up," Stack purred.
The new gold on his teeth gave him a trickster's persona, and Smoke slid his tongue over the bit of gold on his own teeth worn on the opposite side. Both men had to take care of decayed teeth worn down from lack of dentists willing to repair colored teeth in Clarksdale. Thankfully, the army paid for their dental work. Taiwo had been so shocked to see their two mouths full of gold like their daddy.
He parked in back of the barn to hide the car from prying eyes and helped Mayola out while Stack helped Geeshie out on his side. His brother left his jacket on top of Smoke's in the back of the car. He tugged on his suspenders and swiped his hand down his clean shirt. Stack advised they dress casual and comfortable. If any fights broke out from drinking, their good clothes wouldn't get ruined with bloody cuts or tears.
Smoke expected at least one or two people to test him and Stack. Their unsavory reputation preceded them and since they'd been gone for three years, other young men might think they were the top dogs of Clarksdale. Wouldn't hurt to set some men straight if they started puffing out chests. Smoke carried a gun on his ankle in case he needed to add an exclamation point for any man brave enough to step to them.
He could already feel the ripple of nervousness among a few of the young people who didn't know them personally. They gave head nods and a few handshakes. Cornbread rushed over, thankfully pulling him away from Mayola.
They joined a slew of young men and women dressed to party gathered inside the barn where an old cutting table held Coca Cola bottles and root beer, along with Wonder Bread, warm hushpuppies, and fried okra in big pans. Stacks of tin plates waited to be used right next to a spread of forks. Everyone buzzed with anticipation as a group of musicians warmed up their instruments near stacks of old hay being used as seats. Two fiddlers, a guitar player, and a man wearing a metal washboard holding two spoons riled folks up with the first song.
A slick buddy named Ghost Eye Terry pounded his hands on a crate to create a drum beat. As kids, Terry tried Smoke one time too many, and he busted the man's eye with a fist when he stole Stack's penny candy on a fishing trip, injuring the retina. It never healed properly and eventually clouded over, thus the nickname Ghost Eye followed Terry through life.
Once the harmonica player started wailing away with a yearning sound, no one wasted time dancing.
Mayola resumed her grip on his arm and tried to walk through the rest of the barn with him, pretending he brought her there as his date. He scanned the growing group for signs of Annie. So did Stack. His brother's lips poked out with disappointment.
She wasn't there.
A few men started carrying haystacks out toward the circular firepit prepping seats, and Smoke's stomach grumbled. Cornbread laughed.
"We'll be eating in five minutes, promise," Cornbread said.
Smoke nodded.
Lodie, Matthew, and Cornbread soon loaded up the wrapped pigs onto two nearby carts. They cut away the chicken wire and then the protective burlap bags that kept the moisture in. Several people came out to watch as the succulent meat fell off the bone.
Cornbread rubbed his hands together.
"Yeah, they seasoned up real good. Uncle Lodie stuffed them with carrots, onions, and oranges…look how tender it is…ooh wee, we gettin' some good eatin' tonight," Cornbread enthused.
The birthday host headed to the barn with Smoke close on his heels.
"Grab you some plates, everybody! Time to eat while it's hot!"
"Get you a plate first," Smoke said.
"I surely will," Cornbread said.
Cornbread lifted a plate and added some bread and hushpuppies to it.
"Somebody help me grab the pots of sauce," Cornbread said.
Smoke lifted an iron pot, and another young man grabbed the other. Both had spoons in them to ladle out the tomato-based condiment. Once Cornbread piled up his plate, a line formed, following him out to the pit masters where they loaded up on pulled pork slathered in barbecue sauce.
Smoke strolled back to the barn to get a plate and noticed Bo rolling in on a small horse cart chauffeuring Grace, Annie, and two other young Black women he didn't know. Bo guided the horse to the spot others left their animals and wagons. Smoke trotted over to greet them.
"Bo," Smoke said.
His eyes stayed on Annie. Bo jumped down and assisted Grace out first. Smoke helped the two other women out, and then Annie last. Clasping her warm hand caused his heart to thump faster. She held it tight and let go quickly out of modesty.
"Hi," she said.
She recognized him from his brother easily by the way his lips never curved upward animatedly, the way Stack's did. He glanced over her short-sleeved, pale yellow summer dress with a collar and pearl buttons that fastened up the front.
Her luminous dark skin smelled like she slathered it with calendula-scented oils that wafted off of her hair, too. She decorated the twists in her tresses with yellow sewing thread all the way down the back of her neck, adding a cluster of baby's breath flowers at the ends. She looked regal, especially with the touch of ruby lipstick she must have borrowed from one of the other women. He knew her parents forbid make-up for their daughter. Church people thought red lips were a sign of the Jezebel spirit.
Bo slapped him on the shoulder.
"We made it in time for barbecue hot off the pit," Bo said.
"Yep," Smoke said.
Bo glanced at Annie, then Smoke. He cleared his throat to get Smoke's attention.
"How's it going, Grace?" Smoke asked.
"Good. Where's your other half?" Grace said, looking over his shoulder for signs of Stack.
"Around here somewhere, probably in line for the food," Smoke said.
Annie lowered her eyes at the mention of Stack.
"We should get in line before Cornbread goes for seconds," Bo joked.
Annie brought forward the two other young women with them.
"This is Donetha and Caldonia. Ladies, this is Smoke Moore," Annie said.
Caldonia took a step back and Donetha gasped out loud.
"Smoke, as in the Smokestack twins?" Donetha said.
"They don't bite," Annie said, winking at Smoke.
"Go on and get your food," Smoke said, stepping aside.
Bo and Grace strolled over to the barn, and Smoke stayed near Annie as she walked with the other two women.
"Donetha, stop acting so scared," Annie hissed.
"I'm sorry, but I heard nothing but bad things about you and your brother," Donetha said.
Caldonia smacked her friend's shoulder.
"Ow!" Donetha said.
"Don't be rude in front of the man's face. What if he shoots us?" Caldonia said.
"I won't shoot you ladies, not unless you do something that deserves it," Smoke teased.
His deadpan expression encouraged the women to shuffle ahead to get away from him.
Annie gently pinched his shoulder.
"Why would you say that to them? Now they won't come ten feet near you."
Her grin lightened the scolding she gave him.
"Annie?"
Smoke turned to see who called her.
Beau Willie.
He walked up to them from the barn. Smoke didn't notice him earlier when he first arrived.
"I didn't know you were coming. I would've asked your father if I could pick you up. Me and Buster went around gathering a few folks here in my father's wagon," Beau Willie said.
He completely ignored Smoke.
"I rode over with Bo Chow and three of my girlfriends. My parents don't know I'm here. I'd like to keep it that way," she said.
"Understood. Can I get you something to drink? They have Coca Cola and root beer," Beau Willie said.
Smoke grew agitated. Annie sensed it.
"Maybe later, Beau Willie. You know Smoke Moore?" she said, bringing Smoke into the conversation.
"I know him. You ain't been back long, Smoke. How's it feel to be in Clarksdale again?"
"No different from when I left."
"Come get in line for a plate, Annie," Beau Willie said, gripping her elbow to guide her away from Smoke.
"We'll speak again real soon, Annie. I think you and I have an appointment to kick up our feet later," Smoke drawled out.
Annie grinned, and Beau Willie's jawline clenched. He whisked her away and Smoke didn't feel the need to one-up Beau Willie in that moment. Annie knew he was coming for her.
Stack appeared, carrying a plate of food already. He looked at Beau Willie escorting Annie to the end of the table line.
"Hmmph. She thinks Beau Willie is supposed to aggravate me? That boring ass goodie-two-shoes?" Stack said.
Smoke glared at Beau Willie. He was a little too comfortable with Annie. Touching her arm. Brushing lint off her shoulder. Cockblocking. They must've known each other well already. Beau Willie was a pious Christian, the type Mr. Belizaire would like for his daughter.
"This food is good," Stack said, scarfing down his pulled pork sandwich. Barbecue sauce painted the corners of his lips.
Smoke went and grabbed a plate and waited his turn to fill up on a hearty meal of tender pork meat. There was plenty of food, and he softly tapped his foot to the music spilling out from the barn. A barbecue under a pleasant country sun was what he needed to get acclimated into the slow southern way of life again.
After he fixed his sandwich, he took a seat next to his brother outside who entertained a bevy of beauties who weren't afraid to get near the twins. Cornbread joined them and Smoke was pleased to see his friend so happy. From his viewpoint, he watched Annie take her plate indoors with her girlfriends alongside Bo. Annie and Grace seemed close and laughed together while their shoulders touched. Beau Willie followed behind her, carrying his plate and two root beers.
Annie towered over a lot of the other women, and it only enhanced her attractiveness. She literally stood out with her unique hairstyle and the bright yellow dress that reminded him of corn silk. Granted, there were plenty of gorgeous women wandering about that could've tickled his fancy. He only had eyes for the woman his brother wanted.
A gnawing at the pit of his stomach brought him back to reality.
Clearly he had to compete with Beau Willie, too.
He picked at the rest of his food and listened to all the chatter going on around him without participating. Stack regaled the women sitting next to him with stories about the war and Europe. Some men gathered behind him to listen in on the danger they faced, the food white people ate overseas, and how many men died gruesome deaths. The stories enthralled them. Stack could weave a tale like a spider and create enough sticky webbing to hold an audience for hours. Their daddy was like that. He would mesmerize men on their old porch, pluck at his guitar or the old banjo, and orchestrate a rousing good time. Maybe that's why he beat Stack so much. Too much of his nature bled through his baby boy. Whatever demons Cash wrestled with, whatever life-altering thing that happened to him when he went out into the world, he clocked it bubbling up through Stack. Noticed it in Smoke, too. Then the fists came. All the beatings. Split lips. Black eyes. All the blood-curdling screams from Taiwo as she fought to pull Cash off them.
Smoke's hands shook with tremors, and he put his plate down on the ground. Stack noticed. He reached into his vest pocket and pulled out a pouch of tobacco and rolling papers. Made Smoke a cigarette. He lit it, took a drag first, then handed it to Smoke.
The musicians cut the music to eat some food before the party kicked it up a notch. No one noticed the lack of music playing. They were busy catching up and passing around a fat bottle of hooch that they poured into cups. The warm communal feel of the gathering seduced him into relaxing for a change. Stack was in his element, impressing the ladies, and Smoke wouldn't have to watch over him so much for the night.
Life could be good for them.
The bank sidetracked them, but the spirited enthusiasm of their peers bolstered his sense of hope for the better. He had a mother to care for and younger relatives who looked up to him and Stack. If he played his cards right, he could have a woman as well.
The music cranked back up and men grabbed the hands of the women they desired and danced until dust kicked up inside and outside the barn. No one cared.
Cornbread pulled out dice from his right trouser pocket and shook them in a fist.
"You boys ready to throw these bones and wager some bets?" Cornbread said.
Stack passed Smoke the flask of whiskey they shared and swallowed a sizeable amount that heated his blood. His brother pulled out some cash and a group of eight men shadowed Cornbread to the side of the barn where a large slab of wood rested against the wall like a flat table. Stack heckled the other men, and Smoke took a smaller sip of whiskey before handing the flask to Cornbread. Sauced up by the liquor, Cornbread passed it around to the others.
"I got three more bottles of corn liquor and gin for later. Summa you fellas might get lucky up in the barn tonight! Get your peckers wet in some hot juicy pussy."
They tossed their coins and cash on the ground. Smoke shook the dice in his closed hand first. He blew on them for good luck three times and threw them with expertise. They bounced against the barn wall, rolling the number he wanted.
"Muthafucka!" Cornbread yelled.
Smoke came out hot with a seven on the first toss.
"There ya go, big brother! Spank these niggas' asses with that Moore magic touch," Stack cackled, throwing more money down.
They played, drank, and laughed uproariously. Smoke enjoyed the camaraderie and laughter of his brother by his side.
Smoke kept his eye on Annie.
The party turned out to be a lively ring-a-ding-ding, and she flitted about, easily attaching herself to various clusters of conversations and line dances. Beau Willie hovered near her and Stack kept true to his word, staying away from Annie despite the occasional sneak peeks he took to see if she paid any attention to him.
She didn't.
Every time she looked Smoke's way, she smiled at him before her friends pulled her off to mingle with others. Smoke noticed she drank the harder stuff and wasn't shy about speaking to other men who vied for her attention. He stood near the musicians and watched folks sway and rock their bodies. Annie cut loose and danced a few times with Beau Willie while Smoke played dice earlier, but as the rosy-orange alpenglow of the setting sun struck her face, and the music changed to a more sensual offering, he made his move on her.
He passed by Stack who danced close and slow with a woman named Josephine. The way his brother's hips moved, he'd probably drag Josephine back to their car or up to the second level of the old barn to hike up her dress and get busy. With his brother's preoccupation and Annie no longer a concern to him, Smoke seized the opportunity to act.
Cornbread and some other men lit large kerosene lamps and distributed them throughout the barn, setting a romantic mood early. Bellies were full, and most people were tipsy from the liquor. Matthew started the bonfire and the crackling of the kindling and the odor of fresh smoke shifted everyone's mood to thoughts of partnering with someone for the rest of the evening.
Annie spoke to Grace and Mayola. Mayola grinned and waved at Smoke like she expected him to come to her. Annie noticed her enthusiasm and Mayola whispered something in her ear. The expression on Annie's face withered, but she quickly recovered when she looked at Smoke again. Before he reached her, Caldonia approached her.
"Annie, should we bring the cakes out now before it gets too dark?" Caldonia said.
"Oh, shoot! I forgot about the birthday cakes. Lord, where is my head right now? We better get them and sing happy birthday to Cornbread before he gets too drunk to remember," Annie said.
"Guess I'll have to wait for that dance, then?" Smoke said.
"Not for long," Annie said. "Could you get Cornbread for me and have him go to the food table? We can sing to him and cut the cakes up before the sun goes completely down."
"Sure."
"Thank you," she said.
Smoke trudged over to where Cornbread cracked jokes and flapped his gums about the signifying monkey. He was in the center of a small circle of men clapping their hands and building an intricate rhythm on their thighs and chests, while he took verbal shots at his friend Lil Percival. Cornbread's verbal dexterity almost rivaled Stack's ability to rap with the fellas in a sing-song voice.
"Yeah, he's talkin' 'bout yo mama and yo grandma too… and he don't show no respect for a nigga like you! Now you weren't there… and I'm sho' is glad… 'cause what he said about ya mama… made me mad!"
The men threw back their heads and howled with laughter that ricocheted against the barn wall outside. Lil Percival took his turn to out-do Cornbread. His short stature made their exchange look comical since he had to look up to Cornbread's big, wide body. Lil Percival wagged a finger up at his face.
"Signifying monkey stay up in your tree… you don't wanna mess with a man like me… always lying and signifying… signifying monkey stay up in that tree… but ya better not monkey with a killa like me!" Lil Percival barked out, keeping his words sliding on the beat of the handclaps and hambone body slapping.
Smoke listened to a few more lines before breaking up the verbal sparring.
"Hey, Cornbread. Annie wants you back inside for something," Smoke said.
"Oh, yeah? She wanna dance with me?" Cornbread said, tugging on the straps of his overalls.
The expression on Smoke's face told Cornbread to not even think about it.
"Guess I'll go see what she wants," Cornbread said, shambling off.
"Y'all can go in too…help sing happy birthday," Smoke said.
Everyone crowded into the barn where Annie and Donetha lit candles on three big chocolate cakes with white icing.
"Aw Annie, you ain't have to do all this for me!" Cornbread said with delight in his round eyes.
A woman behind Annie belted out Happy Birthday, and all the others joined in. Cornbread blew out the spread of twenty-two candles across all three rectangular cakes. Annie cut Cornbread a big chunk, and he ate it with his fingers, letting the icing paint his greedy lips.
Everyone who wanted a piece ate cake, and the music continued. Stack headed for the fire pit to get a sip of gin, and Smoke made a beeline for Annie.
"May I have this dance, Miss Belizaire," he said.
The radiance of her smile warmed him.
"You may, Mr. Moore."
He took her hand and followed behind Bo who swept Grace in his arms and twirled her out before pulling her back in.
Smoke held Annie's hand and took her to the center of the barn. The flickering of the lights in the kerosene lamps glinted on her earrings. They stood face-to-face, and he touched her dangling silver earrings with tiny blue gemstones at the bottom.
"What took you so long to ask me to dance, Elijah?"
He exhaled softly at the sound of his birth name rolling off her lips.
"I had to wait my turn, I guess. You're the most popular woman here."
"I only wanna dance with you."
Smoke stepped closer, letting her breasts brush against his chest. He wrapped both his arms around her waist, and she curled her delicate hands around his neck. Rocking their bodies slowly, he led the pace in time to the music.
"You're good," she said. "I thought maybe you couldn't dance because I didn't see you out on the floor at all."
"Been a little busy."
"Shooting craps and drinkin'?"
"Yeah. Is that a problem for you?"
"No. I drink. Can't shoot craps though."
"I can teach ya."
"I wanna learn."
"Okay."
The feel of her lushness in his arms awakened a need in him. He wanted her for himself and would have to tell his brother about his feelings before the night was through. They swayed in another direction and Beau Willie stared at them, his mouth fixed in a scowl.
"Is Beau Willie fixed on courting you?" he asked.
"He asked my daddy's permission two years ago, but I was too young then. We tried sneaking around, but my father would've found out. I'm the youngest of seven daughters from a seventh daughter. My daddy made sure all my sisters were married off to respectable men in New Orleans. He aims to do the same for me in Mississippi. Beau Willie knows that."
"What about now?"
"I'm old enough. He has my daddy's permission, too."
"How you feel about that?"
Her head rested on his neck, her lips blew warm air on his skin that curled his toes.
"I used to be crazy about Beau Willie. When I was sixteen, I couldn't wait to be old enough to step out with him. He was the first boy I ever kissed."
"And?"
"I like somebody else now…I like you, Smoke. But didn't you bring Mayola here as your date?"
"Nah, I gave her a ride from the road to the barn. Dassit."
"Good, because I don't like drama. I ain't never fought over a man in my life and I don't plan on startin' tonight."
"My brother really likes you, Annie."
"I know. But he ain't you. He'll have to come to terms with that on his own."
"Will your daddy let me court you if I ask him for permission?"
Annie lifted her head and looked at him.
"Your uncle told him about you after we first met. Warned him to keep me away from you and your brother. My parents don't even know I hang around your momma every day. They don't want me practicing Hoodoo."
"Why not?"
"My grandmother taught me back in New Orleans and I carried what I know here with me. The moment I met your momma, I was drawn to her. I recognized a kindred spirit, but my parents…they're Christians who only want the power of Jesus to guide me. There's more to that, like our ancestors and the power of healing through rootwork, and I want to hold on to what I've learned since I was seven years old. I'm saying all this Smoke because my daddy…he'll never give you permission to be with me."
Smoke ground his molars together.
Uncle Jed.
The uncle who partied hard with his big brother Cash ran from town-to-town with him back in the day, whoring and fornicating with the odor of liquor seeping from his pores. The man who told Taiwo that sometimes his brother had to step out on his wife to keep the peace in their house.
A fucking hypocrite.
Smoke ran his hands up her back, squeezing the softness there and pressing his crotch against her front to feel the warmth of her body all over. They slow dragged through several songs, and he never wanted to let her go. Ever.
He slid his hands below her waist and palmed her backside briefly, just to cop a quick feel.
"You ain't slick," she said.
She leaned back with a smirk on her face.
"I was just moving my hands, and they slipped," he said.
Her eyes twinkled.
"You can smile," she said.
She touched his right dimple and then dragged her finger across his lips to the other side of his face to touch the other one.
"Your face lights up so bright when you smile. I want to see you smile more…for me."
He lowered his gaze bashfully and pursed his lips to keep his face composed.
"No, don't try to hide it…it's out now. Can't take it away from me," she teased.
She lifted his chin to raise his eye level to align with hers. He pressed his forehead against hers and sighed.
"I'm going to see your father tomorrow. I will ask him for permission to see you properly. If he says no, I'm going to keep asking him until he says yes. I know he wants the best for you…wants to protect you and make sure the right man comes along who can take care of you. A father is supposed to do that for his daughter. I respect that. I'll do whatever it takes to gain his trust in me."
Annie stared at him. He'd stopped moving in time to the music and rushed out his thoughts before he lost the nerve.
"I ain't got much right now, coming back from the war and all…but I'm a hard worker and I plan on owning my own business one day. I ain't no good Christian. Been baptized, but I backslide a lot. Got a lot of my daddy in me that I try to control…drinkin', gambling, hangin' in places of ill repute all night. But I'll never lie to ya, Annie. I want a wife and family one day…and I guess I'm tellin' ya all this because it's important for you to know that I won't play with your heart. No matter how terrible me and my brother's reputation may be to you, I sincerely hope you'll give me a chance to prove myself worthy of being yours."
He clamped his lips together. The rush of words unsettled him. Lightheaded, he stepped back from her.
"You can really talk when you want to Elijah Moore," she said.
She entwined her fingers with his.
"Let's go get some air," she said.
He nodded and led her to a side door in the barn that took them out to some small trees. The sun left completely and the evening air felt cooler.
"Look," she said, pointing ahead toward an open area.
A swarm of fireflies darted about, creating the illusion of hundreds of yellow stars dancing in a black velvet sky.
Smoke marveled at the sight. The wonderment of it all seemed extra special with Annie by his side.
"Watch this," she said.
She left his side and the space where she once stood created an uncomfortable vacuum to his peace of mind. He watched her saunter over to the flurry of firefly activity and stand in the middle of the sparkle, holding her arms out to her sides.
The swarm parted at her invasion, their synchronous flashing lights glowing all around her until hundreds alighted upon her hair, arms, legs, and dress. Annie appeared to him like a queen of the fairies in a balmy southern night. Heaven must've looked like that.
She was magic.
Smoke touched the left side of his chest where his heart used to be. It had flown over to be with Annie, floating near hers, beckoning him to walk toward her. He sauntered through the flickering display, the whirring of tiny wings lightly grazing the skin on his face as he joined her in the center of the twinkling.
"The scent of the oil on my skin draws them like nectar," she said.
She indeed appeared to be a dazzling and delectable flower for the insects. But she was more than that to Smoke.
He'd listened to her talk for weeks with his mother and learned parts of her she probably didn't even know he heard. How she prayed for him and Stack with his mother while they were away. She shared the burden of her mother's fears for them in Europe, without even knowing them herself. All she had to go by were the pictures he and Stack took before they traveled overseas, the pictures his mother kept above her mantle. A traveling photographer took the black and white pictures in front of the house where the haint blue Taiwo kept the porch and door painted didn't even show up as a shadow on film. Stack grinned wide and Smoke only looked directly at the camera, hoping the photos gave his mother solace while they were gone fighting. Annie had used those pictures to be his guardian angel.
Had she made her choice then on who to pick based on the photos?
Annie spun in a circle and the fireflies swirled around her like a cloud of bursting nebulas and streaks of gold lightning. Her playful laughter drifted up into the dark sky, where starlight and a silvery moon bathed her skin in deep blue hues.
"Annie," he said, ignoring the fireflies prancing on his shirt.
"Yes?"
He cradled her face and kissed her.
Her lips were so soft.
Pliant.
He slipped his tongue between the seam that she parted for him and sought the relief that only she could give him. Her tongue followed his lead and slid back and forth against his before she explored his mouth on her own with gentle plundering that pulled moans from him that he couldn't hold back. He slanted his head for her to take what she wanted from him and they did an awkward dance to figure out what worked best for them until he locked in on holding her tight. They kept tilting their heads and sucking on tongues with a breathy desperation. He loved the feel of her full lips brushing against his plush ones, and when Annie started tugging on his bottom lip with her teeth, her mouth became ravenous.
His arousal came on strong and the thickening in his pants pressed into her. He rocked his hips forward to grind against her and she released his lips, licking a trail along his neck and up to the shell of his ear, where she nibbled the top of his earlobe. He groaned and his mouth fell open. Exhaling and panting, Smoke melted under her touch.
"Mwen ka renmen ou pou tout tan," she whispered in his ear.
"Whatchu say, baby?" he panted.
The tip of her tongue traced swirls along his earlobe in a slow circular fashion and she kept speaking Creole to him as if she were telling him all the nasty things he wanted her to do to him. He quickly understood the allure that her native tongue brought out in his brother. His erection strained against his trousers and she kept seducing him with whispery Creole. The tip of his dick leaked pre-cum and the root already started throbbing with anticipation.
"Dis-moi que tu es à moi?" she said.
"W-w-whatchu sayin'?"
"Tell me you're mine, Smoke."
"Baby, I'm all yours."
Her teeth grazed against the tender flesh of his ear again and she slipped her warm tongue inside his ear, darting it in and out with slow gentleness. He whimpered and gripped the side of her throat. His tongue sought the tender parts of her neck as he sucked, nibbled, and licked on it with an ardor that nearly overwhelmed him. It was her turn to hiss and whimper as he scraped his teeth down to her collar.
"I gotta take you somewhere else," he panted, pulling away from her.
Threading his fingers with hers, he pulled her from the twinkling mist of fireflies.
"Where are we going?" she asked.
Ahead of him, his father's old car shined under the pale moonlight.
"My car," he said.
He could've taken her up to the second floor of the barn, but Stack may have noticed. Beau Willie, too.
"Here, get in the back," he said, opening the door for her.
Annie shook her body free of the remaining fireflies. He did the same. She climbed in the car and followed behind her. The moon was bright enough to flood the interior. Her eyes shined with the anticipation he also felt in his gut. God, she was so beautiful. Nineteen and so full of life.
He touched a soft tuft of hair near her ear that unraveled from the yellow thread. There was no telling when he'd be able to see her again. If her father kept a tight leash, he'd have to savor every moment with her that night. He leaned in and she met him halfway. Their lips touched, and he let her discover the parts of his mouth that satisfied her curiosity. Every time she sucked on his tongue or whispered Creole in his ear, his dick jumped in his pants.
He finally reached his tipping point and fondled a breast. The abundance in his hand spilled over and he groaned louder while squeezing. Annie pulled away. Her eyes had a glassy sheen to them. Arousal bathed her face in lust. He glanced at her breasts.
"You want to touch me?" she asked.
He bit his bottom lip and nodded in the affirmative.
"I'll be a little sweaty from dancing and all this heat, though."
"I don't care."
She unbuttoned the top of her dress and he helped her pull down the sleeves in the cramped space of the back seat. Her white bra seemed to glow. She slowly pulled down each strap and her voluptuous breasts spilled out.
"Fuck," he said under his breath.
He stared at her titties like he'd never seen breasts before.
"Is something wrong?" she asked.
He shook his head.
"No…you're beautiful Annie. I just wanna look at you. Drink it all in, baby."
The moonlight on her skin dazzled his eyes. She looked unreal. Beyond ethereal. With any other woman, he would've pounced and got down to business, exploiting a carnal situation to his complete satisfaction. But the eroticism she displayed for him had Smoke shook.
She looked down at his dick and swiped her tongue across her top lip, exciting him more. He finally reached over and touched her left nipple. It pebbled quickly and extended out to his delight. Big tits and big nipples. Heaven.
He pinched and played with her nipples, learning the best touches that she liked along the way. Soon he squeezed and lifted them with both hands, fearful of cumming in his pants because she had him under her spell. Her lips quirked and bunched up with all of his gentle breast play. He lowered his head and sucked on a plump nipple, tasting the salt on her skin from the perspiration she warned about. He didn't mind. It gave her skin extra flavor. She moaned out loud and called out his name several times. He kept right on sucking, switching it up with the other nipple, and then smashing her big tits together so he could flick his tongue quickly across each nipple back and forth.
"These titties are so big, Annie," he grunted.
He palmed them and she helped arouse him more by lifting their weight and holding them together for him.
"Tryna tease me, woman?" he said.
She laughed, her eyes crinkling up tight. Her gaze drifted to his lap. She licked her lips again.
"You want to touch it? You made it hard…so fast," he huffed out.
"Yes."
He pulled down his suspenders. Annie started unbuttoning his shirt. His curious eyes met hers.
"I want to touch your chest, too," she said.
He let her finish. She liked what he presented. Her index finger traced a path across his pecs. He unfastened his pants and lowered them with his underwear. Her eyes grew wider looking at his dick. He reached for her hand and guided it to the stiffness.
"It's so hot… and big," she panted.
Her hand knew what to do. She stroked him firmly up and down. Pre-cum gushed out of his deep slit and spilled all over Annie's nimble fingers. He stared at her tits and let her jerk him off. No wonder Beau Willie chased after her. Those big areolas and dark satin coloring on fat tits had Smoke wiggling in his seat. Shit felt so good that he gasped when his balls started pulsing with the friction she created going up and down. He became feverish with lust and licked his lips.
Clutching a breast, he held it with a firm grip. The heft turned him on in the worst way as he imagined taking her from behind. He craved the sound of her breasts smacking together while he fucked her, holding her bent over somewhere private, plunging into some slippery wet pussy that drained his balls. His groan deepened and Annie worked his fat dick up and down…up and down…up and down with such exquisite dexterity that his right leg shook. How deep was her pussy? Could he cram all the thickness she stroked inside of her?
His thoughts turned to Beau Willie. Had he fucked Annie? She didn't seem nervous, like someone inexperienced. He clenched his jaw with jealousy. If Beau Willie had her first, Smoke would have to turn Annie out to erase that man from her memory. His dick throbbed hard in her grasp. The heavy spilling of pre-cum helped keep his dick slippery for her delicious hand-job. His lips bunched up, and she had his dick on the verge of spitting everywhere.
He reached for his pants pocket and pulled out the handkerchief he kept there. He'd need it for the explosion that built up in his nutsack. Annie wouldn't want him to mess up her pretty dress if he wasn't prepared.
"You want me to put my mouth on it?" she asked.
Her sweet voice saying something so filthy caused a hearty chuckle to burst out. If her father ever found out, Smoke would have a dozen bullets in his body like Swiss cheese. Fuck it. She was worth dying for.
"Only if you want to," he said.
"Will you promise to cum in my mouth?"
Jesus Christ!
"Yeah, I'll cum wherever you want me to."
Excited, Annie hunkered above his dick and her breasts hung down the way he thought they would. He almost passed out. She licked his dick like a lollipop and kissed the wide head. He would have to teach her what to do because she wasn't giving him the service he was used to—
Fuck!
Her lips slid down his pipe with the suction he needed to get off. His eyes rolled back for a second, and he lost all comprehension of what his part was in the matter.
"Annie! Goddamn, girl! Suck that dick…aw shit…dassit…fuck girl….!"
She gagged, trying to go past her reflex, but she relaxed into the sucking. Her saliva coated his dick, and he almost started crying as she bobbed her head in his lap. He wasn't expecting that much pleasure from her mouth.
"Suck it…suck that dick…get it all deep in your mouth…"
He praised her efforts and offered her more dick down her throat.
She took it.
Took it deep.
He grabbed a titty and squeezed, needing something to ground him as the surge of his climax rose into his dick. Smoke slammed a hand against the roof of the car and shouted Annie's name as semen spurt into her mouth.
She swallowed.
Everything.
Her succulent lips made a loud popping sound as she released his dick. She sat back and wiped her mouth.
"I always wanted to do that," she said.
"You ain't never sucked dick before?"
The incredulous look on his face caused a giggle to escape from her.
"My first time."
"You a virgin?"
Her eyes darted away from his face.
Goddamn that Beau Willie.
"Was Beau Willie your first?"
"Yes."
"Well, I'ma be your second and last, hear me?"
She beamed, and Smoke kissed her full on the mouth, wanting to taste himself on her tongue. He played with her tits again, stuffed as much in his mouth as he could get, and she stroked his hair.
Voices.
Nearby.
"Shit!" he grumbled.
Annie started fixing her bra and Smoke pulled up his pants.
Too late.
"Nigga, getcho ass out here! Bo is about to propose to Grace and wants us with him when he does it!" Stack shouted. "You in there stankin' up the car gettin' some nookie?"
Stack yanked open the passenger door on Smoke's side. Annie tried to fasten her last few buttons, but Stack caught an eyeful of what went on seconds before.
"Stack, I was gonna tell you about me and Annie," Smoke blurted.
Stack took several steps back in a daze.
Smoke climbed out and stuffed his shirt in his pants and fastened his trousers. He pulled his suspenders back up.
"Stack?" Smoke said.
"What the fuck are you doing with her, Smoke?" Stack said.
Smoke glimpsed Bo waiting for Stack near the barn.
Annie stepped out of the car and faced Stack.
"I like your brother, Stack. You and me were only going to be friends. Don't be mad at him."
Stack's eyes watered.
"Why it had to be my brother, Annie?"
Annie reached for him, and Stack pushed her hands away. Smoke stepped in front of her.
"I was going to tell you how I felt. Since you spoke to her first, I let you have a chance with her. But she wants to be with me. I'm sorry. I ain't mean for you to find out like this."
"What he got over me, Annie? I look exactly like this nigga! I know I'ma lot more fun. Why you ain't want me? Huh?"
"I can't explain why, Stack. Something about him makes me feel…I just…"
Annie's eyes welled up. Smoke reached for her hand and pulled her in close. She hid her face in his shoulder.
"This is fucked up!"
Stack stomped away, turned back, and looked at them.
"Fuck the both of you!"
Bo patted Stack on the back as he passed him to go back into the barn.
"The fuck, Smoke?" Bo yelled over to him.
"Go pop the question to your woman, Bo," Smoke shouted.
"I want you there, too. I need my two best friends to give me courage."
"Give me a minute!"
Bo nodded and went after Stack.
Annie trembled in his arms.
"I'm sorry, Annie. I'll talk to him later. He'll get over it."
He held her and rocked his body against hers.
"He'll find him another woman in no time."
"I'm so embarrassed."
"Don't be. I'm not. Shit happens and then you gotta move on. I promise, baby. We'll laugh about this one day."
He used his fingers to wipe away her tears and then blotted away the rest with his handkerchief. Once she calmed down, he held her hand and walked her back to the barn.
There was a noticeable shift in the group when people caught on that Smoke had claimed Annie for himself. It sparked whispers and curious glances. Their community always viewed the twins as troublesome catches. They were attractive, but the risk of being Smoke's girl would change how others interacted with Annie. They would admire and fear her.
Moving through the barn, Smoke ushered Annie out through the other side to the bonfire. Bo stood next to a visibly shaken Stack. Grace, Donetha, and Caldonia sat on haystacks, laughing and smoking cigarettes, oblivious to Bo and Stack standing behind them.
Cornbread tapped Smoke on his shoulder with a finger up to his lips. One fiddler stood next to him.
"We're going to have Chauncey serenade for Bo while he proposes," Cornbread whispered.
Smoke nodded and moved aside with Annie, giving Chauncey room. Bo slinked over and pulled out a ring and showed it to him.
"I'm so nervous," Bo said.
"Do you love her?" Smoke asked.
"I do."
"Then you're ready."
Smoke nodded toward Grace.
"Go handle your business, man."
Bo took a deep breath and pointed to Chauncey. The fiddler dragged the bowstring down and the pleasing sound alerted Grace and the others sitting around the fire that something unexpected was happening.
Bo walked around Stack and stepped over an unoccupied haystack. He stood before Grace. The firelight illuminated the couple, creating a cozy atmosphere.
Smoke glanced at Annie, and the flickering flames danced in her eyes. She slipped her arm around his and tilted her head up. Her lips enticed him and he kissed her…openly. Let his tongue slip into her mouth. She squeezed his arm.
"Grace," Bo said with a shaky voice, "You are the most important—"
The punch to Smoke's face came out of nowhere. Annie screamed, and he tumbled back, holding his cheek. The pain stung like hell.
Stack held his fists up, his face contorted in rage.
"Hey now…this ain't right. Brothers ain't supposed to be fighting. What's going on?" Cornbread shouted, stepping between them. "Smoke? Stack?"
"Fuck it!" Stack yelled.
He waved a dismissive hand and walked off toward the darkness, away from the fire.
Smoke rubbed his face. The pain wasn't as sharp, but it still hurt.
"Sorry, Bo," Smoke said. "I'll be back, Annie."
Smoke strode in the direction his brother went.
"Stack! Stack! Hold up!"
Smoke jogged after him.
His brother stopped and held his hands on his hips with his back to him.
"Talk to me, Stack."
"You should've told me. The moment you knew you had feelings."
"I should've…but you went for her, and I stood aside."
Stack sighed.
"I could never figure out why she held back with me. She made me laugh…listened to me. Never judged me. I dunno…made me feel like I could be something."
"What are you talking about? You're already something. We're both going to be something more when we start our own shit. C'mon, now."
"Cut the crap, Smoke. You and I both know people see us as two ain't-shit sons of Cash Moore. The man they believe had the devil in him and passed that evil onto us."
"We not evil. Stop believing that shit."
"They call our momma a witch."
Stack sighed. Tried to talk.
"Annie…man, she…..aw forget it!"
He threw his hands up and pulled out his flask. Gulping down the contents, he handed it to Smoke.
"How's your face?" Stack asked.
"It's going to have a bruise in the morning. Momma is going to wonder what happened."
Smoke took a huge swallow and choked, almost dropping the flask.
"The fuck is in here?" Smoke gasped.
He coughed and Stack whacked him on the back a few times.
"Pure grade moonshine, whipped up by Cornbread's uncle Lodie."
In the distance, an old truck kicked up dust, charging toward the bonfire. It stopped just short of the haystacks, and a group of men hopped out.
Smoke and Stack hurried back to see what the commotion was about.
The moment they reached the others, Smoke sensed trouble. Cornbread looked nervous.
"What's going on, Cornbread?" Smoke asked.
"These boys are from Cedar Mound."
Cornbread wouldn't look at Smoke. His eyes stayed planted on the leader of the new arrivals.
"Friends of yours?" Stack asked.
"Nah."
A bulky young man with slicked back hair, beady eyes, and clothes that looked too new to be trusted, stepped forward.
"We're friends with Terry," slick hair said. "He said for us to come around for the birthday party and barbecue."
"Terry who?" Cornbread said.
"The nigga with the fucked up eye," another man with a muscular frame and bitter-looking face interjected.
His eyes dragged up and down Annie and Caldonia. Donetha, too.
Smoke placed himself in front of them.
"This here is a private function," Cornbread said. "I don't know ya, and nobody can invite people I don't know to my jump up. I'll kindly ask you fellas to leave and find someplace else to have fun."
"Nigga, we told you Terry said we could come here!"
The muscular one lunged forward like he wanted something to jump off.
Both Smoke and Stack had already reached down to their ankles and pulled out guns, aiming them in strangers' direction.
"Guess you niggas caint hear too good. The man said you ain't welcome," Smoke challenged.
"We can help clean those big ass ears out if ya want," Stack added.
Annie snickered, and the muscular stranger curled his lips into an angry snarl.
"Bitch, what are you laughing at?" he barked.
Smoke cocked his gun, but Annie reached into the deep pocket of her dress and whipped out a straight razor.
"Call me a bitch again and I'll slice your balls off," Annie spat right back.
Smoke and Stack glanced at her and quickly looked at each other.
"Maybe it's best you keep her, Smoke. Caint have my balls cut off if she gets mad at me," Stack joked.
Ghost Eye Terry ran out from the barn, waving his hands around.
"Aye, Cornbread! That's my buddy Randolph…I told you earlier that he might come through," Terry huffed out.
"You said one person. Terry. Not four," Cornbread said.
Randolph, with the slick hair, grinned widely.
"I'm sorry, that's my fault. I didn't want to come all this way alone. The klan been busy this summer as y'all know. Didn't want to take a chance and get caught on the road by myself. Brought me some back-up just in case," Randolph said.
Cornbread scratched his head and sighed.
"That is true," Cornbread said.
He glanced at Smoke and Stack.
"I guess it's okay to let them stay. I told Terry he could have a friend come since he helped drive people over."
Terry nodded enthusiastically, relief spreading across his face.
Smoke moved closer to the muscular man and kept his gun aimed directly at his head.
"Ain't nobody stayin' until this nigga apologizes to my woman," Smoke said.
Cornbread blinked twice and stared at Annie.
Randolph smacked the muscular man's shoulder to comply.
"Apologize to this beautiful lady, Wilson," Randolph said.
Wilson spread his greasy lips into a caricature of a smile and bowed his head at Annie.
"I am very sorry for calling you outchea name, Miss…?"
"Annie," she said.
"My apologies, Miss Annie. My mother taught me better than that," Wilson said.
Everyone waited for Smoke.
"Is that good enough for you, Annie?" Smoke asked.
Annie folded her straight razor and tucked it back in her pocket.
"It'll do," she said with her haughty dark eyes cutting into the new guests.
Smoke reared back his hand and pistol-whipped Wilson across the forehead.
"I said sorry, nigga!" Wilson wailed, pressing a hand onto the new bloody gash on his face.
"That'll teach ya not to run ya mouth next time," Smoke said.
"Come get something to drink. Might be some cake and food left," Terry said, rushing his people toward the barn.
Cornbread looked over at Annie.
"You sho' is full of surprises tonight," Cornbread said.
Annie smirked.
"I don't trust these niggas. Klan or no klan," Stack said to Smoke.
"I agree."
"I'll go check on 'em. Make sure they don't kill the party with their musty asses. Lawd almighty, that thick neck one smell like a dead skunk," Stack said, his face scrunching up at the odor left behind.
"We good?" Smoke asked.
Stack looked at Annie. Her big brown eyes and pretty lashes were hard to stay mad at. His brother's shoulders relaxed. He tucked his gun in the back of his pants for easy access.
"Yeah, we good."
Stack walked over to Annie. Looked her dead in the face. She reached out and ran the back of her hand across his cheek. Then kissed the side of his face.
"You'll always be my favorite twin," she said.
"I'ma be salty with you for a minute. Don't think we not gonna have a conversation about this between you and me at some point."
"I know," she said.
Stack turned and headed inside to keep his eyes on folks.
Smoke held out his hand. Annie clasped it.
"A straight razor was in your dress while we were fooling around?" he said.
She touched the hidden pocket that blended into her dress seamlessly.
"I gotta protect myself at all times."
"Not from me."
"Especially you," she teased.
"I think we're a good match, then."
He scanned the groups of people relaxing and chatting by the fire.
"What happened to Bo and Grace?"
"He tried to finish his lovely words to Grace, and she jumped up to go puke in the bushes over there. That moonshine Cornbread passed around is rough. Bo postponed the proposal until she feels a little better."
Sweet music and laughter drifted out from the barn. Smoke placed his gun back in his ankle holster.
"May I have another dance with you, Annie?"
"Yes you may, Elijah."
Smoke allowed a tiny sliver of a smile to show on his lips. Annie kissed her fingers and touched his lips with them.
"The best part of my night," she said, "Seeing you smile at me."
He kissed her on the temple and made plans to speak to her father first thing in the morning.
Characters: Elijah "Smoke" Moore and Elias "Stack" Moore (characters in the Michael B. Jordan movie "Sinners"). Taiwo Moore and Cash "Big Smoke" Moore (OC).
Warning(s): Mentions of Hoodoo, Yoruba Orishas, Mississippi Share Cropping Life, a Stillborn Death, Supernatural Elements, Slight Romance (if you squint), Sex, Some Violence, and Angst. Pre-Sinners movie.
Summary: Clarksdale, Mississippi. 1897. Taiwo Moore recently gave birth to twin boys, Elijah and Elias. Haunted by lucid dreams foreshadowing danger for the babies, Taiwo hopes to use conjuring magic to protect her sons from the supernatural tricksters who want to snatch the children's uncertain futures away.
Word Count: 15.1K
"Come to your river, wash myself
I will come to your river, wash myself
I will come to your river, wash my soul again"
Ibeyi – "River"
Ibeji
Taiwo Smoke carried her babies low and heavy in the first five months of her pregnancy. Hummingbirds followed her around as she hung laundry all of November, fluttering their rapid wings near her ears before their winter migration. All signs that twin boys were coming in the early spring. During their first year of life, otherworldly tricksters soon plagued her days and nights, trying to steal her babies, Elijah and Elias.
The boys tore out her body with the force of the raging storm that rattled their newly built tenement cabin. Rainwater fell from the sky in an icy deluge as if the mighty Mississippi River had flipped upside down and emptied itself over their heads. It threatened to overflow the section of the Big Sunflower River near their home surrounded by a thick forest that tapered off into the cotton fields her family sharecropped.
Taiwo's husband Cash stood watch at the front window, plucking on his banjo, staying alert for signs if they needed to move to higher ground because of flooding. When they were courting, he used to brag that he could play his banjo and stop raindrops in mid-air if he wanted to. But they needed the rain this year after a long drought, and Cash played a soft song for her birthing time to soothe and coax the babies out.
Elijah came out first in a rush of warm birth waters, eyes closed and mouth silent. The midwife, his grandmother that shared the same name as his mother, had to make sure he was breathing because his entry into the world was much too calm for a rainy night. Elias, on the other hand…well, that one roared out of her aching vagina two minutes later, wailing and shaking his wet, blood-smeared limbs in protest. His eyes were all wide open and searching around for the culprit who interrupted his secure peace in the womb.
Wo-Ma, as the younger Taiwo called her mother, chuckled and rubbed the traces of blood and pale, greasy coating of the vernix caseosa into Elias's skin. They wouldn't wash the babies off until after twelve hours or more. Wo-Ma said it protected the baby's ruddy complexion, and they needed time to adjust away from their old home in the belly slowly as they entered the new one outside of it.
"This one here is Taiwo, in honor of all the Taiwos in our bloodline," Wo-Ma said. "And this loud baby over here…he is Kehinde."
The name Taiwo meant "the firstborn to taste the world" in the old language of Wo-Ma's ancestors. They came from some long gone and often mis-remembered part of West Africa where Orishas still wept for them. Passed down generation to generation that revered the numerous double births in their family as blessings from the divine twins—Ibeji—Taiwo's people always named the first twin that way. The second twin was always called Kehinde and nicknamed Meji. Wo-Ma said it meant "two" or maybe "second". Language of the old world faded, and so did accurate understandings.
Elias still fretted, refusing to latch onto her left nipple.
"He carry fire in his mouth," Wo-Ma said.
Taiwo nodded and glanced at Elijah. His nature, the opposite of his fiery younger brother, reflected the energy of the unseen depths of big water, lying cool and calm. Wo-Ma studied Elijah's features first and then Elias's.
"Mirrors of each other. Gonna be hard telling them apart until we know them real good. But I'm prepared," Wo-Ma said, walking over to a bureau.
She opened a drawer and pulled out two white, hand-sewn birthing gowns. One had red stitching of little stars; the other blue.
"I give them the colors to match their natures. Blue for Elijah…and red for Elias."
"Mama, how you have those colors ready before they were even born?"
"All twins in our family come out this way. One is always blue, and the other is always red. That's how it be."
"So you were the red one?"
"Sho'nuff. The way I was taught is…twins are divine gifts. They tell the world that you have abundance in store for you. Each twin is fire or water. I was the fire. When you and your twin sister were born together, I knew you were water."
Taiwo noticed the shadow of her husband shift the light of the kerosene lamps in the small bedroom. His tall, sinewy body filled up the room like an extra wall, but his eyes looked small and helpless in the glow of fireplace light from the next room. The lush hair on his head was as soft as fresh cotton bursting from its boll.
"You alright, Taiwo?" he asked.
She smiled. Wo-Ma had already cleaned and covered her lower half. The room smelled of afterbirth, sweat, and tears. Taiwo sat upright with both babies propped under each arm. Elijah suckled a heavy brown breast, and Elias kept fretting. She watched her husband's eyes water with his question.
"I'm fine Cash…we're all fine."
Cash let out a loud exhale and sat next to her on the lumpy bed to look at his boys. He leaned the banjo against the mattress. His fingers trembled as he touched the new life they created. He was terrified of losing Taiwo since her own twin sister, Kehinde, had passed away giving birth to a stillborn a year ago in a Philadelphia hospital.
She gazed at Cash's face that she went soft for at an informal dance where she hiked up her legs doing the cakewalk with him. He had bright, playful eyes and a seductive smile. A true ladies' man that sent hearts racing across three plantation properties. She hoped their babies would have his sun-burnt umber skin color and full lips. Their soft tufts of black hair laid flat on their tiny scalps, looking like her daddy Papa Will who probably worried about her back at her parent's old shack. He was half Choctaw and told her it was bad luck for a man to be around a woman giving birth. Wo-Ma said that was a lie. He feared watching her struggle to give birth to his first grandchildren. They were only the second generation of children to be born free in their family. Papa Will's own Choctaw grandfather owned him until the end of the Civil War when Freedmen slaves and Black mixed bloods could claim their own lives for themselves.
"Cash, I want you to say their names first. They hear you say it, and they'll grow up strong and handsome like you."
He grinned and his lips curled into a half moon. She glanced at their firstborn and Cash looked down at the baby.
"Hello Elijah Smoke…and hello to you too, Elias Smoke."
Wo-Ma lowered her eyes. The corners of her lips turned down with disappointment.
"Wo-Ma, me and Cash think the boys need Christian first names. Times are different and it might be hard for them to carry our old names without people looking at them funny."
"You mean white people," Wo-Ma huffed.
Cash lifted Elijah from her breast. The baby looked so tiny cradled in the nook of his arm. He grinned so hard that Taiwo could see the gums above his teeth.
"Elijah Taiwo Smoke and Elias Kehinde Smoke. They still carry the names Wo-Ma, just in a new order," Cash said.
Wo-Ma fixed her lips into a delicate smirk after hearing the boys still kept the naming tradition for twins.
"Lemme go fix you some soup. Don't worry none if the babies don't eat a lot right now. They may wanna sleep the next few hours," Wo-Mo said.
She lifted a bucket from the floor where she tossed their shared placenta. Taiwo would bury it in the yard once the rain stopped. Wo-Ma headed for their stove in the other room, humming to herself.
Cash lowered his head and kissed her on the forehead. He never displayed too much affection around her parents. Especially Wo-Ma. He was still nervous around his mother-in-law and the quiet Hoodoo power that resonated within her like a hidden torch.
"Tell the boys how we met," Taiwo said.
She loved listening to Cash tell stories. He could spin a tall tale like a spider weaving intricate patterns in the corners of their cabin or relay the juiciest gossip from town about the white folks as if you'd been there to watch it all play out. He'd keep a porch full of drunk men enraptured for hours, all animated a full of charisma. The tone and lilt of his voice gave her shivers whenever he sang songs to her in that romantic, delta-born cadence of his.
He glanced at Elias as he rocked Elijah.
"No, I think you should tell them. I want to hear how you see it."
"I might fall asleep in the middle of it," she said.
"Well, if you do that, I'll pick up the rest and finish it for them. Deal?"
She nodded.
"Elijah…Elias. You see that banjo? Your daddy used that thing to win me over."
Taiwo could see her reflection in Cash's soulful brown eyes.
"He saw me dancing in a ring of young ladies at a barn dance over on the Lexington plantation. Your daddy played his banjo so good to try and impress me. He could make those strings talk! Uncle Beatty played his harmonica…there was a jug player and Mr. Abe played an old washboard. The fiddler sounded so pretty mixing in with the banjo. Oh! I had so much fun that night. Dancing around a fire and relaxing after a hard harvest season. There was only one problem…"
Taiwo looked at her babies and wondered if it was okay to mention her dead twin sister. They would never meet her, and she hadn't been gone that long in order for Taiwo to say her name out loud without tears welling up. Elijah opened his eyes for the first time, and she took it as a sign that the boys wanted to know everything.
"The problem?" Cash said, urging her to continue.
"Your daddy thought I was my sister, Kehinde. See, he met her earlier that day at the merchant store. He invited her to come out and sees me dancing in the ring… thinks he knows me already!"
Cash chuckled, showing gums again. She warmed up to the telling.
"He asked me to cakewalk to the next song he wasn't playing the banjo for and we gets to kicking our feet and strutting with everyone. Ooh lawd, I had so much fun dancing with him! I took a break to get some water from the well at the back of the barn, and when I come back, he's dancing with my sister!"
"Honest mistake."
"We had on two different dresses!"
"I was looking at faces, not dresses."
"Mmhmm."
Elias opened his mouth and his tiny pink tongue flicked in and out. She offered him a nipple again, and this time he eagerly took it. His plump cheeks hallowed, trying to get the hang of sucking. Taiwo rested her fingers above her nipple, helping him secure his mouth on her. He gurgled and suckled while she gently stroked his hair.
"Boys, trust me," Cash said. "I couldn't tell them apart. They both had their hair out, all long and big, like giant black rain clouds all the way down to their waists. I ain't never seen that much hair on a woman in my life!"
Cash reached out and touched a thick rope of hair that hung down her side. Elijah squirmed on his father's arm impatiently, wanting the story to go on. He was learning Taiwo's voice outside of his womb water. Her husband put their firstborn against her other breast and watched boy boys feed from her. Fatigue settled on Taiwo's shoulders.
"Well, then…I marched myself right up to him and said, 'Now you after my sister?' If y'all coulda seen his face…my word!"
"I honestly ain't know there were two of 'em. I just thought it was strange how your Aunt Meji could dance so good one minute, and then the next time, she got two left feet and lost all sense of rhythm."
"Your auntie was a terrible dancer. We looked the same…talked the same…even walked the same…but that girl could never catch a beat to save her life!"
Taiwo laughed, and it was the first time she'd laughed with a memory of her sister. Progress.
"After we cleared up the confusion and Meji stopped fussing with Cash, I danced the rest of the night with him. The only time he let go of my hand was when he had to play the banjo, but he kept his eyes on me, studying me hard so he'd know he had the right one. Now your auntie, she stayed upset for a couple of months until she found her own beau and ran off to Philadelphia. Ain't a finer man around than Cash Smoke. I loves every part of him."
Cash darted his eyes away, embarrassed by her words. She never understood why he acted so bashful about her bragging on him. He truly was a fine catch. Even though he was married to her nearing three years, she still caught other women eyeing him, wondering if he was a tip toeing man. He wasn't. Although he'd still drink a bit of corn liquor with his friends, hoot and holler at celebratory gatherings, he was always straight and narrow with her. His personality often outshined his good looks, and she couldn't get mad at other women for desiring that type of heady concoction. Hell, even men wanted to be around him all the time. Something about his nature attracted people to him.
The day she knew for sure she was making babies, she cried and walked all the way to the cotton field to tell him. He shouted so loud and bragged all nine months about having children coming from her.
A lot of men tried to court Papa Will's girls. She and Meji were hard workers, sturdy in the hips, and as pretty as the dusk at twilight. Only Cash stole her heart. The way he played his banjo with tender care showed her how he would be with her.
"That's the long and short of it. Been a good three years for us. The rains have come back. We have this new cabin your daddy built for us. Now that we have you two, I see only more wonderful things coming our way."
Wo-Ma swept back in, carrying a steaming bowl of chicken and potato soup. Cash stood from the bed.
"I'ma go on over to see Papa Will. Let him know the boys got here safe and you're resting," Cash said.
He lifted a coat and his dark brown hat from a chair in the bedroom. Glancing back at her, his eyes softened.
"You look real pretty feeding them like that, Taiwo. I'm mighty proud to be your husband."
Wo-Ma grinned and sat at the edge of the bed, holding out a spoon to her filled with chunks of chicken and broth.
"Be careful, Cash," she said.
He tipped his hat to her and set off into the rain.
Taiwo's tired body settled into a deep and restless slumber after eating the soup. She flailed in the bed and Cash had to wake her up because she kept hitting his arm in her sleep, waking him.
"Taiwo, you're dreaming," he said, shaking her awake.
His dusky eyes held her gaze in the kerosene light. The babies were in the main room with Wo-Ma, where the fire still crackled near the hearth where they slept to keep warm.
The ends of Cash's hair still held the corkscrew curls from the rain when he went to see her father hours ago. Wo-Ma hustled into the room wearing her long white flannel nightgown.
"Taiwo? Are you in pain?" Wo-Ma asked.
"No, Mama. I had a dream. A bad one."
Wo-Ma crept closer to Taiwo's left side of the bed and touched her forehead.
"What did you dream about that has you so upset?"
"Upset?"
Wo-Ma wiped tears from Taiwo's cheeks.
"Quickly child, before it fades," Wo-Ma said.
Taiwo touched her face, surprised to feel wet teardrops pooling under her lids. She closed her eyes and the remnants of the dream came into tight focus, like she was still bound to it by tenuous silvery threads.
"I'm near the old Indian mounds…and I can hear the rushing of water coming close…but I caint see it none. It smells wet all around me…there's no sunlight, but there ain't really no darkness either…just gray…all gray, and I see a tall man. No…not a man…wait…it's a man, but he's like a rabbit, Mama. Head of a jackrabbit, all furry…all over, but he stands tall on two dark furry legs like a man. Right next to him is a bear…large and black and he's standing upright, too…with eyes like a man looking right at me…they comin' toward me and I caint move, Mama…I caint move…!"
Cash hugged her tight against him and rocked her in safety and comfort. The heat from his body reassured her that the dream world had vanished. But she could still smell the scent of icy river water in her nostrils.
"What it mean, Wo-Ma?" Cash asked.
Wo-Ma placed her hands on her thighs.
"It means we gotta keep an eye on them twins. She done seen Brother Rabbit and Brother Bear. They only come when we need protectin'."
Wo-Ma rubbed her brow and sighed.
"Keep them babies indoors until I put things together for 'em, hear me?"
"Yes, ma'am," Cash said.
Taiwo touched her breasts through her gown.
"Babies are ready to eat," Taiwo said.
Elias's loud squall echoed in the next room.
Wo-Ma brought them back into the bedroom. Taiwo fed them and rested her head on Cash's shoulder. But Wo-Ma paced all that night burning small bundles of sweetgrass in the fire until the rain finally stopped.
2. Meji
Taiwo used her long, nimble, chestnut brown fingers to wrap Elijah in a snug baby blanket. She swiped his forehead and hair with a pungent golden oil she made for her sons.
"This one here gonna be a charmer, Taiwo."
Taiwo's best friend, Mavis, held Elias in her arms. The little brown bundle squirmed in Mavis's hands. After three months, Elias had become the more attention-seeking of the two boys. The loudest crier, and prone to seeking her breast milk again, even when his belly was bloated and hanging out of his baby shirts, Elias could never settle down like his brother and give her one moment of rest without fussing to be picked up and played with. Elijah often scrunched his face up whenever Elias's antics annoyed him. Despite being identical in every way, Taiwo only needed to glance at their impish eyes to know who was who.
"Here, give him to me," Taiwo said.
Mavis handed the boy over and Taiwo clucked her tongue to catch his attention. Big, shiny brown eyes peered up at her. Elijah rested cozily next to her hip on the bed, bundled up tight from the morning draft sneaking under the door of their cabin.
Taiwo smeared more prayed over cotton-seed oil steeped with marigold flowers across the second born baby, and wrapped him carefully. She placed him next to Elijah in their crib.
"Hopefully, they'll go to sleep soon. Call me if they get hungry," Taiwo said.
Mavis rubbed the protruding bulge in her expectant belly.
"Girl, I don't know how you handle two at a time. Having one soon is making me nervous for all you gotta do for 'em," Mavis said.
"You get used to it."
Taiwo went back outside. The clean clothes and sheets she hung up earlier to dry flapped gently in the breeze. Two neighbor's children she looked after while their parents worked the fields lingered near the side of the cabin playing with ants. The June sun hung above them in a pale blue sky with no cloud in sight.
A giant black pot boiled above a fire pit. Filled with white sheets, she stirred it with a large smooth stick. Wo-Ma taught Taiwo how to make money cleaning clothes for the white townsfolk. She had plenty of customers to keep her busy during the week while she babysat, too. She hired Mavis to watch over the twins so she could keep working while Cash tended to the fields. They were saving to buy a plot of land for themselves, and that would only happen if Taiwo kept working. White women in town hired out for everything: childcare, cooking and cleaning, plus their laundry. But they still had the nerve to call Black folks lazy good-for-nothings while they sat indoors pampered. Even the white tenement farmers near them acted like they were better than negroes while they walked around barefoot and unclean with lice in their stringy hair and bedbugs in their mangy clothes.
Wo-Ma said the more well-off whites were no different with uncleanliness, hence the boiling of their laundry to make sure nothing jumped onto Taiwo's clothes. She always greased her scalp down with added cornrows and a hair covering to prevent lice from trying to latch onto her hair.
All morning she boiled clothes, scrubbed them in a tub near the creek water before rinsing them clean, and toting them back in a wagon to the cabin for line hanging. In between those chores, she fed her babies, and shared an early hearty lunch with the older children and Mavis.
While packing up a hot lunch of stew and rice for her husband, she debated about bringing the boys with her in the wagon after they finally went to sleep.
"The babies are sleeping Taiwo, don't wake them. It took me a long time to get Elias quiet," Mavis groaned.
Cash loved lunch visits with his sons, but Mavis was right. If Elias slept well for the next two hours, she could spend some time with her husband alone. Maybe even sneak in some kisses.
She took a deep breath and left them behind. The grandmother of the young girl and boy she cared for came to get them early after cleaning a home in town all morning. Taiwo grinned, carrying a small basket of the stew and rice with leftover bread baked the night before. A jug of cool well water tapped against her thigh. She changed into a pretty dress for Cash, and took off the scarf on her head, letting the four long cornrows bounce on her back. Her body healed enough so they could be frisky again if they wanted. She missed grown up time with her husband.
Taiwo headed toward the far end of the cotton field where she could see her husband in the distance. Cash worked their large plot, weeding and tilling between the rows. It would be a plentiful harvest that year, according to him.
"My stomach just started grumbling," Cash said.
He tossed down his hoe and kissed Taiwo on her lips. She handed him the fresh jug of cool water and he guzzled it down, wetting his lips.
"You didn't bring my babies?"
"They sleep."
Cash's eyes grew wide with surprise.
"What?"
"Mavis somehow got them down in their bed. They look so cute. Big chubby cheeks."
He looked inside the basket.
"There was some stew left? I thought for 'sho Mavis would eat it all up."
"I hid it from her before she could."
They sat on a blanket under a tree where Cash rested throughout the day from the heat. Taiwo watched him eat and lick his fingers, dripping with brown gravy meat. He rinsed off his hands with some of the jug water.
"I'm making fried chicken tonight," she said.
"Oh, yeah?"
"I cooked okra, and I made some cornbread."
"In between all that washing?"
"Yeah. The Claytons are gone this week visiting relatives, so that freed me up with less work today. I'll have a lot to do next week when they return…that'll make up for the loss."
"I'm renting out Brownie Boy to Pete next month for some late planting. His mule died this morning. He can't afford a new one, so I offered Brownie."
"As long as it's Brownie and not Esther."
"Nah, Esther ain't going nowhere. She only likes me and won't pull a plow for anyone else."
"People thinkin' we're rich now since we got Esther."
"It's because of them twins bringing good luck. Just think…a month ago Jake Mathis went on to glory, leaving us Esther, them chickens, and five pigs. Man turns one hundred years old the same day our sons are born and promised to give us all he owned after seeing them one time. Ain't that somethin'?"
Cash stared at her.
"I like this dress on you."
He fingered a button on the top part, admiring the yellow color, and glanced over her shoulder to look at their home further away.
"We're by ourselves," he said.
His seductive eyes drank in the new shape of her figure the babies gave her. He kissed her lips softly and waited for her to allow more to happen. She encouraged it with a slip of the tongue in his mouth and they remembered the touches and sighs that led to them having babies in the first place.
They pulled off their clothes and made love under the shade tree.
Taiwo ignored the discomfort of the hard earth pressing into her back. The strain of arousal lining Cash's face stoked her passion. His dick was harder than the wooden stick she used to stir laundry. He moved above her like a desperate man in need of release.
"Taiwo," he grunted, thrusting to the hilt.
To lessen the chance of impregnating her again too soon, Cash pulled out when he reached his brink. Taiwo scrambled to her knees before he ejaculated on her stomach.
"Whatchu doin'?" he yelped.
She held his erection by the root, took a deep breath, and put her mouth on the wide head. Cash held still and gasped loud enough to arouse her more. She wasn't concerned with her own orgasm. Her focus was on pleasing her husband with something new in her repertoire.
Mavis told her all month about the rumors of a woman named Ruby Lee who blew into Clarksdale stealing husbands. She was known to do nasty things for money that had men far and wide sneaking around with her. Taiwo ran into her once in passing after a church service where she noticed the menfolk cutting eyes at the woman, and she at them. She had voluptuous breasts like Taiwo, but lacked the pretty face to seem like a threat to most women. But she had a sway in her wide hips and fleshy lips with a penchant for what Mavis gossiped about: sucking dick.
The filthiness intrigued Taiwo. Putting a mouth on a man's privates was scandalous. Unchristian-like. She imagined Ruby Lee sitting in a church pew with a pungent whore's breath full of semen. Nasty work.
However…
Listening to Mavis screech about Ruby Lee riding on a horse-drawn wagon throughout Clarksdale selling her granny's laundry soap and hair grease forced Taiwo to turn her attention to Cash. He hung out with the men who enjoyed Ruby Lee's favors. Had he been tempted to see what all the fuss was about? Last Friday, after delivering laundry with the mule Esther on her own wagon cart, Taiwo noticed a wrapped chunk of laundry soap left on her kitchen table. She made her own laundry soap and questioned Cash immediately.
"Oh, that soap gal… Ruby Lee… left free samples. I told her you made your own, but she insisted I try hers," Cash said off-handedly while sharpening their house knives with leather.
"She insisted?"
"She gave it to me and I said 'thank you' and put it on the table for you."
"And then?"
"And then what?"
Cash's eyebrows fixed themselves into two diagonal black lines on his forehead.
"Did she come in the house?"
"For what?"
His tone eased the height of her up-raised shoulders. He genuinely looked perplexed.
"To see the babies or something?"
"The boys were asleep. I don't know her well enough to let her in anyway."
Taiwo's relief tampered down her suspicions. But the woman did come to their home without her there. Brazen.
Ruby's snooping around Taiwo's hearth planted a defensive seed in her gut. Cash was the best looking man in Clarksdale, Black, white, or Native. Those extra pigs, chickens, and two mules probably made him appear enticing and flush with extra cash to toss around. Plus…men were weak.
Ruby could catch Cash at a gathering on a porch somewhere where Taiwo wasn't around. If he were playing his banjo at a jump-up, drinking a little bit, and not rushing to come home, a wily woman could take advantage. She tried something to ensure Cash would have no desire to stray.
The taste of his dick in her mouth mixed with her natural lubrication created an intoxicating sense of power. Cash groaned deep in his throat and she lowered her lips further, sliding them down the slick girth as she whimpered, adjusting to a male organ moving against her tongue.
She went down too far and gagged when his tip hit the back of her throat. Fighting her gag reflex, Taiwo raised back up, and went down again, making sure not to go too far. He hissed when she grazed dick skin with her teeth. She pressed her lips tighter around his penis and bobbed her head as she worked her neck, hoping that was the correct form.
"Taiwo…where you learn that girl? Huh? Keep sucking…keep sucking!"
Pleasure rippled all across her skin and her pussy throbbed, enjoying his pants and pleads to keep going. He shouted God's name and her mouth filled with his release, the blast of warm semen coursing down her throat.
She swallowed every drop.
Removing her mouth from his dick, she looked up at his face. Cash's eyes had narrowed and his brows furrowed looking down at her. Still panting, he stared at his dick as it turned soft in his hand.
"You like that?" she asked.
He threw his head back and looked up at the tree canopy. Laughter fell from his lips.
"Yes," he said.
He touched his chest.
"My heart is beating so fast right now," he said.
A coy smile lifted her lips. She pulled her clothes back on.
"Wayment…it's your turn. I gotta make you feel good, too," he insisted.
"Later," she said. "I have to go check on the babies. I was gone longer than I planned."
Cash reached for her arms and pulled her in close.
"Later, huh?"
She nodded. Reaching for the jug, Taiwo discreetly sipped water and rinsed her mouth. The taste of semen was something she'd have to get used to.
Taiwo meandered back to the cabin carrying her basket and jug.
The hairs on her arms rose, and she stopped walking. She turned to face the direction she came from, and the air crackled with a charge of energy that rushed across her entire body from head to toe, giving her the sensation of being folded inside out like the laundry she cleaned all day. The surrounding colors became saturated and objects in her sight came into sharp focus, as if she stepped into a freshly painted landscape. Her tongue felt thick and burdensome in her mouth. A scent of lavender perfume crinkled her nose, and the familiarity pumped the blood faster in her veins.
Kehinde.
That's what the air smelled like for seven seconds: Kehinde's perfume that her lover bought for her before he swept her off to the east, and an early grave. The odor permeated her dreams the last couple of weeks and it didn't startle her like a portent of grave circumstances in her sleep like it did now. In dreams, anything was possible. But in a waking state? No one else wore that particular scent of perfume. It smelled of sickly sweet foreboding. Only Kehinde—
Taiwo glimpsed a floating blue orb of bright light darting past her cabin. She dropped her basket and jug on the uneven earth and dashed for her home.
Coming upon the outhouse, the wooden door flung open, and Mavis stepped out. She rinsed her hands with a bucket of water left by the outhouse door and shook the excess away.
"Taiwo?"
Mavis stopped shaking her hands and stared at Taiwo.
"You done feeding them already?"
Taiwo ran around the side of the house, searching for signs of flickering blue amidst the flapping of cloud white sheets. Mavis approached her.
"You alright?"
Taiwo touched her arms. The hairs there still reached for the sky.
"I came back from being with Cash…"
Mavis's lips pressed into a line and she glanced back toward the rows of cotton plants.
"Came back?" Mavis huffed, "But you were inside a minute ago, feeding Elijah—"
The pitiful, wailing sounds of her babies pierced the air. Taiwo rushed past Mavis and ran up the porch steps. Bursting through the door, she noticed her rocking chair still moving near the open window. Elijah was face-down on the floor wearing only his cloth diaper, struggling to lift his weak neck up with a tight face bathed in hot tears.
"Why is he on the floor?!" Taiwo shouted.
"I didn't leave him there. You fed him in the chair and told me to take a break. I just went to relieve myself!"
"Mavis…I came back from the field! I didn't…"
Mavis's eyes were round and wide. Her small mouth twitched, and she wrung her hands. A creeping dread cooled Taiwo's forehead. She lifted Elijah and put him back in the crib next to Elias.
"This heat must be getting to me. I probably should rest…"
She touched the baby all over his exposed skin, checking for bruising or itchy, red bites from pesky chiggers that irritated everyone during the summer. He looked fine, and she gave him kisses to soothe his fright at being left unattended on the hard floor. Her fingers trembled when she sniffed lavender on his hair and cheeks. She crossed the room to dig into a coffee can hidden behind a small bag of flour above her stove. Pulling out Mavis's pay for the week, she handed over three coins, and took a deep inhale to calm her nerves in front of her friend.
"I'm gonna stay inside and sleep with the boys. You can go on home now. I'll be fine until Cash comes back."
"What about the laundry? Want me to take it down later?"
"I can do that. Go on home…and thank you for watching them today. Appreciate it."
"Is something wrong? Are you feeling sick?"
"A little under the weather. I'll be fine after I sleep a bit."
Mavis looked unsure, but she patted Taiwo's arm and left the cabin.
Taiwo fetched a clean cloth and used it to wipe down the twins with marigold oil all over. She grabbed some braided sweetgrass from above the fireplace mantle that rested in front of the small wood-carved Ibeji figures Wo-Ma gave her after the babies were born.
They rested snug inside a brown and orange beaded pouch. One identical figure represented Elijah and the other Elias, and as long as she kept those totems together safe, the old spirits from Africa would intercede on her children's behalf if needed. Using a match to burn the sweetgrass, she smudged the totems and the entire interior before quickly moving outside with the burning plant bundle. She circled the cabin three times, waving the smoke around, creating a sacred barrier.
Glancing around, she checked for any signs of her twin sister. The last time she laid eyes on her, Kehinde had worn a pretty golden yellow dress with her hair pinned back from her face. She glowed with love in her eyes, and Taiwo missed her dearly. Her twin flitted in and out of her lucid dreams, a pleasant memory occasionally since she gave birth. It made Taiwo feel like she could visit with her sister from time to time, and that their bond had never truly broken, even in death.
She allowed the last of the sweetgrass to burn up on the ground in front of the bottom step of the porch. Instead of sleeping, she ironed sheets and dresses, and when she needed to urinate, she skipped the outhouse and pissed in a chamber pot, dumping the liquid on the ground in a line from the porch.
When the last of the laundry finally dried, she put the babies in her small wagon and kept them right next to her as she pulled down her last items of the day, along with clean diapers. She remained vigilant as the sunlight faded. Frying the chicken Mavis plucked for her, Taiwo prepared dinner and had food on the table right as Cash dragged in, stretching his back and rubbing his stomach.
They ate together, and he noticed her tense stance between bites of cornbread and fried okra.
"What's troubling you?"
Taiwo swallowed her food.
"Tired, that's all. So hot today."
"No hotter than it was yesterday. The boys give you trouble?'
"No. They've been good. Elijah wasn't too hungry for his dinner."
"What about Elias?"
"His usual self. Want more?"
Cash pushed back his plate.
"Nah, I'm full. Good meal, thank you, honey."
Taiwo grinned. She stood to collect their empty plates, but Cash gathered them up and washed them for her.
"Go get some sleep early. I'll put everything away and look after the boys."
She kissed his cheek and changed into an old slip for her night clothes. Her breasts ached from Elijah not feeding from her and she rubbed her nipples, wondering if she should try to feed him again. Cash walked back into the room carrying their eldest.
"He's moving around like he's hungry," he said.
Taiwo took Elijah in her arms and sat on the edge of the bed, revealing a breast for him to take. He latched onto her and suckled for a few seconds before he pulled away, bursting into tears. His face turned a raging red-brown.
"What's wrong, huh Elijah? You're hungry. Come on and eat."
Elijah turned his face away from her breast and Taiwo checked his diaper to see if it needed changing before bed. He was clean and dry. Cash came back into the room and looked at their son.
"That cry doesn't sound so good."
"He won't eat, but he's hungry."
"Is he sick?"
"He doesn't have a fever…"
Taiwo cooed and gently rocked him, but Elijah would not stop wailing. She stood and walked around their bedroom, giving comforting words. He kept screaming.
"Elijah, please…" she said.
Elias heard his brother and started fussing in the crib. Cash looked after him and Taiwo clucked her tongue, hummed, and bounced him against her breasts. Nothing worked. It was too soon for teething. She stuck a finger in his mouth and rubbed around his gums. He started sucking on her finger, thinking something was on it, and then erupting into earsplitting shrieks.
She took him into the main room and held him near his brother who stared at him with enormous eyes from Cash's arms. The moment Elias heard another shriek from Elijah, he joined right in.
"Let's put them in the crib together," she suggested.
Side by side, the boys continued squawking like frightened birds in a nest. Cash brought out his banjo and started plucking a lullaby for them. Elias jammed his tiny lips together and whimpered, his discomfort broken by the sounds of his daddy playing music for them. Elijah kept screaming.
And then he stopped.
Tears like dewdrops shined on his heated brown cheeks, and his wet eyes looked past her to the corner where he finally cracked a smile, the pitiful whimpers no longer escaping his mouth. His face became bathed in a radiating blue light that danced across his plump cheeks. Cash didn't see it at all.
Taiwo's body thrummed with the sense of being folded again, like someone squeezing her body in on itself. Elijah laughed, but he didn't laugh for Taiwo. He laughed for the entity that joined them in the room. Someone who stepped through the void when they shouldn't have.
The scent of lavender pervaded the front room.
"You smell that?" Cash asked, sniffing the air.
"Yes."
"Like flowers."
"Lavender."
"Yeah, lavender."
Taiwo reached out and grabbed Cash's shirt sleeve, stopping him from moving.
"Keep playing music for them," she whispered.
She focused her eyes on the Ibeji above the fireplace.
"Sing to them."
The tone of her voice prompted Cash to play a soft tune, and he sang about summer sunshine and marigolds. While he entertained their twin sons, she turned to face her own twin.
Mustering the poise and strength of Wo-Ma, Taiwo uttered a spell of protection that she learned as a child to ward off unwanted ghosts, because that was needed as she locked eyes with Kehinde standing in the corner. Her sister looked as alive as the last day of her stay in Mississippi. A blue ring of ghostly flames surrounded her form. The banjo music sounded like it was in a vacuum and far away as Taiwo stepped into a tear of the ancestral realm. No warmth emitted from the blue fire, only a bone-deep cold that divided the living from the dead.
"You shouldn't be here, Kehinde. Not like this. Dreams are one thing, but here? In the world like this?"
A ripple in the ghostly fire made Kehinde look fuzzy before she snapped back to full clarity. The dead twin stared past Taiwo and fixed her gaze on the crib.
"I lost my baby," Kehinde gasped, reaching her arms out, not for her sister, but for the boys.
"I know, and I'm sorry, sister. We miss you, but you caint be here."
"You have two…lemme have one of them. I'll take care of him. See? He wants me…he cried for me, not you."
Kehinde touched her left breast, and milk leaked from it, wetting the ghostly dress.
"He so cute, and quiet and he took my milk. He knows me now—"
"Meji, you must go."
Taiwo clutched at her mojo bag around her neck with her left hand, and outstretched her right, pointing three fingers at Kehinde's face.
"Ibeji will keep us from all harm…they will watch over our lives and your comings and goings both now and forevermore…"
"Taiwo, please, let me have him. You can keep Elias…"
The brightness of Kehinde's skin dulled, the crisp outline of her form slowly faded as Taiwo stepped forward holding tight to her mojo, and her fear of unwanted spirits. Her voice rang out true and clear. Meji wasn't welcome there. By the time she reached the exact spot where Kehinde once stood, her sister had vanished back into the void, and Taiwo's skin stopped prickling with gooseflesh. The tear in the void had sealed back up.
"Thank you…thank you…" she murmured.
Turning back to Cash, she listened to him finish his song. Both boys had calmed down. She joined her husband at the crib and looked down at two peaceful little faces.
Taiwo sought her mother the next morning, and Wo-ma gave her a block of indigo, some milk, and a bag of lemons. She spent the morning mixing the items into a thick paint of haint blue that she brushed all over the front door and the porch steps. After the first coat dried, she painted another layer to keep Kehinde out of her house.
Wo-Ma didn't act surprised when Taiwo told her about Meji. She seemed prepared for it actually, like she'd been waiting for the day to come and had the supplies ready just in case. Cash didn't question her about it, accepting that she and her people did different things because of Hoodoo. No one spoke about it out loud, and he knew that people sometimes visited Wo-Ma for "special" talks in her home with Papa Will. Even her father went off to spend time among the old Choctaw Indian mounds to commune with nature and his own people's spirits.
She didn't tell Cash about seeing her sister, and her prayer the previous night sounded no different from the ones he heard her saying on any occasion when she sought help for a problem. In his mind, he probably thought she was praying for Elijah to get better.
Unfortunately, he didn't.
Day by day, he grew weaker from not taking her milk. After two days, his body became thinner than his brother's and she asked for Wo-Ma's help. By the fifth day, his diapers didn't fit. The sweetgrass, haint blue paint, and spells worked to keep Kehinde out of the house, but it didn't stop her connection to Elijah who didn't even want Taiwo picking him up anymore, his fretful eyes searching for an elusive new mother who abandoned him to the mundane world. Wo-Ma moved back into the house and gave her various spells to cast for her son, but nothing worked on their side of the veil. Elias thrived, getting fatter and happy while Elijah withered down to where she could see gauntness in his cheeks. They tried feeding him cow's milk diluted with water and mixed with honey. The boy ate nothing and didn't want to be touched by people. He cried during his diaper changes and cried whenever he looked around the room for Meji.
"He tasted your sister's milk. She created a bond with him I caint break just yet," Wo-Ma said.
Taiwo's mother sat in the kitchen area and cried, unhappy that she couldn't save her grandchild from her own dead daughter. Seven long, worrisome days had passed.
Cash pretended to stay strong, but each morning he hugged Elijah as if he wouldn't see him again by his noon lunch. He spent most days rushing back and forth from the cabin and the field, barely getting any work done to sustain them as a family. Taiwo told her laundry customers that she was too sick to wash clothes. She worried about their finances dwindling. Papa Will even broached the topic with Wo-Ma of preparing for another death in their family if Elijah didn't get better. He thought she didn't hear him as they whispered in the front room while she rested in her bedroom. Wo-Ma scolded him for saying it and stayed up every night on the front porch meditating and praying. She threw conjuring bones on the kitchen table every morning, seeking answers until she finally found one.
When Taiwo thought she had to give up hope, Wo-Ma took her and the babies outside, washing them thoroughly in a tub. She made them wear all white and packed them into her mule cart and carried them off to her shack. On her kitchen table, unwrapped and hardened from two decades of burial, sat a gray mass.
"That right there wrapped you and Meji in me before your birth. We must take it to your daddy's people…their sacred place where the power is stronger. I'll break the bond there," Wo-Ma said.
She took out her pouch of bones and threw them on her table next to the dried placenta of Taiwo and Kehinde. Pieces of rabbit, raccoon, and chicken bones scattered in a wide arc. Wo-Ma read the bones and Papa Will burned sweetgrass to maintain a connection to the spirit world his wife tried to pick a message from.
"Come, we have to go now. We'll go on the river and not by foot. Meji caint cross the water to get him out in the open before we reach the mounds," Wo-Ma said.
Papa Will tucked some tobacco inside his shirt wrapped in an old kerchief. They left Cash behind to watch over the home he built for Taiwo, and ventured to the river with the babies to catch a flatboat that would carry them upriver to the Indian mounds.
Elias fussed inside the basket Taiwo used for their travel bed while Elijah's gaunt face remained quiet. They arrived at an empty landing in the late afternoon. Papa Will paid a wagon driver passing by to carry them in the sweltering sun a little ways ahead. They soon trudged through a dense meadow where a male Choctaw elder with a weathered, light brown face stood watch, guarding the area. Papa Will passed on the tobacco and a few coins. The elder accepted the offering without a word and led them toward where they wanted to be, like some clandestine meeting in broad daylight. Along the edge of a row of tall, poplar trees, three Choctaw women tended to pulling weeds in a clearing. A sizeable mound of green covered earth rose out of the ground like the curve of a whale's back surrounded by smaller mounds the size of hitched wagons at cardinal points.
Papa Will spoke to the women privately, and they accepted something from him that Taiwo couldn't see and left the clearing silently.
"Feel it?" Wo-Ma asked.
"Yes," Taiwo answered in a reverent tone.
The earth hummed with a sound that no human could hear, but Taiwo and Wo-Ma sensed it on their skin like subtle vibrations itching the flesh. It nipped at them in waves.
"There is a mighty power here. The old ones in this place say the door is here. We need them to close it for her," Wo-Ma whispered. "Put the basket there and keep close to your babies."
Taiwo set the basket upon the soft earth and Papa Will lingered near it, his watchful eyes stuck on the largest mound.
Wo-Ma prayed out loud for a long, long time. Her voice carried a beseeching quality, and it echoed across the mounds until she began speaking in tongues, the language of spirits. Papa Will burnt sweetgrass and left the smoking bundle two feet in front of Wo-Ma. Eventually, Wo-Ma's incoherent speech slowed down and sounded like plain English again. She pointed to the twins.
"See here…these my grandbabies. Freshly born and new to this world. My dead daughter, Kehinde, has a hold on one of them and she won't let him go. He's dying. Hear me? Little Elijah. I need your help. You my husband's people…his kinfolk. Will, he's Chahta Lusa…Black Choctaw. His papa come from you…tell them, Will."
Papa Will, who didn't like to talk much, shuffled forward and pulled off his hat. He held Wo-Ma's trembling hand.
"She's tellin' the truth. Aia-ali. I am from this place…this…yakni."
"Show 'em, honey," Wo-Ma said.
Papa Will pulled out a small paring blade and cut his palm open. He knelt down and squeezed his hand in a fist, letting his blood drip onto the ground. The brown dirt absorbed the scarlet liquid until there was nothing visible. Taiwo handed her father a handkerchief, and he bound up the wound.
"See? He yours, and these babies here are yours, too. Meji…Kehinde, she yours…Taiwo is yours. But Kehinde won't leave Elijah be. I need to bury her spirit here, where the barrier is stronger."
Wo-Ma gestured for Taiwo to show Elijah. Her oldest son hovered on the precipice of a cold, untimely death, and her hot tears fell on his face. She wiped them away.
"Wo-Ma, look," Taiwo said.
A flickering blue ball of light swooped down from up high and hovered in front of Wo-Ma. It was the size of Taiwo's good china plate that she cherished, passed down from her great-grandmother.
Papa Will lifted Elias and crept away with him as they had planned, to keep the spirits from mistaking him for Elijah. He left Taiwo to guard her firstborn. She smothered him down in marigold oil and herbs, his sickly expression worrying her more.
A disembodied voice called out from the blue orb that floated before them like a small alien sun.
"Wo-Ma…please…let me have Elijah…"
"No. I love you, Meji, but he caint go to where you are. That's not fair to your sister. You can watch over him, but you caint keep him for yourself. He don't belong to you. I gotta plant you here because you're killing him."
Taiwo held her son against her chest, feeling a new flow of tears running down her cheeks.
"This my baby. He came outta me…you caint just take him Meji!"
The shriek of her voice made Wo-Ma wince and Elijah wiggled in her arms from the sound of pent up rage.
"I want him!" Meji screamed.
The orb of watery blue light surrounded Elijah and ripped him out of Taiwo's arms. The boy's weak body floated out of reach above Taiwo's head. She jumped up several times, trying to grab him.
Wo-Ma settled onto her knees quickly and dug a hole in the ground with her bare hands. She unwrapped the placenta bundle, cut it in half with her own small knife from her conjure bag hooked to her dress belt, and buried it carefully, smoothing the dirt above it. The conjuring spell she spoke with a ferocious tone frightened Taiwo.
The orb froze in place, and Elijah stayed suspended in the air.
"Wo-Ma, noooo!" Kehinde shrieked, her voice shattering the peace of the woods and scaring birds out of the trees.
"Stay…behind the veil…you will not come for Elijah or anyone else again!" Wo-Ma shouted.
She poured an oil from her work bag over the small mound of dirt that held the placenta half that belonged to Kehinde.
A crack of thunder rattled the sunny sky above them and a silvery lightning flash from out of nowhere slashed across the glowing blue ball. Elijah fell down into Taiwo's outstretched arms. He hollered like he had seen too much for his itty bitty age and Taiwo offered him a nipple and he latched on to it and sucked away, his chipmunk cheeks puffing in and out. She cried out with joy.
The pungent odor of sizzling ozone drenched the air and Taiwo witnessed the rippling of the scenery in front of her, as if she'd taken her hand and swiped it across water and the reflection there spiraled out in layers then snapped back to normal like the sudden slamming of a heavy door.
"Don't move yet. We don't want to attract others who may have slipped through," Wo-Ma warned.
Silent and immobile like statues, they remained in place until the scent of the otherworldly had passed.
"Will she stay gone, Wo-Ma?" Taiwo asked.
Wo-Ma nodded confidently.
Taiwo carried Elijah against her breast and fed him all the way back home.
Cash met them at their front door and cried like a baby himself once the healthy color returned to Elijah's cheeks. They all breathed easy, listening to the squalling noise he did, announcing he wanted more milk to drink down into his undernourished belly. Cash kissed Taiwo all over her face and held his son close between feedings.
When they placed the well-fed boys in their bed together, the little ones faced each other and gurgled peacefully.
But Taiwo kept painting the front door and the porch steps with fresh coats of haint blue every two weeks. She kept them coated down in protective oils, too.
Just in case.
3. The Watermelon Man
At six months old, the twins were fat, heavy, and the most adorable babies in Clarksdale. Taiwo was a proud momma and Cash a proud papa.
Hard work during harvest season and nursing hungry boys kept her days hectic. But Cash had her busy in the evening too, wanting to touch and kiss her as much as possible. The babies learned to sleep through the night, so that meant Taiwo had time to be up under her husband hot and sweaty like they did before they had the boys.
Cash started dreaming about opening a juke joint. Taiwo would've preferred a small mercantile attached to their cabin, but Cash doubted they could rely on a steady harvest to support a store's needed goods and buy property at the same time. He also thought it unwise to compete with the white landowner, who also ran his own mercantile operation that kept sharecroppers in debt through overpriced goods and freely given, unrepayable credit.
Taiwo didn't want to wash clothes anymore. She desired more time with her babies and friends.
"You'll have plenty of friends if we put up a juke. Corn liquor is cheap and easy to make and free money is better than borrowed money from a cracka bank," he said.
She worried about the stigma.
Cash's family already hated that he married a Hoodoo woman from a long line of Hoodoo women. His people were stalwart Christians that looked down on her already. Opening a juke would make it seem like she was leading him further astray from the Lord.
No one in his family gave her credit for keeping Cash on the straight and narrow. Before he married her, he'd been on the run for some nefarious dealings in New Orleans. Rumors said he killed a few people over gambling and women. Cash was what the folks were calling a wandering bluesman, and that was sin enough in his mother's eyes. His family accused her of putting a root on him, tricking him to stay under her. Taiwo could only laugh at that. Whatever devilment he got into in his past was already in him. Taiwo tamed him of all that wandering, but let him keep singing. He sang songs of fucking, fighting, and losing good women. Field hollers and spirituals never came out of his mouth anymore. Her husband told bawdy stories with his banjo and looked forward to teaching his sons how to play. As long as he kept the foolishness in the music, she didn't mind.
One early morning Taiwo drank a special herbal mixture that her mother instructed her to drink if she wanted to prevent having more babies too soon. Cash did his best to pull out or use her mouth for his release, but he was a horny man in love with his wife. Taiwo got it in her head that she'd probably end up pregnant come winter when there was nothing to do but wait for spring to arrive again during the long, cold months. The twins were already a handful and she couldn't bear carrying another child so soon like most of her friends did.
She sipped on the concoction, then busied herself making corn cakes. Twins making it to six months could only be celebrated by gifting friends the fried goods from her skillet to share in the abundance of the Ibeji. Mavis stopped by with her newborn, eager to have a taste of the food herself fresh from the stove.
She fried all morning, and after the cooling time, wrapped up several piles of flat circular cakes to deliver. Mavis left after her fill, taking a few extras home to her husband.
Taiwo bundled the twins up in her small wagon next to the three plates of covered corn cakes.
"You takin' them hoecakes now?" Cash asked.
He rinsed his face from a leftover bucket of water on the porch.
"Yeah, I should be back in a few hours. I think it's time for the boys to get some fresh air and let people see them."
"Wo-Ma okay with that? Thought she wanted them kept indoors for a few more months."
"We can't hide them in the house forever. Besides, Elijah has healed up nice and plump again. He's strong and I want them both to get some sun along the way."
Cash stepped from the porch and kissed her forehead.
"Keep 'em in the shade if it gets too warm and rest if you need to."
"I will."
Taiwo clasped the handle of the wagon.
"And don't buy up all that penny candy from Mrs. Morgan if you see her. I know you'll pass by them people selling at the crossroads."
"One little bag…I promise."
"I'll believe it when I see it."
Taiwo tied her sun hat tighter under her neck and blew him a kiss. She tugged on the wagon handle, rolling the babies behind her.
The fall sunshine on her skin felt pleasant. It wasn't too hot for the twins, so she loosened up their swaddling, letting fresh air pour over them. Warm yellow rays added more color to their cheeks. Their eyes stared up at the big blue sky until she moved them closer to the trees as a few mule-drawn wagons rattled by on their way to town. She fanned her face from the gnats that flew under the tree canopies and stopped to check her babies as dust kicked up from the road along with more foot-traffic and carts. Strangers fawned over her children and she kept on her journey.
A few vendors peppered the way, some selling fish sandwiches and slices of sweet potato pie. She didn't see Mrs. Morgan out with her sugary sweets and kept walking the path that led to her friends.
She noticed an old man with balding grayish-white hair selling watermelon slices. The bright red of the innards dotted with vivid black seeds drew her near. A pile of watermelons sat stacked neatly on the side of the road with an old blanket, keeping them from touching the ground.
"I gots the sweetest, juiciest watermelons you'll ever taste!" he blurted to every passerby.
Taiwo had a taste for something sweet. Most of the vendors stayed out until late afternoon. If she couldn't have candy, then some sweet bites of watermelon would do. The watermelon man sliced chunks for customers who sampled his goods, and their smacking lips convinced Taiwo it was worth buying.
"Hey, pretty lady. Come on over here and try summa this melon. The best you ever had, I can promise you that!"
He sliced a fresh melon in half, and then carefully cut the green rind from the fruit.
The younger man next to him selling green apples looked annoyed. His baskets of fruit didn't attract as much attention from buyers.
"I have errands to run. I'll be by later," she said.
Her feet still carried her over to look at the fruit up close.
"Here, try a piece. I bet I can fit a whole watermelon right in your wagon…oh my, what do we have here? Are those twins?"
Taiwo grinned.
"Yes, my boys."
"Fine looking ones, too," he said, peering down at their chubby faces that peeked out at the fascinating new world.
Taiwo eyed the watermelon.
"Here."
The man handed her a chunk. She popped it into her mouth and it burst with a flavor so sweet and cooling that she gasped with delight. Some of the juice ran down her chin and she wiped it with her fingers.
"So good!' she said.
"Told ya."
"Ain't seen you 'round here before."
"I'm just passing through during the harvest. I heard the folks around here ain't had good watermelon in ages."
"Where you from?"
"Oh, from here and there…everywhere," he said with a sing-song voice.
Taiwo studied his face. Dark brown skin like the tobacco her daddy smoked. Teeth worn down and yellowed. Just enough wrinkles to obscure his true age. His overalls were clean, no trace of dust or dirt, and his shoes were made of sturdy dark leather that looked brand new. Both of his eyes were clouded over with a gray film, and she wondered how well he could see with them. Unlike the other vendors, he didn't have a wagon to move his product. Nor a wide cart he could pull himself.
"Here darlin', have another piece," he said, carving another chunk for her.
"I'll get some on my way back home," she said.
The large knife in his hand made her nervous with his poor eyesight.
"I'll be here waiting for you…and these cute lil boys."
Taiwo pulled her wagon and trudged away from the watermelon man and carried on about her business.
She stopped at her friend Louise's house first and gifted her with the most corn cakes since she had six children and a husband. They chatted for a few minutes and she let Louise hold each twin. Next, she walked over to her childhood friend Ora's home, where she lived with her parents and husband. Ora also had a baby a month older than Elijah and Elias, and the women traded baby tips on keeping rashes at bay and also looking out for constipation.
Her last delivery was to a cousin on her mother's side. Flossy didn't bother waiting to eat the corn cakes. She poured honey over them and feasted on two before her husband and children returned from fishing.
"If I don't eat some now, won't be none left when they get back," Flossy said.
Taiwo visited with her the longest and fed her babies. While she changed wet diapers, they talked about family, the weather, and the harvest party a mutual friend was throwing in a week.
"Girl, I ain't been out dancing in so long," Taiwo sighed.
"Let my oldest Peaches watch the babies and you and Cash come out for a good time. She fifteen and responsible. You can feed them here and come out with me and Dexter for a few hours. Be good to see you out. We'd love to hear Cash play. He still talkin' 'bout opening that juke?"
"He is. But I would rather we open another business."
Flossy ate another corn cake and put the rest inside her oven for safe-keeping. They hugged and Taiwo retraced her steps toward home. The boys slept soundly with the gentle rocking motion of the wagon and the humming she did. She stopped to cover them with another blanket as the air grew cooler.
Most of the vendors had left the crossroads, and the few remaining packed up and rolled away in carts and wagons.
Not the watermelon man.
He stayed soliciting and slicing chunks.
The old man sniffed the air before she approached him.
"I can smell those sweet babies. Such a delicious aroma. Are you ready to buy from me pretty lady?"
Taiwo didn't like what he said. She kept her sons hidden from him.
Cautiously, she moved her wagon further into the road and away from the vendor. He held out a thick slice of watermelon for her to take.
"No, thank you…I don't have any money on me today," she said.
The grin on the old man's face faltered. He sniffed the air once more and his nostrils twitched like a feral animal smelling the subtle whiff of prey.
"Well, I'm sure you'll be by here again with those babies. Why don't you take a whole one home with you?"
"That's a kind offer, but I'm not sure when I'll be back again."
She kept moving until she passed him. He pointed the knife at her.
"I have no problem with you paying me later. I'll be here for awhile. Good business in these parts. Maybe…maybe you could let me hold one of them babies, huh? They are so cute…and fat."
He ogled Elias. She pretended not to hear him, as if the people leaving the area further ahead distracted her.
Pulling the wagon faster, she quickly forged on. Once she had some safe distance between herself and the watermelon man, she breathed a little easier and her chest didn't feel so tight. She glanced over her shoulder and didn't see anyone following her.
Her shoulders relaxed the closer she came to familiar landmarks. She closed in on their plot of sharecropping land.
"Taiwo!"
The anger in the voice calling to her from the dense trees near the right side of the road didn't stop her from moving. Papa Will taught her about answering strange voices she didn't know. If she looked, whatever called her would know she was the owner of the name. If she answered, it would follow her home. Or worse.
She walked faster.
The wagon shook the boys awake, and they babbled at her.
The dark nature of that faceless voice propelled her to go even faster.
She reached her home and carefully lifted her children. Entering the safety of the cabin spilled relief throughout her rigid body. She kissed the boys and fed them in her rocking chair while watching for any signs of trouble through the window.
Cash walked in from the bedroom and looked at the kitchen table.
"No candy?" he teased.
She shook her head.
"What's the matter? You look spooked."
"An old man selling watermelons scared me."
"How?"
"He acted strange…well, he said something strange, and it bothered me. He said he could smell my babies. But I wasn't close enough for him to do that. The boys were covered up. I hadn't even got close enough for him to know I was there. He made me feel uncomfortable… I could feel the badness in my stomach and chest."
Cash rubbed his chin and concern crossed over his features. He sat down and spoke with a steady voice.
"Did you show him the twins?" Cash asked.
"He saw part of their faces."
"Ben came by here right after you left. He dropped off some tools and told me about a baby that was stolen over in Rolling Fork four days ago. A mother turned her back on a man selling pecans for a minute and her baby was gone from her yard. Next time you go out, I'm coming with you."
Taiwo nodded.
A few days passed by and Taiwo rode with Cash on their wagon to see his parents. She didn't want to be around them and their critical gaze, but Cash didn't want to leave her alone at the cabin with the boys.
Taiwo held the twins on her lap, and the couple enjoyed the outing. They made plans to look for land to buy soon. Cash sang to her and her cheeks warmed up from the salacious nature of the lyrics. Her belly ached from laughing at the humorous way he changed the sound of his voice to sing falsetto like a woman. The babies grinned every time she giggled.
Blinking twice, she nudged Cash's arm.
The watermelon man sat on the side of the road not too far from the crossroads. Another stack of bright green melons enticed buyers, and he used his sharp knife to cut the fruit samples.
"Pretty lady. I see you're back."
His cloudy eyes focused in on the twins. His nose twitched.
"Brought those babies, too," he said.
"That's him," she whispered to Cash.
The watermelon man lifted a chunk of dripping sweetness that trailed a line of juice, looking like pale pink blood on his arm. His body appeared smaller and more hunched over than the last time Taiwo met him.
"We don't want none," Cash said.
He snapped the reins, and their mule, Esther, skedaddled along, pulling them away.
They tried to ignore the sighting of the old man and continued on with their day, but uneasiness chilled their once pleasant mood.
Another week passed and a trip home from church with Wo-Ma and Papa Will in their wagon brought them face-to-face with the watermelon man again. This time, he was about two hundred yards from their home and held one melon in his left hand and the knife in his right.
None of them acknowledged the man, simply passed him right by without a sound, even as he called to them about purchasing his fruit.
"That's who I told you about, Wo-Ma," Taiwo said inside her kitchen.
Her parents drank coffee with Cash, and she fretted over how long it would take for the watermelon man to find their cabin. Cash's forehead crinkled.
"He more different from before. Even smaller…older," Cash said.
"It's a trickster. Not even human, Cash. It used the watermelon Taiwo ate to stick to her. It won't leave until it gets what it wants. There's something about those babies that attracts things that shouldn't be around us," Wo-Ma said.
"What can we do? I done tried every root I know to cast it away from me, but it keeps coming closer," Taiwo asked.
"Give him what he wants. Give him the twins," Papa Will said.
Taiwo balked and stared at her father liked he'd gone mad. Papa Will patted her hand.
"We trick him into thinking he's got the twins. It cain't see good, but it can smell an ant fart."
Wo-Ma and Cash laughed. Taiwo didn't crack a smile.
"He's one of the little people," Papa Will said. "They steal babies and then leave you with one that looks like yours behind. Only that new baby ain't right. It'll suck the life outta you because it ain't a real baby. Just misery."
Papa Will looked at Wo-Ma and winked, then gestured for them all to move in closer around the kitchen table.
"This what we do," Papa Will whispered.
"I hope this works," Cash said.
"It has to," Taiwo answered.
She held onto the squirming bundle in her arms.
"Even if he caint see for shit, he can sure tell a piglet from a baby by how that thing is making noise."
Taiwo glanced at the suckling pig in her arms, wrapped in her children's baby blanket.
"Papa Will said to treat them just like I would Elijah and Elias. Go about my business and let that man see me doing it."
"I should come with you."
"No…you caint. You gotta stay with Elijah and Elias. He'll know we're up to something if you show up. I can do this, Cash."
The second piglet that was also dressed in the twin's baby clothes and a blanket grunted and squirmed underneath the abnormal covering for its smelly skin. For two weeks, they didn't wash any of the children's spare clothing, so their scent would permeate the cotton. Then they dressed and carried the piglets around the house and outside as if they were the babies. Taiwo washed clothes with the piglets by her side. Cash chopped wood and worked on repairs around the cabin to prepare for winter, singing them songs he made up like he did his real babies.
The time came to venture out and lay the scheme on the watermelon man.
Taiwo kissed Cash goodbye, and he pretended to kiss the piglets. Earlier, she let the fat sow in her pen feed them. The trip wouldn't take long. She just had to be seen by the old man taking her children out for errands.
She pulled the wagon and hummed, trying to act normal. She stopped to peer at the piglets, acting like she was checking on their comfort. With each squeal, she pretended they babbled to her, and she cooed and kissed their pink snouts.
Mavis and her husband passed her by on the road.
"Where you headed Taiwo?" Mavis asked.
"Taking the boys for a walk," she said, dashing past them.
Mavis glanced into the wagon but Taiwo didn't give her a chance to ask about seeing the babies. The wagon wheels groaned from the sudden movement.
Her eyes darted from side to side as she sang a lullaby to pass the time. Eventually she glimpsed the figure of the watermelon man squatted on the ground further down the road, shielded by the low-hanging branch of a tupelo tree.
He had no more watermelons. Only the knife in his hand. He scraped it against the dirt between his legs.
"Pretty lady, I'm all outta melons today…and patience, too," he said.
Taiwo stayed calm. His appearance had become sinister, the cloudy eyes sunken in on his face and the aged yellow teeth more prominent in his mouth. Longer. Sharper at the tips. The clothing on his body became ill-fitting and tattered. There were no more shoes on his feet and the flesh of his toes looked like hard ashy stones. Even the tone of his voice had become harsh and scratchy to the ear.
"I'm not buying anything today. I have people to see," Taiwo blurted.
She strolled past him with the wagon and paused for a second, peering into the faces of her piglet children.
"You boys are being so good for me," she said, making sure the old man heard her.
Following Papa Will's instructions, she traveled far from her home to search for foxgloves flowers. Wo-Ma never allowed them to grow around their homes. The small purple bell shapes attracted magical beings, and she was positive that the old man came from the bulk that thrived among the brush area near the crossroads.
It didn't take long for her to find a thick overgrowth.
She tugged on the wagon handle and pulled the piglets into the center of the flowers.
"I'm so sorry," she murmured to the animals.
Lifting her skirt, she walked away from the wagon and acted like she had to urinate behind some trees. Hidden away, she closed her eyes tight and hugged her legs into her chest with her back jammed against the bark.
Soon, both piglets squealed in terror…then silence.
Taiwo waited longer before she emerged from her hiding place. Fear gripped her throat, and she held her breath. From across the way, she could see the disheveled blankets in the wagon. She crept closer.
The piglets were gone.
Taiwo ran back home without looking back.
Cash gripped his shotgun inside the cabin. Elijah and Elias slept soundly in their crib. When Taiwo burst through the door, he jumped up from a chair placed in front of it.
"He took 'em! The pigs…they gone!"
Cash nodded and hugged her with one arm.
"Now we wait until tomorrow," he said.
They slept with their boys between them on the bed. Neither of them could sleep a wink. Every sound outside became cause for alarm. A loon wailing hitched their breath. Crickets suddenly going quiet, their wings no longer rubbing together to chirp mating calls chilled their blood. The baying of a loose hound dog roaming the field wrenched them away from much needed rest.
By the crack of dawn, Taiwo could catnap while Cash stayed alert for signs of the trickster.
She fed the babies early and her parents arrived to lend their support. They would watch the children while Cash and Taiwo fetched the wagon.
"Don't take the shotgun, it'll attract attention," Papa Will said.
Cash lifted his axe from under the cabin and clasped Taiwo's hand.
"You musn't speak at all, not until you finish the task at the river," Wo-Ma said.
The couple set off with the sun on their backs. Taiwo sucked in a nervous breath as they arrived at the place where she left the wagon off-road. Two lumpy bundles rested under the blankets that had been empty before. Cash pointed toward the river and Taiwo carefully pulled the wagon handle.
What rested under the blankets squirmed and elicited throaty warbles trying to imitate the sounds of the piglets. Taiwo's hands shook once they reached the water's edge. She took a small bag of salt from the rucksack she carried and sprinkled it in a large circle around the wagon.
Cash signaled for her to step aside.
He reached down and pulled back the faded blanket.
The abomination in the wagon brought Taiwo to her knees. Even Cash retched. She vomited on the ground and held her nose, the stench so overpowering that her eyes welled up with tears. More bile rose in her throat and she nearly screamed before Cash slammed his hand over her mouth. They couldn't let on that the creatures lying in the wagon weren't their babies.
The putrid odor reminded her of rotted meat and burning sulfur. Twisted bloody flesh made a vile mockery of anything that God had created on earth. Skinless with black worm-like protrusions pulsing all over them, the offerings in the wagon in no way resembled living pigs. More like something had vaguely assembled inside-out beings from scraps of diseased tissue they thought could pass for babies. The worst part was the lifeless, silvery eyes bulging out of the sockets on stalks like slugs seeking moisture.
Taiwo shook Cash's arm and pointed into the wagon.
The creatures changed.
A slow blooming of pink skin crawled across the lumpish muscles and wiggling sinew whose foul odor lessened in the air. The transformation from bloody cryptids into sprightly piglets astonished them. Had they arrived later than they did, no one would've been able to convince them of the deceit.
Cash raised the axe and butchered them.
He hissed when a splash of fluid from a piglet dripped down his arm. It sizzled and blistered with yellow pus oozing from it, and he cried out in pain. Taiwo snatched the kerchief she wore off her head and drenched it in cool river water. She wiped down his arm, but the piglet's blood scorched down into the second layer of skin. Cash inhaled his pain and continued chopping up the bodies, careful to avoid any more pig liquid from touching him or Taiwo.
His work complete, Cash collected kindling, covering the decimated creatures. He lit a match.
The bodies blazed. Taiwo covered her nose and stood back from the dark gray smoke that turned an ominous sanguine color. The red fumes rose high and drifted across the water.
Cash pushed the wagon into the river, and its contents flowed downstream before sinking from sight.
Taiwo let out a loud gasp and moaned into Cash's chest as he held her close. The pain in his arm increased, and he grimaced. She ripped a piece of her skirt off and wrapped the wound. Afterward, she reached into her bag again and pulled out a silver dollar. She planted it in the center of the salt circle and buried it with dirt and more salt. She settled the debt to the old man for eating his watermelon. Taiwo spoke an incantation over it to seal the circle.
"Let's go home…get back to our real babies," Cash said through gritted teeth.
Life went on.
Cash's wounds never healed properly and turned into slippery black keloids that remained as a testament to the watermelon man's attempt to ruin their lives.
Elijah and Elias grew bigger, learned to crawl, and that brought on more challenges to keep up with them. Taiwo's conjuring powers and Cash's watchful eye in the world protected them.
When the twins turned a year old, a great flood swept through Clarksdale. A heavy rainstorm planted its watery arms above them and gathered the power of two mighty tributaries that swelled up the river beds and poured out onto the fertile fields. Many people drowned. The churning, muddy waters damaged homes and washed others away forever.
Taiwo and Cash barely had enough time to gather the children and her parents before the roar of water rushed through the plantation land. They used two wagons to transport people, a few chickens, and their pigs. Papa Will kept them somewhat prepared by reading the weather and water level signs early, forcing them to move inland toward higher ground when others doubted the severity of the storm.
Days later, when the waters receded, they returned to salvage what they could. Taiwo found her wooden Ibeji figures stuck in mud outside their home.
Luckily, the cabin remained despite the water damage inside. Cash figured that the trees and brush helped protect their home from being dragged into oblivion. It would need some rebuilding and fortifying, but at least they had a roof over their heads.
Taiwo gazed at the broken doorway and water-logged porch. A new coating of haint blue was needed. She clutched the Ibeji figures as the twins sat on a dry blanket covering the porch. Stroking the wood, she fretted a little. The figure representing Elias had a tiny nick on the neck. Her finger worried the marking and a sliver of wood splintered and cut her skin. She bled. Sucking on her finger, she glanced at Elias, who crawled across the porch trying to get to Cash, who checked the walls outside. Her youngest grabbed Cash's leg and pulled himself up to stand on his own feet.
Taiwo looked at the wooden figure again.
"Taiwo, hey! Taiwo! Cash!"
Mavis and her husband Roy rolled in on their creaky, mule-drawn wagon.
"We came to check on y'all," Mavis said.
Mavis held her deep brown baby girl Annie on her lap. A yellow bonnet covered the baby's curly hair, and her bright eyes were as big as her smile.
"Hey Annie, you sure is pretty," Taiwo said.
She lifted the girl from her friend's arms and carried her over to the porch where she plopped her rump on the top damp step. Mavis joined her and Elijah crawled over to Taiwo and hoisted himself up by her shoulder. He reached for Annie's bonnet and the baby girl squealed in delight.
Cash held Elias and spoke to Roy, and Taiwo chatted with Mavis. Elijah and Annie gurgled and babbled together as the sun rose higher, drying the water left on the land. Eventually Taiwo lifted the Ibeji figures and took them back inside the house, placing them above the fireplace where they belonged. She didn't bother to wipe the mud off, wanting to keep the memory of the flood on them so she would know her babies survived when some didn't.
Mavis and Roy headed out back to their place. They were part of the blessed few who still had a home to return to.
Taiwo and Cash held their children and watched their friends' wagon get pulled slowly by their stubborn mule.
A breeze blew across her hair, and the stale scent of foreboding returned. Cash bounced Elijah in his arms and Taiwo held Elias close to her bosom. A new flood would come again one day in the future. Not one made from a gathering of waters out of the river, but from a different place. It seeped into her marrow. Taunting her.
A battle was coming.
All Taiwo could do was stay vigilant and love on her babies. Lean on her husband.
She prayed that whatever wickedness came their way, God, her conjuring skills, and calls to their ancestors could withstand it.
It had to. It just had to.
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Author's Note:
1. My story title "A Gathering of Waters" is the Anishinaabeg translation for the word "Mississippi" which they named the Mississippi River after.
2. Ibeji is the term for "Divine Twins" in the Yoruba Orisha Pantheon from southwest Nigeria (Naija!). Their colors are associated with red and blue because they are said to have been born of Shango (the Orisha of thunder, lightning, and fire = red), and Yemayá (The Goddess of the primal waters, nurturing, and protective= blue.)
3. Clarksdale, Mississippi is widely known as the birthplace of the Blues and has its well-known supernatural Black American folk tales and myths about blues singer Robert Johnson and his deal with the devil at the crossroads.
4. There are real Indian mounds throughout Mississippi that are sacred to the original Indigenous Mississippians. Black folks descended from Choctaw people would be known as Chahta Lusa, Chahta = Choctaw and Lusa = Black.
5. Hoodoo (which I practice) is not the same as Voodoo (Vodun), but they both have their roots (like Santeria, Obeah, Lucumi, Candomble etc) under the umbrella of African spiritualist traditions. Enslaved Africans carried their belief systems throughout the Black diaspora. Wherever they landed, they transformed, and synthesized with other African Traditional Religions (ATR) from the other west African cultures they were forced into bondage with, often hiding their old "gods" under new names and new ways of worship. This is why Wo-Ma and Taiwo in my story can have some ancestral memories of the Ibeji passed down to them, but they use Hoodoo methods to work their conjuring after nearly two hundred years of Black people being in America.
6. The banjo is an African instrument carried over from enslavement into the Caribbean and America. Please don't think white Americans invented it. They didn't. It's used so often in country music (that Black people created too) that folks think it's a European instrument. Originally made from gourds, it has been a staple in blues music until we started using more guitars.
7. I will be writing more fics in this world. I want to get another quick one out before I see the "Sinners" movie a few days after it comes out. My fics in this new fandom will be called the "Ibeji Series".
Pairings: Elijah "Smoke" Moore x Annie Moore (Sinners)
Warning(s): Mentions of Hoodoo, Explicit Sex, Supernatural Elements, Romance, Some Violence, Angst, Smoke's POV, Pre-Sinners movie.
Summary: Smoke Moore has returned from WWI with his twin brother Stack and meets Annie for the first time. Smitten immediately by the young Creole beauty, Smoke longs to make Annie his own. But he has to get past his brother and another rival suitor first.
A.N.: Dedicated to all the Smoke x Annie fans, writers and readers!
Warning(s): 18+, Explicit Sex, Unprotected Sex, Adult Language, Speculative Elements
Summary: Annie has been asked by her estranged husband Smoke to provide hot food for the opening of his new juke joint in Clarksdale. After seven years apart, their passion and love for each other hasn't waned, but Smoke learns the hard way that leaving his wife alone for a long stretch of time doesn't mean other suitors haven't been chomping at the bit to be with her in his absence.
Word count: 7.2K
"Somebody take me
In your arms tonight, alright
Somebody take me
In your arms tonight…"
Miles Caton – "I Lied to You"
Oh, he was mad.
Big mad.
Full lips all bunched up in a pout. Eyes more narrow than a sewing needle stitching a hemline back in her house. Fingers gripping the rolled tobacco cigarette tight.
Annie Moore watched her estranged husband Elijah "Smoke" Moore pretend to act unbothered on the second-floor, looking down at the mighty fine juke joint he and his twin Stack cobbled together in a day.
That big nigga was fuming up there, all on account of Beau Willie approaching her for a plate of fried catfish, and her mama's red rice recipe carried all the way over from Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
There was plenty of fish to fry, pots of greens to stir, fried potatoes to season, and plenty of people to buy plates and eat them in Club Juke.
Annie wiped her brow with a folded towel next to the fryers and pretended not to notice her man hawking her from above. She gave Beau Willie two big slices of white bread with hot sauce, and pointed out the Irish beer, and Italian wine available to purchase with it. Her best friends Millie and Alberta helped cook and serve, and they all tapped their feet to the music swirling throughout the transformed sawmill. Two of Millie's older daughters stood nearby, watching and learning, and every now and then, the women would let them cook a batch of fish and sell some plates. Grace Chow the grocery store owner, also helped serve and sell liquor while gossiping with them.
"That man keep starin' at you, he gonna have his eyes fallin' outta his head," Millie whispered.
Grace giggled. Annie rolled her eyes and popped the cap of Beau Willie's beer with a bottle opener for him. Handed him the drink.
"There ya go, Beau Willie. You enjoy all that and come back for more when you ready," she said.
"You know I'll be back for your cookin', Annie. Every time," Beau Willie said with a voice deeper than the Mississippi River.
Brawny and handsome, Beau Willie worked the cotton fields like most of the colored people inside the juke. He was her first boyfriend. The first boy to ever kiss her, because of Smoke being too chickenshit to tell Annie that he wanted her first.
Delta Slim belted out some tunes on his harmonica and tickled the piano keys, and Lloyd Allen played the lead guitar. The dancing crowd added the extra percussive beats. Preacher Boy Sammie stood next to the legend and played along with his guitar respectfully, not trying to outplay his elders, just keeping the rhythm steady with his strumming. A fiddler and two sibling banjo players waited offside for their turn to perform.
Annie served a few more plates and propped herself next to Grace against the counter filled with liquor bottles and high-priced hooch. She rightfully assumed Smoke and Stack stole all that shit. Smoke came to her house with pockets so fat and full of cash that she knew he'd been up to no good again. Wasn't no need to question or fuss with him about his criminality. He was going to do what he wanted.
A soft shiver went up her spine.
Lord, that man put it on her earlier that day! Twice. It was like old times with them. Argue and fight, and then fuck the disagreement away.
An undercurrent of disappointment simmered in her blood for his abandonment of their marriage after the loss of their baby. He begged her to run off to Arkansas with him after they robbed several banks in Clarksdale, and she refused to leave their baby behind in the ground they buried her in. That gravesite was holy, and she didn't want to leave her kin behind either. Smoke grew bitter about his pain. Selah, their baby girl, had meant everything to him. He couldn't wait to be a father and the first time he held her, the tears wouldn't stop flowing. They never stopped flowing after her death.
Annie did all she could when Selah grew sick. Asked every ancestor she knew by name and then some for help, wrung her hands with High John the Conqueror root as she beseeched God to grant her one holy favor: save her daughter from a too soon homegoing.
It wrecked Smoke.
He turned bitter, surly, and prone to drinking all day and night. The resentment in his eyes when she could cure ailments in other people, but not her own child, festered like an infection full of pus in his spirit. He said not one word to her, even though she sensed that negative energy clinging to him.
Her sorrow buried itself in her chest and she stumbled around each day numb for many months. They were not good to each other. He got it in his head to leave, like going away would banish Selah from their collective memory. She cursed him out. Beat her hands on his chest. How could he up and leave their child? Who was going to take care of her grave? Talk to her? Let her know they loved her beyond the veil of life?
He didn't skip off in the night when he left. That big gorgeous man looked Annie straight in her face and told her he couldn't stay. If he did, he feared he would turn into his father. A sullen, abusive man.
"Go on then," she said, "You scared to handle your feelings like a man, then leave. I'll stay and honor her and make a life with this pain."
He winced, and she turned her back on him, prepared an herbal remedy for a customer who was due to come by that day.
Smoke left her.
She had the community's support and sympathy. Built a business using the conjuring and medicinal skills she learned from her grandmother and Smoke's mother, Taiwo, both Hoodoo women. Taiwo nurtured her growth of knowledge until her passing two years ago. Annie stayed rooted in her power and fierce determination to keep her people thriving in Clarksdale.
She snuck a sip of the good hooch and squeezed her eyes shut from the burn that scorched her throat.
"Ooh, wee! That is some strong corn liquor," Annie gasped, patting her chest.
Millie cackled and sipped it like a pro, the moonshine sliding down her gullet like water.
"I don't know how you do that," Annie said with wonderment on her face.
"Y'all can't be drinking up the supply," Smoke said.
Annie jumped at the sound of her husband's voice. He'd moved in stealth down from the top floor to the main one. Grace wandered off to check on her husband, Bo.
"You ain't paying enough to be worried about me taking a drink when I want one," Annie joked.
"Thought I paid you in other ways that ain't got nothing to do with cash money," he teased, sliding his tongue across his top lip.
Millie smirked and lifted freshly cooked fish from the fryers and dumped them on some paper to drain. Annie wiped her hands and called one of the teen-aged girls over from the back to take over her spot.
"Where you going?" he asked.
"Going to mingle and let people know we got a hot batch ready. Why you stressing me?"
"As long as you're doing that and not flirting with customers."
"Flirting with who?"
Annie put a hand on her hip. Eyed him up and down.
Smoke glanced around. The crowd wasn't paying attention to him.
"Summa these menfolk might have some amorous intentions toward you that they shouldn't," he said.
She slanted her head and waited for him to continue. He snuck a glimpse of her chest. Annie wore her good bra tonight. Her breasts sat high like mountain peaks and looked voluptuous in her new velvet green dress with the few sparkly sequins she sewed into it. She gave enough cleavage with her beads falling down the center of her breasts guiding inquisitive eyes to the Promised Land. Green was Smoke's favorite color on her. Every man watched her work the floor all evening looking like a Hoodoo queen.
Her heavy hips and high riding backside cast spells on other men as she passed them by, and that worried Smoke in that sexually charged environment. Just because they made love hours ago didn't mean he had her safely tucked in his pocket. And he knew that. He'd been gone much too long to think other men hadn't plotted to scoop her up. It was one thing for her to be out of sight/out of mind while he was up north and not faced with other suitors pursuing her. Quite another to witness it full on in person. That's why he chased the back of her dress every chance he got when she went to wandering in the juke.
His reconciliation with her was still tenuous. By his facial expression, she knew he was having flashbacks of sticking his thick dick in her deep, gushy pussy, and he worried that some other man would dare to wet his dick in it, too. It kept him on his toes. Territorial. He'd already shot two men who tried to steal his liquor when he first arrived in town. If a man tried stealing his wife's pussy…there'd be a funeral in the morning.
Smoke didn't answer her question any further about flirting and cut his eyes away from her face. She slunk around him, draped her arms across his shoulders from the side, and stared up into the brown eyes he once gave their baby girl.
"What you worried about, Elijah?" she purred playfully.
"Ah, woman, get on and handle your business."
He tried to act nonchalant, but his eyes darted back and forth to clock anybody waiting to approach her when she moved away from him.
She kissed his cheek and sauntered off, glancing back to catch him watching her. Sure enough, three other men did the same, grinning at the seductive way she swung her hips. They looked elsewhere when Smoke turned their way, going in the opposite direction of her.
"How you folks doing? We got some fresh fish hot and ready. Some Creole potato salad, too! Don't be shy about getting seconds or thirds…hey Earline! I love that dress on you! Shake it, sis! Casper, let some other fellas get a chance to dance with her…hey Ora Lee! I ain't seen you out in a long time, girl!"
Annie circled the extensive building interior. Smoke's twin brushed past her on swift legs with Mary tailing him in her expensive pale satin dress. The juke stayed turned up, with Delta Slim leading the charge. People drank, ate, and had a damn good time.
Smoke stayed watching her, and she decided to ruffle his feathers.
"Oscar, don't you owe me a dance?"
She tapped a man's shoulder, and he showed all his teeth, so happy to hold her hand and swing her out on the floor. Her left arm casually rested on his slim shoulders, and he loved the feel of her near him.
"Aw, Miss Annie, I been waiting all night for a chance to dance with you."
He was only a couple of years older than her, searching for a wife, and he'd been pestering her to go out even though she told him she was still married…for seven years straight. With no word from Smoke, she started keeping company with Oscar briefly two years ago, but the bones she threw after their third picnic date told her they were not evenly yoked. They also told her Smoke wasn't dead. And if he wasn't dead, he was bound to come home someday. She let Oscar down easy, but he never gave up hope. He dated around, but yearned for her still. It showed in the way he held her while they danced. Annie kept it short and chaste.
"Thank you," she said.
"Why you running off, Annie? You think I'm scared of that runaway husband that showed up out the blue?"
She grinned.
"I got more fish to cook and some money to make," she said.
"Don't be shy coming my way again," he said, winking at her.
His buddy had a different idea.
"Nigga, you oughta be scared. Them Smokestack twins ain't to be tested if you want to stay healthy. You ain't hear about them fellas that tried to steal from Smoke today?" his buddy said.
Annie slipped away from the conversation and checked on Smoke, who still stood up high overlooking the railing. Lips poked out again, but he wasn't taking the bait.
She returned to her post after using the privy outside and washing her hands. Stack's trickster self found himself caught in the middle of a heated conversation within a circle of young women who didn't look happy with him.
"What I miss?" Annie said.
Alberta nodded over toward Mary, who sipped a glass of wine at the far end of the food table, watching Stack like he'd vanish into thin air if she didn't keep her eyes glued to him.
"Stack called those ladies field bitches, and they heard Mary say she'd beat up every one of them over him," Alberta said.
"Oh, Lord," Annie sighed.
One woman wagged her finger in Stack's face and spoke loud enough for Mary to hear.
"Her mama was a field bitch too!"
Millie went over to help get the argument under control. Stack looked somewhat remorseful, but maybe it was because the darker Black women were lighting his ass up. They didn't play that shit.
Alberta inched closer and lowered her voice.
"You see that gal right there? The one fussing the most? She's Grace Latimer's niece. Her sister Jessie left town seven months after Stack left. He was messing with her and Mary at the same time. They say she had two of his babies. Twin girls. Her people carried her off to Pittsburgh and got her married up quick. They were too scared to confront Stack about it. Now that's a rumor, so don't go telling folks you heard that from me."
Annie studied the young woman cursing Stack out.
"Does he know he has children by Jessie?" Annie said.
"Like he would care if it's true. He a rolling stone, that one. I wouldn't be surprised if he got a heap of babies all over the states the way he sweet talks women out they drawers."
Annie glanced over at Mary again. She stayed watching her great love with twisted lips and heat in her eyes. Annie felt bad for her. It made her wonder about Smoke. Were there babies out there in Chicago with his last name attached to them? No, she would've known. Felt it. Her small bag of bones would've told her as well. She prayed for that man to come back home safe, and he did. Took him a long time, but she had him back for herself.
Stack smoothed over the argument, apologized, let the women have free drinks on him, and they rolled their eyes and went about their business partying. He shuffled away to join the rougher men gambling with their Chinese guests in a back room, his gold-rimmed teeth gleaming. Mary huffed loudly, then flounced off into the crowd.
"Whew, I don't want that kinda love coming after me," Millie said, "She sticking to him like a haint in the graveyard."
"She shouldn't even be here," Alberta interjected. "He keeps telling her to go, but she won't leave. What if that sheriff come 'round here to check this place out and they see her? Ain't enough bribery money in this world to keep them crackas from killing him or us if they think she white. Her too. God rest her mama's soul, but she ain't doing us no good being here," Alberta said.
"She knows, but she don't care," Millie said.
Annie fixed plates quietly.
"Annie, maybe you should talk to her. She listens to you. She your play cousin anyway," Millie said.
"Ain't nothing I can say to her that will change her mind. Y'all know I'm married to Stack's other half. I loves me some Smoke, so I know what she's feeling inside. Can't explain it to y'all what it's like being in love with a Moore man. They cut from a different cloth."
"Oh, so they be up in them guts having y'all speaking tongues then," Millie teased.
Annie guffawed and grabbed onto her friend's arm to hush her. The women laughed together and Annie sighed afterward.
"All they got is this one night," Annie said. "We're safe enough in here with our people. Stack gotta decide what he gonna do with her on his own is all I'm saying. I'll talk to her in a little bit. But we got work to do."
Annie supervised the cooking, fanned herself, and chatted up the patrons buying liquor. She couldn't stop grinning at everything and everybody. The festive atmosphere hadn't been in Clarksdale like that for years. People needed the release from toiling in the fields and their troubles.
She took another walk to cool off. The sweat between her breasts and thighs got to her. She fanned herself down in a corner and gazed at the dance floor where folks stomped feet and threw hands up in the air.
The scent of tobacco wafted near her nose.
Smoke found his way next to her. He handed her a small mason jar half-filled with wine. He held another for himself.
"For a job well done," he said.
They clinked the jars together, and she sipped the white wine. He did the same after tossing his cigarette. The sweet liquid tasted good. Not too dry, nor overly sweet.
"You look beautiful, Annie. I meant to tell you that before we got here…but we got busy and…"
"Thank you," she said.
He took their empty jars away and handed them to a young man walking past and asked him to drop them off over at the liquor table to be washed.
"Would you like to dance, Mrs. Moore?" he asked her.
"I would love to, Mr. Moore."
A faint perceptible smile turned up one side of his mouth. She delighted in the rare sight of seeing his dimples. One would think only Stack had them with the lack of smiles Smoke gave freely. So stingy.
He threaded his fingers with hers and purposely walked to the center so everyone would see they were together. The strut in his step gave away his pride at having her by his side. If other men didn't take the obvious hint that she was back with her husband, the gun openly displayed on Smoke's side would deter them.
When he pulled her in close for a down home slow drag, her breasts rested on his wide chest where they were meant to be. She wrapped her arms around his neck, and those muscular ones of his circled her waist. He'd taken off his tweed jacket and the heat from him gripped around her as tight as his arms. They rocked their bodies together and his eyes latched onto hers.
Smoke didn't need words to speak what he felt. He snaked his hips and pressed into her tight.
Love looked right into her eyes through him. So raw and intimate. She almost had to turn away from his intense gaze.
"Baby, you're the finest woman in here," he whispered in her ear.
He let the tip of his tongue swipe the shell of her ear and spoke her name slowly, like an incantation. The hair of his mustache tickled her face the way she remembered, and he rubbed on her Rubenesque shape. Smoke loved him some full-figured women and although she had been a slender teenager when they first met at a church revival gathering, he took one look at her mother and saw the future of what Annie would become. It probably helped that she'd grown plump round titties already, but he'd zeroed in on her like a hummingbird to nectar.
His prediction came true. She filled out in the hips and rump. Her breasts turned buxom. He became an ass man and a lover of big tits.
Smoke liked how snug they were against him in that moment because his dick already poked at her through his trousers. She slid a hand down and palmed that third leg.
"Hey, now," he said, looking around.
"You think your dick the only one hard out here?" she said.
He lowered his hand on her waist and slapped her ass.
"Play around with me, woman, and I'm liable to take you in a room upstairs and bend you over again. You want me to make another big mess inside you?"
Annie covered his mouth with her hand, shushing him.
He pulled it away.
"What? You can talk dirty to me, but I can't give it right back to ya?"
She threw back her head and beamed, feeling tingles all over from the raspy tone of his voice. He gently placed his lips on her neck and sucked on it while stroking her bare arms. His fingertips ignited her flesh and when he finally kissed her, she didn't hesitate to slide her tongue against his. Her heart thumped with the excitement of their lips touching and fired off sparks everywhere on her body. When the man started lifting and separating her ass cheeks, kneading them like he had biscuits to make, she had to shut him down, or else he'd take her right there on the dance floor.
"I gotta get back to work, Elijah—"
"Mmm hmmm."
She pulled his hands away from her backside reluctantly. He slapped her rump again playfully.
"When we get back home, I'll get them big legs around me again," he teased.
He grabbed onto his dick and showed her the bulge ready for her. She waved a hand to shoo him away, but he held her from behind and pressed his temple against hers, swaying to the music. He gently tugged on the soft abundance of her belly and held it while putting his tongue in her ear again.
"You my woman, understand? My wife."
"Yes."
He patted her rump, and she meandered over to the food, playing with her protective haint blue beads, and giving herself time to collect her thoughts about Smoke. She grinned until her cheeks hurt; her husband's touches still lingered over the skin of her arms and midsection.
"Love looks good on you, Annie," Millie said.
Annie patted her friend's hand and calculated the amount of food left to cook. Plates were moving, but the liquor not as quick while folks danced. They would have to lower prices on the booze. Smoke wouldn't like that. The man wanted to make a profit, not break even…or worse. Surveying the crowd, if Club Juke could maintain its current capacity week after week, they would be alright.
She checked the trays of uncooked fish left. Not enough. Millie and Alberta noticed it, too. There was a tub of extra fish on ice in Smoke's truck.
"We need to get the rest from the truck…Hampton, come help me bring the fish in," Annie asked a young man standing idly by the table watching the dancing.
"I can get it for you, Annie," Beau Willie said.
He tossed a bottle of Irish beer into a waste bin.
"That's alright Beau Willie, Hamp can help me—"
"I got it," he said.
He headed out the side door, and Annie followed. She paused at the door's threshold and glanced over her shoulder. Smoke and Stack spoke to each other on the landing of the stairs leading to the second level.
She slipped outside and the balmy fall air felt hot and sticky on her skin.
"The truck's over there," she said, pointing.
He ambled over and she followed behind him.
A crow sat on the truck. Annie stared at it. The bird's eye shine announced its presence. It was odd to see a lone crow like that at night. Normally they did communal roosting hidden away. They preferred safety in numbers, and the anomaly of seeing one crow wide awake and watching her sent Annie's intuition into overdrive.
A pale white moon attracted her attention, and she turned to look at Club Juke in its entirety, surrounded by dense trees. The music bubbled out from it, and so did all the laughter inside. They were isolated from everyone in Clarksdale. The sawmill was the perfect property to buy.
The crow kept watching her.
It stretched its wings with a couple of loud flaps and then settled into observing her and Beau Willie. She touched her beads. The crow seemed familiar to her, like from some dream she had recently, one that woke her up in the middle of the night panting. Smoke had been in the dream with her. It had been so real that she could smell his skin and the cigarette smoke on his clothes. The crow spoke to her like a friend in that dream and told her not to worry. Her man was coming home soon.
Annie shook her head. Focused on the task at hand.
"It's up in there, Beau Willie," she said.
He pulled the tarp back and climbed onto the truck. He picked up the heavy tub of fish Smoke bought from Bo Chow and left it on the edge before jumping down on the ground.
"Thank you for helping me," she said.
"No problem, Annie. Always happy to help."
Beau Willie peered at her with softness in his deep-set eyes. Recently widowed, he cared for his four young children with his mother's help. His grown face still held the boyish charm she fell for as a teenager.
"Annie, can I ask you something personal?"
"What?"
"Is he staying for good this time?"
Annie wiped the back of her neck and turned to head back. He clasped her hand and held her in place.
"I'm not tryin' to be disrespectful to your husband. We both know who he is and what he does. You deserve better, Annie. Someone who won't run out on you when things get tough or even when bad things happen. I loved you first. He stole you from me—"
"Nobody stole me, Beau Willie."
"Then why him? Huh?"
"You and I were so young when we dated. You had plenty of girlfriends after me and married a good woman—"
"They weren't you, Annie. I've had you in my heart for a long time. If he doesn't stay this time like he didn't before…then give me a chance to rekindle us. I can give you a family already. I work hard…look after my kin. I ain't never stopped loving you. Even when you chose him over me, I held you here…"
He touched his heart.
"He's my husband. What you want, Beau Willie, is what I caint give. Maybe…maybe if Smoke never came back…maybe if he'd been killed or thrown in prison and stuck on a chain gang for life…maybe if something like that happened…our bond would be broken. But that man is a part of me and planted so deep in my soul that there ain't nothin' that you or any other man in that juke can say to change my mind different. I would walk through hell with him. Do you hear me?"
"He already put you through hell, Annie. Left you all alone, for all those years—"
"But he back now," she said, shifting her weight onto one foot.
She hated Beau Willie in that instant. He had the audacity to bring out the niggling twinges of doubt into her mind about Smoke.
The click of a revolver behind them snapped them to attention.
"You heard her, Beau Willie. I'm back now. I suggest you take that fish into the juke and stay the fuck away from my wife," Smoke said.
Beau Willie blinked rapidly and stepped back from her.
"No need to have that out, Smoke," Beau Willie said.
"Why not? I come outside and see another man propositioning my wife to leave me, and what am I supposed to do? Let that shit fly? I should blast holes in you right now, but I got a business to run. Pick that fish up, nigga, and go."
Beau Willie glared at Smoke. He didn't dare look at Annie again. Smoke aimed the gun at the man's head.
"I can take you out clean or painful. Your choice," Smoke said.
Beau Willie lifted the metal tub of iced fish and trudged back into the juke.
Smoke holstered his gun and faced Annie.
They stared at one another in silence.
"How much you hear?" she asked.
"Everything."
Her tongue worried the roof of her mouth as her eyes welled up.
"You really staying, right?" she said.
"You let that nigga get in your head?"
Annie closed her eyes. Tilted her head back slightly so no tears would fall.
"I'm staying," he reassured her.
She nodded her head once, afraid the knots in her stomach would find a way to take root in her chest.
"You believe me, dontcha, baby?"
"Like you told me back at my place. I believe what I can see," she said.
She left him outside and returned to the makeshift kitchen to oversee the cleaning of the fish. Smoke did his rounds on the floor, and she fought the anxiety of worrying about him and his plans. Her grandmother always told her people showed you who they were, and she could believe in what Smoke did. Not what he said.
Delta Slim beckoned for Sammie to take center stage with pride in his voice. The young man was finally getting his chance to sing.
"Tell them who you are…" Delta Slim said.
Sammie shyly and sweetly introduced himself, and Annie couldn't help but smile at how precious he was to the Moore family. He was her family, too, and he glanced at her briefly. She nodded her head for him to show the world his gifts and Sammie started singing something he never shared before and the hairs on her neck and arms raised up.
Immediately, a tunnel vision warped her reality and Annie pushed out her breath to keep herself from having a panic attack and passing out.
Sammie.
His guitar.
Annie stared at the walls as Sammie wailed out the blues with Delta Slim perched on stage like a proud Poppa. She could see the people shouting and encouraging Sammie to let loose, and when he held a long note, his voice ripped through the ceiling and Annie sensed there were more people in the sawmill than the ones she could physically see. Some unseen entity darted past her skin, touching her like bird wings fluttering in the air. High above, perched on a rafter, the crow from outside gazed down at her. The surge of power in the room engulfed the entire juke.
Smoke looked in her direction, just as shocked by the music and Sammie's voice and also by the triumphant way the people danced. Grace and Bo also twirled in time to the blues music that wrapped everyone in a cloak of revelry and freedom to be who they be.
Annie gasped, wildly overstimulated by the unseen. She touched the top of her head, feeling the sensation of an overwhelming presence.
It freed her.
She locked eyes with Smoke far across the room and he strode forward, zigzagging through the crowd on a direct path to her. The weight of Sammie's music slowed everything in her mind down and her husband's movement seemed even slower. She moved from around the counter and lunged for him, pushing through sweaty people, needing to get to her man.
Smoke reached for her, and she cradled his face.
"I need you. Here with me," she said.
"I ain't going nowhere."
Their lips crashed together, tongues battling to subdue the other in a frenetic exchange of energy and desire. He entwined their fingers and pulled her through the crowd, heading for the stairs. The music had risen to a crescendo that vibrated on her skin with an intensity that should've burst into flames.
Smoke pulled her up the stairs and into a room that he used for himself, that he planned to make his office if the juke proved profitable. He slammed the door shut behind them.
He spun her around and helped her take off her dress, unhooked her bra, and pushed her onto an old cot covered in a coarse blanket. Smoke undressed quickly, and the music rose through the floor.
"Somebody take me…in your arms tonight…!"
Sammies mature voice thundered below them.
The only thing Smoke had on was the mojo bag she made for him and his metal dog tags from the war. His dick pointed at her and dripped pre-cum. He barely gave her time to pull off her panties before his erection parted her slick labia and sank into her.
"Oh…Jesus!" Annie shouted.
Her man was down in that bottom.
He cradled her breasts and stretched his mouth around her areola, sucking to his heart's content. She wrapped her thighs around him and he gave her more of the deep dick she'd been craving for seven years.
"This is my pussy," mumbled into her ear.
The weight of him smothered her in scorching heat and his steady heartbeat.
He dropped to his knees and spread her legs, licking his wide tongue against her labia, giving extra tender care to her clit. Daddy was hungry and made her a sopping wet mess. He took his time until there was nearly a puddle under her.
"Turn over," he said, helping her move into the position wanted.
She placed herself on her hands and knees. He plunged his tongue inside her entrance and she squealed. Rubbing on her ass, he stood and inserted that thickness between his legs back into her, grunting and cussing up a storm. Her pussy felt exquisite to him by the sounds he moaned out. She was as hot and gushy as he wanted. He angled himself so he could watch her titties hang and smack together with each powerful thrust. Annie was so wet that her pussy sounded like it was having its own conversation taking his dick in the small room.
He climbed on the cot with Annie and pulled her onto her knees. She spread her thighs wide. He took back shots, holding her arms behind her, and Annie's tits bounced like crazy, forcing throaty moans from him. The pounding of the rhythm below them matched the pounding Smoke gave her pussy. The frenzy of his dick going in and out pulled lustful cries of pleasure from her lips. He palmed her breasts and rolled his fingers across her big nipples.
"You coulda been getting this pussy all the time," she said.
He clutched onto her tits, squeezing them, before gripping her arms tight, delighting in her titties shaking and arousing him more.
Annie squeezed her walls around his girth and he shouted her name.
"Pussy so good…Annie…"
She took control and pulled away from him.
"Whatchu doing? I need that shit…" he gasped.
She pushed him onto his back and climbed on top of him. Her thighs spread and wedged against his hips. Her breasts rested on his chest. He fondled them and stared up at her.
"I love you, Elijah. I never stopped loving you. All these years…I never once wanted any man the way I wanted you."
He thrust up, and she snapped her eyes closed. He stretched her like no other, and it felt incredible.
"Elijah…"
He thumbed her clit, allowing the slick wetness from her pubic hairs to coat the button every man wanted to push on her since Smoke had been away. She lowered her head and kissed him. His lips were so fluffy and soft against her mouth. The taste of her pussy there pleased him. He licked his lips as she tasted herself.
"I love you…hear me, woman? I love you. Don't let one of these niggas get killed tryna take you from me."
"No one can take me from you."
"You sure?"
She stopped moving.
"You think I'd want anyone else?"
She spread her hands on the wide planes of his chest. Traced two fingers down the path below his belly button of soft hairs that led to the wild pubic bush surrounding his dick.
He didn't answer, trusting the sincerity in her eyes.
"All I ever wanted was you…just you, Elijah. And when you left me…"
He lifted himself to face her and held his hands around her waist and backside.
"Shhh…shhh. Don't cry, Annie. Baby, please…I don't ever want to make you cry again. I promise."
He kissed away each teardrop that fell from her eyes. The soft pecks built up her confidence in him and she breathed easier. His voice stayed soft.
"I told you I missed you and wanted to be with you…I also want us to try for a baby again. Build our family," he said.
"You do?"
"Yes. That is…if you want that, too."
She hugged him tight.
"I do…I do!"
She wept so hard her eyes blurred. Smoke gave her one of his rare smiles, and her heart nearly burst with joy.
Annie rocked on him, pleasuring herself and him. Smoke held her breasts and sucked on her nipples.
"Oh…damn…Elijah…you're making me…oh Jesus!"
Annie came hard, and it rocked her world. Smoke massaged her breasts and watched her face transform with the rapturous climax. He grazed his teeth across a nipple and she shuddered, exalting in the sensations cascading all across her skin.
"We can try for a baby right now," he said.
He flipped her back over onto the small cot and she yelped as he tossed her legs over his biceps.
"Will you let me put another baby in you, Annie?"
"I sure will," she gasped, nearly out of breath.
His dimples melted her. He got down to business, too. Touching her skin all over, kissing her throat and whispering words of love in her ear. He licked on her nipples and stared at her fullness.
"Touching you is like touching the beauty of the night sky, Annie. You my jewel…my most precious thing in this world. Without you…I ain't fit to live."
"Hush now…"
"Nah, I want you to hear me."
"I want you to show me."
He grinned and pumped that thickness into her slowly, letting her feel every inch. Her mouth parted, and he pressed his forehead against hers.
"Ooh…Elijah…baby…"
Her pants came faster, and the groans from him aroused her to new heights. He hunched over her and every muscle flexed for her. Their sweat mingled and his strokes curled her toes. He lowered her legs and thumbed her clit, watching his dick go in and out. His lips poked out and his face carried a serious expression.
She recognized that look.
He was about to cum.
"Annie…baby…I'm getting close…"
She fondled her own breasts, and it created more tension for him. His eyes darted from her pussy to her tits. The way his eyes narrowed, she knew it was going to be a big load.
"Annie!"
"Yes!"
"I'm cummin'!"
He threw his head back and roared her name, his thumb faithfully rubbing her clit until she spilled over into a new release. His dick throbbed inside her and she matched the pulses squeezing her walls around him to milk every drop of cum.
"Fuckkkk!"
His hoarse cry drowned out her whimpers of pleasure. Her pussy kept throbbing around him until the last surge of her orgasm quieted down enough where she could move again.
"Elijah?"
His eyes watered. Tears fell down on her. The tone of his voice trembled.
"I'm sorry, baby…for everything…"
"My love…it's okay…you're here with me…we're here together," she said.
"I can't give you back those seven years…"
"Shhh…stay with me here…in this moment… in the right now."
He twisted his head to the side in shame. She pulled it back to look at her.
"We here," she said
He kissed her forehead.
Smoke snuggled around her until they were in a tight spoon together. He played with a breast and listened to her breathing calm down. The music below them kept going and Annie didn't want to leave his arms ever again. She shifted her position, and Smoke rested his head on her breasts. Stroking his hair gently, she snatched that tiny moment of peace for themselves, forgetting about everything and everybody in the juke.
Annie cleaned herself up as best she could with the buckets of water Smoke brought up from a well out behind the juke. No one paid attention to him or questioned why he needed to tote water and clean rags upstairs. He cleaned himself up, too, and they rejoined the dancing below.
She floated.
Making love to him grounded her and pushed away any doubt.
He was going to stay with her.
She hoped they had conceived a little one. Lord knows he put enough semen in her over the course of a day to open a whorehouse. She laughed at the thought.
Smoke made his rounds, checking in on everything before he slipped his hand over hers to dance one more time.
She nuzzled her face against his cheek, pulling an open smile from his face. It was such a shock that even Delta Slim had to look twice to make sure it was real.
She hooked her arms around her husband's neck, swayed with him in time to the music and their own internal rhythm. Part of his mojo bag peeked out from his vest. She touched it. Early that morning, she had fed it, prayed over it, recharged it with her love and that of her ancestors to protect him.
"Blood of my blood…bone of my bone…," she whispered.
"You putting a root on me, woman? I told you… I'm home for good. Forever," he said.
"Forever ever?" she teased.
"For always."
"Ashe," she affirmed.
"What that mean again?"
"And so it is."
"I like that."
"Me too."
"Annie?"
"Yes, Elijah?"
"I love you."
He kissed her softly. Kissed life back into her.
The music played on, and for a few hours, it did seem like forever.
A.N.:
Wanted to put out a short Smoke/Annie fic to practice getting Annie's voice for another fic. I plan to write more about these two. How they met. Had their first child etc. This short is connected to my "Choose One" longer fic. You may recognize a speculative figure lurking in the story if you've started reading "Choose One."
Enjoy!
CONTENT WARNING: DESCRIPTIONS OF DEATH AND BODY MUTILATION
"I picked his head. I picked his feet. I would've picked his body, but it wasn't fit to eat."
・・・
JUNE 1960 - SUNFLOWER COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
Kinley John Blackwood was the third boy to come up missing this way since school let out for summer.
He disappeared sometime Friday evening after taking off with his other young, rambunctious friends. They gathered every weekend to do what boys do: drink beers, kiss girls, harass colored folks rushing to cross the city line before sundown.
His parents didn’t know about that last part, nor did the county police. Not that they would have been against it, but the fact wouldn’t have read well in his newspaper obituary.
Saturday passed without a word or a sign.
What remained of Kinley John Blackwood was discovered on Sunday morning. Many drivers had passed him by, thinking he was roadkill or lowly debris. He would have rotted away in that ditch if one passerby hadn’t been curious enough to stop and examine the scene.
A scene that was just like the others.
Kinley John Blackwood had been slaughtered like a hog. He was cut at his jugular and hung upside down to drain the blood. Tongue removed. Skin and muscle shriveled down to the bone. Buzzards had picked at one of his eyeballs, but even scavengers found the carcass mostly useless.
He was, of course, buried in a closed casket.
In the town of Drew, where a young boy about Kinley’s age had been lynched not five years prior, there were rumors of retaliation. Some people say they heard screams and moans deep into the woods in the witching hours of the night.
Many dismissed it as one of those backwards congregations, screaming to God for revival, revelation, or revolution. Others say there was a slaughterhouse built especially for the whites. But those upright citizens of Drew, brave enough to maim a young colored boy, didn’t have the gumption to seek the truth for themselves.
Perhaps those who did never lived to tell the tale.
・・・
LUKE JORDAN, "PICK POOR ROBIN CLEAN" | O, DE BLOOD MASTER LIST
"Oh, you nasty freak! Why didn't I know about this right after it happened?! Did you do it at the same time?"
"We are in a church parking lot! Have some couth!"
It's the summer of 2003 in the deep heat of Mississippi, and Juicy's just trying to live life loud-jewelry clinking, hips swinging, and lip gloss always fresh. Between running around with Mary, eating good southern cooking, keeping her name clean in a town full of loose talk, all while taking a break from behind a perfect college student, Juicy doesn't have time for love... not that it stops love from finding her anyway.
The Moore twins are back, and so are the memories they all tried to keep buried. Elijah 'Smoke' Moore is silent and steady. And he still had those burning eyes like he knew things she hasn't even admitted to herself yet. Observant as ever. And Elias 'Stack' Moore is still as bold, reckless, and shameless in the way he flirts, always saying the wrong thing at the right time just to see her blush.
It was just like old times. They're her brothers best friends, and she's not supposed to fall for either of them-let alone both. But in the hectic summer of '03, feelings begin to slip through the cracks as they all depend on one another, just how they did when they were younger.
What starts as teasing glances and late-night conversations grows into something tender, tangled, and far more complicated than Juicy ever expected. She's never been one to choose between sweet and wild... so why start now?
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐎𝐧𝐞 | 𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐲’𝐫𝐞 𝐁𝐚𝐜𝐤 | ★ ★ ★ ★
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐰𝐨 | 𝐒𝐨 𝐰𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐰 𝐚 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐲 | ★ ★
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐞 | 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐑𝐢𝐧𝐤 | ★ ★ ★
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐅𝐨𝐮𝐫 | *𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐬𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐭 | ★ ★ ★ ★
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐅𝐢𝐯𝐞 | 𝐅𝐮𝐧 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐮𝐧 | ★ ★ ★
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐒𝐢𝐱 | 𝐖𝐞𝐭 ‘𝐧 𝐖𝐢𝐥𝐝 | ★ ★ ★ ★
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐒𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧 | …
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐄𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 | …
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞 | …
𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐞𝐧 | ….
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Welcome to the dungeon. MY dungeon... A place for my darkest, nastiest, and most sinful thoughts to thrive. A blog created purely for the fulfillment of my own self-indulgence.
I am your host Reina, but you can call me Rei or Big Mama (if ya' nasty).
The rules here are simple and easy. Be respectful, be responsible, and be safe. This blog is NOT and will NEVER be suitable for minors, so MDNI. The content of this blog is curated with adults in mind. Your reading experience is, well..., YOURS. I am not forcing you to consume or indulge in anything. So, if you don't like something, keep your thoughts to yourself and SCROLL. It's just that easy.
I WILL NOT TOLERATE racism, fatphobia, homophobia, transphobia, you know... things that go against the foundation of human decency and common courtesy.
Disobeying any rule will result in only one form of punishment— blocking. Big Mama doesn't believe in second chances, so let's behave the first time around. Understood?
XOXO, Reina😘💋
Aaron Pierre's Playroom
Terry Richmond x "Rebel Ridge"
Big Mama (series) => Masterlist
Bad News (series) => 01 | 02 | 03
The Itch
The End
Let Me Talk (series) => 01 | 02
Never Coming Home
Where You Going?
Let Me Teach You (series) => 01 | 02
New Year, Same Bullshit
Michael B. Jordan's Playroom
Erik Killmonger x "Black Panther"
Buy Her Books, and Eat Her Pussy
I'll Show You Toxic
Cookie Monster (coming soon)
Hold This "L" (coming soon)
*I DO NOT CONSENT FOR ANY OF MY PUBLISHED WORKS TO BE REPOSTED, PLAGIARIZED, OR USED TO TRAIN A.I.
You slid over to his house in leggings, lashes, and with a bag packed like it was a field trip—shower things, clothes for a couple days, a lil ‘just in case’ lingerie set…
Ain’t nobody say you was stayin’ the weekend butttt also ain’t nobody say you couldn’t.
And he let you in without a blink.
Kissed your cheek when you stepped in.
Took your bag like it belonged there.
Put it in corner you probably would leave there the next time you spent the night.
“Back again?” he teased.
“Back always,” you grinned, stepping out of your shoes.
Y’all been vibin’ for a good while.
Loungin’ in the living room, feet in his lap, random episodes of whatever playin’ on the TV.
He cooked again Friday night — stir fry this time, okay chef — and y’all ain’t do nothin’ but eat, laugh, and fall asleep halfway through a movie.
Now it’s Saturday night…
…and this man…lord…this man.
“Where you goin’ dressed like that?”
You had asked it real chill when he came out the room in black jeans and a fresh tee, chains hangin’ just right. Cologne hittin’ from the hallway.
“Out with Stack,” he said, leanin’ down to kiss your temple. “Won’t be long.”
You gave him the squinty side-eye.
“How long is not long?”
He smirked.
“Few hours.”
Mmm hmm.
You ain’t trip. Just made a lil face, rolled over on the couch when tried to touch you, and let him go.
But you was watching the time.
An hour passed. Then another.
You ate leftover takeout.
Scrolled on instagram.
Tried to start a show but ended up fallin’ asleep mid-episode.
You was cozy as hell in his tee, bonnet on, face washed, stretched out in his bed like it was yours.
And when you woke up?
He still wasn’t home.
So naturally…
You FaceTimed him.
And babyyyy.
When that screen popped up?
You was lookin’ at chaos.
Loud music. Laughter. Smoke. Some lil LED light tryna change the mood.
He was reclined on some couch, phone low like it was sittin’ on his chest. Eyes low. Shirt halfway up his stomach.
Big, thick ass blunt between his fingers.
“Yoooooo,” Stack’s voice came from behind the screen. “Is that her??”
Smoke tilted the camera slightly and Stack leaned in, grinning like a devil.
“Hiiiii baby mamaaaa,” Stack said in that ghetto ass singsong tone, throwin’ up a peace sign.
You blinked. “Boy bye.”
Smoke was smirkin’. All slow and sticky-eyed.
“Why you look like that?” he asked, voice hoarse from smokin’.
You frowned at him.
“Because you said you was gon’ be back a lil while ago. It’s almost midnight.”
He squinted like he just realized what time it was.
Then smiled wider.
“You miss me?”
You sucked your teeth.
“Answer the question.”
He laughed, real low and lazy, smoke curling from his mouth as he hit the blunt again.
“I’ma be there in thirty minutes, chill.”
Stack was screamin’ in the background, talkin’ to somebody, then suddenly popped back in frame.
“You tryna get pregnant or what?” he cackled.
“STACK—”
“Let me talk to her real quick,” Stack said, snatching the phone. “He be tryna play it cool but he always checkin’ his phone for your name, don’t let him fool you—”
Then it fumbled back to Smoke, who looked like he was too high to even argue.
“Stack drunk,” he mumbled.
You leaned closer to the camera. “You high.”
He grinned.
“You horny?”
Your whole face dropped. “WHAT?”
He licked his lips, all slow. “I said—”
“I HEARD WHAT YOU SAID, RELAX.”
Stack and them was dyin’ in the back.
You covered your face, wheezing.
“Y’all are embarrassing. Y’all need to go to hell.”
Smoke just laughed, then looked dead at the screen with them low eyes.
“Go lay down. I’ma be there in thirty. Maybe twenty.”
You squinted.
“Don’t come home on no weird high shit. I’m wearin’ your shirt and everything.”
He bit his lip at that.
“Bet.”
Then he hung up.
You flopped back in his bed.
Face warm. Heart beatin’ a lil fast. Still lowkey flattered and fake annoyed at the same time.
Now you just had to wait.
And he better not take forty-five minutes…
The last time you looked at the clock it was 12:46am.
You’d been trying to stay up. Really.
Was on YouTube with your eyes fighting for their life and your bonnet hangin’ on by a thread.
You even put one of his hoodies on top of the shirt you stole — cocooned in that big boy scent, just a lil pissed, just a lil turned on still from that dumbass FaceTime call.
And you fell asleep all curled up, thighs tucked together tight like you didn’t know what he was comin’ home to do.
And then…
POP.
You JERKED awake, eyes flarin’ open, body tensing like somebody tried to break in.
Only to hear the deep ass chuckle right behind your ear.
“Nah, don’t get to flinchin’ now.”
He’d slapped the shit out your ass. It started burning a bit from how hard he slapped it.
Woke you up out your sleep.
Real disrespectful. Real unnecessary.
You was finna swing and everything ‘til you felt his chain brush your neck from behind.
“You hit me like I owed you money.”
“You do,” he mumbled, voice all raspy from the weed and the night. “Interest been accruin’ since I left.” He rubbed the spot on your ass.
You turned over and he was standin’ there, shirt halfway off, jeans unbuttoned. Eyes low, gold grill catchin’ the light.
Face a little flushed. Smellin’ like smoke and Hennessy and the kind of sin you don’t come back from.
“Boy. It is one o’clock. In the morning.”
“And you still up.” He smirked, leanin’ down to kiss your cheek. “That mean you was waitin’.”
You rolled your eyes. “You woke me up.”
He laughed again and grabbed your thigh, lifted it up high to his hip like he was about to climb on you.
Started kissin’ up your jaw, your neck, pressin’ himself all into you.
Then next thing you knew?
You was on top.
“You want somethin’ so bad,” he said, voice low, breath hot as his hands slid up your hoodie. “Come take it.”
You blinked. “What?”
“Take it, baby.” he said again. “Ride me.”
And that’s how you ended up straddlin’ him, still sleepy-eyed, bonnet gone, tryna get it together as he leaned back on the headboard, arms behind his head like he was watchin’ the show.
You lifted your hips slow, dragged him in even slower.
He hissed through his teeth, eyes clenching shut, tongue pokin’ the corner of his mouth.
You bit your bottom lip.
Started movin’, workin’ it like he ain’t just come home three hours late.
Bouncin’ a lil faster, leanin’ back for leverage. The hoodie you had on ridin’ up over your ass, thighs burnin’ already.
You was moanin’ soft.
Tryna keep the rhythm.
Tryna not let your knees give out.
He was so damn thick, the stretch makin’ you dizzy.
“Fuck,” he grunted, hands goin’ to your hips finally. “Just like that — damn, you tryna make me come already?”
You smirked, breathless.
“You talk all that shit, now you foldin’?”
He bit his lip hard, grabbed the back of your neck, and pulled you down into a nasty ass kiss — teeth clashing, tongue heavy, breath hot.
Then he leaned back again.
“Stop.”
You froze, hips mid-roll.
“…huh?”
He looked you dead in the face, jaw clenched.
Voice serious.
“I said stop. You movin’ like you tryna win.”
You blinked again.
“I am??”
He leaned up just slightly, whispered low in your ear, “You wanna make me come, you gon’ have to earn that shit. Now come here —”
You still sittin’ there straddlin’ him, lips parted, brows furrowed like — sir?
You just gave him three minutes of your finest choreography. You damn near caught the holy ghost on that dick.
And this man got the nerve to tell you to stop.
Now he got one hand wrapped around your thigh, the other holdin’ your lower back, pullin’ you down, bringin’ you back, slidin’ you onto him slow like he finna run this now.
“Lemme do it my way.”
His voice all rough and sleepy, thick from the liquor and late hour.
Eyes half-lidded but focused, locked in like you the only thing in his world.
You couldn’t breathe for a second, ‘cause the way he filled you? Had you clenchin’ all over again.
He tilted his head to the side and smirked just a lil. “That’s what I thought.”
Now you tryin’ to ride again, but he’s not lettin’ you bounce.
He’s holdin’ your hips in place, grindin’ you down into him, movin’ you the way he want.
Slow. Deep. Pressure in every roll.
You swear you can feel everything.
The heat. The weight. The way he pulses thick inside you with every tiny lil moan that slips past your lips.
Your head falls forward against his chest and he laughs, low and cocky.
“Yeahhh, that’s what I wanted,” he mutters, thumb draggin’ up your spine under the hoodie.
“I don’t need all that fast shit. Let me feel you.”
You whimper.
Like a real whimper.
He lifts your chin, makes you look at him while you grind on him like you tryna make a baby.
You feel so full. So slow-drunk on the way he’s movin’ you, the way he knows what he’s doin’.
“You miss me?” he asks, like it’s not obvious.
Like your pussy didn’t answer that the moment he slapped your ass.
“Yeah,” you mumble, eyes glossy.
“Miss me like this?”
You nod quick, grindin’ harder, and he sucks his teeth.
“Say it.”
“I missed you like this.”
He smirks. “I know.”
Then he’s kissin’ you.
Hard.
One hand on the back of your head, tongue slidin’ deep into your mouth.
Other hand grippin’ your ass, pushin’ you down on him deeper.
You swear he hit a spot that made your whole body lock up.
You moanin’ into his mouth.
Shakin’ from how thick and deep he’s inside you.
Fingernails diggin’ into his shoulders, hoodie startin’ to stick to your back from sweat.
His lips break away from yours and go straight for your neck — you already know.
Kissin’ that spot under your ear, suckin’ on your pulse point, leavin’ a wet trail down your shoulder while you grind on him like you forgot how to stop.
And when you do try to lift up, finally try to bounce again?
He groan low, grips your waist tight, and mutters:
“Nah. Don’t run now.”
“I’m not tryna run —“
And he start movin’ his hips —
Up into you.
Controlled.
Deep.
He takin’ over now.
You can’t even ride no more — he fuckin’ you from under, thick strokes that got your toes curlin’ and your forehead sweatin’.
Eyes rollin’ and lips tremblin’ and you swear he hittin’ your soul.
“Who this pussy belong to?” he asks, voice dark.
“You,” you gasp.
“Say it again.”
“It’s yours — it’s yours, Elijah f-fuck —”
Next thing you knew — flip.
Whole body turned over like you was on a damn rotisserie.
He had you on your stomach, ass up, legs parted just a lil, still slippery from the first round.
You barely even processed the motion and this man was lining it back up.
He slid back in slow — so slow you clenched up on instinct.
You could feel every thick inch stretchin’ you open all over again.
“Mhmm,” he muttered under his breath. “Yeah, you still got it f’sho.”
You didn’t even respond. Couldn’t.
You were too busy gripping the pillow like it owed you money.
First he went slow.
Real deep. Real calculated.
Like he was tryin’ to memorize your shit.
Pushing in alllll the way — till his pelvis kissed your ass —
Then pullin’ out real deliberate, leavin’ just the tip in before doin’ it all over again.
Over.
And over.
And over.
Had your mouth open, but nothin’ was comin’ out. Just gasps. Lil shaky whines.
Then suddenly — like he changed his mind mid-stroke —
SMACK.
Hand landed hard on your ass, made you jolt, and then he picked up the pace.
Started pounding it, grip lockin’ down on both your shoulders like he was tryin’ to anchor himself.
Like you was runnin’ and he wasn’t lettin’ you go nowhere.
“Ain’t tell you to go like that,” he muttered, low and gritty, fuckin’ you through his own breathlessness. “Shit feel too damn good.”
You cried out something soft, probably ‘fuck,’ probably ‘please,’ probably your own name ‘cause you forgot his in the moment.
Didn’t matter.
He was locked in.
Elijah—well, “Smoke,” technically—you still don’t even know his full name.
But what you do know is he love him some backshots.
He worship that view.
Be behind you talkin’ to himself like ‘damn she thick.’
Takin’ long strokes just so he can watch it jiggle back on him.
Holding your ass open with both thumbs, spitting just a lil to keep it sloppy, whisperin’ shit like:
“This the part I missed the most.”
“Could nut just off this view, swear to God.”
“You was sleepin’ pretty earlier. Bet you ain’t think I’d fuck the rest of the night out you.”
He leaned over you now, chest grazin’ your back, lips brushing your ear —
“You finna come again?”
You nodded, whined, damn near cried.
Then he bit down on your shoulder, just a lil, like he was tryna remind you who’s shit this is.
“Good,” he whispered, grindin’ into you deep, finishin’ you off with strokes so raw and filthy, you felt your whole body go limp.
Legs tremblin’.
Pussy clenching hard like you tryna keep him in.
You gushed, loud and messy — like your body was spillin’ over from the pressure.
When he finally pulled out?
He was breathing heavy. Forehead glistening. Chest rising and falling like he just ran laps.
You barely got your bearings.
Still facedown in the sheets, tryin’ to remember your own damn name, when you felt him tug you up — strong ass arms slid under yours and pulled.
Next thing you know, your back hit the headboard and he was kneelin’ in front of you on the mattress, cock already hard again like he ain’t just fuck the soul outta you a minute ago.
He kissed you first, slow and messy — still breathing heavy — and his hand slid down to grip your jaw real soft before he whispered:
“You good?”
You nodded, but only glared up at the man.
You already knew what time it was.
He shifted forward on his knees, one hand guiding your face down, the other gripping the headboard behind you for balance.
“Put that pretty mouth to work,” he said low, tapping the thick tip against your bottom lip. “You got it.”
You looked up at him all slow, mouth already watering, lips partin’ soft as hell —
He slid in easy, let you suck just the tip at first, then eased deeper…hand cradling your jaw, thumb rubbing the hinge of it.
Deeper…
And he moaned — actually moaned — head falling back just a little, abs tight, the kind of sound that made you clench around nothing.
You didn’t even care that your jaw was starting to ache.
Didn’t care your lashes were stickin’ together from the lil tears in your eyes.
All you knew was his hand was resting real firm on the crown of your head now, not forcing, just guiding, and you wanted to give him exactly what he needed.
Then…he started movin’.
Real slow at first.
Pushin’ his hips forward while he kept his grip on the headboard — and suddenly it wasn’t just head, it was a full-on face-fucking.
Your headboard knockin’ lightly behind you from the pressure, your throat stretched wide, lips glossy and spit-slick, and he lookin’ down like:
“Mmm, that’s it. Look at me. Don’t look away.”
You glared up through your lashes, jaw sore, throat burning — but you didn’t stop.
Couldn’t.
You was in too deep — literally.
He kept it slow at first, hips grindin’ into your mouth like he was fuckin’ your throat the same way he fuck your pussy —
But then he started gettin’ bold.
Picked up the pace a little, started rockin’ into your mouth with a rhythm that had your whole head movin’ against the headboard —
Bump. Bump. Bump.
Like he was tryin’ to put your tonsils on sick leave.
Every now and then he’d pause, pull back and tap his tip against your tongue — watchin’ the spit fall from your lips to your chest —then slide back in all slow with a breathy, “That’s my girl…”
At one point?
He laced his fingers in your curls, held your head steady, and said with the softest lil grunt —
“I’ma cum if you keep doin’ that shit.” Then added with a smirk, “You want it?”
You nodded. Couldn’t even speak.
He let go of the headboard to use both hands on your head now, thrustin’ real slow and deep, jaw clenched tight, abs flexed as he fucked into your mouth like he was damn near in love.
His breathing turned to groans.
His thighs started tremblin’.
And finally — finally — he gave a rough groan and buried himself deep, chest stuttering as he came down your throat.
You swallowed every drop.
Because…obviously.
Afterwards?
He leaned forward, kissed you slow, wiped your chin, whispered against your lips like:
“You gon’ be the death of me.”
And you just smiled.
You barely caught your breath before he leaned back, lashes low and tipsy smirk tugging at his lips — eyes dragging over you like he was tryna savor you all over again.
Still flushed from that mouthwork he just got. Still kneeling on the bed in just his damn chain and a glistening trail down his abs.
That’s when he said it — voice all raspy and deep like he ain’t just moan your name a second ago.
“Let me eat it next…”
He bit his lip a little. “C’mon. Sit it right here.”
You blinked. “What?”
He tapped his chest, then slid both hands down his stomach slow as hell, eyes never leavin’ yours.
“Sit. On. My. Face.”
Chile.
You ain’t even get a full thought off before he grabbed your thighs, pulled you up like you was light as air, and laid back against the pillows — one arm under your ass, the other spreading your legs like he already knew the script.
“You scared?” he teased, that smirk still sittin’ pretty even with his head on the damn mattress.
And you? Tipsy off his energy now.
You climbed over him slow, shaky thighs hovering, hands braced on the headboard — and when you finally lowered down, you barely touched his lips before he grabbed your hips and pulled you all the way down like:
“Mm-mm. I said sit.”
BABYYYY.
He devoured you.
No warning. No easing into it. Just straight tongue work like he was starvin’ for it.
Mouth wide open, lips partin’ soft before he flattened his tongue and licked one long, slow stripe through your folds — and then he locked in.
Eyes closed.
Low groans vibrating right through you.
He had your thighs trembling in under thirty seconds and his grip on you? Lord. Possessive. Firm. Like he wanted the weight of you on his face.
You looked down at him, eyes glossy, and he just groaned against you like he was the one getting off. Grippin’ your ass, guiding your hips to ride his mouth like you was a lil toy.
“That’s it… keep goin’,” he muttered into you, lips wet and chin gleamin’. “Tastes so fuckin’ good…”
He ate you like he meant it. Like it was the last meal and you the last girl on earth.
Tongue fuckin’ into you, lips suckin’ your clit, switchin’ it up every time your breath caught just to keep you beggin’. You was grindin’ without even meanin’ to — rockin’ into his face while your hands clawed at the headboard, back archin’, moans comin’ out all high and helpless.
Then —
He hit you with the combo.
Two thick fingers slid in while he sucked your clit — and that was it.
You came so hard your whole body stiffened, legs tryna close on his head and he just hummed, held you open and kept going.
“Uh uh. Let me get that other one.”
You was breathless. Sweaty. Legs weak.
And he still had the nerve to pull you down closer, lickin’ you slow like he was tryna memorize the taste.
“Damn, mama…you gon’ kill me with this.”
You slid off him eventually, thighs shakin’, face buried in the sheets — and he just laid there lookin’ smug, mouth glistening, hand on your lower back like yeahhh, I did that.
You tried to move.
Key word: Tried.
But all you managed was a whisper: “You a munch.”
He smirked wider, leaned over and kissed the back of your thigh. Then both your ass cheeks.
“Yeah,” he said, voice deep and sleepy now. “And?”
Summary: Annie is a master in the kitchen, curating every dish on her restaurant’s menu to leave diners lingering over every bite, craving more. But when a chance reunion with an old flame ignites dormant feelings, the heat shifts from the stove to something far more intimate. By the end of the night, it’s Annie who’s being savored...
Chicago was alive and well on Saturday morning. The city buzzed with its usual rhythm—horns in the distance, heels clacking against pavement, the hiss of early buses. Sunlight spilled between high-rises like honey, catching the glint of Lake Michigan in the distance. The air was crisp, laced with the promise of spring, and downtown pulsed with movement.
And nestled in the heart of it all, in a quaint, Black-owned café, Annie was thriving.
The scent of rich espresso, caramel, cinnamon, and freshly baked pastries curled through the space like a warm embrace. Muffled conversations mingled in the air—first dates, business meetings, friends catching up—all blending into a sweet melody. Annie soaked it in. Her senses were alive in the best way, tuned to the sounds and smells she knew so well. This was her happy place and a reflection of her own success.
As a girl from a small town in Mississippi, this life once felt like a dream too far away. But here she was, head chef and owner of one of Chicago’s must-visit restaurants—Zariah's—beloved by locals and tourists alike. She wasn’t just living her dream—she was serving it.
With her caramel macchiato in hand—two pumps of brown sugar, just the way she liked it—she made her way toward the door, coat swinging behind her in haste. But the moment she pushed it open, she collided with something—or rather, someone—solid.
Her drink nearly spilled, but before gravity could do its worst, strong hands caught her by the waist and arm, steadying her with practiced ease.
"Lawd, I’m so sorry," she blurted, her Southern twang slipping out naturally.
"Nah, I oughta be apologizin’," came a deep, smooth baritone.
They both laughed—soft and surprised—and then her eyes lifted.
Deep, dark chocolate met something achingly familiar. Eyes she hadn’t seen in years, but had never quite forgotten. Her breath caught in her throat.
“Annie?” That voice—tinged with that familiar Mississippi drawl—pulled her further into the moment.
Her brows furrowed as recognition struck. “S-Smoke?” she said, disbelief and wonder laced in her voice.
“Sho is.” He stepped back slowly, taking her in with a smile that warmed the air between them. “Small world. Look at you.”
And look he did. His eyes roamed over her like a slow caress. Her full, 4C afro framed her face like a crown—coily, moisturized, and unapologetically bold. Her luminous skin, deep and glowing with melanin-rich warmth, glistened against the soft morning light. High cheekbones, full lips, and eyes that still carried secrets met him with equal intensity. Her open tan trench coat revealed a seafoam green maxi dress hugging her curves just right, its neckline generous to her bosom, its hem floating around matching heels that kissed the pavement.
She gave a soft, incredulous smile. “Me? Look at you. You ain’t aged a day.”
Elijah—Smoke—grinned. The years had been good to him. The boy she remembered had become a man forged in discipline and distance. His deep bronze skin was smooth and radiant, his jaw square and lined with a neatly groomed beard. His lips were full, his smile disarming, and his eyes—still sharp, still watchful—were just as she remembered. A light gray sweater hugged his muscular frame, and black slacks fit him like they’d been tailored with reverence.
Whatever life had done to him, it had carved him into something quietly powerful.
He chuckled low, the sound soaked in that Southern warmth. “Guess we both clean up real nice. How you been, girl?”
Annie grinned, her voice sliding in like sweet honey. “I’m good. Busy, but good. How ‘bout you?”
He tilted his head slightly, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I can see that. Doin’ good. Still tryin’ to slow life down a little, but y’know how that goes.”
She nodded knowingly. “Oh, I do. Life don’t wait for nobody.”
“I don’t wanna keep you,” he added, though the regret in his tone said otherwise. “But we should catch up soon.”
Annie’s lips quirked with a spark of mischief. An idea bloomed like a flower in her mind. “Well, I gotta get to my restaurant to start preppin’. We’re booked up tonight, but if you come by after closin’, I can have some dishes set aside for you… if you’re free, of course.”
Smoke blinked, a little taken aback but clearly proud of the woman in front of him. “I’d be a fool to say no to your cookin’,” he said with a slow smirk.
They exchanged numbers quickly, fingers brushing as they handed off phones. It felt easy. Natural. Like no time had passed at all.
Their hug was short, but the kind that lingered after release. Familiar. Comfortable. Full of things unspoken.
“See you tonight, Smoke,” she murmured against his shoulder.
“Lookin’ forward to it.”
And as they turned to head in opposite directions, both couldn’t help but glance back.
A spark had been rekindled.
The night promised more than just food—it promised memories, and maybe even something new.
As the last satisfied stomachs exited the building, Annie was in the back of the kitchen preparing for Smoke’s arrival.
The clock struck ten and a jolt of nerves hit her square in the chest. Would he be impressed? Would he still like her cooking? These questions had never once crossed her mind before—until now. She never expected to be reconnected with her first love… and the father of their unborn child.
She paused, letting out a slow breath, shaking the thought away as she placed the last dash of cinnamon on a warm, golden slice of peach cobbler.
"Hey, Annie," came Jonathan’s voice through a crack in the heavy kitchen doors. "There’s a gentleman here for you. Elijah, I think."
A smile bloomed on her face instantly. "Thanks, Jon. Can you seat him at the booth closest to the kitchen? I’ll take care of him. Y’all have a great night—see ya Monday."
"You too, boss," he called back, as the kitchen doors swung shut behind him.
Annie turned to the oven, sliding dishes inside to keep warm before kicking off her worn kitchen flats and slipping into the seafoam heels from earlier. She pulled off her chef’s coat, revealing the same curve-hugging maxi dress beneath. Using her phone’s camera as a mirror, she checked her reflection—makeup intact, not a single coil of hair out of place, her deep, glowing skin kissed by the overhead lights. After a fresh swipe of pink-tinted gloss and a deep breath, she stepped out.
As she pushed through the swinging door, her eyes immediately met Elijah’s. He was already standing, his attention drawn to her like gravity. His smile was instant, bright and warm.
"Well don’t you look plucked straight outta GQ?" she teased as she walked toward him.
His presence was unshakable, the kind that didn’t need to raise its voice to demand a room's attention. He had changed into a tailored charcoal pinstripe suit that clung to his broad shoulders and tapered waist, he looked dapper. The subtle glint of a diamond stud in his ear caught the light just enough to remind you—he knew exactly who he was.
"Aye, had to match your beauty," he replied, drawing her into a soft embrace and planting a kiss on her cheek.
Butterflies hovered in her stomach at the simple gesture. "Thank you," she whispered.
They pulled apart slowly, the air charged, as he glanced around the restaurant with admiration. "This place looks incredible. You really doin’ it big, huh?"
Low jazz and smooth R&B swirled through the air from hidden speakers, a soft soundtrack to the calm night. The warm glow of ambient lighting danced across sweeping wooden waves that spread along the ceiling like a living sculpture. Plush velvet chairs in deep rust and charcoal hues hugged round tables dressed in white linen. Glass walls offered a peek into the open kitchen she loved so much. A soft, earthy aroma lingered in the air with a hint of rich vanilla. Dried pampas grass stood tall in artful arrangements, giving the space a luxurious charm.
She followed his gaze, pride welling in her chest. "I guess I am. Sometimes, I get so caught up in the hustle, I forget to take it all in. But I love what I do."
"Well, you’re gonna have to soak up some compliments tonight. ‘Cause I ain’t holdin’ back, especially once I taste this food."
She laughed gently, heart warming with his presence. "Speakin’ of, what can I get you to drink? I ain’t no bartender, but I can whip somethin’ up."
Smoke tilted his head in thought. "Surprise me."
With a nod, she turned and headed to the bar while he settled into the booth. The clinking of glass and the soft shuffle of bottles filled the air as she crafted their drinks. Moments later, she returned with two glasses.
"Now, I take you for a whiskey man, so... whiskey sour for you. And a cosmopolitan for me," she said, placing the drinks on the table with a wink.
He took a sip, nodding in approval. "Thank you, beautiful," he murmured, the praise warm on his tongue.
Annie smiled and excused herself again, disappearing into the kitchen. She emerged moments later, expertly balancing a tray with a steaming bowl of gumbo over rice, a side of collard greens, and a thick slice of honey-glazed cornbread. The aroma alone was enough to make mouths water.
She placed the meal in front of him with a flourish.
A low whistle escaped his lips. "I know this ain’t what I think it is."
Annie laughed and slid into the booth beside him. "Sure is. Mama’s gumbo recipe. Just added my own lil twist. Go on—tell me what ya think."
He looked at her for a beat, then took a spoonful, blowing gently before taking the bite. His eyes shut as the flavor hit his tongue. The broth was rich and complex, shrimp and chicken tender, sausage savory, the holy trinity of vegetables cooked to perfection.
"Annie..." he breathed, his voice dipped in nostalgia and pleasure. He took another bite, then chuckled with a shake of his head. "You just took me back in time. Your mama, God rest her soul, might’ve just been beat. You put your foot in that, girl."
She threw her head back in laughter, heart full. "Happy to hear it. I aim to please."
His satisfied hums and low moans of approval filled the space between them as he moved between spoonfuls and bites of cornbread and greens. Annie watched with pride and something else stirring deep in her chest.
They talked as he ate, falling into a rhythm so natural it felt like no time had passed at all. The air between them was warm and relaxed as the hum of R&B and jazz classics filled the atmosphere.
Annie sipped her cosmopolitan as she shared her journey. "After Mama passed four years ago, I moved in with Aunt Renee for a bit. Took some time to get my head right. Then one day, I just… went for it. Applied for a business loan, pitched my concept to anyone who’d listen, and somehow convinced a bank to believe in me. Been full nearly every night since opening."
Smoke’s brows rose with admiration. "That's real. I knew you always had that fire in you."
She smiled, a bit bashful under the glow of his praise. "I guess I got it honest. Mama didn’t raise no fool."
He chuckled and lifted his glass. "Cheers to her."
They clinked glasses, taking a quiet sip in her honor before he leaned back in the booth, his deep voice laced with pride. "I been up to some things, too. Did my time in the Army, got my bachelor’s in accounting after that. Then a master’s in business. I’m doin’ good—real good. But I came up to Chicago ‘cause I wanted more. Bigger. Better."
She tilted her head, curious. "So what’s next for Mr. Bigger and Better?"
He grinned. "Me, Stack, and Sammie are openin’ a jazz and cigar lounge out here."
Her face lit up. "Oh my God, that's great! Sammie still play?"
"Hell yeah," he said with a nod. "That boy’s gonna tear the house down. He’s been killin’ it at some local joints, but we want him to have his own permanent spot. It's a family thing. We’re namin’ it Pearline’s, after his girl."
Annie gasped, eyes wide. "What!? Him and Pearline got together?"
"Stuck like glue," Smoke said with a grin. "They’ll probably be next down the aisle. Stack and Mary just eloped last week—still off on their honeymoon, but they’ll be back soon."
She placed a hand to her chest, heart swelling. "Wow. I’m so happy for them. Look at Stack... all grown up and settlin’ down."
Smoke’s eyes lingered on her, his gaze deep and sincere. "Yeah... well, love’ll do that to you. Don’t matter how old or new it is. I should know."
A stillness crept between them, quiet but potent. Annie’s heart skipped at the weight of his words, at the truth hiding beneath them.
"Smoke—" she began softly, but he cut her off gently.
"I owe you an apology, Annie."
She shook her head slowly, her throat tight. "You don't have to—"
"But I do, darlin’." His voice was low and raw as he reached across the table and took her hands in his, thumbs brushing small, soothing circles against her skin. "I didn’t handle shit right. Losin’ our baby... it tore me up more than I ever let on. And instead of dealin’ with it with you, like I should’ve... I ran. I left you holdin’ all that pain on your own. You deserved better than that. Way better. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry."
Tears shimmered in his eyes, and Annie’s own spilled freely down her cheeks. She shook her head, her voice thick with emotion. "I know. I forgave you a long time ago. We were just... young. Dumb. In love. But we weren't ready."
She reached for a napkin, dabbing her cheeks. "As much as I wanted our baby, I know she’s in a better place and it wasn’t in vain. Look at what we’ve accomplished. Look at who we became."
Smoke wiped away a tear that escaped down his cheek, then reached out to gently brush her tears away, careful not to disturb her makeup.
"Zariah," he said softly. "You were so sure it was a girl."
She smiled through her tears. "I know it. And Mama shows her to me sometimes in my dreams. She’s got those deep Moore dimples... like her Daddy"
His soft laugh cracked into sobs, and Annie immediately leaned forward, wrapping her arms around him. His broad frame shook as he buried his face in her shoulder and wrapped his arms around her waist. She held him, hand rubbing the back of his head gently, her other arm anchored around his back. They wept together, years of grief and guilt finally released.
Annie had grieved their daughter long ago, honoring her memory by naming the restaurant after her. But seeing the pain Smoke still carried—still buried—fractured something in her chest. She hadn’t known how heavy it had been for him too.
After a long moment, they pulled apart and wiped each other’s tears. Annie took a deep breath, offering him a small smile. "We need a pick-me-up. I’ll be right back."
She disappeared into the kitchen. The cool blast of air from the fridge kissed her face as she retrieved the dessert she had set aside—a chilled banana puddin’ cheesecake. She grabbed her Mama’s peach cobbler, still warm from the oven and scooped a generous helping of ice cream and placed it beside the cobbler on a sleek black plate.
Moments later, she returned to the booth, setting the desserts down with the kind of pride only a Southern Black woman could wield when presenting sweets made with love.
Smoke’s eyes widened with delight. "And what do we have here?"
Annie sank into the booth beside him again, the soft lighting catching the gleam in her eyes. "Well, this is Mama’s peach cobbler and French vanilla ice cream, we make it in-house. And this beauty," she said, pointing to the other plate with a spoon, "is my banana puddin’ cheesecake. A customer favorite."
She handed him the spoon and raised a brow. "Here. Taste them. Really savor the flavors and tell me what you think."
He grinned and took a bite of the cobbler first. The moment it hit his tongue, he closed his eyes and let out a low, satisfied groan. "Lord have mercy..."
Annie laughed and squeezed her thighs together at the sound. "That good, huh?"
"Annie... you got magic in this crust."
She beamed. "Wait till you try the cheesecake."
He didn’t waste time. One bite and he leaned back with a stunned expression, spoon still in hand. "Now see, that’s witchcraft. I don’t know what you did to bananas and puddin', but they not supposed to taste that damn good."
Annie cackled, covering her mouth. "Boy, shut up!"
They laughed together, the sound full and rich. The weight between them had eased.
"Here," he said as he raised a spoonful of cheesecake to her lips. "Enjoy the fruits of your labor."
She smiled, lips parting slowly. She let him feed her, the creamy, sweet flavors melting across her tongue as the crunch of chessman cookies and bits of banana filled her mouth. She hummed in satisfaction. "I don't toot my own horn often, but toot toot!"
He chuckled and they shared another laugh, the sound buzzing warmly between them. Then his gaze dropped to her lips, lingering.
"You got a lil’..." he murmured, gesturing gently toward her mouth.
She swiped at the corner of her lips. "Gone?"
"Not quite," he murmured again, voice a gravelly whisper. He leaned in slowly, eyes locked with hers. Her breath caught as his lips pressed softly to her cheek, then kissed the corner of her mouth.
He hovered, his lips almost touching hers. "There... good as new," he whispered.
His lustful gaze, teasing tone, and the feel of his lips sent an ache between her thighs. A boldness sparked within her. Her hand moved slowly down the firm plane of his chest to the bulge hidden beneath his pants. She groped him through the fabric, feeling him hard and ready.
His breath hitched, and he bit his bottom lip, eyes dark with want.
"Your body remembers me," she whispered, and in a flash his lips crashed into hers.
Their kiss was urgent, their tongues dancing in a sensual waltz. He wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her closer, while she clutched at his back and neck, bodies pressed flush.
"Say it, Elijah," she breathed between kisses.
He pulled back just enough to look into her eyes, unwavering. "I love you. And I missed you."
That familiar smirk tugged at his lips, but she met it with her own radiant smile. "I love you too," she said, voice full of truth.
Their lips met again, this time deeper, heavier, laced with the ache of years gone by. His mouth moved to her neck, trailing kisses that made her gasp. His hands found the hem of her dress, and she lifted her hips slightly to help him pull it up.
Graceful fingers slid her red lace thong to the side, meeting her wet, aching folds. A soft whimper escaped her lips, and Smoke smirked.
"And this pussy..." he murmured, sweeping up her slick slit to her clit, circling it with teasing precision, "remembers me. Don’t she, baby?"
Annie moaned, swallowing the spit that had gathered in her mouth. "Y-Yes," she stuttered, truth spilling from her lips. No one had ever made her feel the way Elijah "Smoke" Moore did. His touch was etched into her bones.
The pad of his fingers moved expertly over her clit, then slid down to her dripping hole. He pushed inside, fingering her with deliberate rhythm. Her back arched, chest jutting toward him, and Smoke couldn't resist. He tugged at the straps of her dress, and she hastily pulled the top down, shrugging off her bra.
A groan rumbled from his chest as her breasts came into view, his brow lifting with a mischievous glint.
His free hand reached for the cobbler, dipping his index into the melting vanilla ice cream and thick peach syrup. He swirled the mixture over her chocolate nipples, then sucked each one clean, lips hot and hungry.
Annie ground against his fingers, clutching his head to her chest. His soft lips and wicked tongue teased her peaks, each flick and suck sending electric jolts through her.
"Ooh, don’t stop," she moaned, voice shaky with need.
"Not plannin’ on it, baby," he murmured, moving to her other nipple, savoring the creamy sweetness as his tongue flicked the hardened bud.
Her pussy clenched around his fingers as his thumb rolled over her clit, fingers thrusting faster, deeper. A powerful climax was brewing in the pit of her stomach, her moans rising, filling the room with heat and want.
“Mhm, I feel it. Cum for me.” His voice was low—commanding, and just like that, her orgasm crashed through her. Her body shuddering, back arching, whimpers and cries spilling from her lips like a song only he could summon. The look on her face, full of ecstasy and release, was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen—even more breathtaking than when they were twenty and twenty-one.
Annie reached for him as he guided her down from the high, kissing him hungrily. When she stilled, he slipped his fingers from inside her, breaking the kiss just long enough to smear her essence on her lips. His mouth was on hers again in an instant, sucking the taste of her from both their lips. Their moans blended, savoring her flavor, their hunger reigniting.
Slowly, they broke apart. Smoke’s strong hands slid under her, scooting her to the edge of the booth. He rose, gaze never leaving hers, and laid her back. Her thong was slipped off completely, and he parted her thick thighs. Her puffy pussy glistened under the light, making him forget all about the desserts she'd made for him.
“Just as pretty n’ phat as I remember her,” he said, voice thick with desire. He watched her juices trail from her entrance, gliding down the curve of her ass.
Everything about him ignited her. Her body responded on instinct. She watched as he undressed slowly, leaving only his crisp shirt unbuttoned. Mocha skin stretched over taut abs and toned muscle, thighs powerful and promising. Between them, his long, girthy dick bobbed—tip slick with precum—reminding her exactly what kind of memory her body had been holding onto.
Her legs instinctively squeezed shut, trying to ease the aching throb.
But Smoke wasn’t having it.
“Mm-mm. Open those legs up, darlin’. I got business to handle,” he commanded, and she instantly parted them with a soft whine.
He eased to his knees, locking eyes with her as his lips hovered near her waxed cunt. “Just gotta get a quick taste from the source,” he murmured, his breath ghosting over her wet lips—then his tongue parted them, licking slowly up her slit.
“Uunh,” she moaned, chest rising and falling rapidly.
He groaned deep in his chest as he dove in, devouring her. His plush lips French kissed her folds with maddening slowness before latching onto her clit, sucking gently but firmly.
“S-Smoke, please... mmm, please fuck me,” she begged, her voice trembling with need.
His laugh was low and wicked.
After a few more torturous licks, he pulled away, leaving a thick trail of spit that mingled with her essence.
He paused to admire the view, stroking his thick length before placing it at her entrance and slowly easing inside. Their moans met midair as he leaned over her, kissing her deeply while his hips rolled in a slow pace. Her hands gripped his back, toes curling with each stroke.
“Fuuuck, you feel so good,” he groaned against her lips. Once she adjusted to his size, his thrusts grew faster. His mouth moved to her neck, ravishing it with hot kisses as he sank deep inside her.
“Ooh, Smoke...” Her mind was a blur of pleasure.
He sat back slightly, lifting her right leg and pushing it toward her chest, letting him reach new depths. Her mouth dropped open in a silent scream, eyes fluttering shut as he found her spot again and again.
“This my pussy, Annie? Hm?” he grunted.
Somewhere in the haze, his words reached her. “Yes, Daddy. Fuck, yes. Uuunh.”
He savored her moans, the way her body welcomed him—soft, warm, and perfect. He felt built for her, and she for him. They were high on each other.
“Look at me,” he demanded. “I want to see you when I make you cum.” His groans spilled out between thrusts. She struggled to keep her eyes open, but once their gazes locked, she couldn't look away.
Smoke glanced down briefly, watching their bodies meet. His shaft was coated with her arousal, the thick vein along the top pulsing with need. He enjoyed the bounce of her soft belly as he pounded into her, her toes stretching in her heels as pleasure overtook her.
Their eyes locked again, intensity thick between them, and when he hit her spot just right, his hand gripped her neck as her pussy clenched tightly around him.
“Let it go, baby. Mmm, cum for me,” he moaned.
And her body obeyed. She cried out his name as her orgasm took her under, one hand clutching the table, the other gripping his wrist. The feel of her coming undone around him triggered his release, and he spilled deep inside her, his head falling back as his groans joined hers.
His strokes slowed, riding the wave with her. Then he leaned down, kissing her softly. The kiss spoke for them both—how much they loved each other, how they were never letting go, how the future was theirs. She was his, and he was hers. No doubt about it.
And as they made love into the early hours of Sunday morning in Elijah’s bed, they didn’t just savor Annie’s cooking and each other—they healed.
Safe to say these two live in my head rent free. I hope you enjoyed my modern take on our favorite sinners. Leave a comment and tell me what you think. I'd love to hear from you. See ya in my next one! xoxo
