Like a Sister(8)

Since it was Wednesday, I should’ve been just leaving my Strategic Management of Nonprofit Organizations class, trying to decide if I should swing by Target on my way home since I was almost out of Eco Styler gel and needed my two cornrows to last another two weeks. Instead, I sat on the subway to Mel’s office, reading each and every Shade Room comment, restraining myself from responding to all of them with the same message: “Fuck off.”

Track marks.

Desiree hated needles. She didn’t even have her ears pierced. The News article hadn’t mentioned anything about heroin. Just the cocaine found in her purse. So where had it come from? And where had it gone?

I didn’t know the answer to either question. What I did know was if Desiree had resorted to shooting up heroin, then she was lost in something larger than the Bronx. Something major had changed in the two years since we’d spoken. Had her early morning trip uptown been a last-ditch effort to ask for help?

I wondered if the cops would give her cell back. Since I’d blocked Desiree’s number and resorted to only stalking her social media accounts, it would be the only way to know if she’d tried contacting me.

I wanted to see everything. Texts that had never made it to me. Texts that had made it to everyone else. Not to mention the calls I hadn’t picked up and the ones she had. Hopefully they’d bring the cell to the meeting.

I could’ve taken the D down to 42nd and been closer to where I needed to be. Instead, I took the 4 to Grand Central and walked over to Bryant Park, hoping the weather—high 80s, sunny, slightest of breezes—would cheer me up.

It didn’t.

My mom and I used to hop on New Jersey Transit and go to Bryant Park every winter. We’d freeze our Black asses off integrating the ice-skating rink, then warm them back up again with hot chocolate from a holiday pop-up shop. I hadn’t spent much time here since I was a kid. Too commercial—from the office buildings to the tourist attractions. Times Square and Rockefeller Center were both a subway stop away.

Kat texted me on the walk over. She’d read about Desiree. Wanted to see how I was holding up. Technically, Kat was my best friend, if you could still be best friends with someone you hadn’t seen in a year. My fault. I’d blamed school enough times she’d finally stopped asking me to hang out. I sent a thank-you, told her I loved her and lied for the millionth time about how we should get together. She sent hearts in return and asked if we needed her to drop food off or anything.

Pierce Productions overlooked the park. A glass skyscraper next to a glass skyscraper across the street from a glass skyscraper. You didn’t identify them by numbers as much as by names. Salesforce. Bank of America. Building next to Bank of America. But they were never just buildings. They were always “towers.”

I gave my name to the security guard in the lobby, then followed his detailed instructions to the fifteenth floor, where Mel ran his media empire. Tam had been inviting me to “stop by” for two years now, claiming she’d put me in the system so I wouldn’t have to call ahead.

I hadn’t taken her up on it, but I’d seen enough pictures to know what to expect. The hallway lasted at least thirty feet. Everything was white—including the receptionist at the end. Music blasted. I immediately recognized the song. Mel’s first artist and hit. The track was accompanied by the music video. Unseen devices projected it everywhere. On the walls, the floor, and the ceiling. But just as you were about to get into it, the song switched. I recognized the next one too. It was from the same period. I made my way to the receptionist as the songs—and videos—continued. It was a literal trip down the memory lane of Mel’s greatest hits. It took everything I had not to sprint down the hall like I was escaping a haunted house.

Mel always knew good music, even if he didn’t always produce it. One advantage to being Mel Pierce’s daughter was his collection. He was old old-school, preferring twelve inches of vinyl over tapes, CDs, and streaming. Though he lived in a big-ass apartment, he continued to store his records in his mama’s house in the Bronx. The same place he’d stored me.

The summer I turned eight and Desiree turned five, my mom was doing an internship at a law firm while Mel and Veronika were off accompanying Free Money artists on their first world tour. Instead of taking me to class with her, my mom let me stay at Gram’s. I’d known I had a sister. We just hadn’t spent time together. But Gram had mentioned her often. And I’d seen her in more than one “perfect family” photo in Ebony, Jet, and Vibe.

I’d thought I would hate Desiree, that I would be jealous, but it was an instant connection. Gram and Aunt E gave us free rein over the house, the yard, and the music collection. We’d pick an album at random, plop it on the record player, and just dance our asses off while laughing ourselves silly. Usher was a particular favorite.

Those were the things I had missed most after walking away two years ago. You’d think—maybe even hope—having already killed our relationship would make this all easier. I’d already sworn I would never talk to her again. But now that I couldn’t ever talk to her again, I realized I’d always known I was lying. That I would’ve eventually picked up the phone. That even though we hadn’t been talking, I’d known she was still just a call away.

The receptionist silently watched my approach with a smile that looked like she’d yanked off the Crest Whitestrip right before I’d gotten out of the elevator.