Page 11 of Mama Si's Paradise

“Now, breathe in together with me. Come on, do it…” So, we breathed in. “And exhale. Loudly. Deeply…” My heart beat like a drum in my ears so I noticed when it began to slow down. I blinked and the pool to the side of which we’d stopped became visible again. The surface of the water was so still—blue like the sky, like it was trying so hard, standing so still just to mirror it. To mirror the world over it.

Like me. Like I’d done my whole life.

And now suddenly I didn’t want to be the pool anymore. I wanted to be the ocean.

“That’s better,” the woman said, her voice snaking its way into my ears. “Keep your focus on me and understand that it is okay to be overwhelmed.”

Oh,overwhelmedmight have been the understatement of the year. “I’m okay,” I lied, and that made her smile.

“The Paradise is no ordinary place. There is magic in the air here.” She raised her gloved hand, moving her fingers in rhythm with the melody playing in the distance. Slow and seductive. “It takes some getting used to, doll. But I need you to stay with me before I make you my proposition.”

I shook my head, goose bumps all over me. “I’m listening.”

“Tell me, then, why are you here?”

“For the open?—”

“No, doll, no. Why are you in my Paradise today?” And though the question was the same, I somehow understood exactly what she meant.

Again, I shook my head. “I needed a job and nobody else is hiring.”

“Why do youneeda job?”

“Because I need money.”

“But why, though, doll?Why?”

She knew. It was like she fucking knew all of my life’s story and she wanted me to spell it out for her as well.

“Because I need money to live,” I insisted, and she continued to smile as she slowly turned her head toward the ocean. It was indeed a lovely view, but now that I’d focused on her, now that I’d seen her, I couldn’t look away. Not from her sharp jawline or the tight curls of her hair or the way her brows extended almost to her hairline…

Mama Si raised her hand slowly, and her fingertips touched my chin before she turned to me again.

She was no longer wearing a glove, only red on her long, sharp fingernails, which was a bit strange. I could have sworn her gloves were part of her dress, one with it, not separate.

But then she whispered, “Tell me, doll. I do so love a good story. Tell me why you came to me today.”

The touch of her hand was so warm. Just the way the air lightened up all of a sudden. The way it became so easy to let go.

“My boyfriend kicked me out because the woman he was cheating with doesn’t want me in the apartment anymore. I have no money. I have nothing, and I can’t go back home,” I reluctantly said. It wasn’t a good story by any means, but she asked for it herself.

“To Detroit,” she said with a nod. “Where nobody waits for you.”

“Nobody.” Nobody who cared.

“I see.” She moved her hand away.

The air became thick again, just like that.

“Come, Fall Doll. Observe.”

She turned around and continued down the narrow path to the side of the trees, the glove attached to her dress covering her hand again.

More pools a levelbelow the yard. More music. More people. More of those girls with the shimmery skins and the gorgeous sequin bikinis.

A few who caught my attention sat to the side of a pool shaped like a heart, the tiles pink and white, which then made the water look pink, too. It must have come out of a dream. The loungers were white and the side tables as well, but the umbrellas seemed to have been dipped into pink glitter. They shimmered so beautifully.

Behind them, on a yet lower level, wasanotherpool, this one oval-shaped and half covered in pink foam. A round bar was in the middle of it, half into the water, and men and women were laughing and dancing and partying like they had no care in the world. They played a different kind of music here, the kind that makes you move.Electric,Brandon used to say.The kind of music that encourages you to make bad decisions.

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