Page 47 of Honey and Spice

Malakai gave a humorless half smile. “Some things are in the DNA.”

Malakai was focused on the road, jaw tight, loaded from holding on to something. I surprised myself by wanting to help him carry it. If I couldn’t do that then maybe sharing some heavy of my own would keep him company with it.

“You know, the reason I took my sister to the library after school was because my dad would be at the hospital with my mum. We visited on the weekends, but she made my dad promise that he’d keep visits with us sparse. She didn’t want us to see her like that. She got sick just before I started Year 12. She’s okay now but back then it was bad. Really bad.”

I swallowed and looked down at the sleeves of my sweater. This was why I didn’t allow myself to think about it, to talk about it, because the minute I did I was back at the kitchen table, Mum and Dad sitting my little sister and me down and telling us that it was treatable, that it was severe but that she’d fight it:we’dfight it.All we had to do was be strong. So, I was. I pressed everything down so my little sister, Kayefi, would be less scared, so my dad would have one less thing to worry about, so my mum didn’t need anything else to stress over. I would be strong. I would be the strongest, if that was the only thing I could do.

I exhaled deeply. “You know, sometimes I was so scared that I couldn’t even cry. It’s awful. You feel guilty for not being able to cry, but you’re frozen in this...fear.You’re suspended in your own sadness.”

“I know what you mean.”

I stared at him in gentle question, but Malakai shook his head. “Go ahead.”

I cleared my throat. “So, when I needed an escape, or when I wanted to make myself cry, I listened to music. I would listen to all this soul and R&B about heartbreak and yearning, and let it pour it out. It helped. It took me places, gave me space to look inside myself. Let me feel, when I was numb inside.”

I was speaking fast in order to avoid focusing on how much I was showing, on what I was showing, onwhyI was showing, when Aminah was the only person who knew this. Malakai was quiet throughout, his eyes intermittently turning to look at me, flitting between the road and my face.

“I think it’s another version of ‘my place,’ music. I get lost in it, find myself in it. I think that’s why I startedBrown Sugar.I guess I wanted to share that place.”

I caught myself. What was it about him that justtuggedwords out of my mouth? Something in the atmosphere between us dislodged truths from hidden places. I let out a small, nervous, possibly unhinged, laugh. “Ugh. Can we turn the music up? I’m sick of the sound of my voice.”

Malakai glanced at me, his strong features looking so tender in that moment that they hit me in the softest part of my heart. The junction between pleasure and pain.

“Thank you for trusting me with that.”

I hadn’t realized that was what I’d done until he said it.Trust.Was that what I was doing now? Trusting people? How had he made me do that? I wanted to regret it, for that cool feeling to tell me that I’d gone too far, put myself in danger, but the warmth that was beginning to feel like default around him stayed. I liked that he didn’t push, let my feelings sit, waited for me to say or not say. He had a good sense of sensing.

“I’m sorry for what your family went through. I’m really glad your mum’s okay.”

“Thanks. Me, too. It’s weird. After it happened it’s like I forgot how to not repress stuff. I spent so long doing it, it’s kind of like I can’t go back. I get scared that I can’t go back. I mean it’s fine for now, but I want to know that I know how tonotrepress stuff. I want that option. It freaks me out if I think about it too hard. Like, what if I never know how to do it? What if I’m permanently emotionally fucked?”

I could feel Malakai weighing my words. “I don’t think you’re emotionally fucked. You’re just selective with what you express. Protective. Just means that when you dochoose to share stuff it’s special.”

He’d caught me with one hand, quickly, simply. My lips parted to say words that refused to leave my mouth. Malakai, as if understanding my limited capacity for this sort of talk, let the pause stay natural, and continued speaking, as if he’d just made a mere observation, no judgments, no questions.

“I lied to you, by the way.”

The muscles in my stomach constricted. Malakai’s gaze stayed ahead of him, and his face remained still, straight. It was ridiculous. Ridiculous that we’d known each other, what, aweekand my body was already wrapping in on itself, guards ready to have their spikes up in self-preservation as if it was possible for him to hurt me. He shouldn’t have been able to. Weird how the tiny defiant bulb of hope made its presence known only when it shattered after plummeting to the bottom of me. It was fine. I barely knew him. This was professional. Friendship had seemed like a possibility and now it wasn’t. It was fine. Wasteman of Whitewell. Nothing to lose.

“About what?” I kept my tone level, void of emotion.

Malakai’s pause hung in the midst of Frank Ocean telling us that a tornado flew across his room. “When I said I only hung out with you to prove a point at FreakyFridayz, I was lying. I said it because I was pissed.You said all this shit about me and I just got in my head. I thought I might as wellbethat. I thought I was doing something, some sort of double bluff to prove that it didn’t matter what you thought of me, but I just ended up being a dickhead. And a Wasteman. I shouldn’t have said that. Me lying was because, for some reason, I do care what you think of me, on some level.” He rubbed the back of his neck but kept his eyes trained on the road. “I hung out with you that night because I wanted to hang out with you. That’s it. That’s the truth. There was no hidden agenda.”

Malakai was still looking straight ahead at the road, and he was usually so forthright in looking at me—even if only with tiny, discreet glances—that I knew it could only be down to nerves. The guards stood down and a surprising, overwhelming rush of ease and affection ran through me.

“Um, so do people call you Kai? Is that a thing?”

I saw Malakai relax against his seat in relief that I wasn’t going to make him go further. He said what he said. I heard what he said. What more to be said?

Malakai shook his head. “Nah. Not really. You’re the only one that’s ever called me that, actually.”

My cheeks flared. I was glad the last meal I had was perfect because I was about to shed my fucking mortal coil. “Shit. Well, that’s embarrassing. I’ll stop.”

Malakai eyes stayed focused on the road. “Why?” He twitched his shoulder. “Don’t.”

My smile had had enough of being trapped and spilled out, wide and brazen and messy, dripping everywhere. It soaked through my clothes and into my skin.

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