And I just look at her. "Ain't no n***a alive deserve to be with a woman as pretty as you," I say, pulling a spliff from my pocket, lighting it then taking a puff. She keeps her chin steady, but I see it, the way her eyes keep drifting to me and then away again. Like she's trying not to get caught up in the tension of the moment. Our eyes lock in this intense stare, neither of us willing to be the first person to break it. I drink her in, inhale everything that has me hooked around her finger, and more. We're mere inches apart, our faces hovering together, trapped in the intimacy. "Yuh think yuh deserve mi?" she replies, cocking her head to the side, the corners of her lips twitching with something between mischief and what I pray is lust. I get ready to exhale, eager to release the smoke from my spliff. Before I can, her fingers find my face, pulling it even closer to hers. My next exhale becomes her next inhale, our lips exchanging the sinful scent. "Hell nah..." I drawl, grinning at her slowly. "But me already know me aguh spend di rest a mi life trying to. Yuh know seh ah only when yuh deh beside me, me breath easy?"

"Ah yuh decide fi tek set pon mi enuh" I scream at him. "Yuh sick inna yuh head Sarai? Two ah we know seh ah lie yah tell" he retorts with a sinister smile. Shame ah kill mi... "You knew what I wanted from the very beginning, but instead you decided to catch feelings" he shoots back at me. Feel like seh him juss ah seh dis fi provoke mi. Cyaa believe I ignored all of this man's red flags. "Better if yuh juss liff up from yasso doh, cause mi have work inna di morning" Is he really kicking me out right now? "Mi hate yuh wid everything inna mi" I exclaim, as tears build up in my eyes. My response doesn't seem to faze him though, a deadpan look never leaving his face. "You know your way out" he says to me, moving from his spot on the couch and heading towards the stairs. In seconds, I hear his bedroom door slam shut behind him, and soon the house is dead quiet.

Even though I don't look up right away, I feel him. His presence shifts the air, makes it heavier, like the sky right before a storm. A shiver runs down my spine, but I shake it off. I can sense he's here to handle our unfinished business, and I know he won't hold his tongue this time, not without our audience from earlier to keep him in check. "Why yuh really come back Jodie?" He's blunt, as always, and I can tell he's revving up for a fight. Him lucky. "I love Ms. Iva and I respect her for what she does, but dem neva send yuh gah school fi sell yam dung a market...Why'd you leave Kingston?" "I told you already, I'm using my PTO Knox" I dispose of the water into the grass, setting the wash basin up against the tank. He scoffs. "Liad, yuh done tell dah one deh already, betta yuh come up wid a next one." His eyes are daring, challenging me to come clean, but I can't. "Why you cyaa juss believe me? What's so suspicious about me needing time away from work?" I push past him, not yet ready to dive so deep into the unknown. He grabs my wrist, pulling me into his chest and trapping me there. The warmth of him seeps into me, setting off a fire under my skin. He doesn't ease up, but the pressure does something to me that I can't shake. I tell myself to take a step back, create some space, but I don't. I won't. "Because me know yuh, Jodie. Better than I know myself. I know you..." He presses his index fingers to his heart, his breath shallow as it cascades across my collarbone. "I thought we were better than this, I thought we could tell each other anything" I shake my head, my eyes closing as I inhale his scent, it's uniquely him. It's dangerous how familiar it is, how it makes my chest ache. I hate him for making me feel like this, I hate myself for wanting to be even closer than we are now.

Family is meant to build you up. Be the safety net you need in this cruel world, but sometimes the poison that started from the ancestors carries throughout generations. For Ebony Keys, being part of such a dynasty forces you to segregate for sanity. Not that you can find much of it anyway, especially when your supervisor is a micromanaging monitoring spirit. A girl just has too much on her left. But then to her right there's him. Kazmir. The man she seems to be bonded to - a connection held by an invisible thread. The Red String. They are destined to meet and profoundly impact each other's lives, finding each other regardless of time, place, or circumstance. This thread may stretch but it never breaks. It remains intact forever. The only downside to forever is... "You were never mine. Not back then and definitely not now." I half expected him to be throwing questions, weh mi mean? or why mi say dat?- but this time it was pin drop silent. His eyes spared me only a quick glance before he had to refocus, his breath remaining steady even with my declaration. "Ebony..." his voice was slightly elevated. "Kazmir?" Mines shook a bit afraid of what his comeback would be. "First is forever."

I can't bring myself to recognize the girl I'm staring at. Through her glassy eyes you can see that she's no foreigner to pain, whether physically, emotionally or mentally. Her hard expression warns people that she doesn't take their shit. But, her friends are the only ones to help her unravel and step out of the room that's trapped her with all her struggles and pains; they get her through all her enigma. They are all she needs. I stare at this girl, and I see myself. I see someone who is strong and determined, someone who needs to love herself and believe that she can be loved. The tears roll down my cheeks as I realize that 'this girl' is Amiane Alana Rochester, a girl who's been through a shit-load of fuckery. * In medicine pain relates to a sensation that hurts. If you feel pain it hurts, you feel discomfort, distress and perhaps agony, depending on the severity of it. Pain can be steady and constant, in which case it may be an ache. It might be a throbbing pain - a pulsating pain. The pain could have a pinching sensation, or a stabbing one. To Amiane, pain is all of the above. Can she handle any of it? [Completed Monday March 28, 2016]