Tru Stories Presents

It is hard enough being a black woman in America in 2021. But to then learn your also a witch, well that is just too much to bear. What with the racism, sexism, and all the other “isms" we must put up with? Being a single woman during a pandemic might be just enough to make one want to throw in the towel by itself. Is it any wonder that beautiful black woman like good ole' Gloria had to write songs like, “I Will Survive"? It might have been set to a disco beat, but all us women sang those words from our souls.

Hope is a black woman. All 5’8” of cinnamon brown sugar, that made her the mesmerizing creature she was. She had dark eyes, like looking into the ocean on a moonless night, eyes that a couple of men have mistakenly fallen into...hard. She was long, but also well-padded in all the important places. Hope was crowned with a head full of jet-black riotous coils & curly q's, that fought their way down past her shoulders. All that melinated beauty came with its fair share of problems. Hope had just started the healing process after a long-drawn-out friends w/benefits situation turn horror show. She sat on the floor of her new little studio apartment, the owner of which allowed her to sign a lease on the spot, drinking her gas station wine straight from the bottle. She did not have glass, nor table, but what she did have was so much more valuable than furniture. She had peace. The things that happened to her before this move were…terrifying, exhilarating, liberating. Over the span of exactly 333 days, Hope grew dragon wings and learned to fly.

REWIND…

Hope Marie Hawkins has always been a strong soul. She was the only surviving triplet whose mother died giving birth to her and her sisters, while simultaneously taking the identity of her father to nirvana with her. Being a beautiful brown skinned girl, with dark ringlets and stormy eyes, Hope immediately found the grace of having a wonderful foster family. She had an older sister and 2 older brother that were foster children also. Her early years were fun and filled with family vacations, holidays, and good memories, all of which changed once her oldest sister, Al, got ready to leave home and head off to college in another country. When Al told the family that she had successfully applied to, and been accepted to Yale, we were all floored. Wasn't that a while continent away?

In our rather tight-nit family, there was one person who was not at all surprised by Alicia’s decision, our uncle Harry. Uncle Harry was that fun uncle, who had lived off-and-on in our pool house for as long as I could remember. I presumed this was because he was so fun that he could not keep a regular job. He was always asking people to invest in some get-rich-quick scheme or another. There were even whispers from the older family members that Uncle Harry had a drug problem. Although we called him Uncle Harry, he was really a cousin, twice removed. Alicia always warned me to never let myself be alone with Uncle Harry. She had always made a game of it when I was a kid. As I got older the game lost its amusing quality, but Alicia always stayed on my ass about staying away from Uncle Harry. At family functions, if she saw Uncle Harry trying to chat me up, she would always tell me that mom or dad were calling me, but when I got there, they did not know what I was talking about. I had a feeling something bad happened, but when I tried to dig deeper into that feeling, I was always blocked off from getting to the root of it. I was bombarded with thoughts like, "no way, that would never happen in our clan." or "mom & dad would go ballistic." I could not find an explanation in my young mind, so my young mind stopped thinking about it. I tried to talk to Al about it. All I remember of her explanation was, "I'll tell you when we get older." And that was exactly what she did 2 weeks before she flew off across the pond.

“Hopie…I need to talk to you. And I need you to listen and understand me. Then I need you to promise me that you’ll heed my warnings to your soul.” Alicia’s eyes were in their usual downcast position. Why am I just now noticing she never really looks at anyone when she speaks?

“Okay Al.” Alicia’s been Al for me since I met her at 2 years old, which was when I met the entire Hawkins' clan. I did not make my way to them until I was 2, almost 3 years old. My maternal grandmother tried to keep me as best she could, but from what she told the foster care agency worker, I looked too much like my mom. Oh, and she also said something along the lines of my sisters were haunting her.

“Promise me that when I leave", Al whispered, "you will follow suit. If not with me, then immediately after me. I’m talking like within 2 weeks.” Her eyes were raised to mine, to drive home her point, and I could see the familiar shadows hiding behind them. I do not remember when they showed up, but I know those shadows have been there for a long time.

“Wait…what? How do you expect me to pack up and move within 14 days’ time?" I was getting frustrated.

Al & I were almost 2 years apart, one year 11 months to be exact. But she was extremely gifted and graduated 2 years early with a full ride to Yale. While I was no slouch in the cerebral department, having already prepared for my first semester at Brown. THERE WAS NO WAY I was putting any kind of monkey wrenches in those well accomplished works.

“Then you can come with me now. Go pack and come with me. Mom & Dad won’t care, as long as you’re with me. I'll tell them that I need my baby sister to come with me, just temporarily, for moral support. You can go off to Brown from Yale. If that doesn’t work, I'll have them set up you’re housing early. I need you to be out of his reach Hope, do you understand me!”

“What are you talking about!” I shriek. "Out of whose reach Alicia?"

“Please don’t raise your voice.” She shushed me. I'm losing my shit because I start to feel the familiar bite of secrecy that always accompanies her energy. Al has been an almost recluse for years. While she is one of the most intelligent people I know, she suffers so badly from agoraphobia, that she only leaves the house maybe twice a month. “I can’t speak to you if you’re going to act like a child and scream.”

My sister, my Al, battled mental disease since she was 9 years old. I remember the two of us playing as little girls, I remember us in the park, I remember us in the playground at school, I remember us playing in the yard, but then she left. Since she left, there is no more outside play. I regard her and realize that I am just noticing that she looks way older than her almost 17 years. She carries herself with the same caution as she carries her baggage and I stop to make a familiar wish with all that I am, that she finds someone one day to help her unpack it.

“Look,” I reach out and touch her shoulder, sparking that sister bond that’s there despite the lack of a blood tie. “You’re just going to need to come out & tell me, and know that I will do as you ask, to the best of my ability.

Alicia closes her eyes, opens her mouth, and described in way too much detail, years of sexual and emotional abuse wrought upon her by her flesh-and-blood uncle Harry. The things my sister told me happened to her were beyond horrible, they were monstrous, they were barbaric, but they were nothing compared to what came out of mouth next...

“And you can never tell another living soul or let on that you know anything about this. You will swear this to me now, or your dead to me.”

My sister, whom despite coming to be my sister, came by way of another mother’s womb, was still my sister. My sister, who I would kill and die for, was telling me to STFU or be lost me forever. For y'all that don’t know Jasmine Alicia Mae Hawkins, when she says she’s done with someone or something, you had best believe she’s DONE with that shit.

I thought for a split second, worked that superior intellect for all it was worth, and could not come up with one single way around what she demanded, couldn’t find a way out of the corner she had backed me into. I lowered my eyes, a small piece of me dying as I nodded my consent. I immediately felt dirty. I felt shameful. Like I was aiding and abetting uncle Harry's deplorable actions. My mind was screaming in my head, "NO! THIS ISN'T RIGHT! THIS CAN NOT STAND!"

It was then that I heard it.

A voice. Inside my head, my heart, and my soul all at the same time. It was whisper quiet, but so powerful that I had to stop and ask Al if she had heard it too. The voice was everything. I could feel the voice, it felt like a sweater still warm from the dryer, like your bed on a rainy day. It covered and calmed me. I could taste the voice, like spicy sugar and life. The voice said,

“We will get our just deserts.”

Although I did not know from whence this voice came, I knew that this voice spoke pure truth. I knew that this voice was the beginning of something. I didn't know what that something was, but I knew it would change me in ways that I never would expect, and would ever think to fathom. I knew that just those few words had changed me inside, and more was to come.