Ysis #2
I got myself together, threw on a cute little lounge outfit, and made my way downstairs expecting to find Mama Sina somewhere in the kitchen humming along to one of her old-school playlists.
Instead, the house greeted me with an unfamiliar stillness.
The breakfast dishes had been cleaned, the scent of fresh coffee lingered in the air, and sunlight spilled through the oversized windows overlooking the backyard, but there wasn’t another soul in sight.
“Mama?” I called out, glancing toward the family room.
Nothing. I wandered into the kitchen just in time to notice a handwritten note sitting beside the fruit bowl.
Went to run a few errands. Don’t down burn my kitchen.
- Mama Sina
“As if I’d even know where to start.”
With Kade buried in meetings and Mama Sina out of the house, the compound suddenly felt much bigger than usual.
I’d gotten so accustomed to always having somebody around that the quiet almost felt foreign.
The twins weren’t nearly as bothered by it as I was.
One of them rolled beneath my ribs as the other delivered a swift kick low enough to remind me they hadn’t forgotten about breakfast.
“I know, I know,” I laughed, rubbing my stomach. “Y’all act like I don’t feed y’all every two hours.” Before I could make my way to the pantry, my phone buzzed across the kitchen island. Maya ? Editor
“Hey, stranger.”
“There she is!” Maya’s cheerful voice filled the speaker. “Please tell me you ain’t stressing because I have your manuscript back in your hands.”
“You finished?”
“Girl, I finished yesterday.”
“I wanted one more read-through because I kept telling myself there had to be something I missed.”
“And?”
“And this story is really, really good.”
I felt my shoulders relax. “You ain’t just saying that because you love me?”
“I’m saying it because readers are about to fall in love with these characters the same way you did.
” I could practically hear her smiling through the phone.
“You’ve got something special here, Ysis.
The emotion is there, the chemistry is there, the pacing is there, and don’t even get me started on that ending.
I had to sit with my Kindle closed for a minute before I could gather myself. ”
“Thank you.”
“No,” she corrected. “Thank you for trusting me with it.”
I walked over to the living room windows, looking out across the backyard, rubbing slow circles over my stomach.
“I’ve been nervous.”
“I know.”
“What if people don’t connect with it the way I'm hopeing they do?”
“Trust me sis, they will. Stories like this don’t happen because somebody sat down and tried to write a bestseller. They happen because somebody had something worth saying.”
She paused before adding, “Finish these last little edits, send it back over to me, and let me do the rest. Then get ready.”
“For what?”
“For the world to meet your babies.”
“You talking about the book or the twins?” I laughed.
“Both.”
“I’ll get started today.”
“I know you will. Call me if you need anything.”
“I always do.”
“You better.”
We said our goodbyes before ending the call, leaving me standing there with an unexpected burst of motivation.
My eyes drifted toward the MacBook sitting on the kitchen island as I thought about the email Maya had just sent over.
After everything life had thrown at me over the last year, finishing this book felt like reclaiming a piece of myself I’d almost forgotten existed.
The only thing missing was somebody to celebrate with.
I reached for my phone again and called Kayla. It went straight to voicemail.
“Hmm.”
Next came Bree. No answer.
Lauren. Nothing.
Even Nia let the phone ring until voicemail.
I frowned at the screen before laughing to myself.
“Everybody must all be busy today.”
Shrugging it off, I carried my MacBook, a bowl of fruit salad and a glass of iced tea into the sunroom before curling up in my favorite oversized chair.
The room overlooked the backyard Kade had spent too much money landscaping.
Between the natural light pouring through the windows and the gentle breeze drifting in from the cracked patio doors, it felt like the perfect place to lose myself for a few hours.
Pulling the email up, I clicked on the attachment Maya had sent over and waited while the document finished loading across my screen. Seeing my own words staring back at me never stopped feeling surreal.
It was crazy how writing worked. Some days I felt like I had written the greatest story imaginable, and other days I convinced myself every word on the page belonged in the trash.
Months of sleepless nights, random bursts of inspiration, deleted chapters, rewrites, and talking myself out of quitting had somehow become a finished story.
Taking a slow sip of my iced tea, I scrolled to the beginning, determined to read it the way a stranger would instead of the woman who’d lived every chapter inside her head.
“Let’s see what all the hype is about.” I tucked one leg under me, adjusted the blanket across my lap, and began reading.
Over the next few hours, I managed to work my way through half the manuscript.
Between getting up every thirty minutes to use the bathroom, stopping long enough to answer the door for my DoorDash order, and repeatedly catching myself whispering, Girl...
you wrote that, I found myself falling back in love with the story all over again.
Maya hadn’t been exaggerating. Reading it from the beginning instead of one chapter at a time reminded me why I’d started writing in the first place.
There were moments that made me laugh, moments that made me cry, and more than a few that had me staring at the screen wondering how in the world those words had come out of my own head.
Just as I finished another chapter, Kade's name lit up across my phone screen. I smiled, answering the FaceTime.
“Yes, honey.” Setting my MacBook aside, I slipped my reading glasses off and looked up just in time to find my husband staring at me with that same ridiculous smile he always wore whenever he thought I looked pretty.
“I wanna take you out this evening.”
“A surprise date?” My smile instantly widened.
“I like that, Mr. Myles.” I studied his face through the screen while he shamelessly admired mine.
“What should I wear?”
“Don’t worry about it.” His grin grew even bigger. “I got Bella on the way to get you right.”
“Bella?” I frowned. Now I knew something was going on.
“Okay...now I know you really up to something because why can’t I wear what’s already hanging in my closet, Kade?”
“Because troublemaker, when we walk in that room tonight, I don’t need another nigga wondering whether my wife beautiful.” He paused just long enough for that devilish smile to spread across his face.
“I need ‘em leaving with absolutely no doubt she the finest woman God ever took his time creating.”
“Kade...” I rolled my eyes, fighting a smile.
“I’m serious.”
“I know you are.”
“Nah, you don’t.” He shook his head.
“See, I already gotta deal with these broke niggas looking. I refuse to have ‘em thinking they got a chance too.”
“You are so dramatic.”
“I’m territorial.”
“There’s a difference?”
“A huge one.”
Before I could tease him again, the doorbell echoed throughout the house. He looked toward the screen with a satisfied nod.
“That’ll be Bella.”
“You planned this.”
“I plan everything.”
“I noticed.”
“Go answer the door.”
“Bossy.”
“You love it.”
“Bye, Kade.”
“I love you.”
“I love you more.”
Ending the call, I slipped my glasses onto the coffee table, making my way to the front door.
The moment I opened it, Bella stood on the porch with the biggest smile on her face, a garment bag draped over one arm and two rolling makeup cases sitting beside her.
Standing next to her was another beautiful young woman carrying what looked like enough cosmetic products to stock an entire salon.
“Hey, gorgeous!” Bella beamed. “Kade sent me over here to get you right.” She motioned toward the woman standing beside her.
“This is my cousin, September. She’s helping me today and doing your makeup.”
“Yeah, he just called me.” I laughed, stepping aside to let them in. “Come on in.” The two of them rolled their cases through the foyer while I closed the door behind us.
“I suppose y’all don’t know what this occasion is for, do you?” I asked, cocking an eyebrow, trying to read Bella’s expression.
“I honestly don’t. That man called the shop, told me to clear my afternoon, handed me your measurements, and said, ‘Make my wife look like the billion dollars she is.’” Bella held up the garment bag with a grin. “He also insisted I bring this dress and refused to tell me anything else.”
“That sounds exactly like him.”
“So...” she smiled. “You ready?”
Truthfully, I had no idea what my husband had planned.
Then again, that wasn’t unusual. Kade had built an entire marriage around surprising me.
One week he’d whisk me away to another country because I’d casually mentioned wanting to see the ocean somewhere different.
The next he’d shut down a rooftop restaurant just because I’d joked about craving pancakes at midnight.
With surprise vacations, handwritten letters tucked inside designer bags, random flowers delivered for no reason at all, and the way he managed to celebrate ordinary Tuesdays like they were holidays, I’d learned there was absolutely no use trying to figure out what was going on inside that brilliant, overprotective mind of his.
Smiling, I decided to stop asking questions and simply enjoy wherever this day was leading.
“Come on,” I said, motioning toward the hallway.
“My beauty room’s this way.”