Chapter 5 #2
He swallowed hard, waiting for her to catch on.
With her phone out, ready to record and sing, Cyren really looked at the second cake.
It was small enough to fit in one of Boobie’s hands but intentional in a way that made Cyren’s chest tighten before her mind could fully process why.
It wasn’t as extravagant as Dre’s two-tier red-and-black one, but it was still nice.
Whipped white frosting wrapped around the cake with pale pink piping along the edges. Fresh strawberries and white chocolate curls sat on top, surrounding the words written in elegant cursive.
Happy Birthday, Nicole!
Cyren’s smile fell before she could stop it.
She looked up at Heavy so fast, her vision blurred. He avoided her stare for a second, not ready to face the emotions building in her eyes.
“Since you couldn’t get her one,” he offered.
Everything around her kept moving. People were still laughing, talking over one another, trying to organize themselves enough to sing or give a speech, but their voices started sounding distant and muffled.
Her eyes locked on the cake as Boobie carefully slid it beside Dre’s.
Cyren blinked rapidly, trying to keep the tears from falling.
She refused to break down in front of all these people.
She’d spent the entire evening, laughing harder than she had in months, feeling lighter than she had in weeks, and forgetting what this time of year usually did to her.
Grief had a way of reminding people it was still there.
That bitch was always waiting, even in the midst of good times.
Cyren’s bottom lip trembled despite her efforts to steady it, and she quickly looked down at her phone screen, pretending she was fixing the camera.
Heavy’s hand found the small of her back before her body could betray her, completely.
It was subtle and almost grounding, but not enough to stop the emotions climbing up her throat.
They siphoned through her so quickly, Cyren wasn’t sure what hit her. This was a different kind of pain. It was mixed with appreciativeness, yet layered with drapes of sadness because she wished she didn’t have this moment to be thankful for.
“I know today ain’t easy for you either,” he quietly said near her ear so only she could hear him. “Just thought she deserved to be celebrated, too.”
His words almost made her lose it. Heavy studied her profile, watching her fight tears she clearly didn’t want anyone to see. Making her cry wasn’t his intention.
Cyren sniffled, clearing her throat. “That was really thoughtful of you. Thank you.”
Her words were so hushed, quieter than they’d been all night.
A tear slipped before she could catch it, forcing her to turn her head and quickly wipe it away.
These weren’t the angry tears she cried earlier in the day while screaming into her pillow.
They came from being reminded that her mama mattered to people outside of her grief.
Nicole was still loved. She was being remembered in a room full of people, being honored rather than mourned.
“Before we light the candles and sing happy birthday, I just wanna thank everybody for pulling up last minute for my boy.” Big Dre’s eyes found Cyren’s. “And for Nicole. The irony of them sharing a birthday and both being gone is hard as fuck to accept, but we gon’ keep their names alive.”
“Hell yeah!” Boobie cheered. “Happy birthday to my mothafucking brother and auntie. On the count of three. One...two...three.”
The room erupted into song, but Cyren could barely hear it over the pounding in her chest. The lyrics, original and the Stevie Wonder version, floated around her in fragments as everyone sang.
Some of them were singing entirely too loudly and off-key.
Boobie was crying while trying to laugh through it.
One of Dre’s cousins kept clapping off rhythm, somebody in the back was recording with their flash on like they were at a concert, and a little boy with two braids to the back almost stuck his finger in Dre’s cake.
It should’ve felt normal. Like all the other birthday parties she had attended.
But Cyren stood frozen beside Heavy, staring at the two cakes sitting next to each other like her mind couldn’t fully process what was happening.
Dre’s loud, flashy two-tier cake looked exactly like something he would’ve requested.
Nicole’s was softer, and surprisingly one she would’ve loved.
Cyren’s vision blurred again. She blinked quickly and lifted her phone, forcing her trembling hand to steady long enough to record the moment.
If she didn’t, she knew she’d regret it later.
The screen captured smiling faces, candlelight flickering, and voices filling the room as they sang both of their names.
The reality of that cracked something open inside her.
My mama is really gone.
Gone in the kind of permanent way that still didn’t feel real some days.
Gone in a way that made birthdays feel cruel instead of celebratory.
Gone in a way that left Cyren carrying grief so heavy, she had convinced herself she had to do it alone.
But somehow, today, her extended family, and a man who’d quite literally walked into her whirlwind of a life, had made space for her pain without making her ask for it.
When Nicole passed, Cyren felt like she did as well to some family members. Some she’d been really close to growing up had just disappeared, and that hurt her beyond words. Heavy showing up today in more ways than one, nearly broke her down where she stood.
As soon as the song ended, Cyren locked her phone and slid it into the back of her shorts. Muttering a quiet excuse me, she rushed out of the room and toward the basement, where she knew a bathroom was.
The second she pushed the door closed behind her, everything she’d been trying to hold together came apart. A broken sob ripped through her chest as she gripped the sink, and her breathing turned uneven, almost instantly.
Air moved in and out of her lungs in short bursts that never felt like enough. Tears blurred her reflection as she stared at herself in the mirror, trying to calm down but failing miserably.
“Oh my God…” she cried, pressing a shaky hand against her chest.
She couldn’t breathe.
Or think.
Her body trembled under the pressure of too many emotions colliding at once.
Grief. Gratitude. Relief. Sadness. The overwhelming realization that Heavy had acted on something so close to her heart, something casually said while drunk, was dangerous.
And powerful. Fucking terrifying. He hadn’t just listened; Heavy heard her.
No one had heard her in a long time, and he’d actually done something to remedy it.
Tears dripped onto the counter as she struggled to catch her breath. Crying harder, she almost missed the soft knocks interrupting her spiral.
“Cyren?”
Her cries quieted for a second at the sound of his voice.
“Yeah?” her voice cracked.
“You good?” he asked, waiting. “Can I come in?”
She covered her mouth as another sob escaped her. Embarrassment mixed with everything else she was feeling. None of that mattered because she wanted him near.
“Y-yes,” she cried through trembling breaths.
Heavy slowly opened the door, stepped inside, and locked it behind him.
His chest visibly rose with a deep breath before cracking open at the sight of her tears soaking her cheeks faster than she could wipe them away.
Cyren’s watery gaze connected with his, and her breathing stuttered all over again.
“It’s not fair,” she cried, breaking down harder. “It’s not fucking fair.”
“C’mere,” he softly urged, closing the distance between them.
Heavy pulled her into him without hesitation, and Cyren folded into his chest like she’d been waiting all night to just exhale.
She clung to him, feeling safe enough in his embrace to fall apart.
Her cries came harder now, muffled against his shirt as his hand moved up and down her back in slow strokes.
“It’s okay. Get it all out,” he murmured, though they both knew that was a lie. Wasn’t shit okay right now, but it would be. Eventually. Even if for a moment. “Just breathe for me.”
Cyren shook her head against him. “I-I c-can’t.”
“Yes, you can.” His voice stayed steady and calm.
Heavy pulled back just enough to tilt her chin up. “Look at me.”
Her lashes were clumped together from tears, with her chest still rising too quickly.
“Breathe in,” he instructed.
Cyren tried.
“Slow.”
Her inhale shook.
“That’s it,” he whispered. “Again.”
Heavy talked her through it until her breaths stopped sounding like she was drowning. Until her body softened in his arms and her sobs turned into quiet cries.
Heavy wiped beneath her eyes with his thumbs. “Better?”
Cyren shook her head as her face crumbled. “She was my best friend,” she whispered.
The words hit Heavy so hard, his jaw tightened. His stomach flipped, knowing the one person who was supposed to be there, talking shit about his emotional ass in the bathroom, wasn’t. Heavy swallowed hard and pushed the grief back where it had been sitting all day. Cyren kept talking.
“She was all I had for a really long time,” she cried. “Even when I got older, it was still her. Every good thing that happened in my life, I called her first. Every bad thing, too.”
Heavy listened, swallowing down the knot of emotions in his throat.
“She was supposed to be here,” Cyren’s voice cracked.
“She was supposed to meet my kids one day. She was supposed to complain about me working too much and how we needed to add another stamp to our passports. She was supposed to be here for all the regular things, and she’s just…
” She broke off, shaking her head. “Gone.”
Heavy closed his eyes, briefly. Cyren’s tears had mentally and physically disturbed him, but her words almost made him break down right along with her.