Chapter 20
Chapter Twenty
In the corner of her bedroom, Zena had built a sanctuary.
It was a desk, a ring light, a keyboard, a guitar, and a microphone.
This was the one place where she didn’t have to hide her soul, just her identity.
She built an anonymous online presence under the pseudonym Algena, her mother’s name, Angela, spelled backward.
Her videos never showed her face. Only shots of her singing, playing the keys, or playing the guitar.
She had made peace with leaving the machinery of the industry behind in Atlanta. She no longer felt the pressure of a label. Her love for music remained, but being Alegna gave her creative freedom. No one could profit from her or her pain, and for the first time in her life, her music was for her.
She finished recording a video of herself covering a Miguel song, then posted it to her social media pages.
She then got out of bed and started getting dressed for work. She found her pants but came up short looking for her shirt.
“Mari, have you seen my work shirt?” Zena stood in the doorway of Amari’s room, already running behind.
“Check the dryer, Z.” Amari’s voice came from somewhere deep under the covers.
Zena grabbed her shirt from the still-warm dryer, threw it on, and headed to the bathroom mirror.
She took the rollers out of her hair and let her curls fall against her face.
This was one of the things she reclaimed in the years since Atlanta.
Her real hair and her real face. Nothing that belonged to someone else’s vision of who she was supposed to be.
She filled in her brows and applied a light coat of lip gloss.
“How do I look?” She stood in the bedroom doorway.
Amari peeked her head out from under the covers and gave her the once-over. “Good. Now go away.”
Zena stuck out her tongue and went to find her bag. By the time she was ready to leave, Amari had migrated to the kitchen, heading straight for the coffee pot.
“Have you seen my green notebook?’ Zena asked, looking through her tote bag.
“All those damn notebooks you got. I can’t even keep up.”
“This was a new one. Must be in my car.” Zena grabbed her keys from the key hook.
“Quez paid the rent,” Amari said without looking up from her coffee cup.
Zena turned around and gawked at her. “The whole thing?”
“He asked how much it was. What do I look like, telling him half?” Amari laughed.
“Thank you…Are you going to the shop today?” Zena asked, putting on her belt.
“Nah, I had a cancellation, so I'm just gonna catch up on some rest.”
“What do you want me to bring for dinner?”
“Sushi. Have a good day at work, boo.” Amari yawned.
“Done and thank you.”
Zena shut the door, walked down the steps, and went through the courtyard. She walked to the parking lot, got into her Hyundai, and pulled into Richmond traffic.
Seven years had a way of smoothing things out. She had a car now. She lived in a two-bedroom apartment with Amari, who had finished her cosmetology license and now rented a chair at a shop on the south side.
She faithfully made payments to Royal Reign on the 15th of each month toward her outstanding debt.
It was a quiet life. She had learned to be grateful for quiet.
She parked in the Dangerous Records parking lot and sat in the car for a moment before going in, as she always did. She got out, walked into the building, and confirmed her assignment on the clipboard.
The studio was dead on a Tuesday, she had learned to appreciate. She was just assigned to clean at this location a few weeks ago and was already loving the assignment.
The studio brought back memories of when she used to be in the booth.
Amari told her she should book studio time, but she never bothered.
She had made peace with that part of her life, the label and the whole machinery of being someone’s artist. Her love for music remained, but now she had the creative freedom she wanted.
The faint smell of bleach permeated the air. Zena was locked in, sliding the dingy mop back and forth across the tiled restroom floor.
Her coworker had called out tonight, which meant the whole floor was hers to clean, including the bathrooms, common areas, and the offices on the second level. Two hours or so if she kept a steady pace.
A pair of white headphones covered her ears as she moved seamlessly to the new task.
She was pushing the vacuum toward an office when her favorite song started playing. The electric guitar strings rang out, and her hips swayed to the beat.
Loudly, she sang, “What are you willing to dooo?”
A hand landed on her shoulder.
She spun. The vacuum handles hit the wall. Her phone flew against the floor.
She put her hand over her heart. “I’m so sorry…I didn’t know anyone was still here.”
Danger stood in the hallway.
She had seen him in passing in the short time she’d been here. Coming out of his office, moving through the lobby. She often admired him from a distance.
He was fine, like 90s fine.
He was always so put together. He wore perfectly tailored suits and the rose tattoo on his neck that peeked out whenever he moved his head.
“No worries,” he said. He crouched, picked up her phone, and handed it back. “You sound good. You mess with Rihanna?”
She nodded. “ANTI was a fucking masterpiece.”
He smirked. “I get that. What else are you into?”
She shifted her weight. “Well, I like a little bit of everything. Rap, Hip-Hop, Country, but R&B is my favorite.”
She was a lover of all music and learned to appreciate it in all forms.
He ran a hand through his thick beard. “Like Jodeci or Keith Sweat?”
“Something like that.”
He looked at her for a moment, not as men usually looked at her, but with genuine interest.
She raised an eyebrow. “I’m on the clock.”
“It’ll be quick.”
She left the vacuum where it was and followed him.
His office was exactly as she had left it every Monday and Thursday, spotless, with everything in its rightful place. She came in behind him, scanned the room for a mess, and found nothing.
She gave him a look that said as much.
He went to the desk and pulled open the top drawer.
He set her notebook on the surface between them.
The green cover with her handwriting on the spine. Volume 7. She’d filled six of them before this one, and this had been the one she’d been carrying for the last few months.
“Where did you find that?” she said.
“Second floor. Window by the east stairwell.” He sat back in his chair. “I waited for someone to come looking for it. Nobody did. So, I read it.”
Heat moved through her body. Her private thoughts have been seen by someone. Songs she told herself she wasn’t ready to share.
“Those are private,” she said.
“I know.” He maintained eye contact. “How can someone write like this and not let anyone hear it?”
“Easily,” she said. “You just don’t.”
“For how long?”
She looked at the notebook on his desk. “Seven years.”
His brows furrowed. “Why?”
She considered several answers. “It’s complicated.”
He nodded slowly. “I’ve seen you before. Before here.”
She looked at him.
“Lucky’s. About seven years ago. You sang Whitney Houston, then came out in an apron twenty minutes later to take orders.” He paused. I gave you my card.”
Everything arrived at once. She thought he looked familiar from the first week. If she remembered Lucky’s, that meant he remembered every encounter.
“You were just starting out, but look at you now,” Zena said. She didn’t know him well enough to say she was proud of him. From what she could tell, the studio was thriving.
Danger beamed. “Ya boy then came up, huh? I also remember the boutique on Broad. You had a disagreement with the owner.”
“Wasn’t really a disagreement.” She folded her arms.
“Hmmm. It was always you,” he said quietly. “Lucky’s. The boutique. I don’t think that’s an accident.”
The room fell silent.
“Can I have my book back?” She stepped toward the desk.
The corner of his mouth moved. “One condition.”
“What condition?”
He opened the notebook, turned it to a specific page, and double-tapped the title.
A rose.
“Sing for me.” He said simply.
She looked at the page. At her own handwriting. At the songs she’d written the first month she was back in Richmond. She wrote about everything she’d lost. She wrote the details of her trauma between the pages of that notebook.
Of all the songs in that notebook, he’d found that one.
“What?”
“Just one song.”
Zena thought about it for a moment. “One song. Two minutes.”
She sighed. “I can st-”
He put his index finger up to stop her. “Not here.” He came around the desk and grabbed her hand, leading her toward a recording booth. “Here.”
She felt the blood leave her face. She hadn’t recorded any music in a studio in years.
Danger eyed her curiously. “You, okay?”
“I haven’t been in a booth in a long time.”
“Can’t what? Sing? We already know that’s a lie. I heard you sing before.”
“That was different.”
“It’s just us.” His tone sincere. “Nobody’s listening. Do it for yourself.”
She looked through the glass at the microphone. It was almost as if it were waiting for her.
She pushed the door open. The headphones were cold as she slid them over her ears.
She stood at the mic and looked through the glass at him, settling into the chair at the board, making small adjustments.
A slow violin started to play. Then a beat came in.
Her heart was beating too fast.
“Let the beat play for a bit, and when you’re ready, just catch it,” he said into the microphone.
She closed her eyes.
Seven years of notebooks. Seven years of writing and putting her life together piece by piece.
She found herself in her mother’s living room, singing as if it were the only thing she knew how to do.
That girl was still in here somewhere.
She wasn’t performing for a crowd—it was just her and him.
She breathed in.
She breathed out.
And she let her out.
“I used to sit and imagine everything we could be
I used to follow your every word carefully
gave you all my love, maybe that caused you to flee?
It was always you and me, but then you added a we
two became three, and then you buried me”
She didn’t open her eyes until the last note was left on the track.
When she did, he was watching her through the glass, and she couldn’t fully read his expression.
She stepped out of the booth.
Her heart was still moving fast. “That felt… It’s been a long time since it felt like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like I’ve just been set free.”
He peered into her eyes. “And I wanted to fix that… if you would let me.”
“I-I don’t know…” Her eyes shifted to the floor.
“You don’t have to know tonight.” He leaned against the soundboard. “At minimum, you can record a few demos. Your voice, your songs, nothing that doesn’t come from you. No brand. Just what’s in those notebooks.”
“And when will I have time to do this exactly? I already work enough as it is.” Her mind was already going a mile a minute with excuses.
By now, they had moved out of the studio and made it back upstairs, near the spot where she was about to start vacuuming.
How much do you make an hour?” He ran his hand through his beard.
She blinked. “Excuse me?”
“How much do you make an hour cleaning the floors and taking out trash?”
“Not enough.”
“Just answer the question.”
“Eleven fifty. And I am due for a prom—”
“Bet. Give me your phone.”
She unlocked her phone and handed it over to him. He was typing for a few seconds and gave it right back. He made sure to save his number under Dmitri with a random smiley emoji.
“My assistant will contact you in a few days with a schedule.” He stood, straightened his jacket, and slid his phone from his pocket. “And the answer to your question about time –”
Her phone dinged.
She looked down.
A $ 5,000 Apple Cash notification from Dmitri.
She looked up.
He was already moving toward the elevator.
“Quit.”
With that, the elevators closed.
She stood alone in the empty hallway, frozen in time. She picked up the vacuum. Set it back down.
She pulled out her phone, typed her resignation, and sent it via email.
Then she picked up her bag, left the vacuum where it was, and walked out of the building into the night.
She had a new chapter to start.