CAFÈ AU SUCRE ROUX

† The Priestess

A Slow-Burn, Smoke & Annie Backstory

Annie, an 18-year-old from New Orleans, moves to Clarksdale with dreams of building a life all her own. There she meets Smoke, a 21-year-old war veteran with a dangerous reputation. What grows between them is sweet, sticky, and Southern— a smoldering love set against a world of bootlegging, Hoodoo, and blues.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9 - Coming Soon

The Mile High Club

A Modern, Alternate-Universe, Sinners Story

A unique opportunity pulls Athénaïs "Annie" Alexander, a seasoned flight attendant with a harrowing past, out of her comfort zone, and into a world of danger, intrigue, and the orbit of some notorious twins.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5 - Coming Soon

Netflix & Chill

Modern Smoke & Annie Smut

Smoke and Annie have been seeing each other for a few months now. They’ve kissed, even done some heavy petting. Lately they’ve been spending more time together alone, each time getting hotter and heavier. But tonight? The side effects of a little weed and liquor turn their Netflix & Chill date into something freaky.

Read Here

She Was Mine, First.

Modern Smoke & Annie Moore + Family One-Shot

Elijah “Smoke” Moore is tired of sharing his wife Annie with their kids, especially his greedy ass, 9-month-old son.

The hands of the grandfather clock ticked quietly in the front room of the boarding house, but to Annie it sounded like gunshots. 

It was late. 

The house had fallen into its nighttime rhythm— mostly quiet except for the random sounds of boarders stirring in their rooms. A cough from behind a closed door. The creak of a bed frame. The slow pouring of water into a basin. The smells of supper still lingered like they always did this time of night, settling into the walls like a layer of time. The fragrant aroma of clove hung over top of everything, bursting through the air every time Aunt Della parted her lips. She chewed on it slowly. Methodically. Watching Annie as her fingertips smoothed gently over the leather of the sketchbook cover. 

Annie sat on the couch across from her. Her eyes looked full of possibility as she flipped through the paper, the corners of the pages sitting crisp beneath her thumb.

Something was on Aunt Della’s mind. 

Annie could feel the warm flush of her skin cooling under the quiet intensity of her gaze.

Her voice broke through the silence. “He been comin’ ‘round a lot lately.” 

There it was. 

Annie looked up.

Aunt Della stirred her drink in her hand, ice cubes clinking against the sides of the mug. “How you feel ‘bout that?” she asked. Then she took a sip.

Annie’s head lowered. Her first instinct was to not respond. Her second was to deflect. Her third was to ask why. 

“Baby,” Aunt Della probed. “I been alive too long. I know what it means for a man to stand around tryin’ to make himself useful.” She crossed one leg over the other, her ankle bouncing with anticipation like she knew this was going to take a while.

Annie’s mouth curved despite herself. She turned a page in her sketchbook, smoothing the spine down harder than necessary with her palm. 

“You like him?” 

Annie still couldn’t look up. It was like her words got stuck in her throat. The more Aunt Della talked, the more Annie felt caught off guard.

“Annie Royal, I ain’t talkin’ to myself,” she said sternly.

Annie’s head snapped up. She opened her mouth. Then closed it. Then opened it again. “I don’t know,” she said finally, in a hushed tone.

Aunt Della rolled her eyes. She let the words sit between them long enough for Annie to hear how untrue they sounded. 

“Yes you do,” she answered back. 

Annie looked down again, her throat tightening with something she didn’t have the name for. Aunt Della watched her for a moment, admiring how softly the lamp light curved around the edge of her face. It was smooth. Innocent. There was a vulnerability in her that she wanted to protect. But as much as she wanted to shield her, she knew she needed to be ready for the day the world came knocking. 

But she was so young. Barely 18. 

She remembered herself at that age. She remembered how quickly she got swept up in her husband’s kind words and gentle eyes like it was yesterday.

It happened so quickly. Marriage. Mississippi. A son. 

She thought about the day her husband came back from town hall with the deed to their house. He painted the outside a rich buttery yellow and whitewashed the shutters with a puffed up chest. Dug out the underground storage with his bare hands, a shovel, and a strength that could only be explained by a feeling he’d never experienced before in his lifetime. Pride. Ownership.

The boarding house became a sanctuary without a steeple. They took in anybody who needed a hot meal and a place to lay their heads. Musicians, preachers, teachers, people trying to get up North. And two little boys trying to escape their father’s fists.

Elijah and Elias.

She met them young. Back when their father, Adam Moore, went door-to-door in town, strumming his guitar and sipping hooch straight from the bottle while his young sons walked around hungry. 

She knew them before they went by Smoke and Stack. Then she watched them earn those nicknames in blood, gunpowder, and grit. And now Smoke was coming around her sister’s granddaughter. Her only great-niece. 

She watched Annie nervously brush her thumb against the edge of the sketchbook and sighed. “I ain’t tryna fuss at you,” she clarified. “I just wanna know where your head’s at, and how you feel when he’s around.” 

A moment passed. Then two. 

Aware. 

That’s how Annie felt when he was around.

Aware of herself. Aware of him. Aware of the space between one breath and the next. Like something inside her had started listening before she knew that there was sound. 

Loose.

Not in the way men and women meant when they whispered about such things. 

But in a way that words just came out of her mouth before she could stop them. She couldn’t carry on with him like she could with Aunt Della right now—taking the hard parts and making them sound just right so she didn’t reveal too much too soon. He got the truth before she could dress it up. And she hadn’t taken the time to figure out why quite yet. And that scared her. But it made her feel something else, too.

Seen.

She was holding back. Aunt Della could see that with her eyes closed. She could see the wheels turning in Annie’s head like she never got a chance to sit with her feelings long enough to name them. But she already had her answer. It was in the way she held the sketchbook to her chest before remembering she wasn’t alone.

She tried a different angle.  “He good to you?” 

“Yes, ma’am.” Annie could reply quickly when she could answer without thinking too hard. 

“Respectful?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“He pressure you?”

“No, ma’am.”

“I feel like—” Annie paused, embarrassed by the honesty that sat right on the tip of her tongue. She was fighting to keep it to herself. Not because she didn’t want to be honest, but she felt like words couldn’t do her thoughts justice. And she felt foolish that she felt any kind of way to begin with. “He makes me feel….”

Aunt Della let out a sigh. “You ain’t gotta explain it yet. Sometimes when the feeling’s good, you can’t explain it right away. You gon’ find the right words when you ready.”

Annie nodded once. “Yes, ma’am.” 

“You intact?” 

“Yes ma’am.” Heat climbed up her neck as she held the sketchbook to her chest.

“Don’t let him take it, if that’s not what you want.”

“Yes ma’am.” 

A quiet beat passed. “If it is—” Her breath hitched when she cut herself off. 

It felt like the room held its breath. Annie, too. 

“Nevermind.” Aunt Della shook her head like she regretted saying anything.

Annie frowned, her lips poking out. “What is it?” She asked. Her voice was cautious, but not in the way it had been earlier. It was more braced than anxious. 

Aunt Della looked at Annie with a fierce protectiveness. “What you think about him?” she asked quietly.

Annie twisted her lips, searching for something that wouldn’t feel foolish the second it came out of her mouth. “At first I just thought he was quiet,” she said finally. “Not empty quiet, but the type of quiet that’s always holdin’ somethin’ back.”

Aunt Della’s eyes stayed on her.

“But when he’s with me, when he look at me…” Annie’s voice softened despite herself. “It feels like…the rest of the world disappears. And it’s just us. Just me and him. And he can let go.”

Aunt Della didn’t answer immediately, and her face didn’t change. The silence felt worse than being questioned. “And how you think he feels about you?” 

“Ummm….” Her eyes flitted around the room nervously.

“The truth do just fine.”

Aunt Della set her mug down on the coffee table with a soft thump. Then she sat back and crossed her legs again, twirling that ankle in the air in slow, deliberate circles. 

“Truth is…” Annie started. “I think he’s taken a shine to me. He got me this.” She rubbed the cover of the sketchbook, her cheeks warm flushed with warmth and a hint of embarrassment trying to explain herself. “He comes around, he sits with me, he listens–really listens–to what I say. And he don’t forget,” she said, remembering the note he left her, and the conversation that sparked the words he left.

“What’s all this?” Smoke asked, gesturing to the drawings sprawled across her quilt under the magnolia tree.

“Drawings,” she replied sarcastically.

Smoke sucked his teeth. “I know that,” he tutted. “What they for?” 

“Helps my memory. Drawin’ things. Writin’ them down.”

“So you remember what they look like?”

“Kinda. So I remember what they for.”

Annie glanced over, bracing for laughter, amusement, or even teasing. She got none of it. When she found Aunt Della’s eyes she wasn’t smiling. She didn’t laugh. She almost looked sad, but not in a way Annie fully understood. 

She simply crossed her arms across her chest and arched a brow in challenge. “So you think that means…what?” 

The bluntness felt like a physical thing. It cut sharply through the room like a knife slicing through a thick fog.

Annie blinked. “Ma’am?” 

“You think every man who buys you a little somethin’ or listens to you talk, means to do right by you?” 

Annie blinked twice this time.

All of a sudden, she felt every bit of eighteen. 

Not a child anymore, but not grown in the ways the world seemed to demand all at once. 

Smoke wasn’t the first to come around. She had a few who called on her back in New Orleans. Always respectfully, always in the proper way. 

She had a freedom up here that she didn’t have living under the roof of her very protective family, and that freedom allowed her to get to know Smoke in a way that would have been damn near impossible back home. 

But he was always respectful. Never pushed. Always made sure she felt comfortable. That meant something to her. Time. Energy. Intention.

She kept getting four when she added two and two together.

But maybe Aunt Della was trying to tell her she wasn’t too good at math.

“I’ve known the twins since they were real young. Seen ‘em grow into bright young men. Good-lookin’ young men that every woman in this town want a piece of.” She paused. “And men like Smoke…they can make a girl feel like the whole world done gone quiet around her. But that don’t mean the world ain’t there no more.” 

Annie’s ears had already perked up at the mention of his name. But now she listened even more intently. 

Aunt Della’s gaze sharpened. “Don’t assume nothin’ based on a man’s silence. You’ll get yourself in trouble fillin’ in blanks that ain’t yours.”

The flame of the oil lamp shifted behind its glass, throwing a soft tremble across the wall. “You got dreams. Hopes. You want your own shop right?”

Annie’s chin lifted with a defiant certainty. “Yes ma’am.”

“Good. Don’t you put that on hold for him, or any man. If he really likes you, he won’t keep you from it.” Her voice got lower, like she wanted to say something hard but make it sound sweet. “Smoke ain’t a man who say much unless he mean it. But if a man really wants you, he’s gonna spell it out plainly.”

The words moved through Annie slowly, crawling up her spine and down her chest where her heart thumped a little faster. She traced her thumb along the back cover, feeling the grain of the leather beneath her fingertip. 

The ceiling creaked softly above them. Another lodger, maybe. Or just the house settling into itself. Crickets chirped low in the grass while the night wrapped around them, fully aware of what truth hid behind her silence. It chose not to soften it. 

“I understand,” she finally said, quietly.

“Now gone’ to bed. I know you tired.” 

Aunt Della stood. Annie did, too. Aunt Della turned towards the kitchen, then thought better of it and turned to grab Annie’s forearm before she got too far. She grabbed her face gently, staring at Annie with warm brown eyes. “I ain’t sayin’ all this to scare you. I’m sayin’ it ‘cause I love you.” 

The tightness in her chest eased a bit. “What were you gonna say, when you stopped yourself?”

Aunt Della’s eyes softened. “It’s not for me to say,” she said softly. “But you’ll find out soon enough.”

She pulled her into a hug then released her. Annie moved slowly towards the staircase, purse slung tightly over her shoulder, sketchbook secured underneath the crook of her arm. 

“Goodnight Aunt Della,” she called out.

“Goodnight, Annie.” 

Annie started up the stairs. Halfway up she paused, her fingers tightening their grip on the banister. She looked back toward Aunt Della who was halfway to the kitchen. 

“Thank you,” she said, just loud enough so she could hear it.

The night was dark and tonight that darkness felt loaded. The sky was bare. No stars, just an endless stretch of shadow that pressed against the windows, barely softened by the faint glow of the waning moon. 

Annie laid in her bed just staring. First she counted the cracks in the ceiling. Then she traced the lines on the walls with her eyes.

The words of Aunt Della replayed in her head. That and the feeling that something laid quietly underneath their conversation. Something Aunt Della knew and refused to say. 

Two questions came to mind. 

What was Aunt Della holding back from telling her? 

What made her change her mind?

It took a while for Annie’s eyes to get heavy while her thoughts refused to shut off. Something settled in her bones at that moment. 

Somewhere beyond the boarding house, Smoke—Elijah—had come and gone and left something behind. Something more than just a pretty sketchbook and a thoughtful note. 

Morning light came soft through the windows, a pale gold that stretched across the floorboards, taking on the pattern of the lace curtains. Annie stood at her dresser with her nightgown hanging off one shoulder, a satin scarf sliding slowly down her braids. 

She counted under her breath, the silver coins plunking against the thin metal of the container where she kept her money. It was a tea tin, a small one that smelled like mint no matter how many times she tried to air it out. The last coin clinked against the others in the tin. She closed the top of it, taking a moment to write the total on the back cover of her sketchbook. She kept a running tally there, one that she copied over from a piece of scrap paper she used to keep track of her earnings before last night. 

Annie set Smoke’s note on her dresser. She traced her fingers over the words, brushing her hand over his name on the paper. The ink pooled thickest where he dotted his “i,” and when she touched it, it stained the part where flesh met fingernail. Aunt Della’s words from last night crossed her mind as she watched the ink bloom and spread across her fingertip before slowly sinking into the skin. 

Crossing the room, she knelt near the loose floorboard in the corner that lifted without a creak. She tucked the tin into the hollow space and started to fit the wood back into place. Then she hesitated. Not because she doubted herself, but because she wanted to imagine what it would be like for a spell. Her own shop. A modest house with blue paint. She’d sell and barter healing herbs and medicines that ward off sickness and bad spirits, the shelves lined top to bottom with jars, vials and bottles of them. A long table, polished smooth by her own hands, would stretch proudly across the front room where she’d serve meals to sharecroppers and passing workers. Dried roots tied in bundles would hang from the rafters in a shed off to the side. People would come to fill their bellies and stay for something more.

That was hers. 

Annie left New Orleans before dawn, dust kicking up from the soles of her shoes and darkening the hem of her dress. She kept her money folded small, eyes cast down the way she was told to when she was traveling alone. A few things she held close to her chest— her great-grandmother’s bible, some knick-knacks, and a few letters. A burlap sack hung from her shoulder, holding some other possessions she held dear. An old trunk held the rest.

The Mississippi River laid before her, wide and brown. She boarded a boat with other people heading upriver, women with their satchels, men with their hats pulled low to keep the mosquitos away. Annie hung onto the railings, watching the trees dip their roots in the water, their branches swinging heavily in the wind like they’d seen too much. The depot was next. When she boarded the train, she closed her eyes and said a prayer underneath her breath— one for the journey, one for the destination. 

She spent the night in a Colored waiting room with families piled on top of each other and solo travelers with tired eyes wearing all their possessions.

The next day was another train. Cotton fields stretched wide beyond the thick glass of the windows, the grim landscape broken only by oak trees and tiny shacks lined up in a row. They passed by another stretch of land mostly hidden behind the treeline, but she could feel it— water, soil, roots, foundation. 

An elderly man, skin the color of pralines, sat on his porch watching the train go by. Striped overalls with the clasps unbuckled, white shirt with the sleeves rolled, straw hat, heavy work boots— but what caught her attention was his eyes. One was completely covered in cataracts. The other one looked sharp enough to hold the sight of four people. The man sucked on a stick of sugarcane while a hound dog sat by his side, tongue out, panting hard under the burn of the Mississippi sun.

Then he was gone. 

All that remained were the muted shades of nature as the train trekked through the countryside.  No house. No dog. No sugarcane. But Annie could remember every detail, even the dusty blue denim of the man’s overalls. And the expectant look in his eye.

She woke up with a jolt, spine snapping straight where she was slumped over in her seat.

The train cabin was quiet. Most people were asleep, some lingering in the corners, some just starting to wake up. Nighttime was on the horizon. Shades of orange and pink swallowing what was leftover from the day. 

“How long I been out?” she asked the woman next to her.

The woman thought for a moment. “Since we got on, I reckon.” 

“I been sleep this whole time?”

“Mhmm,” she confirmed. “Must’ve had you a long day…” 

“Must’ve…” Annie frowned, rubbing the sleep from her drowsy eyes. She looked out at the land through the thick, cloudy windows of the train cabin, and the land looked back. 

Time passed and she still remembered it all. The land. The house. The way the sun slanted just right through the trees. The man. How he looked like he was waiting for something. How real he felt, even after she realized she was dreaming. When she finally pressed the floorboard back into place the room became itself again. A bed. A dresser. An altar. And a young woman kneeling on the floor daydreaming about possibilities.

One state over, the road began to flatten towards Memphis. It was bad in places, rutted deep from wagons, farming equipment, and animal hooves. Dust rose up behind the truck in low brown puffs, sparkling in the light before disappearing up into the trees.

Smoke drove with both hands steady on the wheel. Stack rode beside him, one arm hanging lazily out the window, hat tipped low against the glare.

“So you gon’ tell me?”

“Tell you what?”

Stack sucked his teeth. “Don’t do that.”

Smoke kept driving. Stack waited him out. That was the thing with twins, when one soul splits into two. Silence didn’t work on somebody who already felt it on the inside.

“Annie,” Stack blurted after a while.

Her name shifted something in the cab. Stack could tell by the way Smoke’s eyes narrowed slightly, his hands tightening around the wheel all of a sudden, the leather groaning under the force of his grip. 

“What about her?”

Stack barked out a laugh. “So, it’s like that?”

The road curved just ahead of them, pecan trees crowding close to the edge on either side of the road like they were trying to listen in on their conversation. 

“I talked to Della,” Smoke admitted. He looked over to Stack, whose smile eased a bit where he sat.

“About?”

Smoke didn’t reply.

Stack sat up fully. Back straight, slouch gone. “For real?”

Smoke shot him a look. 

Stack leaned back slightly, studying the side of Smoke’s face. “Damn,” he trailed off. “What she say?” 

It was the day before they were set to head to Memphis, and the early evening sun poured molten gold through the back windows, warming the floorboards of Della’s kitchen. Smoke stood in front of the counter watching her slice a batch of onions. Della stood on the other side, her arm moving like the wheels of a locomotive, the movement slow, methodical, and sharp because she’d done this a thousand times. 

“I been meanin’ to ask you somethin’,” he said, voice steady. 

Della kept her pace, she didn’t slow or stop. “That right?”

“That’s right.” 

“This ‘bout my girl?”

“It is.”

Della stopped what she was doing. She wiped the knife off on a kitchen towel, then set it down on the counter.

“I was hopin’ I could court Annie,” Smoke said firmly. “Proper like.” 

“What you know about courtin’ a woman proper?” Della asked. She crossed her arms. 

Smoke took his lick. He didn’t flinch.

“She ain’t just anybody,” Della said before he could respond.

“I know,” Smoke replied. Something in him leaned forward before his body did. “I wanna do it right. If she’ll have me.”

Della looked over Smoke carefully. For the lie in his eyes. For the joke tugging at the corner of his mouth. For the doubt in his posture. “You talk to her ‘bout this already?”

“Not yet.”

“You need to.”

“I will. Wanted to ask you first.” 

She eased her weight off one hip, and put it on the other. “She ain't built for no half steppin’.”

“I don’t do half.”

Della’s eyes narrowed for a second, then relaxed. “That girl want somethin’ of her own,” she said. “Don’t know if she told you that yet.”

“She did.”

“Well.” Her voice came out soft but sharp. “She got powerful hands. Hands that ain’t meant to be locked up under some man’s roof waitin’ for permission. If you wanna court her, you better not try to shrink her.”

“I won’t,” Smoke replied. 

Della picked up her knife again. She sliced into an onion slowly, the thin, methodical rhythm of metal hitting wood echoed in the otherwise quiet room. 

Lodgers started to walk in from their work shifts, heading to their rooms or back out to the porch where a few of them were squatting over a dice game. A few of them poked their heads into the kitchen to ask about supper. 

Smoke hadn’t moved an inch. He waited quietly, letting the silence sit between them, more for him than her.

“You like her,” she said. It wasn’t a question. She didn’t even need to ask. She could see it. Feel it, even. 

“Yes ma’am.”

“How much?” 

“I care about her. Wanna see her more. Respectfully.” 

Della’s nose wrinkled. “You serious?”

“I am,” he said with finality. 

Something passed through Della’s eyes as she looked him over carefully, from head to toe. It didn’t feel like judgment. It was something Smoke didn’t have a name for. He raised a brow, a silent question.

“Still seein’ other women?”

“No, ma’am.” 

“Ain’t what I heard.”

Confusion. It spread slowly across his face like the petals of a night-blooming flower before turning into something darker. Smoke flexed his hands at his sides before clasping them firmly in front of himself. “What you heard?” he asked, inclining his head.

“Little here, little there,” she admitted. She tilted her head. “May not be loud, but I can hear whispers just fine.” 

Smoke’s jaw worked. He shook his head once, firmly. “It ain’t true.”

“It ain’t?”

“I ain’t lyin’,” he stated simply. “Since I started spendin’ more time with Annie, I’ve only been seein’ her.” 

“Then why they still talkin’?”

Smoke sighed, running a hand down his face. “I don’t know,” he shrugged.

Della sucked her teeth. She looked away, then looked back. “That don’t answer my question.” 

Her eyes got a little sharper, then. Defensive. She folded her arms across her chest, pushing back.

Smoke looked like he was racking his brain for the answer. When it clicked, let out a ragged, frustrated breath through his nose. “I guess, I ain’t really end it the way I should,” he confessed.

Della’s voice went up a whole octave. “You guess?” she asked incredulously. 

“That’s on me,” Smoke said, jaw tight. “But I’ma handle it.” 

“How you tryna court Annie, when you can’t even end somethin’ proper? What happened?” 

“I stopped reachin’ out,” he explained. “Ain’t seen ‘em, none of that.” He sighed into his words. His voice tight, but firm. “Thought that was it. I moved on, figured they did, too.” 

“You figured wrong,” she corrected. “You leave one woman guessin’, don’t come over here askin’ me for permission to leave another one guessin’.” 

Smoke nodded, the muscle in his jaw fluttering. “I won't. I’ma clear it up. Before I bring anything to Annie.” 

“Don’t lie to me,” Della started. 

“Miss Della—” he started. 

She searched his eyes. “Elijah,” she said, in a tone that sounded like a warning.

Smoke’s gaze didn’t waver. He looked at her firm, steady, unblinking. “I mean to do right by her. I wouldn’t be askin’ you if I didn’t.” 

Della sighed. “Alright.” 

Smoke’s face relaxed. 

“There’s rules.”

“Okay.” 

“Handle that business, first.” 

“Trust me, I will,” Smoke said, nodding once.

Della picked her knife back up, turning it sideways so she could start dicing the onions. “Y’all been kissin’?” 

He wasn’t about to lie. He didn’t lie anyways, not when it mattered, but especially not to a woman who could put a root on him with one hand, and chop an onion clean down the middle with the other—at the same time. “Yes ma’am,” he admitted. 

She didn’t flinch. “That it?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Mhmm,” she muttered. “No funny business in my house,” she warned, pointing the tip of the knife towards him. 

“You ain’t gotta worry about that.” 

“I know,” she said warmly. “Not with you.”

“Can I leave this for her?”

Smoke held up a thin, black leather covered book.

“What is it?”

His jaw worked. “It's for her drawings,” he said simply. “So she can keep 'em all in one place.”

“I will,” she said. She could feel the tenderness in his words, even though he tried to hide it.

Smoke let out the breath he’d been holding since he walked up the steps of her porch with a gift and a question. “Thank you.” 

“Don’t thank me yet,” she said, sweeping the diced onions into a bowl with the edge of her blade. “That girl’s heart is her own. She gotta say yes, first.”

“Smoke.” Stack’s voice came out quiet. 

Smoke slowed without thinking. He cursed under his breath, sitting fully forward in his seat. 

Up ahead, the road dipped towards a narrow wooden bridge that laid over a stretch of shallow, muddy water. Off to the side, something rose from behind the cotton fields. 

Dust. It came from the far side of the bridge, lifting faintly through the trees along with the sound of a mule dragging something through dirt. 

Smoke eased the car to a stop beneath the shade just before the bridge. Stack moved from the passenger seat and stalked towards the edge of the field, his body loose in the way men looked when they were prepared not to be. He looked for what didn’t belong while Smoke stayed behind the wheel listening for it.

Wind rustled through the leaves, a dry, papery sound that blew through the acres of cotton plants. Sharecroppers that sang hymns and blues songs as they moved down the line. They picked cotton with tired, calloused hands, the cost of their labor paid in bright red splotches of blood that dripped from their fingers, staining the stark whiteness of the cotton bolls. A vulture circled overhead, then found its prey. It swooped down, its wings spreading menacingly slow as its talons gripped the rung of abandoned machinery.

Stack walked back to the truck with the cautious confidence he carried no matter how many times they’d taken this route. His face didn’t show it, but his eyes stayed sharp. “Just some nigga on a wagon,” he said, waving it off.

Smoke looked back, looked towards his brother, looked towards the bridge, flexed his hands on the wheel, then steadied. 

Memphis appeared thirty minutes later. 

The city smelled like hot grease and opportunity. The sound of brass instruments hung heavy in the air, cutting through all the cigar smoke and pipe exhaust. A band played on the street once they turned the corner, a crowd of people gathered around them tossing money, dancing, and singing. Vendors lined the streets selling all kinds of treats, both savory and sweet, shouting their prices above all the noise. 

There was a lightness here. 

But Stack hadn’t spoken since they crossed that bridge.

“Just say it,” Smoke muttered.

“Say what?” He spoke with his usual slick tone, toothpick hanging out the corner of his mouth like he knew something you didn’t. 

“Whatever it is.” 

Stack grinned. He rolled the toothpick around his mouth. Cleared his throat. “I’m just thinkin’.”

Smoke waited.

He rubbed a hand over his freshly lined up goatee. Smiled again, wider this time, his gold fronts shining in the late afternoon. “You ain’t seen…you know?”

Smoke didn’t even let the question linger in the air. “No.”

Stack didn’t back down. “Last I heard…”

Smoke’s brows pulled together. “It ain’t true,” he said flatly. 

“I knew she was full of shit.” He shook his head in disgust. “She gon’ be pissed, though.” 

“Who, Annie?”

Stack looked over. “Nah.” He shrugged. “I mean, maybe…” He shook his head again. “I mean...”  

“Nigga.”

Beale Street pulsed around them. A saxophone blared loudly on the sidewalk. The sultry voice of a woman floated out from the open door of a juke they passed by. 

“Look at my nigga tryna be serious,” Stack teased, clapping his brother on the shoulder. “I mean you was born serious but…” 

“Aight….” Smoke mumbled. 

“For real," he continued. Voice lighter now, but not unserious. “I’m happy for you brotha.”

Smoke didn’t answer.

Stack leaned back in his seat, arms folded behind his head as the truck slowed in front of The Monarch. The juke joint was already breathing through the walls. Music, laughter, and the smell of fried food spilled out into the street. 

“You know she good for you, right?” 

Smoke’s eyes cut over. 

Stack lifted a hand. “I’m bein’ serious,” he said with a grin.

“I ain’t ask you for all that,” Smoke grumbled. He pulled the brake and cut the engine. “I just need you to be serious ‘bout this business we ‘bout to handle.” 

Stack smoothed out his suit jacket before climbing out first. “Nigga, I’m always serious ‘bout—” He cut himself off. His grin widened. “Oh, you really like her huh.” 

Smoke stepped out after him, shutting the truck door harder than necessary. “Shut up, Stack.”

Stack only laughed as he headed towards the door of the joint. Smoke followed behind him, both brothers disappearing into the smoky mouth of the juke.

They waited until the boarding house was empty. Breakfast was long over, the kitchen back to the way it looked before the lodgers ran through it in the morning. The floors were swept, shelves dusted, dishes washed, dried, and stacked neatly in the cupboard. Flour dust hid between the cracks of the table no matter how many times it was wiped down, a chipped blue bowl full of onions and garlic hiding most of that. A heavy cast iron pan hung over the stove with something in it that would cook low and slow until supper. 

Annie stood in the kitchen with her sleeves rolled past her elbows, wiping down the edge of the table. Aunt Della watched her from across the kitchen, tending an arrangement of calla lilies in a slender glass jar. “Ready?”

Annie looked up from wiping a stubborn corner of the table. “Yes.”

“Nervous?”

Annie rung the rag out, twisting it once and dropping it in the wash basin. “A little.”

The kettle hissed softly behind them, steam reaching up towards the ceiling in white, pillowy puffs. A burst of bright, mid-morning light flooded the room through the curtains, catching the edge of a jar of dried bay leaves that sat near the windowsill and the fur of Felix who was curled up with his paws tucked under him like he was waiting on this exact moment. He purred gently, the sound a sharp contrast to the kettle whose whistle was now piercing the air.

“Come on,” Aunt Della said, leading her towards the lean-to in the backyard.

The space was narrow and dark even though the sun was high, only slivers of light peeking through the cracks in the siding. The shelves held various grooming items needed for a house full of men. Lye soap, oils and tonics, shampoos and aftershave. A galvanized tub sat in the middle of it all. Aunt Della moved two small crates aside in the corner of the room. Annie looked down, her mouth dropping open when she caught the glint of the iron ring hidden between the floorboards.

“Don’t just stand around catching flies,” Aunt Della threw over her shoulder. She was already bending over as quickly as she could for her age, hooking two fingers into the ring and pulling up. 

“What’s down there?” She bent down to help her. 

“You ‘bout to find out.”

The wood lifted from the floor with a low groan and a whistle of trapped air that escaped like the room was letting out a breath. The smell of something earthy and dark—roots, clay, old wood, and something more sharp—hit them with the first whiff that rose from beneath the ground. Aunt Della lowered herself carefully onto the first step then looked back, a lit oil lamp secure in her hands. “Mind your skirt,” she told Annie. “And close the door behind you.”

Annie gathered the length of her skirt, wrapping it twice around her hand. The stairs creaked beneath her feet, each one more narrow and steep the deeper she moved below the boarding house. The hum of the street disappeared first. Then the sounds of the backyard—chickens, birds, bees and the breeze. 

Then the daylight. 

Annie paused at the bottom to take in all that she could see from the stretch of Aunt Della’s oil lamp. Shelves lined the walls from floor to ceiling, crowded with everything from bottles to tins to roots dark and twisted that reached into the soil like fingers. 

Aunt Della led her to a door. They had to be underneath the front porch of the house, Annie thought to herself. She unlocked the room, a heavy oak door fitted with two heavy padlocks, and guided them inside.

More shelves.

Glass jars caught the flickering flame of the lamp in dull flashes. They were lined up along the walls, filled with graveyard dust, mandrake, cinquefoil, High John, and camphor. A stack of bones too small for Annie to name. A brown bag of black mustard seeds, blue glass beads, river stones smooth as polished teeth, and an assortment of other things. 

Aunt Della set the lamp on a low table in the middle marked with knife nicks and stains like old wounds. On it sat a mortar and pestle, a ledger book with a cracked spine, a fountain pen, three small bowls, and a white candle burned low in its dish. 

“This where we gon’ start.”

Annie looked around, wrapping her arms around herself. “This all yours?”

“It’s all mine,” Aunt Della confirmed. “Take a seat.” She gestured for Annie to sit on one of two cushions around the table and moved to one of the shelves. She glanced at a bundle of dried leaves, touching them lightly with two fingers before bringing it back to the table. “Some of this belonged to my mama. Some of it from women I met along the way. Women whose names don’t get spoken much anymore.” 

She opened the ledger to a blank page, then pushed it to the corner of the table. “First thing you learn ain’t gon’ be what does what, it’s gon’ be what not to touch.” 

Annie’s eyes narrowed.

“There’s stuff that heals and stuff that calls. Calling is where it gets tricky. You can call luck, love, happiness. You can call something darker. Something that settles. Something that unsettles. The thing that gives you mercy can be the same one you beg for mercy. It all depends on which hand holds it.” 

Annie absorbed as much as she could while her gaze drifted around the room. This room felt smaller, not because of its size, but because of what it held. Most things felt familiar, a few things did not. It was the few things that didn’t, that unsettled her. 

She thought of her grandmother. Of the stool in her apothecary. Sometimes she’d sit there all day, just watching. Reaching for things out of curiosity and being told ‘not yet’ so often that it became part of her rearing. 

Aunt Della must have seen something cross her face, because her voice softened. “You know more than you think,” she said. 

“Then why do I feel like I don’t know anything…all of a sudden?”

She paused. And then— “Lemme show you.” Aunt Della reached for a jar of something dried and fragrant hidden under a strip of blue fabric. She set it on the table. “Name it.”

Annie tried to peer through the glass. The leaves were green, obviously. Smooth, and curled at the edges, from what she could see. She opened the jar carefully and sniffed the fragrance that wafted through her nose. The smell was earthy. Sharp. “Sage?” she asked.

Aunt Della gave her a look.

“Not sage,” Annie winced.

Aunt Della paused a moment. “You know that ain’t no damn sage.”

Annie brought the jar to her nose again. She took a deeper whiff. It smelled different this time, something warmer and sweeter. Familiar, but not from the kitchen. “Boneset?” she guessed.

“You askin’ or tellin’?” 

“Tellin’,” she said, twisting the lid closed and setting the jar down.

Aunt Della waited a moment for Annie to second guess herself. She didn’t. “There she is.”

Annie smiled despite herself. 

“What’s it for?”

“Fevers and aches,” Annie began. “Unless you take too much.” 

Aunt Della hummed as she shuffled through the  jars, vials, and pouches littered on the shelves. “Every living thing got a spirit,” she started. “It had a spirit ‘fore it had a name.”  She continued on. “Its smell will tell you its name. But its spirit, that’ll tell you what it wants.” She looked at Annie closely, eyes narrowing. “This,” she tapped her temple, “is how you learn the spirit of a thing.” 

She reached behind her without looking, pulled another jar down, and set it on the table in front of Annie. “Name it.”

They went on like that for a while, one jar after another. Some Annie knew right away, some she hesitated on, and some that made her feel straight foolish when Aunt Della corrected her.

“Don’t just guess ‘cause you wanna be right.”

“I wasn’t!”

“You was.” 

Annie huffed softly, frustrated. 

“You gotta learn how to trust yourself, baby. Like when you close your eyes to draw.”

Aunt Della turned her back to the shelf, her eyes sweeping over her collection until she landed on a small bundle wrapped in red thread. She placed it on the table without a word.

“Gon’ head. Pick it up,” she insisted. 

Annie hesitated at first. Her fingers wrapped around it gently, something tightening low in her belly once it touched her palm. Whatever was inside the cloth was hidden, but she could feel the weight of what she held in her hands. 

“What?” Aunt Della challenged her. “Tell me how it feels.” 

Annie rubbed her thumb along the fabric. “This one feels…like it wanna be left alone,” she said breathily.

The flame of the oil lamp that sat on the low table shifted, flickering once then standing still—but it wasn’t from any wind. 

There was no wind down here.

Just darkness, soil, and walls that held their breath like lungs. 

Aunt Della watched her for a moment, then reached out and took it from her. Annie’s hands felt lighter instantly. 

“What was that?” Annie’s eyes lifted, following the bundle.

“Not today.”

“Really?”

“I said,” Della repeated. “Not today.” She sat back down. “Lesson number two. Curiosity don’t mean permission.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Power ain’t always in what you can hold. Sometimes it lies in what you know to leave alone when you ain’t ready. When it ain’t ready.” 

She looked up to the ceiling. “They know?” 

Aunt Della snorted. “Men don’t notice half of what’s goin’ on.”

Annie laughed and Aunt Della smiled back, pulling the ledger towards the edge of the table. The pages were filled with names, dates, ingredients, measurements, and notes. Some in Aunt Della’s hand, others in foreign script. Most of the entries were normal: fever, toothache, bad blood, sleeplessness. Others were less common: keep someone away, restore peace to a home, stop a tongue from speaking ill, return what was sent. Annie traced a line without touching it. Her pulse felt different as her finger hovered over the script. Slower, heavier, like something had reached up and guided her hand. 

Aunt Della flipped to the next page of the ledger, tapping a blank line on the page once with her finger. “When you open a door with your name on it, you better know what you sellin’. You ain’t just sellin’ an herb. Ain’t just sellin’ a bottle. You sellin’ a promise.”

“A promise?”

“When a woman’s hurt and she comes to you for help…she ain’t just lookin’ to buy a root. She’s lookin’ to buy trust. Silence. The hope that somebody knows what to do with what she can’t carry alone anymore.”

Annie thought about the women slipping through her grandmother’s door. Their faces covered with veils, hands holding tight onto coins, voices just above a whisper. She drew them sometimes while she sat in the corner on that stool—not just their faces, but the changes. How they came and how they left. 

Aunt Della pushed the pen, ink, and the ledger on the table right in front of Annie. “Write today’s date.”

le 31 octobre 1919

Annie wrote it in her best script. When she put the pen down she felt different somehow, like she had crossed a threshold she didn’t even know was there. 

Aunt Della moved the ledger away to let the ink dry and the moment settle. Then she stood, took down another jar from the shelves, popped off the lid, and set it in front of her. 

“Name it.”

Annie lifted the jar to her nose, but this time she didn’t rush.

She smelled first. 

Looked second. 

And listened to whatever quiet thing inside her answered third.

It took Smoke three attempts to light his cigarette.

It was later that same evening. He stood on the second-floor balcony of the Greenwood House. It sat on the corner of Hernando and Beale; the place he and Stack stayed every time they came down to Memphis. The clink of utensils and the hearty smell of andouille sausage and gumbo drifted out the open windows of the porch and floated upward to where he stood outside, making his stomach twist with hunger. 

An older woman named Mrs. Johnson owned the place and knew them well, often turning a blind eye to whatever they (Stack) got up to when they came down for business. 

“This ain’t no whorehouse! You want a whorehouse, there's plenty of them down the street! Tryna soil my good furniture. The sheets is one thing, but I catch one of them hussies on one of my couches, I’ll put you out on ya ass in the middle of the night with just ya draws on!”

Smoke held a lighter in one hand, an unlit cigarette in the other, rolled up tight with the special New Orleans blend of tobacco laced with a little grass that he got from Bo every other week.

His thumb slipped on the spark wheel on his first try.

His hand shook suddenly on the second. 

He gripped the base harder, clenching his teeth on the third try. An eruption of flint and fuel sparked a flame that burned bright and angry against the setting Memphis sun and the backdrop of Beale Street.

Smoke brought the cigarette to his mouth, its red ember heating the inside of the palm. 

He exhaled with relief. 

It felt like a betrayal. That a white man’s war was the reason his hands had a mind of their own sometimes. The lack of control that had him shook. Angry.

He took another drag to calm his nerves, his thoughts searching for somewhere soft to land.

Annie.

He’d seen her walk into some shop on Issaquena a few weeks back. Long blue dress with buttons down the middle. Curved just right over her hips and thighs. Like it was painted on. 

Smoke took another hit, blood sparking heavy with desire. He let the smoke filter through his nostrils when he exhaled. He inhaled it back through his nose, letting the fumes settle deep and spicy in his chest.

He had to think about something safer.

Like lips or eyes.

But Annie’s lips? And Annie’s eyes?

Her lips were dangerous. Soft, fluffy, inviting. Sweet.

He thought about how his name slipped out of them like it was the best thing she ever tasted.

“Smoke,” she’d drawl. It melted on the tip of her tongue like a scoop of her favorite ice cream from downtown, her Louisiana lilt drawing out the o, making her lips form a perfect circle like she was—

“You good?” 

The sound of familiar steps made him turn his head to the side. 

It was Stack. 

“Yeah,” Smoke said, flexing his hands at his sides. “Food ready yet?”

”Just about. She puttin’ dishes out and shit.” Stack turned to walk away. Then he paused. Turned back. “She made sweet potato pie, too.” 

Smoke snuffed out his cigarette and hurried his ass downstairs. 

One Week Later…

It was lunch hour. The dining area at Blackbird was packed full of hungry customers, unbridled laughter, and the smell of frying oil. Annie weaved expertly through the tables and around the booths like she belonged there. Since she started working there, she’d already found her own rhythm even though she only worked a few times a week. She was keeping up with the seasoned waitresses, the ones who didn’t write orders down and could balance two serving trays and a pot of coffee with one hand. She was doing so well that even Mr. Hightower was impressed with how she held her own, even with the sudden increase of diners from out of town.

Especially people’s relatives from up north.

There wasn’t a family in Clarksdale who didn’t have somebody who went north for better opportunities, higher wages, and more or less, more freedom. Annie heard the stories. Walk off a train, walk into a stockroom or a shipyard and find work that pays four times what you’d earn in the fields or as a domestic down south. 

And now she was looking at them sitting in the booths, laughing with their friends and family while showing off their fancy cars, shiny shoes, and new clothing. 

That ‘Northern’ polish. 

Stack had that type of polish. Always kept a waistcoat. Always wore real gold—chains, pocket watch, gold fronts. Shoes always shined like they were polished by the sun. 

Smoke didn’t dress like his brother, but he had a way about him too. His clothes weren’t flashy, but they were clean. Neat. He kept a wristwatch instead of a pocket one. One with a black leather strap, smooth bezel, and a nice engraving carved on the back. But he still had a ruggedness about him that she liked...a lot.

She wondered if their “travels” ever took them up north. Pittsburgh, Detroit, Chicago. She knew they’d been to New York. Smoke told her that. Spent some time in Harlem staying with Aunt Della’s son before they shipped off to war.

Annie didn’t know exactly what they got up to when they went out of town, but she wasn’t wet behind the ears. She didn’t need all the details to know the shape of danger. The town knew what the SmokeStack twins were; they earned those names here. Even if the town knew to not go into detail about what they did to earn them. But there were rumors.

Especially about the women they dealt with.

Stack was the womanizer. Annie knew that the minute she first met him at the train station. He had a mouth so slick, he could make a woman apologize to him for breaking her own heart. Smoke was a little different. Quieter about his, at least. But quieter didn't mean it ain’t exist. Where Stack left noise, Smoke left silence. The type of silence that was hard to measure sometimes. And with silence came people trying to fill that empty space with their own version of the truth. So they whispered. 

“So-and-so said…but you ain’t heard it from me.”

“He don’t talk as much as Stack, but he ain’t no saint.”

Aunt Della’s words came to mind. About things being spelled out plain and not assuming attention meant intention. But Annie wasn’t so sure if it was a warning, or just plain words of wisdom.

Was she just another woman in a line of quiet whispers?

“Annie!” It was Mr. Hightower.

She looked up. 

“You been wipin’ the same spot for a minute, now.”

“I’m sorry.” She shook her head a little, plopping the rag in the bucket. 

“I need you to dump the coffee in the back please,” he requested, walking off.  

Annie sighed. “Yes, sir.”

She made her way to the back, coffee pots in one hand and a bucket of hot, soapy water in the other. She set the bucket by the back door and walked outside. 

The back alley smelled like cigarettes and old food. 

Annie’s nose wrinkled as she walked over to the trash receptacles before getting startled by a raccoon that darted out from under one of the trash bags. She managed to dump the coffee out without splashing it all over her shoes. The cool, brown liquid pooled on the ground for a minute before seeping into the dirt, the coffee grounds scattering across the wet surface like ash.

Fourth Street was alive. Wagons, voices, music, smoke drifting up from cigarettes and woodstoves. Smoke had finished one last piece of business near Fourth Street. He stepped out of the back room of a building and onto the street, money folded tight in his pocket, hat sitting low on his head. He stepped off the curb and crossed the street, slowing right in front of Blackbird Cafe. He stopped. Looked through the windows casually, trying to be subtle. He wasn’t. The writing and the glare from the sun made it hard to see, but he found her instantly.

Annie was behind the counter, but her head turned towards the kitchen. Probably listening to one of the cooks talking shit from the back like they always did. He saw her shoulders shake and her head dip forward like she was laughing at something one of them said. But when she turned back around, the smile on her face broke the room open. 

Something struck him low in the chest. A possessive tightening pull on his ribs. Annie’s eyes shifted. She looked around the restaurant. Through the other waitresses that darted around her, through the people in the dining area. They kept on moving until they finally found him. 

Her face went blank for a second and he thought his chest would cave in. Then it softened, then the corner of her mouth lifted slowly. Just for him. That was enough for him to walk inside before he even realized what he was doing.

The cafe got quieter when he walked in. Conversations lulled, laughter turned into low chuckles that turned into throats clearing. Men nodded to him. Either out of respect, fear, or something else. Smoke took a seat at the counter and watched as Annie made her way over with a coffee pot in her hand.

“Afternoon,” she said softly.

“Afternoon.”

“You hungry?”

“Coffee’s fine.”

She took a mug from the shelf behind the counter, placed it in front of him, and started pouring. The coffee spilled into the cup dark and hot, steam rising off the top before dissolving into the air like the things left unspoken between them. 

Smoke wrapped his hands around the mug and took a sip. Warmth settled into his palms and spread throughout his chest. And it wasn’t from the coffee. “Thank you,” he said, voice low.

“My pleasure,” Annie giggled. “How was your trip?”

“Long.”

“That it?”

“Mostly.”

Annie didn’t push. She studied him for a second, topping off his coffee and wiping down the countertop while the diners went back to their own conversations and meals. She thought about saying more. She decided not to. It was too quiet now. Too many ears perked up. She reached behind the counter again, this time to pull out a clean napkin.

“Thank you,” she said as she set the napkin down next to his mug.

“For what?” His eyebrows pulled together.

“The sketchbook,” Annie said incredulously, head cocked to the side.

Smoke’s mouth twitched. “You welcome.” 

“Mhmm.” She rolled her eyes playfully.

“You been good?” His voice was rough when he asked that question. 

She tapped her fingers slowly on the counter as he set his mug down. Annie leaned forward on her hands. Smoke leaned forward on his arms. Annie looked at Smoke. Smoke looked at Annie. 

“Been great,” she said finally. Her lips were pursed in that playful way he liked. “You?”

Smoke’s eyes moved over what he could see of her from his seat at the counter. Slowly. 

“Better now.” 

She raised a brow. “Oh yeah?”

“Wouldn’t say it if I didn’t,” he said casually. He kept his eyes on hers. 

Her mouth dropped open, whatever she was fixing to say right on the tip of her tongue when Sheila’s voice from the kitchen made it snap shut. 

“Table six, order up!” Followed by two dings.

Annie turned around, quickly sliding the plates of hot food from the pass-through window onto her serving tray. She moved from behind the counter to a table with hot food and a smile brighter than the sun reflecting off the windows. Smoke watched her working, stealing glances over the rim of his mug. Every so often while she was taking an order, or refilling a coffee, she’d look over at him like she could feel his eyes on her, then quickly look away. When it started to get busier and she couldn’t steal a look at him, he felt something. Like a dull ache. 

He stood as Annie finally circled back to where he was sitting, stretching his arms above his head. 

“You leavin’?”

Smoke nodded. “Got some business to handle.” 

He put his money on the counter, their hands meeting when she reached for it before he had pulled his hand back. The contact made them both still. Their index fingers brushed against each other where they touched for a second before pulling away completely. Their eyes met again.

“I’ll see you,” Smoke said.

“Okay,” she replied. It was just above a whisper.

He wasn’t finished. “Soon.”

Their eyes held, the contact lingering for a moment like they both had something they wanted to say but knew it wasn’t the moment. 

Smoke slipped away, steps light even though he carried weight. Annie watched the door swing shut behind him, letting in a flash of air and street noise before locking it out again. She stood behind the counter still, fingers resting on the money he’d left on the table, feeling the ghost of where his finger rubbed the side of hers. She stood there for a second, letting it sink in. Two seconds went by, then three. Then she snapped out of it, pulling herself back into what she was there for— the money. 

“Felicia!” Annie called for her as she carried a tray over her shoulder. “Table four said they want two more sodas!” 

“Got it,” Felicia huffed. 

The bell above the door rang again. Annie moved quickly, sat the diners at a table, pulled out her pen and pad. She gave recommendations, talked up the specials. She even took on an extra table—a party of six that started off with a round of drinks. 

She kept herself busy. There was no such thing as a quiet moment during a lunch rush. But every time she looked out into the street, she thought of him. Coming through like he owned the place. Leaving something behind every time he walked out. 

—

Smoke was far enough away that he couldn’t see her clearly through the window anymore. Just movement and light and the shape of her passing between the tables. Blackbird stayed loud and alive behind him. Annie’s world now. Part of it, anyway. The more Smoke saw her, the more he wanted to be that other part. Not keep her waiting. Not tuck her away. 

Della was right. Just wanting her wasn’t enough. Other men wanted her, too. He saw the way their gaze would follow her around as she moved around the cafe…until they saw him. He heard about the one at the theater. And the preacher. But he knew she needed to hear it from him soon.

When they stared at each other before he left Blackbird, the look in her eyes held a question. One he didn’t have to ask to know. He knew one thing, he was gonna set shit straight before she was left guessing what kind of man had walked into her life.

The Blue Room was Coahoma County’s most popular Black supper club. Music, fine foods, good liquor, and special company. Just north of Clarksdale, it sat on a small island in Moon Lake—a crescent-moon shaped oxbow lake that curved delicately into the Mississippi River.

Smoke stood just outside the back entrance watching his truck while Stack and Della stepped inside to speak with the club’s owner, Clay. The leveled brick roads were damp with the aftermath of a sudden shower, the earthy scent of rain and exhaust smoke wafting through his nose carried by a cool October breeze. The lantern above the back door was still lit from the night before, its flame flickering in the wind like it was barely hanging on despite its thick glass cover. Smoke was leaning against the tarp covered truck, arms folded across his chest, when the back door of the club suddenly flew open. Stack stomped outside, wet leaves crunching under the steel toe of his boots. A familiar voice followed right behind him. 

“Why you can’t just be cool?” 

Smoke sighed hard, running a hand down his face. 

Mary.

The octoroon offspring of Cecily, the woman who nursed him and his brother after their mother died in childbirth and their father started drinking his earnings away. She took them in later on when his fatherhood turned into fists. 

Cecily was like family.

But Mary?

She was a pale little thing. Slender frame, pointy nose, mousy brown hair. She stepped outside into the muddy grass in just a rose-colored silk robe, a few clusters of pearls around her neck, and fire in her eyes.

“So, you can flirt with her in my face? You said—” Mary hissed.

“Keep your voice down now, Mary,” Stack’s voice boomed in the silence of the alleyway as he looked around to make sure nobody else was listening. Rain dripped slowly from the gutters onto the street. 

“I ain’t witchu. Ain’t ever gon’ be witchu. You need to get that through that thick skull a’yours sooner rather than later,” Stack snapped, pushing back through the door with a look and not another word. It slammed shut with a loud thud, leaving only the sound of an engine idling and Mary’s soft sniffles. 

She cleared her throat, swallowing the words that got stuck there. She wrapped her robe tighter around her small frame when she saw Smoke looking dead at her. His eyes were tight little beads void of any warmth as he closed the distance in the narrow alleyway behind the club. He could smell the heavy perfume that she piled on to disguise her helplessness. 

“Mary,” he said firmly. He paused, taking a second to cool the rage bubbling up inside. “Don’t make me choose between mercy and my brother. Understand?”

Mary’s bottom lip trembled. She turned on her heel to leave when Smoke grabbed her forearm. Not too harshly, just enough to stop her in her tracks.

“I said,” he repeated slowly. “Do you understand?”

A single tear fell down her right cheek. “I get it, Smoke,” she said with a trembling voice. 

He released her and she stumbled back into the club. He wiped his hand on his trousers and walked slowly back over to his truck, looking up to the windows of the next-door building to see if anyone was watching.

No eyes. 

Good. 

He was sick of running interference for Stack. Especially over a liability. His teeth ground together just thinking about it. 

His mind drifted away to a better place. Somewhere that would calm his spirit. Take the edge off. 

Annie.

His irritation cooled a little faster thinking about her. Her warmth. How light he felt around her. He could almost taste her scent on his lips when he kissed her the night before, the sweetness of her skin like a tattoo, hitting nerve endings every time he licked his lips. He’d been doing it since he left her under the magnolia tree, like a damn fiend. 

A few minutes later, Stack peeked out from the back entrance, signaling it was time to bring in Della’s wooden box of things from her cellar. Her special liquor, tonics, and special blend teas. He grabbed the box, secured the back, and cut the engine. 

The air in the supper club was thick with cigar smoke and the smell of black-eyed peas from the kitchen. Smoke stepped inside with the box, nodding at the workers and greeting the women who moved around him as he walked through the hallway behind Stack. They reached Clay’s office where Della balanced a thin cigarette holder and a slice of whiskey cake at his desk. Clay reached over to light her cigarette as he took another puff of his own. 

“Have a seat,” he gestured to the plush leather chairs in front of his office desk.

A few minutes earlier…

The whiskey cake was a sugary, buttery, boozy delight that melted in her mouth. Della carefully wiped the side of her lips with a napkin before taking another bite. 

“Congress movin’ forward with the prohibition bill,” Clay said, exhaling a puff of smoke above his head. “It’s official.”

“What they sayin’?”

“January.” 

“This good!” she mumbled between chews. 

“Ada used a spice cake this time instead of vanilla. Give it more kick.” 

“A lot more kick. She put her foot in this!” 

“Ada!” Clay yelled to the open doorway. 

“Yessir,” Ada yelled back from the kitchen.

“Bring us some more of that cake! Four more slices!” 

Clay sighed and turned in his swivel leather chair towards the window. Rain beaded slowly down the glass, the sky behind it a solemn, murky gray. 

“What vice talkin’ bout?”

“I ain’t worried about them. I’m too deep in they pockets.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“Railroads. They puttin’ vice on the railroads startin’ in January.”

“Shit.” Della’s fork clinked loudly in the silence after her words.

“I was thinkin’ bout the twins. Usin’ they network. They got the North on lock. I got Memphis in my back pocket. Together, we can make a good team.” 

The doorway darkened. Stack entered first, then Smoke with Della’s box which he set in the corner by the liquor cabinet.

“What you got for me this time, Delilah?” He asked, lighting her cigarette. He stood, moving to the cabinet where he poured two fingers of whiskey in two glass tumblers and handed them to the twins. 

“Have a seat.” 

Smoke set his tumbler on the desk as he sat down. Stack took a sip of the brown liquid as he made himself comfortable in the chair next to his brother.

Ada walked in with four slices of whiskey cake on a platter and mirth in her eyes. She wore a thin blouse tucked into the tiny waist of her skirt that stopped at her knees. Her hair was pulled back with a satin headscarf folded once and tied over it. 

“Mornin’,” she cooed as she set the platter down on the office desk. She smiled politely at everyone before returning to the kitchen. Clay’s gaze followed her with heat in his eyes as she sauntered out of his office. Nobody missed it. 

Mary slinked past the ajar office door with a sad look on her face. The sound of her pearls and sharp click of her heels echoed in the hallway.

“Mary?”

Mary stopped just in the doorway looking hopeful. 

“Instead of mopin’ around here, how ‘bout you bring us some coffee?” 

She nodded at Clay, her eyes automatically falling on Stack. “Comin’ right up, sir.” 

Della cleared her throat slowly and Smoke took the opportunity to reach for some cake, and immediately dug into a slice. He closed his eyes and hummed in satisfaction at the rich taste of the whiskey, spice, and sweet glaze.

“Never took you for a sweets man, Smoke,” Clay chuckled.

“This nigga got a sweet tooth if I ever seen one,” Stack joked. “Surprised they ain’t fall out yet.”

“Still got time,” Smoke mumbled between chews. 

Mary came back with a steaming pot of coffee, four cups and saucers, a small jug of milk, and a small ceramic bowl filled with sugar cubes on a silver serving tray. Sitting the tray on the liquor bar top, she offered coffee to everyone in the room before taking her leave. 

“Shut the door behind you, Mary.” 

Mary left the room without another word.

Everyone took sips of their coffee and let the room settle before Clay finally spoke again. Smoke dumped his whiskey in his coffee. Stack did, too. And Della stirred a sugar cube in, the silver stirring spoon scraping gently against the porcelain cup in a steady rhythm. 

“I was tellin’ Delilah here, I wanna bring you two in on my operation.” 

The statement registered, then settled deep into both of them like water in dirt when it rains. Smoke’s chewing didn’t slow, but Stack could almost feel his brother’s jaw tighten over the words. “Oh yeah?” He leaned closer. “Talk to me.” 

Clay Chavis was a Black man in his 50’s. Salt and pepper coils cropped short and moisturized so well they looked shiny. Clean shaven except his sideburns—the one sentimental thing he allowed himself. 

He wasn’t born with silk pocket squares, eating whiskey cake. Maybell Plantation raised him. Reconstruction taught him possibility. Jim Crow taught him ambition. 

Hustler. Entrepreneur. Pimp. He was whatever he needed to be to get shit done. 

He saw Black folks who came out of the Civil War as politicians, illustrious statesmen, business owners. Pockets fat with real money, not that plantation scrip. 

He saw how power had changed his community for the better. 

And he’d seen it fall. 

It stirred a hunger in him that couldn’t be satiated by money alone.

So, he played their little game. Paid off racist sheriffs and crooked politicians because he could. He even had a few senators on his bankroll to look the other way. 

But deep down was a festering anger. 

So, he poured his heart into his creation: The Blue Room. The supper club and social room was his muse, his baby, his safe haven and his one true love besides Black opulence. 

The music, liquor and women may have been its heart, veins, and arteries, but he was the blood. The pulse that kept it moving.

Clay snuffed his cigar. Cleared his throat. Smoothed out his cuff links. 

“Tell me ‘bout Harlem.” 

Smoke and Stack shared a look. 

Stack spoke up first. “What about it?” 

“Long story short— they crackin’ down on the railroads. Sendin’ vice to inspect the cars.”

“Shit,” Stack sucked his teeth.

“Right,” Clay agreed.

“Pay ‘em off,” Smoke cut in. “Find ‘em, pay ‘em off. No more vice.”

“It ain’t that simple,” Clay said simply.

“It ain’t?” Smoke said incredulously. 

“What my brother tryna say is…” Stack gave Smoke a look out of the corner of his eye that said back down. “What that gotta do with us?”

“How much time you two spent in Harlem? Before the war.”

“Few years.”

“You seen how they operate up there. The mob and the mafia.”

Smoke mumbled something under his breath. He took another bite of whiskey cake. 

“Well, Chicago mob like to come down to my club every so often. Their leader some cracka who go by the name of Diamond Jim. They call him Diamond ‘cuz he like to carry a bunch of fuckin’ diamonds on him for no reason.” 

Stack snorted into his coffee. Smoke worked his way through Stack’s slice of whiskey cake. 

“Fat mufucka just walkin’ around with diamonds in his waistcoat. Shit don’t make sense.”

Aunt Della giggled and shook her head. 

“He and his wife like to talk to my girls. Don’t do nothin’ else, just talk to ‘em. They own a bunch of brothels up North,” he continued. “Town don’t like ‘em…but I do. You know why?” 

It was a rhetorical question. 

“Cuz they see green, instead of just black and white.” 

Clay continued. “See up North all the peckerwoods divided amongst themselves. Irish, Italian, Polish, Scottish—they all the same down here but up there, there’s a difference. A pecking order.” He paused, took a sip of coffee and let the heat linger on his tongue. Then he set the cup down, the saucer clinking against the mahogany office table. The sound was loud in the quiet of the room, like everybody was holding their breath waiting for the punchline.

“That gives us an opportunity.”

“And what’s that?” Smoke asked, voice flat. 

“Divide and conquer.” 

Annie didn’t realize how late it was until Luella’s assistant stepped outside to light the oil lamps.  “Oh Lord,” she murmured, blinking towards the windows.

Luella’s shop was covered in warm amber light, the colors of the evening settling over lace collars and half-finished hems while jazz crackled softly from the phonograph in the corner. Somehow between talking, laughing, and getting measured for alterations, she’d lost the entire afternoon.

Luella looked up from pinning a sleeve. “What?”

“I forgot how early the sun goes down this time of year. What time is it?”

“I know right?” Luella glanced at her pocket watch. “It’s almost five.”

“Oh shit…I gotta go.” 

Luella grinned. “Where you rushin’ off to? Meetin’ somebody?” Luella asked casually, carefully stripping her of the dress mold. Annie slipped her robe on and bent over to gather her things. 

Luella’s eyebrows lifted. “Ohhhhhh, you are!” 

“It ain’t like that,” Annie muttered, scurrying off to the washroom. 

“Mhmm.” Her voice was teasing, playful. Knowing. “I should have the shell stitched by next Monday. Can you come back Thursday to pick out accessories?”

“Yesss,” she said through the washroom curtains. “Thank you.”

She walked past shoppers and onlookers admiring sequined handbags and velvet shawls, through the narrow hallway connecting Luella’s Dressing Room and Ritzy Beauty Salon, up the stairs, and onto the sidewalk. Outside the sky had darkened into deep blue, the last pieces of sunlight caught low against the rooftops. Her feet carried her towards the boarding house quickly where the porch light was already lit. She slowed her steps as she climbed the porch stairs, opening the door with the same amount of care. 

“You finally done galivatin’?” Aunt Della said from the stove in the kitchen. She didn’t need to turn around to recognize the shape of Annie’s presence. 

Annie rolled her eyes softly. “I was at Luella’s.”

“Mhmmmm.”

Then, casually—

“Twins was here earlier.”

Something tugged low in Annie’s chest before she could stop it. “Oh.” 

“They ain’t stay long.”

Annie nodded once, setting her bag down carefully beside the stairs like she suddenly had to think about where her hands belonged. She decided to put them to work, washed up, then helped in the kitchen. Supper passed without incident, a simple meal of fried fish and spaghetti. Dessert was a drunken peach cobbler. It was around 7:30 that evening that Annie had an unexpected visitor.

“Annie, Georgia’s here!” 

Annie came out of the kitchen wiping her hands with a kitchen towel. “Hey Gigi.” 

“Annie!” 

Gigi was dressed nicely, like she was coming or going to or from town. 

“Hungry? We got leftovers I can put in the warmer.” 

“No, I already ate dinner at home.”

Annie stopped just short of her. “What’s up?” 

“Well…I was heading to the Savoy to see a play and…I wanted to see if you wanted to go.”

“Tonight?”

“Mhmm.” She looked at her watch. “In ‘bout an hour.”

Annie thought about it. 

“Oh come on! Live a little. It’ll be fun. Just go put somethin’ on real quick!”

“Okay fine,” she said already heading toward the stairs. “Gimme like 15 minutes.” 

Their steps made the stairs groan as they made their way to Annie’s room. Gigi followed right behind her, automatically going for her dresser drawers. 

“Ohh, wear this one!” 

She pulled out a royal blue dress with a white collar and trim. Annie paired it with a pair of Oxford heels and her handbag and in thirty minutes they were out the door. 

The air was that balmy type of cool, the one that sat on top of the skin. The marquee lights of the Savoy on Issaquena shone bright in the nighttime as people congregated in front of the ticket box. Annie and Gigi bought their tickets and were heading for the concession stand when two men approached them. 

Isaiah.

And the man Gigi had her eyes on during the churchyard picnic. 

Annie felt her heart drop. 

“How y’all doin’?” the man with Isaiah asked.

Isaiah kept his eyes on Annie. She could see Gigi and his friends were eying each other down. 

“We good,” Gigi answered for both of them as the concession line moved forward. 

“I’m Will, this is Isaiah.”

“I’m Gigi, this is Annie.” 

“Nice to meet you, Annie.” Will said first.

“Yeah, nice to meet you Annie,” Isaiah said, holding his hand out. 

His voice was deep. So deep she could feel the bass deep in her chest like a vibration. She shook his hand politely. “Nice to meet you, Isaiah.”

“Where you from?” 

“Louisiana.” 

“Ah okay. I can hear it in your voice.”

“Yeah…” she trailed off. “I figured that much.”

Isaiah smirked. “You been here a while?”

“‘Bout a month,” she replied, trying to look around discreetly.

Isaiah blinked. “You lookin’ for somebody?”

Annie frowned. “Nah, it’s just—this my first time here.” She recovered quickly, rubbing her arm as a distraction. 

She looked over at Gigi who was fully enthralled in conversation with Will. This little heifa planned this. She looked way too comfortable with Will for somebody who didn’t even know his name yesterday. Annie made a mental note to bring it up later. She wasn’t slick at all trying to set her up and make it look like a coincidence. 

The play was a series of skits. It was filled with romance, drama, comedy, even a murder mystery. 

They were sandwiched between the two men, with Gigi resting her head on Will’s shoulder while Annie sat stiff in her chair feeling Isaiah’s eyes burn holes through her during the show.  

During intermission he caught her coming back from the washroom. 

“You want some more popcorn?” 

“I’m all good.”

“Somethin’ to drink then?”

She almost said no. But then she looked at his face and relaxed hers. “I could use a milkshake.” 

Isaiah’s face softened, and when his teeth were revealed between his parting lips she saw a peek of gold at the bottom. 

The rest of the night went surprisingly smooth. Annie and Isaiah whispered amongst themselves while Gigi and Will disappeared until halfway through the second part of the show when they snuck in the back row. She learned Isaiah was originally from Bogalusa. He worked for the sawmill there until the labor strike in August of this year, then hightailed it to Clarksdale to work for the railroad. 

“I knew I heard a lil’ somethin’ somethin’ in your voice,” Annie remarked. “A lil’ Louisiana in there.” 

Isaiah chuckled low. “Did you like the show?” He asked Annie as they walked up to meet a very bashful looking Gigi and Will. 

“Yeah, I did,” she sighed satisfactorily. “I’m glad I came out tonight.”

Isaiah paused. “You should let me take you out sometime. Just us.” 

Annie hesitated a little. Isaiah caught it.

“Just think about it,” he reassured her.

Annie nodded. “I’ll think about it,” she said genuinely. 

“I stay at the Yellow Dog rooming house.”

“Okay.”

She had no idea what or where that was.

“It’s the only yellow one,” he said with a smile. “Right by the tracks.” 

“Got it,” she said. 

Annie smiled politely. Isaiah was handsome. Nice. Engaging. But he just wasn’t…

“Well,” Gigi started, linking her arm with Annie’s and damn near dragged her away from the front of the theater. “It was nice seein’ y’all. We gotta go. Yall have a good night!” 

She waited until they were far enough from Will and Isaiah so they couldn’t hear their whispers. Annie snatched her arm away from Gigi. “Girl don’t be draggin’ me? Why the hell you runnin’ away from that man?” 

“I never wanna see him again,” she declared as they hurried down the street. 

“Why? I thought you liked him the way y'all were all over each other.” 

“His feet.”

Annie blinked. “What?”

“His feet stink,” she repeated slowly.

“I heard what you said. I’m just tryna understand how you saw his feet on the first date.”

“When we came back from gettin’ food,” she started. Annie narrowed her eyes. “Anyway, when we came back the ushers only allowed us in the back row.”

Annie crossed her arms under her chest, curious as to where this was going. “Uh-huh.”

“And he said he wanted to take his shoes off. Let his feet breathe a little.”

“And they smelled like shit,” Annie finished for her.

“Almost burned my nose hairs off.”

Annie snorted. “Nose hairs?”

“Almost became a casualty of an atomic bomb.” 

Annie laughed quietly. A mix of amusement and disbelief. “Lord…”

“I’m serious.”

“I believe you. The way you got us up outta there, I knew somethin’ went wrong.” 

They had reached Aunt Della’s house by then, the chirp of crickets carried by the wind over the rooftops. 

“Seems like you and Isaiah hit it off.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“What?”

“Nothin’. He asked to take me out.”

“And you said yes, right?”

“No.”

“No?”

“I said maybe.”

“Mayb—,” she sighed hard. “We'll talk about this later. Lemme get out of here before it gets too late.” 

“You sure you don’t wanna stay? Walk back when it’s light out?”

“I'm on the next street over.”

“Well, don’t make any stops on the way.” She looked Gigi up and down. Gigi just rolled her eyes.

She turned to leave then turned back for a second while Annie idled in the doorway. Her voice sounded genuine, warmer than it had since she met her. Even a bit grateful. “Thanks for comin’ out with me.” 

Annie smiled warmly. “Night, Gigi.”

“Night, Louisiana!” she threw over her shoulder as she skipped down the road. Annie watched her until she was out of sight. 

The next day, Smoke came over to fix the wire on the backyard fence so the chickens couldn’t escape. He stood in the backyard in a wife beater and a pair of trousers that hung loose on his hips. Suspenders not suspending a damn thing. Annie clutched her ileke beads. Lord forgive me, but that man look unfair, she thought to herself as she discreetly watched him through the back window. She shook her head. 

Earlier that day she had been collecting eggs from the chicken coop at five somethin’ in the morning when Smoke scared the shit out of her, appearing from the backyard mist like the hero in a romance novel appears from the shadows.

She gasped when she saw him through the morning fog. Loudly. Her breath fogged the air in front of her. 

Smoke looked genuinely amused. “What was all that shit you was talkin’ the other day? I can’t…what?” 

“Shut up!” she snapped, but her words held no bite. 

They went about their work, sneaking little glances at each other out of the corner of their eyes. 

“How you feelin’?” Smoke asked. 

Annie sighed. “Tired as hell.” 

“Up late?”

“Out late.” 

Smoke’s ears perked up, his jaw tightening. “Doin’ what?” 

Annie smirked at his concern. “I went to the Savoy with Gigi,” she started. “This girl I met at church the other day.” 

“How was it?” 

“Good,” she replied quickly. 

Smoke grunted.

“You good over there?” she teased. 

Smoke grunted a very distracted “mhmm” while tightening a piece of wire with a pair of pliers. 

Two days later she waltzed through the front door of Luella’s to browse accessories to match her Harvest Party dress. She felt him before she saw him. He was across the street at the barbershop again, those same eyes piercing through the store window. 

By Friday he was back at Aunt Della’s when she got home from work. This time with Stack. They were reattaching the tin roof to the top of the shed in the back.

She was gonna let them work, but she decided to bring out a pitcher of ice water and two sandwiches. 

“Hungry?”

“Hell yeah!” Stack said eagerly taking one of the sandwiches from Annie's outstretched hand.

Smoke wrapped his arms around her before grabbing a sandwich and pulling the wax paper back from the top to take a bite. “Thank you,” he said quietly.

Stack looked at Smoke. Then he slowly looked over to Annie.

He decided to keep his mouth shut.

This time.

Sunday night they were underneath the magnolia tree again. Annie with her sheets of paper, Smoke with his pipe, puffing circles into the air. They talked about friends. The past. Occasionally, their conversation hit somewhere deeper than expected. 

Smoke talked about the day he realized the war had become part of his bone marrow.

September 30th, 1918. Séchault, France. 

His regiment was occupying a small town by the ocean. They had run the Germans out. Bombed their strongholds and blown parts of the French countryside to pieces.

Then there were the trenches. The noise. Taking cover while the world exploded around him. The ringing in his ears that felt like a strong vibration reaching far into the depths of his soul.

He had gotten up early that morning to walk along the boardwalk like he always did. It helped clear his mind.

It was peaceful by the water. As peaceful as wartime occupation could be. He even saw a few kids playing with seashells by the shore.

At first, he thought it was just a shiver. A result of the cool air that came off in waves from the Atlantic. But by the time he got to the mess hall his hands were still shaking. 

Annie talked about her family. All six siblings, even the one who died in the war. How she was the youngest and he was the one she was closest to. How she says a prayer for his soul every morning and night, knowing his spirit isn’t settled on that foreign land. 

That night ended with another kiss. This one was longer, more exploratory. Their tongues met and did a short dance before they pulled away from each other. 

By the following week, he was asking about her work schedule. He’d show up to drop her home if she worked past sunset and come sit with her if he was in town and business was slow. 

Lunch rush. Business was steady. Smoke was sitting at the bartop with a catfish sandwich in his hands and crumbs all over his mouth watching Annie refill coffee and yell out orders. 

“I made the catfish batter today,” Annie said proudly. 

“Mhmm,” he said between bites, “this shit good too.” 

Annie clicked her tongue. “I know.” 

“Y’all got anything sweet?”

“Apple pie.”

“It’s decent?” 

“Mhmm.” 

“Lemme get two slices.” A beat. “And some ice cream.” 

They spent weeks getting pulled into each other’s orbit and accidentally falling into a routine. A missed connection turned into a budding bond. A magnetism. A tether that lived behind the ribs like a slow, settling ache. Two people quietly becoming important to each other before either of them fully realized it.

Annie’s hair was currently a giant halo of ebony coils that reached up to heaven. It had been washed, stretched, and air dried, and now she sat between Aunt Della’s legs on the steps of the front porch as she separated it into sections and oiled her scalp. The cool feeling of almond oil hit the sensitive skin on her head, and she relaxed back until she was leaning against her aunt’s thighs.

“Don’t fall asleep yet. I ain’t even got the first row braided,” Aunt Della warned. 

Felix leaped from the porch railing to the space next to where she was sitting. She stroked his back and listened to him purr under her touch. He curled his body up and laid under her hand like a velvety loaf of bread. 

“You just want straight backs?”

“Yes, please.”

It was early evening, the golden sky being swallowed by the purple shadows of nighttime. Porch lights started to flicker on as folks moved from the supper table to the porch. Annie felt herself drifting off as Aunt Della swiped a bead of hair grease from the back of her hand and put it on her scalp as she started her first cornrow. 

“I remember when you were younger, you used to fall asleep every time ya mama put some braids in your head.”

“Really?”

“Mhmm. Sure fire way to get you to stay still, though.” 

Annie sighed deeply. “I hope she got my letter.”

“I know she did. Loretta’s good at what she does.” 

“I hope so.”

“I know so.” 

Annie yawned where she sat and a shiver went down her spine from the sudden breeze that made goosebumps form on her arms. “Ooh!” she exclaimed. “Got cold all of a sudden.” 

“Almanac said it’s gonna be our coldest winter yet.”

“How cold?”

“They forecastin’ snow this year. As early as Thanksgiving.”

“Guess I’ma need a heavier coat, then.”

“We can go to the 1 & 5 cent store next week. See what they have. If they don’t have anything, we can order one from the Chow’s.”

“What about Luella?”

“She only do fancy stuff. Big furs, stuff with sequins. You want somethin’ practical.” 

“She said she’d make my harvest party dress without charging me extra.”

“What y’all decide on?”

“A flapper dress with sequins on it. She even givin’ me a handbag, some shoes, and a thin little coat to wear over it with furry trim.” 

Aunt Della hummed. “How you doin’ your hair?”

“She said I should straighten it out, then curl it, and pin the curls into a bob.”

“That’d be nice.”

“I wanna do a red lip too, since the dress is dark green. Almost black.” 

“Look at you all excited. Aren’t you happy I convinced you to go?”

“Yes ma’am.” Annie grinned and ran her hand over Felix’s coat. She’d only been in Clarksdale a month and a half and already felt like she was starting to find some sort of community for herself within the town. 

But something was still missing. 

“I wanna get back to practicin’,” Annie said suddenly.

Aunt Della had finished her first cornrow by then, and paused as she was parting her hair to start the next one.  “Practicin’ how?”

“I wanna start mixin’ teas and makin’ tonics again,” she lamented. “Like I was learnin’ to at grandma’s shop.”

Then, a little quieter. “I feel disconnected from her. From them.” 

“You been doin’ your prayers? Your rituals? You shouldn’t feel disconnected, baby.”

“I have, but I do. I wanna…make things. Help people. Not just myself.” 

Aunt Della swallowed hard. She hadn’t yet shown Annie the underground storage where she spent time while everybody else slept. But maybe now it was time. She sighed into her words. “We’ll start lessons Monday,” she said simply. “First thing after we send the men off, just after breakfast.” 

Annie rubbed her great-aunt’s bony knee and whispered, “Thank you.” 

“Word of warning though,” Aunt Della continued. “I might be ya grandmother’s sister, but…I ain’t her.”

“What you mean by that?” Annie’s face twisted up. 

“The way I teach is a little…unconventional.”

Annie blinked. “You do left hand work?” she whispered.

“I do what works for me, sugar.”

“Oh…okay.” 

“But I’ll only teach you what you comfortable with, and how to send back what you ain’t.” 

“I ain’t got no problem with that.” 

“Good.” Aunt Della smirked a little and continued her braids. Another breeze blew by, bringing with it the warm scent of impending rain. “Let’s go inside. Storm about to come.” 

“Come on Felix,” she picked up the tuxedo cat from its place on the steps. “Inside m’piti.” 

Annie sat comfortably on a pillow on the floor as Aunt Della resumed her braiding. “Auntie?”

Aunt Della hummed.

“Who taught you that…left hand work?”

She breathed deeply, like she was choosing her words carefully. “My mama. Your great-grandmother.”

“Really?”

“Mhmm. She was born a slave. Separated from her mama as a baby. Raped by the massa, his wife, and his son.”

Aunt Della took a moment to collect herself. 

“One day she went to a woman lookin’ for a hex to put on the family. She told her she was gifted, said she was born with a caul. Could tell just by lookin’ at her.”

Annie listened carefully. 

“Well that lady taught her how to protect herself. It ain’t evil work if you protectin’ yourself from the evils of this world.”

“White folks.”

“Mhmm. They ain’t all bad. But a lot of them are.”

Silence hung between them. A skin deep, ancestral silence. 

“You was born with one, too.”

“With what?”

“A caul.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s a little piece of afterbirth that sticks to your face when you come out. Like a veil.”

“Oh,” Annie sighed.

“I remember it like it was yesterday. The Mississippi was high that whole year. Gulf waters was reckless. Storms bad all summer, oh Lord, the bayou kept floodin’,” she laughed to herself. “Then you came.” 

“You real special, Annie,” Aunt Della continued. “More than that. I knew it then, and I can feel it now.”

She stopped braiding for a moment and grabbed Annie’s chin from behind, tilting her head so she could look into her wonder-wide eyes. “So make sure you guard your gift, and be careful what and who you use it for. You understand?”

“Yes ma’am,” she said quietly, her mind going a mile a minute.  “Now tilt your head down chile,” Aunt Della declared. “You can fall asleep after I’m done.”

The alleyway between King Tamales and Blackbird Café smelled sinful. Freshly steamed corn tortillas with succulent meat smothered in red chile sauce on the inside, wrapped in corn husks and steamed to perfection. Catfish. A perfectly seasoned batter, crispy on the outside, perfectly done on the inside. And the rich, savory aroma of pot greens. It made Stack Moore’s stomach twist with hunger. It made him divert from what he was doing and step into Blackbird Café. He wiped the beading sweat off his brow when he stepped through the door, the cooler air a balm against the heat on his skin. 

The first thing he noticed was the emptiness. No servers by the register. No Luther grunting himself into a chair by the hallway to watch the dining room. Just a lone diner that sat in a booth by the window nursing a drink. 

Please Have A Seat, the sign read. So he sat, choosing a stool at the bar by the kitchen’s pass-through window.

He was looking at the menu when he heard a familiar voice that made him look up. “Fancy seein’ you here.”

Annie moseyed over to Stack in a black short sleeved shirtwaist dress with a white collar and a half apron overtop. Her hair was neatly cornrowed and pulled back into a bun at the back of her head. Her nametag sat just above her heart, a small rectangle with a white background and black lettering.

He couldn’t help but smile. “Hey Annie.” 

“Hey Stack.” She looked him up and down. “What can I get you?”

“Lemme get uhhh…,” he looked down at his menu again. “Porkchop sandwich and a Coke,” he tapped his finger on the bar top while Annie wrote his order down on a pad of paper. “And a slice of that pecan pie.”  

“Comin’ right up.” She turned to the pass-through window. “I need a porkchop sandwich and slice of pie!” 

“I didn’t know you worked here,” Stack questioned as Annie wrote the total in the ledger. 

“I just started last Monday,” she admitted as Sheila checked the order ticket. 

Sheila mumbled to herself. “A porkchop sandwich and a—hey Stack!” 

“Sheila,” Stack said with a grin. 

“You been stayin’ clean?” Sheila asked as she slung a clean kitchen rag over her shoulder. “You always into some trouble.” 

“What can I say? Trouble love me,” he joked. “Like it’s my middle name.” 

“It is your middle name, Stack.” Sheila winked at him before turning around. “I’ma fry you one fresh right now. Extra crispy,” she called out over her shoulder. 

“Just how I like it, thank you baby.” He straightened out his suit jacket.

Annie chuckled under her breath. “Aight Romeo, that’ll be forty cents.” 

Stack took the coins out of his coat pocket and into Annie’s open hand. She dropped them into the till then wrote something else on the ledger before closing it. She was fixing to turn the corner when Stack’s voice got her attention again.

“So what made you work here?” he asked.

Annie slowed. Stopped. Turned around looking confused. “What you mean?”

“Don’t you do…” her eyes narrowed. He almost said the quiet part out loud but he recovered quickly. His voice dropped a little.  “The same shit as your aunt?” 

“You mean work at the boarding house?”

Stack nodded. 

“I still do.”

“So why you got two jobs?”

“Because…I’m savin’ up for somethin’.”

“Order up!” 

She set Stack’s food in front of him and grabbed a bottle of Coke and a cup from the cabinet behind the bar. “For what?”

“You said you savin’ up…for what?”

Annie sighed, letting all the air out of her chest. “A shop.” She said it quietly, like saying it too loud would make it real. Which is what she wanted, but the thought still scared her a little.

Stack took a bite of his sandwich and looked Annie over as she stood in front of him. She put her hand on her hip and leaned against the bartop. “What kind?”

Annie looked off into the distance. “One like my grandmother has. A cafe and apothecary.” 

“You mean sellin’ those teas and shit like your aunt?”

“Mhmm.”

“Anyone buy them from you now?”

“No, not yet—”

“Well how you gon’ open a shop with no customers?”

“They’ll come when they need them—”

“They gotta know they can get them from you first.” Stack put his sandwich down. “First rule of business is you gotta sell the product before you sell the product. Understand?”

Annie nodded her head. “Yeah.”

“You gotta market yourself. Start with friends first. Then word of mouth will get around. Before you know it you gon’ have people comin’ to you instead of you goin’ to them.”

Annie nodded again, taking his words in. “I can do that.”

“You tryna rent a place?”

Annie’s eyes lit up. “I wanna own one.”

Stack looked at Annie perplexedly. “You.” He dusted his hands off and pointed at her. “Wanna buy a shop…by yourself?”

“Mhmm,” Annie said proudly, digging into her apron and taking out the sketch she'd been working on. “Like this.”

She slid the drawing to the side of his plate, a sketch of a modest shack with a shed attached to the side. Sitting on cinderblocks, surrounded by trees. It looked like something quiet. Peaceful. Something Smoke would like. Something he’d love. Annie explained where everything would go— a smokehouse, a root room, a chicken coop and goat pen, even where the sun needed to rise and set in order for her vegetable garden to flourish. Stack looked at the expression on her face, the excitement in her voice, the spark in her eyes. His voice softened. “How long you need to work and save for it?”

“Bout a year.” 

Stack grinned. Annie did too. “So, in a year I can come to you for a slice of that bread pudding I heard all about?”

Her cheeks warmed. “Mhmm,” she hummed. “That’s what I’m workin’ toward.”

“Well, I hope it all works out for you,” Stack muttered. “Truly.” 

“Thank you, Stack,” she said sincerely. “Anyway, enough about me.” 

Stack had resumed eating his sandwich, the crumbs from the bread gathering at the corners of his mouth. “What’s up with you, Stack?”

“You know me…just shootin’ the shit. Bein’ on my best behavior in these Clarksdale streets.”

“Oh,” she said, voice flat, rolling her eyes. “Okay.” 

He wiped his mouth with a napkin. “How you and my brother been?”

Annie paused. Her face gave nothing away. Or that's what she liked to think.

“Yeah,” he remarked, pushing his plate back. “I know.” He popped open the top of his Coke with the ring on his finger. 

Annie crossed her arms across her chest. “What you think you know?” 

“Enough,” he shot back, leaning back on the barstool. 

Stack stared at Annie. And Annie stared right back.

“You ain’t gotta admit nothin’,” he said finally, taking a swig of his soda. “But y’all both make it obvious. Actin’ all giddy around each other.”

“I don’t act giddy.” 

“So there is somethin’ goin’ on.” He studied her face. She still didn’t crack even though her heart started beating faster ever since he first mentioned Smoke. 

“I don’t act giddy,” she said. Quieter now, like she was trying to calm the pulse lodged in her throat. 

“My brother can’t hide nothin’ from me. No matter how hard he try, Annie.”

Annie huffed, turning her head away. Stack stood up to leave and stretched his arms above his head. “My brother…he a good man.” 

“Stack, I ain’t no child. I don’t need no advice on how to handle a man.”

“I ain’t givin’ you advice. I’m just lettin’ you know.”

“I got eyes. I can see just fine.” 

Stack chuckled softly. He liked her spunk. Her fire. Her wit. She was playful, but she could turn deadly if need be. “See you next week.” He tapped his hand on the bar top twice before heading towards the door. “Headin’ to Memphis soon.”

“What?” she didn’t mean for the word to slip out so…desperately.

Stack smiled fully, his eyes almost looked warmer at her slip up. “Just til’ Friday. Don’t worry, your man gon’ come back in one piece.” 

She rolled her eyes. “Bye Stack.” Annie tried to act like it didn’t catch her off guard, like she actually understood what they got up to in Memphis. She didn’t. But she wasn’t naive. She could take a wild guess and probably land somewhere close. But for some reason, her stomach twisted a little thinking about Smoke being gone for that long. What was worse was she didn’t understand why his leaving bothered her this much yet. 

Smoke and Annie were sitting at the kitchen table in the boarding house. The window was open, a gentle breeze flowing through it, making the corner of her paper lift up slightly as she sketched the side of his face. At least that's what she was trying to do. Smoke agreed to let her draw him, then kept fidgeting where he sat.

“I’ma be gone ‘bout a week.” 

“When you leavin?” Annie replied. 

“Tomorrow.” A beat. “We goin to–”

“To Memphis,” she finished. “I know.”

Smoke tilted his head. “How you know?”

“Stack came to my job the other day and—will you quit movin’?” 

His jaw clenched a little when he heard his brother’s name. 

“I ain’t movin’.”

“You is. Arèt.”

Smoke mumbled under his breath. “That another French lesson?”

“Another—nigga I said stop movin’!” she said with a playful slam of her pencil. 

He wanted to grin. He could barely stop the one threatening to spread across his face when she fussed at him. Why? He ain’t even know. She wasn’t the first girl who did. Wouldn’t be the last. It was something about her tone. That purry Louisiana lilt. The way she rolled her L’s. The way her tongue wrapped around his name. Smoke. He wondered how she’d say his real one. 

“You ain’t say that’s what it meant.”

She looked up at him slyly as she blindly shaded in his left dimple. “You still knew I meant stop, though.”

He didn’t respond. He couldn’t. It was those eyes again, those big brown eyes that wrapped him up in warmth and wouldn’t let go. Those perfectly shaped eyes that almost looked feline. Deep, almost endless. Dark, like midnight couldn’t hold a candle to them. Dangerous, like he need to quit starin’ out the corner of his eye before he got himself in some trouble. 

“Now you can’t talk?” 

“You told me to be quiet.”

“I told you to be still.” 

“Same thing,” he grumbled. 

“No it ain’t.” 

“You done yet?”

“I said don’t move.”

He sighed heavily. “Aight.” 

A few more strokes of her pencil and she was done. 

“Done.”

“Can I see it?”

She exhaled sharply. “No.”

Smoke sucked his teeth. “Why not?”

“Ion like it.”

“You made me sit still for how long just to not let me see it?”

“Guess so.” She smiled mischievously. 

“You somethin’ else, Annie.”

“I know,” she said gleefully. 

He reached for the folded up paper and she hovered her pencil above the middle of his hand.

“You finna stab me over a picture?” 

Annie shrugged. Eyes daring. 

“Better put that thing up, woman.” 

They looked at each other in silence for a minute. Circling. Nothing but suppressed smirks and squinting eyes. Smoke broke first this time, pulling his hand back before he ended up with a hole in it. 

“Crazy ass.” 

Annie just grinned. 

“When you work next?” 

“Tomorrow.”

“You makin’ decent money at that place?” 

“Mhmm. Tips good.” 

“People?”

“They good, too.”

“Nobody givin’ you a hard time?”

“Nope.” She moved from the kitchen table to the icebox. “Besides, I can handle myself. I keep tellin’ you this.”

There she go, fussin’ again. The grin threatened to return. He bit his bottom lip instead. 

“Want somethin’ to drink?” 

“I’m good.” 

“Suit yourself,” she said, taking a cold Coke from the icebox. She popped it open and took a long sip. 

Damn he looks good doin’ that, Annie thought to herself. She pretended not to look at him while she was definitely looking at him. That plump, soft lip pulled between those pearly white teeth. Lord have mercy. She cleared her throat, and those thoughts, from her head. 

“You go in early tomorrow?”

“Late. They got this band comin’ up from Tutwiler to perform at supper and they need some extra hands in the kitchen.” 

“How late?” he asked quickly. 

“Probably til close.”

His jaw clenched. “And what time is that, woman?” 

Annie’s face twisted up. “Smoke, I know you ain’t just lose yo damn mind in my home.” 

Smoke shook his head. “I don’t want you walkin’ by yourself that late.” 

“And who is you?” she sassed playfully, blinking her eyes slowly at him. 

Smoke paused, like he was actually thinking about it. Then he chuckled low. A little too low. Because what’s so damn funny? The sound reverberated deep in her chest and sent a shiver, no, a shock, up her spine. She almost gasped at the feeling. He stood up and stalked to her seat at the table, tilting her chin up so she had no choice but to look him in the eyes. 

Her gaze was unwavering when she looked up at his unreadable one. His hand moved from her chin to cup her cheek and when he kissed her, it stole the breath out of her lungs. She pulled away from him dazed with kiss-bruised lips.

“See you next week.” 

He whispered it but it sounded stern, damn near like a warning. But the energy radiating off of him was so heavy, so mannish, that it made her thighs press together like she had no control over herself.

Damn that man, she found herself thinking. 

Annie’s eyes followed him as he tipped his hat and dipped through the front door silently. He bit back a grin as he slipped into the afternoon heat. But not before he said one last thing. 

“Be good.”

Annie’s mouth dropped open, but no sound came out.

The screen door didn’t snap closed like it usually did. It fit into its frame quietly, like it was scared to fall out of line too. 

“Hi, I’m Annie.” 

Annie stood in a group with the servers as they introduced themselves to the entertainment of the night. It was a small band of two, just a quirky guitarist and a singer. 

The place was already starting to fill up in anticipation, and Mr. Hightower was taking care of drinks at the bar while the other staff helped the musicians with their set up. 

“I’m Reeny, and this D.W.,” she said with a bubbly disposition. 

She was a cute girl. Couldn’t be more than five feet tall. Caramel colored skin, a patch of freckles across her nose, and a pendant necklace that caught the dimming lights of the café every time she bounced around like a ball of energy. She wore a tan dress, similar in design to their uniforms, with a simple pair of yellow flats. 

“Where y’all from?” Loretta asked them. 

“Shelby.” 

“How long y’all been playin’?” Sheila chimed in. 

Reeny and D.W. looked at each other. “‘Bout five years,” D.W. said.

“Y’all look young!” Loretta exclaimed. 

“I’m 26. He’ll be 30 next year.” 

“Damnnnnnn,” Felicia said, pointing at Loretta. “You need to get your eyes checked. Mr. Hightower— you sure it’s a good idea for her to be head cook? She can barely see….” she joked walking off towards the bar. 

The guitarist strummed a few notes to warm up. Then the melody kicked in. It was a mix of bass and alto that sounded so enchanting it felt like they were casting a spell. Reeny’s voice was breathless but deep, magnetic but so light it made the air in the room feel like a whisper against skin. She belted from her diaphragm, giving all she had into that little microphone like she was in front of an audience of thousands instead of the 30 or so people packed into the dining room of Blackbird. 

People on the street stopped what they were doing to look inside and couldn’t believe the big voice coming from this little woman. 

I got the deep river blues

I would never lose you…

The spiriiiiiits they soak my soul…

I said, them water spiriiiiiiiiiiits…they live in my soul… 

I got the backwoods, muddy water, deep bayou river blues—

And I could never lose you…

The heady warmth of the blues spread through the café like heat in the dead of summer. The guitar rolled low underneath the angelic, soulful sound of Ruby’s voice that drowned out the sounds of…everything. Time, space, surroundings. What was left behind was pure magic. Excited shouts and joyous stomps made glasses rattled on tables as couples engaged slow two-steps and gyrations to the sultry rhythm of the music. 

Of course it wasn’t magic in the literal sense. The magic was in a community finding joy in the little things. Music. Love. Gathering together. Carving beauty out of a world set up for them to fail. Annie eventually caved and joined in, even with a serving platter in her hands. Sweat dripped down her neck as she shook her hips and shimmied her shoulders in tandem. 

The song ended with a roaring applause. Whistles, cheers, stomps rang out from the room and all the way down the block. Almost everyone on Fourth Street had stopped to witness the show at Blackbird. Tips were rolling in, drinks were flowing. Mr. Hightower even looked like he was enjoying himself instead of micromanaging or waiting around for something to go wrong. 

“You walkin’ home?” Mr. Hightower stood with his arm hanging off the counter by the kitchen as Reeny and D.W. transitioned into a slower tune. 

Annie turned at the sound of his voice. “Yes, sir.”

“Gon’ home.” 

“You sure?”

“Gon’ git. Before it get too late.” 

“Alright alright I’m goin’,” she said. “Goodnight.”

He nodded and disappeared down the hall. Annie padded behind him and turned into the break room. She put her apron in her locker, slipped her purse around her shoulder, then slipped out the back door. 

The moon was high, nighttime glittering all around her. The sound of the music faded slowly as she made her way back to Aunt Della’s, but the bass still thumped behind her ribs like a heartbeat. She felt sated. Electric. She walked up the steps of the front porch glowing from head to toe. She took a deep breath and let it out.

She felt home.

Annie could see candles burning in the kitchen as she stepped through. The house was asleep. All except Aunt Della. She was rummaging around in one of the kitchen drawers for something when she heard the front door close and lock. 

“How’d it go?” 

Annie exhaled loudly, her bag sliding down her arm. 

Aunt Della chuckled. “That night shift rough, huh?” 

“My arms feel like wet noodles,” Annie whined as she slumped into a chair in the front room. “And my ears won’t stop ringin’.” She exhaled hard. “But I had fun.” 

Aunt Della walked into the front room with two mugs of sweet smelling liquor. “Here,” she held a mug to Annie’s lips. “Drink.” She sunk into the middle of the couch, crossed her legs, and took a slow sip from her own mug. 

“What’s this?” Annie asked, not waiting for an answer before she tasted it.

“Somethin’ to take the edge off. Relax after a long day.”

She hummed in delight as the taste of orange blossom, cinnamon, and honey flooded her tastebuds. A little fizz. The sharpness of hooch, without all the bitterness. “This gon’ put me right to sleep.” 

“Mhmm.” Aunt Della cleared her throat and set down her mug on the coffee table. “‘Before I forget,” Aunt Della said matter-of-factly. “Smoke left this for ya before he left.” 

“Oh, did he now?”

She grabbed the book from the coffee table and set it on Annie’s lap. It was larger than a standard book. Thinner. Sturdy. Leather bound. Smelled like tobacco and old wood. A picture book maybe? 

She opened it to find blank pages.

Nothing but a line at the top to write in titles or dates. 

It was a sketchbook. Something she could use to keep all her drawings in one place. 

Her cheeks warmed and a grin spread across her face before she could tighten her lips to stop it. As she flipped through the pages, a small piece of paper slipped out and floated onto the floor landing face down. She bent down to pick it up and flipped it over in her hand. 

His handwriting was neat. So neat. Tight. Precise. Just like him. 

Except his j. 

It was traced over a few times, like somebody bumped his arm while he was writing and he tried to fix it. She read the message and released a breath she didn’t realize she was holding.

For Annie,

To remember what they for. 

Elijah