Kolah’s right hand massaged her left wrist while the left cupped something black. It was the dead of night and she showed up at Sister Hadeema’s house banging on the door. “Why does it look like this?” she asked the woman she ran to whenever it felt like her body was falling away from her, becoming something unknown.
Sister Hadeema looked down into Kolah’s hand and led her to the bathroom at the end of the hall. “Wash the black off your hands,” she said. “Wipe yourself up. There’s a pad and some pants for you to put on.”
The water ran, the sound of it hitting the drain a melody. The words swirling around her head were suddenly a song she could fall into.
Kolah cradled the little, brittle body. It was coated in a water that was too thick and murky to see through, a water that acted more like fire.
“Wash the black off your hands,” she sang to herself.
The baby fell apart at her caress. She thought about saying a few words, but didn't know if it would be able to hear her.
“Wipe yourself up.”
She pulled her pants and underwear to her ankles. A smoking smell was finally free to fill the room. Kolah took the washcloth Sister Hadeema left on the counter and interrupted the water’s melody, soaking it in the faucet’s glory and blues. Pulling the washcloth from between her legs to examine, she wondered if Sister Hadeema had any darker colored ones. This one wouldn’t be bettered by any amount of washes.
“There’s a pad and some pants for you to put on.” A pair of underwear and a plastic bag also waited for her. Kolah grabbed her blackened underwear and pants, stuffing them into the plastic bag whose smile and directive, Have a Nice Day, felt strange in her bones. She started to tie up the bag but stopped to grab the washcloth and placed it in with the rest. She didn’t think Sister Hadeema would miss it, but figured she could bring it back if she could get the remnants of missing life off. If not, it was hers to care for.
Kolah found Sister Hadeema at the glass table in the dining room. She tried to look like herself; at ease surrounded by the dozens of plants under grow lights that filled the room and a few others. But tired eyes gave her away.
“I washed the black off my hands.”
“The bla— Oh, the blood?” She didn’t wait for an answer, “Come sit down, this raspberry leaf tea is yours.”
She sat opposite Sister Hadeema, placing the plastic bag underneath the table and guarding it on both sides by her bare feet. The pair sat in silence for a bit. Under normal circumstances the quiet would’ve made Kolah squeamish, forcing her to compliment a knick knack or complain about Mayor Johnston’s overreliance on the city’s incinerator to relax her stomach. Now she offered nothing but slow sips and the clink of ceramic on the table, again and again.
Sister Hadeema eventually interrupted what she alone understood to be silence. “I’m so sorry about your baby, Kolah.”
She waited to see if Kolah might break from her rhythm, then kept on, the clinking punctuating her sentences.
“The way your baby passed, all burnt up that way, is starting to become more common. Nobody’s sure why. It’s been bad out here of course, but this is a little different. Everyone’s been healing up ok, though.”
Kolah looked down at her hands and back to Sister Hadeema, offering nothing. Sister Hadeema understood Kolah’s silence, so she moved on from it. She went to her floor-to-ceiling apothecary cabinet and started pulling different herbs and tinctures for Kolah. Everyone who had sense in Buoy, this small city too far from the ocean, had a stash of herbal medicine, but Sister Hadeema was especially diligent. She spent a lot of time wondering if the plants that grew in the area were well themselves, if the thick darkness that covered everything would force them to add despair to their healing essences. But she never said this aloud. The few doctors that charged too much and the new illnesses— like the old ones, but hotter—that began cropping up in the last few generations demanded a return to traditional methods. She believed in making the best out of a bad situation.
“I’m gonna make you a couple things to take for the next few weeks. And come back in a few days, I need to make sure your head stays cool and clear.”
Kolah put her mug down again, forcing out what needed to be said before the melody let her know it was time to let the tea slide down her throat again. “My momma kept coming by this past week talking about a baby dying in a fire,” she said. She raised the mug to her mouth again, leaning her head so far back as to will the bottom of the cup to conjure more tea into it. The mug refused her this favor and the song was over.
She slowly pushed herself and the chair backwards, the sound of it scraping against the tiles drowning out Sister Hadeema’s confusion. Kolah stood up, clutching the plastic bag to her chest. “Thank you, Sister Hadeema. But I think I have to let everything play out how it wants to.”
“Hold on now, let me get you this medicine so you can take it with you.”
Kolah was already at the front door, sneakers untied but on, and heading out when she shouted back, “I should be alright.”
She walked the 12 blocks home quickly. A little bit of light peeked through as Sun began its journey for the day. Kolah always appreciated sunrise because it was usually the brightest time of the day, Sun low enough that you could somewhat make it out. But this morning the thin rays did not ignite her and she did not say hello. She reached home faster than she realized, her legs working while her mind got the chance to do nothing at all. She opened the plastic bag, remembering her keys were in her pants pocket.
Inside the apartment, Gully was stirring awake at the sound of Kolah and her other child shuffling down the hall. Kolah greeted Gully with a kiss to the forehead. “You can keep sleeping baby, you don’t have to be up for a little while.”
“You left?”
Gully knew she went to Sister Hadeema’s house. But a thought was pulling at her that she had been somewhere else, too. Kolah couldn’t even tell Gully she’d only been gone for a little, because time was absent and her memories were blurring. She wanted to answer the question but there was nothing to say.
“Lay down, I’ll wake you up when it’s time to eat,” Kolah told her tired child, the sleeping one in a plastic bag hidden behind her back.
Contributor Notes
Kiian Dawn is a Black American writer, hoodoo, mother, and organizer born and raised in Central Jersey, living in Philly. Their work often revolves around the natural world and climate change, communal and familial dynamics, and spirituality. She received bachelor's degrees in Africana Studies and Journalism from Rutgers University, and credits most of her education to her ancestors and elders who raised and continue to guide her.
