5
Lotus
“Join me next week when we explore staying cool in the summer’s hottest fashions,” I say into the mic. “Till then, it’s ya girl Lo. Don’t forget, the world might try to get you down, but you gotta glow up.”
I pull the headphones off and push the mic away from my mouth, releasing a weary breath. I’m often tempted to stop the fashion podcast I started last year, gLO Up, but it’s becoming so popular. I’m gaining new followers every week. I have sponsors now, not only for the podcast, but paid partnerships for Instagram. I’m an “influencer.” Who knew?
My position with JPL has catapulted my efforts. I’m not under the illusion that all of this would have happened so quickly if I didn’t work with one of fashion’s darlings.
My first official position with JPL Maison was “intern.” Unofficially, glorified grunt. That worked while I was getting my associates at FIT. Now, with my degree, I’ve been promoted to Assistant Design Coordinator. Unofficially, whatever JP needs. One day, I’m selecting fabrics for him to consider as he’s designing, the next I’m organizing pattern-makers. I could be sketching, pressing, steaming, draping. Hell, I’m not above getting in there with the seamstresses and sewing buttons, embroidering, and doing whatever needs to be done. I’m learning fashion from the ground up and at every level. It’s the best education I could ask for under the tutelage of a genius.
My eyes drift to the Singer sewing machine in the corner of my bedroom. A gift from MiMi. It blurs through my tears. I don’t know how other people grieve, but processing the loss of my great-grandmother will take a lifetime. I can’t think of her without aching. She left me so much, though. Not the tiny house Iris and I inherited in the bayou where I spent much of my childhood. Not even the sewing machine she used to teach me how to create an almost invisible seam. Not even the black magic I’m not always sure I completely understand or believe. Those aren’t the greatest gifts she left me.
“In the next life, I’ll live as a spirit,” she’d told me solemnly. “And God will require my soul, but my heart—that I’ll leave to you, ma petite.”
The words poured ice down my spine. I couldn’t imagine this world, this life without MiMi’s guidance, and it’s as hard as I thought it would be.
I can’t explain it to Iris or anyone else. They’d have me committed, but I knew the moment MiMi left time and entered eternity. That was how she talked about life. She said most of our existence is before we are born and after we die—that time is a drop in the bucket. The walls of time fall long enough for us to enter this world and then to leave. And after we leave, forever begins.
I know the moment MiMi’s forever began.
I was rushing to class, climbing the subway steps to the street, when I felt a prick in my chest like a scalpel making a tiny incision. And then I felt so full, I had to stop right there, morning commuters rushing past me impatiently on the subway stairs like water dumped into the river of the city. Warmth and peace and pain made themselves at home between the slats of my ribs, nestled in the flesh of my heart.
And as it had so often in ways I couldn’t explain, the sky, my soothsayer, spoke to me.
Look up.
On a gorgeous autumn day, I Iooked up and saw a fire rainbow. So rare most people go their entire lives never seeing one—arcs of color blurred, set on fire by the sun and streaking through the clouds.
A rainbow is the bridge from Heaven to Earth.
And this one was on fire.
“MiMi,” I’d whispered. I’d known.
And when my cell rang, when Iris called, jarring me from that sacred spot at the top of the subway steps, I knew MiMi was gone.