PASSION FLOWER

He was born right out of passion flower, rooted in dark soil, strong from dew and rain. He sprung from purple, yellow, pink petals into the space between Earth and Heaven. A child from the Divine, he blossomed with beauty and talent. His parents kept him grounded during his growth, while all of nature was abuzz awaiting his maturation. His eyes were the color of both the aloe leaf and bark. They could heal and protect with only a glance. They harbored his intention ensuring it was never lost and never stolen.

His pigment was bright and abundant with life due to his reflection of sunshine. When he danced from petal to petal and leapt through the air, flowers sang and spirits opened up to catch a glimpse of his energy. His talent was untouchable. Only he could make the breeze feel good when she was down. Only he could hush the bees and cause the birds to sing sweeter melodies. His adventures spread word of his passion from mountain to sea. Yet, he wore a shield over his heart to protect it. For in his heart lay a lone seed.

All of nature was attracted to his irresistible passion. Yet that one seed matured as he did, and eventually he longed for something special. She had to spring from passion as well. When she came, he would know. But as with the breeze, the birds, the bees, he could not stay. His passion was too great. His seed was just for her, but his beauty and talent was for many. His connection to her passion made him want to stay enwrapped in her leaves forever. He enjoyed the added life she gave. She was pure, life-giving. Between the Earth and Heaven everything grew ten-fold. The seed from his heart was stronger than his passion alone. A good breeze would stay up, the bees would hush longer, and the birds’ melody could soothe the biggest beast.

Yet, his passion was his poison, so he left from her leaves. But every now and then a seed would form in his heart for her. The breeze would stay longer, the petals sing louder, and the spirits open wider for their union. Then he would go again to follow his passion - his dance and his leap, to spread his beauty and talent for all of nature to see.

The Juxtaposition

I reached into my pocket and found an old gum rapper rumpled into a mixture of paper and a sticky wad of green-gray-white. I couldn’t figure out why my brother was still in the building. He had gone inside to talk to this major player named Cooper. Cooper wasn’t one to be played with. However, my brother had seen him pushing up on his girl Angela the other day.

I had warned T, my little brother, to be cautious of the words he chose, stay alert to his surroundings, and carry something real with him. He assured me that he just wanted to find Cooper and tell him Angie was his girl, period. I guess T had decided he and Angela were going to stay together even after high school. Whatever. No broad was going to make me risk my face against Cooper. But that was T- always did what he felt was right no matter the consequences.

I imagined the worst Cooper would do was beat him up. Thing about it was if Cooper wanted a girl, he got her. The chicks couldn’t resist his charm and his loot, I guess. Plus, my thoughts are if Angie was letting him talk, maybe she wanted to listen. Then again, curiosity can be a bitch. I told T it probably was no big deal and just make sure Angie didn’t go in and out our building when Cooper was hanging around. But T, smart quiet bookworm bee-bopping idealist, was quick to insist that he speak to dude man to man so there is a distinction between his girl and the other girls who come around.

T, charismatic with his words and skilled in self-defense, said he would be in and out of Cooper’s building, easy. I wasn’t too worried. It’s just that he’s my responsibility. I guide him. He learns from my mistakes. I push him to be better. I make sure he’s on the right track. He is my little brother. I haven’t gone to college and don’t plan on going. I haven’t fallen for no broad and can’t see that shit happening. I wasn’t an A student in high school and could care less. But T is going to college to be an engineer and engineer city plans to get us out this hood somehow. T is serious and good and doesn’t play with his future. Playing with this Cooper guy is risky though. Cooper runs things around here.

He had gone in the building nearly 10 minutes ago. To me that’s not in and out. To me that’s enough time for the worst and more to happen to T. I had my baby revolver strapped to my lower leg and my nine at my waist. So I made my way into Cooper’s building. I was ready for whatever. When I got to Cooper’s mom’s door, it was already opened a crack. I pictured my little brother with a busted face in the corner barely breathing or even worse my little brother not breathing at all.

I listened at the door for a hot second, but didn’t hear anything. I had one hand close to my nine as I slowly pushed the door open. I saw a sneaker on the floor, but it wasn’t one that T had been wearing. I walked further into the apartment and saw a used white sock. I peeked around the corner to see the apartment empty except for Cooper and T. T had me blown by what I saw. Cooper was sitting on his own couch like a rebuked little kid, while T stood over him, one foot on the couch looking like he was schooling Cooper. And yes Cooper was missing a shoe and a sock on one foot. I stepped back a little so they couldn’t see me.

I could hear T say with a tight voice, “Hopefully there won’t be a next time with me dragging you across your mom’s nice floors. I won’t tell anyone what happened. It’s between you and me. Everyone knows what’s mine is not theirs and what I treasure is not theirs to burn, pillage, or fuck with. You respect me and I will respect you. We clear Mr. Cooper?”

“We clear?” He repeated.

“We clear.”

“We are clear, what?”

“We are clear, T. I know the rules.” I heard Cooper say.

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I walked out before it was all over and waited by the stairway.

A couple minutes later, T rounded the corner.

“Ay man, what’s going down?” T asked with a big grin on his face.

“What happened?”

“I heard you come in the apartment. I know your steps. So you saw what happened?”

“No, T. What was that about? You done this before? What’d you mean by everyone?”

As we walked back toward the outdoors, he explained.

He had hidden when he knocked on Cooper’s door. When Cooper went to push the door closed and turned around, T headlocked and strangled him from behind and dragged him kicking to across his mom’s apartment to the couch. Scared his ass so bad that he started crying. Not a good look. I had forgotten T was bigger and stronger than Cooper. Apparently, T had the whole block on lock. Come to find out the whole block was scared of my little brother. This had happened multiple times since T was a kid. From the first time a little mu’fucka tried to steal his new sneakers off his feet to his first serious girlfriend, he’s been schooling dudes on what he finds unacceptable. He told me how he has been beating big and small dudes up since he was 11. He had been trained in two two types of fighting by then and had excelled at both. He was always into training, what I had always thought was his hobby. But it was truly his defense. He told me he protects the whole family. He speaks, they listen. He threatens, they hear him. He told me they respect him because he’s a role model for their little brothers and sisters coming up. He told me how they fear him too because he’s never backed down and he’s always won every fight and altercation. And no one has ever tested him and come out the winner. He fights better- quicker, stronger.

I told him, “I thought you had lost it, man, going after Cooper like that.”

He said that’s why he let me come along, but had insisted I stay outside because there aren’t any problems when things like that stay between two people. It’s an understanding, he said.

That night at home, I passed by T reading some dictionary-sized book with Angie curled up next to him. He looked so kind, innocent, like all he had was his charisma, his smarts and his girl. It made me understand. I had done my job with him, and he was schooling me.

Dreaming

I had a dream last night that he gave me all his love. All his love came in an email. It was crazy- 10 pages long including mad pictures. He told me about his family, his job, his summer shenanigans. Yes, even the shenanigans. He told me about his grandfather and how his father was his caretaker. He calls his grandfather his “Paupa”. It was sweet!

I hadn’t heard from him in months. The weeks seemed like years and the months seemed like decades. It had gotten to the point where I no longer believed he had any feelings for me at all. Though the email did not express his love explicitly, it was indirect yet long-windedly obvious. He once told me love is like a corporation. It’s an investment of your care and your time. He showed me it was an investment of your senses, your faith and - my favorite- your degree of involvement.

In brief moments we had spent time together. We made our memories talking, laughing, dancing, and eating together. Brief moments- only minutes, if that. We had talked about our plans for our future. We would have a house with a fireplace and eat apples from our own apple tree. We would have three kids and travel to distant places together, Brazil, Fiji, Bangladesh, Egypt, and Sierra Leone. And we would laugh about how ludicrous we sounded. And then he would remind me that he only required my okay. Before parting ways, we would dance to our favorite artists, intimately, slowly.

I gave him my okay one day. One day too late. I expressed my feelings to this man and he smiled in my face, kissed my cheek, and walked away from me. At first I thought he would be back in a moment. But, no! No response. This was the last time we had a moment together. Afterwards it was the most informal and impersonal way of communicating- brief texts replaced brief moments. I suppose he needed more than my okay. I figured maybe he had a closeted secret, so to speak, or he was being facetious with his words and his actions.

I retreated. I actually went on a retreat. It was a weekend retreat for singles who wanted to reach deeper self-awareness in order to heal from being lonely and dejected and possibly meet a man who feels just as pitiful. It was otherwise known as the singles retreat sponsored by the church. I read books and watched movies for awhile. My music didn’t help because it all reminded me of him. He was jazz, reggae, rock-n-roll, and any other derivative of soul all rolled into one.

After my retreat into greater self-awareness and the avoidance of past reminders, I picked myself up and went back out into the dating world. And what a world it is! Duplicitous, jobless, uneducated, fathers with multiple women, post-incarcerated, pre-incarcerated, selfish creeps were the men I met. Each seemed to be more of the same. No variety. No center. No direction. Just lost clones with a low attention span.

So, I moved on from dating. I decided to focus on my dreams and stop working for a paycheck alone. I wanted to work for a paycheck and a plan. The first step into me was buying a mortgage. When my lease ended, my job transferred me from the boonies to an office in the city closer to my new home. Once I settled into my new digs, the second step was getting a consulting job. That was around the last time I heard from him. We had texted a conversation to each other. Updates and congrats were given back and forth, back and forth. I silently missed him, and as usual he was a busy bee.

With my last step of renewal I wasn’t sure if it would be to visit my mom in Dallas or visit my dad in Argentina. But something told me that I needed to visit one of them and let them be matchmaker. I was getting older not younger. Meaning my chances for three children were sadistically waning and my looks needed even more creams and potions. It was either to let my aging and eager parents play matchmaker or adopt a child from somewhere, like Kenya.

I chose to go to Argentina and visit my dad and my grandparents, whom he visited each year. My grandmother was ready too! She had two eligible men to introduce me to. I was not too excited, but I knew from my father and mother that the men were genuine and honored their women. Why not, right? I had my passport, my bags packed, and gifts to bring everyone.

The week before my trip in my tiny backyard, the first apples from the lone apple tree began to ripen. I thought of my past friend, the love I had that had never been there for me in return. I took some apples and went inside to wash them. I took out a small bowl and placed them inside. Those were for me. I took a Polaroid of the apple tree, wrote a brief memory on the back, and put that in an envelope. I wasn’t sure where he lived. It had been a few months so I addressed it to the last address I had for him. It would be forwarded. My last gesture. I mailed it that day not knowing or really caring if it would reach him.

Then, the night before my trip I went to bed ready to embark on new relationships. However, I woke up ready to continue with the last one. I had received a long-awaited, detailed email so I excitedly pulled out my laptop to read it in its entirety.

Oh, but it was only a dream.