Labor of Love Anthology: 10 Anecdotes of Love and the Struggles Within

by Aliyah Burke

  Immokalee flashed him a bright smile. “Come let me get you inside, the cold is making speak without using your brain.”

  The old man laughed as they walked among the sleeping village. It wasn’t a very big colony. It consisted of about thirty houses. And since it was the beginning of the cold season, the square, summer wattle and daub homes were gone to be replaced by their smaller round homes that looked like upside baskets. In the center of the plaza was the largest building in the colony, the council house where meetings, dances and gatherings were held. Immokalee slowed as she passed by the dark dwelling. She mumbled a prayer to the spirits.

  “So you do hear them whispering often?” He tightened his grip on her arm.

  “I know not you mean.” She hastened her step.

  “Don’t treat me like idiot, Tumbling Water.”

  She exhaled. “I’m sorry, it is hard for me to speak about such things. It is hard to have these odd feelings or to be able to hear and see things others cannot. Every morning when the sun rises I wish not to hear, see or even feel but my prayers have never been heard. So, yes I hear them and now that I have said it how can I make them go away?”

  “You can’t. They speak to you for a reason, girl. Instead of wishing them away, ask them to come closer to you. Can you understand the whispers yet?”

  Immokalee shrugged. “Not all the time. Sometimes it is like I’m covered in water trying to hear through the waves and the more I try to decipher what they said my lungs burn and I feel like I’m dying. So I stop listening to them and for a while I can almost. . . Nevermind,” she shook her head. “It is cold and morning is coming. One of us should rest before the day starts.”

  “One day you will learn to breath within the cloud of water, but it takes time.” Oukonunaka bent down to crawl into his home. “Come, we shall greet the sun together.”

  ***

  Immokalee glanced around the village. With daylight coming only slight stir rippled through the village mostly babies crying for their morning feeding. Movement from a nearby house caught her attention. Her keen eyes scanned the darkness. She gripped the handle of her stone club then crept into the darkness. She moved on silent feet, weaving in and out of the round houses until she found the noise disturbing the twilight. Immokalee caught a whiff of a fresh fire. She looked around suddenly realizing besides who’s house she now gazed upon. Mohe. He was the only man she’d ever given herself to, body and soul but he rejected her in the end, but here she stood longing to catch one single glimpse of the man with her heart. As if on cue, Mohe stepped out. Immokalee slid into the darkness. Mohe stretched his arms over his head. His body hard from years of hunting and fighting. His black hair hung loosely over his broad shoulders. Immokalee stared at him in awe. She moved closer to him. Her eyes outlining the shape of his body in the darkness. On his right shoulder she saw the long scar. Memories of the past flooded her mind.

  The night of the Great New Moon festival their village buzzed with food, stories and dancing. Mohe slipped past here to ask for a moonlit walk and she’s agreed. Besides her older brother, Adahy, Mohe was the best hunter in the village. Women from their village to ones far in the North threw themselves at him. When he asked her, she jumped at the chance to spend more time with him. They talked into the night, about their lives and future. When Mohe placed a tender kiss on her lips, her body nearly exploded. She wanted nothing more than this moment and when he entered for the first time there was nothing more perfect. They enjoyed each other bodies into the morning until exhaustion finally claimed them. Bliss but no matter how joyous it ended in a fight that split her soul, breaking it into many fractured pieces.

  Her older brother searched the village for her when they did not return to the plaza. Adahy along with his small warriors stormed through their wooden place of seclusion. When he saw glimpsed their naked bodies he flew into a rage pulling them apart.

  “Stop, Adahy this is my choice! I beg you, stop this.”

  Her brother glared at her. “He is not for you, sister.”

  “It is not for you to say what is for me or not. I chose this. I choose Mohe.”

  “But does he choose you? Time will tell.” He bent down to snatch up her dress and threw it at her. “Cover yourself. Before you disrespect yourself any further.”

  Mohe tugged her behind him, protecting her with his own body. “You speak of being disrespectful yet here you are disrespecting your sister. Our union should mean nothing to you. Where were you when your precious sister nearly died of fever?” Mohe stepped closer to Adahy. “Where were you when your own mother called out for you before she went into the land of the dead? Who has been here for Immokalee when you are not? It’s me, Adahy. It has always been me.”

  Adahy’s temper flared as he attacked Mohe. They fell to the ground in a heap of fists and blood. Shock flowed through the watchers like lightening in water. In a flash Immokalee grabbed her knife trying to separate the two men of her life. It was a melee. Seeing blood drip down the corner of Mohe’s lip made Immokalee raise her knife as she sprung to her feet and plunged the knife into the shoulder of one of the fighting men. Crimson gore slipped down the blade. “Adahy, I am sorry. I did not mean to hurt you. I lost control, forgive me.”

  Her brother’s eyes softened for a moment. He held her at arm’s length. “You didn’t hurt me, sister. Even in anger your heart knows the truth but like you said the choice is yours to make.” He turned without another word and vanished into the trees. He left the village a moon later, never to return. In her haste to protect Mohe, she let anger blind her stroke and her blade pierced her lover’s skin. Loved him, how could she hurt him? After that everything changed, her brother left taking a few of his most loyal friends and warriors and Mohe, he never looked at her the same way again. She chose him, but in the end his choice was clear. Immokalee shook the thoughts from her head she turned to leave but stepped on freshly fallen twigs. “Stupid,” she grumbled. There was no running from him.

  “Come out!” He hissed his hand on his war club.

  “Do not hurt me, Mohe. It is only me.” She raised her hands then stepped into the light closer to him.

  “Immokalee,” he whispered. “What are you doing out here?”

  “I needed a walk.”

  Mohe nodded. “Still find it hard to sleep at night?”

  “Sometimes.” Immokalee shifted from side to side under his penetrating gaze.

  “Uwoduhi Immokalee.”

  “Beautiful? You called me beautiful, now?”

  Mohe cleared his throat. “Forgive me I misspoke it’s just I know I have never said certain things to you that I should have said long ago.”

  “No,” she tried to walk away but her legs did not obey her command.

  “I want to say I never meant to hurt you, just like you never intended to hurt me, but after your brother left I thought you would blame me and it was in my own head I thought your heart would go cold.”

  “Coward. That is a selfish excuse, Mohe. What happened between us, there was a connection. I felt it and so did you. It was something so powerful and burned with great intensity and my maybe your soul couldn’t take it. You turned your back on me. To this day you walk around the village but you never are close enough to me to see my pain. Hurt? You do not know the meaning of the word.”

  Mohe crept closer. Her heart pounding with his every step. “No matter how you think I feel I would not change being with you. I’ve dreamt of holding you. I made bad choices. Would you change it if you could?”

  Immokalee licked her lips.

  “Can you not answer me? Or is our past something you’d rather forget.”

  Immokalee stiffened her shoulders. “No, I will not forget no matter how hard it is to see you in the arms and bed of another. I will remember probably for the rest of my days.”

  “I would . . .” Mohe started then stopped as his wife stepped outside carrying their youngest son in her arms. He took a huge step away her. “Morning wife.”

  �
�Who are you speaking too, husband?”

  “It was just. . .” he turned to the spot where Immokalee stood but like a spirit she was gone. He cleared his throat and smiled. “No one, my love, there is no one here.”

  Immokalee watched Mohe and his family walk away to greet the sun. He would never know how bad he’d hurt her but sharing a bit of her pain with him eased her soul…just for a moment. She walked back to the old man’s hut and crawled inside, it was warm and smelled of drying mint. She crawled on to a heap of robes then closed her eyes.

  “What are you thinking about, child?”

  “The things I cannot seem to forget.” She turned on her side, away from the nosy old man and fell sleep.

  PROMISE ME

  Reana Malori

  Promise Me

  Copyright © 2017 Reana Malori

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews. Due to copyright laws, you cannot trade, sell or give any ebooks away.

  Chapter One

  The alarm clock sounded and jarred Brandon Rivera from a restless slumber. Reaching one long arm over, he grabbed his phone and slid his finger along the screen to stop the buzzing sound. What he wouldn’t give for another thirty minutes of sleep…

  Forcing his lids open, he stretched from head to toe as he readied himself to get out of bed and start the day. His hand came down on the other side of the mattress and he felt nothing but cold sheets. Sighing deeply, he listened closely. Picking up only silence in the house, he took in a deep breath as he concluded that his wife was in the other room with Alexis, their youngest child.

  Placing his feet on the floor, he stood up out of the bed and went to find his wife and child. His own heart was beating at a fast pace as he hurried to the nursery; he hoped his little girl was okay. She’d been cranky and feverish the past few days.

  Walking into the room, he paused as he caught sight of two of the people he loved more than anything else in this world. The only one missing was his little boy, Michael, who was probably still drooling as he slept in the other room.

  As he looked at his wife holding his child, he thought back on everything he and Monique had gone through in the past seven years. If he had it within his power, he would take away all the pain and difficulty that his family had endured since the two of them first met in college. It had been difficult enough for him and Monique to become a couple, especially considering her parents’ feelings about her being with a white man.

  They’d both been so young and very, very naïve. Nothing could have convinced them that their future wasn’t laid out perfectly. Both of them had been so stubborn.

  When they discovered Monique was pregnant after a year of dating, the uncertainty had paralyzed them both and they'd been lost regarding what to do next.

  Neither of them had truly grasped the potential risk of a pregnancy. “Playing house” was what her parents had called it. They’d been right. Not having any idea of how a pregnancy would change them, they’d only cared that everything between them felt too good to stop. So they didn’t—and they were reckless in how they approached things.

  He’d fought tooth and nail to convince her father that being with Monique was not some fetish or phase that he was going through. When he’d met her in college, she’d been a junior and he a senior. He’d known within the first ten minutes that she was the woman he would marry someday. Convincing her of that fact took much more time and effort.

  Shaking his head at the twists and turns their lives had taken, he smiled at the memory of some of the hoops he’d jumped through to finally make her his. He spent more time and energy convincing her to give him a chance than he had on his classwork.

  Laughing under his breath at how desperate he'd been at the time, he was glad he’d been able to woo her with his charm and wit within a few weeks. Otherwise, he probably would have failed out of school, which wouldn't have helped him one bit. When she'd finally decided to give him a chance, it had been the best day of his life.

  Looking back on it, he knew that was the first day of the rest of his life. And she became the reason he had for living.

  When they finally became a couple, he was committed to the idea that she was the one for him. He’d asked her to marry him after six months of dating. She’d turned him down flat, but that didn’t stop him from declaring to the world that she would be his wife one day.

  Even after they knew a little one was on the way, she stubbornly refused to become his wife. She claimed she didn’t want to ruin his future and shackle him with a wife and child at such a young age. Shaking his head at the thought, her stubbornness was one of the reasons he fell in love with her in the first place.

  “What are you smiling at?” His wife’s voice broke into the silence.

  “You. Us.” Stepping closer to her, he knelt down and kissed his daughter on the forehead. “What happened?”

  Knowing what he was asking, she looked down at their baby and gave a small smile. “Nothing, really. I heard her squirming around and got up to check on her.”

  “Are you sure?” he couldn’t help but ask.

  Giving him one of her signature quirked-eyebrow glances, she shifted positions and settled the baby deeper in her arms. “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “I could have gotten up with her,” he said as he stood up again, looking down at the two ladies who held his heart.

  “No. You got home too late last night. It was just easier for me to do it myself.” Standing up from the comfortable blue rocking chair, she placed the baby back in her crib.

  Brandon took a second to gaze at his wife in an unguarded moment. She’d probably call him a liar, but he couldn’t help but think she was still the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes on. Even with her hair wrapped in her night scarf, her face puffy from sleep, and her comfy black gown, there was no one else he’d ever wanted more.

  “I still want to help with the kids, baby. We’re a team, right?” He’d stepped up behind her as he said the words. Wrapping his arms around her waist, he was surprised when she paused before leaning back into him.

  “We are,” she said in a low tone.

  He kissed her on the temple as he tightened his arms around her, “Should we take her to the doctor? Has her fever returned? If you’re worried about something, you need to tell me.”

  “No, it’s fine. Just the nervous jitters that come every so often. I’m not sure if I’ll ever be able to sleep during the night again. With two kids, any chance of a peaceful night's sleep has been shattered,” she said with a laugh. Trailing a finger down the side of their daughter’s soft cheek, her face almost crumbled and his heart lurched. “My baby,” she whispered.

  “Monique, what’s going on?” he demanded.

  “Nothing,” she said, looking up into his eyes.

  “Okay, come on. Let’s go in the other room. We need to talk.” Brandon made sure the baby monitor was on before picking up the receiver they kept close by in case she started to fuss.

  Once they’d made it back to their bedroom, he closed the door. Monique sat down on the edge of the bed and just stared up at him.

  “What’s wrong, Brandon?” she asked, her eyes wide.

  “Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” he pressed. “If something’s going on, why aren’t you telling me?”

  “There’s nothing to tell,” she said, as her eyes looked anywhere else but at him. She was lying.

  “Yes, there is. You know I don’t like it when you don’t tell me the truth. We’re gonna stay here until you spill it.” Sitting down beside her, he grabbed her small hand within his larger one.

  “I’m fin
e, Brandon. Listen. You have to go to work soon and I should take a shower before Alexis and Michael both wake up looking to eat. You know your son is cranky in the morning when he doesn’t get his Fruity Pebbles.” Pulling her hand from his grasp, she stood up from the bed and began walking over to the dresser.

  Now he knew with certainty that something was wrong. His wife didn't do this. Monique never pulled away from him or avoided eye contact. Looking over at her, he tried to will her to speak to him. “Baby, don’t do this. I don’t know what’s been going on lately, but what I do know is that something is wrong.”

  Turning to lean up against the dresser, she looked at him with little emotion. What the hell was going on with his wife?

  He watched as she took a deep breath before answering. “It doesn’t matter. Are you going to be home for dinner tonight?”

  Sighing, he stood up before responding. At five-eleven, he was a few inches taller than his wife. He could admit that he took full advantage of their height difference when it served his purpose. “Not sure. We have an audit going on at the office, and I need to be there for some late meetings. I’ll call you when I know more, probably around four, after the weekly meeting.”