Gone Like Yesterday


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
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 Copyright © 2023 by Janelle M. Williams
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 “Paul Robeson” by Gwendolyn Brooks, reprinted by consent of Brooks Permissions.
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 library of congress cataloging-in-publication data
 Names: Williams, Janelle M., author.
 Title: Gone like yesterday : a novel / Janelle M. Williams.
 Description: [New York] : Tiny Reparations Books, [2023]
 Identifiers: LCCN 2022038179 (print) | LCCN 2022038180 (ebook) |ISBN 9780593471630 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780593471647 (ebook)
 Subjects: LCGFT: Magic realist fiction. | Novels.
 Classification: LCC PS3623.I556783 G66 2023 (print) | LCC PS3623.I556783 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6—dc23/eng/20220819
 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022038179
 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022038180
 Cover design by Kimberly Glyder
 book design by daniel brount, adapted for ebook by estelle malmed
 This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
 pid_prh_6.0_142545503_c0_r1
 
 
 For Black Women
 holding it down and keeping it together
 as a means to love on us
 
 
 
 
 “Paul Robeson”
 Gwendolyn Brooks 1917–2000
 That time
 we all heard it,
 cool and clear,
 cutting across the hot grit of the day.
 The major Voice.
 The adult Voice
 forgoing Rolling River,
 forgoing tearful tale of bale and barge
 and other symptoms of an old despond.
 Warning, in music-words
 devout and large,
 that we are each other’s
 harvest:
 we are each other’s
 business:
 we are each other’s
 magnitude and bond.
 
 
 
 PROLOGUE 
 Tree hugging, earth loving, nature praising—that shit is for white people. Not for people who are made of bark themselves, who are the air you breathe. So, of course, Zahra being as black as she is, in skin color and attitude, does not feel she can afford to pay attention to the trees until one goes missing and it swallows her breath like a plague of locusts. Derrick Lewis Robinson is his name, and he’s her older brother, barely, by a year, and he’s gone like yesterday. Just yesterday, they were shooting the shit in their small backyard on the Eastside, making bets at the Battle of the Bands, running late for school and blaming it on 285 traffic. Just yesterday, he was louder than the snap music they leaned and rocked to, more rooted than Gram’s ever-revolving love life and Mom’s dedication to the cause. Seems like just fucking yesterday Derrick asked Zahra, “You think people can step outside of themselves? Feel two skins at once? Your own and someone else’s?” Zahra had looked at him confused, and when he didn’t laugh or say That’s wild or wave his statement away like he was really on one and knew it, she felt a wave of panic that came and went like a late-summer breeze. Now, it is all a wonder. Among everyone. Where did he go? Why isn’t he happy? When will he pull through, but then again, it’s not cancer or diabetes or any strict science awaiting a cure. So the wondering is prolific and pervasive. Nobody asked Derrick to make like a moth and fly away, just like nobody asked Billie Holiday to sing the blues or the Temptations to masquerade Cloud Nine’s despondency with an upbeat. Nobody asked Marvin Gaye’s dad to shoot him only for his brother to reveal that Marvin had wished for it but hadn’t had the courage to do it himself. Makes a 
 ONE 
 One month ago—September 2019, Harlem, a Saturday night
 Buzzed from her third glass of Roscato, Zahra slouches low in the back seat of an Uber headed east down 125th. She knows it’s impossible to hide from shame but doesn’t forsake the attempt. There are people who make a life of this, aren’t there? She’s people. A disaster headed to Kahlil’s apartment like an MLM victim selling knives or a door-to-door Bible-thumper. Her expectations are low. She’ll most likely find Kahlil reading one of his medical books or rolling a blunt. He’ll open the door and look at her like he’s nearly forgotten she was coming over. It’s not that he doesn’t like her; he’s just that kind of a player, mind games, a one-upper. Even though the back-and-forth has always been their dysfunctional dynamic, she was surprised when he texted. Lately, she never wants his type of intimate fun. A finger maybe, but nothing more.
 She was practically in love with him when they were at Stanford together. He was always shooting her smiles across parties or probing her with nonstop questions, stuff like, “You always been this shy?” or “You think you’ll get everything you want out of life?” or “What was growing up in ATL like?” He’d follow that last question with something absurd like, “I bet all the girls were poppin’ on a headstand, no? You were different though? You barely dance now.” Then he’d grab her waist, and the shock of his hands would send electricity up her spine, and she’d imagine a different version of herself, a looser version, someone who slow whines to Sean Paul, and maybe that’s what love was, being someone else for a short time. Kahlil was somewhat of the same, a nerd in class, his fuckboy alter ego part of a larger facade.
 Now, in the middle seat of a Nissan, Zahra smooths her hands along the nylon upholstery, then curls