The mic was heavy in Tia’s hand, but her voice came out sharp.


The crowd in the tiny poetry lounge on 55th was still—packed in tight under buzzing neon lights and sweat-stained walls, their silence wrapped around her like a spotlight.


She stood on stage, braids pulled into a knot, eyeliner winged to filth, gold hoops glinting with every heartbeat.


“They say my love is loud.

Too many decibels, too much skin showing.

They say I need to soften,

like I ain’t already survived men who broke me just to make room in me.”


A low mmm rose from the crowd. They felt it.


But the one person she hoped would be there?


Wasn’t.


Malik.


Her on-again, off-again… everything.


Thirty-seven. Promoter. Provider. And a storm she kept walking back into like thunder was therapy.


She stepped off the stage to applause, but it didn’t touch her.


Because applause didn’t hold you at night. It didn’t erase bruises. It didn’t whisper apologies into your spine and then turn cold the next day.


Tia sat at the bar and ordered her usual—whiskey neat, chased with silence.


Nova slid into the seat beside her.


DJ Nova—tattoos, faded hoodie, and eyes like they’d seen more than most men ever confessed.


“I heard that last line,” Nova said. “You gonna pretend it wasn’t about him?”


Tia sipped. “Who said it was?”


Nova stared. “Your silence is always louder than your poems.”


Later that night, Tia let herself into the apartment she shared with Maya part-time. The place was quiet. Maya was probably at her warehouse. Zaire's drawings still hung on the fridge.


Tia dropped her bag, peeled off her boots, and stood in front of the mirror.


Her lipstick was smeared.


Her wrists were bare.


And her heart?


Still wrapped in Malik’s name like barbed wire.


She pulled out her notebook and wrote a new title:


“Roses Don’t Grow in the Dark”


Then crossed it out.


Wrote underneath:


“Unless They Learn To.”