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The instructor, Winnie, was on her bubbly vibe as usual, which didnotkeep her from wearing us the fuck out in class. After our stretches at the end, I stayed laid out on my yoga mat, keeping my mind purposely empty.
Trying to, at least.
“I love a good corpse pose as much as the next bitch, but I gotta ask… you okay, babe?”
I opened my eyes to find Winnie crouched next to me, one eyebrow lifted in concern. “I’m good.” I laughed, pulling myself into an upright position. “Just… prolonging the release, I guess.”
Her face softened into a grin. “Heard you. You wanna stay for the next class? It starts in like ten minutes. Or you know Brittany does spin in five.”
“I would, but I’ve gotta get going,” I said. “I… am shadowing Nick Davison today.”
“The filmmaker?” she asked. “That’s different for you, right?”
I nodded. “I think it’s more of what I really want though, so… we’ll see.”
“It’s gonna be amazing.” She grinned, standing up and then extending a hand to help me. “What is he working on here in the Heights?”
I accepted her hand up, then bent to get my yoga mat. “He’s doing something with Kyir.”
“Awww, Ky,” she gushed, hands clasped. “He’s such a gummy bear.”
My eyebrows shot up.
Gummy bear?
“Really?” I asked, trying to temper my face. “You know him pretty well?”
“Oh for sure.” She shrugged. “Ky is… well, I wanna saygangin the colloquial way, but… he for real is.” She laughed. “Or at least used to be. Changed man and all that.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I’ve heard.”
“A lot of the guys who grew up here were. Tristan, my brother Dray, Hendrix, Jay, Troy. Not necessarily gang shit for all of them, but definitelystreetshit,” Winnie chattered on. “They kinda had to be, with the way it was before.”
“Before the gentrification?”
“Don’tcall it that,” Winnie huffed. “I hate when people use that word for it, like people weren’tdyingout here.”
My mouth dropped. “I… I’m sorry, I didn’t mean anything negative by that. I know it wasn’t quite like that; there’s too many locals still here for it to be that.”
“Roman called itredevelopmentwhen he came back. Or revitalization, I can’t remember. Either way, it wasn’t about bringing something we never had. It was about bringing the lifeback.”
“And it’s beautiful,” I assured, reaching out to squeeze her hand. I didn’t know Winnie super wellyet, but she was becoming a friend. Unlike Jules, who’d been gone from the area damn near long enough to be considered a transplant like me, Winnie had never left the Heights.
This was the only home she’d ever known and, like many others, she was protective of it.
Which I actuallyloved.
Gentrificationwas the word for it in our current lexicon, but she was right. This place had always sustained life, always had a soul of its own. It had suffered greatly from the fallout of the race riots in Blackwood next door, leaving a community resilient, but strapped for resources.
The people did what they always did.
Survived.
And when the funding came, even from outside, it was never with the intention of pushing out the people who’d been there the whole time. In fact, it was specifically aboutkeepingthem there, and providing access to better, in the meantime.
Obviously, that made the area attractive, which attracted people who were also looking for better, so it did kinda switch up the vibe.
But, there was room for everybody.
