Where It’s Most Dangerous to Be Black in America
Black Americans made up 13.6% of the US population in 2022 and 54.1% of the victims of murder and non-negligent manslaughter, aka homicide. That works out, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data, to a homicide rate of 29.8 per 100,000 Black Americans and four per 100,000 of everybody else.(1)
A homicide rate of four per 100,000 is still quite high by wealthy-nation standards. The most up-to-date statistics available from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development show a homicide of rate one per 100,000 in Canada as of 2019, 0.8 in Australia (2021), 0.4 in France (2017) and Germany (2020), 0.3 in the UK (2020) and 0.2 in Japan (2020).
But 29.8 per 100,000 is appalling, similar to or higher than the homicide rates of notoriously dangerous Brazil, Colombia and Mexico. It also represents a sharp increase from the early and mid-2010s, when the Black homicide rate in the US hit new (post-1968) lows and so did the gap between it and the rate for everybody else. When the homicide rate goes up, Black Americans suffer disproportionately. When it falls, as it did last year and appears to be doing again this year, it is mostly Black lives that are saved.
As hinted in the chart, racial definitions have changed a bit lately; the US Census Bureau and other government statistics agencies have become more open to classifying Americans as multiracial. The statistics cited in the first paragraph of this column are for those counted as Black or African American only. An additional 1.4% of the US population was Black and one or more other race in 2022, according to the Census Bureau, but the CDC Wonder (for “Wide-ranging Online Data for Epidemiologic Research”) databases from which most of the statistics in this column are drawn don’t provide population estimates or calculate mortality rates for this group. My estimate is that its homicide rate in 2022 was about six per 100,000.
A more detailed breakdown by race, ethnicity and gender reveals that Asian Americans had by far the lowest homicide rate in 2022, 1.6, which didn’t rise during the pandemic, that Hispanic Americans had similar homicide rates to the nation as a whole and that men were more than four times likelier than women to die by homicide in 2022. The biggest standout remained the homicide rate for Black Americans.
Black people are also more likely to be victims of other violent crime, although the differential is smaller than with homicides. In the 2021 National Crime Victimization Survey from the Bureau of Justice Statistics (the 2022 edition will be out soon), the rate of violent crime victimization was 18.5 per 1,000 Black Americans, 16.1 for Whites, 15.9 for Hispanics and 9.9 for Asians, Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders. Understandably, Black Americans are more concerned about crime than others, with 81% telling Pew Research Center pollsters before the 2022 midterm elections that violent crime was a “very important” issue, compared with 65% of Hispanics and 56% of Whites.
These disparities mainly involve communities caught in cycles of violence, not external predators. Of the killers of Black Americans in 2020 whose race was known, 89.4% were Black, according to the FBI. That doesn’t make those deaths any less of a tragedy or public health emergency. Homicide is seventh on the CDC’s list of the 15 leading causes of death among Black Americans, while for other Americans it’s nowhere near the top 15. For Black men ages 15 to 39, the highest-risk group, it’s usually No. 1, although in 2022 the rise in accidental drug overdoses appears to have pushed accidents just past it. For other young men, it’s a distant third behind accidents and suicides.
To be clear, I do not have a solution for this awful problem, or even much of an explanation. But the CDC statistics make clear that sky-high Black homicide rates are not inevitable. They were much lower just a few years ago, for one thing, and they’re far lower in some parts of the US than in others. Here are the overall 2022 homicide rates for the country’s 30 most populous metropolitan areas.
Metropolitan areas are agglomerations of counties by which economic and demographic data are frequently reported, but seldom crime statistics because the patchwork of different law enforcement agencies in each metro area makes it so hard. Even the CDC, which gets its mortality data from state health departments, doesn’t make it easy, which is why I stopped at 30 metro areas.(2)
Sorting the data this way does obscure one key fact about homicide rates: They tend to be much higher in the main city of a metro area than in the surrounding suburbs.
But looking at homicides by metro area allows for more informative comparisons across regions than city crime statistics do, given that cities vary in how much territory they cover and how well they reflect an area’s demographic makeup. Because the CDC suppresses mortality data for privacy reasons whenever there are fewer than 10 deaths to report, large metro areas are good vehicles for looking at racial disparities. Here are the 30 largest metro areas, ranked by the gap between the homicide rates for Black residents and for everybody else.
The biggest gap by far is in metropolitan St. Louis, which also has the highest overall homicide rate. The smallest gaps are in metropolitan San Diego, New York and Boston, which have the lowest homicide rates. Homicide rates are higher for everybody in metro St. Louis than in metro New York, but for Black residents they’re six times higher while for everyone else they’re just less than twice as high.
There do seem to be some regional patterns to this mayhem. The metro areas with the biggest racial gaps are (with the glaring exception of Portland, Oregon) mostly in the Rust Belt, those with the smallest are mostly (with the glaring exceptions of Boston and New York) in the Sun Belt. Look at a map of Black homicide rates by state, and the highest are clustered along the Mississippi River and its major tributaries. Southern states outside of that zone and Western states occupy roughly the same middle ground, while the Northeast and a few middle-of-the-country states with small Black populations are the safest for their Black inhabitants.(3)
Metropolitan areas in the Rust Belt and parts of the South stand out for the isolation of their Black residents, according to a 2021 study of Census data from Brown University’s Diversity and Disparities Project, with the average Black person living in a neighborhood that is 60% or more Black in the Detroit; Jackson, Mississippi; Memphis; Chicago; Cleveland and Milwaukee metro areas in 2020 (in metro St. Louis the percentage was 57.6%). Then again, metro New York and Boston score near the top on another of the project’s measures of residential segregation, which tracks the percentage of a minority group’s members who live in neighborhoods where they are over-concentrated compared with White residents, so segregation clearly doesn’t explain everything.
Looking at changes over time in homicide rates may explain more. Here’s the long view for Black residents of the three biggest metro areas. Again, racial definitions have changed recently. This time I’ve used the new, narrower definition of Black or African American for 2018 onward, and given estimates in a footnote of how much it biases the rates upward compared with the old definition.
All three metro areas had very high Black homicide rates in the 1970s and 1980s, and all three experienced big declines in the 1990s and 2000s. But metro Chicago’s stayed relatively high in the early 2010s then began a rebound in mid-decade that as of 2021 had brought the homicide rate for its Black residents to a record high, even factoring in the boost to the rate from the definitional change.
What happened in Chicago? One answer may lie in the growing body of research documenting what some have called the “Ferguson effect,” in which incidents of police violence that go viral and beget widespread protests are followed by local increases in violent crime, most likely because police pull back on enforcement. Ferguson is the St. Louis suburb where a 2014 killing by police that local prosecutors and the US Justice Department later deemed to have been in self-defense led to widespread protests that were followed by big increases in St. Louis-area homicide rates. Baltimore had a similar viral death in police custody and homicide-rate increase in 2015. In Chicago, it was the October 2014 shooting death of a teenager, and more specifically the release a year later of a video that contradicted police accounts of the incident, leading eventually to the conviction of a police officer for second-degree murder.
It’s not that police killings themselves are a leading cause of death among Black Americans. The Mapping Police Violence database lists 285 killings of Black victims by police in 2022, and the CDC reports 209 Black victims of “legal intervention,” compared with 13,435 Black homicide victims. And while Black Americans are killed by police at a higher rate relative to population than White Americans, this disparity — 2.9 to 1 since 2013, according to Mapping Police Violence — is much less than the 7.5-to-1 ratio for homicides overall in 2022. It’s the loss of trust between law enforcement agencies and the communities they serve that seems to be disproportionately deadly for Black residents of those communities.
The May 2020 murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer was the most viral such incident yet, leading to protests nationwide and even abroad, as well as an abortive local attempt to disband and replace the police department. The Minneapolis area subsequently experienced large increases in homicides and especially homicides of Black residents. But nine other large metro areas experienced even bigger increases in the Black homicide rate from 2019 to 2022.
A lot of other things happened between 2019 and 2022 besides the Floyd protests, of course, and I certainly wouldn’t ascribe all or most of the pandemic homicide-rate increase to the Ferguson effect. It is interesting, though, that the St. Louis area experienced one of the smallest percentage increases in the Black homicide rate during this period, and it decreased in metro Baltimore.
Also interesting is that the metro areas experiencing the biggest percentage increases in Black residents’ homicide rates were all in the West (if your definition of West is expansive enough to include San Antonio). If this were confined to affluent areas such as Portland, Seattle, San Diego and San Francisco, I could probably spin a plausible-sounding story about it being linked to especially stringent pandemic policies and high work-from-home rates, but that doesn’t fit Phoenix, San Antonio or Las Vegas, so I think I should just admit that I’m stumped.
The standout in a bad way has been the Portland area, which had some of the longest-running and most contentious protests over policing, along with many other sources of dysfunction. The area’s homicide rate for Black residents has more than tripled since 2019 and is now second highest among the 30 biggest metro areas after St. Louis. Again, I don’t have any real solutions to offer here, but whatever the Portland area has been doing since 2019 isn’t working.
(1) The CDC data for 2022 are provisional, with a few revisions still being made in the causes assigned to deaths (was it a homicide or an accident, for example), but I’ve been watching for weeks now, and the changes have been minimal. The CDC is still using 2021 population numbers to calculate 2022 mortality rates, and when it updates those, the homicide rates will change again, but again only slightly. The metropolitan-area numbers also don’t reflect a recent update by the White House Office of Management and Budget to its list of metro areas and the counties that belong to them, which when incorporated will bring yet more small mortality-rate changes. To get these statistics from the CDC mortality databases, I clicked on “Injury Intent and Mechanism” and then on “Homicide”; in some past columns I instead chose “ICD-10 Codes” and then “Assault,” which delivered slightly different numbers.
(2) It’s easy to download mortality statistics by metro area for the years 1999 to 2016, but the databases covering earlier and later years do not offer this option, and one instead has to select all the counties in a metro area to get area-wide statistics, which takes a while.
(3) The map covers the years 2018-2022 to maximize the number of states for which CDC Wonder will cough up data, although as you can see it wouldn’t divulge any numbers for Idaho, Maine, Vermont and Wyoming (meaning there were fewer than 10 homicides of Black residents in each state over that period) and given the small numbers involved, I wouldn’t put a whole lot of stock in the rates for the Dakotas, Hawaii, Maine and Montana.
(https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2023/09/14/where-it-s-most-dangerous-to-be-black-in-america/cdea7922-52f0-11ee-accf-88c266213aac_story.html)
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A Family of Three (C.L 16) - Part.I- Discoveries, Reunions, and Surprises
Paring: Charles Leclerc X OC!Marie Anderson
Synopsis: Charles and Marie ended any chance of a relationship years ago. They just didn't expect to have to share custody of a child after the death of their best friend.
⚠️ Warnings: Mention of death and murder, swearing, Charles being a little aggressive in his reactions, mention of sex and drug use. (This chapter may contain triggers!) (+16)
**In this story, Jules Bianchi died in 2019, not 2015, which changes some facts in the careers of the drivers.
A.N: Hello! How are you doing? After a long time, I finally brought Part 1 translated into English! Remembering that English is not my first language, so there may be some mistakes! I tried my best!
Feedback is always welcome. Let me know if you liked it!
Word Count: 7.882
Read the prologue here!
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January 15th, 2023 - Milan, Italy
"Good morning, Marcella!" I greet my secretary as I enter the office. "Any news for me?" I ask the blonde girl who is sitting with her eyes fixed on the computer in front of her.
"Good morning, Marie! And...HA! I did it!" Marcella suddenly jumps, startling me. "I'm sorry! It's just that I managed to schedule the meeting with Fred Lacroix for next week." She says, trying to compose herself, and I smile."
"That's great! You're amazing," I say, leaning over next to her at the table and taking a peek at her computer. "Do you think he'll be in a good mood? He's not exactly known for being pleasant when it comes to selling and buying his art," I ask and Marcella just shrugs.
"I don't know, and honestly, I don't worry about it," she says, and I can see a smug smile spread across her face. "Either way, we're awesome! We always get what we want," she finishes, and I laugh at her enthusiasm.
I agree with Marcella. We are awesome and always get what we want when it comes to work.
After Jules died, I moved from Monaco to Italy. I felt like I needed to leave it all behind, even if it meant burying a part of who I was with my past. I needed a fresh start, and I closed my eyes to my old life. I had nothing left in Monaco. Nothing held me back or was even worth staying for.
I needed time and a new life, and that's exactly what I found when I came to Italy, where I was able to enroll in arts just in time to continue the school year. And a year and a half later, I graduated and started interning at one of the best galleries in Milan. Shortly after that, I realized I had a lot of potential for curating and dedicated myself to the field, of which today I am still a part, with the highest success rate in recruiting and selling new artists.
Today, I can say that my life is more than comfortable, and I spend so much of my day occupied with work that I hardly have time to think about everything I left behind a few years ago.
"Ah!" Marcella screams and catches me off guard, making me take a few steps back.
"Oh my god, Marcella! You're going to kill me, girl!" I say and put my hand on my chest, feeling my heart skipping like crazy.
"Sorry! I just remembered you got a letter this morning," she says, and I swear my confusion is written all over my face. "I mean, you didn't really get it, it's more like 'they passed the envelope under the door while we were closed, and I stepped on it when I got here'," she says and pulls out a crumpled white envelope with a half footprint on it. "I tried to clean it up, but as you can see, it didn't go very well. Seriously, someone should clean the streets of Milan more," she says and hands me the envelope.
I examine the envelope to find the sender, but I only find "Marie Anderson" written in delicate handwriting.
"There's no sender. That's strange." I say and Marcella nods.
"I thought it was kind of creepy too. I mean, who still sends letters In 2023? Isn't it easier to send a message on Insta? Or like, an email?" I nod my head and shrug.
"Well, let it be," I say and start walking towards my office. "Please let anyone who wants to speak to me know to leave a message. And that includes my mom, okay?" I say and Marcella nods. "Great, thanks," I say, entering my office and closing the door behind me.
I throw my bag on the desk and sit in my chair. I analyze the envelope in my hand again and for a moment, I feel a strange sensation as I stare at it.
"Okay, let's end the suspense, Marie," I say to myself and I grab a staple remover from the pencil holder, passing it over the glued part of the envelope.
Opening the envelope, I take out a sheet of paper with the same handwriting as the envelope, and two photos of a little boy with dark hair and eyes who I swear I've never seen before, but who somehow seems very familiar to me. I turn over the photos to see if there's anything written on the back.
"Vincenzo. 24/12/2021"
Was written in one of the photos. The little boy was sitting next to what looked like a Christmas tree. I took a look at the next photograph, where the same boy, who seemed a bit older, was sitting on a mat surrounded by toys.
"Vincenzo. 19/12/2022."
Feeling even more confused and with a strange sensation spreading through my chest, I picked up the letter I had left aside on the table and began to read it.
France, January 2nd, 2023.
Marie,
I can't even begin to tell you how many times I've thought about how I would write to you. You don't know me, and to be honest, I don't think anyone in his circle of friends and family has even heard of me.
My name is Cecilia, and that's all you need to know about me right now, aside from what I'm about to write to you next: I was engaged to Jules Bianchi.
I know this is strange and perhaps even unbelievable, but it's true. Jules and I had a brief but passionate love story. I loved Jules, and I can say that he loved me too.
Two days before his death, I found out that I was pregnant. I gave birth to Vincenzo on December 24th, 2019. He was a healthy and strong little boy, very similar to Jules.
I loved him from the moment I found out he was growing inside me. The result of something so pure and beautiful, from my relationship with Jules.
I know it's a lot for you to process right now, but so that you can know that I'm telling you the truth, there are two photos of Vincenzo. I want you to look at them and see Jules, just as I do every time I look at my son.
"I've been wanting to write to you for a long time. Jules saw you as a sister. I'm sorry I hid this from you and his family too, but I was so afraid. Afraid of rejection, of being seen as a liar. I couldn't go through any of that. I only had Jules, and after he left me, there was no one else I could trust, so I've been raising Vincenzo alone until now, but I don't think I can do it anymore. Vincenzo has a family besides me. And I need him to grow up knowing that he is loved.
I promise I to explain everything you need to know. Please meet me at the café where you used to meet every time you came together to Nice. January 18th at 4 pm.
- Cecilia.
My hands tremble as I put the letter back on the table.
What the hell is this? Is this some kind of sick joke?
I take the two photos back in my hands and stare at them, now realizing why I found that boy so familiar. It was Jules. That boy is the spitting image of Jules.
But how is this even possible? Why didn't Jules tell us he had someone? That's not like him. Jules was always an open book to us. He told us everything, just as we did with him. He wouldn't hide this from us...would he?
With my head swimming with questions and my heart heavy as lead, I found myself shouting Marcella's name, and less than a minute later, her short locks appeared through the door.
My hands tremble as I put the letter back on the table.
What the hell is this? Is this some kind of sick joke?
I take the two photos back in my hands and stare at them, now realizing why I found that boy so familiar. It was Jules. That boy is the spitting image of Jules.
But how is this even possible? Why didn't Jules tell us he had someone? That's not like him. Jules was always an open book to us. He told us everything, just as we did with him. He wouldn't hide this from us...would he?
With my head swimming with questions and my heart heavy as lead, I found myself shouting Marcella's name, and less than a minute later, her short locks appeared through the door.
"Yes?" She asks before looking at me for a moment and entering my office complete with a worried expression. "Are you okay, Marie?" She says kneeling by my side.
"Book a flight for tomorrow morning. I need to go to France."
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January 18th, 2023. - Nice, France.
I stare again at the clock hanging on the wall above the counter of the small café. 3:45 PM.
15 minutes. Just 15 minutes until I could find out who Cecilia was and why she decided to contact me now, after all this time. And why me? Yes, Jules, Charles, and I were always very close despite the age difference. But why reach out to me? If she intended to introduce the boy to Jules' family, why didn't she contact Christine or Philippe?
I hadn't seen Jules' family in a long time, we didn't even exchange messages. I left them behind when I decided to move on to Italy. They were buried with my past in Monaco.
The bell on the entrance door rings, indicating that someone has entered the premises. My head quickly snaps toward the sound.
And it's like in one minute, everything I struggled so hard to forget and leave behind comes back with force and without control like waves of a tsunami.
Standing just a few meters away from where I'm sitting, my gaze meets Charles'.
Charles. My ex-boyfriend whom I haven't seen in almost four years. The part that hurts the most from my past, besides the death of Jules.
He looks different. So different from the last time I saw him at Jules' funeral. This time he's not dressed in mourning black, no. He's wearing casual clothes, dark jeans, and a moss green sweater with the word "FERRARI" stamped in black. There's a scruffy beard on his face and his eyes...damn. The eyes that last time reflected so much hopelessness were now more alive, but still with certain traces of concern.
Charles walks up to where I'm sitting, his steps quick and wide as if he wanted to corner me before I could escape again. He stops half a meter away, and his gaze curiously roams over me. His expression is stern but also covered in doubt. I bet that, like me, he wants to understand why I'm here.
"Charles..." I'm the first to say, my voice low and uncertain. He nods slowly, his gaze still fixed on me, as if he wants to uncover all the secrets I gained during the years we were apart.
“What are you doing here, Marie?" he asks, direct and determined, without any hesitation. It's a tone I would have never expected to hear from the Charles I left four years ago. Yes, he really has changed.
I wished I could answer him with the same intensity, but honestly, I don't think I could. There's so much going on here and my head is spinning with so many questions and emotions. Why is Charles here? What the hell is going on? Did he set all this up?
"Is this some kind of joke? Because if it is, I swear to God it's not funny," he says, his tone now rough.
I sit there staring at him, completely confused.
Charles runs his hand through his hair, messing up his brown locks even more. He sighs heavily and closes his eyes, his tongue quickly passing over his lower lip. He used to do that all the time when he felt anger or frustration. At least that hasn't changed.
"What are you doing here, Charles?" I ask, and he opens his eyes, once again staring at me.
Charles's hand reaches into his back pocket and pulls out an envelope identical to the one that was left for me in the office in Italy. The difference is that I can see that this one was addressed to Charles, only his name, and also without a sender.
"Please tell me it wasn't you, Marie," he says as his eyes shift from the envelope to my face. I look at him with all the sincerity I can muster and answer, "No, it wasn't me." He nods his head, his expression softening a bit. He moves and sits in the vacant chair in front of me, his hands going up to his face to rub it.
"Jules has a son," he says.
"I know," I reply.
"Charles lowers his hands and stares at me once again, confusion etched on his face. Before he can say anything, I reach into my bag on the table, open it, and take out the white envelope. Charles looks at my hand for a moment before reaching over the table to take the envelope from me."
"You got one too," he says, not looking at me, even though it's not a question, I nod my head in agreement.
"It seems she arranged to meet with both of us. I think it's easier if we hear the story at the same time, that way there's no risk of getting the wrong versions," I say, and his gaze shifts from the envelopes on the table to me.
"Do you think it's a lie? That the boy isn't Jules's son?" he asks seriously, and I just shrug in response.
"I believe it could be Jules's son. I just don't know why she waited all this time and why she chose us. Obviously, we're not the best people to show Vincenzo that he has a family on his father's side," I say, and I see Charles's jaw tighten.
"We were friends with Jules. He trusted us," he says, once again his voice sounding rough.
"It seems he didn't trust us enough to tell us he fell in love," I say, and immediately regret it.
I look at Charles and if we were part of a cartoon, he would have flames in his eyes.
“You don't know what happened. You don't know his reasons, just like me,” he says through gritted teeth. “Don't doubt his motives. Not when he's not here to defend himself.”
In all the years I've spent by Charles' side, I've never seen him so angry. And if I didn't know him, I'd be scared.
But do you still know him? I silently ask myself.
"That's not what I meant," I defensively reply. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean for it to come out that way. Of course, Jules had reasons and we'll find out when Cecilia arrives." Charles relaxes his jaw and adjusts in his seat.
I look at the clock on the wall again. 4:10 PM. She's late. I look at Charles, a little anxious.
"Do you think she's coming?" he shrugs, but his hand goes into his hoodie pocket and pulls out a cell phone.
"She's late," he states what I already know. "But I think so, she's coming." Charles carelessly tosses the phone onto the table, his anxious fingers fidgeting with his rings.
"Congratulations on the runner-up, by the way," I say, trying to ease both of our anxieties, and he looks back at me.
"Did you follow the races?" he asked, a little surprised.
"Yes," I admit, somewhat embarrassed. "My secretary is a huge Formula 1 fan," I add, which is not a lie.
Like all Italians, Marcella is a devoted Tifosi. And even though I wanted to leave everything I knew behind, I couldn't escape one of the most beloved sports in Europe, especially in Italy, the home of Ferrari.
Charles lets out a low laugh, his look adopting the expression of a mischievous boy. Oh no.
"Your secretary, huh?" he says with a teasing and suggestive tone.
"Ah, shut up, Leclerc!" I say, trying to sound serious but failing when I let out a laugh. "I'm serious! My secretary is a diehard Tifosi. She can't shut up for a minute about Ferrari and makes me watch all the races," I say, shrugging.
"Yeah, yeah... And I bet I'm your 'secretary's' favorite driver, right?" he says, making air quotes with his fingers and having a smug smile on his face.
"Actually, she prefers Sainz," I say, and instantly his smile turns into a serious expression, which makes me laugh.
Soon, Charles' dimples appear on his cheek and my heart skips a beat at the sound of his typically somewhat flawed and exaggerated laugh. Oh, how I enjoyed hearing that horrible but at the same time very cute laugh again.
At that moment, even though I hated to admit it, I realized how much I missed that feeling of familiarity and lightness. And even though just a few minutes ago, I was doubting whether I still knew the person that Charles had become, I could see that regardless of the years and tragedies that life had subjected him to from a young age, that kind and playful boy that I had once fallen in love with was still there. And maybe he would never leave. And I liked that.
Looking at Charles smiling, sitting in front of me, I wonder for just a second if it would have been different if I hadn't left. But as soon as the thought came, I pushed it away. Because even though I was happy to know that Charles still had something familiar to me inside him, we were not meant to be even before Jules' death. And I doubt that we could have maintained a good relationship with all the pain and mourning that surrounded us. I made a good choice. Yes, I did the right thing.
Leaving Monaco was one of the hardest things I had to face. But it made me grow and become a strong woman. I learned to deal with loss, even if it may not be the healthiest way, it still worked for me. I was able to finish college, got the job I wanted, and met new people. I fell in love, and even though I didn't love them like I loved Charles, I still allowed myself to feel and try happiness. Clearly, it didn't work out, but the experience was worth it.
And I can also say that Charles has achieved what he wanted, or almost everything. He is one of the best Formula 1 drivers and drives for Ferrari, which is almost every motorsport athlete's dream. He has a successful career and is known worldwide for it. And even though he didn't get the title he so desperately craved last year, he may get it this year. He is focused, grateful, and kind. The golden boy. Il Predestinato.
Even though Charles is so young, he has given his family and friends everything they ever dreamed of. Pascale must be so proud of him, and if Harvé were still alive, I'm sure he would also be proud of the son he raised. And Jules would also be proud to see Charles' progress.
And then the emptiness appears again. Jules. I try my best not to think about him. The memories are still painful even after all these years.
I think I let my thoughts reflect too much because Charles, who was laughing before, now looks at me with a compassionate expression. He probably thought of Jules too.
"I miss him too," he says and I nod my head. "And I missed you too," his hand meets mine on the table.
There were no ulterior motives. Just a gesture. A gesture to affirm what he was saying. And it hurt. It hurt in my heart and soul.
I quickly withdraw my hand from his and stare at the table. Charles withdraws his hands and keeps them close to his body.
"I know you didn't owe me anything, Marie. No explanations, not loyalty," he starts, his voice a little broken, making my heart tighten. "But Jules died and you left. Why did you leave?" he asks, and I can hear the hurt in his voice.
I wished I had the strength to lift my gaze and tell him while looking him in the eyes that everything I did was out of fear and thinking that there was nothing left for me in Monaco. That I still loved him even after he broke up with me and that losing Jules to death destroyed me, but knowing that I would lose Charles while he was still alive would only ruin me even more. I couldn't see him every day and know that he no longer belonged to me. And that every minute I spent mourning and heartbroken without him reminded me that love was impossible for me. That I didn't deserve to be loved. That there would never be anyone to love me.
"I had to go," I say, still staring at my hands. "I don't expect you to understand or forgive me. Because I'm not asking for any of that, Charles," my voice sounds firm but my eyes burn.
I take a deep breath and hold it for a few seconds before releasing it. I raise my gaze to meet his when I'm sure the tears won't fall.
"I had to make a choice and I did. I chose myself," I say simply, perhaps trying to convince myself.
Charles nods his head and goes back to fiddling with the rings on his fingers. This time it was difficult for him to look at me.
"I'm happy to see who you've become, Marie. And I hope you've achieved what you wanted when..." he pauses for a second, unsure of what to say, "when you left Monaco." A tired laugh escapes his lips. "I'm not going to judge you, especially since when you left, we were no longer a couple. But I was an idiot to think that we were still friends." He looks back at me. "I was foolish until I realized that there would be no possibility for us without Jules being here."
I wanted to scream. I wanted to stand up and throw everything in front of me at him. I wanted to curse at him and tell him that he didn't have that right. But to be fair, I could never do that. Not when I left, when it was me who left what was left of the three of us. Jules had died and I had fled. When I left, I didn't think of Charles or his feelings. I only thought of myself and how I could never live with that.
I don't regret it. I did what I thought was necessary and would do it again. Charles might have needed me, but I needed to leave and heal. And that's what I did. Charles still had friends and family to rely on, and I had no one. No present family, no friends, and no boyfriend. Charles and I both mourned, of course, but we mourned in different ways. He had lost a friend, and I had lost everything.
There was no one to come home to and hug. There was no one there to tell me that they were sorry for my loss and that everything would be okay. So I went after what I thought I needed and I got it. I went in search of myself, a new life, new choices, and opportunities, and I found them. I found myself. Of course, I let go of a lot, and the void left by Jules and Charles was never filled, but I learned to cope and use it to my advantage for other things, and that was enough, at least for now.
Before I could respond to him, I'm interrupted once again by the sound of the damn doorbell.
Charles and I turned our attention to the door at the same time. Both of us were staring at a slim blonde woman, wearing a green coat and leggings. But what caught our attention the most was the little boy in her arms. He was about 3 or 4 years old, with dark hair, lying with his face hidden in the woman's neck, and his small hand clutching onto her collar as if he were afraid she would leave if he let go.
Charles and I stood up in rehearsed gestures, all at the same time. He stopped beside me, his hand resting on my shoulder, covered by my own coat this time. The woman looked at us and came slowly towards us. When she got closer and stopped about a meter away from us, I could analyze her.
Her face was thin and perfectly symmetrical, and even though it seemed like she hadn't slept in days, her tired eyes were a beautiful shade of greenish-brown. She is very beautiful. Her lips opened in a small smile, and there I could see that she easily fit Jules' type.
"I assume you are Charles and Marie, right?" She says, her voice sweet and tired.
My gaze moves from her to the little boy in her arms, and then they cross with Charles'. He tells me through his eyes the same things I am thinking. We return our attention to the blonde in front of us and nod.
"Great!" She clears her throat before continuing, "I'm Cecilia, and this little guy here is Vincenzo." She gently shakes the child, who tightens his grip on her coat collar even more. "Jules' son."
Charles' grip on my shoulder becomes stronger, and I swallow hard. I can't take my eyes off the little boy, and now up close, I can see his profile. His chubby childlike cheek and long eyelashes, just like Jules'.
Cecilia shifts uncomfortably, her feet shifting the weight from one to the other, and she adjusts Vincenzo's position in her lap.
"I know you must have thousands of questions, and I promise I will answer them all. But before that, would you mind if I sit down? Vincenzo is a bit heavy, and I walked here with him in my arms," she says, embarrassed.
"Of course not. Please," Charles approaches her and pulls the chair he was sitting in a few minutes ago. Cecilia sits down, careful not to make any sudden movements and wake Vincenzo.
Charles points to the empty chair, and I sit down. He takes a few steps hto the table next to us and takes an unoccupied chair to sit on. Once the three of us are seated around the table, Charles calls the waitress, whom I only now notice has been staring at us this whole time. The redheaded and smiling girl, who probably can't be more than 19 years old, approaches with her gaze fixed on Charles- she probably recognized him.
Charles is the one who orders. A cappuccino for me- which causes a sensation in my stomach that he still remembers- an iced tea for himself, and he asks Cecilia what she would like to drink, to which she responds that coffee would be enough. The redhead writes down the orders and asks for permission to leave. Her eyes still glued to Charles.
I roll my eyes internally, but I know I can't blame her. After all, it's probably not every day that she serves a public figure. When we used to come here with Jules, the employees were different, and the small café is located on a somewhat isolated street in Nice, so it's unlikely that many famous people come here.
I take my gaze off the waitress and turn back to Cecilia, who was already looking at me attentively with a small smile on her lips.
"Well..." Charles begins. "Why are we here, Cecilia? Why only now have you contacted us?" He leans forward a little more, his arms resting on the wooden table.
Cecilia shifts in her chair carefully and her eyes briefly glance at Vincenzo before turning back to us.
"I wanted you to meet Vincenzo. While he was alive, Jules always mentioned you as part of his family. He loved you both very much," she says, and I feel my chest tightening.
"But why only now?" I speak for the first time. "I know you wrote in the letter that you were afraid, but it still sounds strange that you would come looking for us now, without any reason," I say, trying to keep my voice steady.
Cecilia falls silent for a few seconds as if she wants to formulate the next words carefully.
"There's a reason," she confirms. "Look, I know it's strange, and I assure you that I'm not looking for any money or anything like that." Her gaze shifts from me to Charles, as if she wants to confirm the latter part specifically for him. "Jules and I met about six months before he died, and it was love at first sight."
"He never told us about you," Charles responds cutting her off and she nods.
"I know he didn't. I asked him not to," she says and Charles and I exchange confused looks before turning our attention back to her.
"What do you mean? Why would you ask him not to?" I ask, finding it all very odd.
"When I met Jules, I was in a complicated time in my life," she answers and I see her face darken. "I was only 19 and had run away from Italy." Her voice trembles as if it's hard for her to mention those times again.
I wish I could tell her that she didn't need to tell us if she wasn't feeling comfortable, but the truth was that it was really necessary. After all, that's what Charles and I are here for.
Charles nodded for her to continue and I could feel his tension.
"I got involved with the wrong people in Italy," she continues. "There was a boy I had been in love with during my teenage years, Paolo was his name. We were very young and stupid, you know?" Cecília laughs and her eyes fill with tears. "Like every teenager, we thought we were invincible, but we weren't. When I was 17, I spent most of my time at parties and clubs with him. We drank and did drugs, and everything was fun and happy until it wasn't anymore. Over time, the drinking and drugs stopped being just for parties and began to become necessary for anything. From being able to concentrate on studies, to being able to get out of bed. My parents assumed that Paolo was to blame for my addiction and banned me from seeing him. I obviously went against them and they made me choose between a life with them or my ruin with Paolo. I, being young and foolish, chose love and abandoned my parents without looking back. I left the life I had to chase adventures with Paolo and he did the same, running away from home. But the thing is, we were two addicted people without a home and money. There was no more money from our parents, so we started doing whatever we could. Small thefts and even..." She stops for a moment, thick tears streaming down her face.
"Here." Charles extends a napkin and she takes it, wiping her face immediately after.
"Thank you," she says and he offers her a half-smile. "Even prostitution," she continues, and I feel my stomach churn. It wasn't disgust, but rather a pity for imagining someone in that situation. Beside me, I could see that Charles was equally uncomfortable. It was hard for him to put himself in her place.
Charles grew up with great parents who did everything for their children, and even though they weren't millionaires at the time, they still managed to have and offer a comfortable life for them. And I bet that if any of the three, Charles, Lorenzo, or Arthur, had gone the wrong way, Pascale would never have abandoned them.
And me, well, I was lucky. I spent my teenage years with Jules and Charles, who had a structured enough family to share with me because my parents were absent.
Obviously, Charles and I had our rebellious phase with occasional drinking and smoking weed. But Jules, being almost ten years older than us, always kept us in line like a good older brother. And if he knew that we had crossed the line at parties or anywhere else, oh God! He would freak out.
- "Cecilia, I know it's difficult for you to say this, but I think it's important for Charles and me to understand," I say and she nods.
Cecília takes two deep breaths before continuing, and that's when I'm sure the story would only get worse. I try to prepare myself to hear what she had to say.
"I prostituted myself a few times without Paolo's knowledge. Some traffickers gave me drugs in exchange for sex and since many times I had no other choice, I accepted. But one day he found out and that ended us. With us." Tears returned to stream down her face. "Paolo went crazy when he found out and went after the trafficker I had slept with. He got a gun and killed the guy. We were on the run for a few weeks, but it was too hard for two homeless addicts to hide in Italy. Soon they found us and..." She closes her eyes and sobs.
I stretch my hand across the table and take Cecilia's hand. There was a lot of pain there and part of me wanted to curl up and stop listening, but I couldn't. I glance at Charles and he meets my gaze, his eyes reflecting distress at hearing everything that came out of her mouth. It was too surreal for him to hear all of that.
"They killed Paolo and thought they had killed me too. But by some miracle, I managed to survive and ask for help at a church. The priest there was friends with my parents and managed to find a family in Nice who were willing to help me. So I came to France, went through rehabilitation, and started attending meetings for drug addicts." Her eyes become distant again, and I continue holding her hand. "It was on the way back from one of those meetings that I met Jules, and that's where I understood the reason why I survived. We fell in love, but he had a public life and I couldn't expose myself because I was afraid that they would come after me. I told Jules what had happened and unlike what I thought he would do, he embraced me. He promised me that he wouldn't tell anyone, not even you two until I was ready and safe. And he did that. He kept us a secret for months. We saw each other every time he came back to Nice, after the races." She finishes.
Charles and I watched as Cecilia tried to calm her breathing, her grip on the sleeping Vincenzo's body tightening as if afraid he might disappear from her arms at any moment.
It breaks my heart to see all her pain and gives me a completely different perspective from when I walked in here today. She loved Vincenzo, and that was clear, just as she had loved Jules. And that's the part that hurts me the most.
Knowing that the reason Jules never mentioned her to us, his friends and family, was sole to protect her, made my heart heavy and warm at the same time. That was so Jules.
I remember months before he died, he started to spend more time in his hometown and whenever we asked him about it, he said he wanted to spend a little more time with his family. We even found it a little strange, but Jules always had a great relationship with his parents and closest relatives, which made us simply let it go and just enjoy the time we spent together before he and Charles had to go back to racing.
"I'm sorry for all of this, really, Cecilia," Charles is the first to say after she seems calmer. "But we still need to know why you're only coming to us now," he says, and I agree.
Cecilia nods and looks at Vincenzo in her arms. The tension emanating from her makes me shiver, and Charles probably noticed it too as his hand finds my thigh under the table.
"About two days before Jules' death, I found out I was pregnant with Vincenzo," she says and I nod in understanding. "Jules was racing in Shanghai and I was scared and alone here." The tears that had ceased returned in stronger waves.
My mind teleports back to 2019, to Jules' last race. He was so happy to finish seventh that day. But, all of a sudden, he just wanted to go home and rest, not even celebrating with the boys on the grid.
"I sent him a message after the race. I said I needed him to come to Nice as soon as possible because something had happened," Cecilia looks at Charles as she speaks. "Then he sent me a message saying he would take the first available flight back to France."
As Cecilia talks, Charles' grip on my thigh gets stronger. I look at him from the corner of my eye and I can see the moment his Adam's apple goes up and down.
"So that's why he left so quickly that day," Charles' voice sounds low. "He left before I could talk to him..." His eyes fill with tears and his breathing becomes a bit unstable. Cecilia just nods and closes her eyes tightly before continuing.
"When Jules arrived in Nice, it was already early morning and it was raining heavily. He tried to get a taxi or Uber, but couldn't get either," this time I feel my breathing falter a bit as she continues. "He managed to rent a car from a nearby 24-hour agency and sent me a message saying he would arrive soon and that I didn't need to worry because no matter what was happening, everything would be okay and that he loved me."
Charles stood up abruptly. His face adopted a look of disbelief.
"It was you..." his voice was weak and accusatory. "It was because of you that he... My God!" He flinches and his hands pass through his face and his hair.
"Charles..." I try to calm him down, even though I am also anxious. "Charles, please sit down and try to calm down." I try to grab his hand, but he recoils in a sudden movement.
"Calm down? It's her, Marie!" he says, pointing to Cecilia who only shrinks into her chair and holds Vincenzo even tighter, as he moves uncomfortably in her lap. "She killed him! IT'S HER FAULT THAT JULES DIED!" he screams.
My breathing becomes difficult and my heart races. In front of me, Cecilia sobs and holds Vincenzo even closer to her body.
All that commotion made some employees start to appear and approach at a safe distance from the table.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Cecilia pleads. "I swear I never wanted this to happen, I was so scared and..." She stops when she hears Vincenzo's low cry.
Charles' attention goes to the little boy as he realizes he is now awake. He shakes his head in a negative motion and leaves the café in a hurry, slamming the door hard behind him. We are startled by the noise and the little boy cries even louder. I quickly get up to go after Charles, but before I do, I turn to Cecilia.
"Please wait here, okay? I'll try to calm him down. Don't leave," I say, and she nods, her face stained with tears that continued to fall, and her breathing accelerated as she rocked Vincenzo, trying to calm him down.
A dark-haired waitress approaches with a glass of water in her hands and places it in front of Cecilia. I thank her with a gesture and quickly leave through the door to find Charles.
It doesn't take me long to find him, he was in front of a black car. His body leaned against the driver's side. Even from a distance, I can see his body shaking and hear the sound of his erratic breathing. I approach him slowly, so as not to startle him.
When I get close enough, I think about touching him, but the thought leaves my mind when I realize it's not a good idea.
"Charles..." I call him softly to get his attention. "I'm sorry, but we need to go back there. She-"
"No!" he exclaims. "Please, Marie! Don't ask me to go back there. She killed him! It was her fault!" He stares at me with red and swollen eyes.
My heart tightens at the sight of him like this. I find myself being sent back to the year of Jules' death, specifically to the day of his funeral.
I wanted to hug Charles and tell him that everything would be okay, but in reality, I didn't know if it would. Jules had died almost four years ago, and yet it still hurt every time his name was mentioned. And hearing today from a stranger the reasons that resulted in his death was not easy. But there was a reason why Cecilia wanted to contact us after all this time, and we needed to know.
I take a deep breath and decide to approach Charles more. One of us had to try to be rational at this moment, and if it had to be me, okay. I wasn't going to go back to Italy without an answer.
"Charles, I understand that it's difficult to hear all of this suddenly," my hands go to his face. "I know it hurts, Charles. I'm feeling it too." He closes his eyes and I feel tears rolling down my face. "But we can't blame her entirely, Charles. She was scared and just wanted to talk to him.”
“And it resulted in his death." He says, his eyes opening and meeting mine. "Marie, if she hadn't done what she did, he would be here now. He would be alive and he would have met..." His voice trails off. "He would have met his son." He cries and I pull him into a hug.
Jules died without knowing his son. Jules died without knowing that he would have a son. Jules died in the dark without knowing what was happening to Cecilia. Jules died alone and worried, and nothing we can do will bring him back. He died. It's over. But Charles and I are still here.
"Jules died without knowing his son, but we're still here and we can do this for him," I say and he squeezes me tighter.
"We're still here, Charles. And we can do this." He breaks the hug and looks at me with a face full of sorrow. I nod.
"We need to go in there together. Together," he looks down at his feet. "Charles, I need you to go in there with me because I can't do this alone." His eyes come back to me and he understands that I used the same words he did a few years ago. "Please, Charles. I don't want to do this alone. I can't." He nods and I take his hand and slowly lead him back to the cafe.
When we walk through the door, my eyes meet Cecilia's. I nod my head to let her know it's okay, and she nods in understanding. I look at Charles who stares at her expressionlessly. His gaze is icy, totally different from the one I once knew.
Still holding Charles' hand, I walk toward the table where she uncomfortably waits for us. I notice that Vincenzo is no longer in her lap and feel momentary concern that quickly passes when I see him playing with the same red-haired waitress who had served us.
We sit in our chairs and I see that our orders are placed on the table. I feel my stomach churn just looking at the cappuccino in front of me. I take glance around and notice the employees trying to avoid looking at us. I make a mental note to "solve" this problem so it doesn't follow us when we leave.
"Just say what you want," Charles breaks the silence, his eyes still staring at Cecilia who nods and swallows hard.
"I understand your anger, and I know I have no right to ask for what I'm about to ask," she says and my hearing sharpens. "I live with guilt for years. Whether it's for Paolo or Jules, guilt and remorse follow me wherever I go. No matter what I try to do, they're always there." She looks at her hands. "Last year, I relapsed. I used heroin, once, but I used it. After years of resisting and not even going near drugs, I let my messed-up mind fall into the hole and I shot up." She lets out a desperate laugh and her eyes fill with water.
My body freezes and Charles makes a sound of scorn beside me. When he opens his mouth to say something, Cecilia cuts him off.
"Yes, I know I'm a whore, and I deserve the worst shit life has in store for me. But that's the thing. I deserve the bad things, but my son doesn't," she says firmly, looking at us seriously. "I need Vincenzo to have a good and decent life. I need to make sure he grows up loved and that he never lacks anything." She looks away for a moment to the table where Vincenzo was happily playing with the waitress and then back to us.
Cecilia takes a deep breath and leans forward. I could swear she was capable of asking for anything at that moment. Money, a house in a distant place, a period in rehab, anything.
"I can't take care of Vincenzo anymore," she asserts, her tone exuding bitterness. "I promised Jules that I would do everything to make him different from me. And that's why I came to you after all these years."
My head spins. She's asking for...? No, it's not possible.
"What do you mean by that?" Charles asks anxiously.
"Cecilia wipes the tears from her face with her hand, blinks a few times, and adopts a determined look, a look that I knew well. The same look I gave to myself in the mirror when I decided to leave Monaco. Suddenly, I feel afraid because my suspicions are confirmed.
"She wants us to take care of Vincenzo," I say.
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