Lexi's Choice
A short story to share my voice before The Full Picture drops this December.
I recently realized that while some of you have read my writing covering the McMaster University’s sports scene, very few have had the chance to read my fictional work.
And though many of you have supported me in good faith by pre-ordering my debut novel The Full Picture, I wanted to share a little something extra for those who might be on the fence, wondering if your girl’s got any talent or not.
As many of you know, my mom is Ghanaian, but my dad is from Barbados. So, when I was invited to contribute to a short story collection all about weddings, I decided to give his homeland a moment to shine.
This story is a heartfelt glimpse into love, family, and difficult choices before a life-changing decision. And luckily for you all, the anthology never saw the light of day and I get to share it here!
So, settle in and forgive me in advance for any typos. This piece didn’t have the honour of being blessed by Midier Editorial like The Full Picture 😉
Lexi’s Choice by Jessica Carmichael
FALL
Lexi Reid
“Excuse me, is anyone sitting here?”
My head snapped toward the voice. It sounded familiar—no, it felt like home.
“Go—” I began, reaching for my leather tote bag from the seat beside me, but when I saw him, my brain short-circuited.
“Go... away?” he teased, a smile tugging at his lips.
“No, no,” I laughed, pulled in by his charm. “I was going to say go ahead.”
I shoved my bag under my seat and tried not to stare as he squeezed into the row beside me. His knees—covered in navy slacks—pressed against the wooden seat in front of him. He glanced my way again, smile still dazzling.
“Thanks.”
There it was again—that sound. That feeling. Like home.
“Alright, class, settle down, settle down.”
A petite woman in a pink pantsuit stood onstage, grinning out at the packed auditorium.
“I’m Dr. Lina Wong, and welcome to the first day of the hardest two years of your life. Trust me—I know firsthand.”
She launched into a speech about how honoured we should feel to be part of Schulich’s MBA program, Canada’s number one business school. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. If it were up to me, I’d be back home—either still working or doing my M.B.A. at the University of the West Indies. But, like so much else in my life, that choice wasn’t mine to make.
“We’ll equip you with the leadership skills to gain a competitive advantage,” Lina said, clearly quoting from the school’s website. “And your classmates? They’ll become your closest collaborators—on group projects, and most importantly, your strategic consulting assignment.”
“You Bajan?” the guy beside me whispered.
I turned. He was still staring straight ahead.
“What gave it away?” I whispered back, eyes fixed on Lina’s ombré bob. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him smirk.
“Come on. You think I don’t recognize my own people’s accent?”
That familiar twang soothed the ache I’d been carrying around for weeks.
I grinned at Dr. Lina, trying not to laugh. Since landing in Toronto, I’d had to repeat myself to almost everyone—even other Black folks. One lil’ accent and suddenly they acted like English wasn’t my first language.
“…And that is the course outline,” Lina was saying. “Now let’s dive into Chapter One of the assigned reading.”
She raised an eyebrow at the murmurs rippling through the room. “What, you thought I was joking about this being the hardest two years of your life?”
Ray Hanes
She was beautiful, she was Bajan, and she was in my program. The chances of that happening were already low, so the odds that she was single were one in a million.
I had been in Toronto for six years and not once had I come across another Bajan. But being constantly mistaken for Jamaican was a small price to pay for freedom. Hence why I was sitting in Innovation Through Technology and Design, doing more school. Trying to stay free.
I listened as she talked to the people who sat in front of us. She had told them her name was Lexi Reid, and her accent dripped like honey when she spoke. I was someone who picked up accents after spending too much time with other people, and I had begun to lose mine shortly after I left Barbados. Not on purpose, of course—it was just something that happened when I got comfortable.
“What about you?” Lexi asked. She turned to face me, waiting for me to offer up my name. The straight-haired blonde and the brown boy with thick-rimmed glasses looked up too.
“Raymond Hanes. But you can call me Ray.” I was cheesing at Lexi, and I knew I probably looked stupid, but the way she smiled at me made it hard not to smile back. I definitely wasn’t the youngest in the room, and neither was Lexi. Though there was a youthfulness to her face when she grinned like that, I could tell she was closer to my age than most of the other students. Mid-twenties, probably twenty-five.
“Right, Ray. What does innovation mean to you?” the blonde asked, her tone tinged with annoyance. Her icy blue eyes bounced between Lexi and me, clearly impatient.
Before I could respond, Lexi cut her own brown eyes at the Ice Queen, and I had to stifle a laugh.
“It’s cool,” I said, giving Lexi a slight nod. I watched her shoulders drop, her thick black curls bouncing with the movement. Her brown skin was smooth and rich, still kissed by the sun. Not yet exposed to Toronto’s harsh winters.
“Well,” I started, but Dr. Lina’s booming voice cut me off.
“Alright class, that’s all for today!” she announced. “Read chapters two and three for Thursday’s class!”
“You stayin’ close?” I asked Lexi as we scrambled to grab our stuff.
“Um, none of your business.” Her bottom lip jutted out in mock offence, but the humour in her eyes betrayed her. She angled her body to walk past me, and I leaned back slightly in my seat, trying not to stare at how her fitted skirt curved at the hips.
Just as she passed, her phone lit up. She lifted it to her ear and a diamond winked at me from her ring finger.
Told you the odds were one in a million.
WINTER
Ray Hanes
“Lexi, don’t let him fool you! That bwoy so single his own shadow scares him,” said my best friend, Anthony Persaud.
He and Lexi were walking over to where I sat in the talking zone of the library. She was dressed more casually than our usual business attire and as they got closer, I had to force myself to tear my eyes away from the sliver of her exposed soft midriff. I focused my attention on Ant instead and watched as he playfully teased her. That boy didn’t care if you were taken—he was going to flirt with you whether he wanted you or not. Typical Trini boy.
“Who’s so single?” I asked, clearing the desk I had been working at to make space for them.
“Oh, just an old friend,” Ant winked.
I knew he was talking about me. He was well aware of my feelings about Lexi and most of our conversations during our walks home this semester were always about how to "get my girl." But what Ant didn’t get was that I had a more simplistic approach to dating. What was meant to be, would be. What wasn’t, wouldn’t.
“Are you ready to work on this assignment?” I asked, knowing it was wiser to change the subject than to indulge Ant.
“We’re still waiting for Esi,” Lexi reminded me, pulling out her phone to text one of the first friends I made at York. Fresh from Ghana, five feet and full of life, Esi was one of the best people to come into my life. She was like the older sister I never had. In undergrad, she always had my back when I had to miss class for work and got me hooked on her mouthwatering peanut butter soup. I was glad to know she and Lexi hit it off too.
“She’s just running late from her meeting with Mr. and Mrs. Braithwaite.”
The Braithwaites were our clients for the strategic consulting assignment. They owned a Jamaican food joint nearby, and it was the closest thing I could get to Bajan home cooking. The problem was, the older couple were struggling to keep up with the fast food chains in the area—so we were trying to change that.
“Okay, we can wait,” I nodded.
Ant had abandoned Lexi and me and was now flirting with two pretty dark-skinned girls by the large printers, so we sat there awkwardly, smiling at each other.
Over the last few months, I had learned a lot about Lexi. We were both born and raised in Saint Michael, but she’d spent her whole life in private schools and horseback lessons.
I, on the other hand, went to the nearest schools and spent most of my time looking after my younger sister.
Back home, we would’ve run in very different circles. But out here, we were the same—two Bajans far from home, who found some sort of refuge in each other.
She also wasn’t like some other international students we had encountered. Heck, the only reason we even knew about her wealth was because Esi’s nosey ass stalked her on socials and then asked her about it in detail.
Lexi wasn’t one to boast, and she never made us feel inadequate for being scholarship students. As a foursome, we shared cultural meals and study notes. But when it was just the two of us, there was an unspoken current between us.
I wondered if she felt it too.
“Soooo, how’s work?” Lexi’s eyes lit up, genuinely interested in hearing about my new job at the Pan-African grocery store nearby.
It was a major step down from the data analyst position I’d landed straight out of undergrad. But when they let me go just before I needed to apply for permanent residency, I had to think fast. Getting my M.B.A. was the next best option to stay in Toronto, and to help pay for that meant I had to work by any means necessary.
I didn’t want to be embarrassed about being a cashier, but after working so hard during my undergrad, it felt like I was walking backwards—back toward the home I was trying not to return to.
“It’s good,” I said, clearing my throat. “You’re going home for the summer, right?”
“Yeah, I have my... uh, engagement party.”
Her lips spread into a thin, sharp line after she said this.
When Esi confirmed that Lexi was indeed engaged to some guy named Akeem—and my eyes weren’t playing a sick joke on me—it took everything in me not to look physically pained by the weight of that information. This was the first time Lexi had brought it up directly to me, and her strange reaction made me want to dig more.
But before I could fully uncover the obvious cracks in their relationship, Esi interrupted us.
“Hey guys,” she cried out, her wide brown eyes somehow looking wider than usual as she flailed her arms. “I know how we’re going to save the Braithwaites!”
Lexi Reid
I knew I had to call off my engagement. It would have been easier to say I knew it the moment I laid eyes on Ray, but the truth was, I had always known it would come to this.
My childhood friend and longtime boyfriend, Akeem Cohen, got down on one knee at my farewell party, and while dozens of flashing cell phones blinded me, I said yes.
I promised myself I would tell him the next day—over fried flying fish at Sunday lunch. But I couldn’t. Not while the grandmas kept going on about how we would finally be a true family, the mums squealed about bridal party colors, and the dads fantasized about our future on the hotel’s grounds. The wedding planning was starting, with or without me.
See, my life was preordained. Being the only daughter of Mark Reid, the co-founder of The King’s Palace Resort—one of Barbados’ finest Black-owned luxury resorts—had made sure of it.
Daddy and Akeem’s father, Uncle Noam, had first met while doing their M.B.A. at York. By the time Daddy returned to Barbados to reunite with Mummy, his childhood sweetheart, he realized the island lacked Black-owned resorts of a high caliber. That was where Uncle Noam came in. He had grown up in Toronto’s affluent Forest Hill suburb and invested in Daddy’s idea as a silent partner. King’s went from idea to five-star success almost overnight.
The year the resort opened was the same year Aunty Mili—the Bajan girl who fell in love with the foreigner—gave birth to Akeem. When I came along two years later, our story had already been written in permanent ink. Akeem and I would both go to Schulich for our M.B.A.s, get married the summer after I graduated, and become the new co-owners of The King’s Palace Resort.
Akeem had already started his ascent to the top and was named Director of Operations upon his return. I tried my best to drag my feet in the sand. After I completed my undergrad, I convinced Daddy to let me work as the resort’s Foundation Coordinator—but three years was the most he would give me. By the time year three rolled around, I was engaged one week and off to Toronto the next.
I shook the thoughts of home away and turned to watch Ray as he and Esi animatedly discussed their plan to host student-run parties at Braithwaites once a month. I still found it hard to believe I had never come across Ray back home.
Barbados was small, okay? My best friend Aurielle and I used to drive around the entire island on a day off from school, stopping at every other Chefette, stuffing our faces with flaky chicken rotis until we couldn’t eat anymore.
If I had met Ray during one of those escapades, there was no way I would have forgotten him. He wore his shoulder-length locs pulled back, making his sharp features stand out. Hair product residue often shined on his brown forehead, and he had a dimple so deep I wanted to press my finger into it. As Aurielle would say, he was ‘Bajan fine.’ Scratch that—he was ‘international fine.’
Good looks aside, the more time we spent together, the more that gnawing feeling I needed to end it with Akeem became full-blown chomping. And no, it wasn’t because I was in love with Ray. I mean, I had only met him a few months ago. But the fact that I could look at him and, for the first time in my life, clearly see a future beyond King’s and Akeem—that was something I knew I could no longer ignore.
SUMMER PART 1
Mummy’s hands tugged at the rose-coloured satin around my waist, cinching it tighter than my lungs would allow.
“It’s fine!” I cried, turning to face her.
She frowned up at me, folding her Pilates-toned arms across her tiny chest. Mummy and I had had more than enough rifts over the last twenty-five years, and despite being away since last fall, three weeks back home proved not much had changed. I closed my eyes and inhaled a deep breath of the well-ventilated air.
“Mummy,” I said slowly through gritted teeth, “the dress is fine the way it is.”
“I suppose you’re right,” she sighed. “Your engagement dinner is going to have seven five-star courses, better to make sure you won’t look bloated after one.” Her slender index finger prodded my soft belly, and I bit down on my bottom lip, holding back my tears.
Mummy and I were two very different people—in size, in style, and in our hopes for the future. While all she ever wanted was to be the First Lady of Daddy’s empire, I dreamed of a life of my own. Which was why I knew I needed to call off the wedding.
I had planned to do it as soon as I got home, but Akeem had left the island for work the moment I landed. Since this wasn’t the kind of conversation you had over the phone, I had no choice but to wait.
The problem was, Akeem wouldn’t be back until hours before our engagement party, and thanks to Mummy dearest, everything was pre-planned. The charade would have to go on—but right after it was done, I would put an end to the madness.
“Okay, change so we can go pick up your shoes.” Mummy whirled out of the changing room. “Thank you, Beatrice!” she shouted at the short elderly woman who had done the alterations for my school uniforms and riding gear my entire life.
The seamstress had stayed a few feet away on the other side of the curtain, as if she had known the moment we walked into her boutique that a mother-daughter quarrel was bound to go down.
I grumbled as I changed, feeling frumpy after a long day of party errands. I just wanted to go home and not wake up until this nightmare was over.
We were headed down the strip in the direction of the shoe store when I spotted the side profile of a familiar physique exiting a pharmacy.
“Ray!”
At the sound of his name, he looked up.
“Hi Lexi. Long time,” he yelled back.
I laughed, remembering I had seen him just three weeks earlier. We had all gone out for drinks to celebrate getting an A on our assignment. I was the only one still sober, so I walked him back to his place when Ant and Esi disappeared to God knows where.
He had drunkenly spilled about his childhood, the story coming out in fragments. But from what I could piece together, he had to grow up a lot faster than I did. At ten, he was nursing his newborn sister, and at fourteen, he was practically raising her himself.
When I asked him if he missed home, his eyes drifted off mine for a second, as if there was someone behind me. “I do miss she, but other than that, there’s not much to miss,” he said. Yet here he was.
Unable to help myself, I bounced toward him, feeling light on my feet for the first time that day. I could hear Mummy’s heels clicking rapidly on the pavement behind me, and I knew she was wondering who I could possibly know on the island that she didn’t.
“You didn’t tell me you’d be back home,” I exclaimed when I finally reached him.
“I didn’t plan to.”
He was smiling, but his dimple was nowhere to be found. The lack of it made a sharp pain pierce through my chest. Ray’s smiles almost always met his eyes. It was one of my favourite things about him.
I wondered if whatever he was running from had dragged him back—most likely while he kicked and screamed the entire time.
“Hello, young man.” Mummy shoved her tiny wrist in his direction. “I’m Hyacinth Reid. I’m guessing you’re a friend of my daughter’s from business school?”
“Hi, Ma’am. Yes, I am.” He gave her a weak smile, and the pain in my chest pulsed again.
“That’s great! We’ll see you at the engagement party on Saturday evening then.”
I froze. The guest list to a Hyacinth Reid party was carefully curated well in advance and had no room for last-minute invites.
“Yes, ma’am?” Ray answered, his voice more questioning than sure. He fiddled with the white paper pharmacy bag while I looked away, half embarrassed, half petrified about what Mum would say next.
“Perfect,” Mummy said, pivoting to walk away, but not before turning back to look at me. “And darling, you really shouldn’t be walking around without your engagement ring. You don’t want to give single men the wrong impression.”
Ray Hanes
The ceiling fan in our family home still didn’t work. Sweat trickled down my neck as I fixed my dress shirt collar with one hand and knocked a familiar rhythm on the bedroom door with the other.
“Come in,” said a voice so soft it barely passed through the thin wood.
Inside, my sixteen-year-old sister Yasmine looked up at me with big brown eyes. She was the only person who could pull me back home after I had sworn I never would.
Guilt throbbed in my temples as I stared at her flat belly, imagining the bump that would soon swell, undeniable and irreversible.
I should have flown her to Toronto ages ago—shown her a world bigger than this, where babies didn’t have to raise babies.
“Stop looking at me like that,” she giggled, shifting to get comfortable underneath her comforter. “All sad and shit like when mummy used to drink your last Frutee.”
That was Yasmine—finding a way to smile even when things were rough.
“I’m glad you can laugh about this,” I scoffed, sitting at the edge of her bed.
“I’ll be fine,” Yasmine insisted. “I just panicked and needed someone to tell. Didn’t expect you to come all this way—especially since you haven’t been home in six years.”
I had booked my ticket the minute we got off the phone and woke up in Saint Michael the day after I found out. The first thing on my list was to find the boy who hadn’t bothered to wrap it up, but Yasmine refused to name him—said he wasn’t worth it since he bailed on the baby. Instead, she sent me uptown to buy her pre-natals, and that’s when I bumped into Lexi and her mum.
“Look, Yas, I’ll have to go back next week, but I needed you to know I was here for you. I’m sorry I’ve been gone so long—it wasn’t fair to you. Just let me finish my MBA, and things will change, okay? No matter what, big or small, you can always call me.”
She wrapped her arms around my neck and I squeezed back tight, trying to show just how much I loved her. But deep down, I knew it would never be enough.
As I headed to the front door, I saw Mum in the kitchen, gossiping into the landline. She looked the same—dark, clear skin like mine, save for a tiny mole beneath her nose. As usual, her clothes were two sizes too small.
When we were younger, people often thought she was my sister and it used to drive me mad.
I sighed, watching her laugh as if nothing was wrong. She was just sixteen when she had me, and to this day, I didn’t know who my—or Yasmine’s—father was. I had spent years hating her for bad choices, but seeing Yasmine now made me see her differently. She was just a younger version of Mum, doing her best with the crappy hand life had dealt.
I stepped closer and pressed a quick kiss to her temple.
She yelped, startled, then laughed when she saw me. “Oh, it’s just you.”
“Goodnight, Ma.” I sighed and headed for the door. As I reached for the handle, she called out.
I turned, hand still on the door.
“Thank you, Ray. For everything.”
Her voice was serious—something I had never heard before, so I knew she meant it. Memories of our family over the years played in my mind, making my eyes sting with tears. I nodded and slipped outside before they fell.
I had no business going to Lexi’s engagement party—especially with my feelings for her being stronger than ever. But I was in desperate need of a distraction, so that party was exactly where I had to be.
SUMMER PART 2
Lexi Reid
The engagement was Mummy’s finest party yet. The sounds of a classical quartet playing R&B’s greatest love songs floated throughout the resort, which was bathed in soft white light. The ballroom and surrounding areas had been shut down for the night, with a strict invite-only policy and bodyguards enforcing it.
Under different circumstances, I would have loved every detail—the pictures of Akeem and me over the years illuminating the walkway on large digital screens. But for me, they were just a painful walk down memory lane. Another reminder of all I had given up for this family.
“Bobby had texted me. Akeem had just gotten here,” Aurielle said from the makeup chair beside me. I glanced at my phone; sure enough, there was an unread message from Akeem. I gulped and pressed to read the preview on my home screen.
Akeem: I’m back! See you soon ;)
This would have been so much easier if he had been an asshole or had a baby mama somewhere else on the island. But no—he was just Akeem. My sweet Akeem, the one I loved with everything in me but wasn’t in love with. Not when I knew, deep down, he was also just trying to fit into shoes far too big to fill. I knew him well enough to know he would do anything to make his daddy proud—even if it meant marrying a girl he wasn’t in love with.
I rose abruptly, and the makeup artist about to place a lash on my left eye jumped back, startled.
“Sorry, I just need some air,” I said. Daddy had given us ground-floor rooms on either side of the ballroom as bridal suites, with ensuite gardens just steps away.
Before Aurielle could try to change my mind, I moved quickly, storming through the garden toward the low metal fence. Flipping back the lock, I pushed open the gate and hurried across to the other side of the resort.
When I arrived at Akeem’s suite, I knocked fervently on the door with one hand while anxiously tugging at my bathrobe with the other. The door swung open to reveal a perplexed Akeem.
“Woah, Lexi? I thought I wasn’t supposed to see the bride beforehand? Or is that only before the wedding?” Akeem’s earnest desire to do everything by the book made me laugh and cry at the same time. Despite everything, he was still one of the best people I knew.
“Wait, Lexi, are you crying?” he asked when he finally noticed the disarray I’d become.
“Akeem, I’m so, so sorry to do this to you, but we need to talk.”
Ray Hanes
The wooden ballroom doors burst open as if the person behind them had known I was waiting on the other side.
“Ray! Thank God you’re here!” Lexi exclaimed, looking surprisingly underdressed for the occasion. Her hair was still pinned up, and she wore dark wash blue jeans, a white strapless top, and pink sandals. I had to pause for a moment to take her in. Despite her casual outfit, she was a sight to behold—especially against the sharp contrast of people dressed to the nines around us.
She grabbed my hand and pressed what felt like a car key into my palm.
“Ray, I needed to get out of here.” Her eyes pleaded with mine, and at that moment, I knew I’d do just about anything for Lexi Reid.
Before I could respond, I heard her mum shrieking, and looked up to see her leading a pack of angry family and friends in our direction.
“Oh, I just know this is all your fault,” she bellowed. The shrill scream that followed sent a shiver down my spine. I squeezed Lexi’s hand tighter, digging the key deeper into our skin.
“Come on, I know just the place.”
Thirty minutes later, we drove along the coast as Lexi bared her soul. She told me all about the plans that had been made before she and Akeem were even born, and why she called off the engagement.
Now we sat nestled under a blanket we’d found in her car as she stared at the waves dancing toward the brown sugar shore. I’d only ever brought my sister to this rocky alcove—it was my only refuge on this island. The place where I’d birthed my plan to leave home.
“You know he wasn’t even upset when I called it off,” Lexi said. “He’ll probably never admit it, but I know Akeem. Why did we torture ourselves for so long?” She asked the ocean.
“I’m just glad you chose what was best for you, Lexi.”
“I mean, I probably just lost my entire family and maybe my best friend in the process, but gosh, it felt so good to finally do it.”
“They’ll probably need some time, but I have a feeling you’ll never truly lose them. Sometimes we have to jump off the sinking ship to survive. I knew I did.”
“Is that why you were gone for so long?” she pondered. I nodded.
“Having to raise myself, my sister, and sometimes my mum—all under the age of eighteen—wasn’t easy. When I left Barbados, I was in a really dark place. Moving to Toronto saved my life.”
She squeezed my palm. “I’m so sorry you had to go through that, Ray. I couldn’t even imagine.”
I squeezed hers back. “And even though my life was still far from perfect, heck, my sixteen-year-old sister is having a child!”
She gasped, and I nodded slowly, coming to terms with the situation.
“But sitting here talking to you makes me realize that if I could go back in time, I would still choose me. I definitely would have made more of an effort to visit, but there was no way to know if her life would have turned out differently if I had been here, you know? Now I was in the best position—mentally and financially—to help her out. Living for others and being miserable benefits no one in the long run.”
“You’re right.” She nodded. “I only made a bigger mess. Mummy will probably get Daddy to disown me. And I’ll have to figure out how to pay for this M.B.A. in the city I didn’t even want to go to, but ended up loving anyway.” She groaned and threw her head into her hands.
“Don’t worry. I’ll be taking you back to do your cleaning,” I grinned. “But if you do end up losing your folks, just know you’ll always have family in Toronto. Ant and Esi were there for me when I had no one else to lean on. They were part of the reason I got out of that dark place, and they’ll be there for you, too.”
“And you, Ray?” Her eyes darted across my face. “I’ll always have you, right?”
I nodded, leaning toward her, then paused, our mouths just inches apart. My heart was beating so loudly she probably thought it was her own, but I wanted her to have this choice—to be the one to decide.
Her face showed no hesitation as she crashed her lips into mine—finally tasting what had been simmering between us.
If you made it this far you are the real MVP! I truly appreciate you taking the time to read this little taste of my work. As usual, here are my monthly thoughts brought to you by my hardest working app—after TikTok and Libby of course—my notes app.
Until we gist again,
Jess 🫶🏿
P.S. Don’t forget to pre-order The Full Picture
Amazing!
Loveee this story