Prologue

My head was fucking throbbing. It felt as if someone had burrowed their way through my open orifices, drilled through my skull, and set up all their percussion instruments on the soft tissue of my brain. I had had my fair share of headaches, but this made the others feel like a tickle. It was debilitating to the point of being all I could focus on. I naively believed that this pain, which felt like someone was tossing boulders around in my head, would just go away. It had to because I had too much going on that day. So, I got out of bed, pinched the space between my eyebrows with my right thumb and pointer finger, then let out a long hiss to stave off the pain. I looked through my closet briefly and remembered I needed to wear a suit that day. With an eye roll and scoff, I put on my white collared shirt and black suit and began to make my way to campus.

I had to man a table to spread the word about Alphas on my campus, several classes to go to, and many homework assignments I was religiously procrastinating on. So I fought through what I assumed was a headache to be a man of my word. Also, beyond seemingly reasonable excuses, I am a man: A Black man. You may not be aware of this, but Black men are notorious for not going to the doctor. I’m not sure what the psychology is behind that. Maybe there is some historical reference that ties back to the civil rights days, or even further back to slavery. I think mistrust of doctors stems from how they may not have always treated us fairly, or maybe we couldn’t afford to be sick when we were sole providers for our households. The now, notorious Tuskegee Experiment, where black men were purposely injected with syphilis, also left an ugly stain on the relationship between doctors and us.

Maybe that mentality was passed down to me because I rarely ever saw my dad go to the doctor. It had to be severe to even consider it. As for me, I had just been to the hospital a month ago, so I had to be okay. I had also played pretty loose with my health and well-being, so this was just another instance where I shrugged it off as something minor.

While I was handling the table, Erica, one of my closest friends, who is more like a younger sister, and I took pictures that day. All the while, something terrible was brewing. I didn’t know what it was, but it seemed to be getting worse.

Miraculously, I made it to my last class, but my headache was doing its best to torture me. Chido, who is an older brother to me, was in class with me, and he gave me an odd look.

The professor of our Greek leadership class was speaking, but what I heard was “blah blah blah blah.” The sensation in my head was louder and more powerful than a jet engine. Without warning, I stood up and made my way to the exit. I didn’t ask for permission, nor did I explain. The pain had finally reached what I thought was its peak. Chido came out of the classroom shortly after me.

“Kawan, are you okay?” he asked cautiously.

“My head—” was all I get out, and I was downing Tylenol like Skittles. Even when I inhaled the last of the pills, the pain wouldn’t stop. I peered into the pill bottle like you would a telescope, hoping more pills would magically appear. Unfortunately, the new pills did not appear, and the headache did not go away.

“Yo, my head, man!” I growled at Chido. “I’m leaving.”

“Kawan…” he started, but I had already walked off.

As I trudged across campus from the southernmost end back to the buses to get to my off-campus apartment, it got to a point where focusing on anything but the pain was impossible. This reminded me of a time when I was trying out for varsity football in high school.

When you’re playing football, you become accustomed to pain, but every once in a while, you get your bell rung, and it rings so loud, you reconsider everything. There was one drill I could remember causing pain like this. I think it was called the “nutcracker.” Essentially, we were trying to run each other over. In high school, I was 130 pounds soaking wet. I was a small guy, but I had heart. However, in this case, my size was more of a liability than my heart was an asset.

I was lined up against a mountain of a kid. He must’ve been over 250 pounds and close to 6 feet. Why no one thought this was a complete mismatch, I will never know. At the time, all I was thinking about was “Go all out!” and that’s what I was prepared to do.

“FWEET!!!”

We both took off, barreling straight toward each other for the inevitable collision.

“Give it your all,” I thought.

We were gaining momentum, and the closer we got, the bigger my opponent got.

“Man, I didn’t realize he was that big,” I thought. “No turning back now, though.”

Can you picture an 18-wheeler hitting a Ford Focus? It’s a pretty accurate description of what took place.

“WHACK!” as he slammed into me.

I was flat on my back. Stunned. For a moment I just lay there motionless. Then the pain came like a swift wave, and my head throbbed. My whole body was covered in white noise. Life choices were all reconsidered at that moment. My bell had been rung, but the funny thing is, that bell-ringing paled in comparison to the pain I was experiencing on that September day of 2014 on the University of Maryland’s campus.

When I arrived at my Courtyards apartment complex, I stopped by Erica’s room, as I usually did, to attempt to get some homework done. She lived only two floors down from me, but it was a futile effort. No homework was getting done that evening.

She had a concerned look on her face. “You gonna be okay, Kawan?”

“Yeah, just need to lie down,” I answered quickly.

I packed my things rather hurriedly and slogged up the stairs to my apartment on the fourth floor. Each step was immensely jarring because it felt as if a small earthquake had rocked the inside of my head. Eventually, after seemingly infinite stairs, I had crossed the threshold. I stumbled to my room and slammed on the bed.

As I lay there, tossing and turning, hours passed, and there was no relief in sight.

Earlier that day, I had gotten a call.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Kawan!”

“Hey, Brent, what’s going on?”

“Nothing much, man. So the reason I called is that there is a small business expo tomorrow in D.C. and I think it would be a good opportunity for us,”

“Okay, what time?”

“I believe in the afternoon. Can you handle this?”

Instantly I got nervous, but I couldn’t let him know that.

“Yeah man, no problem,”

“Just take some business cards, hit some tables, you know what to do,”

“Got it!”

The call ended, but it turns out it wouldn’t matter if I had it or not, because I would never make it to D.C.

I was lying in my bed writhing in agony.

“My head, man! I just want to sleep!” I yelled into the darkness.

I got up and walked around, but the headache persisted, to my dismay. No matter what I did, that headache was here to stay. Despite all the pain, it never occurred to me to, you know, call a doctor. They say that pain is inevitable, but suffering is a choice. Right then, I was in pain, but also choosing to suffer. I didn’t believe danger was on the horizon at all. I always pushed boundaries, to see just how far I could take things.

One night when I was five, I was at my Grandma Sandra’s house in Richmond, Virginia. I was sitting up at the bar on a chair next to a couple of family members. As you grow up, especially when you’re a child, you like to test your boundaries. For some reason, that day was my day.

“Stop rocking in that chair, Kawan,” my mom said sternly.

“Okay,” I said half-listening.

I continued to rock back and forth. There was something about the thrill of the chair almost not coming back down that made it risky and exciting. So I kept at it.

She gave me the death stare. “Kawan, did you hear what I said?”

What I didn’t know was that my mom saw a different perspective. She saw what could happen if I continued to rock and went too far. Behind the chair I was rocking in, was a glass table. I was oblivious, so I kept rocking, feeling more and more content with myself after each rock.

That is until I went back too far. There was no thrill, only terror when I realized the chair wasn’t going to sit back up. I was going down hard.

“CRASH!”

The glass shattered everywhere. I don’t remember the pain, but I do remember the concerned faces looking down upon me. I was Icarus because I flew too high and burned my wings off. I got staples in my head as a result, and there is still a little reminder somewhere on the back of my head.

This situation was the same, and my mother was constantly telling me to slow down. Erica would always ask if I was okay.

“I’m fine,” was my default response.

No matter what I felt, I believed I’d be fine. You can call it pride, arrogance, or stupidity, but I just lay there with my headache, not showing any signs of proactivity.

Regardless, something changed in the wee hours of that morning. Something that would change my life for the foreseeable future in a way I never thought possible.

Suddenly, my stomach began to rumble and swashed around in a way that can only mean one thing: Vomit.

My eyes widened in that dark room. My heart rate increased immediately, and I hopped up and raced to the bathroom. I kneeled, more like fell, over the toilet and let it all out. What came out wasn’t what I expected to come out. Something was off. There was no putrid smell or chunks of food. There was no dry heaving aftermath. It didn’t have a strange color. It was clear as water. In fact, that’s exactly what it was: water. I stood up and stared at the toilet with a very puzzled look. I was silent for what felt like 10 minutes.

As I stood there in silence, something else happened. My vision began to get cloudy as if I slammed my eyes into smoke. I tripped over myself backward and dragged myself back into bed. Just as I was about to get on all fours, my right leg shot back straight out as if my right quadriceps had an idea about what was happening next. Immediately following my right leg’s rebellion, my right arm gave way as if all the muscles gave out.

“What is going on?!” I yelled.

My emotions went from surprise to anger, to frustration, to downright terror all in one moment. Something had suddenly made my right limbs useless. How? What? Why? I didn’t realize at the time, but something was seriously wrong. In situations like these, I think your mind knows what’s going on before you consciously realize it because I started thinking about loved ones, friends, and family. I thought about my little sister Anyah, who was only six at the time. I thought about how excited she would get when I made those infrequent visits home. I thought about how she controlled every game we played together because that’s just how things went. I thought about the day she was born when I was a freshman in high school.

Then I had a more chilling thought: What if I wasn’t there for the rest? What if this was it, and she had to grow up without me? That thought was 100x more painful than the headache. The aftermath would have a ripple effect that would send me on a journey filled with trials and tribulations, but that would also lead to finding out what I was meant to do with my life.

You see, life isn’t about getting from point A to point B; it’s about the path you travel to get there. Life is about balance, and it’s never linear. You have ups and downs, peaks, and valleys, but they balance out, in the long run, to map out your unique life journey. I heard someone say that “the darkest night always comes before the brightest morning.” This is the story of my darkest night and how I found my morning sun. This is the story of my path and how I found my light amidst the darkness. Find your morning sun, and you will never lose sight of your purpose.