“I won’t deny that, Truly be having me doing some questionable things.” He chuckled lightly as Truly side eyed him sharply.
“Questionable? Like what?” I probed.
“Like none of your damn business, are y’all hungry?” She changed the subject smoothly.
“I came here to see my nephews first, then get a free meal.” I smirked.
“I shouldn’t give you any food since you admitted to wasting my time not taking any of the advice that I always give whenever you come calling with theatrics. Maybe I should start listening to my husband and not be available.” She laughed.
“See, that’s why I liked you better when you were bald headed. Women start getting a little length on they head and start having a whole new attitude.” I retorted.
“Yeah, and men see their exes at mid shows and?—”
“Please don’t start that shit.” Bleu cut right into it.
If I wasn’t going back and forth with Truly, me and her sister Kenzuri threw insults back and forth between each other. It drove Bleu crazy, but to us it was all love. I was happy that Bleu married Truly for several reasons. One of those reasons was always wanting a sister. Now I had two sisters with Kenzuri and Truly. I didn’t claim their eldest sister just based off how nasty she treated Truly.
Till this day it hurt Truly. She confided in me once and told me that she’d rather protect her and the kid’s peace and energy by not dealing with her big sis, Calissi, at all until she changed her evil ways.
“Anyways, dinner will be ready in a minute. Bleu help me get the twins to their swings in the kitchen so you and this meat head can finish talking.” She playfully rolled her eyes and stood up.
I flicked her off before she stood up and grabbed Kreu off of Bleu. I kissed True’s forehead then passed him to his dad. Once they ambled out of the den, I dug in my pocket and called my mom to check her temperature. She ignored my call and my stomach tightened. She had been doing that shit a lot lately and I didn’t like it one bit. I got this funny feeling inside of the pit of my stomach.
I wanted to press Bleu about telling me what was really going on with our parents but decided against it. I made a mental noteto ask Truly for some of her energy tea that I constantly ran out of due to being in the studio. I smoked a lot of weed but didn’t do any of the hardcore drugs that came with being famous. Truly’s tea was the truth, she only made her special teas for family.
She now turned her kitchen experiments into a full-blown franchise in under a year. Her herbal weight loss company worked for women and men. The tea was like crack, whatever she mixed in that shit really had people dropping pounds weekly. Since the demand for the herbal weight loss tea was in high demand, she kicked back on her other strains of tea.
Truly even tripled Maison Langston’s revenue by expanding the fashion side. She took over the plus-size collections and added spice to that shit. Each collection she created sold out the first week. As much as my mom tried not to like her, she fell in love with Truly once she saw how much of a true mastermind she was.
Thinking about Truly’s success made me think of Jatavia. I wanted that and more for her.
“You good?” Bleu asked walking back into the room.
“Yeah, just thinking.” I said a little too quickly.
“Let’s go to the backyard to smoke before dinner.” He smirked.
I stood up excited as hell; I needed a blunt right about now and a moment to talk to my brother over a nice spliff. We both kept busy, so our time together was hit and miss. Sunday dinners stopped a year ago until my mom found herself overly emotional and missing all of us under one roof. Bleu saw more of our parents now that he had kids but even that was in increments since my mom did the most each time she came over.
I inhaled the crisp cool air soon as we made it out to the backyard. The yard stretched wide and open, the grass manicured so clean it looked fake. A stone path cut through the lawn, leading to a sunken firepit wrapped in smooth grayseating. Bleu had tall palm trees all around his yard. There was a built-in grill off to the side of a gated pool. I chuckled when I laid eyes on the water fountain that my mom gifted Truly and Bleu. Moms had a fit when they refused to put the water fountain in the front yard.
It was an expensive fountain sculpture of all three of the kids. She wanted her grandbabies conceited just like her. I walked toward the firepit where Bleu already sat, his elbows rested on his knees. He already had a cigar stuffed with weed between his fingers.
“Every time you come back here, you look around like it’s your first damn time out here.”
I chuckled then dropped into a chair across from him.
“Shit is dope as fuck, I gotta fix up my property. I’m trying to get my Pancakes out here to visit,” I looked off at the pool. “Maybe she can bring more life into my house.”
Bleu passed me the blunt. I took it, sparked it, and inhaled deep. A comfortable silence sat between us. I listened to the bird’s chirp as wind bristled through the trees. I exhaled and leaned back.
“She got you fucked up, huh?” Bleu asked casually.
The smirk on his face made me chuckle because Jatavia had me beyond fucked up.
“Shit is that obvious huh?” I laughed under my breath.
“Hell yeah, I been missing your annoying ass. You hardly come sit with me unless it’s something heavy on your mind. Half the time you go to Truly.” He stated.
