“Oops he fell, Daddy.” Romance’s little deep tenor filled the space in a way only a child could.
“Yeah, that’s why I be telling you to stop running in the house, shorty. Motherfuckers fall like that every day, baby girl. They just be fucking themselves up.”
“Didn’t I tell you to stop cursing around her?”
I sucked my teeth. Everybody got mad at me for cursing around Ro, but I told them I wasn’t raising her on no proper shit. This wasn’t gonna be the first or last time she heard me curse. I’d always be up for adding seasoning to my words.
“I’ll stop running, Daddy.”
I nodded. “Good, now let’s go get these cookies so we can get home.” My hand found Karim’s side, pulling her with me as I pushed the cart around ol’ boy, no matter how badly I wanted to run him and his Oompa Loompa over with it.
“We’re horrible,” Rim said as we walked toward the cookie section.
“Nah, we’re perfection.”
We were out for another hour before finally making it back to my place. On the ride home Romance fell asleep, which let me know she’d sleep good until dinner. Then she’d eat and be sleepy again. Romance got the itis after eating no matter the time of day. When we made it in, I quickly tucked her in, so she didn’t wake up. Lil mama was rude as hell when woken up from her sleep.
“You were about to hit him?” Karim’s voice made me turn around. She was unpacking the bags while I put a pot of tea on.
“Damn right and I didn’t even know who he was at first.” I chuckled at myself.
“But you were about to hit him for me?”
I nodded.
“Tell me something though.”
Her brows furrowed as she began to move through the kitchen prepping for dinner. “’Sup?”
“When we first took it there, you told me you weren’t looking for anything because you were still reeling from something. Was he that something?”
Even if she didn’t say anything, her eyes did. “Yeah.”
“What happened?” I asked, though I shouldn’t have. The thing was, if I was making sure I didn’t fuck up, I needed to know what had hurt her in the past. So I could vent a nigga’s skull and fix that shit.
“The girl in there calling him baby. She was my best friend, or so I thought. He and I were engaged.”
“Damn.” Those two sentences told me things about Karim I wasn’t aware of.
“Crazy thing is, I’d never been the type of chick into getting married or any of that, but I trusted him and let my guard down.”
I nodded. “So what you’re saying is when I see him I should knee his ass.”
“I already did.”
“Left or right? For my memory.” I moved behind her, leaning into her body, resting my chin between her neck and shoulder.
“Right. Why, what are you gonna do?”
I kissed the side of her cheek. “Hit that nigga in his other knee. Fuck a limp, baby,. I want that nigga on a walker for life.”
The weekend did that shit where it somehow sped past, and before I knew it, we were all in Rennix’s kitchen talking shit Sunday night while the kids watched movies in the other room. Shit was kind of strange seeing as how I was used to cutting out and not being one of the ones here with somebody. The somebody I had with me was Rim and I couldn’t keep my eyes off her. It was like I wanted to make sure she was always fine, even though I knew she was a big girl and no stranger to my family. I was on some sap shit and I knew it.
I stood out back with my twin while he pulled from the blunt, eyes traveling the massive yard before they found him again.
“You seem happy.”
“C’mon get off that sap shit. I ain’t come back here to talk about feelings or happiness, Renny.”
