“Hey, girl.” I smiled, while hugging her back. “Whew,” she let out, after we finally released each other. “I
can’t believe that you actually came. I just knew that you was bull-shitting.”
I sucked my teeth. “Girl, you love to exaggerate.”
“I’m really not,” she claimed. “I haven’t laid eyes on you in over two months, Babi.”
I gulped, knowing that she was telling the truth.
We technically still lived together, and my apartment was maintained, but I was rarely physically there. Still, I made sure that the bills were paid promptly, and Soya no longer had to chip in. She just kept food in the fridge and cleaned up.
113
Wanting to see my cousin win, I told her to save all her bread. Stack up. So, that she and her baby could eventually find some-where nice to live with a nice nest egg on the back end.
Low key, she honestly could’ve lived with me indefinitely, but I felt like Cass deserved to live in a better environment. Hell, if I’d had any kids, then I would have moved away from the area and never looked back. But I didn’t have kids to consider and had been sticking around for the cheap rent.
Nevertheless, bouncing back and forth between spaces had been a lot, hence the reason Soya hadn’t seen me lately. I had been tied up with Face out in the Woodlands, and hadn’t been seeing family as much as I would’ve liked.
Soya had been begging for some time, and I figured that this book event at a hotel was the perfect occasion for us to link.
I pulled out of the apartment’s parking lot. “Don’t take it personally, cousin. I’ve just been busy.”
“Yeah, right,” she sighed, as her eyes wandered around the truck. “I see he let you loose in the G-Wagon.”
“Yeah,” I yawned,feeling sleepy,although I’d justwoken up.
A few months back, I was hyped to drive any one of Face’s vehicles. So, I would swing through the hood behind the dark tint, and scoop my cousin up. And now, riding in his cars was a common thing. Nothing to brag about. In fact, he’d paid o$ my C300 Benz, and it was now parked back at the complex, since I hadn’t driven it in months.
“I seen that you was out riding with his sisters last night,” Soya grumbled. “Aint told me shit, though.”
I sighed. “It aint like that. They just randomly stopped by the house and we ended up going to brunch.”
She sucked her teeth. “That aint got nothing to do with you not inviting me, Babi. Let’s address the elephant in the room.”
“Andwhat’sthat?”Iquestioned.
“You don’t bring none of your family around, because you’re not living in your truth, Babi. You won’t admit that you switched lanes and got with somebody else. So, you keep everything separate, as if letting us establish a relationship with them people will violate Too Low.”
I gulped, as she called me out. “You don’t get it, Soya. I’m really just doing something with Face. And that’ll really complicate stuff, if I start letting y’all mingle with him and his family.”
“Girl, bye.” She waved me off. “You just doing something with Face? Who the hell do you think you’re talking to? You aint no casual encounter type girl, Babi. And nothing you got going on with Face says that you justdoingsomething. That man got you around his kids. You sit on the phone with his mama for hours. Hell, you can’t even sleep away from his house, or he’ll go o". So, call it what it is. You’re in a whole relationship with that man. And you love it there.”
Hearing that, I became choked up. “But that’s wrong. Too Low doesn’t deserve none of this.”
She cut her eyes at me. “Bitch, since when are you all sensitive like this?”
“Shut up.” I sniffed, as a lone tear drooped from my eye. “Girl, what the hell is going on with you—”
The ringing of my cell cut her off.
Glancing at the screen, I sighed. “Hold up, let me take this call.”
I answered the phone and listened to the automated prompts, before his voice came onto the line.
“Hey, baby.”
“Hey,” I spoke, as I felt Soya’s eyes burning a hole through the side of my face.
