Page 107 of Senior

“She’s a light at the end of some very long, dark days. I’ve never loved another woman the way I love her. My heart doesn’t function right without that. Getting to love her has been my greatest blessing next to my kids, man.”

“I can tell. You be showing all thirty-two teeth when she’s around. I’m surprised Deuce ain’t crash out.”

“He wanted to, but my son had to realize there wasn’t shit he could do to stop me and his mama from being together. That’s my soulmate. I firmly believe that no matter what, we were always going to end up spending the rest of our days together.”

“You have a lot of faith and patience, Unc. I can’t wait to see you pull this off.”

I stood and dapped him up. “Watch me work, nephew.”

Presently

I walked into my mother’s home and could hear her fussing in her native tongue. She must have been talking to her sister. Whenever they got on the phone, they were either laughing or fussing. There was no in between. I walked into the kitchen to find her with the phone propped up, whipping up what I knew was her famous chocolate chip cookies. Every week she made a big ass batch so the kids could grab a few when they came over.

I stood in the entryway with a smile on my face. How lucky was I to still have my mother at my age? I was vastly approaching sixty, and she was still vibrant in her early eighties and had the youth of a woman several years her junior.

She looked up and saw me and smiled.

“Your nephew here. Let me call you back. Love you too.”

She ended the call as I entered the kitchen.

“Hey, Stanley.”

“Hey, pretty lady.” I hugged her and kissed her cheeks. “How you doing?” I asked, snatching a cookie.

She slapped my hand. “I’m good. Just talking to your aunt about taking a trip back home. It’s been a while since we’ve gone.”

“It has. Let me know when y’all wanna go. I’ll charter a plane for you. My girl has to fly in style.”

She playfully rolled her eyes. “Thank you. Where’s my girl?”

“Brunch date with her ‘sister wives’,” I said, chuckling. “She might be home now. Maddie was supposed to bring her.”

“Lord, I never thought I’d see the day those two were so friendly. Miracles happen.”

“They do.”

“Now, if they had torn up my kitchen when they had that little conversation, I was gonna come out of retirement and whip all three of your asses.”

“What I do!”

“You started this shit, Stanley. All you had to do was learn to balance the street shit with your home life. Your father and I gave you and Blake a solid foundation. You had so many people up under you that you didn’t have to be in the mix as much as you were.”

“I couldn’t trust those people, Ma. I needed to make sure shit was on the up and up.”

“We trusted them. Everybody that worked for us were vetted and knew what was expected of them when we passed this shit to you and Blake. Even with that being said, we kept our grass low enough to see the snakes.”

“It wasn’t just that, Ma. Back then, I felt like the game was a birthright. I hated to disappoint you and Pops by telling y’all I didn’t want to do it.”

She shook her head. “I’m sorry you didn’t think you had a choice. Honestly, Stanley, I wish your father and I had done a lot of things differently when it came to you boys. I wish we’d given you a chance to have the childhood my great-grandbabies have. You had no business in the streets so young. Blake… he would have ended up there, regardless. He wanted to be everything your father was. But you… you were destined for something greater, and you achieved that.” She cupped my face and stared up at me. “I’m so proud of you, Stanley. I know your father was, too.”

The mention of my father being proud of me took me back to a dream I had just a few nights ago. Before the shit with Mia in Paris, my father had never come to me in my dreams. Him coming to my baby when she needed him most let me know that he was watching us.

During that time, I spoke to him and God more than I ever had. I thought I was going to lose my baby, if not from the bullet, then by her own hands. My father came to me and told me everything was going to be okay with Mia. He wouldn’t let her go into the light.

Since then, he visited me every so often. When he came the other night, we were sitting in my sunroom. I’d gone in there to roll myself a blunt and he was sitting there smoking one and rocking in my chair.

“Good shit, son,” he said, with a hearty chuckle. “Y’all still have the best strands this side of the state.”