Page 30 of Without You I Have Nothing To Lose

“I know you have questions for your mama,” Zeus started, but I cut him off.

“I ain’t got no mama,” I snapped.

“Hijo!” Isabella chastised.

“My bad. Juanita ain’t my mama. My mama wouldn’t have let some strange muthafuckas come into our home and strip me from everything I knew and place me in a fuckin’ group home until I got shipped off. My mama would’ve fought tooth and fuckin’ nail to make sure she got me back, or at least came and visit me to give me some kind of hope. I wasn’t that lucky because I ended up with a mama who would rather fuck and suck dicks for money than be more concerned with her son’s well-being. So what the fuck could you possibly tell me now that’ll make me give a fuck about you.” I stared a hole in Juanita’s ass, fighting back tears that were stinging my eyes.

“Meechie,” she croaked out.

“Don’t call me that shit,” I growled.

“Demetric, I know you hate me, but it’s not what you think. You have to give me a chance to explain,” she begged. I dropped my head and took a deep breath. I felt Daizha rubbing my back before I heard her whisper in my ear.

“You can do this, and I’ll be right here with you,” she voiced. Taking a deep breath, I lifted my head and just stared at her until she started speaking.

“Meech…Demetric, I never wanted things to end up like they did. I did what I thought I had to do to take care of you. You can thank your grandmother for that. I’ve been selling my body since I was thirteen to help her pay the bills. When I saw how easy the money was, I kept doing it. You always had everything you wanted when you were with me, right?” She looked at me for a response, but I didn’t have one for her.

“The day that they took you was the worst day of my life. I watched as they tore a piece of my heart away from me and there wasn’t anything I could do about it.”

“But it was, though! You just didn’t want to,” I snapped.

“You might be right. I sat around that house for a month straight, merely existing because I missed you so much. Because they put you in the system and they were investigating, I wasn’t allowed to see you. After the first month, things didn’t seem to look up, so I went back to do what I thought was best. I left you alone. I knew that somebody would come and take you in and do better with you than I did. After three years, they contacted me and said that they were running out of space and that if I wanted to get you back, I could. I gave them Zeus’ name and told them he was your father. I know it sounds farfetched, but it’s not. I knew someone that worked there, and they saw Zeus and his wife were already foster parents. She placed you with them without him knowing you were his son. I knew you would be better off with him, so I left.”

“Zeus didn’t know about you, and from my knowledge, he still didn’t find out right away. From the looks of it, they took pretty good care of you.” I scoffed at words because all I heard were excuses and I didn’t have time for that shit.

“When did you find out?” I turned my attention to Zeus. Since he wanted to talk, I needed to hear his version.

“It was not long after you turned sixteen. I heard you and Kev talking. Y’all had just reunited, and I heard you ask him has he seen your mama. He mentioned Juanita’s name and my ears perked up. I remember a Juanita from my earlier hustling days from the same area, but I only saw her a handful of times after that, but I never saw her with a kid. You remember when Izzy took you to the doctor a few weeks later for your physical? Well, I paid the doctor to send off our blood samples to get tested. As you can see, they came back a match.”

“Why didn’t you say anything? Do you know how long it took me to get over the fact that I didn’t have real parents that gave a fuck about me? Yeah, I had y’all, but it wasn’t the same.”

“I honestly thought you would reject me and want to leave. I was already excited that I had a son, even though Izzy didn’t give birth to you. I got a late start on everything, but I never made you feel like you weren’t mine. When I found out, that was when I started grooming you to take over because I now had an heir I could pass my legacy down to. Believe it or not, son, I was scared of losing you.” I heard Zeus and after looking into his eyes, I believed him.

“Demetric,” Juanita called out. My eyes dropped on her, waiting for her to speak. “That’s not the only reason I came back. There’s something I need to tell you,” she voiced.

“What? Jaylen is my real sister that you abandoned too?” I asked sarcastically.

“No. I only had one child. The reason I reached out to Zeus is because I have cancer and I wanted to see my baby boy before it took over.” When she said that, all the breath left my body. This shit couldn’t be happening.

“Are you for real right now? You came back into my life just to tell me that you’re dying? Fuck kind of shit is that?” I bellowed.

“Calm down, hijo,” Ma Izzy said with her eyes full of sympathy. I looked over at Jaylen and she was sitting quietly, observing everything.

“No…no, those aren’t my intentions at all. I just wanted to lay eyes on you, that’s all.” I couldn’t take the tears coming out of her eyes, so I put my eyes back on the floor.

“Juanita, you’re more than welcome to stay for dinner. You are staying right, hijo?”

“Yeah, Ma. I’m staying.” I purposely called Isabella Ma so it could piss Juanita off. It wasn’t shit she could say about it because Isabella had been my mother for the last ten years. No matter how mad I was at her for not telling me, I’d never disrespect her by calling another woman mama in her face.

“Good. Y’all go wash up. Juanita, you can come with me.” I got up and pulled Daizha with me. I led us upstairs to my bedroom and closed and locked the door behind us, before falling down on the bed.

“I’m not even going to ask you if you’re okay, because I know that this is a lot. Shit, it has my head spinning,” Daizha voiced as she took a seat next to me.

“Shit, mine feels like it’s about to explode. I feel like I talked her up. I never talk about Juanita and after our conversation the other night, she pops back into my life after thirteen years. Ain’t that some shit?” I swiped my hand down my face and laid back on the bed. Daizha curled her lil’ thick ass body next to me and my nerves started to settle. I really believe this girl is my soulmate because she came into my life and brought peace without even realizing it.

“Thank you,” I said.

“For what?” she asked, looking up at me in confusion.

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