Page 38 of Read the Room

“Eat that shit off the floor like the dog you are. I can’t believe I came from a bitch like you.”

Lakeisha stood there with wide eyes and nostrils. We walked past her. Joey and Ethan followed us when we passed them.

The restaurant had a valet service, so we waited for our car. I felt Reya’s body shake with my arms wrapped around her. I kissed her temple, put my lips to her ear, then said, “I got you. Mama Bee got you. We all got you. Fuck her.”

This was why I didn’t want my baby to waste time with this bitch. I knew going into this that she would get upset and that this wouldn’t end good. My ma said that I needed to let Reya have this meeting so she could get the closure that she needed. I prayed seeing that her mother was still a fuck ass was all the closure she needed.

Reya’s lunch with her mother fucked her up for some days. Mama Bee came over one night and told me to get out of my house and take my son. I was confused about how we got kicked out of our house, but we didn’t go far. My man cave had a full bedroom, so we went there. Jedi asked way too many questions about the pole, so I knew I wouldn’t bring him back out here for a long while.

I wasn’t sure what happened in that house with my ma, Reya, and Simone. Whatever happened in that house, the next day, my baby seemed like a new fucking woman. Like I told her the day of that stupid ass meeting, we had her.

“What you doing in here, Mrs. Jordan?”

I plopped down on the couch next to Reya where she had her head in her Kindle. She loved reading, and I loved that not only for her but for me too. Every once in a while, she wanted to act out sex scenes from books. With her flexibility and my ingenious stroke game, acting out sex scenes from the smutty books that she read was no problem. She side eyed me with a smirk before she shifted her body to face me.

“You’ve been calling me Mrs. Jordan since you told that woman that I was your wife. What’s up with that?”

“You don’t want to be my wife anymore?” I grabbed my chest. “Damn, baby. I thought you loved me.”

She grinned before she giggled. “Lo’ak, I don’t have a ring. We haven’t had a wedding or at the least signed a marriage license. How am I your wife again?”

My back lifted from the back cushion of the couch. “Oh, is that it? Bet. Room read. That was all you had to say.”

I cupped the back of her head to pull her lips to mine. We tongue fucked each other’s mouths for a moment before I pulled away.

“I got some shit to handle. I’ll be back.”

I left her there on the couch frozen, wondering, and wanting. That was how I loved her. It gave me a chance to thaw her ass out, answer her wonderment, and give her exactly what she wanted.

What just happened?I asked a question but was left with more questions and a wet pussy. I watched his back move toward the front door then out of it. Lo’ak was a man that kept me on my toes. He was the second man that I had been in a relationship with. I wasn’t sure if I should have counted Kevin. I guess it was more of Lo’ak was the second male but first real man.

I loved him long before I told him, but I was nervous to tell him. After he disciplined Lucas when he hit me and the way that he did it, I knew without a shadow of a doubt that I wanted him in my life forever. Did I tell him in a timely fashion to try to persuade him about the meeting with my mother? Yes. Did it work? Not like I thought that it would. I had to pull out the big guns.

I did learn a very important lesson that night. Free will was in fact expensive. When the price of free will was my pussy and the tender was Lo’ak’s dick, my credit was maxed out. After I paid for it, I thought it would be enough for him to feel alright with me meeting my mother. He promptly told me that nothing had changed about his decision. The next morning, I put my jaws and suction to work to get what I wanted.

In hindsight, I wished I would have listened to his initial no. The meeting was a complete fucking disaster. Lakeisha had become no better of a person with age than she was when I was younger. In my mind, she was even more of a repugnant person than she was before. This woman said that I should forgive Logan for hollering at me. I never in all my years of living knew that rape and hollering at someone was an interchangeable action. That entire lunch had my mind fucked up.

Like the amazing man he was, Lo’ak said something to Mama Bee, who took the time to come over with Simone to spend the night with me. I never knew I needed that until I had it. That night, she did simple things that my mother never did like washing and braiding my hair in a fishtail braid. After my grandmama died, my neighbor did my hair out of pity until I was ten when she taught me how to do a wash and go twist-out because she was moving. Over the years, I learned how to do my natural hair from YouTube tutorials. I wasn’t sure if I should have been ashamed to say that I’ve never sat in a stylist’s seat to get my hair done. If my hair wasn’t worn in a twist out, I had it in a crochet style or braids that I did myself.

Simone, Mama Bee, and I sat around talking, laughing, eating, and just loving on each other. Simone was the first woman that I considered a real friend. Lucas was now Mama Bee’s grandbaby, and Simone, Sully, Joey, and Ethan’s nephew. That was more than he would ever be to Lakeisha.

Since we’d left the restaurant that we had lunch at, she had tried to reach out to me. It was sad that this thirty-nine-year-old woman was so childish. My eyes fell on my phone that buzzed on the couch beside me.Speaking of the silly bitch.She had resorted to creating fake profiles since I blocked her on social media. I opened the message because I wanted to be entertained by a clown.

FlyGirl_KeshBabe: Lil bitch you need to bring me my money. My man is about to be on y’all ass with your broke, robbing asses.

There was no way that this stupid girl was hurting for that money. If she wanted to stay in contact with me, that was all she had to say. She had a lot of time on her hands.

ReyaPrettyBaby_Love: You can’t be serious right now. You’re hurtin’ for less than three hundred dollars. Bitch it was a one-hundred-dollar bill, five twenties, and a bunch of ones. That’s not lace, that’s Velcro. Get out of my inbox before I get my nigga on your ass.

The bubbles came up that indicated she was typing. I allowed her ninth grade literacy skills to work for her while I went back to reading. After what felt like ten minutes the message came through.

FlyGirl_KeshBabe: Bet bitch. I’ll be seeing you.

Maybe she got distracted. There was no way it took her that long to type six words. I couldn’t be bothered with the malarkey. I took the time to block the profile before I continued with my reading. I finished all of my schoolwork yesterday because I knew that I wanted to relax today. At some point during my reading, I fell asleep.

“Mama! Mama!” Lucas’s little voice woke me from my sleep.

I didn’t open my eyes until I felt his little lips kiss my cheek. I leaned to the side and wrapped my arms around him to pull him on top of me. His head flew back with his laughter.

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