Page 56 of On Everything 2
My next stop after I left my grandmas was East Chester Gardens, and once I pulled up over there, it took me a minute to find somewhere to park. It wasn't until a car pulled off the curve that I was able to slide into that parking spot. I headed in the direction of her building, surprised by how quiet it was outside. I remember a time niggas had this shit rocking, and back in the day, this was one of the places I wasn't allowed.
I made my way through the courtyard and up the stairs of the building that my pop's baby mama lives in. When I strolled past her apartment number, I stopped and knocked a few times before the door came creaking open.
"Yes?"
The lady's face was scrunched up, and she had a cigarette in her hand with smoke floating in the air behind her.
"What's good, is you name Regina?"
"Yes, it is Regina. Hi Hov. I was wondering if you would ever show up at my door." She smirked, leaving me standing at the threshold while she went to sit back down in her chair. The way she looked now was nothing like the lady in the photo that was taken. She'd gained weight, her hair was in a bonnet, and the moo-moo she had on was five sizes too big.
"Can I come inside?"
"Of course. If you couldn't, I would have shut my door."
I stepped further into the apartment even though I didn't want to. Weed smoke is not my favorite scent in the world, but that Cigarette smoke legit have a nigga gagging sometimes. My paw paw smoked cigarettes back in the day, and I swear you can still smell traces of it in my grandma's house to this day.
"Have a seat, Hov."
"Thanks."
I sat down on the worn-out furniture that was way too low to the ground for my long ass legs. I would make it work, though, for this conversation.
"So, I guess you are here to talk about your baby brother. The forgotten one."
"With all due respect, I can't forget someone I never even knew about."
"Oh, so Papi never mentioned my son to you. I guess he had no reason to. You were his whole damn world, so my baby didn't matter."
"Well, according to my grandma, you didn't exactly make it easy for him, so he chose peace."
She sat up in her seat, flicking the ash of her cigarette in the ashtray on the coffee table in front of her. It was only then thatI noticed she had a big ass black cat lying underneath it. I didn't fuck with cats like that. They give me the same uneasy feeling that snakes do.
"Do you have any kids, Hov?"
"Not yet?"
"Mmm, well, when you do, you will see that nothing will keep a man from being with his kids but death. I don't know much about you, but if you are a stand-up man, you will be there for your child every day, no matter who their mother is. Not just one, when the mother of that child ended up doing worse to you."
She threw shade at my mother, but I would never check anybody when speaking the truth.
"Look, I get the way the shit may look or seem, but I'm here to see who this nigga is. I'm trying to focus on family these days. I want people around me who know and share my blood, and that's why I decided to look for him. Having a sibling doesn't sound bad to me if he a stand up nigga."
This time, she didn't have a smart ass comeback and instead puffed on her cigarette a few more times.
"Well, it's good you feel that way, Hov."
"Yeah, so where is he? Where does he live?"
"He's in the Bronx. He always says that he is trying to stay out of trouble, yet he gets into plenty. You could never tell him about anything his whole life. Girls, friends, the hustles he chose. Maybe you do need to connect with him to straighten his ass out. It's sad I even have to say that about a grown man. Sometimes I wanted to tell him who his father is so that he could feel a sense of pride if nothing else." She shook her head.
"Alright then, what is his name?"
"It's Kairo."
"Kairo? Show me a picture."
"Pick one. He's my only boy."
