1. Tahli #2
After showering, I dressed in a navy blue tennis skirt, matching sports bra, and white sneakers.
All I’d been doing lately was working and thinking of a master plan.
Living with my mother for longer than a year wasn’t an option.
I could have cashed a few counterfeit checks and maxed out some credit cards getting cash advances and selling the items I purchased with the card.
However, I was trying to fall back from scamming.
Time in the feds didn’t seem appealing to me.
Growing up watching my mother’s dependency on alcohol made me never want to become addicted to anything, but I was a social drinker.
I couldn’t wait to get to Sheniah’s house and drink away my troubles even if only for a day.
When I arrived at Sheniah’s house, there were two other cars out front aside from hers and her boyfriend, Nook’s.
I had known Sheniah since middle school, but we didn’t become close until our freshman year of high school.
Her and Nook had been together since we were seventeen.
When they were good, they were good but when they weren’t things could get real ugly real fast. There were times she talked about how trash the men were out here, and she was glad she wasn’t single.
Then were times she said that after almost ten years of being with the same person, she wanted something different.
While I was checking my appearance in the mirror, a black and white Mustang pulled up and parked behind my car. When I was satisfied with what I saw, I emerged from my car. Rounding it, I walked over to the passenger door and opened it. Leaning in, I reached for the pan of deviled eggs.
“You need help?” the deep rumble that came from behind me made a chill creep up my spine. I had no clue what the person attached to the voice looked like, but he damn sure sounded like he could talk a bitch through it.
Looking over my shoulder, I locked eyes with a sexy ass light-skinned guy.
The fact that I considered him sexy said a lot because light-skin men weren’t really my thing.
There was something about a dark man that turned me all the way on and generally, the darker the better.
However, the man standing behind me was about six foot even with honey-colored skin, shoulder-length locs, a sharp, chiseled jawline, and cognac hued eyes. Damn.
“Um sure,” I gave him a small smile. There was no need to turn down help when it would be easier to have assistance. If the eggs and pasta salad ended up on the ground because I was trying to be independent, I’d be pissed.
I passed him the pan of deviled eggs before grabbing the pasta salad.
Using my hip, I closed my car door. As I walked behind the gentleman that was carrying the eggs, I noticed that he was bowlegged, and my yoni pulsed.
It had been way too long since my walls had been stroked if the way a man was walking had me damn near creaming in my panties.
The front door opened, and Nook stepped out onto the porch.
“What up family?” his smile was broad, and I could tell he was in a good mood.
Nook was holding a red plastic cup in one hand and a blunt in the other.
He appeared to be talking to me and ole boy.
Nook often referred to me as family because I’d known him for so long.
I had been around from the first day he tried to holler at Sheniah.
The guy in front of me reached Nook and extended his palm for Nook to slap. When I approached, he gave me a one-armed hug before placing the blunt between his lips and taking the pan from me.
“This is my homie, Khalif. Khalif, this is Sheniah’s best friend, Tahli.
Khalif turned his body slightly. “How you doing, Ms. Tahli?”
“I’m good,” I smiled as he held the door open for me.
I heard music playing in the kitchen. Following Khalif, we entered and found Sheniah at the sink cleaning meat, and Nook’s brother, Fred was standing by the back door filling a cooler with ice.
“Hey, boo,” Sheniah smiled brightly.
My bestie was super tall. She was almost 5’10 and built like a stallion.
In middle school boys used to clown her because she was so tall, but one thing was for sure, and that was her face card never declined.
The same ones that joked on her were the same ones that would double back and ask for her number, and she always paid them dust. Her and Nook were the same height, so when she wore heels, she was taller than him, but neither seemed to mind.
Sheniah had caramel-colored skin, full, juicy, lips, round eyes, and a broad nose.
Her hair was super thick, and she loved rocking her natural, tight coils.
I hadn’t seen Sheniah wear weave in about four years.
I possessed peanut butter-colored skin and while I wasn’t as tall as Sheniah, I wasn’t exactly short.
I stood 5’8 and had a slim build. My thighs were kind of thick due to me running track for three years, but my ass wasn’t the fattest. I never got any complaints, however.
I contemplated getting a BBL many times.
It wasn’t completely off the table but if I got one, it would damn sure be for me and not the opposite sex because they didn’t give a damn about my shape.
Attention was one thing I got enough of.
Even if it didn’t come from the right people because at almost twenty-seven, I was still single and had been for five years.
“Bae, fix me a drink,” Sheniah called out to Nook while shaking the container of seasoning over the bowl of chicken in front of her.
“You on light or dark?” Nook asked exhaling weed smoke from his nostrils. “Never mind. Dark,” he said at the same time that I replied dark as well.
Looking over her shoulder with a hiked brow, Sheniah’s gaze bounced from me to Nook. “What y’all trying to say?”
“That white makes you fight,” I stated. Nook and Sheniah went at it so much that I had learned to ignore them. They had never put their hands on one another to my knowledge, but they could come damn close. I’d seen them standing nose to nose arguing before.
“And I don’t have time for the bullshit,” Nook grabbed a bottle of Anejo tequila. “If I slam your ass on the ground, then Tahli gon’ get mad and start talking shit, then I’m gon’ have to dunk sis on her head,” Nook sighed, while I chuckled.
“Picture that.”
“We’ll beat your ass in here,” Sheniah frowned. “But I don’t want no smoke. I’ll never hear the end of it if I cut up, so I’ll drink dark today. No problem.”
Walking toward her with the cup in hand, Nook smacked Sheniah on the ass. “I love it when you comply.”
“Oh brother,” I groaned as I grabbed a cup and walked over to the table that had the alcohol on it.
“Don’t hate sis. I keep telling you, you gon’ meet a good man soon.
In fact,” his eyes widened as if he’d had a sudden revelation.
Passing the blunt to Fred, he slammed his empty cup on the counter.
“Tahli twenty-six, no kids. My nigga, Khalif, twenty-six one kid. She’s four.
Both of y’all are single. Go ahead outside and mingle. ”
I angled my head to the left a bit and stared at Nook like he was crazy.
When he tried to hook me up with Fred knowing he had two women pregnant at the same time I told him to never in life play matchmaker for me, and that was what I meant.
I preferred men with no kids, but that was a rare find.
Four was pretty young, and it was possible that he had baby mama drama.
Even if he didn’t, the way he just threw us both on the spot was nasty work.
“What have I told you before?” I pulled the stopper from the bottle of tequila I was holding.
Kissing his teeth, Nook waved my comment off. “I was young back then and just wanted my brother with a woman that didn’t walk around with dirty feet. I was out of pocket for that one though not gonna lie.”
Sheniah pushed out a loud laugh while my jaw slacked. Standing up straight, Fred mean mugged his brother. “Not too much on my baby mamas fuck nigga.”
“You don’t even like those hoes. Bae pass me some meat, so I can go ahead and start cooking.”
It was going to be an interesting day indeed, and I was there for it.