Epilogue #2
Every interview with the media that Travis had, he was intentional about Maggie being at his side.
If she was not able to be at his side, then he found a way to weave her into the conversation.
Tristian sat Travis down when he began to get interest from major league teams. He explained to him that if it was truly his intention that Maggie be his forever that he had to be intentional about it.
The world needed to know that she was his heart, unapologetically.
Travis had no issue with that, because it was easy to show the loves of his heart: God, family, Maggie, and baseball. Maggie’s family respected and appreciated how Travis loved her even at their young age. Like Mega was reminded years ago, there was no certain age to do the right thing.
It’s A Party . . .
When Maggie started to plan the graduation party for her boyfriend, she had no idea of how big it would be.
The graduation class wasn’t that big, so they all were invited to the party.
From how it looked, they all came. With the graduates, family, friends, and all other invites, there were over two hundred people at the party.
“Maggie! Maggie! You didn’t tell me that Akon was coming.” Kellie’s eyes bugged out when she noticed Akon, Warrior, and Jamal walk into the venue together.
Maggie giggled at her best friend. “I didn’t know if he was coming. You know niggas don’t RSVP. Oh my God! He’s coming over here. Stay cool!”
Kellie’s hand rubbed down her hair to make sure there wasn’t a hair out of place. Kellie met Akon a little over a year ago at Jamal’s eighteenth birthday party. From that day on, she had googly eyes for him. Akon’s eyes may not have been googly, but they were on Kellie.
“What’s up, y’all?” Akon greeted Maggie and Kellie. His attention focused on Kellie. “You look beautiful, Kellie. Your hair is pretty. It looks like you added some highlights or something,” he said before he reached up and touched her hair.
Her light cheeks blushed over. The fact that he noticed her new highlights made her feel special. “Thank you. Yeah, I got some blonde highlights last week. I wanted to do something different.”
Akon lived in North Charleston, South Carolina, with his parents.
Just like Kellie, he was a rising high school senior.
He attended North Charleston High school while Kellie was a student at Coreland High School.
The just shy-of-an-hour distance didn’t stop the teenagers from seeing each other at least twice a week.
From across the room in a section that was curated just for the chaperoning adults in the building, Ned had a laser focus on his daughter and the little boy that had been sniffing behind her for the past almost nine months.
He was convinced that it was War’s and Yetti’s plan to infiltrate his family by way of their sons.
Warrior and Shanae had been in a relationship for almost two years now.
Ned just came to terms with that fact. Now, here came Akon with eyes for Kellie. God plays the craziest games.
“I need a freeze option with life,” Ned mumbled.
Mega heard his best friend and understood exactly how he felt. “Man, I prayed for that, and Big G was like, no. I guess some of the desires of your heart are just unreasonable.”
Both men chuckled at that thought. Ned was annoyed, but in the same breath, there was a sense of relief that the boys interested in his daughters were sons of men that he knew well.
He knew the stock of the kids that came from the people in his intimate circle.
Even with that knowledge, he knew that good kids made mistakes as well.
What kind of mistakes would a group of good kids make?
Maggie, Kellie, Shanae, Kayslin, and Serenity sat in one of the VIP sections in the venue. Serenity, War and Pea’s daughter, was the oldest of the small crew at twenty-two years old. She’d gotten close with Shanae during the course of her brother’s relationship with her.
Serenity was intrigued by Shanae’s career in the pole dancing industry.
She was a regular at the pole dancing studio in Charleston before her brother began his relationship with Shanae.
Now that Serenity and Shanae were good friends, she didn’t miss any of Shanae’s classes.
Between pole dancing classes and a semi-healthy diet, Serenity was down fifteen pounds.
She took on her mother’s plus-size, perfectly thick physique to War’s dismay.
Shanae was proud of the women that attended her class as a workout choice.
She loved to see the weight loss results.
Her bachelors of arts in dancing was so close that she could feel it.
Performing on stage was a love of hers, especially when her man was in the audience.
Warrior never missed a performance of hers.
Next to her parents, he was her number one supporter.
“Maggie, you did your thing with this party. Who knew that Coreland would have a dope spot like this? Let me find out,” Kayslin joked.
Maggie’s and Kellie’s faces contorted. Maggie’s perfectly manicured nail went up in the air. “What we’re not going to do is act like Coreland ain’t the shit on the low. We just like to stay low-key out here to keep out bumble bee head ass bitches.”
Shanae’s head bucked. “Bumble bee head ass bitch! Yeah, you’re Uncle Mega’s child because in what world does that description make sense?”
The older Maggie got, the more Mega’s traits showed themselves. She had the poise, grace, and elegance of her mother, but the insults of her father. It was a balancing act that she managed with expert precision.
“Maggie!” A loud voice called out from the side of the section.
Angie walked smoothly into the section like she belonged with her little entourage behind her.
“Girl, when I heard about this party, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to come.
You know you and your best friend tend to be a little lame at times,” she said with an arrogant snicker.
The tip of Maggie’s ear tingled. Angie graduated today with Travis.
She was one of the most popular girls at Coreland High School who got everything that she wanted.
Well, not everything, because she wanted Travis in the worst way.
The first time he rejected her, she took it as a bad day, a one off.
After the fifth time, she developed a hatred for Maggie.
Angie couldn’t understand what the hell Travis saw in Maggie.
Yes, Maggie was beautiful, that couldn’t be denied. You needed more than beauty to be on the arm of a pro-baseball player. At least that was how Angie felt. To her, Maggie was a boring daddy’s girl who would never be able to keep a man like Travis happy.
“Angie, first, congratulations on your graduation. Being number sixty-seven in a class of seventy-four has to be such an accomplishment. I’m sure the colleges and universities that don’t need SAT or ACT scores for acceptance are chomping at the bit to have you on their roster.
As for the lame comment, I rather be lame than a dummy.
” There was no smile on her face or humor in her tone as Maggie spoke.
Angie’s face dropped as her little cronies quietly giggled behind her.
Yeah, she wasn’t a bright one. The time that she should have used to study was used for more salacious activities.
Her mother had given her the Ronnie advice since she was twelve years old.
Use what you got to get what you want. As long as she was able to do that, did the grades really matter?
Serenity burst into laughter. “How you come over here like a Billy badass, but you’re a dummy. Sixty-seven out of seventy-four, damn.”
“Look, bitch! You don’t fuckin’—” Angie’s words were cut off mid-sentence when Shanae stood and placed her finger on Angie’s lips. Angie was too stunned by the action to react.
Shanae shook her head. “See, that’s not what we’re going to do. It’s obvious that you are dumb. You are at a party thrown by my cousin for her man where all of her people are. If shit really pops off, who do you think might not make it home tonight?”
Shanae stayed to herself because of that crazy gene Ned had seeped into her theoretically by osmosis.
She was raised and surrounded by trained killers who taught her how to protect herself.
Ned often described his oldest daughter as an aftershock.
People always feared the earthquake but rarely gave a second thought to the aftershock. That was where they fucked up.
Angie heard the subtle threat. Her thoughts went one hundred miles a second on whether to call the bluff or back down.
She already felt like an idiot with Shanae’s finger still over lips.
Her eyes scanned her surroundings, and she didn’t like what she saw.
She was the center of attention in a way that she didn’t want to be.
From across the venue, seated in a section with the guys, Jamal had eyes on the girls’ section. It was in his blood to be observant as Jacob and Galiana’s son. “Warrior, what your girl got going on over there?”
Warrior wondered the same thing. He hadn’t taken his eyes off his girl since they arrived. “Travis, who is that?”
Travis paused his conversation with Akon to focus on the girls’ section. He sighed when he noticed Angie. “Ugh, that’s Angie. She’s this chick that tries to stay on my dick. She doesn’t like Maggie because she’s not Maggie. Let me see what the fuck this girl got going on.”
Akon extended his arm to stop Travis from getting up. “Nah, lead from the back on this, Mr. Baseball. You don’t need to be in the mix of bullshit. Be last in the pack for this one just in case.”
Warrior led the pack since it was his girl who had her damn finger across another human’s mouth. On the walk to the section, he glanced at the section where all of their parents were. Multiple eyes were on them, so he gave a nod of confidence that shit was cool.