Chapter 23 #2
I ain’t had shit else planned for the night, so I accepted the offer.
I honestly wanted to catch up with her anyway, so this would be the perfect opportunity.
When I started to walk toward the door, she stepped aside to let me in.
It smelled good, but the place looked a mess.
In the entryway, her kitchen was to the left of me.
It wasn’t big or anything, which shocked me.
Now knowing that the building didn’t have an elevator, I knew it had to be an old prewar build, and usually those were spacious.
Unlike the new ass buildings they were tossing up everywhere that had no damn space.
This is why I didn’t mind staying in the basement apartment of the house my grandmother owned.
I wasn’t leaving the nest until I could afford to put down on my own home and pay my own mortgage.
She rolled the stroller off to the side to allow me space to come all the way into the apartment.
I closed and locked the door behind me. The damn girl had three locks on her door.
“You trynna keep the zombies out?”
“Huh?” She turned around and looked at me, confused as fuck.
I nodded my head toward all the locks on the door.
“Oh… I had to have two more locks installed because my baby daddy broke down my door when I first came back here.”
I twisted my face in slight disgust, but I didn’t offer a response because it was none of my business.
What I did know is that she was too good a female to be subject to the bullshit that I’m sure she had been through and was possibly still going through.
She walked over to the stroller and then pulled her child out before retreating somewhere into the back.
“Make yourself at home,” she said before leaving me in the living room.
The space in the corner was cluttered with a whole bunch of boxes, like she had just moved in. I walked over to the leather loveseat and sat on the edge of the couch. Because the place was so cluttered with shit, I wasn’t sure what would pop out of that muthafucka if I placed all my weight onto it.
The coffee table in the middle of the floor was dark brown in color and had a glass surface.
I looked on the side of the table and saw that one of the legs was cracked and broken.
I was sure her baby daddy probably had something to do with that as well.
I grabbed the remote from the table and turned the television on.
I was about to try to watch some TV, but I saw that her cable was off.
Since I couldn’t watch TV, I put the remote back on the table.
“Thank you for helping me upstairs.”
I jumped as she entered the room because she had scared me a bit.
“It’s nothing really.”
Her round brown eyes rolled over to the television screen, and once it did, a look of embarrassment spread across her face. I could see her eyes bouncing around with the DirecTV symbol bouncing across the screen.
“I’m going to pay that.”
“You're good, really. I don’t even watch TV for real. I was just trying to have something on ’cause you left a nigga sitting in the dark.”
She chuckled before flipping a switch on the wall closest to her.
When she did, the light was dim, but it was on.
I honestly wished she hadn’t done that because now I was able to observe the living room as a whole.
The carpet was balding, and there were a couple of juice stains spread about.
She had gotten out of her wet clothes and was standing in front of me in an oversized t-shirt and some sweatpants that hugged her fluffy frame.
Her hair was pulled into a bun on top of her head.
She put one knee on the couch and then sat next to me.
Once she was comfortably seated, I sat back in the chair.
She grabbed the other skinny remote off the table and turned on a speaker.
I watched as she connected her phone and started playing music.
Once the beat dropped, a smile spread across my face because back in school, this was her shit. She closed her eyes as she sang along, and I was sure she was probably thinking back to those days. The good old days when things were simpler for her.
Come enjoy the life
Baby, take a ride
I just wanna vibe with you, you
Baby, you and I can have a good time
Tell me what you like, ooh, ooh
“Now, listen, I've been single for a while now, and I've been kinda lonely.”
She said that part with her chest, so I knew she felt that part. I quickly looked away from her when her eyes shot open, and then she looked in my direction.
“You thirsty?”
“Umm, yeah.”
She stood up from the couch and walked to the nearby kitchen.
When I saw a roach crawl out of the sofa and crawl up the arm of that shit, I stood from my seat and followed her.
Ciara still lightly sang in the background as I watched from the entryway of the kitchen.
She stood in front of the refrigerator with the door open.
“What you got?” I asked.
I peeked over and looked into the refrigerator. She had a bunch of shit in there. I just chalked that up to her getting food stamps or something. She took a Minute Maid carton out of the refrigerator and shook it before pulling two cups out of the upper cupboard.
She turned on the kitchen sink and rinsed both cups out before pouring juice into them.
That eased me because I didn’t need any extra additives in my damn juice like a dead roach or something.
She handed me one cup and then led the way back to the couch.
Again, she sat comfortably, but I knew it was a roach somewhere on that muthafucka, so I just sat on the edge.
If I hadn’t known her since high school, I would have parked my ass on top of the chair back and had my feet in the seat cushions like I was seated at a damn park bench.
“How is your grandmother?” she randomly asked.
Back in the day, my nana used to love herself some Cayla. She was smart as hell in school and didn’t take any shit. Nana said that Cayla reminded her of herself when she was a little girl. Ma used to say the same shit before she died. Cayla was a miniature version of my nana growing up.
“She is doing good. Nana be at the house chilling. She used to travel a lot before her legs started bothering her. She was just in Texas last year.”
“What the fuck is in Texas besides good barbecue?”
I laughed a bit because that was the same thought I had when my Nana told me that she had booked her flight.
She was a retired nurse. As soon as her retirement paperwork was in, she started traveling her ass off.
I was her only grandchild, and I didn’t have any babies, so there was honestly no need for her to sit her ass down in one spot.
I loved that she lived her life. Whenever she was home, though, she would heavily express that I wasn’t getting any younger and that I should consider giving her a great-grandbaby.
Her ass would be quick to tell me that she would like to see a great-grand before she was in the dirt.
Once her legs started troubling her, she sat down, and now she wanted a great-grandchild because she feared that she wouldn’t be around to see the baby grow.
When she started talking that death shit, I got the fuck out of dodge.
I got out of my thoughts and engaged back in conversation with Cayla.
“That’s the same shit I said.”
A moment of silence lingered between us. On the slick, I kept giving a side eye to my right to make sure that damn roach didn’t make another appearance.
“You good?”
“Who me? Yeah. Shit… I’m chilling.”
She must have sensed my on-edge behavior. I didn’t have OCD or anything like that, but I just kept my crib a certain way. Cayla never struck me as the dirty type, so I was sure the whole roach shit was from the boxes she had scattered about.
“You moving or something?” My curiosity had to ask.
She took a sip from her juice and stared off a bit before she responded.
I didn’t want to intrude on her business, but the curiosity in me wouldn’t pass up a chance to ask.
Shit, honestly, I felt for her, so I wanted to know all there was to know about this new Cayla.
I knew her back in school, and that was almost twenty years ago.
I didn’t really know the woman who was seated next to me.
What I did know, though, was that she seemed to be going through a rough ass time, and I wanted to help her.
Most niggas would have seen all her problems and run for the hills, but I wanted to take that shit and toss it on my back for her.
It seemed like life had been beating her down lately.
I was sure she didn’t deserve that shit.
“I actually just moved back in.”
When my face held an expression of confusion, she finished speaking.
“The smartest thing I did when my mom died was sublease this apartment right here. The dumbest thing I did was not save the damn extra money I was getting monthly from the tenant. I would do dumb shit like go to clubs and be in sections, spend it on clothes and shit, jewelry. I should have been banking his paper and stacking mine. Anyway, when Oriana’s dad and I broke up, I ran so far from his place and came here.
It must have been perfect timing because my tenant had moved out of state, so this place was available for me to move back. ”
I sat back further into the chair as I listened. That was a lot to unpack, and I appreciated that she felt comfortable enough to share that with me.
“Damn, girl, you need something more than some fruit punch in that cup. Ya ass need a shot.”
She laughed and then lightly pushed me, which caused me to laugh too.
“Well, let’s get you unpacked. You don’t seem to have a lot of downtime. Baby girl sleeping? Let’s get you together.”