Chapter 29
The Final Piece
When Islah agreed to cancel all the wedding shit and marry me sooner, she don’t even know what she did to a nigga heart.
All I been thinking about was her being my wife. All that extra shit: venues, decorations, people, none of that shit meant anything to me. I just needed her.
Islah was starting to sleep in more. Pregnancy was starting to take over lil’ by lil’, and I was loving seeing her changes.
I snuck out while she was still asleep, kissing her on her forehead before I walked out.
I got to the shop just as Keith was opening up the door. That nigga looked at me as if I was a stranger.
“Damn, I thought you forgot where the store was,” he said, taking a sip of his coffee.
I laughed him off. “You know what, your remarks are not gonna get on my nerves today. A nigga is on top of the world.”
I walked in and went into my office, unpacking more custom pieces and getting them ready for pickup with my music playin’ and my smoke in the air.
After Keith got done doing his job, he came into my office to see what was up with me.
“What you on today, Brah?” Keith asked as he sat down.
I turned around in my chair. “Islah and I are canceling the wedding—”
“Nigga what the fuck is going on?!” he yelled out before I could finish, and I laughed.
“Calm down, nigga!” I yelled out. “We are canceling to do something smaller, just me, her, and Amir.”
Keith nodded, liking the sound of it, then he raised his eyebrow.
“What about our fits! I was ready to slide into that suit.”
I laughed again. “It will get used. Let me put some shit together.”
He nodded. “So where are you doing it at?”
I sat back, glad I had somebody to talk this shit out with.
“I was thinking about in the backyard, or at the botanical garden. But then I was thinking about taking a trip to somewhere tropical, doing it on the beach or some shit like that.”
“That beach shit sound had,” Keith expressed. “When are y’all gonna do it?”
“I want to do this shit in days, like in another week.”
“You really wanted to speed it up?”
“Hell yeah, we got that nigga gone, my BM outta the way, this the last thing that we need to do, and I can’t wait any longer—I don’t want to.”
Keith understood where I was coming from.
“You stayin putting a lot on your plate nigga,” he said as he was getting up.
I agreed.
“Pressure build diamonds, I was built for the shit.”
Keith walked outta my office talkin about how I was finna be stressed, and I didn’t even respond. I just turned back around in my chair and started locking in on the plans like I had it all figured out.
At first, it looked easy. I was sitting there scrolling through different beach spots, resorts, villas, looking at the water view, and all that shit, thinking about Islah standing there with the sun hitting her, with Amir standing right beside me. It was that simple; that was all we needed.
I started calling around to places, but the more I called, the more shit started stacking up on me.
One place was already booked. Another place wanted a deposit.
That wasn’t the problem. It was the date they had open that was.
I hung up and didn’t think about callin another place for them to tell me I gotta wait to see what they had, like I was trying to buy a car or some shit.
I sat back, rubbing my face. This shit was not gonna be as easy as I thought it was gonna be.
I called Islah after that just to hear her voice, and she answered, sounding calm, like she wasn’t doing nothing stressful.
I told her what I was trying to figure out with the wedding shit, and she started laughing at me like she already knew what I was going through, and that made me click a lil’ because she had been dealing with this shit for months, and I see why she was so stressed.
She calmed me down a lil’ bit, and I got back on it, not wanting her to lift a finger to do shit.
I called different people with different connections.
I switched plans and changed ideas, trying to make something small happen fast, and every time I was close, something else came up, and by the time I got tired of it I realized I had been in the same chair all damn day trying to make my marriage happen in a week.
I left the shop later than I expected and went and picked Amir up from school.
When he got in the car, talking about school, I switched the subject and told him the plans for the wedding had changed and that it was going to be soon.
He stared at me, then looked out the window like he had to think about my changes.
“I’m cool with all of that, but am I still gonna be able to wear my suit?”
I laughed. “Yeah nigga, you can wear your suit.”
I did my normal stop and picked Islah up some flowers, letting Amir grab whatever he wanted, and we went home.
As soon as we walked through the door, we were hit by the smell of good food being cooked and music playing from the kitchen.
Amir dropped his book bag at the door and ran off into the kitchen, and I followed behind him and stopped at the entrance, watching how he embraced Islah and how she embraced him back.
She damn near stopped everything she was doing to ask him about his day, school, and whatever else they had talked about when I wasn’t around.
She finally looked my direction and smiled.
“Oh, my big baby, I didn’t see you standing there,” she said as I walked further in.
“It’s cool, I like seeing y’all together.”
I handed her the flower and a kiss across the island as I looked at what she was cooking.
“Dinner ready?” I asked.
She shook her head. “Nah, boo, give me a few more minutes.”
I nodded and told Amir to go get changed and washed while I went down to my man cave for a lil’ bit.
As soon as I sat down, I pulled my phone outta my pocket and got back to work on our wedding shit, thinking about what I could do to make shit happen the way I wanted it to.
When I thought about Turks and Caicos and that smile that she had on her face.
It made me smile just thinking about it, and I made a call.
After talking to a few people and explaining to them what I was trying to do and how many wasn’t a problem, they were able to work on my time frame, and I locked everything down.
Once I hung up the phone, I clapped to myself. The hard part was done.
A short time later, Islah yelled that dinner was ready. I walked up there and sat at the head of the table and smiled at my lady.
“What is going on?” she asked me.
“I locked in the wedding shit.”
Islah and Amir cheered and clapped.
“Where are we getting married?” Islah asked.
I opened my mouth to respond, then closed my mouth thinking about what I was about to say.
“I want it to be a surprise,” I said softly. “You have been doing a lot for the wedding, then canceling everything. I want this to be a surprise for you, but I will tell you that we are getting on a plane.”
Amir started cheering while I could see the wheels spinning in Islah’s head, trying to think about where we were going.
“And when are we doing this?”
I took a bite of my food and looked at her.
“We are doing it next week.”
Her eyes got big.
“Are you sure, Love?” she asked me.
I nodded. “I am more than sure. All we have to do at this point is pack our bags. I took care of everything else.”
Islah looked at me like she was a lil’ worried, but she exhaled with a smile.
“Okay, baby.”
That was all she said.
We went on with dinner, with Amir leading it as always. I kept glancing at Islah, but she stayed pretty quiet throughout it.
After dinner, me and Amir cleaned up the plates and put the food away while Islah went upstairs. And when we were done, we went down to my man cave and played some rounds for 2K until he got tired of losing.
When I made it up to the bedroom, Islah was still away on her phone, laying in bed. She looked at me with a smile, but I still had to question her.
“Are you okay with moving the wedding up?”
She looked at me, confused.
“Yeah baby, why did you ask me that?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. You looked a lil’ worried or something when I told you we are doing it next week.”
“It kind of threw me off that you could get it done for next week, but at the same time, it’s what I want just wished I knew more.”
I smiled and got in bed beside her, giving her thigh soft kisses, lifting up my shirt, which she was wearing.
“I don’t want you to have to worry about anything or question if you have to do anything. I understand the stress you were having, even though I’ve only done it for a day or so. That shit is a lot. I want you in your soft mommy area and for stress to never come your way.”
Islah smiled at me as she leaned down and kissed me.
“That’s cool for right now, but I’ma have to plan a celebration party or something. My girls want to wear their dresses.”
I laughed. “Man, Keith is pressed to wear his suit.”
We laughed together, then I caught myself smiling at her.
“Stop staring at me,” she said playfully.
“I can’t help it, you make my heart sing.”
She blushed.
“What did I do to deserve you?” she asked.
I shrugged with a smirk.
“You got away from a fuck nigga.”