Zoya #3
“Inez?” Maxine came out and looked at Goo confused.
She rushed to hug her daughter and checked over her. The way she rubbed her face, I could tell it had been a long time since she looked like she had tonight. She held her daughter’s hand, taking a seat right next to her. His grandparents both took each head of the tables.
Dinner was amazing.
Well, I thought it was amazing until his grandmother complained about the festival.
She didn’t like any of the food the restaurant served and made it known with her face.
His grandmother was more vocal, but his grandfather kind of went with the punches.
The food wasn’t his favorite, but he rolled with it because he was able to sit next to his daughter the entire night.
“The oxtails were delicious,” I decided to add some positive feedback.
Everyone knew when you ate at the resort that the food wouldn’t be the same as the local cuisine.
I’ve had the pleasure of staying at some beautiful islands where I was able to enjoy the local’s food.
I knew Goo decided on here because of his mother and trying to find a place that could accommodate her.
Everyone’s head snapped in my direction like I offered Inez some jungle juice. “It’s oxtail… why the hell are you adding extra letters,” Inez snapped.
There goes Dr. Highkell and Heroine with her damn mood swings. One minute she was good, then the next she was snapping at you.
Gerald gave his cousin a look. “Chill on her… she didn’t know.”
“Did I not have multiple on my plate?” I questioned.
“Gyal so dunce,” she muttered, and I heard her loud and clear. I had been picking up on the way Sharon spoke and understanding certain terms.
I wasn’t Ariel, but I was starting to learn what the Sebestian’s were saying. “Excuse me?”
“Nothing.”
“Inez, do you have a problem with me?” This wasn’t the right time to address it, but the bitch called me stupid in front of everyone.
All I had been was nice to her when I should have wanted her away from me. I could have turned my nose down on the junkie that she was.
“This is for family. Why are you here?”
“Cause she is family,” Pumpkin jumped in before I could. His hand remained on my stomach, as he looked across the table.
She kissed her teeth like her aunt and grandmother. Apparently, this was a generational thing. “Yet, you fucking Kimber.”
My eyes nearly popped out my head when I looked over at my dead Pumpkin. He couldn’t have betrayed me like this. Got me out here acting all soft when I put my hands on men for less.
“Eh, enough,” Sharon jumped in.
Goon was calm and collected as he kept his hand on me, despite me trying to push him away from me. “You wanna ruin everyone’s life because yours is, right?”
“Oh shit.” Khaos whistled while taking a sip of his drink and watching this unfold.
Inez snapped her head in his direction like he said something to her. “You always got something to say… the fuck you got to show for your life? No woman wants you, no kids, and you live at home.”
Khaos chuckled. “By choice. I choose to stay with Mommy because I know that she needs someone. I have a fucking condo that’s in my name and paid for… fuck you got? Needles and condoms still left up inside you. Nasty bloodclaat gyal,” he spat, looking at her with disgust.
“You honor this? They can do no wrong, but I’m always the blame.” She pointed to both her cousins. “He knocked up her up, so we celebrating, but this nigga been in and out of prison, and it’s a fucking celebration every time he comes home!”
“Fair,” Goon replied.
I looked at him like he lost his mind. The fuck did he mean fair? The shit she was saying out her mouth wasn’t fair, and that was because I heard the stories from his mother and him. Nothing about her going off like this was fair in my opinion.
“Aye, not this one.” I pointed to him and leaned up in my chair.
“He’s not perfect and has never claimed to be perfect.
He did what the hell he had to do to help his mother and if I’m not mistaken you and your fucking child.
Did you ever want for anything when your child was born?
When he was locked up, did you not still benefit from the work he put into the streets?
You so damn selfish that you can’t see past your own pain.
He feels responsible for your son’s death.
Fucking blames himself for it, and you sit here and play the blame game. Oh you wicked chile.”
Khaos snorted when I busted out in accent.
I see why they randomly spoke in patios. It felt good and conveyed your emotions better. I wanted to bust out a bloodclaat, but it wasn’t the time.
Tears fell down Inez’s face as she pointed her hand at me. “You don’t speak on my fucking chi—”
“We can fucking speak on him. That guilt tearing yo’ ass up because the reason Melle was killed was because your baby daddy fucking stole from them. While you were getting high off stolen work, your son was bleeding in the street. They sent the message by taking Melle!” Khaos raised his voice.
Goon’s body tensed when his brother tossed that secret onto the table. He was deathly quiet and I was scared for how things would come out when he did erupt.
“Easy on ha!” Maxine hollered.
“It’s always easy on her and never making her take accountability. Maxine, when you call me in the middle of the night because you’re scared for her, I go and get her… don’t tell me to fucking take it easy.”
“I deserve that!”
“No, the fuck you don’t deserve nothing. Sending my boys out to get her when she made this decision like you made yours!”
I felt like this was beyond Inez and Khaos arguing, because the two of them had become silent and now Maxine and Sharon were going at it. She stared at her sister, daring her to assume her sons owed her anything.
From what I knew Goo paid for his aunt’s bills and made sure she never needed nothing. The same care he had for his mother, he extended it to his aunt.
“You let that go, Sharon… let it the fuck go,” she warned her sister, and pointed her finger at her, tears burning her eyes. “I’m owed this… I am.”
From the way Maxine spoke, not even she believed that she was owed it.
“You are owed this? Sleeping with my fiancée while I was pregnant with his second child? Or was it the part where he gave you HIV, Maxine? Chef warned us both about him… said to leave him alone.” Her voice was shaky as she revealed that her sister had HIV and that Kevin had it, too, and had given it to her.
I squeezed Goon’s hand, as he looked at his mother. “Kevin Robinson.”
Inez spit her drink across the table onto her grandfather as she looked at her aunt. “Who…who?”
“Kevin Robinson, Goo Goo. I always expected that when you wanted to know him, you would come to me. You never did.”
I was becoming lightheaded and leaned back in my chair. Inez looked at her aunt before holding onto the table before passing out.
His grandmother put her fork down and sighed. “Mi did know she when Chef give yuh him pickney, tings did bad.”
I wasn’t well versed in patios, but when Goo and Khaos’s head snapped in her direction, I knew I heard right. “What?”
I thought my family had damn skeletons, but these people had a graveyard. Maxine was fanning Inez, while Khaos and Goon looked between their grandmother and mother.
“Inez is Chef’s daughter?”
Goon leaned up and then stood up. He didn’t want to hear what was going on. It was already news that he just learned who his father was, but to know his father shared both his aunt and mother.
“Mommy, you got that shit, too?” Khaos asked, not even caring that he referred to his aunt’s diagnosis as shit.
Sharon shook her head as tears fell down her face. “No. I got tested when you were a couple months old.”
“I’m sorry, Auntie… this shit is…”
Maxine held her hand out, and he took it into his. Meanwhile Inez was on the floor being fanned.
His grandparents had heard and seen enough. The second his grandfather pushed his chair out, kissed his daughters and headed into the restaurant, his grandmother followed. Goo stood up and walked behind them, not saying a word or turning to look in my direction.
Dinner was ruined.
I pushed Sharon back to her bedroom. She was emotional, and I gave her a hug to calm her down. Apparently, I was the hug dealer around here. It was this baby that was making me softer, and I hated every second of it.
Usually, they would have revealed all these secrets, and I would have walked away never caring.
This time I couldn’t pretend that it didn’t happen because I cared for these damn people.
She didn’t want to talk and I respected that.
I helped her with whatever she needed before heading back to where my suite was.
It was one in the morning, and I found myself staring up at the ceiling. I thought Goo would have returned so I left the doors open, in case he wanted to come through the back.
I called his phone a few times and it went to voicemail.
He was going through a lot right now. Fuck that, he could have at least told me he was staying with his grandparents tonight.
You didn’t get to do shit like that and then turn around and yell at me for the same thing.
If we were being fair and equal in this bitch, he needed to know that shit.
Snatching the sheets from my body, I grabbed a pair of his sweats and shirt to toss on. I slipped my feet into my sandals and grabbed my keycard, as I made the walk to Khaos’s room.
“Right here,” he called before I could knock on his door. In front of their rooms there was a long-shared pool.
“Can’t sleep, either?”
“Nah. Out of all the shit I heard, Chef being a father trips me out the most.”
Chef was easy as pie like his father. He was there and then he wasn’t, so assuming he had children or even a woman was a stretch. What woman would put up with his disappearing acts?
“I’m driving up there.”
“Where?”
“You slow, Khaos?”
He was offended I even asked. “I might be, because what the fuck would make you think you could drive up there at this time of night.”