6. Ozyris Brentley
Ifelt like a nigga was having an out-of-body experience, real talk.
After watching Noree pull off, I just stood in that same spot for a minute, tryna process all this shit.
I couldn’t even tell you how long I’d been standing out there.
Eventually, that Atlanta heat started whooping my ass, sweat dripping down my forehead, so I finally headed back inside.
I barely made it three steps into the house before Unc caught me.
He came around the corner from the kitchen with a dish towel over his shoulder and stopped when he saw me.
“Nephew… what you doing back here?” He frowned. “I thought you left?”
“I did.” I dropped my keys on the entry table.
“Then my biggest brand deal fell through on the way to the tarmac. Talking about they want fresh new faces for the campaign.” I ran my hand down my face.
“And then Ginger got on my last fucking nerve on the plane, so I said fuck it and got off before we even took off.”
Unc laughed. “Yeah, that sounds about right. That girl stay working your nerves. I don’t even know how y’all lasted this long.”
I chuckled because he wasn’t lying.
He put his hand on my shoulder. “Listen, nephew. Fuck that deal. You built a whole name for yourself, and I’m proud of you. If they don’t wanna work with you, make your own shit. That way ain’t nobody ever gon’ be able to pull nothing out from under you again.”
“I hear you.” I nodded. “I appreciate that, Unc. For real.”
He studied me for a second. “So why you still standing here looking like that?”
I let out a breath.
“Talk.” He said.
“You remember that contest I did a year and some change ago?”
His expression changed slightly. That was the same weekend everything happened with Reesie.
“Yeah. I remember.”
“I met somebody that weekend.”
He gave me the side-eye. “You slept with her.”
“Yeah.” I laughed. “But it was more than that.”
“Okay. And?”
“She was here today.”
His eyebrows shot up. “Here?”
“Yeah. She was interviewing for the nanny position for King.”
Unc stepped back. “Nephew, I ain’t even gon’ lie to you. That sound like some meant-to-be type shit.”
I laughed. “Man, what?”
“I’m serious. Me and your auntie lost each other for years and somehow found our way back. Sometimes people come back around for a reason.”
I stood there thinking about that.
“Did you like her?”
“Yeah.” The answer came faster than I expected.
He nodded slowly.
“Honestly, Unc, talking to Noree was easy. The kind of conversations I wish I could have with Ginger sometimes.” I shook my head. “Gin always gotta be on her phone, taking pictures, going live, worried about what everybody else got going on. Sometimes I just wanna exist without all that shit.”
“And this girl made you feel like you could?”
I thought about it for a second.
“Yeah.” I nodded. “Noree was… different.”
“Did I hear you say something about Miss Marcell?”
We both turned around. Opal was coming down the hall with her purse on her arm.
“Yes, ma’am,” I said.
She laughed and put her hand on her hip.
“Mmhmm. I knew something was going on between you two. That poor girl looked mortified. She jumped up out that chair so fast she almost hit the floor, and then you went running out behind her.” She raised her eyebrow.
“Now, I peeked out the window first because I’m nosy.
And when I couldn’t tell what was about to happen, I came out to check on you.
That girl looked like she was about to cry, Mr. Love. So, what is going on?”
I shrugged, playing it cool. “She’s just somebody I used to know.”
Opal gave me a long look over the top of her glasses. She wasn’t buying a word of it.
“But what happened with the nanny position, though?” I asked. “You find somebody?”
“Well, technically, Miss Marcell removed herself from consideration.” She adjusted her purse.
“But between me and you? She would have gotten that job. Hands down. Best interview of the day by a mile.” She sighed.
“I do have a couple runner-ups I’m going to bring back for second interviews, though. Just to cross my T’s and dot my I’s.”
“Cool, cool.” I nodded slowly like it was nothing.
Meanwhile, my mind was somewhere else entirely, picturing Noree under my roof every day, in my kitchen, in my hallways, and my chest was doing something I hadn’t felt in a long time.
“Alright, I’m off for the day,” Opal said. “I’ll see you gentlemen tomorrow.” She started for the door and then stopped. “Oh, hi, Princeton! How are you, baby?”
I turned around to see my brother walking through the door. Opal hugged him and kissed his cheek, and they stood there talking for a minute before she headed out.
PB and I slapped hands and pulled each other in.
“What’s up, boy?” he said, then hugged Unc.
“Y’all want something to eat?” Unc asked. “I’m about to fix King his lunch.”
“Nah,” we said at the same time.
“Alright then.” He headed off toward the kitchen and left us standing there.
Me and PB walked through the house to my man cave, and soon as the door shut, he threw his hands up.
“Bruh. What the fuck is going on today? I ran into Noree’s sister.”
I stopped mid-step. “What? Where the fuck you run into her at?”
“Remember I told you I had something important to do?” He dropped down on the couch. “I had a suit tailored. She’s the one my team hired.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “And I ain’t say nothing to you, but I’m getting honored at an event in a few days.”
I was at the minibar pouring us both cognac on the rocks, and I looked back over my shoulder at him. “Nigga, what? Why you ain’t say nothing?”
I walked over and handed him his glass, then sat down beside him. “I wanna celebrate you the same way you always celebrate me. Anything important comes up, you tell me.” I took a sip. “Matter fact, can I be your plus-one?”
PB looked at me like I was slow. “Nigga. You Ozy Love. You wouldn’t be my plus-one. If anything, I’d be yours, nigga.”
We both fell out laughing.
“Man, whatever,” I said.
I sat back and sighed, staring into my glass. “I ain’t gon’ lie, though, bruh. I’m stressed. So much shit happened in the last couple hours, I don’t even know what to think right now.”
He tipped his glass toward me. “I’m already knowing.”
We sat there in the quiet for a minute, both of us sipping, both of us somewhere else in our heads.
“So, what’s up with Nourah?” I asked.
PB shook his head with a little smile on his face. “She was looking good. I ain’t even gon’ front. But she said she got a man now.”
“Word?”
“Word.” He shrugged. “Last time we ain’t exchange numbers, I only had hers.
And by the time everything settled, and I actually tried to call, her number was changed.
So, I said fuck it and made sure this time I called myself from her phone.
” He turned his glass in his hand. “But seeing her today kind of brightened up my whole day, I’m not gon’ lie.
I wasn’t in a bad mood or anything like that but seeing her took my mind off shit with Paisley. ”
I shook my head. “What she on now?”
PB sat up, elbows on his knees, then looked over at me. “Man, that damn girl tried to fuck me.”
“I told you,” I said, laughing. “I told you moving your baby mama up in your crib wasn’t a good idea. How long you been dry now?”
PB sighed. “Too goddamn long. And if I do wanna be with somebody, I gotta get a room or pull up on them, and you know I don’t even like doing shit like that.”
“Nah, that’s facts.” I leaned forward. “But hold on. What happened? Y’all fuck?”
“Nah. You called me about the situation with Noree right in the middle of it. Saved by the bell.” PB laughed. “She was pouting and throwing a whole tantrum about it, but honestly? If you ain’t call, I probably would have.”
We both damn near fell out.
“Man, you hell,” I said.
“I’m just being honest, big bruh. She be walking around the house in her bra and panties, tempting me on purpose.
But she too damn jealous for me. I ain’t got the energy for it.
Right now, her living with me is straight.
But the minute I get serious with somebody?
” He shook his head. “She gotta get the fuck on. I’ll get her a crib, make sure she straight, pay the bills over there and everything. But she can’t be up under me.”
I nodded in agreement, and for a moment, we got quiet again.
Then PB said, “So since Opal interviewed Noree, they probably got her email, her number, all that shit on the paperwork.” He looked at me. “You gon’ hit shawty up?”
“What make you think I wanna call her?”
“’Cause you sitting over there looking like a sore loser right now. Sad-puppy-looking-ass nigga.”
I sat with that for a second, but I really needed to let that shit go. She wasn’t tryna talk to a nigga no way, and she probably got a man now too.
“Nah, I’m looking like this because I lost my biggest brand deal today,” I said, tryna play it off. “I was just talking to Unc about it before you walked in.”
“Damn. My bad, bruh.” He held his glass up. “But fuck them.”
I laughed. “Everybody keep saying that.”
“Nah, for real, though. You could really do your own thing. Your own product, your own line, whatever. You don’t need them. You don’t need nobody.”
“Yeah. I know.”
I finished off what was in my glass and got up to pour myself another.
“As far as Noree, though, she looked good as hell. Thicker than she was before but filled out in all the right places.” I turned around. “And goddamn, her ass got fatter.”
PB choked on his drink. “Nourah’s got fatter too. Man, them some fine-ass sisters, for real.”
“Nigga, you ain’t never lied.”
We laughed for a good while off that one, and then he got quiet again.
“So, what you gon’ do about Gin?”
I sighed and leaned back against the bar. “I don’t know. I really fuck with her. But I’m fifty-fifty right now. Shit be real good between us, then it go sour real fast. Almost like she putting on a front sometimes.”
“Yeah.” PB set his glass down. “I ain’t gon’ lie to you, big bruh.
She ain’t the one for you. And all that shit about staying with her because she was there when you was going through it?
I appreciate her for that, especially because you wasn’t opening up to me then.
But you ain’t gotta be with somebody just because they showed up for you. ”
There was a long pause between us. I took a sip and let it burn going down.
“Yeah,” I said. “Probably not.”
PB stood up. “But aye, fuck all that. It’s my dawg birthday! And since you still in town, fuck it. Let’s go out tonight.”
I sighed and shook my head. “Nah bruh, I ain’t even in the mood for anything tonight, but tomorrow…I’m down.”