13. DaVinci
13
DaVinci
S liding into my G-Wagon, I started it and pulled off. It was time for my monthly meeting with the bosses, and I was less than thrilled. The closer I got to the club, the more irritated I became. I knew I was gon’ have to see Lake’s goofy ass, and I really wasn’t in the mood for that. With River still dealing with her mental health, he had to take on doing her job and his. I’m sure he had been holding it down, but I still ain’t wanna see the lil’ nigga.
Once I arrived, I parked and then grabbed a blunt from the center console. The weed was most definitely needed so that I didn’t click out in front of my workers and beat Lake’s ass again. After I finished facing the entire blunt, I hopped out and checked my surroundings. My biggest threat was gone, but I was still keeping my head on a swivel regardless. Going inside, I headed straight to the back, ignoring the lustful glares from some of the ladies.
“What’s good?” I acknowledged the men when I got into the room, briefly glancing in Lake’s direction. The mug on his face seemed permanent, and I had no problem knocking it off for him.
A murmur of wassups echoed throughout the room before I took my seat and got down to business. I continually glimpsed over at Lake because I wanted to see if he wanted to handle the tension between us. He acted like I wasn’t there the entire meeting which was cool by me.
“Money and product good?” I asked him, and he nodded. “You can’t open your fuckin’ mouth and answer?”
He laughed and shrugged, further pissing me off.
“Aye, we done here. Y’all can go and enjoy yourselves while I talk to Lake privately,” I gritted, clenching and unclenching my teeth.
All of them jumped to their feet and hurried out of the room. Lake stood up like he thought he was leaving, too.
“Nigga, if you walk out that door just know we’re done for life, and that’s on grandpa,” I warned him as he inched towards the door.
He sucked his teeth but stopped in his tracks. “What the fuck do you want?”
“What I really wanna do is beat yo ass again, but I’m trying to handle this like men,” I turned slightly to face him.
“If we ain’t fighting ‘bout it, then I’m really not tryna hear shit you talking about, DaVinci.”
“Muthafucka,” I rose to my feet and stood directly in front of him. “You wanna hit me because I fucked you up? Go ahead, Lake. If that’ll make you feel better, take your best fuckin’ shot. Ima let you get one off, and I’m on yo ass after that so c’mon,” I granted him a freebie and waited for him to act on that.
After a silent and intense stare down, he let out an audible slow breath. “Y’all could’ve told me, DaVinci.”
“I understand that. At any point, we could have, yes,” I cleared my throat. It was a lil’ hard for a nigga like me to apologize. “And I’m sorry that we didn’t, but we can’t change the past, bro. It happened. What are we gonna to do about it moving forward?”
“I hate you,” he mugged me, but I could see the impish smirk hiding underneath that fake anger.
“I hate you too, lil’ nigga,” I pulled him into a hug. “Hard ass bones. You had my knuckles swollen for days.”
He pulled away from me and playfully jabbed at me. “That’s what you get, thinking you the big bad wolf and shit.”
“I am,” I shot back with a smirk, ready to put them paws on him again as a reminder if needed.
“Yeah, aight. I think as a way to make it up to me, you can put me on a private island for my birthday with ‘bout twenty to thirty bad bitches. I’m talking fat asses, thick thighs, and breastfeeding titties.”
Leaning my head to the side a little, I looked at him like he was crazy. “Breastfeeding titties? The fuck is that?”
“You know,” he cupped his hands over his pecks. “Big ass titties! When Brooke was breastfeeding Blaise, her titties was sitting up under her chin, aight? Them muthafuckas was swole as hell. Gimme twenty of ‘em!”
A deep laughter erupted from my gut and just like that, the tension between us was gone. I could’ve kept beefing with him, but I knew my wife was gonna be happy as hell to hear that we had made up. As we walked out, he continued talking about a birthday trip, which got my wheels turning. The twins’ birthday was the first week of June and that was a few weeks away.
“Aye, how about this?” I started my proposal once we got outside. “I’ll pay for all of us to go on a trip. Wherever, it don’t even matter. I want to do something nice for Clo anyway, so this will be perfect.”
“And the catch? ‘Cause nigga, you’re my big brother, I know that tone. You want something,” he called me out, crossing his arms across his chest.
Chuckling, I shifted my shoulders up a little. “Get River to come.”
“You gon’ have thirty bad bitches there?” His eyebrow hiked in wonder.
“Nigga, I want Brooke to go.”
“We can fuck ‘em together! Brooke ain’t never tripping ‘bout no bitches. She know she got my heart forever. It’s just my dick she gotta share,” he coolly shrugged. “So…about the bitches?”
“Man, what the fuck ever. I’m not paying for no thirty bitches to be nowhere all my family gon’ be. You gon’ have to meet them hoes on yo own. I’m paying for the trip, all expenses. Shopping, airfare, hotel, food, every damn thing. That’s not good enough?”
We had a silent debate with our eyes; his demanding that his wants be met, and mine telling him that it wasn’t going down.
“You take the fun out of everything,” he huffed and rolled his eyes, finally caving. “Fuck! Fine, I’ll get her to agree to go. Because after all…she is talking to me,” he tauntingly bounced his eyebrows.
I jumped at him, and he flinched a little. “Shut yo ass up. Don’t tell her Ima be there, Lake, dead ass. I wanna make shit right with her, too. And I think mentally, a week-long vacation would be good for her. Pick the place and let me know something.”
“I gotchu, big bro,” he leaned in to dap me up.
Meeting him the rest of the way, I pulled him in for another hug. “I’m sorry about how I did you with Mom, too. Clo Baby told me about y’all conversation, and I dropped the ball on that with you.”
“It’s all good,” he tapped my back a few times and then we separated. “I never thought about how you would feel either. It’s a fucked up situation all the way around, but it is what it is, DaVinci. This the life we live and tough decisions gon’ have to get made. We take our feelings out of it and do what needs to be done.”
“Was the funeral nice?”
I didn’t give a fuck about that looney bitch’s funeral, but I wanted to act like I cared. For the sake of mine and Lake’s relationship.
“Vinny, you don’t give a damn if she had a nice funeral or not,” he chuckled and shook his head, calling me on my shit again. “It was decent. I cremated her, and I was thinking of having her ashes either turned into a diamond or incorporated into a painting like Grandpa’s.”
“Definitely a diamond. That woman didn’t give a damn about the art.”
“You right,” he laughed and dapped me up one more time. “Let me get out of here. I gotta go pick up Blaise since Brooke having a girls’ night.”
“Aight. Make sure you get River on this trip,” I recapped to ensure he didn’t forget.
He nodded as he started backing up to walk away. “I said I got you!”
“Mmhmm,” I turned and darted back to my truck.
On the way home, I stopped and got Clo a few Hershey’s Cookies and Cream candy bars. Those had become her favorite over the last week. When I walked in the door with them, her emotional ass would probably cry. Parking in the driveway twenty minutes later, I hopped out and hurried into the house. I couldn’t wait to tell Clo that me and Lake made up.
“Bae?” I called for her when I reached our bedroom and didn’t immediately see her.
She stuck her head out of the bathroom with a face full of make-up. “Yes?”
“The hell you got all that make-up on for?” I frowned up my face.
“Because I’m going out,” she disappeared back into the bathroom.
Tossing the bag of sweets on the bed, I stepped into the bathroom with her delusional ass. “Clo Baby…going out where ?”
“I don’t know. A lounge or just to eat, I don’t know.”
“Um,” I studied her as she curled the wig that was on her head. “You think you taking yo pregnant ass out to a lounge?”
She cut her eyes over at me. “Because I’m pregnant, I can’t go out to a lounge?”
“Yes! You gon’ have my baby inhaling that funky ass hookah smoke? I think the fuck not. I don’t even smoke in my own house because you’re pregnant. My daughter not breathing in that shit.”
“Okay, so I’ll just go out to eat then.”
“Hold up…who the fuck you going out with in the first place?” My questions persisted.
“DaVinci, you better stop fuckin’ cussing at me like you stupid,” she declared in a sharp tone with her nostrils bucking out. “Gahdamn. You coming in here with all this attitude, and I’m not tryna deal with that! I’m going out with Brooke, Charm, and River!”
It never even clicked in my head that when Lake said Brooke was having a girls’ night, that my wife might’ve been involved in that.
“Awh okay,” I kissed her cheek with my wheels already spinning with a plan. “Have fun, baby. I bought you some cookies and cream bars, they on the bed. I’m about to take a shower and call it a night. I love you.”
She nodded like a brat as if she had won the battle. “Now that’s better. I love you, too.”
Moving back out of the bathroom, I went into the closet to get undressed and text in private.
Me: We on a mission tonight. Ima pull up to yo crib in an hour.
“Blaise, this your first mission, lil’ man. It won’t be your last, I promise,” I laughed as I strapped my nephew into his car seat.
“Your wife is gonna kill us. Actually, she gonna kill you,” Lake complained, getting into the driver’s seat. “Shit, she’ll kill me too for bringing yo simple ass.”
“We gon’ be straight!” I closed Blaise’s door and hopped in the passenger sat. “Let’s go.”
“Got me and my son out here in these streets all late at night. It is way past his bedtime. His momma gonna kill me too,” he continued complaining, pulling out of his driveway.
“You too worried about nothing. Ima just pull up on her, make sure everything is everything, and then we can be out,” I pledged with a sly grin.
“Somehow, Vin, I highly doubt this is about to go as simple as that,” he glanced at me and shook his head.
Laughing, I shrugged but he was probably right. It didn’t matter. I just needed to make sure there weren’t any niggas smiling up in my wife’s face. I still owed Dr. O’s extra friendly ass a bullet for flirting with her. I wasn’t above adding more names to that damn list.
It took us a little over forty minutes to get to Legacy Live in Hampton, thanks to the traffic. When we attempted to enter with Blaise, one of the security guards tried to deny us access. After the second guard came out and realized who we were, he requested that we at least try to cover Blaise up. Lake had him strapped to his chest in one of those lil’ kangaroo pouch things. I ran back to his car, grabbed a jacket out, and gave it to him.
“Brooke is gonna kill me,” he reiterated, zipping up the jacket enough to cover Blaise’s face. Thankfully, he was fast asleep.
“Relax,” I waved him off before asking the cool security guard what area Clo and River were in.
Once I was armed with the helpful information, we pressed inside the dimly lit building. The music was at least at a decent volume which meant my baby girl’s eardrum weren’t being rattled with a bunch of bullshit in the womb. As a matter of fact, I was gon’ put some Mozart on for her when we got home to counteract the trap music that was currently playing.
“There they go,” Lake nodded in their direction, unzipping his jacket a little so Blaise could get some air.
A warm smile spread across my face as I watched Clo light up with laughter. She was the prettiest woman in the building without a doubt. My eyes landed on River next. It seemed like she was still sad but trying to have a good time at least. There was a bunch of food on their table along with some drinks.
“Aight, ain’t no niggas around them. You came, you saw, you conquered. Let’s go,” Lake turned to head for the door.
I grabbed him by the hood of the jacket and pulled him back. “I ain’t conquer nothing yet.”
“I just got word that my boys, DaVinci and Lake Pierre, are in the building, wassup gang?!” The DJ embarrassingly announced.
Before I had a chance to duck up out of there, Clover’s eyes pierced mine from across the lounge. That brief, gut-wrenching moment of fear hit me like a linebacker, because I knew my ass was grass. What kinda man spied on his wife, and with his brother, no less, who thought bringing his 8-month-old son inside a lounge was a good idea?
Peering over at Lake, I saw that Blaise was now awake and gnawing on a pacifier like he was taking mental notes for later. As he should’ve been, but that’s neither here nor there. Clover started marching toward me, and I swear I could hear the Jaws theme song playing in my head.
Lake leaned over and whispered, “Abort mission?”
“We already lost this round, playa,” I nervously smiled as Clo Baby’s sweet perfume hit my nose. I just hoped her ass didn’t hit me in the nose next.
“Really, DaVinci?!” She threw large shards of glass at me through her eyes. I knew I had fucked up. “What the hell are you doing here?!” She looked at Lake and her head bobbled in disbelief. “Y’all brought the gahdamn baby in here?!”
“This isn’t what it looks like,” I lied.
“It looks like my fuckin’ husband doesn’t trust me, so he decided to play like James Bond and spy on my ass,” her arms folded against her chest.
“Lake!” Brooke’s voice pierced my ears next. She looked just as pissed as Clo. “Nigga, are you dumb ?! My son is in here for what?!”
“Don’t be mad at me. Blame DaVinci. This was all this smart ass nigga’s idea,” Lake ratted me out, jabbing his thumb in my direction.
“Baby,” I fumbled with my words for a minute, rubbing the back of my neck. “I was just tryna make sure you were safe, that’s all.”
“Safe? Safe from what ? The only person that wanted to harm you is gone!”
“Well,” I tried to explain myself but the look on her face told me to save it.
“You two idiots,” Brooke waved her pointed finger between us. “Deserve an award for stupidity. Bringing my fuckin’ baby in here like you don’t have no damn sense!”
“They don’t!” Clo added, the corner of her lip curled in disgust.
“Yeah, well, you know who you married,” I leaned in quickly and kissed her while I still could. “No go backs.”
“Nigga, you need to go back home,” Clover’s rant continued. “The fuck. I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself. Y’all can’t even spy right anyway!”
“Exactly,” Brooke rolled her eyes so hard, I thought shorty was gon’ pull a muscle in them. “Next time y’all wanna spy, leave my son out of it and use some common sense for once! Now, we are gonna go back to our table, finish eating, laughing, and talking about you two simple muthafuckas,” she interlaced her fingers with Clo and pulled her away.
“Aight, baby, I love you, too! I’ll see you at home with yo fine ass!” I shouted after her, losing the last lil’ bit of dignity I had left.
Lake sucked his teeth and shook his head. “I told yo dumb ass this was a bad idea. You gon’ be getting real comfortable with palmala,” he laughed and headed towards the door for a second time.
I looked over in their section one last time, and River had turned her back to me. That hurt me deep down, but I knew God was gon’ give me a chance to make it right with her. Or at least I hoped so. In the meantime, I was gon’ have to get my gorgeous but mean wife back on my side. This stunt failed miserably, so I knew it was gonna take a lot of ass kissing, literally, for her to forgive me.