ELLA
“Mon ange! I’ve been awaiting your call! You are in Missouri, I trust? Your papa has, uh…tucked you in?”
I giggled at hearing his voice, his French accent thick and curvy. “Tucked me in? I’m not a child, Claude.”
He sucked his tongue. “You know what I mean. He bought you a house, no? So, you are uh…squared away?”
“I am. You know my dad, always going above and beyond. Three bedrooms, four bathrooms, three thousand square feet of luxury fully furnished, and all this for little old me.”
“Everett McClain is a good man, mon ange. Always has been. He loves you as a father should.”
“I know. I’m a lucky girl in many ways. So, how are you? Taking your meds? Staying away from the liquor?”
“You nag!” Claude DuMont groaned. For a man in his sixties, he could be downright pigheaded about taking care of himself. “You might be my favorite model, but that doesn’t mean I want to hear your fussing. I’m fine! Hans makes sure of that. And here he is now with a smoothie or something. It’s green. You know I hate the color green.” Hans was his main lover of many years, but Claude had a trail of broken male and female hearts cluttering his past.
“I do know that. Tell Hans I said hi. You drink your smoothie, and I’ll call you later.”
“All right, mon ange. Call your mother, chérie.”
Before I could reply, he hung up and I sighed, resting against the back of the sofa in my new living room. I loved Claude DuMont, a legendary designer who’d taken me under his wing from the very beginning of my modeling career. He was a dear friend, a mentor, and there wasn’t much I’d ever refused him, but I wasn’t calling my mother.
Not today.
Not ever, if I could help it.
Feeling that way killed the good vibes chatting with Claude always gave me, but I was sadly accustomed to my emotions being in a pit anyway. Loss could do that to you. Loss, pain, despair—I was uncomfortably familiar with those states of being. I’d spent a lot of time dwelling in darkness, so much so that being in the light felt…foreign. Nevertheless, I’d continue to fight to keep the void behind me. I’d almost lost myself before. I couldn’t let that happen again.
ARMAND
She a baddie and she mine
Prime rib, perfection defined
Long legs, a pretty face
All eyes on her when she steps in the place…
On One’s Mine blasted from the speakers of my Urus as I rode through the streets of my hometown, checking out neighborhoods mainly on the north side where my mom and I lived while I was growing up. Every time I came home, it seemed shit just got worse and worse. A lot of my old friends were either dead, in jail, running from the law, or had left the city altogether, but there were a few who were still here and had managed to upgrade. My boy, Scotty, was one of those few, and being able to hang with him on the regular was one of the scarce positives about this move. That, and I’d be close to family—my granny, my cousins, aunts, and uncles, my mom.
My mom.
If “it’s complicated” could apply to mother/son relationships, it’d fit us like a glove. There wasn’t a person on this rock that I loved more. There also wasn’t a person on this rock who’d hurt me more.
See? Complicated.
On One continued to provide the soundtrack for my ride through Da Lou as my mind wandered. Dude had a weird voice when he rapped, a cross between DMX and Pac. Like, he was smooth and gritty at the same time, God rest his soul. Ain’t no way On One should’ve died so young, but life for a black man was nothing if not perilous. We never knew when the dagger hanging over our heads would fall. Wasn’t no hiding from that shit.
I was heading back to my hotel when she called. My first thought was to ignore it. My second thought was to ignore it, too. My third thought was to answer, but I was too late, so I called her back.
She answered with, “Hey, Boogie. You in town?” She sounded excited as hell. I wished I felt the same.
Pulling to a stop at a red light, I shut my eyes for a second before replying, “Yes, ma’am.”
“Good! Where are you staying?”
“Uh…I got a room at the Sable Inn for now.”
“Oh…” I knew she wanted me to stay in the little cottage on her and her husband’s property, but bump that.
“Yeah. Ma, I gotta go. In traffic.”
“Oh, okay. Well, I’m glad you’re here. Hope to see you soon.”
“Yeah,” I said, and then I hung up.
My boy since forever smacked my shoulder. “Man, I’m glad you’re in town! How’s it feel to be back home?”
I shrugged, taking a seat at the bar in his kitchen. “Weird as fuck, familiar and unfamiliar at the same time.”
Scotty nodded, his back to me now as he worked at the stove in his downtown loft. Dude had a nice crib, exposed brick and pipes, sleek furniture. I suppose being a business owner was working out for him, and his clothing line for big and tall men was dope as hell. “I hear you,” he replied. “A lot of shit has changed but a lot of shit is the same.”
“Yeah. When you learn how to cook?”
He glanced over his beefy shoulder, giving me a smirk. “I been knowing how to cook, nigga. I’m big, gotta know how to cook.”
“You ain’t never cook nothing for me before.”
“I ain’t fucking you, fool.”
I laughed. “Damn, okay. So your girl got you like that? You clean and do laundry, too?”
“Cook, clean, do laundry, eat pussy. Shiiiid, I’ll tap dance for that pussy. You just don’t know!”
I fell out laughing. “Nigga, you sprung?!”
“I’m in this motherfucker going boing-boing, my guy!”
We both laughed.
Shaking my head, I said, “I can’t believe this. Next thing I know, your ass gon’ be married with kids.”
“That’s the plan.”
My eyes damn near popped out of my head. “Scotty, you for real?!” I could party, but this dude was the partying final boss.
“For real. Man, we hittin’ our thirties. I found a good woman and I ain’t got time to fuck it up. I’m keeping my ass out the clubs and out of chicks’ DMs. This thing me and Rory got? This some forever shit.”
“So…wait, I finally get on the home team and your ass ain’t gon’ kick it with me?”
“Hell naw I ain’t!”
“That’s fucked up, Burgess!”
“I don’t care about you using my first name. I still ain’t going to no clubs with you. Dinwiddie still in the streets. Lance, too. They got you.”
“Ain’t Dinwiddie married now?”
“Supposedly. He don’t act like it though.”
“I’d probably be the same way. Ain’t no female finna tame me. Believe that shit.”
“Nah, I thought the same thing, but the right woman will have you rolling over and playing dead for that ass. Hell, Rory got me aligning my chakras and recycling plastics.”
I gave him a smirk. “Nah, I ain’t letting that happen to me. I am not going out like that.”
“Wanna bet?”
“Bet!”
“How much we talking, ‘cause that’s a bet I’ll take.”
“A hunnid.”
“A’ight, my guy. It’s on!”