LEANDRA
“I’m going to go check on dinner. Shariece, can you give me a hand in the kitchen, please?”
“Girl, I swear, I’m about to slap the shit out of that boy.” I slid on my pair of flower-print oven mitts, opened the oven, and pulled out the platter of vegetarian lasagna and set it on the kitchen counter to cool. “Has he been like this all night?”
“He’s been salty ever since he walked in the door. It’s not like him to be so rude. He might be too grown for me to spank, but he ain’t grown enough to be kicked out of my house.”
“Don’t worry about Emjay. Him seeing you with someone will just take some getting used to.”
“So what do you think of Taj? He’s cute, right?”
“He’s so . . .”
“Young I know, but he’s good to me, Shariece, and girl, he can fuck like a bull.”
“If nothing else, it’s good that he can screw,” Shariece said.
“Can you believe how successful he is at the ripe age of twenty-six?”
“Twenty-six? Damn.”
“Did you see his Spyder outside? It’s nice, right? He let me drive it the other day.”
“It looks like the lasagna turned out all right.”
“I only hope it tastes as good as it looks. I want to impress Taj, so I hope he likes it. He told me the other day, ‘I’ll eat anything you cook. I don’t care if it’s a mud pie.’ Isn’t he sweet?”
I took the flowers Shariece brought and set them in a crystal vase with water.
“Girl, these are so pretty, thank you.”
“I know how much you love lilacs.” I took a vase from under the sink, filled it with water, and arranged the long-stemmed flowers in the vase.
“They’re beautiful.”
“So what did you make for dessert?”
“Don’t kill me for this, but I made cherry cheesecake with bits of walnuts on top. It’s Emjay’s favorite. And yeah, I know it’s fattening, but I figure we can indulge for tonight and then hit the treadmill tomorrow.”
“I don’t think we’ll blow up to blimps after one piece of cheesecake.”
A bowl of Caesar salad sat off on the side of the counter next to the cheesecake.
“It looks like we’re ready to eat.”
I couldn’t imagine what Taj and Emjay were discussing. I didn’t hear yelling or anything breaking, so I figured everything was fine. I walked out to the dining room armed with lasagna while Shariece followed me out with the Caesar salad.
“Dinner is served.”
Taj and Emjay joined us in the dining room.
“This looks delicious, baby,” Taj said, giving me a kiss on the cheek.
“Thank you.” I smiled.
“Lee, you really outdid yourself.”
Emjay still had this look on his face that I had no problem slapping off if he didn’t straighten his ass up and fly right. He is too big to be acting like a baby. He sat down at the dinner table and didn’t utter a word. “Ya’ll make sure you save room for some cherry cheesecake.” I glanced over at Emjay when I announced that I had made his favorite, but still, there was no sign of cheer on his face. If he was going to continue to act stupid, I knew that before long, I was going to have to snatch his ass up. He’s my son, and I love him, but nobody’s going to disrespect me in my own house.