July 2013

I feel light kisses being planted on my cheek.

My waist is being tightly held against someone's torso. There's a sound of faint sniffles too.

As much as I'd like to wish it were Jahseh; the scent, the body heat, and the rubbing of my scalp in just the right way is how I know it's Momma.

"Good morning, my baby," she says giving me another kiss on the cheeks.

"Good morning."

"I missed you," she says lowly.

"I missed you too, Momma."

"We're gonna have a girls' day today, how does that sound?"

"Like torcher." I joke.

"Alright, be ready in twenty." She gives me one final kiss and climbs out of my bed.

She must have just flown in. I'm glad it was today of all days.

Yesterday, Zae came over and helped me clean up my house because it looked horrible—his words, not mine.

He took all of my Swishers and weed home with him, making me take a break for a week.

I close my eyes and try to get in as much extra sleep as I can get.

𓆩♡𓆪

"Is it fun wiping patients' asses?" I ask.

My mom and I are sitting inside a coffee shop, waiting on our breakfast to arrive.

"Butts," she corrects. "And no, I wouldn't say it is. But then I remember, these are people who can't help themselves. I would hope you'd do the same for me."

I instantly drop my eyes to the iced coffee in front of me.

"Wow," she laughs.

I laugh too.

"Enough about me though, how have you been? How was school?"

I don't know if I want to tell her the truth and risk ruining our day, or lie and have her find out another way. It would be kind of embarrassing to tell her I stopped going after the first day.

I put the straw to my lips, "It was cool."

"Cool? Give me more details! I know you must have made a few new friends! What about those two girls you used to be friends with? You know, their names were..." She trails off expecting me to finish.

"Can't remember," I muttered not wanting to get into the detail of what happened with them.

"Okay... Well, any boyfriends or crushes?"

I start to choke on my coffee.

"Oh, so there is! Tell me about him!"

Just to my luck, our waitress comes out with our meals. "French toast with a side sunny side up eggs and bacon?"

"Right here," Momma says raising her hand lightly.

The waitress places her food down in front of her and mine in front of me. We thank her as she walks off.

"How would you feel about working at a place like this, Chari?"

I look around. It's not a busy place, it seems pretty calm. I also happen to love the smell of coffee, so a coffee shop wouldn't be too bad. "It might be an option, but knowing me, I'd probably fall and spill hot coffee all over the customer."

"Right."

We laugh and start eating.

I tell her all about the things I did while I was on my own, being mindful to leave out a lot of details, and some things I did while I was out of state.

We finish up our meals, split the check, and walk out of the shop. "Where are we going next?" I ask.

"I wanted to get my nails done, but I know how you are when it comes to getting your feet done."

She's referring to the time she took me to get a pedicure a while back and kicked the lady in the face from laughing too hard. "That was purely an accident." I protest. "I'm very ticklish on my feet, but I swear, I'm doing better now."

"We'll see."

𓆩♡𓆪

I laugh at the top of my lungs from the feeling of metal being scraped against my feet.

"Charisma!" Momma says while laughing at my laughter. "You swore!"

"I'm a liar." I wheeze out.

It's not even funny, I hate being tickled. I'm laughing against my will. I know these ladies up here are probably talking so much shit about me in their language.

I put my hand over my face once I realize Momma's recording my hysterical laugh session. "Your father would've loved this," I hear her mutter.

"What?" I chuckle wiping a few tears.

She just shakes her head and gives me a sad smile. "You plan on getting any designs?" She asks changing the subject.

𓆩♡𓆪

Momma and I are currently sitting on the couch, watching the new spider-man movie from my laptop.

"How come he doesn't look the same as the guy from the last movie?"

I sigh and pause. I've explained this to her at least three times by now. "The first few movies were played by a different actor. This is Andrew Garfield. There's even a whole new M.J. named Gwen."

I press playback on the movie and zone out.

I wonder what it would be like to be Gwen. A smart-ass blonde who has the heart of Peter Parker wrapped around her little finger.

Her father's a cop and her boyfriend is a superhero? This bitch has it made.

Any small inconvenience and both of them would come running in a heartbeat.

"Charisma?" My mom says snapping me from my thoughts.

"Yeah?"

"I have something to tell you. And I don't want you to take it too hard, okay?"

"Sure," I pause the movie again. "What's wrong?"

"Your father— Chaiyn, he," I turn around and give her my full attention. Her eyes are filled to the brim with tears, "Yesterday, I received a call informing me that your father passed away from unidentifiable circumstances."

"He what?"

"Doctors claim to not know exactly what happened with him, his roommate on base claims that he fell asleep and didn't wake up."

I look at Momma's face hard, trying to find a sense of humor in her words hidden somewhere on her face. She holds eye contact with me until her lip starts quivering and she pulls me into a hug.

The sound of her sobs slowly tunes out into background noise as I try to process the news I just received.

My dad's the strongest man I know. There's no way he'd just go in his sleep.

But I won't cry, right now, comforting Momma is the only thing I'm focused on. I know she needs it a lot more than I do.