Brother's Keeper✔️

32. The Man Jordan

Jordan POV

He packed all the clothes he owned just for the four-day weekend back in St. Louis. Manny said he could wash all his clothes free while they were there. Why not? Saved him a couple of dollars washing them in the dorm's laundry room. Manny did the same, although he was a neat freak and had no problems washing his clothes on a regular.

They spent all of Thursday with Manny's family. He got to call his mother, but he was not too eager to go visit. Especially if he had to show where he lived to Manny. He was not embarrassed, more ashamed. It was not his responsibility to have him in better living conditions, he was a kid. He knew his mother did the best she could, but living in poverty was no joke.

When he made enough money, he was getting his mom and siblings out of the hood.

Friday they were able to go visit the girls. He saw that they did not have much either, but at least they lived in a house with no bugs or falling apart. Marketta and Laila's parents were nice, and that's another thing. They had both of them. He never even knew his father, and his two sisters and two brothers' father was around whenever he wanted to be, barely any time at all.

As the oldest, he was always the man of the house. He needed to visit them before he left.

Saturday morning he told Manny to drop him off and pick him up later that day.

"Are you sure? I can hang out with you at your place if you want."

Manny drove him to his apartment, north city, Labadie, and Union. Duck down when you drive by and heard gunshots. Every other house was an empty lot with broken glass, beer bottles, and bullet casings. Not that Riverview wasn't about that life either, but it had nothing on the city and his block.

"Naw we've been tied at the hip the last few days, be free, do something on your own. But hey...don't get into any more trouble and you know what I mean."

Manny chuckled at him, but he wasn't slick. He decided it was no longer his business whatever he did.

"Yeah, just for the record, staring at naked pictures of that girl on your phone is cheating too. I thought you were in love with Laila?"

"I am."

"Muh'fucka love doesn't work like that! If you love her, then there is no one else, period."

Manny side-eyed him as he drove. "What do you know? You've been in love? You're in love with Marketta?"

"I mean..." He thought about it for a second. He was still keeping things casual with her and liked the pace of things. Still getting to know each other. After all, it had only been three months of knowing her. "I ain't saying it's love or what, but I like her. She cool as hell."

"Well, I know I love Laila. She's the only one for me."

Jordan laughed. Was he serious? "So you must think being a player is cool. What will happen if Laila finds out?"

"You're not telling her!"

"I didn't say I would...but loose lips sink ships, and that girl lives on Laila and Marketta's floor. She could run her mouth,"

"She won't."

"Listen, I am not telling because then Marketta probably would think I'm doing the same shit you do. You know, birds of a feather."

"Then you should."

"Fuck that!" What was wrong with his boy, the preacher's kid, or deacon's kid, whatever he was, This was not the same Manny he met that first day in their room. He could barely talk to a girl, not that he had a girlfriend and was putting his dick in other chick's mouths. If that was all he was doing.

He could cheat, it was so easy. But also, he could just leave Marketta if he was looking elsewhere. He did not understand.

Manny dropped him off and he said he would let him know when he was ready to get picked up. His mother, who was waiting for him at the door, grabbed him in a hug.

"Yo ma, you act as if I was gone for years."

She kissed all over his cheek. "Just happy to see my son doing good and coming to visit me. Even though you didn't come by on Thanksgiving."

"Ma, you said it was okay."

His mother looked good. She worked hard, and she looked older than her forty years. Had him when she was nineteen and worked hard ever since. She was shorter than him, carried a lot of weight on her, was missing a front tooth because she fell and cracked it many years ago, and didn't have insurance to cover it getting fixed.

But she made sure he was always fed and clothed and had a roof over his head. They were homeless once, for nearly a year. Sleeping on others' couches, or crammed in a small bedroom on the floor, sleeping at the library, visiting homeless shelters some nights, and eating from a food pantry to not starve to death.

Once section eight came through his mother was able to get a piece of a roof over their heads. 

"Jordan!" Chastity was his oldest sister at fourteen. She hopped on him, wrapping her arms around him in a hug.

"Come on Chaz, you're getting too big for me to pick you up."

"Never!" she said. "I missed you. I want to go to college with you. Can I come to visit?"

Then his brother Kain came in, he was twelve. "Zup bro, bring me something?"

"Why would I do that?" He pried Chastity off him. "Maybe y'all can visit me next semester or something. I'll try and figure that out."

He needed money, that's how. They deserved to come to visit and see something other than just the hood. All his sisters and brothers were pretty smart, with better grades than he made, so college should be an option for them as well. Hopefully, he would be financially stable to help them when the time came.

His other brother and sister, Khloe who was ten and Rico was nine, heard all the ruckus and had to come and talk his ear off. He spent the next few hours listening to them talk about what they had been up to with school and their friends.

"Bro, I follow your Tik Tok videos, pretty cool, but you should have blown up by now," Chastity said to him, grabbing his phone. "I have almost as many followers as you and all I do is other people dance challenges."

"You don't even have a phone!"

"I use the tablet you bought for us to share, duh!" Chastity did a few things and then brought up her page. He leaned in to look at it. She was right! The girl had a massive following doing dances.

"How do you do that!"

"The dance challenges?"

"Followers! You're fourteen! You don't even have a phone tied to your hip like me. This is to be a new account, right? I've had mine over  a year."

"I thought you were smart Jordy, college and all." She laughed at him. "It's all about post times and interacting with other content creators. Look let me show you."

When he blew up he was buying his sister her open phone. She knew what she was doing. In a matter of a few hours, he gained nearly a thousand new followers on all his platforms and he was that much closer to becoming a paid social media influencer. She was a whiz kid.

He was so glad he came home to his family, it gave him the push to handle his business. His family deserved everything.

A/N: I cried a little writing this chapter because I put a little of me in it. My family's struggles growing up were real. But many outside of my family didn't know what was going on with me, not even my sorority sisters.