Shelton Family Saga

Chapter 27

Secrets

June 03, 1986  - 10:32 p.m.
Helmsville, WY

With Hollywood out of prison and back in Helmsville, won't Brisha be excited to see the love of her life? Too bad no one knew he was coming home except his best friend. Harvey "Hollywood" Greene had made parole after serving eleven years of his fifteen year sentence, and where else would Hoochie and Hollywood be after all these years except under the Ol' Crape Myrtle tree outside Miss Ruby Mae's candy shop. Well, the candy shop had long been torn down, but the Ol' Crape Myrtle remained. Now, the two best friends blood brothers were sitting in Hoochie's brand new Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham as Bobby Womack's song, Secrets, softly flowed through the speakers in the background of their conversation.

"Hey Hollywood, you home for good this time brother?"

"Hoochie, I have no choice but to get my life right. It wasn't fair for me to leave Brisha with our baby on the way....." He paused before continuing, "but anyway how's your daughter doing?"

"Awe shit Hollywood, she's smart as a whip. Got that number sense. She know how to run them numbers."

"Like her daddy use to run numbers for Cong back in the day," Hollywood asked?

"Awe hell naw. It's more like how her daddy use to do his best friends Math homework for him after his momma died," Hoochie said.

"Man Hoochie, I sure appreciate you taking my baby out that children's home and keeping her with you."

"Ain't nothing to that Hollywood. But we cant ever let Sharosta find out."

"Shit! Or Brisha. Man, them finding out that type of thing would bury our asses."

"Hollywood, long as my daughter stays my daughter, you'll always stay the Golden Boy in your momma's eyes."

"Awe man Hoochie the way you took the rap for me all these years letting my momma and everybody believe you were the bad one and I was the Angel....that you robbed the bank when I really did it, letting my momma believe that you were hiding that million dollars from the robbery when you really had no idea where it was stashed, cause I had it hidden all along down at Kingdom Hall, but you never blew my cover.....man, Hoochie. All I can say is, even with all the shit we been through, it was better to..."

Hoochie chimed in, "git the paper sooner than later" and Hollywood finished with "cause this street life gonna remain our secret for life!"

Hoochie and Hollywood exchanged dap on those words before Hollywood got out of the car. He took pride in slamming the door of Hoochie's new Cadillac. After all, he HAD paid for it! As he walked away into the pitch black of the night, Hoochie leaned his seat back and sat alone with his thoughts. He was truly proud of the way he had managed to keep his natural born daughter with him all these years. Too bad Hollywood never figured it out. He'd spent so much time locked up, he never questioned the child's age. He lost track of time a long time ago, so he was never the wiser that Sharosta wasn't his and Brisha's kid. Their baby was actually being raised by Juntas and his wife Aniya, who only had one kid and always wanted another, but it was too risky with Aniya's blood condition. She was a type 1 diabetic and was advised against bearing more children, which is why they chose to take in her sister Brisha's kid with Hollywood.

He was also satisfied that Averie would never know Sharosta was truly their child. The night she gave birth from her only pregnancy by him back in January 1973, she along with everyone else, believed her only child had been stillborn. It still seemed funny to him how no one questioned how he went into the delivery room with the doctor and when the drunk ass doctor came out to the waiting area to tell everyone the news, Hoochie kept walking straight out the front entrance of the hospital, while everyone else was emotionally riled up and bombarding the doctor with loads of questions. When Hoochie walked out, it was with the second baby wrapped in a blanket laying against his chest underneath his long trench coat on that frosty January day. Averie's entire family had joked throughout her pregnancy that she was probably having twins due to how rapidly the size of her belly continued to grow with every passing month, as well as her being a twin herself. Her doctor wasn't the most ethical physician in his chosen field as he never revealed the information that she was indeed pregnant with twins. Hoochie never told Averie the truth, cause he didn't want her trying to use the child to manipulate him, so in order to get a birth certificate for their baby with his name on it, he lied to Noochie about it being his baby with Big Star's cousin. She had been the girl he was seeing for the longest time that his younger sisters knew well and he didn't want Averie to know about, but he never had any kids with her. He stayed gone for six months which was just long enough for Brisha to have her and Alex's baby that they believed was the baby he brought back upon his return since it was born March 30, 1973 and that was the date he had Noochie put on Sharosta's birth certificate. That's actually how Averie figured out him and Noochie had done something to try and pass the baby off as hers that was born in January, when she saw the date on the birth certificate; however, only him and Juntas knew the real truth, that he'd sent Brisha and Alex's baby with Juntas to Kansas to be adopted by Hattie Lee. Hattie Lee was the Callie siblings first cousin who worked for Child Protective Services and never had any children of her own. So while Hoochie and Averie were raising their own daughter, Brisha thought Sharosta was her and Alex's kid.

Hoochie had heard how Greasy Steve's grandson had linked Madam Lottie's disappearance to the arson of his place back in 1978. He thought it was bullshit. Just another attempt by old ass Greasy Steve to try and get back at him for not being able to pin the bank robbery on him. Nevertheless, his heart ached for Big Star. That was his boy. He never forgot how Anthony had reached out to him when his momma had died when he was just fourteen. It had been so devastating. He knew the feeling very well, so he knew how bad Anthony must be feeling, especially since he'd always been a momma's boy. Anyway, good luck to Greasy Steve trying to take down his niece, he smirked to himself. She was smart like her momma, who was Hoochie's big sister, and had built her an empire so massive, it would take more than an accusation and some circumstantial evidence from an ol' jelly donut eating sheriff to make it come tumbling down. Hoochie must've drifted off asleep with his thoughts, cause by the time he opened his eyes he heard the roosters crowing. He started up his Fleetwood Brougham and proceeded to back his car from under the tree. As he did, Bobby Womack's voice slowly became audible as it echoed through the speakers with the song, Daylight.