Love On The Court

𝕊𝕚𝕩𝕥𝕪-𝕊𝕚𝕩 (𝔼𝕡𝕚𝕝𝕠𝕘𝕦𝕖)

📆: August 17th, 2023
📍: Toni's apartment, Upper East Side, Manhattan, NY

"Get up, Toni. I'm not coming in here again!" Mikayla whispers/yells into her sister's bedroom while cradling her sleeping son in her arms.

"F...five more minutes, Kayla."

"No. You said five minutes fifteen minutes ago. You're going to be late for your AA meeting." with a huff, Toni slowly raises from the mess of blankets on her bed and rubs her tired eyes until they aren't blurry anymore.

"Are you not hot with all those blankets?" her sister inquires as she sets Theo into his aunt's unsuspecting arms. The brunette stares at her sister questioningly before looking down at her nephew and smiling.

"Withdrawals are kicking my ass," she mumbles, her sister opening the blinds causing light to flood into the humid room. "Hi, Theo...look at you with your little nose." her voice accelerates to a high pitch octave as she speaks.

Mikayla shakes her head while a soft laugh falls past her lips. "Just get ready so I can drop you off. Theo has an appointment in 2 hours so I have to meet Bryce at the hospital because he went to get Hea early for her appointment as well."

"Yeah, yeah. Take your son so I can do that." Toni counters, smirking. It looks a bit weird due to her face being swollen with sleep but the latter doesn't say anything as she gently adjusts Theo in her arms.

"Hurry up, Anty. I'm not kidding."

"Okay, mom! I heard you the first time!" the brown skin beauty chirps sarcastically. The older brunette rolls her eyes as she exits her sister's room, leaving her to get dressed.

Toni dreads Tuesdays. Because on Tuesdays, she has her AA meetings. For the past week or two, she's been attending these meetings and it hasn't been impacting her the way her family wants it to.

Well, it's keeping her from drinking, yes, but hearing people tell stories about their problems isn't exactly her ideal plan on Tuesdays.

Nonetheless, the aforementioned athlete dresses in regular sweatpants and a T-shirt before putting on her crocs and grabbing her fully charged phone off of her bedside table.

She has yet to check it. But, she makes a mental note to do so later when she hears Mikayla demanding her to hurry up once again.

"You understand how important these meetings are right, T?" the woman mumbles as she starts the car, checking on Theo in the rearview mirror.

"Yeah." her little sister hums. "Getting better, blah, blah, blah...talking about my problem, blah, blah, blah. I'm only going to these because you guys want me to. I may as well live for you guys since I hate myself enough to not live for myself."

Mikayla frowns at that and glances at Toni briefly. "Toni..."

"What? It's true." the brunette chuckles to keep the lump in her throat from forming. "You guys need me here. Want me here. And I don't want to put you guys through anything seeing as you are going through enough."

"So that doesn't mean you have to live for us. You can live for yourself."

"Not when I'm too busy hating myself, no." the athlete swallows thickly. "I wish I could think fondly of myself, Kayla. I really do. But...this is what's happening. I'm attending therapy for something I hate most about myself and I'm in an AA group for drinking myself half to death. There is no way I can bounce back from that."

The older tan beauty listens to Toni's words with a sinking sensation in her chest.  "I never knew you felt that way."

"Mmm, yeah, no one does. You're my family, yeah, but all you ever do is worry about me. When you have better things to worry about."