"Well I definitely didn't expect this."Amari shrilled, stuffing fries in her mouth. "I'm very confused."She added.
"Uh yeah. Ditto."Aaliyah agreed.
"Mother..please explain."Amaru Jr. sounded off, sitting his drink down on the table.
"No. Let me. Sit down"Amaru sr. spoke.
Everyone did as asked and sat down because they had to hear this.
"Let me start by saying that Damita had nothing at all to do with this at all. So don't look at her sideways. She's was just as surprised as you all are now when I showed up at her office this morning."He explained. "The way things went..I wish It could've went differently, but I really had no control over the situation. If I could've stayed, I would've."
"So, why did you leave in the first place. What happened?" Amari asked,
still eating.
"I wanted to franchise my second store. I could never be there, so I took this trip to Orlando and held an open house for the space. These Italian niggas showed up and offered me a lot of money. So I agreed, but I told them that I had to let my lawyer look over the paperwork first."He explained. "I brought the paperwork home and let Damita look over it because she was my lawyer. They agreed to meet us out here because she was pregnant obviously and I didn't want her traveling a lot. We met up with them at this fancy as restaurant and I let her look over everything."He added.
"When I was looking over the paperwork I saw all kind of loophole clauses. They were trying to confuse him because I'm sure they didn't think he knew what they meant and I wasn't going to let them take my baby's money."Damita joined in.
"So after the meeting, they let me know that they were upset by me choosing not to close the deal. I told him that I was just going to close the offer for the time being and focus on the arrival of my children. I guess he didn't like that I had changed my mind. So after that he left it alone for a little bit then he started calling me out the blue. Telling me he wanted to seal the deal again and I told him no."He continued. "After that, he started tripping. Following me, telling me he was going to kill all of y'all if I didn't do what he said. I was ignoring that nigga, I ain't no Bitch. It was when he sent me this picture....Damita and Amari were at the store and he said "If you love them and you want them to make it out of this, you'll do what I say."He explained in a fake Italian accent. All three of their children were so intrigued. They are all looking up at him so interested, eating their chic-fil-a like popcorn.
"He left his number and I called him. I told him to take me instead. The babies need a mother more than a father. I just asked that he give me enough time to see the twins birth and spend a little time with them. So Christmas night he called me while I was driving down the street, I was actually on my way back home because I had told Damita that I was coming right back and I was. When he called all he said was "it's time" and the next thing I knew there was this black van riding my tail extra hard. At that point I was like fuck this shit. I ain't want to go through with it anymore so I sped up. I was gonna get y'all and your momma and we were gonna leave. Another car turned out in front of me and blocked me in the middle of the street. They pulled me out of the car and put me in the back of the van then put a body in the car. I didn't even see it. We sat there and they made me watch the car speed down the street and flip over several times."He explained with a sigh.
"What happened after that?" Amaru asked with big eyes.
"Ima get there son, give me a second."Amaru sr. Chuckled.
"When I was in the van, I was plotting on how I was going to back to my family. I was thinking hard. We were driving for a long time, I had no idea where we going and I tried to look outside to see if I recognized anything but I didn't. I had no idea where I was. I was sure that they were going to kill me soon as we got there, but they didn't. I was surprised."
"So what did they do?"Amari asked.
"They took me to this little underground room. They tried to get me to sign some papers, but I wouldn't do it. He had some dudes beat me up. I fought back, but it was a lot of them so I eventually gave up. They did that every day for what seemed like years. After a while they stopped. I couldn't move for a long time. I guess they thought I was dead down there because they stopped coming. After a few weeks this woman started to come down. She helped me get better. She started bringing me food and water. She would sneak me in the house and let me take showers when everyone else was gone. Then she talked about how what they were doing to me was wrong."He explained.
"I didn't even know this much time passed by. So finally, I started talking to her. Telling her how much I missed you all and one day she came down with some clothes. She told me that she found you and that she'd bring me to you. I was so nervous. I didn't know if you had moved on or what but I came. She knew everything about you, I don't know how but I was grateful that she brought me back to you guys ...and now I'm here."He ended with a shrug.
"I told him that first night that if they were going to kill me, I just wanted to hear your voice."he smiled and grabbed Damita's hand.
"Awwww."Amari cooed and wiped away her fake tears. "You guys are too cute. I wanna be like you guys one day."She laughed.
"I think that we should have a family day . You know so we can all catch up."Amari added.
"That's a great idea. The twins don't have practice tomorrow either so that would be great."Damita smiled.
"I'm so happy we can have family time now."Aaliyah smiled. She always dreamed about the day that her mother and sister would get along. She never really imagined her father in the equation but it was something she'd have to get to used to, especially with the way she was introduced to him.
