Where Would I Be Without My Baby?

Scene 2: Dear Momma 🙏🏾

You've reached a new low.. even for you
Hesitant steps, scattered thoughts and last but not least a troubled spirit carried her legs downtown. Years had passed since Gaia even thought to walk pass Sheer Perfections a place she once frequented at least once a week growing up. She'd loved the salon, the talk, the one place black women got to be free among their own kind with a need to ever alter their selves for presence sake. Black women spent their whole lives having a different face for different situations just to make it but the salon was sacred.

That was then and this was now where Gaia knew better. She saw the place she once idealized for what it really was now, just another place for someone to get a chance to judge someone else. One thing Gaia tired her hardest not to be was judgmental, she let that in the Almighty's hands as much as possible.

Sheer Perfections had its purposes alright and Gaia needed them to fulfill them to their highest potential.

"Look what the cat done drug in?"

"Chile it's gone rain today, now you know Lil Gee don't come up in here"

"She lost or something?"

A series of phrases rang out along with a bunch of eyes Gaia all fell on the moment the door chimed and she walked inside. She wasn't supposed to be here and the whole hood knew. Yet like the queen she knew she was, she'd never let them her sweat. The melanin in her skin, the stride in her step and even the slight bow in her legs came from the descents of Nefertiti and Cleopatra, the richest of rich and more legendary than any king could ever. Nobody in here would ever have the chance to say they saw her crown slip even if they had been waiting for it to fall patiently.

They been waiting on my downfall since birth.. every breath in my body would be gone before i let my guard down.

"Gee, suh you feeling okay?" the only friendly face Gaia had rocked with since diapers appeared. Mesha was the epitome of ghetto fabulous and she knew it without a doubt. Crazy how such different personalities could bond together longer than most marriages. Gaia was sand and Mesha was the waves yet you to the beach for the experience together and never apart.

Gaia cracked a smile seeing her girl, it had been a while since she seen her. She had been isolating herself, hospital and back, hospital and back; nonstop but if anyone understood it was Mesha.

"Where's Sonya?" Gaia asked and looked around the shop. A few things had changed appearance wise however she knew some things never would. People were creatures of habit. "She still stay in the back , doing the inventory that never seems to be done so she never do no real work"

Mesha frowned, pleading with Gaia with her eyes and laid the back of her hand against her forehead. "nah you really bugging like shit. you sick or what girl?" Gaia stepped away from Mesha's touch and looked her in the face.

"No Messina, I literally just had the sense knocked back into me. I'm perfectly fine. "

"Shit real name, we pissed for real, huh?"Mesha folded her hands across her chest in defeat. It was nothing that cold be done at the moment. Mesha might have been the one people looked at to pop off first, her temper wasn't nearly as bad as Gaia. All the incense in the world couldn't calm Gaia when she got riled up. It was literally back her up, shut up or get run over with her best friend.

"Do we have a problem here?" another stylist approached them slowly.

"Tell Sonya, her god daughters here. it would be nice if she greeted me after all these years." Gaia stated with her hand on her hip and the conviction that her own godmother taught her.

"Send her up." A voice echoed throughout the salon from overhead. The woman who'd help raise her leaned against the banister of the second floor watching Gaia with a raised eyebrow. She look not a day older than thirty, the same as she'd always looked. Beautiful mocha colored smooth skin that people prayed for, a beauty that sat right above the corner of her lip, full lips and sapphires for eyes that drooled over.