Where Would I Be Without My Baby?

Scene 4: Ex-Factor 💔

As she took her next step, Gaia pivoted backward and slid onto the floor between the man's legs. As he reached for her, the gun slipped onto the floor and she grabbed it. She sprinted for the nearest door because her life depended on it only to run face first into somebody.

She attempted to stumble backward but the person caught her by her elbows. Gaia struggled to get away fiercely but was stopped by a statement and voice she hadn't heard in years.

"What the hell? Gaia Alena Carter?!"

"Daddy ?"

                                                                                          *********

Gaia never thought she'd be happy to say those words she hadn't uttered in years. He had left her and her mother like they meant nothing to him. As if they were throws and he had another family tucked away that would replace them instantly.

And that's just about what happened.. He didn't move on immediately it waited three months  and then the streets told her that she was replaced. Her father who swore to love her forever had a new princess and she was star of his eye. The expensive private school Gaia was snatched out of was now hers. The family who told her she would never be replaced was now hers.

Nothing hurt more than watching your mother grieve the love of her life and grieving your first love at the same time. No other man has ever gotten close enough to her to hurt her but it never mattered because her "daddy" broke her heart first.

My father broke my heart before another could ever love me..

A free tear broke the defense of closed eyes, sliding those her cinnamon brown cheeks faster than she catch it. Emotionally Gaia was neither here or there. She couldn't tell anxiety from fear, grief from anger or sorrow from doubt.

Her mind was in shambles but that wasn't the biggest problem for a girl like her. It was her troubled heart that had played the pivotal part in weighing her down like anchor to ship.

Stuck..

That's how Gaia felt and the man who helped create her was the cause of it.

"Lena" he called as if she was still a ten year old kid and he hadn't picked a new wife and kid up to erase her and her mother's memory for the house her mother designed from the ground up. There had always been the old wives tell of niggas getting bread with the woman loved him fiercely but the second he came up with some real money, he left.

Niggas aint shit didn't even begin to fit Gianni Andres Carter.

"Lena, baby girl" he started again but Gaia continued to ignore him. She chose to focus on the office she sat in. Not much had changed,He was still creature of habit. The same heavy oak desk she used to do her homework on while he worked on business deals and cocaine runs was the center piece of the room. The bookcase that went from wall behind him was still there, she'd organized it herself. She was seven and while the bookcase went from floor to high ceiling she was the one calling the shots as her father and Uncle Blu listened to the instructions of the missing front tooth kid like she was God. That same day, Gaia learned the power of being charge and how to control the energy of the room. He had taught her and Uncle Blu had took to get ice cream after.

As she continued to ignore her father's pleading eyes and calls, Gaia rose to her feet and her feet took her to the book shelf were she'd tucked her favorite book at the time right beside his. It was comical to have the Art of War and Bear in The Big Blue House: Let's Find Treasure. As if nothing had changed the books lie side by side.

Gaia laughed, full on and completely impulsively.

"Your favorite book and mine; still there hanging on." for the first time since he took her from the warehouse and to her childhood home Gaia looked at him. Time had done the old man well, his skin was still smooth. His eyes still vibrant and mirroring hers. Freckles still lingering along the bridge of his nose and apples of his cheeks just like her only his was darker.