I had to admit I was feelin pretty good about myself. I popped my collar and proceeded to walk to my car when somebody grabbed my arm. “Daddy is that really you?” I turned and looked Erin dead in her face. I never would have recognized her because when I saw her last she was in diapers. Next to her was some dark skinned niggah in a wheelchair. “Yeah, it’s me,” I said beginning to perspire heavily. She shook her head as tears rolled down her face. “I can’t believe that you are still alive, I was told that you were dead.” “Erin there are some things you don’t understand and now is not the place.” “You think you gonna waltz your old ass u in my daddy’s funeral and then upset my wife, “said the dude in the wheelchair looking up at me. I instantly remembered he was Detroit’s only son. “Man look, this ain’t got shit to do with you so you best to mind ya handicapped busy playa.” I underestimated him because the next thing I knew he had a gun drawn on me. “Rayne and Rene screamed, but I remained calm. “Look, you don’t really wanna do that do you? I mean ya wife here would never forgive you for killing her daddy.” Erin looked up at me, “That is where you are wrong pops cause you been dead to me a long time ago. I am not Erin anymore, I am Veronica and I don’t have your last name I have his. I could care less about what he does to you. Do you have any idea how hard my life was cause of you?” I felt ashamed, but I didn’t know what I could say to comfort her now. I just wish that I had come back around for her, but when I almost got killed I thought it best to stay away from her. Everybody was standing around looking and talking and Rayne and Rene had disappeared somewhere. “Look, I did what I came to do and I just want to leave in peace.” He nodded his head with the gun still fixed on me, “Get the fuck outta here before you leave in pieces then!” I wobbled away on my cane feelin like a sucka as I made it across the street to my car. Rayne was in the driver’s seat and Rene got out to help me in.
“Paw-Paw I think this was all a bad idea,” Rayne said before pulling out into traffic. I didn’t want to go into it so I turned the radio on. When we got up to the light we could see that traffic was backed up and police cars had the street blocked off. “Damn, I gotta take a piss and look at this shit,” I muttered under my breath. We were flagged over to the side of the street and as we slowly passed I could make out a person being loaded onto a stretcher. Whoever it was had hit the concrete island in the middle of the street and the car looked like a bent up soda can. I felt bad for being so impatient. The car in front of us was stopped so I took a glance back at the wreckage. “Oh my God, it’s Mama Quilla,” Rayne screamed. I leaned over her best as I could and I could see that she was right. Quilla had blood all over here, and she was being loaded onto a second stretcher. I wanted to get out, but as soon as I reached for the door handle a horn was blaring behind us so I told Rayne to pull off. She hesitated, but then took off towards the highway. After dropping the girls off at home I started calling all the hospitals.
Blue: I couldn’t believe the clown shit that happened at this funeral. By the time we had left the gravesite everybody was in an uproar. To make it worse Ms. Quilla had been badly injured in a wreck so I gave Shade my keys so her and Mr. Jeremiah could go to the hospital. I skipped the repast at Erica’s house and me and Veronica went straight home. “I can’t believe he showed himself after all these years,” she said pacing as I fumbled to unlock the door. I just wanted to get a drink and forget this shit happened at all. We walked into the house and Veronica sat on the couch as I rolled over to the bar to make me a drink. I kept feeling my phone vibrate against my leg, but right now all I wanted to do was rest, but something was weighing on my mind. I filled my cup halfway and then rolled over to where Veronica sat on the couch, “I just got a real quick question for you.” She nodded for me to go on, “If Red is your daddy then who is your mother?” She smiled, “Quilla gave birth to me, but she ain’t ever been my mother if that’s what you’re askin. I took a long sip and shook my head all this shit was too confusing for me. I placed my hand on her knee, “I know you don’t wanna hear this, but I think you should go to the hospital and see about her.” She pushed my hand away, “For what? When did she ever see about me? She gave me away and kept Erica so that’s who needs to see about her. At least when I gave up my girls I had the sense to make sure they went to a good home.” I almost choked on my liquor and it burned my throat, “What did you just say?” She realized her mistake, but it was no taking it back now. “The twins with daddy…..those are my daughters. I felt like the air was knocked out of me.
I couldn’t get too upset because I had my own skeletons, “well, since we are clearing the air then I gotta tell you that Erica and I have a baby together named Shaday.” She stood up, “So we both got shit we been hiding for a long time huh? I mean I got kids you didn’t know about and you got a kid with my sister. Any other secrets you wanna reveal to me?” I sat my drink down and motioned for her to sit in my lap. She sat down carefully and I wrapped my arms around her as she cried into my neck. We sat like that for what seemed like hours. My legs were starting to feel numb so I nudged her to make her get up. She stood up and stretched, “I’m gonna go take a shower and then Imma fix dinner.” I nodded my approval and she walked away. When I heard the last click of her heels on the stairs I grabbed my phone. I have 12 missed calls and 23 text messages. I saw Shade had texted me asking me to come to the hospital and as I opened each text I could tell she was frantic. I was just about to call her when my phone rang in my hand, “Hi baby what’s goin on I was about to call you.” “Daddy you gotta come quick, they sayin granny ain’t gonna make it…….we all up here in the ICU visiting room.” I could hear the pain in her voice so with no regards to my recovery I told her I was on my way and slowly lifted myself out of the wheelchair. My first few steps were wobbly, but I managed to grab the keys off the coffee table and slowly made my way to the front door. I hopped into the car too fast and the pain shot through my chest, but I started up the car and peeled out of the driveway as fast as I could.
Veronica:
I heard the door slam and I called downstairs to Blue. When he didn’t answer I walked over to the bedroom and peeped out the window and sure enough the truck was gone. I slipped into a t-shirt and some jeans and made my way over to the closet to grab some shoes. I feel like I should have just stayed in Chicago and let Blue handle all this on his own I thought as I threw on a pair of sneakers from my suitcase. I zipped it back up and pushed it to the back of the closet where it hit something hard. I tried to push it back some more, but it wouldn’t go any further so I pulled it all the way out and opened the door for the light to shine on a safe. I knew I should have just left it alone, but I couldn’t resist touching it and I when I saw it was unlocked I opened it expecting to see money. What I found inside were letters. There had to be at least two hundred of them stuffed in there. What interested me the most was a manila folder in the corner. I pulled it out and I contained a bunch of pictures of a cute little chocolate little girl. She had a big curly fro. I immediately knew she was Shaday. Each picture had a date on it and I saw that he had followed her whole life in pictures which was more than I ever did for my girls. Not a day went by that I don’t regret how I treated them. I sucked in my breath and put the folder back. The letters were all from my mother and they expressed thanks for the financial contributions he had given them to help with Shade. I was flabbergasted at the money order receipts he had had kept over the years. I shut he safe back and ran down the stairs to the kitchen where I yanked a set of keys off of the rack and I raced to the garage and jumped into my truck since it was blocking in the smaller cars. I was worried about Blue driving his truck because he kept losing feeling in his legs but even more than that I knew I had to go right some wrongs. It was about to be a family reunion at that hospital.
