Lipstick 💄 Talk

The Funeral

Smooth R&B played in the background as DeAngelo sat in his recliner sipping on Jameson, with a hint of lime remembering the times he and Dan'a would go dancing. They had many wonderful nights. He could remember the first day he saw her in high school like the back of his hand. Her beautiful smile, petite figure, and how she always smelled like Rosewater. Despite the last conversation they had he knew she loved him. They had been through twenty-four years of marriage but they had been in love since they were sixteen years old. Life without Dan'a would be hard, and he needed to be strong for his children. It was two days before the funeral and DeAngelo couldn't shake the fact that his life would never be the same. He got up from his chair staggering towards the speaker. As he blasted her favorite slow ballot tears streamed down his cheeks.

"God, Are you punishing me? What did I do to deserve this?" cried out DeAngelo

He knew he would never know the reason behind so much loss, but the liquor and the memories were helping cope with the pain. It felt like his heart had literally been ripped from his chest. To know that you were a few feet away from where your wife's life was taken away played over and over in his mind. The words that left her mouth haunted him and he would never forget them. Dan'a wasn't an angel by far but she was loving, caring, feisty, eccentric and she captured any room she walked in. De Angelo sat back in his chair, drinking, and drinking until he drifted off to sleep.

3:00 am

"Creek, Creek, whoosh,"

The sound of the trees hitting Navina's window in her studio woke her up in a panic. She had been having nightmares ever since that night. Sleep wasn't the same anymore, all she did was dream of her mother and her dying. Navina grabbed her robe and headed towards the main house. She needed food. As she hit the door, she could hear the music blasting. Her dad hadn't been the same, she could tell this was tearing his world apart. As soon as she bent the corner of the family room, she could see her dad sleep in his chair with an empty bottle of Jameson in his hand. Navina turned the music off, took the empty bottle, and covered him up. It's funny how the roles reverse when you became an adult. You take care of your parents. She cleaned his mess and went to the kitchen to make a sandwich. Five minutes later DeAngelo was walking in.

"Baby doll, what are you doing up so late? ,"

"I couldn't sleep and I needed grilled peanut butter and jelly. Just how mom used to make them for me."

"Well, make your old drunk father one too," said DeAngelo as he laughed.

"I got you,! Two grilled Peanut Butter and Strawberry jelly sandwiches, coming up! ,"

Navina and DeAngelo had always been very close. She was their miracle baby. Dan'a was told after complications with Amina that she might not carry another child full term. When she found out she was pregnant with Navina, she prayed that everything would be fine, then she came early but she was a fighter. Dan'a always called Navina her fighter child.

"Daddy, how are you feeling?" said Navina as she sat down at the table.

"I'm okay, I've seen better days but I'll be fine."

Navina knew that was a lie, she was good at reading people, and her father was heartbroken. She was heartbroken herself, seeing her mother and Gary in that parking lot and their relationship hadn't been the same since that day.