Roommates

chapter 24

I took another hamburger from my dad's grilling plate and sat it on the empty bun, preparing burgers for Lee, Nas, and I.

My dad decided he wanted to use the grill and my mom decided she wanted to use the pool, so we're having a Patterson pool day.  I bought a few Zaful two-pieces weeks ago and I finally get to use them.

"You just got a package, bear." Elaine waddled outside with her tinted shades on and a melting popsicle.

I nodded and finished topping the last burger.

"Monk, can you come here for a second?" Nas called me from the opposite side of the pool, I walked to the edge of the pool, refusing to walk all the way around.

As I opened my mouth to respond to Nas, I felt my whole body being lifted and dunked into the cold water.  I swam to the surface and let out an irked breath. Lee's head popped out of the water, he and Nas began to laugh obnoxiously.

"Lee Malakai Beckett!  If I wanted to go for a swim I would've got in myself, you better be glad my hair is covered!"

"Oh, bug, you should have seen that coming.  Look at that, Lani." My mom sat on her favorite pool chair and flipped the view to her back camera to let Healani see all of it.

"Did you get it, Nas?" Nassem replayed the video of Lee dunking me and they laughed even more, dapping each other.

"Don't start bullying me with my brother, Lee!" I snatched my towel from the patio table and angrily dried myself off.

Lee trailed behind me in the hair store as I studied all of the wigs.  Every time I come to Houston, I buy a new wig from my favorite shop, they have the best selection to choose from.

Lee never complains when I take him to the beauty store, he's actually helpful and always carries the shopping basket for me.  I looked up at him with a smile and took the basket from him.

"You can choose this one." He raised his eyebrows at me and scratched his neck.

"How am I supposed to pick something out of all this?  What should I even pick?"

"It's not hard, here," I held his hand and led him to a wall filled with human-hair wigs, "Pick something from this wall."

Lee looked at my face, then the wall.

"I can pick anything?"

I nodded and watched Lee call the attendant to pick it out.  He chose a pink, 12-inch lace wig, the light color is similar to the one I had when we first met.  I smiled and ran my fingers through the straight hair.

"Good job, baby.  I love it, we'll take it." 

I stood in front of the large mirror, in my old personal bathroom, and struggled to braid my thick hair down.  I threw my arms forward with a huff and I shook my aching hands.

"Hey, baby-" Lee looked at me and laughed, I rolled my eyes and sighed.

"Come on, let me braid it." I raised my eyebrows at Lee, who was grabbing all of the products he'd need to braid my hair.

"You can braid?"

"Hell yeah." Lee sat me down and easily finished the braid I was working on, then perfectly started a new one.  He finished it quickly and got two more down, he's not even heavy-handed.

I admired his work through my front camera and smiled.

"Where did you learn how to braid like this?"