Apartment 311

Ch | 23

Noah Silas Anderson

Chapter Twenty-three: "Getting the band back together"

Kenya set the table with the help of Brooklyn.

She's all "what a nice home", "oh such a beautiful family," "I'm from Texas, y'all!"

Brooklyn is dangerous (for me) and bringing her to Terrance's was a mistake! If I was smart, I'd take her home and just watch her from a distance from now on. Except, well, I'm not smart.

"Dinner is ready," Kenya exclaimed, "Brooklyn, I hope you like tacos!"

"What she means is, she hopes you like spicy food," Terrance said, nudging Brooklyn as the three of them walked to the dinner table in the decorative dining room.

"I'm from Texas and my mom is Spanish, are you kidding me. Before all the diets, I put hot sauce on literally everything. I'm used to spicy food," I heard Brooklyn say back, getting the couple to laugh at her charm.

"Yo, Noah," Terrance called out. I stood tall and walked around Brooklyn's body to get to the chair beside her.

"So, where's Gael?" asked Kenya as she put the bottle of Seagrams on the table.

"I don't know," I spoke, "last time I saw him he was getting chewed out by some girl in the hallway."

"Brooklyn, what made you move here?" asked Kenya.

Brooklyn swallowed and put the other half of the beef taco on her plate. "I lived with my parents and things were getting a little... difficult. I just wanted a fresh start and I got this crazy job offer!"

"Wow, sounds lucky," Kenya beamed.

"I'll say," Terrance snarled, staring right at me. "Noah, what do you think? Wild coincidence, huh?"

I sunk in my seat and tightened my grip on the bottle. "I guess," I mumbled, not caring to be part of their conversation.

My eyes rolled and I got up to get another handful of tortilla chips.

As I dug in the bag, Terrance walked over and put his hand on my shoulder. "Let me holla at you in the other room real quick," he said in a whisper so the women wouldn't hear. I dropped the chips onto my plate and followed him to the guest bedroom across from the girls' room.

"What's up?"

"Noah, who is that girl?"

"What? That's Brooklyn, I thought we already went over this-"

"Why'd you bring her here?"

"Tacos?"

He smacked his thick lips and paced. "Noah, is that one of the girls Zane was talking about?"

Realizing he caught on, I didn't bother lying. "Yeah, man."

He sighed heavily and flailed his arms. "Noah," he scolded me, pinching the bridge of his wide nose, "you can't keep doing this irresponsible shit."

"What irresponsible shit?!"

"Shit that got you into this mess in the first place! I knew you and Gael one day wind up in some shit over some girls. Noah, you know I try to keep work as far away from my family and home as possible - you and Gael being the only exception. Now what's gonna happen if you get attached to this girl? She's gonna be around more and I don't want my daughters asking me one day what happened to her. Now I'm sorry, but I don't want to get involved with this mess y'all got with Boss."