by Nako
Paris was what he needed to heal and to regain his peace. He was ready to be happy and she was the chosen one to complete his puzzle.
η
He was back and the Who’s Who wanted him at everything. Porter was one person and he told his team, “I need for my associates to feel as if even though I am not present, I still am in a sense. So, what does that mean? Step your shit up. Tailored suits, lingering fragrances, beautiful smiles and charming personality. The word for today is schmooze. We are in the business of making people happy. Happiness gets the deals people,” he told his new group of ambitious comrades.
Slowly but surely, he had weaved out the bad apples and conducted a series of interviews to bring in the right people. Dedicated, determined, and dependable was what he always looked for in new hires. He needed people that didn’t believe in only doing what was required of them.
Porter passed out a few papers that were needed for today’s meeting.
“Every label is looking for the next Cardi B, every model agency wants the next Tyra, these product companies are looking for plus-size goddesses because they are proven to get an item sold faster. And what is our job?” he asked no one in particular.
“We find the hidden talent.”
“No.” Wrong answer lil girl.
“They discover the talent, we polish it.”
Porter returned to the front of the room and wrote the word beauty down. “Everyone needs to study this word and tomorrow be able to tell me what it means to them. Your job depends on it.”
He walked out of the room and Juice was behind him, along with his new sexy ass assistant. His girlfriend was already complaining about his schedule and how they didn’t spend time together anymore. He told her that he was grinding right now, and she was going to either stay down or keep it moving. Nothing or no one was getting in the way of his career. He had waited too long on this moment. Porter meant every word that he told him that day about him staying close to him and he’ll show him the world. Juice had shaken hands with so many people and was able to sit down with a few of them to get pointers on the direction he was trying to go in. Everyone told him the same thing, he was in the hands of the perfect mentor. To be so close to Porter Bavay was truly humbling.
“I gotta swing by the doctor. My back has been killing me. When I leave there, I’m going to get a haircut and then probably a nap. I’m tired.” He looked at his watch, wondering if he really had the time to even lay down.
His days were running into each other and he was on E.
“What time do you think you want to go to the listening party?”
Porter rather spend time with his new boo, but knew business had to be handled. Plus, she had him on her time and not the other way around. For now, it was acceptable because he was really had a lot going on and at the same time. He wanted to be sure that he wasn’t using her as a crutch to migrate rapidly through his hurt. He didn’t feel that way but wanted to be sure. She put on a front that she was hard, but he saw right through that.
“Not sure yet. I’ll call you,” he told him, as he dialed Mahogany’s number.
He was worried that she was growing restless with having so much time on her hands. He had asked her several times if she wanted him to get her a job somewhere, but she swore that he had done enough.
“Why are you up so early?” she groaned into the phone.
He chuckled, “It’s nine thirty. You must don’t have to work today?”
Porter was thankful that she didn’t defy him and return to Shakers because he would’ve been done with her.
“No, they’ve been tripping on me lately. I’m going to do some apps today whenever I get up. I put my baby on the bus and went right back to sleep.”
He wished that he could see her for a second.
“Where are you going to apply?”
She had no idea. “I don’t know. Something with at least ten dollars an hour. The diner is cool, but I need more.”
Ten dollars an hour? Was that enough for someone to live off, let alone raise two kids?
“What’s the salary on ten dollars an hour?” he asked, out of curiosity.
“Don’t know, P. What you doing?” She didn’t want to talk about her struggles nor did she want his help. She was going to figure it out on her own, as she had always done. Mahogany wasn’t unfamiliar with making a way out of no way. It was how she survived the stormiest of storms. Raheem had been back calling her and she honestly didn’t know why. She had nothing to say him not today, tomorrow, or ever. When she told him, “I hope your ass die in there,” she meant every single fucking word.
“Headed to the doctor. My back has been killing me. I don’t know if I pulled a muscle in the gym the other day or what.” He tried to stretch and was unsuccessful.
“I hope that you’ll be okay. I’m supposed to go to the studio tonight, so maybe we can do lunch tomorrow.”
That was her second or third time mentioning a studio and every time he asked her what she was doing in the studio she changed the subject.
“Let me find out you’re dating a producer or something,” he said it playfully, but was serious.
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll text you when I wake up.” She yawned.
“Cool.” They ended the call and he texted Jillian, “BACKGROUND CHECKS DO NOT TAKE THIS LONG.”
He was running out of patience.
“P, the truck is outside.”
He chose the days he wanted to drive and today wasn’t one of them. Perks of being a boss was he always had several options.
η
Mahogany watched her son play in the park while she and Genesis shared a blunt.
“Have you been going to school?” she finally asked him.
He didn’t lie to her. “Nah, for what? I ain’t going to college or none of that lame ass shit.”
“Genesis, why does college have to be lame? People that go to college further their education and they make a lot of money. You can even go to art school.”
“Man, they can’t teach me what I already know.”
That was her brother’s problem; you couldn’t tell him nothing. He thought he knew everything.
She pursed her lips together, trying to think of another way to talk to him. He was always shutting her down. Mahogany believed it was because he didn’t look at her as a good example. She had made a lot of mistakes and he knew 99% of them.
“I want you to go back to school and pull your grades up. Genesis, graduating is not an option.”
He looked at her. “Did you graduate? No.”
She dropped her head in shame.
“…Fuck outta here with that bullshit, man.” He stood up from the bench and tossed the remainder of the blunt out.
“Worry about you and getting your shit together. I got me,” he told her before walking off, stuffing his hands into a Nike hoodie and mumbling something under her breath.
Every time they talked it ended that way. Him throwing some shit in her face and then leaving. She sat back but not defeated. She was determined to help him figure his future out even if she didn’t know what was going on in hers.
Kareem ran over to her and right in between her legs.
“Slow down!” she warned him.
“Where Uncle G going? We supposed to play ball.” He was huffing and puffing.
“You tired, baby?” she laughed.
He wiped his sweat on her clothes, not caring that she was clean, and he wasn’t.
“Yeah mama. I need some water.”
This was happening more than normal, and it was starting to worry her.
“Are you out of breath?” she asked him, cautiously.
His head went up and down as he held his chest.
Mahogany stood up and pulled his shirt off. “Breathe baby,” she told him in a panic.
“I am…” He was trying his hardest.
She saw him struggling and she picked him up and ran to her truck.
“GENESIS!” Her brother couldn’t have gone too f
ar that fast.
Mahogany didn’t have time to wait on him. She put him in the back seat. “Here baby, drink some water.” She was sure that it was an asthma attack, but she wasn’t about to wait around.
There was a hospital not too far from the nice park that she drove across town to take him to. It was sad that the play area in her neighborhood wasn’t safe for her five-year-old to run around in.
Hours later, the doctors had informed her that it was definitely an asthma attack and that there was a slight chance he may have inhaled some mold.
Genesis, her brother, arrived shortly after they were checked in and he said, “Told you, sis. I knew I wasn’t tripping.”
He too had been coughing and getting sick more than usually.
She had to move, she couldn’t have them getting sick.
“We’re going to keep him overnight to monitor his breathing and you guys can leave first thing in the morning.”
If it wasn’t one thing it was another.
Mahogany couldn’t catch a damn break. She was in a trance. Genesis thanked the doctor and then told his nephew, “You gon’ be alright, buddy,” he promised him.
She sat back in her seat, telling herself over and over again in her head, “I got this.”
How in the hell was she supposed to move right now? Moving wasn’t free.
Her phone buzzed, and it was P flirting with her, but she wasn’t in the mood.
“What you and the producer doing?”
“My son is in the hospital. Asthma attack and it’s mold in my apartment.”
He called her instantly and she stepped out of the room to take the call.
“Yea?” she had an attitude and it wasn’t towards him although it sounded as if it was.
“What hospital are y’all at? Is he okay?”
“Yeah, he good. We’ve been here all day.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“WHY WOULD I?” He wasn’t his daddy, so what was the point in notifying him of anything? Porter hadn’t even met him yet.
She didn’t mean to yell at him, she took a deep breath. “My bad. I’m just…it’s always something. I’ll call you in a few days, I’ve got a lot going on right now.”
“Tell me where you are, that’s all I’m asking.”
She didn’t ask him for to be her guardian angel.
“I’m straight, we’re good. I promise,” she reassured him.
“Mahogany, I’m not going to ask you again.”
She rolled her eyes, although he couldn’t see her, and told him where she was along with the room number.
Twenty minutes later, food was being delivered from an Italian steakhouse.
“Oh, hellllll yeah.” Her brother’s greedy ass opened the bags and pulled out several items.
“Wash your hands first.”
She didn’t have an appetite, all she could think about was moving and would she have to do something stupid to get the money up.
η
“Last night was cool… How do you feel about the guy?” Yara asked him over tea. Before he left the event, she grabbed his hand. “You + me. Tomorrow at noon. Our spot.” She didn’t ask if he was free. She never did. She was one of those easy souls that you vibed with and met her when she extended the invite. He was grateful that his friend trusted his wife enough to lend her to him in his time of need. They often bounced ideas of business back and forth on each other. Yara had a lot of brain. She was highly-intelligent, amazingly talented, and extremely creative.
“He gives me Daniel Caesar vibes, I can dig it. What do you need me to do?”
She smiled. “Oh, he needs the Bavay touch?” she was toying with him.
“Isn’t this why we’re meeting?”
The smile left her face. “Actually, it isn’t. I haven’t seen or heard from you since the you know what. You sent me that one text…”
“You threatened me,” he reminded her.
She shook her head. “We have different recollections of that conversation, but I digress. I wanted to see you outside of the stu. How do you feel?” She was always worried about him.
Porter didn’t deserve to lose everything connected to him and she often told her husband that if he killed himself, she wouldn’t blame him.
Yara loved her three daughters more than anything in the world and if they were all to have died on the same day at the same time, God forbid…she would’ve gone right with them. To lose a child is a life-changing experience. She had been there once before, and the pain never goes away.
“I’m okay, which has me worried,” he admitted.
She bit into the Danish and then wiped her mouth. “Why?”
He knew that he could talk freely to her and it’ll stay between the two of them, plus the tea shop that they were at wasn’t too busy during the lunch hour.
“I don’t miss Kim.”
She didn’t expect him to say that.
“Wow, that sounded fucked up. Let me say this, I’m not mourning for her necessarily. It’s the fact that she died…and the kids…they’re gone.”
“You miss your family as a whole? Not your wife?”
“We were barely talking. Every time she called me, she was yelling at me being a sorry lousy ass nigga. I don’t have any recent memories to hold on to make me be like…. wow I lost my wife,” he sounded like a heartless nigga.
“Have you told anyone this?”
“Come on, really? No. Hell no.”
Yara honestly didn’t know what to say.
“Have you met someone?”
He nodded his head slowly.
“You like her?”
“It’s still in the beginning stages, but I think about her often. Yara, I haven’t pursued anyone in a long time. The few women that I had…” his voice trailed.
“This is something new. It’s beyond the physical.” He had a great way of making things sound good.
“Porter, do you plan on marrying again? Do you want more children?”
If one more person asked him that…
“I don’t know, it doesn’t cross my mind. I made a lot of mistakes and I’m still busy. Still on the go. None of that has changed, so why give another woman the same blues that drove Kim away?”
Yara agreed with him there. Before she told him how she felt on the situation, she offered a disclaimer.
“Unpopular opinion.”
He laughed, “I’m listening.”
“I never felt like she liked you. You can ask Q because I’ve asked him several times were y’all in an open relationship. She didn’t smile around you. I never saw y’all hug or anything. That’s not love.”
It was crazy how everyone had a different take on what he and his wife had. Many people were on the outside looking in and if anyone knew how that could go should’ve been Yara. There were all kinds of speculation around she and Quentin when they first went public. Porter didn’t judge them. Happiness was a personal choice.
“We were private. Me or her didn’t believe in PDA,” he said defensively.
“You weren’t private with what’s that girl’s name you used to date?” She couldn’t remember.
“Not important and that doesn’t count. We used to fuck like rabbits.”
The good ole days when he was Bad Boy P. Nasty Daddy P. He had a few monikers he used to go by, now he was just P.
“I said that to say that people love using the excuse that they’re private, but when chemistry is really present all that private shit goes out the window. Trust me. Real love…you don’t care if the world knows.”
Porter felt where she was coming from. “Yeah, but for the record I love Kim. I always will. We weren’t perfect, and we never tried to be. I thought I had more time…”
Today was a good day and he refused to go back to that dark depression that he once lived in. Yara peeped his mood shifting and changed the subject quickly. Death made her uncomfortable.
“Who is the new girl? I know her?”
He shook her head. “She�
��s hood. Young and a lil’ ratchet. I met her at the strip club. She has a chap. Ex-boyfriend in jail. Wants to be a rapper. Mom is serving life. Father was killed a few years ago. She had a hit a few years ago called Run Me Dem Pockets,” he gave her the full-rundown.
“Wait, and how do you know all of this?” she chuckled.
“Background check came back this morning, right before I met with you.” He didn’t know how to feel about the information in the email and planned on reading it a few more times before he digested it all.
“Run Me Dem Pockets? Why does that sound familiar.”
“They were signed to Nash, apparently,” he scoffed. He didn’t have an issue with Nash, although it seemed as if he made everyone in the industry choose sides once him and Quentin went separate ways. It was immature if you ask him.
“Waittt… which one are you dealing with because it was a group of three? One is locked up and then it was a dark skinned one, she got shot in the head. I think.”
She knew exactly who he was talking about. They had the potential to do great things, but they couldn’t keep themselves out of the streets. Those little gutter bitches gave Nash the blues.
“Nene…that’s what she goes by, but I use her first name, Mahogany.”
C H A P T E R 8
You thought that I’ll just fall in love with you…boy was you wrong – Summer Walker
One thing about Mahogany Sinclair was that she was an open-minded, she knew how to get some money. She was beautiful and in situations where her back was against the wall, she knew how to use that to her advantage and get some money. She pushed Raheem’s hurtful words about her not being that cute, but good enough to not be ugly, to the back of her mind and counted the money.
“Is it enough?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “Should be.” She prayed that it was because she wasn’t doing that shit ever again. Her heartbeat was still racing, and her adrenaline was rushing. She took her wig off. “Shit, I’m hot.”
Genesis got up and turned the air on high.
“You can make a lot of money if you keep this up,” he said, excitedly.
“Nigga, are you crazy? And if something happened to me, who gon’ see after you and-”