So Gone - By Jennifer Luckett Page 0,12

If I had a man, and he did that…” I heard her smack her lips. “He’d be a thing of the past, and Chunuchi would be somewhere nursing her eye with an ice pack.”

I laughed at the image of such a thing. That would be just like Leesha.

"I'm not playing," she said.

“I know, but…”

She cut me off in the middle of my sentence. “Girl, me and boo thang would have been throwing some hands. Shit, that bitch would have gotten fucked up if it was me.”

"I'm not going to stoop to that level," I replied. "I'm much better than that."

"Maybe so, but you have to get ignorant right along with those bitches, or they'll think they can run over you. Chunuchi needs to teach her child some manners before she dump him off on somebody. I tell you what, it couldn't be me."

We discussed the topic for another fifteen minutes. Leesha was so appalled by what I was going through. I hardly got a word in the rest of the conversation. "I guess you'll leave Blunt alone when you get sick and tired of being sick and tired,” she concluded.

"I'll do it long before that," I replied sincerely. Regardless of what I had put up with, there was a point that I refused to go beyond, and Blunt was right on that line.

"Well let me get off of this phone. There's a police right behind me, and I don't have my Bluetooth with me. I do not have money to throw away on no damn ticket, Honey Child."

"Okay, bye. I'll see you in a little bit."

"Bye."

I got out of bed and tidied up the house. Then, I went in the kitchen and prepared some chicken tacos for us to snack on when Leesha arrived. As I moved around the kitchen, I replayed everything in my mind that Leesha had said. Her points were well taken.

An hour and a half later, Leesha was pulling up in my yard in her 2012 black Nissan Maxima. The outside motion sensored light in my driveway automatically came on. From the doorway, when she got out I could see that she was looking like a certified diva. She was wearing a white baby tee with DIVA written across the front in bold letters and a pair of hip hugging Capri’s and white slide ins. Her blonde highlights worn in a long wrap complimented her smooth honey skin tone. She stood 5’7, thick in the hip department with small breast and a tiny waistline. To have pushed out a set of twins, her body was still tight. I sprinted out of the door and bear hugged her.

I looked up and noticed that her twins, Akeela and Aquisha, had gotten out of the car too. They were wearing matching Coogi mini dresses and black lace-up sandals. Her twelve- year old daughters were the spitting image of her. My heart dropped because although I was glad to see them, they were bad as heck. Akeela, who was born five minutes before her twin sister, was the taller of the two, but not by much. To the eye of a stranger, it was hard to tell them apart.

They rushed up to me and gave me a group hug. “Hey, Auntie Mo’,” they chimed.

Actually, I was their second cousin, but they referred to me as their auntie.

Leesha stepped back and looked me over. "Girl, you're looking good. No homo," she complimented.

"You're crazy." I laughed.

She turned to the twins and fussed. “Y’all bring the luggage in 'cause I ain’t doing it. Hell, I’m tired.”

Akeela sighed and rolled her eyes. “Mama, you could help, too,” she whined.

Leesha stopped in her tracks and whirled around. “I’m going to remind yo’ smart mouth what my motto is: Money Over Matters,” she said. “Until you get a job to support yourself and earn some money, what you say or think doesn’t matter.”

"That was so lame," replied Akeela.

Aquisha laughed and nodded her head in agreement.

“Now, don’t y’all get out of town and try to show out. I told y’all what will happen… three chops to the throat.” She busted a kung fu move.

Leesha was too funny, but I loved the relationship that she had with the twins. She laughed and joked with them, but they knew that she didn't play.

As soon as she turned her back, Akeela rolled her eyes and her sister stuck her tongue out. I just shook my head. "What did they do?" asked Leesha. She knew her children well.

"Nothing." I suppressed a