Lights Please II

36 (Part II): All Star Weekend

Jermaine

I woke up early to go through some emails and make some last minute phone calls cause the weekend was gonna be super busy. We were in the Presidential Suite so we could accommodate everyone. I left Tess sleeping and made my way to the living room. I found mama Joyce sitting there with Aaliyah.

"Morning mama," I smiled at them, "I thought I would be the first one up,"

"Your child wouldn't let me sleep... she woke me up talking about I'm hungry so I got us some room service,"

I picked up Liyah who was crawling across the carpet, playing on the iPad, "good morning baby girl,"

"daddy I wuz watchin peppa pig," she frowned.

I raised my eyebrow at her, "just cause you said that, no more peppa pig for you all day—" I poked her belly.

"Mama you can go ahead to your room and rest if you want," I told her.

"You don't have to tell me twice, I'm gonna facetime my man—" she immediately got up and I laughed shaking my head.

I brought my laptop up and replied to some emails with my youngest daughter sitting in my lap. She was fussy until she got comfortable and just laid on me. I didn't even realize how much time had passed until Lex and Chris joined us, claiming they were hungry.

"Aight lemme get y'all some breakfast," I told them. "give daddy some kisses first,"

Lex came over first and kissed my cheek, "morning daddy,"

"hey baby how'd you sleep?" I gave her a hug and she tried to sit on my other leg, basically pushing her sister off.

"STOOOOOOOOPPPP—" Aaliyah yelled, pushing her sister back.

"You can't have him all by yourself Liyah das not fair—"

"Aye aye aye calm down," I told them both. "Lex come on, you saw your sister was already sitting here." I shook my head. It was cute how she got jealous.

"Okay whateva," she shrugged and walked away and went to sit down on the couch. I had to do something about this girl and her attitude honestly.

"Chris what you wanna eat?" I asked as I grabbed the phone to order food.

"Chicken and waffles... and pancakes," he replied.

"Aight bet," I nodded. "you good though?"

"Yeah I'm good.. mom said she wants to see me while I'm out here—"

"I know," I nodded, "uncle Ib sent her her tickets for the weekend she should be getting here today."

I hadn't seen Brandy since the whole custody ordeal and since Christian moved in with us he hadn't been to visit his mom either. She had the right to see him every other weekend if she wanted to but because she was out of state it made things a little more complicated.

"How you feeling?" I asked him.

"Alright," he nodded, "I just don't want her to be mad at me,"

"Why would she be mad at you?" I genuinely asked.

"Cause I chose to live with y'all," he mumbled, "when she calls she says she's not mad but... I dunno," he shrugged.

"You want me to stick around a bit after we drop you off?" I asked him and he shook his head.

"Nah it's cool... it's a big weekend for you—you gotta work and get ready for your show," he told me. My boy was only 10 but he was very mature and very wise for his age. I was still gonna take him to his moms and make sure he was straight before going to the Dreamville Brunch cause at the end of the day I had to put my kid first.