Page 4 of Love Next Door
I snatched her by her arm, but Thad and Evyn grabbed me and pulled me back, while Nick’s big ass lifted and carried her to the door. I jerked away from them.
“I’m not done, Juju. I will stalk you using that same GPS tracker I put on your car that showed me where you were today. I’ll be at every event you have, showing my ass till you come home,” she screamed as he carried her out the door.
I snatched her purse up and rushed out into the hallway with them. Flinging her purse at her, it smacked her on the side of her head. “Get the fuck outta my life and stay out, Briana!”
“I’m not leaving. This ain’t over, Juju. You can’t just walk out on me like this! I’m pregnant!”
My chest heaved up and down as I tried to calm my anger.
“Go on, G. Get inside. I got her,” Nick stated, bending to pick up her items that fell from her purse.
I was so furious that I kicked half the shit, and Evyn and Thad dragged me back into the house.
“Nigga, you might need to get a restraining order. She’s purposely antagonizing you because she’s trying to get ya ass locked up,” Evyn stated.
“Yeah. She just wanted to get a rise out of you, Juju. You can’t let her know that you still care that much,” Thad advised.
“I don’t. I fucking don’t,” I lied, shaking my head.
By the time Nick returned fifteen minutes later, I had calmed down.
“Nigga, you might wanna get a restraining order on her. I sent her little ass on, but she wants her claws sunk in you,” Nick expressed.
“Yeah, Evyn just said the same thing,” Thad explained.
“Bitches know when they got a good man and fuck around and lost ’im,” Evyn commented wryly.
Lucky for me,Briana hadn’t shown her face again in the last week. I hadn’t heard a peep out of her, and for that, I was thankful. There had been nothing but peace in my new place, and I was relaxing and chilling.
There was one thing that always held true: You couldn’t put a price on peace of mind. When I first learned that Briana had cheated on me after her ex showed up at our house, I went through a myriad of emotions, from disbelief to anger, to humiliation to hurt, to wanting to do something to somebody. The next day, I immediately made a doctor’s appointment as soon as the office opened and had an STD screening.
Relief flooded me when I was informed that everything was good with my big homie down below. But then the next thingthat flooded me was apprehension about whether or not the daughter we had been expecting was mine. I was excited about our baby and building a family with Briana from the moment she told me that she had missed her cycle.
I was probably more excited than she was. Looking back, it now made sense why she had been upset. Her ass wasn’t really upset about not making all the goals she had set for herself. She knew her ass had been cheating, and she was afraid of who the baby belonged to.
Briana argued about the DNA test, but I told her that I would get it one way or another. She could go willingly, or I would petition the court for one after the baby was born. If I did that shit, then I was posting it on my social media platform and telling all her family and friends about her scandalous ass.
I couldn’t think of a better way to get what I wanted than by using an empty threat. Briana was a Sociogram model with a large platform like mine. She knew that if I posted that, they would drag her ass on social media, and she might potentially lose followers and sponsors.
When she finally agreed to go, I prayed that the baby would be mine. When the email came back stating that there was zero probability of me being the father, I was devastated. It sucked all the life out of me.
That was three weeks ago. I left home that night and went to stay with Thad in his place, and I hadn’t returned to our home until moving day. While she was out shopping and living it up with her friends, as she always did, I went back to the house and packed all my shit as quickly as I could.
We loaded the truck with the help of some teenage boys in our neighborhood, who I’d paid. No sooner than we had everything on the truck, we hauled our asses out of there, and the four of us unloaded it at my new place.
I had worked hard as hell to find a temporary upscale residence and paid a hefty fee up front to speed the process up. Once my credit and background checks were completed, I was approved to move in right away.
A glance at the clock showed that it was a quarter to one. It was almost time for my appointment with a couple regarding a wedding reception that I would be deejaying next month.
Grabbing my keys and phone, I headed for the door.
I pulled my apartment door closed behind me and inserted the key into the lock at the same time that I heard, “Shit.”
I glanced to my right and saw a woman struggling with her door and bags of groceries. She was gorgeous and fine as hell.
It felt like there was an extra beat in my heart as I checked her out. Momentarily, I forgot all about what I was supposed to be doing as curiosity about the woman next door got the best of me. I moved in her direction only for her groceries to shift in her arms again.
“Careful,” I called as I moved in her direction to assist her.
