Happy New Year!!!!🎆

Shawnie's POV

It was the day of my birthday. I originally planned to spend it with Aubrey but since our public fallout, I knew that wasn't going to happen nor did I want it to happen. Plus I haven't talked to him in days. I've been trying to get in contact with him because I wanted him to bring Atlas down to San Diego so I could spend time with him on my birthday. I wanted both my kids with me but he's totally ignoring me. I even called Christina and she said he hasn't called her either. So I feel like he's kidnapping my son.

I thought I'd try one more time before I got out of bed. I grabbed my phone and texted him.

Me: Aubrey I've been trying to contact you for days about bringing Atlas down. Please text me back. It's my birthday and you're ignoring me. I wanted to spend my birthday with my children. PLEASE. Text or call me back.

I sent the message and put my phone down. A
couple of seconds later I hear my phone ding. I quickly picked it up thinking it was Aubrey. It wasn't, it was Christian.

Christian: Happy Birthday!! Yes, I remembered. I have something being delivered to your house. It's still weird being able to text you like this after so many years. I hope you have a wonderful day!! When I get a free minute I'll give you a call. I want to talk about what happened that day at my house.

I smiled to myself as I heard a soft knock on the door. I knew it was Joe.

"Come in." I say loud enough for him to hear but not loud enough to wake up Gen.

Joe walked in wearing a white, loose fitting tank top and black sweatpants shorts, with a huge bouquet of blue roses

"Awww!" I say, sitting up in bed.

"Happy Birthday!" He says, sitting them down on my nightstand.

"Thank you!" He hugs and kisses me on the cheek, then he hands me a small envelope.

"What's this?" I was surprised he got me anything for my birthday.

"Just a little something." He smiles.

I opened the envelope to see it was from a local spa. No amount.

"You know exactly what I need." I laugh.

"Yeah. I know you do. That's unlimited, so whatever you want to get you can."

"Thank you, Joe."

"You're welcome." He turns his attention to Genesis who is sleeping next to me. "Miss missy slept with mommy last night."

"Yeah.."

"Good way to wake up on your birthday."

"Yeah. She likes to sleep just like her mama." We both laugh, but I notice him looking at me a few seconds longer. I look at him.

"What?"

He shrugs. "Nothing. I just like seeing you like this, before you get all done up." He says

"No make up." I say

"Yeah...hair messy and all." He smiles.

"That's nice of you to say but you don't have to give empty compliments because it's my birthday."

"I'm not it's true." I wave him off. "Okay, Joe."

He looks away and shakes his head for a second.

"Anyway, I talked to your cousin, Mercedes." He says

"Really? How?"

"I asked Chris for her number." He says

"Damn. Y'all are really cool, huh?"

"He checks in on you from time to time when he doesn't want you to know. He cares about you a lot." Joe says and I smile.

"I know he does but...whatever. That relationship is no more. What happened with my cousin?" I ask. I'm trying to avoid any Chris talk.

"I asked her to come down so you can see them. She said she would and that they're going to stay a while."

"Oh yay!" I say excitedly. "I miss them. Crazy I brought them out here and they just abandoned me." I laugh

"Well, you moved." He says

I laugh, "True, but they could've come with me." I say, "Are they coming today?"

"They are already on their way."

My phone dings and I hurry to check it. It was my cousin telling me happy birthday. I instantly get frustrated.

"Oh..."

"What's wrong?"

"I've been trying to get in contact with Aubrey but he's ignoring me. He was supposed to bring Atlas but no sign of him."

He sighs, "That sucks. I'm so sorry. Is there anything I can do?"

"No. I just need his stupid ass to call me back and stop being a bitch." I snap

Joe laughs.

"No, seriously. He's always in his fucking feelings about something and is only worried about himself. He doesn't realize this is literally kidnapping. I don't know where my son is."

"Let me call and find out where he is." Joe takes out his phone and sits next to me on the bed. "Let's call Eric first."

I watch as he finds Eric's phone number and calls him. He holds the phone up to his ear and waits for him to answer.

"What's up man...nothing much. Where y'all at?...Oh...Shawnie is looking for him...Okay." He ended the call.

"What did he say?" I ask

"He said they're here."

"In San Diego?"

"Yeah. On their way here."

"Good." I get out of bed. "I need to get dressed. I'm about to go all the way off on him."

We hear the doorbell ring.

"I got it." Joe gets up and leaves my bedroom.

I go into the bathroom to brush my teeth. After a couple of minutes, Joe returns.

"Come downstairs." He says, as he appears in the bathroom doorway.

I finish up, and I walk downstairs with Gen in my arms. She was still asleep and resting her head on my shoulder. I see a bouquet of a few dozen red roses on the dining room table. I'm assuming those are from Christian. I also see a box next to them but I continue to the door. Before I step outside, Joe and I make eye contact and he smirks at me, then shakes his head.

"What?"

He smiles, then opens the door. "....Nothing."

Once I get outside, I see Aubrey holding Atlas. A car sitting on a truck, and a man unloading it. I also see a couple of guys with cameras filming the whole thing. The car was a Falcon Wraith, and it had a huge red bow on it. I was pissed.

"Nope! Nope! Nope! HELL NO!" I say, loudly.

Aubrey was standing there smiling all big like he did something special.

"Happy Birthday, Mami!" He yells, arms out, all excited. 

"I don't want it. Take it back." I hand Gen to Joe and I walk over to Aubrey. I grab Atlas out of his arms. "Have you lost your fucking mind? I have been calling you like crazy and you've been ignoring my calls."

"What? Why?" He drops his arms. He ooked confused. "You don't like this one? I can get you a different one..."

"Go away." I say irritated with him.

Aubrey tells the camera crew to stop filming. I just walked into the house, and he followed me.

"You don't want no birthday Dick? That's why I came early...start your day off right." He laughs

"No, I don't want any dick from you." I look at him like he's crazy.

"Damn, really?" He says surprised. "What's your problem? Happy fucking birthday!"

"Are you serious? I have been trying to contact you for days, ever since the Tiffany's event and you've ignored me. Now all of a sudden you pop up in San Diego with a fucking car? And a camera crew? You literally have people crowding around my home and now people know where I live. I see right through your bullshit. You're trying to make yourself look good." I snap. "I didn't know where my son was, Aubrey." My time softens for a second, thinking about how scared I was that I wouldn't see my son.

"You knew he was safe." He says waving me off. "And I'm not gonna respond to the other comments you just made."

"I didn't know shit. As mad as I've gotten with you, I have never taken our son and not responded to your text or calls. You can't do shit like that."

"He's fine." He says, disregarding my feelings. "You need to stop overreacting. You're lucky I came down here for your birthday in the first place. And I bought you a car? You are trippin."

"I would prefer if you would've stayed wherever you were. I don't want the car, I don't want anything from you. You're actually ruining my birthday being here. All I wanted was my son. I have him now, you can leave." I say

He laughs, "Anyway, I was thinking we could all go on a trip somewhere. Try to iron out our differences." He says, completely disregarding what I just said again.

"So you're just gonna totally ignore what I just said to you? I don't want you here." I say.

"But I'm here and I ain't going anywhere right now. So what do you think?"

I exhale out of frustration and roll my eyes. I know he's not gonna go anywhere until I have this little conversation with him, so whatever. 

"All of who? I don't wanna go anywhere with you. I'm trying to keep as much distance between us as possible." I say

"Shawnie..." he just looks at me and shakes his head for a second. I really think he thinks that I'm joking with him but I am dead ass serious, I don't wanna be anywhere around him.

"What?" He doesn't say anything.

"All of us. My people, and your people." He answers.

"My people, meaning Chris? This is about Chris." I say

"Yeah." He says and I see Joe walk in the house with Gen. He doesn't say anything, he just walks past us and walks over to the couch to lay her down.

"You're lying. You don't want him anywhere near us. How the hell do you want us to all go on a trip together? That makes absolutely no sense. When have you ever tried to do something like this?"

"True, but I'm trying to show you that we can coexist." I do see he's trying but like I told him before, it's too late.

"That's fine and all and I think it's great that you're trying but we're a little bit past that point."

"We've done it before." He says

"We did, but it didn't last."

"Well, we can try again." He says

I look at Joe and he shrugs. "Where are we going and for how long? Because Chris is in Europe right now."

"Let me know when he gets back. We can set up something."

"I don't know about this and I think it is going to be an absolute disaster but I will try." I say

"I'm happy to hear that. And maybe we can work on our marriage during that time too."

"Yeah. Maybe." I say, unenthused.

Just then the door to the patio slides open and I see Mercedes and Dori walking in.

"HEEEEYYYYYY!!!" They both come in all loud. "HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!" They yell, in unison.

Mercedes walks past Aubrey and looks him up and down. "Ugh..."

"The feeling is mutual, Mercedes." He smiles, then looks at Dori. "Dorian."

"Hey, Drake." She says, with a smile.

"Aight ...I love you..." He looks at all of us one more time then he leaves. I just roll my eyes.

"I think he's really that stupid to think that I believe that he came up with this idea on his own." I looked at Joe and he just shrugged his shoulders.

The girls walk over to me and give me a hug. I'm happy to see them.

"What the hell was he doing here?" Mercedes asks

"Dropping off my son." I say

"And the car outside with the big bow?" Dori asks

"It's going with him. I told him to take it back." I say

"Good. We don't want anything from his ass." My cousin says. She turns her attention to Joe.

"Hey Joe, how are you?"

"I'm good. It's good to see you ladies." He says

"It's good to see you too..." Dori smiles. I know she's flirting with him.

Joe laughs and looks at me. "I'm going to go make sure they're all gone."

"Okay. Thank you. Joe."

We all watched him leave but Dori was more into it than we were. She even bit her lips and tilted her head to the side.

"Are you done drooling?" I say

She laughs. "He has a nice ass."

"I agree. You haven't banged him yet?" Mercedes asks

I laugh, "No. I'm married."

"Is that gonna be your excuse for the duration of this bullshit marriage you got going on? Because if you ask me, that is no excuse. It's not like you guys get along and it's not like you guys are fucking."

"I am having sex with my husband." I say

"You guys are separated and you're living in two separate places, but you're having sex with him? Doesn't even sound right."

"It's the truth though. We haven't had sex in a while but I still get it when I want it."

"When is the last time you had sex?" She asks

"A couple weeks ago..."

"But you said you haven't had sex with him in a while. A while as in weeks or months?"

"I need to get dressed..." I try to walk away but Mercedes grabs me by my arm and turns me around.

"So you are fucking Joe?" She asks

"No. Joe and I are strictly friends...and he works for me.... I had sex with Chris."

"I knew you was fucking someone. This is so good. Now you guys can get back together because Drake is not it. Move the fuck on. Serve him them papers!!"

"Yeah...Chris and I are not getting back together. I actually ended it for good."

"WHAT!!" They both yell.

"I just think we're better off separate." I say

"There is no "for good" with you and Chris. You guys always find a way to get back to that loving place." Mercedes says

"I really hurt him and I feel guilty about it but at the same time, he really hurt me too. I can't come back from that. I tried. We connect on that level and we love eachother so much, but I believe we're just not meant to be together again. I want him to be happy but I feel it's not with me...and I have to force him away because if it was up to Chris, he would be right here waiting for me."

"He definitely would." Mercedes says

"I want us to be really good friends, because we both need to heal from that relationship. And to heal, we can't be involved."

"Wow. You've really had some clarity since you've been out here." She says

"Right. I think that's sweet of you and I applaud you for that. It's very mature of you." Dori says

"Yeah..... it's like mourning a loss, but I know we will be fine. I just have to figure out what I'm going to do with Aubrey."

"Divorce him." My cousin says, "You're dragging this shit out."

"Mercedes, I love you, but stop."

"What? You don't love him and you've cheated on him twice. End it for good."

"First of all I do love him, and just because we're having a lot of issues right now doesn't mean they can't be worked out. Granted, I am pretty over it but I just feel like you shouldn't judge me for that."

"I'm not judging you. I'm just trying to get you to see that it's time to end it." She says

"Well let me end it at the pace that I wanna end it at. I'm sorry it doesn't go with your timeline of things but I think you know by now I'm gonna do what I want to do."

"Yeah. I know." She rolls her eyes.

"And this goes back to the conversation that we had when I was telling you why I talk to Joe about some things."

"Oh, I remember. You said he's easy to talk to and he doesn't judge you like I do."

"Yes. This is what I'm talking about. I feel like you're judging me. And I don't wanna get into a deep conversation about that on my birthday because I don't wanna be upset and I don't wanna upset you. So let's just agree to leave this conversation alone for right now."

"Agreed." She says and smiles.

"Okay... Like I was trying to do before the conversation went way left, I need to go get dressed. You guys can make yourself at home. Genesis is asleep on the sofa. Please don't wake her up until I am done, Mercedes."

She starts laughing. "I miss my little ladybug, but okay."

"Here." I give her my son. "Play with Atlas." I say, then I go upstairs to get dressed.

As I made it to the top, I heard Dori whisper to Mercedes.

"Do you think she'll be okay with me flirting with Joe?"

"She says they're just friends but I don't think so, something is going on." Mercedes says. "If it is, I just want him to fuck her so good, she won't even know what the fuck a Drake is."

They laugh and I just go in my room.

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