Aiight lil nigga… don’t make me come out of character on you…

I pressed my teeth together as I pushed out a deep breath through my nose, trying my best to not say what was really on my mind. Cause that would mean cursing Ferdinand Vance out, and Toni loved Ferdinand Vance, but Ferdinand Vance wouldn’t fucking work for us anymore if I didn’t control my mouth.

Damnit.

Now he had me thinking of his annoying ass as “Ferdinand Vance”, instead of “Freddy”, which I was reasonably sure his real name was. He was selling that shit waaaay too hard – Ferdinand Vance would never, Ferdinand Vance would rather be caught dead, Ferdinand Vance is above, and that is beneath, et-fuckin-cetera.

Ferdinand Vance was about to get a foot up his ass.

“Now, for the last time, Mr. Wright,” he grumbled, pushing a bundle of fabric swatches in front of me. “This is a wedding – not a fish fry. Can you dig deep within yourself and find some elegance to call on to choose your linens?”

Did this motherfucker just…

“You know what… I know you and Toni are trying to keep me involved in these plans, but… I don’t care about linens, bruh. So what’s going to happen right now is… I’m going to leave this table. You’re going to take your swatches. And when Toni gets back, you’re going to talk to her about all this, and I’ll write whatever size check you need. How about that?”

For the first time since this meeting started, hours ago, Ferdinand Vance smiled. “Mr. Wright, that’s the only respectable decision you’ve made all day. I approve,” he said, pointing with a flourish. “We can pretend this never happened, and I will not have to suffer through ecru centerpieces and ivory programs.”

“I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

“Of course you don’t darling, but you’re very handsome,” he assured, gathering his random swatches and books from the table. “You show up on the right day, and make sure everyone gets paid.”

“Works for me,” I called after him, as he practically ran out.

Shit.

You’d think I was the one being annoying.

In any case, I was glad that shit was over, and hoped Toni wasn’t going to be too pissed at me when she found out how this ended up. She hadn’t wanted to be one of those brides who completely took over, not looking to the groom for anything except paid invoices to the vendors.

But… that was exactly the kinda groom I wanted to be.

This wedding was Toni’s thing, and I was perfectly happy to let it just be that – to show up and look good in my tux, and to make sure the night ended with a big smile on her face.

That was all I cared about, not whether the napkin rings matched the flowers.

With that in mind, I got up to leave the coworking space where our meeting had taken place. I’d promised Bri we’d get hot chocolates and go see the Christmas lights downtown, but that meeting had gone so long it was cutting into the time I’d planned with her. She wouldn’t be that bothered, but I didn’t like it – the last thing I wanted was for this wedding to impede on spending time with my daughter.

Especially now that she was getting older.

Ten was fast-approaching, and though she got along really well with Toni now, any negative memories would be ammunition for acting out in her teen years. The thought of that put a little extra pep in my step, so I could get to my car.

At this time of year, the area was packed with people – Christmas shopping, sightseeing, all that. I kept my head down and kept moving, and I was almost home free when I heard my name, from an unfamiliar source.

“Justin Wright,” I heard again, and I stopped to look around. This time, I noticed someone coming straight toward me, a sturdy-built young man wearing a huge grin and pointing a cell phone in my direction.

“Yooo,” he gushed, throwing an arm around my shoulder as he approached me, adjusting the phone so that both of us were on screen. “I’m out and about, minding my own, trying to get a little live-stream Christmas season action, and look who I ran into, Blakewood’s own bestselling author, muhfuckin’ Justin Wright. If y’all don’t know who this is, read a damn book or something, get your mind right. Can’t read? He’s got you anyway. I can’t think of the title right now but I know you niggas saw the movies with the fine ass ballerina jewel thief and the FBI and the drug kingpin and all the sex, lies, betrayal and all that shit, y’all know what I’m talking about.” He finally took a breath, and pointed to me. “He wrote all that shit. Put some respect on my man.”

I didn’t know what the hell was happening, but when I squinted at the screen, I could see the big “LIVE” in all caps in one corner, and a steadily climbing number of viewers – in the thousands – in the other corner. At the bottom was a steady stream of reactions from people watching the stream.

“Wave to the people or something man, you look washed right now,” he told me quietly, prompting me to throw an awkward deuce at the screen.

“Uh… thanks for watching?” I said, and the young man shook his head, pointing the screen to himself.

“Aiight see, this what happens when you catch the old heads off guard, they can’t stick and move with it like I do, so I’ma shut it down for now. Later.”

Did this lil boy just call me old?

“Yoooo, Justin Wright – bruh, I’m a huge fan. You write ya ass off, man,” he told me, raising his hand in a gesture he clearly expected me to return.

I did, to not be rude, but as soon as it was done, I told him, “Thanks youngin’, but I’ve got somewhere I have to be right now.”

“Oh my bad, definitely understand that, but listen… can I get a business card or something? I’m a young brother out her trying to break into the business, any way I can. I can act, I can joke, I’m handsome as fuck out here you know, anything you could do to put me on, I’d appreciate.”

Even though I was annoyed by the interruption, I stopped, pulling out my wallet. “What’s your name man?”

“Theodore Graham, TeddyGramsNoMilk on IG, five hundred thousand followers, over a million on You—”

“Nice,” I cut in, not knowing what the hell he was talking about. “Theodore Graham, nice to meet you.” I handed him the card he’d asked for, plus one for my publicist. “I don’t personally have anything going on right now where I could use you, but I’ll keep you in mind. Good luck to you, aiight.”

“Much appreciated Mr. Wright, thank you,” he called after me as I hurried off, trying to get to my car. I’d barely pulled out of my parking spot when the phone rang, and I grinned as soon as I saw the name that popped up on my dashboard display.

“What can I do for the soon-to-be newest Mrs. Wright?”

“Ohh, have a glass of wine ready for me as soon as I walk through the door tomorrow?” she asked, sounding tired. I knew she’d gone to the Bahamas for work, but I’d kinda hoped she’d find a moment to relax too.

“Damn, it’s like that? Something go wrong with Soriyah’s book?”

“No, not at all. It’s… nothing for you to worry about.”

I frowned as I drove. “You sure babe? I don’t like how you’re sounding right now…”

“I’m sure Jus,” she insisted. “I’m crazy exhausted, and ready to be back home. Did you make a lot of progress with Ferdinand Vance today?”

I scoffed, then quickly cleared my throat to cover. “Uh… you could say that. If by progress you mean… did we decide it was best to wait for you, and let you make these important decisions. Then, yes, we did.”

“Jus…”

“Baby, that shit is not for me,” I told her, shaking my head. “And I came dangerously close to hurting Ferdinand Vance’s feelings, but I know that’s your dream wedding planner so I chilled. But keep that nigga away from me.”

“He’s not so baaaaad.”

“To you. That motherfucker is like nails on a chalkboard to me though, so… y’all put together your dream babe. Just tell me when to show up and where to stand.”

On the other end of the line, Toni groaned. “Fiiine. I just didn’t want you to feel bad, or left out.”

“Nah. Please leave me out,” I asked, making her laugh.

“Duly noted. But on another note… how is Jason doing? Is he okay?”

I frowned. “He’s good as far as I know. I haven’t seen him today, but he was tossing back wings like usual last night at the sports bar. Why, what’s up?”

“Oh nothing, I just thought about him. I know he was complaining about having to use the wheelchair at dinner last week.”

“That’s Jay,” I chuckled. “You know that. Mr. Independent isn’t fond of anything slowing him down, so the chair feels like a cage to him. It’s only temporary though – he’s only using it at the basketball court now.”

“So I see he refuses to slow down.” She sighed. “It’s admirable though, honestly. I don’t understand where he gets the energy – and I’m wondering if he’ll bottle some to share.”

I laughed. “Man, I’ve been trying to figure it out since childhood. I haven’t so much as broken a sweat today and I’m ready to call it a night.”

“You already took Bri to see the lights?”

“Headed to pick her up now,” I said, as I pulled into my father’s neighborhood, heading for the house. “About to turn into Pops’ driveway in a second.”

“Oooh, I’ll let you go then – have fun, and give everybody a kiss for me okay? Tell Bri-Bri I’ll see her tomorrow.”

“Consider it done baby.”

“I love you,” she crooned, as I parked the car.

“I love you too, Almost Mrs. Wright,” I shot back, making her laugh as we ended the call. I didn’t hang around long to grab Bri, knowing our time was already short. She had school tomorrow – and the rest of the week – so it wasn’t wise to keep her out late.

That little wisdom was soon forgotten.

We drove back into the downtown area, stopping for our loaded hot cocoas first. We walked and looked at the vast, intricate light display the city had sponsored, took pictures, talked, laughed, stopped to speak to any friends from school she ran into, with her giving me all the hot ten-year-old tea along the way. Before I knew it, it was damn near eleven at night – way past bedtime – and the light display was starting to clear out.

But my girl was happy, so I wasn’t going to complain too much about it.

“So…” I started, as we headed back to the car. “You know Toni and I started the process of adoption several months back, right?”

“Yeah,” she gushed, stopping to look at me. “Wait… am I getting a little sister or brother?!”

I wrinkled my nose. “You have a little sister. Your mom had a baby like seven months ago.”

“Yeah, but she’s boring,” Bri groaned. “When you adopt, it’s like… a real kid. Not a boring baby.”

“Well, that’s the thing – we don’t know who we’ll end up adding to our family. The agency is going to let us know when there’s a kid who needs a home.”

A grin spread across Bri’s face. “And… they called you, didn’t they?”

“Don’t say anything to Toni,” I warned immediately, since she’d caught on. “I don’t know any details yet, but they contacted me to make sure we were still interested in fostering. So… I’m expecting another call soon, yeah.”

“Congratulations Daddy,” she beamed. “Toni is gonna be a good mom.”

I smiled back. “Yeah… I think so too.”

Back at the car, Bri fell asleep almost immediately, exhausted from bouncing around all day. I was ready to be on that same energy, wasting no time waking her up to get out of the car once we got home.

But then the phone rang.

As soon as I saw Joseph’s name on the screen, I knew what was up.