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I nodded, he was right. This was our family. His dad who was nice to me, my dad who was nice to him, his brothers who were literally my own brothers at this point –especially Uncle Sam, the nicer twin and my mom who treated him like her own son.
They were our family, we were all one.
We got in and they were all seated, talking to themselves. Their smiles widened as they saw us walk through the door. Raphael winked at us and I chuckled when I saw Jayden roll his eyes at him. They were like twins, arguing one minute and agreeing the next.
“Guess who came in, it’s the people who called us abruptly. You both look fine, but I’m still scared, not until I hear what you called us for,” Uncle Troy said and the others nodded their heads, murmuring in agreement.
“So what’s up? You both told Raphael to call us, so here we are.” They all nodded again.
“Flower and I actually have something to tell you.”
“Can you call her Jordan while you are at it? You don’t let anyone call her that anyway,” Uncle Rick said and they all laughed.
“You think he’s the only one? Even she doesn’t answer whenever someone else other than him calls her that. How did you even come up with that name?” My dad asked, but Jayden shook his head at them.
“That’s not the point here, we are here to talk about something important.” They turned serious and nodded. He took my hand in his again and cleared his throat. “Well Flo… Jordan and I are in a ship.”
“Yeah we know that, it's called a friendSHIP.” one of them scoffed out.
“No, we are dating. Like we love each other, romantically.” Jayden explained further and they all stared at us with their mouths wide open. Well except Raphael.
“Whhattt…” Raphael drawled out and puffed. “How could you guys?”
“You knew, didn’t you?” Uncle Cedric narrowed his eyes at him.
“Whhattt…” He started again until they all glared at him. “Yeah I did.”
“How long has this been going on?” My mom asked us and I swallowed spit. She wasn’t smiling, why wasn’t she smiling?
“Umm five years,” I said as I was starting to get nervous. My dad choked.
“Y’all have been fucking for five years… Owww,” Uncle Rick groaned as Uncle Troy hit his head.
“Language Rick. Now why didn’t you deem it fit to tell us?”
“They are telling you now,” Raphael shrugged.
“Well…” My dad started with a small smile. “We can’t do anything now, can we? Will you leave him if we say no?” He asked me and I immediately shook my head. “And you Jayden, will you leave her if we say no?”
“Never.” He grabbed my hand again and shook his head too. Everyone smiled and I felt relieved. I had thought they were mad at us.
“So I guess we’re in-laws now. I mean you both want to get married someday, right?” Uncle Daniel said, pointing to Jayden and I, and we both nodded.
Especially Jayden. He nodded as if his life depended on it.
“Fine, we accept your relationship. But no pregnancy please, my baby girl still needs to work for a while after her graduation.” My dad said and the rest agreed.
“Talking about her graduation, should we plan a surprise for her?” Raphael asked and they all shook their heads.
Uncle Cedric facepalmed himself, probably wondering where he went wrong in raising Raphael. “She is literally sitting right there, right there in front of us and you want us to plan a surprise for her. You are getting dumber by the day.” He bashed and Raphael pouted at him.
“That’s all we want to tell you. We are going now, we have somewhere to be.” Jayden stood up with me, refusing to let go of my hand.
“Where?” Raphael wiggled his eyebrows.
“A Place,” Jayden spelled. “Flower needs a nice meal. It’s our fifth year anniversary and I haven’t treated her yet, so bye.”
“Stop holding her hands in front of me, you make me think she’s growing older.” My dad cooed and Uncle Cedric snickered.