Page 20 of Pulse of True Soulmates

He chuckled. “I don’t have time to talk to a bunch of different females. I have way too many things to do in life than juggle potentially crazy bitches. I talk to females one at a time for my sanity.”

“Yeah, that’s a good method. No one wants an Alesha on their hands,” Julian quipped with a smirk.

It was my turn to hold up my middle finger.

After Alesha’s pop-up at my lounge, she fell back because she found a new nigga to obsess over.

The only reason I knew about her and her new dude was because she felt it necessary to tag my page into a post about them that her dude was also tagged in.

I wasn’t sure what type of dude she had, but in my mind, he screamed pussy.

There was no way that I would allow Aeon to tag another dude in a post with me for any reason.

My phone rang on the table that we sat on. I picked it up when I saw it was Fatima. “What’s up, Tima?”

“Get to Presbyterian Hospital. Aeon had a bad episode. I had to call the ambulance.” Fatima’s voice was panicked.

I jumped up from my seat. “What the fuck? I’m on the way.” I disconnected the line. “Aeon had to be rushed to the hospital. I got to go.”

All of us got up to head to the hospital because there was no doubt that their women would be at the hospital too.

I had a lot of questions because Aeon has had some bad episodes, but between me, Midnite, and Fatima, we were always able to get her heart rate down.

Before I pulled out of Tiberius’s driveway, I texted Mr. Vernon to let him know to get to the hospital.

Someone was going to have to tell me something.

It took almost twenty minutes to get to the hospital from Tiberius’s out of the damn way house. When I rushed into the emergency room, my steps slowed for a second. The fuck.

“Declan!” Fatima’s voice caught my attention. I rushed over to her. Midnite came right to me when I was close.

“Fatima, what happened?” When I looked behind her, Iesha, Leydi, and Jesika were in seats. Iesha had fire in her eyes, so whatever Fatima was about to tell me I knew I wouldn’t like it.

She huffed. “We were at the lounge for brunch, our normal routine. Aeon got a text message from Ariel asking about meeting again with her skip head ass daughter. I know Aeon told her that she was busy, but she must have told her that she was in the lounge. Next fucking thing we know this?—”

“What the fuck are you doing here?” The deep timbre of Mr. Vernon’s voice caught us all off guard. You could see the figurative smoke expelled from his pores.

Ariel jumped up from her seat. Who I could only assume was her husband and daughter sat next to her. “Ver-Vernon, I was at the lounge when she got sick. I came there so she could meet her little sister.”

“You ambushed her with the shit!” Iesha popped up out of her seat. “Your silly ass thought it was a good idea to pop-up where the daughter you abandoned was to meet the daughter you chose not to abandon?”

Ariel’s face tightened and a hand kissed her hip. “Who are you? I don’t damn know you, and you don’t know me.”

I loved the way the girls cut for Aeon. She went from having one crazy ass friend to having four. There was a current debate on who was the craziest, Iesha or Fatima.

“Is that what you did, Ariel? Did you try to push your damn child on my daughter? Yeah, that’s what you did,” Mr. Vernon said before he turned his back on her.

You could tell that Ariel was trying to maintain her composure. “She is not just your daughter, Vernon. Aeon is my damn daughter too.”

When he turned around and rushed toward her, me and the guys stepped in front of him. “Whoa, Mr. Vernon. Calm down. She’s not worth all of that,” I told him.

Ariel’s husband was out of his seat now. He stood slightly in front of his wife. Their daughter must have had her headphones on the loudest level to watch whatever was on her tablet. She hadn’t looked up once.

He lifted his hand up in mock surrender.

“She’s your daughter too, huh? Let me ask you something, what’s her favorite color, movie, cartoon?

What was her favorite toy? How old was she when she started menstruating?

Do you know any of those, shit? Hell, what’s the fucking name of her condition with your slack ass.

“You’re the woman who dropped your daughter off and said you want her so bad, take her. Stop acting like you’ve been around. If you hadn’t moved to Charlotte, your ass would still be in the fuckin’ wind. You are so fucking selfish!” Mr. Vernon was pissed.

Ariel’s husband took a step forward. “Hold on, you’re not going to talk to my wife like that! There is nothing wrong with her wanting her daughters to meet.”

“Nigga, who the fuck are you? Get fucked up where treatment is available,” Mr. Vernon said.

“You know what? It’s not worth all this energy for that chick.

” He looked around at Ariel. “Stay the fuck away from my daughter. If she wants to deal with you, it will be on her terms, not yours. Now get the fuck out of here.”

Ariel stood there frozen like the rest of us. I was genuinely surprised by his reaction to her. Is this an old person crash out? Fatima was the only one that didn’t look fazed. “Vernon, I just want to make sure she’s alright.”

“When she wants you to know that she’s alright, she’ll let you know. You are not wanted here,” Mr. Vernon said through gritted teeth. An intense stare down began.

If I didn’t know any better, I would say that Ariel was trying to make herself cry, but the tears wouldn’t come.

After she realized how foolish she looked, she turned around, tapped her daughter’s shoulder, and told her that it was time for them to go.

The three-piece family stalked out of the waiting room.

Mr. Vernon moved to Fatima and asked what happened.

Overwhelmed . . . my baby got overwhelmed.

The pop-up from her mother was a lot and it was just too much.

Per what Fatima told us, Aeon became irate, and it was downhill from there.

When I sat down, Midnite sat at my feet.

I felt the worry that came from him. “She’s going to be alright,” I told him as I rubbed his back.

It was another thirty minutes before the doctor told us that she would be fine and that some of us could go back. Mr. Vernon, Fatima, and I went back while everyone else decided to leave and check on her later. We didn’t want to overwhelm her again.

Aeon was awake when we walked into the room. Midnite was the first one to her when he jumped on the bed. Next it was her father with kisses to her face. Fatima and I smiled at the interaction. I prayed to be even half of the father that he was.

“I’m so sorry, Daddy. I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened.” Tears fell from Aeon’s eyes. I wasn’t sure why she felt the need to apologize.

Her father shushed her. “You have nothing to be sorry for. If anyone should be sorry, it should be Ariel. She had no right to ambush you like that.”

Fatima went to the other side of the bed. “Best friend, that lady knows her ass was dead wrong. You told her two days ago that you weren’t ready to meet that lil girl or her husband. For her to pop up like that was wrong.”

I stood back to let Fatima and Mr. Vernon have their time.

I’d already canceled all my appointments for today.

I planned to stay here until she was discharged, then stay at her house until she felt better.

When I said until she felt better, I didn’t mean only physical.

The day after my baby had dinner with her mother, she went into a depressive episode for a few days.

On top of Aeon’s POTS diagnosis, she was also diagnosed with anxiety and major depressive disorder which was not the same as bipolar disorder.

Aeon sighed. “She texted me and asked how often I came to the lounge because she wanted to bring her husband. I told her that I was there often. I mean it is my boyfriend’s establishment.

I happened to tell her that I was there at the time,” she said with her eyes ping ponged between us.

“I never thought she would pop the hell up.”

“Baby girl, I’m telling you now that you do not have to interact with her if you do not want to.

It is your choice, and don’t allow anyone to make you feel obligated to do so,” her father told her with soft eyes.

“The same way your mother chose not to interact with you all those years, you can make the same decision if you want to.”

There was a moment of silence before her focus moved on me.

Her smile was weak, but it was there. The doctor told us that she needed fluids because she was severely dehydrated, which pissed me off because I was on her about her water intake.

She hates water. I’d had to go as far as to tell her that she couldn’t get any dick until she drank at least forty ounces that day. She hates those days.

“Declan, I understand if you don’t want to deal with this. I know it’s a lot.” New tears released from her lacrimal glands. “I don’t want you to think that you have to be balled and chained to a disabled person.”

She only calls me Declan when she is serious about something. This was not how I envisioned what I was about to do. I had a whole plan, but God clearly had a different one. I moved toward the bed to take her father’s place. I didn’t feel the need to address her ludicrous statement.

“Aeon, you know I love you, right?” After she nodded her confirmation, I continued.

I pulled the ring box that was still in my pocket and opened it.

I tittered at her and Fatima’s gasp. “With the people that you love the most, I want to ask you to be my wife.

I love every part of you, including your speed racer pulse. You are my heartbeat.

“You’re my soulmate. Will you let me change your last name?” She sat frozen.

Midnite lifted himself to smell the ring. When he lay back down and put his head on Aeon’s lap, I felt like he approved. Like, that lab nigga always had an opinion.

“Aeon, you have to answer the man.” Fatima pushed her shoulder lightly to bring her out of her daze. When Aeon glanced at Fatima, she smiled. “You going to answer?” Fatima asked.

Aeon peeked at her father who gave her a nod. “Yes, I’ll marry you. I love you too.”

I took the ring out of the box to place on her finger. After it was secured there, I leaned in and gave her a kiss. This woman was my forever. There was no condition, situation, or person that would keep me from her. Without her, I had no pulse.