Page 49 of The Impact (Parachutes #3)

“Yaaaassss , Auntie Tahli! Body is tea!” Akemi fed her ego. Tahli even put something extra in her walk off.

“You saw Tahli’s extra-stank walk?” Abby wasted no time to joke to Paige when they were all near the patio. Tahli slapped Abby’s pink arm.

“Yeah fucking right.”

“Hold on. Pretend I’m Tahli…”

“I’m a pretend you got ass, too,” Paige insulted, and Abby slit ocean eyes, throwing an invisible ass from side to side right after.

“Abby, what the hell are you doing? You gonna break your hips.” Robert joined in on the antics.

“I was just imitating your daughter’s stank walk.”

“Oh, just now? After hitting that electric slide? Oh, yeah. Me and Nessa were cracking up. Extra stank,” her father surprisingly agreed, and Tahli shoved him.

“Daddy!”

“It’s okay, baby. Put a little funk on it. Make him regret that loss.”

Tahli’s head shook, and like a lion to carnage, Vin made his way over.

“Good luck.” Tahli’s father slapped Vin’s chest, leaving them.

“Uh-oh,” Vin quipped. “Fuck did I walk up on?”

“Hold up, Big Homie. I think you got a little drool right here,” Paige teased, wiping near Vin’s beard.

“What?” Vin chuckled, pushing her hand away.

“You know, nigga,” Paige smirked. “I saw you over there. Watching that ass,” Paige sang like the Groove Armada track, and Tahli choked on her wine cooler. Even Vin snorted. Drew walked right into their spirited energy.

“Good times over here, huh?”

Vin cracked his knuckles, retreating back to Bianca. Progress , Tahli knew. Old Vin would have sent Drew through the patio door for no reason other than infringing on his space.

“What happened?” Tahli tugged on Drew’s stained shirt. He smirked as Abby and Paige returned to dancing.

“Your pops bumped into me and now I’m wearing the barbecue chicken.”

Tahli chuckled. “What is it with my father and you and barbecue sauce?”

When Drew and Tahli dated back in college, her father dumped ribs all over Drew.

“I think he does it on purpose because I’m not Vin.”

Tahli sucked her teeth. “Knock it off.”

“For real. I should dress up like that mothafucka for Halloween. Get the fake tattoos and one of those foam Superman costume muscle joints.” Tahli laughed hard to the cloudless sky.

“Come upstairs, silly. I have something for you to change into.”

“Don’t be giving me no old high school boyfriend’s clothes now.”

“I think I actually have an old jersey from my ex-boyfriend Kevin,” Tahli giggled.

“Oh, Mr. I Believe I Can Fly?” Drew kept the Kevin balcony jokes current.

They were tucked upstairs in her father’s room where Tahli stole a Ralph Lauren t-shirt from her father’s drawer. “He won’t miss it. He’s already had his share of brandy.” Straight from Calvados, France. A lifetime supply from Vin, Tahli wouldn’t say.

Drew peeled off his soiled shirt to replace it, but Tahli couldn’t help grazing her fingers across his toned core before he could. In turn, Drew stepped closer, kissing her tenderly.

“You trying to get into trouble in your parents’ bedroom like we’re sixteen,” Drew joked into her mouth.

“He really ain’t gonna like you if he catches us,” she uttered to her male-model of a man, turned on.

“See, I knew his ass didn’t like me. All the money I spent on cigars for nothing.” They were mid-giggle when three hard bangs on the bedroom door rattled it. Tahli’s breath trapped in her throat at the notion of getting caught by her father in her father’s room. She and Drew froze.

“Tahli!”

Her mouth flew open at Vin’s bass coming through the door, and Drew scowled.

“Yeah?” She called out.

“Get out here. It’s time to cut the cake.”

Tahli was unsure how to respond. Drew’s visible irritation didn’t help.

Another thunderous bang almost broke the door off the hinges, snapping Tahli and Drew’s heads, jolting them. Drew blazed toward the door, but Tahli blocked him, hands clasped in a plea of peace. When she cracked the door open, she knew instantly.

Vin’s glassy eyes were packed with fury, shifting between hers, as if searching for confirmation. Dali’s eighth-grade graduation. All those sneaky and freaky barbecue adventures. Vin was burning with the notion that she and Drew had picked up where they left off.

“We’ll be right down,” she appeased, when he only stood there. Tahli attempted to shut the door, but Vin’s heavy foot wedged it open. Her shocked eyes flew up to his. A stare down ensued. Beyond the anger, Tahli caught the pain.

“Come on, Drew,” she muttered. Shaking his head, Drew pulled the fresh shirt on. They were trailing Vin when Drew had enough.

“Tahli, you don’t have to move when he says move. He’s not your fucking daddy.”

He used to be, she kept to herself, but Vin spun from the top of the stairs, and Tahli puffed an exasperated sigh.

“Speak to me, pussy.”

“You know what, Vin? I try to. I really try to keep it civil for Tahli and the kids, but I can’t keep letting the disrespect slide, man.

I know how long you two were married and how hard losing Tahli is, because I was there, too.

But you think ‘cause what… you sold some drugs once upon a time, been to prison, and all that cliché shit, that I’m supposed to be scared of you?

I’m from Trenton, nigga. I’m far from soft. ”

Delayed mocking laughter echoed from Vin’s open mouth, after seconds crawled by. As if he’d been waiting for this version of Drew. An equal sparring partner.

“That’s what you think? You think I call you pussy ‘cause you not from the streets? Matter fact, you think I am who I am because I went to prison?” Vin’s lenses tightened, and Tahli scrubbed her hands down her face.

“Tahli, this who you marrying? You. Tahli Celine Mothafuckin’ Hall. You tryin’ to tell me this nigga’s on ya level, baby love?”

“Can we just go downstairs?” Tahli begged.

“No,” Vin objected. “Let me tell you something, boy. This woman right here? This woman that I helped mold through the years,” Vin haughtily professed, “She needs a man like the one she helped form me into. And it’s not you,” Vin promised.

“I know everything about Tahli. Don’t talk to me about losing Tahli. You don’t know shit about Tahli.”

Tahli gulped.

“I know her thoughts. Her fears. Why I’m not in the picture and why you are. More importantly, I know that if you were out of it, I could wrap my hand around her throat and pin her to any one of these walls.”

“That’s e-fucking-nough, Dalvin!” Tahli’s chest heaved. Cheeks flamed. “Just…ignore him,” she touched Drew’s chest.

“He can’t ignore me. Because he knows it’s true,” Vin taunted, closing the space between him and Drew. “I’m so interwoven throughout Tahli, I’m in her fucking DNA. You might as well have put that ring on my fucking finger.”

Running a hand through her locs, Tahli focused on her father’s hardwood floors.

“Can y’all please grow up and at least try to coexist? I’m not saying be friends. But at least be cordial?”

“Hell no.”

“Fuck no,” Vin spat on top of Drew, before turning and leading the way down the stairs.

“So, then he told Drew that he could grab me by the neck and pin me to any wall? Can you believe that shit?”

Another exchange of glances between Paige and Abby.

“So…are we cutting the cake, now, or are we hating Bianca?” Abby switched subjects.

“Both. Can we do both?” Tahli huffed, examining the woman before allowing her clenched stomach to relax.

“Come, Leah. Come join the tea party,” Abby called out to Tahli’s sister as she almost passed.

“We’re having tea with the cake?”

Abby slammed her hand on her auburn hair.

“Gossip, Zoe Saldana,” Paige teased.

“Oh! Tea,” Leah nodded. “Got it.”

“Okay, y’all are the only ones I can admit this to without being judged.

” Tahli turned to Abby, Paige, and her sister.

“But what in the buttered pasta is going on here? Like, y’all know Vin.

” She swept her eyes across them. “He could probably pull just about any woman he wants. You know these bitches nowadays ain’t got no standards, so the fact that he’s fine and got money…

that’s all they care about now. So again, what in the buttered pasta is this shit? ”

“Buttered pasta?” Leah scrunched up her face.

Growing up, Tahli asked for Nike and Leah wanted Skechers. While Tahli was into Destiny’s Child and Alicia Keys, Leah was the Crazy Town, Blink-182 girl.

“No sauce,” Abby elaborated.

“Plain Jane,” Paige expanded.

“Oh. I get it. No flavor. Well,” Leah shrugged, “maybe it’s not about looks. Maybe they have a connection?”

Tahli’s body stiffened. Slowly, Abby and Paige’s heads curved toward Leah. Paige sighed noisily.

“Leah, Leah, Leah. I know you’ve been in China these past years–”

“Japan.”

“Exactly. So, you missed the whole learning on how to give Tahli life advice.”

Leah’s head jerked in offense. “She’s literally my sister.”

“Right. The ball’s already set up. Ya just gotta hit it over the net,” Abby broke it down.

“She doesn’t want you to tell her what you think. She wants you to tell her what she thinks. In your voice,” Paige clarified, and Tahli sucked her teeth.

“Got it. In that case. No sauce. All butter. Not even. No butter. Just plain pasta. Not even al-dente. The store-brand kind.”

“That’s enough,” Paige muttered.

“She has no ass,” Abby rubbed her chin. “I thought Vin liked booty. He was always slapping yours and biting yours through your clothes.”

“She got a little ass. Little scoop you can cup your hand under–” Paige met Abby’s glare, before Abby shook her head. “Yup. Nope. She ain’t got no ass,” Paige corrected.

“I mean…she’s bouncing on a trampoline . You meet your boyfriend’s ex-wife for the first time, and you bounce on a trampoline?”

Tahli flipped her head to her sister in amazement, and Abby clapped.

“Good job, Leah!”

“Welcome to the tea party,” Paige chimed.

Tahli chuckled, zoning in on Bianca while they carried on. Who was she kidding? There was nothing wrong with Bianca. Take Vin out of the equation, and Tahli might’ve genuinely liked the woman.

Woman. Bianca was a woman. Not a girl, as Tahli had hoped.