Please excuse ANY grammatical errors.

January 17, 1993

~DeVanté's P.O.V~

"It warmed up from earlier." She shrugged.

"It feel colder." I stuck the key in the ignition and turned it to start. "Where you tyna go next?" I asked, turning to Tia.

"How does the hospital sound?" She turned to me.

I raised my eyebrow at her. "You breathin' fine right?"

"Yayas..." She is trying to be goofy.

"Then nahh, you said it yourself, you been in there way too long. So, where you tryna go?" I raised my eyebrow.

"The movies?" Tia asked with raised eyebrows. "Besides the premieres, I've only been twice. I wanna dress regular, and comfortable to enjoy a film."

"The movies?" I moved my head back. "You know who we are?" I raised my eyebrows at her.

"I do, BUT it's like three almost four in the morning. Not many people are sitting in a movie theater at this time. There aren't any HOT new movies, so I think we'll be fine. Plus, it's dark. Bodyguards, remember?"

"Yo movie just came out in, what? November. What about it? And what kinda theatre you tryna go to? The drive thru or..?"

"It's a historical movie. Who would watch that this late? Well, early..." She squinted her eyes at me in disbelief. "We can go to the sit in theatre."

"A'ight, let's go then." I finally pulled off after the car warmed up enough.

"Let's get to getting then." She laughed.

"What you tryna see?" I glanced at her.

"We'll see when we get there..." She sang.

"A'ight, be that way then." I chuckled.

"What way?" She laughed.

"Noth- nevermind."

"What was up with you at the restaurant, though?" Her face held a curious expression.

I cleared my throat, "What you mean?"

"I don't know, you were just acting weird." She shrugged. "Are you okay?"

"I'm good. What about you?" I said paying attention to the road. I know exactly what she means but sometimes we got to pretend. You know what I'm sayin'?

"I'm... fine." She croaked.

"I'm not believing that." I chuckled. When I looked over, I saw that Tia's face was flushed. It was red, but not the flattered kind of flushed. "Yo, what's goin' on with you?" I looked at the road then back at her for a second. She mumbled something incoherent. "Huh?"

"Pull over." She mumbled this time.

"We on the freew-"

"Pull the FUCK over!" She said then covered her hands over her mouth.

I switched lanes. I had to move over two lanes to pull over. When I finally was able to, the passenger door flew open. She stuck her whole upped body out of the door and threw up. I'm talking about gagging and all. I put the car in park. I began tapping my fingers against the steering wheel and looked ahead out of the windshield.

The car that held the guards was parked way ahead of us on the same side. Two of them cam walking towards us, it was Jax and Creed. Creed kept slipping, so he held on to Jax. That's what his ass get for trying to wear Air Jordans in bad weather. I unbuckled my seatbelt and leaned over closer to Tia.

"You done?" I asked her, digging into the glove compartment.

"Mmm," is all she let out. What does it mean? I don't know... I grabbed some tissue from the glove compartment, and tore some off the roll.

"Here." I called out to her. She turned around and grabbed.

"Thank you." She croaked out.

"You welcome." I told her. Jax and Creed finally made it over to the car. Creed came over to my window, he had to stand close due to the traffic on my side. I rolled down my window.

"What's goin' on? Why we pulled over?" Creed asked me. I shifted my head towards Tia.

"Ahh, SHIT!" Jax yelled out once he saw Tia. "I stepped in it... Hey, you good?" He said to Tia.

She's obviously not okay. I saw her head nod yes. The door in the back on the passenger side opened up. Creed sat in the back seat, updating Apollo on the phone on the situation.

"No, you ain't." I spoke up. "Stop lying. We going back to the hospital. We done for the night."

"No." She said very hoarse.

"Aye, any of y'all got some water?" I asked Creed and Jax.

"Nahh," Jax answered and Creed just shook his head no.

"Check my bag." Tia said aloud. I reached into the back and grabbed her bag. I unzipped it dug through it. It was a fat ass bag of chips in there.

"Drink it." I said handing it to her. She grabbed it and and sipped it a few times. Afterwards, she sat in in the cup holder. "You done? You good now?" I asked. Then I rolled up my window, the wind is too cold. The whole left side of my face is freezing.

"Yeah, I think so." She nodded and put her legs back into the car.

"Cool, we can head on back to the hospital now. Y'all can just follow us." I said to Tia then to Jax and Creed. Creed got out the car, the both of them started walking back to their car.

"Nooooo, let's go to moviiieeeesss." She dragged out. "Weren't you the one who said that I been in there too long or something?" She really trying to imitate my voice.

"Yeah, I thought it was a pretty good idea at first, but now you all sick."

"I'm NOT sick. I just overate, that's all." She shrugged.

"You barely ate. Most of yo food in the back seat!" I frowned.

"It's more than I've eaten in a while. My stomach is smaller. You stuffed more food in my mouth AFTER I said I was full. Let's go to the movies."

"ONE BITE! That was all I stuffed in your mouth." I chuckled.

"Same thing with Squidward. It all went to his thighs, THEN he blew up."

I looked over at her like she was stupid. "You really over here talking about a cartoon?" I raised an eyebrow in amusement.

"Uhh... DUHHH!" She said in an obvious tone.

"Ain't no duhh. This is REAL life, that blue nigga is just a character." I reasoned.

"BUT, it has real life situations."

"Like what? Drinking water underwater? A squirrel with a spacesuit on?"

"No, but-"

"Exactly! We not finna argue about to damn cartoon. We need to get back to where we need to get, which is the hospital." I said turning the key that was in the ignition.

"No... The movies, plllleeeeaaasssseee?" She said with her hands folded together. I glanced at her then pulled off. "I promise that I feel fine. See." She danced in her seat, well attempted to.

"Okay. Damn, change of plans AGAIN. We goin' to the movies." I said giving in. "If something else like that happens, we turning right back around. Ion care how far we made it." I pointed at her.

"Awesome!" She said loudly, then clenched her ribs.

"Aye..."

"I'm fine."

"Mm, a'ight. But imma need you to do me a favor." I said seriously.

"Yeah?" She raised her eyebrows.

"Grab yo bag from the backseat, and grab you some of that mint gum I saw. Cause that breath on Andre 3000 mode right now! Probably need the whole damn pack." I chuckled.

She smacked her lips and grabbed it from the backseat. "Thanks for telling me though. Most folk'll just let you walk around with your breath smelling like watussy." She put the gum in her mouth, then put her bag back where it was.

"Most folk'll?" My face scrunched up.

"That's what I said, right?"

"Yeah, but 'most folk'll,' that's southern as hell. Sound like you straight outta Mississippi." I laughed holding my stomach with my left hand.

"Haha, so funny that I had to grab my tummy. Donald, stop that, 'fore I make that nose bloody."

I stopped laughing. "You all talk, you ain't gon' do shit." I cracked up louder this time.

"I won't, BUT I didn't have anything else to say. You're going to stop talking about the way I talk." She pointed at me with a smirk.

"Hey," I shrugged, still amused at thw situations. "Another thing, that lil rhyme you did was shit." I shook my head.

"You're the one to talk? The rhyme you did for 'Gotta Love' was GREAT- magnificent even, but what have been better if we could understand ALL you said. You mumbled a lot."

"Ain't nobody ever told me that. I think all my words was mad coherent." I shrugged.

"Donald, I heard some of your words but most of them were just mumble. I had to listen to it a few times to really hear what you said. Was your tongue drunk?" She laughed.

"No. I bet if we ask five people, they would know exactly what I said on first listen." I said truthfully.

"Okay, what do you want to bet? I actually have a copy of it in my room, and we'll asked FIVE people." She smirked at me goofily.

"A'ight, let's bet on..." I said thinking, staring at the road ahead.

"How about whoever has the lesser votes has to donate for a good cause? Like children, homelessness, sickness, addiction etc. $10,000 to be exact, that isn't too much." She explained. That's a pretty good bet through.

"A'ight, bet. I bet imma win though." We were off the freeway and I was no at a red light.

"Shake on it." She held out her gloved covered hand.

"Okay," I shook it. "Deal." I agreed and we drove in comfortable silence for the rest of the ride.

Finally, I pulled up to the theatre. The amount of cars here is LOW. It was most likely workers and a few customers inside. I turned off the car and looked over at Tia. She was grabbing her bag from the back then turned back around.

"Well, we here." I announced, then opened my door. Again, her hand touched her doorknob. "Fuck I tell yo ass?" I laughed. "DON'T. TOUCH. THAT. DO'." I said, warning her.

She held up her hands like a criminal that was told to hold up their hands by the police. I got out the car and went over to her side, open the door and picked her up. I closed the door with my knee. Apollo was ahead of us, and the other two was behind us.

"I thought we were headed back to the hospital?" Creed asked.

"Change of plans." I mumbled loud enough for them to hear.

"Again?" Jax laughed, walking ahead of us to open the door.

"Yeah, again. It wasn't entirely on me though. That was her." I said looking down at Tia.

"I'm sorry, I just don't feel like being there right now." Tia said apologetically.

"It's okay, we understand." Jax shrugged.

We walked up to the front desk. "Can uhh, we get two tickets for-" I looked down at Tia.

"The Last Boy Scout. I heard it was a good movie." She lowly said looking up at the options.

"This ain't about sellin' candy is it?" I asked her.

"Not that I known of... Bruce Willis and Damon Wayans are in it, so I highly doubt that." She said lowly.

"The Last Boy Scout. Oops, my bad uhh, can we get three- one, two- five tickets." I said counting heads.

"Hey, you that DeVanté Swing guy from Jodeci, and you that producer lady I see a lot. You was recently on the news." The guy who's name tag read 'Satan,' ummm... Tia acknowledged him then put her head in my shoulder.

"Yeah, that's me, Satan. I need my tickets." I held out my hand as far as I could with Tia in my arms. Tia grabbed it and held it out to him.

"Uhhh, it SUH-TAN, sir. It's pronounced Suh-tan, even mistakes the pronunciation." The guy corrected us. He grabbed the tickets and money, then handed it to them. "I'm sorry. Here you go. Anything else?" He asked me.

"Uhh, y'all want something?" I asked all of them.

"I'm fine." Tia mumbled.

"Some popcorn and a large cup for a slushy is good." Apollo said to me.

"Gimme two hotdogs and a large cup too." Jax said.

"A hotdog, cheese fries, a small popcorn, and a large cup is all I need." Creed said rubbing on his stomach. This nigga still hungry, we all just ate a whole bunch of food not too long ago.

"What they said, and give me a hotdog, medium carmel corn popcorn, and a large cup." I said to Satan for myself.

"Okay, that'll be $31.92." He told me. Movie theatre food be way too high.

I opened my waller and pulled out the money. "You sho' you 'on't want nothing?" I asked Tia.

"Water, Sandy water..." She said mimicking Spongebob.

"You play too much." I chuckled, I ordered it, and paid Satan.

"Coming right up." He told me and turned around. I watched him make the food. I don't trust nobody named Satan. He handed us the cups, then prepared the food.

"Thanks." I said and Jax grabbed the cups from the countertop. Satan turned around and placed the hotdogs and cheese fores on the counter. Them cheese fries looking kind of good. "Can I get another one of those cheese fries?" I asked Satan, who was doing the popcorn.

"Yeah, sure." Satan nodded at me.

He sat two popcorn, then made the other one. As soon as he finished Tia grabbed my stuff to hold, since I'm holding her. He told is what room, and pointed in the direction of the machines. We did what we needed and went into the theatre room. It was empty, we had the whole room to ourselves. Good!

"Where you wanna sit?" I asked her.

"The back. We're going to be breaking our necks if we sit in the front. It'll also be stupid when we got the whole room to ourselves.

"You right. Please, don't drop my shit." I said walking.

"Boy, I cannot control your bowels. Am I supposed to hold your cheeks together or something?" She said eyeing me. I just shook my head laughing.

We made it to pur chosen seats and sat down. The guards were slightly spread apart. Tia dug into her bag and pull out that big ass bag of chips I saw earlier.

(The BEST chips. They're sold up north, places like Indiana and Illinois. I don't know if these are sold in the west, south, or east of USA. If you compare these to Flamin' Hot Cheetos, Flamin' Hots taste like feet.😭😭💀)

"What are those?" I asked her.

"Hot Crunchy Kurls. They're the BEST chips EVER. They sell them back home and whenever I go back, I get a whole bunch of them. I want you to try them." She smiled.

"Them look hot as hell. Hand me some." I grabbed them and opened them.

"Dang," she laughed. "Help yourself."

"I will." I said pouring some in my right hand. I put shook them out my hand, into my mouth and crushed down on them. "These dope." I said while still crunching.

"I know..." She nodded. My nose started to run a bit, but it hit. I grabbed a napkin to wipe my nose.

"They a lil hot." I said sniffling.

"Uh, duhhh ye big goof." She laughed. "Hence the fire on the bag and the color of the chips." She shook her head at me.

"Yeah..." I said wiping my nose.

"Taste it with your caramel popcorn. It's so good. The sweet and spicy is a good mix." She nodded slowly.

I gave her a look of disgust, and shook my head. "Nahh." I frowned.

"Come on, it's so good. Give it a try." She urged.

"A'ight." I ate thw popcorn and chips at the same time. "Okay, you might be on to something. I'm not even a big fan of spicy, but this right here is good as hell." I smacked.

"I'm telling you." She chuckled. "The movie is starting." She quieted down, focusing on the screen, and I did the same.

~Tia's P.O.V~

This movie is actually good. The movie came out in 1991 and it's 1993, I'm always late on movie and the hype of them. During the end of the ending credits of the film, I picked up my phone to see the time, it read 6:14 a.m. I also had a bunch of missed calls from my brother. I sat up in my chair, and called him back.

"Hello?" I heard my brother sat on the other end of the phone.

"You called?" I said as my eyes traveled around the room.

"Now, you KNOW I call. I called you about three times. The hospital phone, and yo cell. What was you doin'?" Yasir asked.

"Boy, have have waaayyy more hair than you." I laughed out.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. What is yo baldheaded behind doin' though to not be answering your phone? You in there all day, so what was the reason?"

"I, uhh... I was asleep." I said 'TRUTHFULLY' to Yasir. "Why'd you call though?" I asked him.

"Do you want anything? I just got off from work and I was coming up there to see you while I'm still awake. I ain't seen my little sister in two days." He chuckled.

I looked over to Donald who was next to me, with wide eyes. He mouthed to me. "What?"

I need to stall Yasir. "Yeah, where are you?"

"At home now, I'm finna head out though in a lil bit. Imma go get something to eat first. You want anything?"

"I- where are you going to eat?" I asked and mouthed to Donald that we had to go.

"Aye, y'all ready to roll?" Donald saud aloud to Jax, Creed, and Apollo.

"Who is that? Is that goofy lookin' nigga there?"

"Who? Donald?" I raised my eyebrow, and began to put on my winter wear.

"Please don't ever say that lame ehh name again, and yeah, I'm talkin' about that dude."

"Yeah, he's here, he's just asleep. That was the television." I came up with a quick excuse. Though there was a film, well the end of one anyways that was playing. "You can get me a burger and some fries. I love you, see you in a bit. Bye."

"A bur-" he said, but I already hung up before knowing what he said.

"Ooops..." I said aloud. "We have to go, my brother will be on his way to the hospital in a bit, and he will spaz out if he knew I left. Especially of he knew I was out with you."

"I ain't scared of his ass, but a'ight, we can roll out. He 'a be a'ight." He said zipping up his coat.

I stood up, and Donald kicked the back of my feet. Not too hard, just enough for me to lose my balance and fall back into my seat. He had a tight grasp on the upper half of my body, but fell back into my chair. "What are you doing?" I said with widened eyes.

He blank faced me. "You so fuckin' hardheaded. How many times I gotta tell yo ass?"

I frowned at him, confused. "Huh? Dude, what are you talking about?"

He swept me off my feet, or behind... I was in his arms bridal style "I'm talkin' about you-this. How many times I gotta tell yo ass that I'm carrying you?"

"I forgot, I'm in a rush man." I chuckled lowly.

"Rush? For what? You grown as hell. Let's go y'all!" Donald yelled out.

"I know, I just don't want to hear y'all bicker."

I mean, they get along pretty well. Its just that they bicker sometimes, and your girl don't want to hear that. Again, they're cool with each other, my brother likes the fact that he showed up when family didn't, specifically our sperm donor. We made it back to the hospital in the timespan of thirty-five minutes. It was just in time for me to put on my gown, because as I came from the bathroom my brother was just sitting down in the seat he usually sits in. Donald was sitting up in his usual seat. I already had on the part of the machine that goes on me on.

"Yo ass spent the night or somethin'?" Yasir asked looking at Donald.

"Yup, I slept here." Donald shrugged. "You here early yourself."

"Just came from work, and she my sister. Seeing if she good is what I gotta do." Yasir said with a nod.

"I respect that." Donald nodded back. I was now just sitting down on the bed and listened to them speak to one another.

"How you feelin'?" Yasir directed the conversation towards me.

"I'm fine." I shrugged laying back.

"You can't be, you wanted me to get you a burger, which I ain't get. You ain't smokin' that stuff now, is you?" Yasir's face held a skeptical expression. De bursted out in laughter.

I sat up in the bed. "Now, you know dang well..."

"Closed mouths don't get fed. I had to ask. I ain't get it though. I got you a chicken sammich though." He handed it to me and sat back down.

"Thank you." I grabbed it and sat it down on the food tray table thingy next to my bed.

Yasir looked at my leftover food from the restaurant. "You welcome, but you already got uneaten food. Why you have me get mo'?" His head cocked to the side.

"I forgot about that, but I'll eat the SAMMICH another time. Thanks bro."

"Where is that from?" He asked.

"I- I don't even know." I shrugged, which was true because I didn't even look at the name on the building. I mostly paid attention to the architecture of it.

"It's from this one bomb ass place that I always got to. It's called Old Lady's Southern Cuisine. I go there everytime I come here." Donald spoke up.

"People at work be talking about that place. I heard it was good." Yasir spoke to Donald.

"What? You wanna try some?" I asked Yasir.

"You know I ain't finna turn down no food. What kind of question is that!?" He raised his voice in shock.

"Don't I know..." I mumbled, mostly to myself. "I'm just asking. Have some." I motioned to the plate. "It's not hot though." I added on.

"Ion care. You know me. It it a spoon in there?" Yasir ask me.

"There is a spork in there. I ate off of it though."

"Ion car- Wait, you ain't been doin' nothing with yo mouth have you?" Yasir raised his eyebrow at me, then looked over at Donald.

"Boy, if you don't stop asking mw these dumb ol' questions..." I trailed off. "NO!" I yelled out.

"I'm just making sure." He said and grabbed the bag covered, foam container. I laid back again and looked up at the ceiling. I was now in more pain than earlier. "Why yo machine ain't plugged in?" Yasir stood up again and walked to it. He pulled on the cord that was out of the socket.

I looked at Donald, and he looked back at me. I forgot about hooking it back up. Probably the cause of this pain. I was hurting earlier at the restaurant, but it was tolerable, I just ignored it. My pain tolerance is pretty high. "I probably unhooked it when I was asleep."

"From the wall?" Yasir looked at me then back down at the cord. "I'm not the smartest person in the world, but, I know you sleep wild sometimes, but it ain't enough to pull out the cord from dang near behind the bed. Why come it ain't notify the nurse when it happened? There should be something that notify the burses that it's unplugged. What if you died?" Yasir said then pressed the button on the side to call in a nurse.

A nurse came in within seconds. "Is everything okay?" The male nurse said eyeing me and the other two people in the room.

I cleared my throat and spoke up. "Yes sir, everything is just fi-"

"Nahh, why didn't it notify nobody when it got unplugged?" Yasir cut me off, pointing to the machine cord in his hand. Me nor Donald even thought of nurses being notified.

"One of our nurses made a mistake earlier today, which turned it off. I'll be sure that it'll never happen again." The nurse stated amd walked over to plug it back up.

"It's okay, don't worry about it." I smiled.

"Don't wor- look, if that happens again I will be contacting someone." Yasir looked at me in disbelief and back at the nurse.

"It's fine, sir. It was an honest mistake. I'm fine and that's all that matters." I held my smile. "Thank you." I nodded to him.

"You're welcome. Again, I'm sorry." The nurse bowed and left the room.

"Fuck is he bowing fuh?" Donald said confused.

"Shhh, come on now. Leave the man be." I eyed Donald. "You too." I said to Yasir.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah... Ion give a-" Yasir cut himself out by eating some of the food from the restaurant Donald and I went to. He shook his head in approval. "Mm, good. REAL GOOD." His mouth full of whatever food he filled it with.

"I know." I said eyeing the some of the food falling back into the tray from the outside of his mouth.

"It'd be better of you warm it up, and eat it like an adult." Donald looked at him in disgust.

"You can have it though. You know, since you like it and all." I spoke up.

"You sure?" He asked me from his seat, looking up from the tray.

"Positive." I said very sure.

"A'ight, thanks." He continued to eat.

"Since you're here, we could listen to this track. Donald and I made a bet, and whoever loses have to donate some money for a good cause." I said to Yasir.

"What's the bet?" Yasir asked us.

"We can't say. I know if we do, you gon' take yo sister side. Just listen and see if you can understand what I'm saying." Donald told him then looked at me. "Where is the CD?" He asked me.

"The closet." I pointed.

"So I'm about to listen to yo music?" Yasir asked Donald.

"Yeah. Well JoDeCi." He nodded.

"Oh, a'ight. Don't disappoint me." Yasir joked.

"Disappointment? Nahh, that ain't even in my vocabulary. My shit is dope." Donald said cockily popping the CD into the radio.

"Fast forward to your part." I told him.

"Nahh, he need to hear the whole song." Donald said going to track eight. I shrugged at him. "Listen to this closely, tell me if you hear everything clear." He said to Yasir.

"A'ight." Yasir nodded, still eating on the cold food. We listened to it an was almost on the part.

🎶I gotta love I wanna give
If it's too much, baby, just tell me
I gotta love I wanna give
If it's too much, baby, just tell me
(DeVante, let's break it down now)🎶

🎶The girls and the crew get served but they got to do
What's up D? i think you wanna rapped to
What's up D? i think you wanna rapped to🎶 Dalvin's voice rang through the room.

My brother was bobbing his head with an ugly facial expression. It got to Donalds part and he bobbed his head even harder. He looks like he understood it, but who knows? The track finished off and Donald looked at me knowing he'd win.

"Okay, I see yo goofy lookin' ass. This track is dope, but what they hell did you say? I heard sex, wet, and raw skin." My brother raised his eyebrow at De.

"Damn..." Donald sighed.

"That's one to your ZILCH." I stuck out my tongue with folded arms.

"We still got four more people to ask though. Don't get too excited." Donald pointed at me with an amused expression.

Author's Note: Who else had to listen to the track twice to really know what he said? Don't get me wrong it was bomb, it just took me a while. He is one heck of a producer amd writer.

Word Count: 4,815

Please feel free to like and comment. Feedback gives motivation, and motivation urges me to continue to write.

Thank you all for taking the time out of your day to read another chapter of this story.💚🖤❤💜💙💛