This is the end.

Thank you guys so freaking much. This has been the most fun I've had writing in SUCH a long time. Like, I can't tell you guys how refreshing this story has been. Trying something different from my cutesy, fluffy stuff has been great. I don't think I'm ever going to go back to writing that sort of stuff because I loved every second of writing this.

I hope you guys will follow me over to S A I N T and of course Burning Red (yes, there is a sequel). Once again, thank you guys soooo much.

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Kenzie

Ashley was done packing up his shit. I didn't really notice how big our room was with his bed out of here until now. I also didn't realize that he ate so much damn junk food and just threw it under his damn bed when he was done with it.

Moms was grumbling to herself about her nasty ass boys when I leaned against the door and kicked my foot up. "So, you gon' let Ash move in with some white man?" I asked her.

She looked up, hair wrapped in African print cloth, a light blue night dress, a facial mask on – like she even needed that.

"Yes," Moms answered. "When it's time for a bird to leave the cage, you let it out," she said. "There's nothing more sorrowful than a bird singing in a cage in which he doesn't want to be."

I shrugged. "Reece iight, anyway."

"Is he?" she asked. She stopped sweeping, rested one of her hand on her hips and looked over to me. "Is he? I mean, I haven't really spent any damn time with him at all. That love profession on television was cute and all, but white people tend to be dramatic like that all day every day – it's not a sign that he love shim any more than Dennis did and certainly not a sign he'll be any more faithful."

"He's cool," I answered. "He saved my neck a few times."

Moms started sweeping again. "Well, you're not family until you've saved Gorgeous' neck at least a few times."

I snorted, and I saw more smile a bit as she swept. "I always thought you were the nasty ass brother," she mumbled to me. "But Ashley had a damn mountain of half eaten twinkies, an old Beyoncé B'Day album, and five condom wrappers under his bed." She said something I couldn't hear. "Thank God neither of you are girls. I don't think either of you are ready for kids."

"What makes you think we'd get pregnant?" I asked.

"I found five condom wrappers," she said. "Do you think Ashley and Dennis only had sex five times?"

"I straight up know they didn't," I answered. Then I shook at the memories of me walking in on Dennis backshotting my little brother. They moved the twin beds together and had Brandy's I Wanna Be Down playing in the background.

When I turned on the light, they ran like roaches in the kitchen up on the counters at night. Dee at least gave Ash the sheets to hide his body since I had seen him naked enough to know how what his dick looked like. Curved dick having redbone, smh.

I wanted to cut off Dee's head and slap the bottom right out of Ashley. I mean, if you was gonna be gay, at least be the man in this shit, you know?

But unlike the light skin Aunt Viv on Fresh Prince, I got used to it and accepted it over time.

I mean, shit, if I was sus enough I might have let Dee touch me a bit. We showered enough to know to know how much hair we had on our balls when we was growing up. Which I'm just realizing is as suspect as suspect can be.

"When are they getting back?" she asked.

"Not sure," I said. "Should take them a little over an hour or so."

Mms rested the broom against the wall next to my bed and sighed, looking around the room. "It's going to be a lot quitter now that he's gone. As a parent, you think you want peace and quiet, until you got it and then you realize that the noise is what makes everything come alive. Makes the walls dance, and the floors move."

"Not really," I snorted. "I'm the one with the big ass mouth."

Mom smiled. "Who you gonna be screaming at?" she asked. Her big smile turned into a small frown. "I wish I could take pictures of you guys and photocopy you, take you out when I wanted to see you."

"He just moving to another house, mm," I said. "He's not moving out of state or some shit."

"You wouldn't understand," she said. "You're not a parent yet."

"Thank gawt," I whispered. "I mean, I'd make a bomb ass dad or whatever, but I ain't here for a little nigga to be crying in my head all night. And cleaning u some lil nigga shit? No sir."

Mom smiled again. Mission accomplished. "What about you and Lisa?"

"It's Liza," I corrected. "We taking things a little slow."

Mom raised a brow. "I didn't realize you had a slow switch?"

I shrugged. "I didn't realize I had a relationship setting. I thought it was just fuck bitches, get money, smoke weed."

Moms rolled her eyes. "You're a mess of a person. A negro Picasso painting. Nonsensical, and artful all at the same time."

"I'm your mess of a person," I said. She went to pick up the broom, but I kicked off of the wall and stopped her. "I got it, moms."

The doorbell rang. She still gripped the broom. "No, I find cleaning therapeutic," she said. "Go turn on some Tasha Cobbs and go answer the door for me. It's probably your Aunty."

I groaned. "You invited Aunty Linda?"

"If I invited my sister to my husband's getting out of prison dinner, yes, I did." She eyed me. "Now do as I say, Kenneth, and go and get the door."

I scowled. "Yes."

She pulled my nose. "Yes, what?"

I fought free and rubbed at it; it burned. She always pulled so damn hard. "Yes Ma'am, damn."

She smiled. "Now go, Gorgeous."

I got out the room before she pulled my ears next and jogged down the stairs. The doorbell rang two more times. "I'm coming, woman!" I shouted. "Can't stand this hoe," I grumbled, as I opened it.

Except it wasn't Aunty. It was "Gina?" I said. "The fuck you doing here? I haven't seen you in months after I fucked yo best friend that we fought."

Big Gina, with her black hair and blonde tis, acrylic nails, dark skin, squinty eyes and fat face put one hand on her hips and cocked it. That's because she had another human life in her other hand.

"And why you carrying a sleeping midget?"

Gina stared, blinking. "It's a baby, you dumb ass. And it's your son."

I blinked. Three minutes went pass with us just staring at each other. "Girl, if you don't get off of my porch, buy a one way ticket via Bitch You Lyin' Airlines, board that flight to the great state Where's The Paternity Test Results Hoe and live a merry ass life in Inglewood in apartment number Don't Fucks With Me Girl."

Gina laughed. "Kenzie, this is your son."

"I ain't seent no paternity test, homegirl," I barked. "That could be mine. It could be Morris Chestnut's for all I know. I ain't accepting no parental responsibilities without knowing shit."

"Well," She said, poking the side of my head angrily, like she was texting me instead of speaking to me in person. "Call me Black Angry Woman Jesus cause bitch 'ask and you shall receive'." She narrowed her eyes. "I'm taking your ass to Maury."

Reece

"Reece?" Liza called me from my bathroom. I looked up from her from my bed, staring at the boxes Ashley had just dropped off, his clothes poking through its arms. "Can you give me a hand in here?"

I squinted. Her top body half was sticking out of the bathroom; I could see her pink shirt and bits and pieces of her hair falling backwards, but I could also see a bit of her thigh as well. "Who does it look like you only have a shirt?" I asked. "We're not blonde enough to the Lannister twins."

Liza rolled her eyes at me. "You're eno9ugh of a cunt to be Cersei," she sat.

I gasped, clutching my chest. "You can't call me that."

"Can you please shut up and come here you hairy asshole?" she barked and ducked back into the bathroom, leaving the door half cracked, enough for the light to stream out of it.

I grumbled and got up, at least having the decency to pull on my sweat pants before trudging into the bathroom.

Liza was seated on top of the (thankfully closed) toilet seat with her knees to her chest, rocking back and forth and singing that Korean song she hummed whenever she was close to a breakdown. "I can't help but notice that you're humming I Got A Boy," I mumbled, closing the bathroom door. "What TV show character was killed off unexpectedly now?"

"No one," she whispered.

I narrowed my eyes and walked over and hung back in front of her. "Liza?" I said, and knelt down in front of her. "What's wrong?"

She looked up at me and went to smile, but her lips instead trembled and quivered, and she snorted out a laugh. "Um. Sooooooooo, remember how I said Kenzie eats me out like noodles?"

I shook my head, in hopes the memory and it's accompany mental image would fly out of my head. "Unfortunately."

"Well," she huffed and reached down beside her where the trash can and (un-sanitarily) scrounged around until she pulled out a white stick and I have cummed up enough girls to know what that stick was.

"Bitch," I mumbled.

She groaned and dropped in on the ground in front of me. I picked it up and read it.

I swallowed. "But this is only one test; it could be a false positive like that one time I had that false positive HIV test and listened to Backstreet Boys' This I Promise You for three days straight, only eating stale carrots and half eaten chik-o-sticks."

She groaned again, massaged her forehead and pointed to the marble counter. I looked up and saw the edge of anther stick hanging off of it, like legs dangling off of the cliff. I reached up and grabbed it off of it.

I coughed into my hand. "Okay. So two?" I laughed, but it soured on its way out. "It takes three to be-."

She pulled another one from her hair and handed it over.

"Is this what they mean by natural fucking selection? Because I'm not a great person or a smart person – I mean I dropped out of college after, like, a month – but having a baby by a gang banger doesn't seem like the best life decision you can make."

"He's an ex-gang banger," Liza barked. "And you sound like mother."

That shut me up. I huffed. "So, how do we tell him?"

She shrugged. "I mean, how do you tell a boy that you're pregnant with his unborn child?"

"Rap it over a Kendrick Lamar song?" I snorted.

"Reece!"

"Okay, okay," I said, clearing my throat and standing up. "Let's just go over there. I have to take Ashley to get the rest of his things anyway."

She nodded. "Where is he anyway?"

Ashley

"So, when does he get out?"

"Tomorrow," Andrea, our family lawyer, said over the phone. "Have you guys thought about suing?"

"Mom and I have thrown the idea around, but...really we're just happy to have Dad out of prison." I sat down on Reece's couch and rested the cup of java that he made this morning down on the coffee table. This boy needed to buy coasters. "Kenzie thinks we should sue the white off of their skins, but I don't think Dad will like want to go through with it."

"Well, if you guys change your mind," she said, as Reece reentered the room, only in a pair of gray sweatpants, shirtless and nuzzled my neck, before dropping on the ground in front of me, between my legs.

I couldn't help but smile. "We'll call," I laughed, and hung up the phone tossing it to the side.

Reece tilted his head upwards; my hands went to his hair and ruffled it a bit. He smiled his mouth and his eyes, and I returned the favor by bowing forward to kiss him. He smiled, hummed something under his breath and rested his head in my lap. "I think I'm falling in like with you."

I smiled. "I think I'm falling head over Nike's in like with you too."

I got up to his knees and reached into his sweatpants pocket and pulled something out. The ring was in his hand. "You gave this back to me the night of that blackface party," he mumbled, smiling and looking down at it.

I watched his cheeks go from pale and to red, like sun pouring into a room during sunrise, through half opened blinds.

"I was wondering if I could get you to put this on your finger, for real this time. Not as an engagement. Not as a promise that we will last forever, but as a promise to try, for as long as we possibly can to aim for forever." Reece took my left hand into his and stared at me for the answer.

And it's here where I remember what Erika said. Boys will look at you and lie. Boys are trash. Nigga ain't shit. They aren't happy unless they fucking with your feelings. Dennis cheated. He was just the first that will look at you, tell you they love you and fuck you over in the end. It's what they do. It's doesn't matter what you look like or what you do. Love is a lie. Love isn't forever. Self-respect is. Education is. A degree is. There is a chance that you will die alone. 20 guys you will fall in love with and 20 guys will fuck with your feelings.

But what about the 21st?

Maybe I'm hopeless. Maybe this love will reach into heaven, only to fall back to earth – like Lucifer – and destroy everything on the ground below, cracking the earth in half and sinking it into the abyss. But what is life without risk? What is the point of living safe? What is the point of lying in your dying bed and saying: I played it safe, and now I die. Why not kiss the girl who you want to? Why not say I love you first? Why not say yes? Why not say yes?

What was the worst that could happen?

I looked at Reece. At the red in his cheeks. And then.

Then.

At the grey of his sweatpants. And the black of his freckles. And finally, the blue of his eyes. I smiled. Blue. Beautifully blue. Crystal blue. Shakily blue. I could see clear skies in them; the ocean; I could see his soul swimming, and diving and paddling away in them in them.

"Yes," I said.

Ma opened the door when we got to my family home. Family home. Not my. Felt strange, even without saying it out loud and just in my head.

"Beautiful," she greeted and reached out to hug me. I stepped up so she could. "I miss you already." She pulled us apart. "I hope you're in the mood to eat. Your family is here"

I looked over at Liza. They told me about her...problem. "Um. We will, but I think we need to speak with Kenzie first."

"He's upstairs," she said. She looked over to Liza and smiled. "It's good to see you Liza." Then she looked over at Reece and stared for a moment, placing a hand under her chin. "Lovely."

Reece frowned for a moment, looked over to me for a moment, swallowing and then back at Ma. "I'm sorry?"

"I name all my children," she said. "You and Ashley are together. That makes you mine. Kenneth is Gorgeous; Reece is Beautiful and you are Lovely."

She stretched out her hand to him, opening hem. Reece stiffened for a moment, hands to his side. I nudged him a bit and his eyes trailed over to me for the briefest of moments. Then Ma curled her fingers to him. Reece's cheeks twitched and he took a step; and then anther and then another, until he was in Ma's arms. He was taller, but so much smaller. She patted his back. "Welcome, son." She let him go and kissed his cheek.

Mom stepped aside. "Come in. Everyone is in the backyard, waiting on guys to get this party started."

Liza rushed in and passed Ma, who briefly acknowledged it, but let it go, closing the door behind us. "So Lovely," she began, "I heard you sold your company for nothing. Or that's what the newspapers are saying"

I snorted. "Yes, how will he ever survive on 60 million dollars?"

Reece chuckled and threw an arm over my shoulder, kissing the side of my face. "5 million actually."

I looked over at him. "What?"

"Yeah." He cleared his throat. "I was going to surprise you. But, I decided to invest into Urban Life & Times, now that you are running it. TO help you expand. Hire some people and become a really big force for good. Instead of Flavor, you'll be like Essence."

Mom raised a brow. "Was that a Living Single reference?"

"Yeah," I snickered. "I made him watch it to realize how much FRIENDS stole from Living Single."

"Wow," Mom laughed. "But you couldn't have invested 55 million dollars, did you?"

"No," Reece said. "Uh. Actually I've decided to only invest 10 million. The rest will be going into converting my family home – The RED Manor – into a safe place for underprivileged runaway urban youths. Get them the help they need and a place to stay if they can't afford anywhere else."

"Really?" I whispered.

Reece looked at me with his blue eyes. "Yeah. The Dennis Devon Center For Urban Youth."

"Mom smiled. "You sure know how to pick 'em," she said. She took Reece by the hand, as the doorbell rang again. "Beautiful can you get that? It's probably your Aunt who curved me in helping set this party up. Let me learn more about my step baby"

Reece looked back and shrugged his shoulders, and Mom walked away with him. I blew him a kiss and he stuck his neck out to catch it with his cheek.

I laughed and turned around, opening up the door. And unless Aunty had somehow morphed into a small, skinny dark skinned teenage boy, it wasn't her. "Hello?"

"Yeah," he started, but trailed off, looking behind me. "I'm looking for a Mr. King? I think his name is Lionel?"

"That's my Dad," I said.

He blinked up at me, mouth half open. "Oh. Well. Um. This is weird but. I'm his son."