Stone's Diary: Kairo

Chapter 33.) Talk About It

"Hey... can we talk?" Renae asked King, leaning against the door of his quiet room. It's been an hour since Kairo had left to go over Kelly's place and Renae had figured that King would be walking around the house by now, but he was still inside the room, quiet.

"Yeah... wassup?" King attempted to seem a bit excited but Renae took the liberty of restudying his body language.

"You've been in here since you... y'know... moved in... what's going on?" she closed the door behind her and sat next to him on the sofa.

King remained quiet for a moment, just wanting to calm his raging thoughts before he glanced at her. He had a lot on his mind but decided to talk to her about the less upsetting topic.

"You know I love you, right?"

Renae became nervous, "Did I... did I do something?"

"I love you and I love how much you've changed, I swear I do... I just... I'm not trying to come at you, I'm just asking because I want to hear your side... did you disrespect dukes?"

Renae's twisted her face up and thought to get crazy but stopped herself. She already had to lay hands on her ex-best friend and now her mother-in-law was lying?

"I know how you are, Nae and that's why I'm asking because tha' way she was explaining things... it ain't even sound right."

"So why are you asking me this as if you believed her a little bit?" she frowned.

King just stared at her for a moment then Renae sighed, "Sorry," she mumbled then shook her head, "Maybe the way that I spoke to her was mean but I was just overwhelmed. I felt like she didn't care about your drinking problem and yes, I said some stuff that I shouldn't have, but I don't regret it at all."

King studied her for a moment then cleared his throat, "I love you, let me start with dat and I stand with you a hundred percent for how you handled things but I don't want y'all beefin, ma."

Renae pursed her lips, "She said some foul shit."

King chuckled, "And didn't you?"

Renae cut her eyes at him, "In my defense, I was defending you since you couldn't."

King smirked, "You ain't get all crazy with her?"

"I mean..." Renae paused then busted out laughing when King quirked a brow. "I didn't... she was going in... there was a small moment where I had a thought to put my hands on her, but I didn't."

King tried not to laugh.

"Look," Renae took a deep breath, "I love you... I realized that no matter what, I always will love you and King... don't take this wrong, but like I told your mom... when it comes to her being a mother to you, she is never there for you the way that she should be."

"Nae-"

"I'm sorry," she cut him off, "But it's how I felt and feel. She knew you had a problem and let you get out of control. Yeah, you're grown but damn it, I left you with her, hoping that she would look out for you... I just couldn't understand why, I was able to get you help quicker than she could, and she's been with you through all of this longer than I have been."

"She doesn't know how to react in situations like dat... I'm not excusing her and I can't blame her for my drinking problem but after other incidents... Nae, I had to tell myself dat I'm just not what she really wanted and I've been learning to be ok with it."

"And that's not fair to you," she reminded. "What if things would have never gotten back good between us? You could have died, King and I kept trying to get her to understand that but she... I just won't say anything else," she mumbled the last part.