American Woman: Book 4

Chapter 3

"Looks like OutKast and Beyoncé are winning pretty much everything." Brian informed us as we entered the living room.
"Cool." Prince replied. "Honey I'm going to make sure the workers have everything ready to go and know what to do. I'll be right back." He tells me as I take a sleepy Devon and lay her on my chest as I watch the tv. I was a little bummed that I could be watching all of it live but instead was watching it on a screen in my house. A few minutes later, Prince returns and sits down to watch it with us. "I think Beyoncé has won five awards!" Kim remarks.
"That's more than I've won in my entire career." Prince replies, shaking his head.
"How is that even possible?!" Brian asks.
Prince shrugs his shoulders. "But has she won an Oscar?" I add. "Not to downgrade her talent but there's not as much competition now. And there's a lot more categories than there used to be. Awards don't equate to talent that's for sure."
Prince turns to me and gives me a quick kiss "thanks baby. Maybe I'll add more to my collection next year."
"I bet you will." I wink.
Looking down at Devon, Prince chuckles, "She's out! Maybe they need to go ahead and head back to their place with her."
"I'm kinda stalling." I admit. "I ran into Lenny and Zoe in the lobby before the show and Zoe really wants to come meet Devon. Not sure if they'll show or not, but I would hate to send Devon off and then Zoe be disappointed. I told them to come early if they wanted to see her though. Looks like the show is almost over. Let's wait a few more minutes. Maybe they're on their way."
"Ok, but I don't want her here once a lot of guests arrive." Prince replies.
"I know." And as if on cue, Lenny and Zoe were shown in by the greeters.
"Hey man." Prince stands up and fists bumps Lenny. "Where's Zoe?"
"Uncle, it's me!" Zoe giggles.
"Holy shit! I thought you were Lenny's new woman or something."
"Ewwww!!!" Zoe says in disgust.
"This isn't right. She's taller than me!" Prince turns to me in pure shock. "What happened to that little girl I helped write my symbol?! Or followed me around non stop?" He sighs.
"I still remember how to draw it! I have heels on. Here let me take them off." She replies. "There. Oh um guess I'm still taller." She chuckles.
"Yep even with Prince in his heels." Lenny jokes. "Hey if you don't think it's right, try being her father! I almost beat up several men tonight. Threw out the words 'illegal' and 'underage' a few times to scare everyone around. Of course when you're showing off as much skin as she is..."
"Oh dad drop it! Now I'm here to see Devon." Zoe gushes while making her way over and sitting down by me.
"Awe she's asleep! Dad I told you we should have left earlier." Zoe pouts.
"I tried to get you to but you just HAD to watch Beyoncé again." Lenny replies. "By the way, you two rocked it tonight!"
"Thanks." Prince replied.
"Is she going to be here?! I really want to meet her!" Zoe exclaims.
"I don't know. I invited her but seeing as she's tonight's big winner she may have other plans. Baby wake Devon up so Zoe can meet her." Prince insists.
I lifted her off my chest and she started to stir and fuss a little. "What are those?" Zoe asks, motioning towards her implants.
"Cochlear implants. They help her hear. We have been told what she hears is similar to what you hear when underwater. But since it's all she knows and she's had them for almost a year, she actually is getting pretty good at figuring out what we say. We still use a lot of sign language though." I explain.
Finally Devon perks up a little and looks around. As soon as she spots Lenny, she touches her lips and says "ouch!"
"Oh my gosh! She remembers you!" I say in surprise. Making Devon look at me I say "that's Lenny. Do you remember him?"
"Ouch!" She repeats and points to her mouth again.
"Great! I'm the 'ouch' man." Lenny chuckles.
"Devon the jellyfish hurt you. Lenny helped you." I say with signs to help her understand. Lenny starts to step towards her and she clings on to me and screams.
"Awe man! She's scared of me! That sucks!" Lenny replied stepping away.
"Devon, Lenny's not bad. Bad jellyfish!" I tried to explain.
"It's alright Jen. Maybe next time she won't remember." Lenny says hopefully. "Zoe I bet they want to get her to bed so if you're going to hold her or whatever, get to it." He demands.
I hand Devon to Zoe who is beaming. "Hi I'm Zoe. Can you say Zoe?"
Devon grins from ear to ear but doesn't say anything. "Your mommy sorta used to be my mommy. So we are kind of like sisters."
"Zoe, you're making it creepy." Lenny replies.
"Well it's true! Well your daddy is my uncle so maybe we are more like cousins."
"Prince isn't your uncle." Lenny corrects her. "Let's just stay off of the slightly inbreeding subject and just talk normal to her." He suggests. Zoe rolls her eyes and stands up with Devon and starts walking around and talking to her about stuff they see in the living room. "So are you still in the Bahamas full time?" I ask Lenny.
"Pretty much. I come back here some, obviously to see Zoe and stuff. But she came and stayed with me basically all summer last year. I'll probably head back soon. How long y'all staying in LA?"
"A little while. Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is next month in New York City so we will fly out there for a couple days. Then about two weeks after that I start my tour." Prince responds. "Staying here to rehearse and everything though. Going to be almost non-stop from end of March through middle of September."
"Congrats man. On all of it! And selling the album with the concert tickets, that was genius.  You know everyone is going to jump on that bandwagon now." Lenny chuckles.
"That was all Jensen." Prince smiles.
"Well shit Jen. Why couldn't you had ideas like that while married to me?" Lenny jokes.
Before I could respond, Brian and Kim walk in to tell us they probably need to take Devon bc people are arriving. Zoe reluctantly gives Devon to them and we kiss her goodbye. "She is the cutest little thing ever! You need to have more!"
"Zoe! You don't say stuff like that to people!" Lenny scolds her.
"Oh I'm sorry. Is it bc all your children will have hearing problems?"
"Good lord! You act like you have no manners! I know I've taught you better."
"It's Uncle and Jen! They're like family. I don't censor myself in front of family!" Zoe explains.
"Actually no." I cut them off. "More than likely any more of our children will not have any hearing problems. Devon fell into the 25% chance we have of having children with a hearing impairment. And even if we do, we know it will be ok. Devon has already amazed us." I smiled, looking towards Prince who winked at me. Our interaction was cut short by people starting to spill into the house.
Within an hour, the house was packed with lots of people I recognized and many I didn't. I talked a lot to Zoe and Beyoncé did show up and Prince made her life by introducing them. At one point, Prince and I found each other in the crowd and he asked, "who's the Amazon standing next to Lenny?"
I searched around and spotted him standing next to who I assumed was Nicole but wasn't positive bc their backs were to us. "I guess it's Nicole Kidman. He's engaged to her according to Zoe."
"Really?! I wouldn't put those two together...at all!" Prince laughed. "And does he literally propose to every woman he dates?"
"I don't know. Appears so. Maybe this one will stick." I reply. As I continue to scan around the room, I spot Zoe off in a corner being hovered on by some guy. "Um there's not any boys here around Zoe's age, is there?" I ask Prince.
"I don't think so. Why? Trying to set her up?" Prince laughs.
"No! But some guy is over there trying to score it looks like! You better go break it up before we are in the middle of a statutory rape case or a murder by Lenny." I joke.
"Who is that?!" Prince asks, squinting his eyes towards them.
"It looks like Usher." I replied.
"Fuck!" Prince exclaims as he makes his way over to them. I watch as Prince starts talking to them and must have said something about who she was or her age bc Usher's eyes got big as saucers and he walked off soon afterwards. I'm not sure what Prince then said to Zoe but she looked ashamed and embarrassed.
"What did you say?" I asked as he made his way back over to me.
"I told Usher she was Lenny Kravitz's fifteen year old daughter and that sent him packing. Then I told Zoe she doesn't need to be trying to get involved with older guys. If she wants to date a boy, she needs to find one her own age." Prince responded. "But I'm done babysitting for tonight. Lenny needs to keep an eye on his own daughter. Not my job. So on a scale 1-10, how much are you enjoying yourself?"
"I don't know. A five maybe. Just kinda neutral. Not loving it, but not hating it either." I answered honestly.
"Well then let's liven this party up!" He replies and scurries off to do God knows what. At this point, I just wanted to go to bed. A few minutes later, Prince and his band members set up and start playing. Great! He's trying out stuff for his tour on the crowd. It's going to be a long night. And I wasn't wrong, there were a lot of people still in my house at 4:00 am dancing and singing and going strong! Around 4:30, Zoe, Lenny, and Nicole came over to tell me bye. "I'm guessing you don't have to go to school tomorrow?" I giggle.
"We will see!" Lenny teases. "Jen, I would like you to meet Nicole." Lenny introduces us. We exchange a handshake and pleasantries. Soon after, they left and I signaled to Prince that I was heading to the bedroom. "Alright my wife is going to bed, so party's over." He announces.
The crowd erupted in a sea of "ahhhhs" and other sighs of disappointment. I give Prince a stern look and he starts laughing. I walk up to him and say "I'm just going to lay down, you don't have to end the party."
"Are you sure?" He asks sincerely.
I nodded and he says into the mic, "she's allowing us to keep playing."
The crowd erupted in applause and cheers. I was out as soon as my head hit the pillow. I have no idea what time Prince joined me in bed, but neither one of us woke up until early afternoon the following day.
"What time did everyone finally leave?" I ask while rolling over onto his chest.
"Not sure. 6:00, 6:30 maybe. Then it takes me awhile to unwind so I don't think I was asleep until close to 8:00."
"Please don't tell me it's going to be like this on tour." I groan.
"What do you mean? After shows?" He asked.
"Yeah. I can't do this every night. And we can't have any sort of normal schedule for Devon if we do it."
"Honey I don't do lots of after shows anymore. I didn't on the last tour but maybe 4 or 5 times total. I'm still going to be a responsible parent most nights. Don't worry." He assures me. "So how did we sound last night? We aren't anywhere near ready for a full show yet."
"Baby, you are way too hard on everyone and yourself. Y'all sounded fine."
"Well then that's a problem. We need to sound better than just fine. But first we got to polish the Hall of Fame performance."
"So how long will that performance be?"
"About ten minutes. So I'll do a medley of songs, kinda like tonight. Then a speech and that tribute. But we aren't anywhere ready for the tour. So the next six weeks or so are going to be hectic. I'm just warning you now. I'm probably not going to be around a whole lot. But I promise I'll make it up to you and Devon once the tour starts. We will spend every waking hour together and explore the cities we stop in and surrounding places too. Just please be strong for me until then. I'm not neglecting or trying to avoid y'all. I just have got to get all this stuff right."
"Ok baby. I understand. Can we make a little compromise?"
"Of course. What is it momma?"
"One day a week of nothing, no rehearsals or anything but family time, and at least one meal a day with us." I respond.
"Deal. I'll make it happen. Now let's get in a little loving before the tornado named Devon returns. I'll start work tomorrow." He says, grabbing me and placing me on top of his morning wood. "Ride it like I'm about to go away to war baby."