Like No Other

THE END OF THE BEGINNING

Emma came scurrying back into the bathroom, showing everyone a wet spot on her shirt that smelled minty, more mouthwash. She said she'd tasted like liquor with a self-conscious titter.

"Grind with me, relax your mind take you time with me..."

Jeremiah's hands were getting more and more familiar with Angie and she was not stopping him at all. He winked at Trey behind her back and his younger sibling stealthily flipped him off. Angie sat back with her small beasts pushed in the air, her ass tight against Jeremiah's lap, and gave Trey a look. "Emma ain't this your song?"

Emma sipped the water and shrugged. "Everything is my song, let you tell it."

Trey had to agree.

But he understood the situation for what it was. An opening.

"Whatcho scared I'ma tell on you," Trey said quietly to her. It was worth a try and much better than watching his brother get a mediocre dance when he himself could be getting one worth paying for. Emma looked up at him, a slight crease between her eyebrows. "I won't tell on you baby."

Emma giggled honestly. She turned and sat on her feet, regarding him. "Oh really?"

He nodded. She kept her position.

Jeremiah whispered something in Angie's ear that made her laugh quietly in a private manner and winked when she caught his gaze. When Trey passed the blunt to Emma and she to Jeremiah Trey watched his brother swivel the chair until the back faced the door and start scooting, Angie in tow on his lap, backwards. At the bathroom he turned and rolled onto the tile. "Ah," Trey called. "Fuck you goin' with the blunt nigga?"

The bathroom door closed and the light never came on.

Trey sucked his teeth and turned to Emma to talk shit but the words died at the site of her. She'd lie down on her side facing him. Her head rocked to the beat propped up on her hand. Her hair looked golden in the light. She ran her fingers through it to push it away from her face. Her flared hips sat high and femalely off the bed, making her waist look smaller and her legs look longer somehow. Her shirt rode up showing a little skin where her pelvic bone was.

Instead all he could do was ask her if she wanted to smoke another. She sat up and asked if she could roll it that time around. Trey eyed her dubiously; he only had three more cigars. He asked her if she was any good. She sat up and pretended to be appalled. But her face melted away when she replied that she was not versed so much but that she could put a dubie together if given the opportunity.

Trey broke down her weed and gutted her cigar in an empty solo cup. Emma got up the change the mixtape, just going through the strangers shit. Poor girl, Trey thought, looking around the room and wondering why someone would leave their door unlocked all weekend.

When Emma turned back to him to sit back on the bed Trey causally maneuvered her to sit between his outstretched legs where he was leaned against the wall so that he could direct her rolling. She did as he asked.

She'd rolled a blunt somewhere before because the L she'd turned out was not bad at all. It would hit better in the end than it would in the beginning but it was still a pretty fair blunt. She smiled with glee at her work and his praise when he handed her a lighter she'd declined and asked him to spark it.

She kept her position between his leg along the foot of the bed and the other thrown over the side. Trey subconsciously listened for noises from the bathroom. They chuckled while Trey muttered that he could not light the blunt while she wiggled the bed like she did with her seat dancing. She giggled.

He offered her another shotgun. Her swaying head turned to his and she nodded. Emma leaned towards him, her nose bumping his and then she laughed when she realized sillily that he had not even put the blunt in his mouth yet. Trey smirked at her genuine delight in her own antics and her demure little hand holding her nose and plucking his to ask if he was ok. It hadn't even hurt, it was more a brush than a collision.