Picture Above: Alfre Woodard (left) as Ariella
Daphne Maxwell Reid as Acacia (right)
Tim Reid as Raymond (Acacia's husband)
They're married in real life too, didn't know that till now
I said the next update would be Sunday!
It's not Sunday for me yet but it almost is.
Didn't wanna keep y'all waiting
Enjoooyyy🥳🥳
Dedicated to LakeshiaTucker & superflysister22
🎶I need a girl that could stand me
Raise me a family
Go to trips to Delancey
Trip to the Grammy's 🎶
Chapter Six
Jordan Francis and Solana had just arrived at his parents' house because they were having dinner there and spending the night.
After one hour and a bit of driving, they had finally arrived right in front of Jordan Francis' parents' house:
Solana was in awe.
"This place is beautiful!"
Jordan Francis didn't say anything, he had just smiled complacently to himself as he had knocked on the door.
Before he had done that though, he wanted to know if Solana had remembered the rules for being here, which they had discussed like once or twice in the car.
"Of course I remember the rules."
"Why are they?"
There were three.
Don't be someone you're not
Don't ask any personal questions
Don't chew loudly
Definitely don't chew loudly! Huge turn off.
Grinning, Jordan Francis had then knocked on the door for real, waiting for one of them to open the door.
To their surprise, both of Jordan Francis' parents had answered the door, along with his Aunty Ariella.
"Jordan Francis!"
His mother Acacia had hugged him because ever since he had been married, he hadn't really been visiting them.
Not his fault they lived over an hour away, was it...
They should have lived closer, so therefore why were they indirectly complaining for living so damn far away?
Raymond, aka Jordan Francis' father had greeted him too, followed by Ariella, with all of them looking confused when they had seen Solana.
"And... and who this?"
Did they seriously not remember her?
If they had forgotten Jordan Francis' wife then there was honestly a problem somewhere.
"This is Solana."
He wanted to know if they had remembered the fact that they were married, but nope.
Acacia shook her head, even when Jordan Francis had placed his hands on Solana's shoulders to make it easier for them to be above to detect the fact that they were married.
Or in a relationship at least. If not married.
"Doesn't really seem to be ringing a bell."
Either they seriously couldn't have remembered the fact that they were married.
Or they were pretending that they didn't remember that fact for one reason or the other.
Solana had luckily come prepared, she had a picture of when they had gotten married.
Then she had showed it to all three of them.
"Ohhh! You his wife!" Ariella remembered.
Yeah, no kidding.
In their defence... they were all almost 70, and Raymond was 72.
Acacia was 65.
And her sister Ariella was 67.
After that somewhat interesting encounter, they had let them inside with Jordan Francis closing the door behind him.
It wasn't that he hadn't told any of them about Solana.
He did.
More than enough times already.
Their memory wasn't really the best.
Even their corridor was beautiful, but not as beautiful as their dining room.
"Jordan Francis, why didn't you tell me that your parents' house was so beautiful?!"
He shrugged.
Because they lived far away, that was why.
So they couldn't really have visited them even if they wanted to.
Raymond had let them know that there were some changes to the dinner last minute.
Ariella was staying there too.
With her six grandchildren.
Her children were in different countries, one was dead though. She had four.
Solana freaked, with Jordan Francis realising that.
"You okay?" He wanted to know, standing in front of her.
"I didn't think so many people would have been here. I thought it was just your mum and dad."
Solana didn't like talking in front of a huge crowd of people, she was a bit shy.
She was a retired singer, yeah, retiring because of her marriage.
But she still had stage fright regardless.
"Don't worry. Ariella's grandchildren are all less than thirteen years. They really don't know what they're doing. At some point, one of them even thought that Christmas was a disease instead of a special occasion."
How that was possible, Solana didn't know.
Dinner was fettuccine, aka pasta made in ribbons.
The children had mash potatoes and sausages in case they didn't really like what the adults were having.
They had asked the girl a lot of questions, with Jordan Francis not saying anything.
Solana had kind of accidentally on purpose fibbed about a lot of things though.
So much for the don't be someone you're not rule, that was for sure.
"So... Solana, right?" Acacia had double checked, after Raymond had kindly opened the chair for her.
She nodded.
"Apparently, Jordan Francis says that you're also known as SZA?" Raymond added.
But he didn't pronounce it right.
It was pronounced Siz-uh.
Raymond had accidentally pronounced it as S-Z-A... saying the letters respectively.
Solana cringed.
"Actually, it's pronounced as Siz-uh."
"Scissors?" Ariella repeated wrongly.
She didn't say anything, she wanted to scream at her but she didn't.
She had absolutely hated people saying her name wrong, and Jordan Francis knew that very well... she had complained about it many times now.
Hence why she had reverted to her real name Solana.
"Not scissors, ma'am. Siz-Uh."
"Ion like it," Acacia commented. "Sounds too much like scissors?"
Nobody had asked for your input, did they?!
Was what Solana reaaaalllyyyy wanted to yell right now but she didn't for some very obvious reasons.
Jordan Francis had realised how tensed up she was over his mum, dad and aunt completely mispronouncing her name.
Less than minutes here and Solana already wanted to go home.
"Don't worry, love. It's not that deep."
"For you!" She whisper screamed. "Not for me!"
Acacia wanted to know what was her favourite song that she had made.
And Raymond had asked her if she could have sung it in front of everyone.
"Raymond!" Ariella had screamed, whacking him with the napkin that was located almost right next to her. "You don't ask the woman personal questions."
"No, it's fine," Solana lied, chuckling. "But I don't have a favourite song. I love all my songs equally."
She did have a favourite.
She just didn't want to be judged by these grannies and grandpa over here again.
Anything to keep the conversation short.
"Also, I retired."
"And why's that?" From Acacia.
Because she had gotten married to Jordan Francis...
Although she couldn't say that— of course she couldn't.
Solana didn't want to make it seem like her retiring was all Jordan Francis' fault, even if it kind of was.
She could have continued but she didn't want to leave Jordan Francis behind.
"Uhm..."
Lie.
Don't lie, are you crazy?!
Screw it.
"I own a nursery."
Jordan Francis had mentally facepalmed himself because if he had done so physically, he knew that that would have caused some questions to be asked.
Solana loved little children, otherwise she wouldn't have tried to get herself a pregnancy.
However the girl did not own a nursery whatsoever.
"Oh really?!"
They were all amazed as of right now, which was good... except from the fact that she had to lie.
She nodded.
"Yeah, I do! I started in July."
No, she didn't start in July.
She didn't start at all!
"That's wonderful!" Ariella beamed. "My grandchildren can be a handful sometimes, you know...? Especially how they're all under ten and—"
Speaking of her grandchildren, who were also staying here?
One of them had come up to her:
Her (real) name was Euphoria and she was five.
Ariella's husband was light skinned.
"Mummy, I want ice cream!" She had complained, tapping her lap to and fro.
"Not now, love. You can have it during the winter."
"But everyone has ice cream during the summer!" She had realised. "I want ice cream and I want it now."
Solana was just happy that attention was diverted away from her if she was being honest.
"Yes, but ice cream melts during the summer, Euphoria.You were complaining a lot of times when it did. I know it's good though when it's too cold and you want it to be warmer. I thought we already discussed this. Now go and play with your brothers and sisters over there."
She had two brothers and two sisters.
They were all quintuplets.
Mega handful.
Back to Solana again, most especially how Euphoria had gone back to her siblings.
They were kind of fighting over Lego but nothing too harmful. Although when it did start to get kind of harmful, Ariella inevitably had to leave the table to interfere.
Raymond wanted to know how her and Jordan Francis met.
Jordan Francis just wanted to know if she was going to tell the truth or lie about this as well.
They had met at a café.
Their orders were swapped by mistake.
They had coincidentally the same unisex leather jacket on too.
Then things went on from there.
That way of meeting must have been tedious in Solana's eyes or something because here she was telling them that they had met each other at the same university.
"No way! You studied Maths in Harvard like Jordan Francis too?"
She didn't.
She studied Childcare of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Thank God that Jordan Francis had actually studied Maths because if not then some questions would have been asked.
She had kept on unconsciously lying about everything, and soon Jordan Francis was so fed up that he had to say something.
Accidentally banging the table, the ticked off guy spoke up.
"Solana!"
They had all looked at him blankly.
"Can I talk to you in private please?"
Her man wasn't happy....
She didn't even have a choice— Jordan Francis had stood up and left with her.
Acacia and Raymond didn't know that they wanted to talk to each other in private, as he whispered it, therefore wanting to know where they were going.
"The toilet."
The toilet was the other way.
"The other toilet," Jordan Francis lied.
They had three.
Then he had gone with her, and damn.
He wasn't very happy... at all.
Why, Solana... why?
Yeah but like, don't be someone you're not. It could affect you negatively. I guess that's the moral of the chapter. Hope you enjoyed and I really hope to see you in the next one Xx