Marshall's P.O.V.
I wake up the next morning in an empty bed.
Mel is not next to me, and I immediately feel like shit and I know I had fucked up with her again last night.
I remember very well everything I've said to her, and I honestly ain't mean to do that, and I never wanted to hurt her, it's just that at that moment I was too numb to give a fuck.
I sigh down my nose and squint my eyes at the clock near the bed. I have like about an hour before I have to start heading for the studio. Fuck me, I can't just leave here like this though, I need to makeup with her first, cause I really did mess up.
I don't know what to even say to her at this point though, so I just lay on my back and stare at the ceiling. Maybe drugs do fuck me up man, cause I'm starting to realize now that sometimes I can't even control myself.
I then hear one of the babies start crying and Mel fussing over her in the nursery.
I get out of bed and something on the nightstand catches my eye. A small shiny object. I pick it up and see that it's the engagement ring that I gave Mel, and I know that she has never taken it off before, so why would she take it off now? The thought makes me both angry and sad, and I know that I need to do talk it out with her right now or imma lose her for real.
I make my way to the nursery and watch Melody with the girls. She's been getting more of a hang of it lately, and honestly I do love to see how she interacts with them. Betty would still be taking over for her with them though from time to time, so she could catch a little break.
Melody changes Whitney's diaper, then looks up and sees me standing in the doorway, and her previously calm expression changes into an unsure one, and I hate that I put this look on her face now.
"Yo can we talk?" I ask quietly.
Mel shrugs and puts Whitney back in her crib. She then pushes her way past me and walks out of the room.
"Talk," she tosses over her shoulder.
"It's like that?" I ask, following behind her like a lost puppy.
"How else you expect it to be, Marshall?"
She makes her way into our bedroom and starts straightening things out in there, with her back turned to me. And I know she only does this so she doesn't have to look at me.
I close the door behind me and lean against it, as I just watch her for a while.
"You wanna tell me why you took your ring off?" I finally ask her.
"Because like I told you, I'm not marrying you if you keep on fucking with those pills. I told you that, Marshall. Plus, last night, you said something about how you wouldn't have married me anyway, cause I'm bad for your image or whatever. So, I see no reason to wear it," Melody replies, still not looking at me.
I walk up to her then and wrap my arms around her, pulling her to my chest, and I feel her whole body stiffen up in discomfort, and I hate for her to react to me in this way, I'm not fucking used to it. But I get it. She's real fucking mad at me right now, and it's my own goddamn fault.
"Baby, I'm sorry," I say to her quietly. "That shit I said to you last night, I didn't mean that. You know that, right? You know I love you, right?"
"I don't know, Marshall," she shakes her head. "You say you love me, but you don't show it."
Now that makes me angry just a little bit. But I let it slide because I feel like I owe it to her because of what I had pulled last night.
"I do love you, Mel. I'll do anything for you."
"Yeah, except stop popping pills."
"For fuck's sake, Mel!" I exclaim in exasperation. "You do realize that at this point, it's literally physically painful for me to even think about not taking them," I grudgingly admit, and it's the honest truth. Just thinking about suddenly stopping with the pills literally hurts me.
"So then you need rehab, Marshall," Mel whispers, and it takes everything in me not to recoil from her.
"Rehab?!" I say incredulously. "Nah, Mel, it ain't that fucking serious! Are you out of your goddamn mind? No, I don't need no damn..."
"Either it's not that serious and you can just stop taking the pills at any time, or it IS so serious that you need to go to rehab," Mel says firmly. "There's no middle ground, baby boy."
"Melody, just cut me some fucking slack already! And please put the ring back on."
"No, Marshall," she frees herself out of my arms and walks over to the closet. "I'm done," she says and then opens the closet door and starts shifting through her clothes in there.
"What you mean you are done?" I frown. "You leaving me?"
She doesn't answer.
"Mel, you can't fucking leave me!" I exclaim. "What... what about Lyric?"
"We can co-parent," she shrugs. "Same like you and Kim do."
"Nah baby, look at me. Mel? Look at me please?" I touch her shoulder lightly, and she suddenly spins around with some of her clothes in her hand and throws them on the floor.
"WHAT, Marshall?!" She exclaims.
"I don't want you to leave me. That can't happen, baby."
"Marshall," Melody then sighs. "I'm not leaving you. But... until you get your shit together, I'm just staying here for Lyric's sake. We are nothing but roommates at this point."
"What's that supposed to mean?" I ask, narrowing my eyes at her in confusion.
"You'll figure out soon enough," Mel replies. Then she grabs some of her clothes out of the closet and marches towards one of the guestrooms where she apparently intends to stay from now on.
***
Melody's P.O.V.
Maybe I'm being too harsh on Marshall at this point. I don't know, because at the end of the day, he literally is sick right now, and he's not really in control of his actions, and I know that. At the same time, I'm trying to show him tough love to make him see that he's got to change his ways or else.
So the next few days, I continue to sleep in one of his guest rooms and I barely even talk to him. I refuse to put that damn ring back on, and the only time I interact with Marshall is when it's about one of the kids.
Betty helps me out with them a lot now, by the way, which is definitely a plus, at least I don't have to feel nearly as overwhelmed as I was before. She helps me out a lot around the house too, she is honestly a blessing.
Now, today, she just took all four girls to her place for the night, and it's actually kind of tough for me to part with them, but the whole D12 are gonna be here tonight with Marshall, and they all intend to get high and drunk, so I realize that it's not exactly appropriate for the kids to be here when that happens.
I actually kind of missed the guys, I barely see them anymore, so it's nice to see them.
I sit with them and I laugh at their usual clownery that they do, and I'm actually starting to have a good time.
When I get up to go to the bathroom and come back, Marshall suddenly pulls me on his lap and wraps his arms around my waist.
"What are you doing?" I ask, frowning, and try to get up, but he holds me firmly in place.
"Ain't you tired of fighting with me all the goddamn tired, baby?" He asks in my ear. "I know I'm fucking tired as shit of it. I can't take you walking around here mad at me and shit. I can't take you not sleeping in the same bed with me. It's driving me up the fucking wall. So let's just make up, okay?"
He then moves my hair out of his way and places soft kisses against the back of my neck.
"Don't," I whisper harshly, trying my best not to react to him touching me, because I honestly did miss it a lot. As much problems as we currently have in our relationship, THAT part has never been a problem. And I realize now why it's so easy to try to fix everything with sex, because that is literally the only thing that is always perfect with us. I also realize though that we can't keep using it like a fucking bandaid.
"What you want, Mel?" Marshall asks me. "You want me to get down on my fucking knees, right here in front of everybody, and beg you to forgive me?"
"I don't want you to do a thing, Marshall, but stop taking those pills," I reply, watching the puppy dog expression on his face quickly being replaced with annoyance.
I finally manage to get off his lap and I walk away towards the kitchen.
By the time I'm away from him though, my mind starts playing tricks in me and I start thinking that maybe I should make up with him. After all, I'm going crazy with us barely talking to each other too.
I walk back into the living room and see three blonde girls surrounding Marshall. They are part of a group that the guys apparently brought with then to the house for their entertainment, but I know those girls have been eyeing Marshall all night as well, and now I guess they feel like they finally have a chance with him.
My blood starts to slowly boil as I watch him get up from the couch and one of the girls stands in front of him and starts rubbing his biceps, and before I can stop myself, I quickly march my way over there.
"Excuse me," I say with a fake smile on my face and place myself in between Marshall and the girl. "Are you lost sweetie?" I ask her sarcastically.
I mean, she's gotta be lost trying to be all up in my man's face like that.
I feel Marshall's arm wrap around my waist and he pulls me back.
"Mel, don't start," he says in my ear.
"Don't start what?" I exclaim. "I was only gone for what, like 5 seconds, and you are already knee deep in groupies. I can only imagine what must be going on when you are at the studio. No wonder you can't write any songs now," I mumble under my breath, and immediately feel Marshall's grip on my waist tighten.
"What was that?" He asks me angrily.
Just as I'm about to answer him, I realize that the groupie chicks still standing there looking at us.
"Do you got a staring problem, bitch?" I ask her and she smirks.
"Girl, who the fuck are you anyway?" she says to me, then turns to Marshall. "Why don't you leave this boring bitch alone already, Em, and let all three of us show you a good time."
And if you can just see how fast I move then to snatch up that girl by her hair.
It's only by some miracle that Marshall manages to keep me in place and away from that fucking groupie chick.
"Don't fucking move," he speaks in my ear again, and I can hear it in his voice that he clenches his teeth, immediately picking up on his anger. "Yo, all three of y'all, get the fuck out of my house," he says to the groupies.
"What, why?" One of them exclaims and pouts.
"Bitch, are you fucking slow?!" Marshall suddenly snaps behind me, as his arms goes even tighter around me, as if he's expecting for me to still try and fight them, which I'm not gonna lie about, he is right about that. If he lets me go, I probably would pounce on them, especially that one bitch that was running her mouth. "Do you hoes really think you can come to my house and disrespect my fucking girl?" He continues, "Nah, man all three of you get out!"
"But it was her, we didn't even say anything," the same girl speaks again, jamming her finger towards her homegirl.
"Well, all three of you are friends, right?" Marshall says coldly. "So you are all fucking guilty by association. I don't give a fuck which one of you said it, now all three of ya gotta leave. Get the fuck out!!"
The three groupies exchange looks with each other, then curse and start to exit the room in a extremely dramatic fashion, flipping their hair and rolling their eyes, as they all stomp their feet.
Just as they make their exit though, the bitch that was bold enough to talk shit to me right in front of Marshall, turns her head and tosses over her shoulder.
"Oh, and Em? Genna says hi."
Then they all walk out.
Marshall waits a few seconds, then releases me from his hold, and I immediately turn around to face him.
"Who the fuck is Genna?!" I ask.
"Huh?"
"Who's Genna, Marshall? Who the fuck was that bitch talking about?"
"I have no idea, Mel. I don't know why you even asking me this. I don't know any of them sluts."
"You are lying," I simply say.
I turn on my heels and leave the party altogether, making my way upstairs and going back to my room.
As usual, let me know what you guys think. With the first part of this chapter, I was trying to kind of show y'all that Marshall does regret his actions, but he's just too gone on drugs to control himself right now. And with the second part, I'm trying to set things in motion for some major future drama 😈