Gionni sat in his office, watching the clouds run past him as he tried to distract himself from the negative feelings fogging his mind. He was waiting for Nadira to arrive from her final wedding dress fitting so they could go.
He wanted to make this as quick and painless as possible for himself but he had a feeling he'd just be hurting more at the end.
He was finally meeting with his mother today, a month before his wedding day. All the preparations were complete. They had secured their photographer and videographer just three days ago and as of today, Nadira's dress was done. Gionni had some preparations of his own that were also coming to a close, and they were growing more excited by the day.
On November 1st, they'd officially become Mr. And Mrs. Cartier.
As Gionni was getting ready to call Nadira to make sure she was okay, she entered his office with a bright smile on her face, lifting his spirits a bit.
"Hey baby!" she sang happily, making her way to his desk, leaning over it and kissing him.
"Hey, mama. You look real happy, I assume everything went well with Mona?" he asked, as she took a seat across from him.
"Babe, it's gorgeous, I cried when I put it on," she pouted, making him genuinely laugh.
"I can't wait to see you in it, baby," he smiled.
"And I can't wait to see you in that tux, my Lord," she fanned herself, remembering how good he looked on the day of Ray and Xavier's wedding. "Anyway, you ready to go?" He sighed deeply and she was instantly concerned.
"What's wrong?" she asked, sitting straight up in the seat and leaning on the desk.
"I...I'm scared man. I know this not gon' go the way I want it because I know part of me don't wanna hear shit she gotta say. Tink and Gio don't either, we just doing this so we can try and move on with our lives but what if I can't?" he breathed out. "What if it just makes everything worse and I'm stuck?"
"Babe, you're letting the negative thoughts make you forget why you're doing this. Remember what you told me when we talked about it? You just wanna know why she left you, you wanna know for you. That guilt has been eating away at you for twenty something years and it's time to let that go for you," she spoke. "It may make you sad at first or it may piss you off but you're doing this for yourself. Eventually, you're gonna feel that weight drop off you. The grief of losing your mom is going to stick with you, trauma doesn't just disappear, but the emotions that came along with it are something you can tackle," she reached over and grabbed one of his hands in hers.
"And no matter what happens when you come out of there, you won't go though it alone. Your brother and sister will be there for you and you already know I will. If any point you wanna go, we can go okay?" he nodded his head, watching as she pressed a kiss to his hand.
When they arrived to the restaurant, it looked like they all had the same idea and both of his siblings brought their spouses. They asked their dad if he wanted to come but he couldn't bring herself to see her again. He elected to pick his grandkids up from school and spend the day with them.
"Ya'll aight?" Amina asked, looking at her husband, brother and sister in law.
"We gonna have to be," Guiliana spoke first, as she noticed their mother walking toward their table. Nothing was said as she approached, Nadira just tightened her grip on Gionni's arm.
All eyes were on her when she slid into the other half of the round booth they shared. It was still painfully silent as the siblings stared at the woman who birthed them all, yet the woman they barely knew sitting in front of them.
"Uh...thank you all for agreeing to meet with me here, I can imagine that was hard for you. I don't wanna beat around the bush for long because you're here for a reason. I want-- no I need to apologize to you three. What I did was completely inexcusable, it was selfish, it was wrong, and I am sincerely sorry to all three of you for hurting you the way that I did.
"Then why'd you do it?" Guiliana spat out.
"There were a lot of things that factored into it. When I had Gionni, I had PPD, and it never seemed to go away. I found myself overwhelmed at being a wife, a mother of three and a stay at home mom at that. When I was diagnosed with PPD after Gionni was born it was hard for me to show empathy to you all as I should have, and it made me basically emotionless, and I had to find myself and at the time, I thought leaving was the only way to do it," she sighed. The remorse was evident in Sidra's voice, but unfortunately that did nothing for her hurt children.
"Overwhelmed?" Guiliana chuckled bitterly. "You know how overwhelmed I was at twelve when my father was so depressed, he couldn't take care of my six-year-old brother so I became his mom? I was in the seventh grade taking care of him every single day until my daddy got therapy? I needed you so many times and every single time I was alone. I looked for you so many times, a-and you weren't there!" she began to get emotional and she stopped talking, taking a deep breath. "You weren't there and the only thing you can say to excuse it was that you needed to find yourself? You had a responsibility to us. We didn't ask to be born and the least you could've done was come back," she sniffled, as her husband consolingly rubbed her shoulder.
"Why didn't you come back? Or at least try and contact us? Or dad? He went through so much hell alone," Gio asked, leg tapping underneath the chair. "So much shit happened to us that could have been so avoided if you would have at least tried,"
"I-I wanted to. I thought about it so many times but I figured you all had been messed up enough without me popping in and out of your lives and-"
"It would have been better than you not being there at all," Gionni finally spoke up, voice low. "Seeing you sometimes would have hurt less than never seeing you again. It was hell. All of it, the explaining how my mom wasn't with me anymore, the depression, the therapy, the anxiety attacks, the emptiness and the loneliness and the guilt. You had me believe I was the one who made you leave, because you didn't love me, I let that shit eat me alive," he continued, voice cracking.
Nadira intertwined their fingers together, squeeze his hand tightly. Hearing all three of them expressing their pain made her feel so sad, typically they avoided talking about anything regarding her so to hear this was weighing heavy on everyone.
"No, baby, I never stopped loving you—"
"You did! You would have come back if you loved me! If you loved us! There were so many other ways to survive PPD and depression without doing what you did. I was depressed, clinically. I had to take medicine every night for it. I dealt with insomnia because of the depression and I got diagnosed with separation anxiety. I'm almost thirty years old and if I lose sight of my daughter or my fiancé in a mall, I just might have an anxiety attack. All of that because you couldn't think of a better way to cope with your depression than abandoning the people who needed you the most and yet—" he paused to take a deep breath and gather his emotions again.
"Yet, I can't hate you. I never could. I wished on every birthday, I wished on every star, I prayed that you came home. Even now I sit here and as angry and sad as I am, I could never hate you. I-I'm just happy you're alive," he expressed, making everyone a bit emotional.
Nadira reached up and wiped a tear that was falling from his face. She hated it when he cried because she knew how long it took him to get to that point. She knew just how many words he swallowed and how many emotions he forced down until the only outlet for his pain were tears.
She wiped her own face, before she started crying herself and looked back up at him, noticing he was already looking at her. She smiled comfortingly at him and his eyes pooled with tears again, but not sad ones.
Every time he looked in her eyes he was reminded of everything good he had. He saw his daughter in her eyes, and he saw his future in her beautiful brown eyes.
"Thanks for showing up," Gio muttered after a brief silence following Gionni speaking. Being their older brother, he was tired of seeing his siblings cry.
"I owed you all that much," she nodded, getting the hint. She'd seen the damage she caused them, especially seeing it in Gionni made her realize the detriment of her choices and it hurt her to the core. She took her exit and the three siblings visibly relaxed once she was gone.
"You okay, baby?" she asked, caressing his face.
"I-I think so? I don't know..."
"That's okay! That's okay, you did so good papa. I'm proud of you," she smiled the same comforting smile that made him feel a bit calmer. His thoughts were chaotic at the moment, so many different things were happening in his mind. He got what he wanted and that was answers. And now he had to come to terms with and fully process them and he didn't know how to go about that just yet.
"Y'all gonna stay and eat, Peanut?" Tink asked, leaning on her husband's shoulder. Nadira looked up to him for his answer, she'd do whatever he was doing today.
"Yeah. Yeah, I'll stay," he nodded.
"I wanna see my daughter," Gionni mumbled as he watched Nadira drive back to their home. After eating and decompressing with his brother and sister he was in much better spirits, even laughing and smiling by the time it was time to go.
Realizing that they still had each other no matter what happened with Sidra, made it much easier to recover.
"You wanna go pick her up? I can take this exit coming," she glanced over at him.
"No...I know my dad needs them today. I'll cuddle with my other daughter," she smiled to herself, knowing he was talking about Chanel. It was almost impossible to cuddle with Polo now, unless he was sleepy. He was almost fully grown and whenever he jumped on either of them he nearly knocked the wind from them every time.
"I know she'll love that, she misses her daddy," she chuckled.
"Thank you, Nadira," he blurted a few moments later.
"Thank me? For what?" she scrunched her eyebrows, looking over at him.
"Being there with me. There for me. I appreciate you supporting me through all this. It means the entire world to me, so thank you." He placed a kiss on the back of her hand, holding it against his warm face.
"Of course, Gionni. Your mental health is so important to me, baby, I'll do whatever I can do to make sure you're okay, just like you did for me when you met me. I'm here to help you," she said sincerely. He just stared at her intensely, before shaking his head with a smirk on his face.
"I really get to marry you, dawg. I'm blessed as fuck,"
"Gionni stop," she blushed, waving her hand at him.
"I am! Not everyone gets to experience love the way you give it to me, but I sincerely hope everyone does because I feel on top of the world all because of you," he expressed. She loved so much that he wasn't afraid to be vulnerable about his feelings for her, she never had to beg him to say I love you or to give her reassurance because he did it all the time, just because.
"Well, you deserve to be loved that way, Gionni. Everything that I give you is what you deserve, nothing less," she smiled softly.
"You gon get what you deserve when we get in the house," he bit his bottom lip, unashamedly staring at her.
"Gionni! I'm trying to be romantic," she laughed loudly. "You're so damn nasty, horny ass," she shook her head playfully.
"I'm gon give you some romantic ass dick in a minute,"
"Sir!" she laughed harder at his words, making him laugh slightly as well.
"What? You don't want it?" he asked, tilting his head.
"I ain't say all that now," she muttered and it was his turn to burst into laughter.
Around 5:30, the couple were taking their dogs on a walk after they got through with each other.
"Why you always give him to me? His big ass is walking me," she spoke, wrapping the leash around her hand again to keep it steady.
"Because he's protecting you," he shrugged. "Nobody gon try you with a big ass pit walking by you, unless they want they ass bit into,"
"Well what about you? My baby too boujie to protect anyone," she chuckled, watching Chanel trot beside Gionni.
"Polo got me and Chanel lil boujie butt too," he laughed. Beside the fact that he loved pit bulls, he knew if it came down to it a pit would protect Nadira and Nayeli if he wasn't there to it himself. He was very loving but trained to keep them safe.
"We should get another puppy," Nadira spoke as they let Polo and Chanel run off the leash at the dog park.
"Girl what? Why?" he asked, making her laugh.
"Because! We need to let Nai pick one. I got Chanel for myself, you picked Polo, we need to let her pick a puppy," she pouted.
"Is Nayeli gonna take care of the puppy she picks?" he raised his eyebrows.
"We can teach her to! You know she's smart, she probably knows how to take care of a dog just by watching us take care of these two," she pointed out. "You know she'd love to pick her own puppy, G."
"I know she would, she been asking me for a puppy since she met Chanel," he chuckled. "After the wedding okay? We'll take her to the shelter," he gave in and she nodded with a grin, turning back to watch their dogs play.
"You're spoiled," he shook his head.
"I'm not! You always say this, and it is simply not true,"
"Nadira, baby. You're in denial. But it's okay, I know you are and so does your dad, who spoiled you in the first place,"
"Gionni! I'm not spoiled I just-"
"Get whatever you want?" he finished her sentence, making her squint her eyes at him.
She always felt like spoiled had such a negative connotation to it, her "friends" in high school used to call her spoiled and call her a brat, just because they saw that her brother and her dad did a lot for her and she didn't really ever ask for it. She never had a bad attitude about it so she always felt offended when people called her a brat or called her spoiled.
"Being spoiled is bad, Gionni. Spoiled girls have bad attitudes and are mean," she said.
"No, it's not bad. It's bad if you're a mean-spirited person and don't appreciate nothing, but you're not like that. You deserve everything you get, and you appreciate everything you get. Being spoiled is okay," he shrugged, "even if it wasn't, I was still gon do it 'cuz I like blowing a bag on you for no reason at all. You know what your dad and your grandad said to me?"
"What? Was it embarrassing? It wasn't embarrassing was it?" she cringed thinking about all the stupid things she did as a kid, and teenager.
"No," he laughed. "It was more like advice, and they said it to me on two completely separate occasions too. Your grandad said 'you know how I lived so long? And I look so good? I give Alma whatever she want. Whenever she ask for it and when she's happy the entire house is happy, I'm not stressed, she's not mad, we all good. Even if it's just as simple as a kiss on the cheek, or if she wants me to listen to her complain about that bitch at work, Ima do it. Giving your wife the world ain't hard, son.'" Gionni retold.
"Aww, that sound just like my pawpaw, he is the sweetest man," she grinned. "So, this means I'm just gon get whatever I want huh?" she raised her eyebrow.
"Do I not already give you whatever you want? I'm slacking?"
"No! No, you are not," she laughed, "Wait, I do recall getting told I was getting a house," she joked, tilting her head.
"Uh... you said make you my wife then get the house, I'm just doing what you said," he defended, raising both his hands.
"You have exactly one month to get my house or we fighting," she feigned a threat, pointing her finger in his face.
"Sure, we are," he laughed at her as the dogs came running back and they prepared to go home.
The next weekend, Gionni and Nadira were at Mona's shop again, having Nayeli fitted for her dress for the wedding as well. They thought it was a good idea since they were both getting their dress and tux made that she gets hers personal for her too.
She insisted on having a 'pretty dress like mommy', and Nadira had the same thought.
"Okay, sweetie! Come on out and show mommy and daddy your pretty dress," Mona said. The curtain got pulled back and she happily stepped up on to the podium, bringing instant smiled to their faces.
"You look so gorgeous, mamas! Oh my God look at her!" Nadira cooed, bottom lip pouted out. "You look so pretty, Nayeli," she complimented.
"Wow, my little baby is so grown up," Gionni stared at her in astonishment, watching Nadira fawn over her. She was growing too be a beautiful and intelligent young black girl and he fekt privledged to have had a hand in raising her.
"You like it, daddy?" she asked, stepping down and walking straight over to him.
"I love it, princess, you look so gorgeous, baby," he smiled, making her grin. She was still a daddy's girl all the way through, and still loved that he was the only one to call her princess.
"Thank you, daddy! I'm so excited for you guys to have a wedding," she exclaimed, "mommy's gonna look so pretty, daddy. You might pass out or something," she said, making her father laugh.
"I hope I don't pass out because then your uncle Vinny is gonna make fun of me forever. But yeah, I know mommy is gonna look so beautiful. You gonna tell me what her dress looks like?"
"No daddy. It's a secret! I can't tell you," she shook her head adamantly.
"Even if I say please?"
"No, sir. You have to be patient, its only" she paused to count "twenty-four days away," she finished.
"Good job, mamas. It is twenty-four days but that's a long time," he spoke as Nadira chatted with Mona about some last minute things.
"Well if you be patient, it won't feel like a long time daddy," she spoke, like it was such an obvious solution.
"You're right, baby, I'll just be patient," he chuckled, toying with her loose curls. Soon enough, Nayeli was called back and Nadira helped her remove her dress and Gionni was left sitting on the couch.
He couldn't imagine how someone could leave their child. Their children. The conversation with his mother still stuck with him, and as a father, he could just never fully understand her.
Witnessing Nayeli's birth and her growth up until now was one of the best blessings he had received. The stress and the sleepless nights, all the times he thought he was failing, and all the prayers he said over his baby were worth these moments he got to have with her, and he wouldn't trade it for anything. No matter what the difficulty, he wanted to be there to see her grow, and he wished his mother had the same thought process.
But he knew he'd be there for everything as long as he had the power. Every recital, every ceremony and speech, every time she was recognized, her promotions and graduations, for every single accomplishment and God willing to walk her down the isle.
He didn't wanna miss a thing.
hello hellooo.
let's chat, how do we feel about gionni's mom?
what about gionni's confessing that he could never hate his mom? y'all feel the same? would you hate her?
wedding is otwwww 🥰 the next chapter most likely & then the honeymoon 🙂 drop some destinations!
till next time 💘