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Granny sat beside me and started breakin’ down her crab fast as hell. I remember bein’ a kid and watchin’ her pick crabs. I used to beg her to do mine, but she told me I had to learn on my own. The more I watched her, the better I got. Now, I could fly through some crabs. This was another reason I missed home. L.A. didn’t do blue crabs like this. When it came to seafood, nobody did this shit like home.

“So, JuMarion… Have you been to see any of your aunts or cousins yet? I ain’t call them ’cause I wanted to keep you to myself for a while,” Granny asked, still pickin’ her crabs.

“Nah. This is the first stop I made. My house should be ready in a week. Once we get settled, I’ll put somethin’ together for the family.”

“Ni here? Why didn’t she come?” Granny asked, glancin’ at me with one of those looks.

“Yeah, she here. She had some stuff to take care of today.”

Granny was drillin’ a hole in the side of my head with her eyes. I just kept pickin’ my crabs, ’cause whatever she was ’bout to say, my Pops knew. He had this slick-ass grin, lips curved up.

“I seen Juicy’s grandmuva out in the county with Marley’s sister.”

I glanced at my Pops and Shera. Both of them were over there snickerin’ and shit. I glanced at Granny, and she was starin’ right at me.

Ain’t this ’bout a bitch.

“Yeah? Pops told me he saw her sister, Selene. I seen Juicy too. At a gala,” I answered before goin’ back to pickin’ my crabs.

“Uhm hummm. Juicy still so pretty, too. Her grandmuva showed me a picture of her. She grew right on up. I gave her my number to have her call me.”

“That’s wassup. What else you got to say, Granny?” I asked, sippin’ my drink.

“Oh, nothin’ much.” She sighed. “Did Niema meet Juicy?”

I dropped my crab and looked right at her. She was dead serious. “Yeah, they met. Sav introduced us to her boyfriend too. We cool, Granny. Ain’t no beef wit’ me and her.”

“Sav, huh? That’s what you call her now? But I didn’t say it was… It’s good that they met.”

Then, she went right back to pickin’ her crabs and tappin’ her foot to the music. My phone buzzed on the table, and when I looked down, Granny’s eyes went right to my phone too.

Ni: Are you coming back tonight?

I wiped my hands and picked up my phone.

Me: Idk. I’m wit’ my granny.

Ni: Ugh. Okay.

Me: Watch ya fuckin’ mouth, Niema.

I dropped my phone on the table hard as hell. I ain’t know who Ni thought she was playin’ wit’, but she knew not to even say anything out the way about my granny. When I looked up, everybody was lookin’ at me, Granny especially. I just shook my head and kept eatin’. I wanted Juicy. That was the fucked-up part. It was takin’ everything in me not to pull out my phone and find a reason to hit her. But sittin’ here thinkin’ about it, I knew that wouldn’t stop shit either.

Tonight was girls’ night at my place. The theme was early 2000s, and I was going all out with my outfit and hair. My stylist made me a two-toned wig with a deep side part and feathered bangs. Now, I needed to put this outfit together. I was in my closet, looking through some of the boxes I got from my parents’ house. Shaina had a pair of earrings I stole from her years ago, and I knew I had packed them up.

“Damn it. Where the fuck are they?” I muttered, pulling out pictures and little trinkets.

One of the pictures I came across was of Selene and me. I had hot pink tips on my hair, and she had purple. Our leave-out was fried, lips looked dry as fuck from the matte lipstick, but you couldn’t tell us shit. Needless to say, Mommy didn’t know we had all this damn makeup on, but we were outside with our cousin, Tempress, so a time was had.

“Look at Tempress and this green hair.” I laughed loud as hell, shuffling through the pictures.

When I finally found the earrings, I found the belt I wanted too. I started stacking the pictures aside because I eventually wanted to put them in a photo album. There were so many pictures. Some were so blurry that they weren’t even worth keeping. I got to the last stack, and my diary sat at the bottom of the box. I cracked it open to a random page, and the date made me pause.

“Well, damn,” I said, leaning against the wall.

May 17th

Dear Diary,