"Are you sure you have everything?" Jeremiah called from the front door of my apartment.

I lugged my carry-on behind me as I shouted back, "Yeah!" I took a moment to get my things acquainted in my arms as I continued, "I pack the day of to make sure I don't forget anything."

Jeremiah crossed his arms over his chest and said, "That's the worst system ever." He grabbed a few items from the clutter spilling out of my arms as he added, "What if you do forget something? You don't have time to check."

I moved through the now open front door, Jeremiah's arm holding it ajar for me. "But I won't forget something," I stated matter-of-factly. "That's the whole point of the system."

His gaze followed me as I walked past him through the doorway to his car waiting on the curb. I heard the door shut and the jingling of keys as they turned in the lock.

"How many flights have you missed, Ki?" I heard him call after me.

"None," I responded. The trunk of the car popped open, and I placed my carry-on inside. "Besides, the jet couldn't go anywhere without its key passenger." I ran a hand down the braid resting over my shoulder, it following the length down to my hip.

"Mm," Jeremiah hummed. "That explains everything."

"And what is that supposed to mean?" I asked with slight offense in my tone. I quirked an eyebrow at him as I got in the car and settled in my seat.

"Baby, you know there are some things that don't apply to you because of how you were raised," he began to explain as the car roared to a start.

I raised a hand to stop Jeremiah before he could continue. "I get it," I admitted with a sigh. "I had the luxury of taking my sweet time when traveling."

If there's one thing being with Jeremiah has taught me, it's that I can be a little oblivious to how things work in the world. He is always the first to remind me when my privileged experiences are trampling over how things really are. They're my "silver spoon moments," as he likes to call them.

"Exactly," Jeremiah confirmed with the nod of his head. "Private jets wait for up to what, two hours after the scheduled flight time? That's a lot of extra time."

I rolled my eyes as I reiterated, "I get it!" A moment passed before my eyes narrowed and I turned to look at him. "How do you know about private jet protocol?"

Jeremiah snorted. "Private jet protocol?"

"Answer the question, Jere," I pressed.

His eyes flicked over to me before they settled back on the road ahead, so quick I would've missed it if I weren't paying attention. A few more beats of silence passed as my suspicious gaze stayed fixed on him. I watched as his hand pulled from the wheel and dragged from his eyebrow to his cheek.

"Baby, King and I have been friends for years," he began. Then, as we rolled to stop behind a line of cars at a stop sign, he fully looked over at me and offered an easygoing smile. "If his locs aren't looking just right, he can't leave the house," he finished with a chuckle.

I looked over him one last time, my lips pursed as I took in this information. From the combined opinions of Jeremiah and Sienna, that seems in character for King. I could absolutely imagine him being as late as he needed to be for a flight if he wasn't on point.

"Yeah, that makes sense." I dropped my doubtful gaze and relaxed back into my seat, my hand finding Jeremiah's over the center console. "Si is always telling me how dramatic he is."

The rest of the ride to the airport passed with conversation passing breezily. It's just that sometimes, Jeremiah seems to know a little too much about things that are outside of his tax bracket, owns too many things outside of it.

But at the same time, Jeremiah has known King for much longer than he has me. So it's absolutely possible for King and the rest of his friends to share the wealth with him. I would never leave Adrienne high and dry if Sienna and I were doing something she couldn't afford. And, it's been a habit for me to give her my hand-me-downs. That wouldn't lead anyone to believe Adrienne was fronting about her finances. Besides, he said his friends paid for his car service when we first started dating.

We pulled up to the airport. Instead of following the departure signs, Jeremiah began heading towards the airport parking garage. I perked up in my seat and fixed him with a questioning look.

Almost as if he could feel my eyes boring into the side of his face, Jeremiah explained, "I told you I had a business trip a couple days ago, remember?"

"No," I immediately responded with the shake of my head. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah, I'm sure." Jeremiah pulled into a parking spot and shut the car off. "We were talking about—"

"We are arguing about how you're refusing to coordinate with me for Adrienne's wedding," I cut off. I unbuckled my seatbelt and stepped out of the car, rounding it to grab my bag.

"First off, it was not an argument," Jeremiah rejected as he stuck his finger in the air. "I was only telling you how—"

"How emerald doesn't flatter you," I finished in a whiny tone. "Baby, I'm telling you, emerald always looks beautiful on dark skin!"

Jeremiah took a deep, steeling breath as he pulled our suitcases from the trunk of the car. "I've told you a million times to stop. Cutting. Me. Off." He gingerly shut the trunk of his car before continuing, "And it only looks beautiful on your dark skin. Those jewely colors never look good on me."

I held my forearm up to his. "We're basically the same shade of chocolate, Babe!" I threw my hands up in exasperation. "And jewely isn't a word!" I knew Jeremiah was shaking his head behind my back as I stomped off in the direction of the airport.

"Who cares if it's a word or not! And we weren't even talking about this anyway!" He called after me.

"All I'm gonna say is that I know King and Sienna are coordinating, and y'all are damn near the same color too." I paused and pivoted on my heel. "He has no problem with wearing emerald." I crossed my arms over my chest.

"If I say I'll coordinate and wear emerald, can we be done with this conversation?" Jeremiah's hand dragged down his face in defeat.

"Yes," I answered with a firm nod.

"Then I will coordinate and wear fucking emerald, okay?" he caved.

I clapped my hands and planted a kiss on his cheek as he moved to pay for parking.

Jeremiah decided to wait with me before I began the flight check-in process. We were waiting for Cameron and Malcolm to arrive, as we were all seated together on the same flight. I was grateful for both Cameron and I's companies coming together to coordinate all our flight and hotel details for Kobe Bryant's memorial service. It would make the process much easier, not to mention I'm not exactly sure I'd be able to handle baggage claim and customs by myself; I've never actually done it myself.

I stood up from my chair and out of Jeremiah's grasp as I noticed Cameron and Malcolm enter the airport. I plastered on a smile and waved them over, Cameron nudging Malcolm in our direction.

"Hey Miss Kiara," Malcolm greeted with a small wave. His balled fist found his chin as he looked over to my boyfriend. "Who's this?"

"Oh, this is my boyfriend, Jeremiah." I gestured from Jeremiah to Malcolm as I introduced, "Jeremiah, this is Malcolm." I leaned in to loudly whisper to Jeremiah, "I've heard he's the Kobe of his generation."

Malcolm's eyes found the floor as the ghost of a smile fell upon his face. "I don't know about all that, Miss Kiara..." he trailed. "Doesn't she have to say that as my publicist?" Malcolm questioned, his attention now on Cameron.

"Nah, she doesn't have to," Cameron disputed. He clapped a hand on Malcolm's shoulder before he assured, "You're good, Malcolm. One of the best we've seen in a minute; you should own it."

"That's exactly what my kid brother said!" I agreed with a small nod. "He's the one who called you the next Kobe, not me."

Malcolm turned back to me, his eyes wide in disbelief. A smile quirked my lips as he asked a breathy, "Really?"

I nodded, not offering a verbal response.

"C'mon, head on over and get your bag checked," Cameron instructed as he nodded in the direction of baggage check. "We'll catch up with you in a sec."

The three of us watched Malcolm walk away before Jeremiah spoke, "I've gotta get to the tarmac," a finger pointing over his shoulder.

"Must be nice to fly private," Cameron noted with a chuckle. "Customs checks you right on the plane, you don't need to get your baggage checked..."

"No, forreal," Jeremiah agreed with a laugh. "Sucks that y'all didn't get set up with the good life."

"You'd think that two different companies would be able to work out private, right?" Cameron checked on Malcolm over his shoulder before continuing. "But hey, at least we're in first class, right?"

I was nudged by Cameron's elbow, my attention pulling from my phone. "Oh, sorry. I just didn't want to interrupt this bonding moment that was going on. What's up?"

"Nothing, Ki." Jeremiah planted a kiss on my cheek before he said, "But I do really gotta hop on this flight. It was nice meeting you, Cameron."

Cameron responded, "Likewise. And hey, drink a bottle of free champagne for me, aight?"

"He would've done that regardless," I exposed with a giggle.

Jeremiah shot me a look that earned laughs from both me and Cameron. "I got you," he promised with that one head nod that guys do. "When I get back, we can definitely link and pop one together. You down?"

"Yeah, I'm down," Cameron confirmed.

There was a quick exchange of phone numbers before Jeremiah darted off, but not before throwing an "I love you" followed by a few lingering kisses my way. Cameron and I joined Malcolm at the baggage check counter, and a little too long after that, we were sitting in the terminal waiting for boarding.

Malcolm was lost in his own world, his AirPods plugged in as he watched a college basketball game from the other night. Cameron was on a call with Brent Collins—Malcolm's agent—about some company that wants to partner with Malcolm.

On the other hand, I was texting in Adrienne's wedding group chat telling the girls not to forget about me for Adrienne's bachelorette party in a couple of days. Unfortunately, I would still be in California while Sienna and the rest of the bridal party flew out to the Maldives. But just because I couldn't be there physically didn't mean I wasn't going to be there, not while we have FaceTime!

"Hey," Cameron softly called to grab my attention. "So Brent just reached out with a minor endorsement deal for Malcolm."

"Oh, forreal? Who with?" I asked, my attention no longer on my texts.

"Have you heard of the Panini Group?" Cameron questioned as he also put his phone to the side.

"Yeah, they do comics and trading cards." I took a beat before my jaw dropped in slight shock. "Do they wanna put Malcolm on a trading card?"

Cameron nodded, although there was a grim expression on his face.

"What? Is this not good news? Him grabbing his first endorsement would open the door for so many others!" I looked over to Malcolm, who was still immersed in the game. "He's aiming for a Puma endorsement, and this is one step closer to that."

"If he accepts the endorsement, he's no longer an amateur. So he wouldn't be able to play in college or anything," he explained.

"That's right," I remembered with a sigh. I grabbed my bottom lip between my teeth, my thumb tapping my lip pensively. "But isn't he a basically guaranteed prep-to-pro?"

"He is, but—"

"But that doesn't mean something can't happen," I interrupted. Cameron nodded in confirmation. "I wouldn't exactly table it yet, but I wouldn't say yes. I wanna talk to Brent myself and see what he thinks. I also wanna sit down with you and Celeste to see what his funds are looking like. She's still handling the business side of his management, right?"

"Absolutely," he confirmed. "I've never been one for numbers and all that, and she's not that great with the people aspect," he continued with a small laugh.

"Perfect, we should set a meeting for sometime next week." I pulled my phone back out and immediately opened my calendar. "We're at an advantage because most high school athletes don't even have a manager, let alone a whole team. Which is another reason we shouldn't be worried about taking the endorsement, by the way."

"I know. We can start selling Malcolm to teams early and ensure that he's drafted straight outta graduation." Cameron was cut off by the airport intercom calling our flight for boarding. "But we can get the team together and talk more next week."

The two of us stood from our seats, the movement grabbing Malcolm's attention. He plucked one AirPod out and began gathering his things at Cameron's instruction, us boarding the plane not too soon after.