[Lamarr]

"Damn," I hissed lowly as I leaned forward in the passenger seat, my eyes scanning the block Riley's car was currently approaching. The moderate sized color coordinated homes and apartment complexes aligning it like some gated community definitely didn't look alike to the ones on her GPS system, which left me to assume one thing. "You were supposed to turn at the last left, Ry. Not this one, the left on Moorpark. I said that like twice."

"No, you said turn in three lefts, not two." she shot back before sighing and pulling over behind a parked car. "And you never told me the name of the street until now so how was I supposed to know?"

"I did, and I said turn in two lefts four lefts ago, so technically it was the last left."

"Negro, what?"

"Just cut a U-turn right here once traffic clears, then at the light, turn right at the 7-Eleven." I quickly instructed, noting how her eyebrows scrunched together in an instant. "What now Ry? Those were the simplest set of directions a nigga could give. I don't know any other way to put the shit!"

"Okay, first of all lower your tone." Riley began as she cut her narrowed eyes at me and pointed her finger my way. "Second of all, you're the king of illegal U-turns, traffic stops and tickets. Not me. Therefore I'll turn my car onto this side street and drive up the back way to Moorpark."

The only thing about that was many of the streets in California, specifically Sherman Oaks where we were currently roaming, weren't like what she was used to in NYC. There were many abrupt dead ends and roads that seemed endless with all of their curves that led up cascading hills, and on top of that they were all compact as hell. Though I still hadn't mastered driving in such a different environment, I knew more than Riley did. And I knew that she was in for a rude awakening and would regret not taking my 'illegal' directions.

"Aight," I muttered, leaning back into my seat and discarded my phone from my hoodie as it began vibrating. "Since you're the one who volunteered to be the designated driver I'll sit back and let you rock, baby girl. Hamad, speak to me." My attention was now zeroed in on the loud background music that blared from the speaker, tuning Ib completely out as he barely greeted me.

I had an inkling he was in the middle of someone's studio session and was now desperate for some silence as he shuffled around on the opposite end. Riley on the other hand was still serving me a mean death glare, one so strong that I could feel the strain of her eyes piercing through my skin.

Ignoring her instead of succumbing to her attitude, which I was sure I triggered, was easier than I thought it would be. Mostly because by now I was frustrated as fuck and had been dodging her one way or another anyways.

After hours of driving from one neighborhood to another and walking around doing tours, Riley managed to hate all of the apartments and condos I had narrowed my choices down to. She found something about each of them that wasn't fit for a child or went against her unspoken standards of what a home should be. I was starting to think there was something else swaying her opinions, something along the lines of fear. Riley never wanted me living here in the first place for reasons that could only be explained by her, and just because a child was involved now doesn't mean that'll change - her actions were proving that.

As much as I wanted to have a conversation that'll hopefully get to the bottom of this, I decided against it until I could find the right way to begin it. A way that wouldn't lead to a petty argument we both agreed to never let happen again. So here I was for the time being, rubbing my fingertips along my temple as I regarded the dull image of my call screen and gradually became consumed by my impatience.

"Ib, man."

"My fault fam," he apologized as his voice became clearer, and Riley rolled her eyes away from me then went about her alternative route. "What's poppin' over on the east side this ugly Tuesday afternoon?"

"Hell if I know," I shrugged. "I'm in Sherman Oaks riding around with Riley. We're looking for a new place for me to lay my head."

"Wait, you're in the Valley? Nigga, I thought you were in New York! I could've sworn you told me you were leaving right after Shaw's party, which was a smooth three days ago."

"I did say I was leaving afterwards, never said the exact day. And if you must know, my flight leaves tomorrow evening at five." I clarified as he mumbled oh, leaving the line quiet as I waited for him to get to the point of this dry conversation. The lack of utterance from him, Riley or even the radio that she had turned off out of spite was beginning to heighten my annoyance. I needed someone to relieve me of it and ASAP, or else I'd be liable to snap.

Clearing my throat didn't seem like enough of hint for Ib so maybe being blunt as I was resisting was my only option. "Yo. Not to be rude or anything, but what is it that you want?"

"Lamarr!" Riley snapped in response and slapped her hand against my arm as Ib laughed heartily in my ear. At least he found humor in the midst of my very much serious stance instead of taking it personal. "Don't be an ass to him."

"Yeah, don't be an ass. You grouchy ass bitch," Ib teased as his laughing lulled and he finally took my unpleasant mood and the possible cause of it serious. "The hell is wrong with you anyways?"

"Nothing man. What you need?" I posed the question once again, my attitude emphasized more than before.

"Look, I don't know what you and beauty got going on over there today beast, but don't be taking it out on me. To be real, you shouldn't even be letting whatever it is get so deep under your skin. You said it best the other night, she's going through a weird transition in her life and it makes her act wild irrational. You said how she feels tends to rub off on you. However, that doesn't necessarily have to always be the case. You gotta learn how to either drop the shit or talk to her about it. Stop being so damn prideful. Stop acting like communicating openly with your woman instead of sticking your chest out is weak. Stop acting like twenty-something year old Cole with daddy issues when your back is against the wall. "Ib disclosed harshly.

"Express yourself, Lamarr. It won't kill you and it's not a sin. In fact it's healthy, well if you're doing it correctly. Meaning don't be an asshole and get all disrespectful like you prefer to." he chuckled lightly, eliciting a smirk along my lips. "You know better and were doing better, so stick to the script. Anyways Grinch, I was calling to tell you that the meeting I had with Interscope earlier this morning was a success. They finally signed you through Dreamville and it's officially in ink. No more Columbia, my guy. They still gone show us love with or without a contract though, that's family."

"Word," I said lowly as I peered out the corner of my eye to see Riley disappointed with the dead end she encountered on Moorpark Street. As I figured, this was bound to happen and as I promised I'd sit back and let her rock. "I'm glad it went well though. I still get to keep my freedom as far as album releases, right? I don't want that kind of pressure, not right now at least."

"Yeah man, you're good on that. I made sure that the contract was written to your liking, from top to bottom." Ib assured before pressing on to another topic. "So, you really moving, huh?"

"It makes sense to, don't it?"

"Yeah I guess it does, pops. Can you believe it though?" he asked as Riley bit her lip and finally backed out the tight area we were stuck in, then began taking the route I had initially suggested. I literally had to shake my head at the shit as I answered Ib with another question.

"Believe what?"

"How different things are now. You're like two steps away from planning a wedding or should I say from eloping. You and Coleman seem like the type to run away to an island and elope in the middle of the winter anyways."

"It's currently fall, and nigga what? Get the hell off my phone with this mess." I barely jeered as Ib cackled at my lack of effort to refrain from laughing. He was the serious one in comparison to Mike and sometimes even myself, but in this moment everything about what he was saying was pure jokes. Neither one of us could keep a straight face. "You're mad annoying, man."

"Chill, I was only playing." Ib swore as I pursed my lips together. "You said it best though, you ain't a man until you stop chasing your friends. At some point we have to grow up and go down our own paths. Who knew yours would begin with fatherhood though. I'm still in awe."

"God knew, he knows everything." I disclosed simply with no intentions to elaborate, but the words that began to roll off my tongue seemed uncontainable. "Isn't that kind of relieving though? That there is someone, anyone who knows your destiny and even through the bullcrap they have kept and will always keep you afloat so you can meet it face to face one day? I don't talk to God as much as I should anymore. At one point I didn't believe anymore, but he has this all figured out. He has a divine plan that I may not understand or even see coming. He or she knows what I need, and when and how to prepare me for it."

And I believed that wholeheartedly, so deeply I felt an unexplainable pang in my chest that I was rather familiar with. I had, in that moment, come to a realization that there was something I needed to sort out with myself. Something I insist on approaching on an impulse, only to then bury and neglect. Something that would prepare me for this new journey I was on.

I have a lot of issues that I never dealt with and Ib made sure to remind me of them. These days Riley's seemed to overshadow mine, but yet they still existed and would forever exist unless I attacked them. I'm so preoccupied with helping her deal with her shit when I should get to the bottom of my own.

"There definitely is a God and they know. This is their doing..." I rambled more to myself, and it explained why I was no longer contemplating this important deed I had put off for years now, but was going to do it. It was time.

"You just got extremely deep on me and out of nowhere, fam. That there was a word." Ib uttered sarcastically as I sucked my teeth and noticed Riley had finally made it to the grey contemporary four level complex, known as Sherman Village, that I hoped she'd fall in love with.

"Yo, hell awaits Hamad. God don't like blasphemy." I joked as we both shared a laugh and I pointed toward the parked BMW 2 Series that my realtor waited in. Riley followed suit and pulled aside her, prompting me to unbuckle my seat belt and end this short but in depth phone call that had become valuable after all. "I'll hit you up when I make it to the city tomorrow, aight?"

"Coo'," Ib said before the line was cut short and I immediately caught Riley staring back at me.

Her eyes locked with mine and gleamed with an emotion I couldn't quite put my finger on. There was more than one thing she was feeling. It was then though when it dawned on me that she had heard every single thing Ib and I were speaking on. She heard everything that I had casually admitted to him, and because she knew me better than I knew myself sometimes, I knew Riley was aware of the place my words had come from. She knew exactly what I was thinking about and what was inferred.

She knows, and all too well.

Riley smiled faintly and reached across the console to grasp my hand that sat open on my lap, almost as if it was anticipating her delicate touch. Her rosy lips parted as she hesitated briefly on intruding, but I was glad she fought against it. Her knocking on that unyielding wall of mine, conscious or unconsciously, was appreciated. Once she exhaled the air was immediately cleared, nothing needed to be said at this point because that was oddly enough.

"Just reflecting?" she questioned with her brow arched high and her grip tightening. "It's time."

"Yeah, it's time." I agreed as she nodded and slid her hand from mine, but not before I brought it to my lips and pecked it softly, "Promise me one thing."

"Anything,"

"You'll like this place, please." Riley smacked my arm this time around as she smirked, then yanked the keys from the ignition. "What? It was worth a try!"

"I thought you were referring to —never mind." she murmured before unlocking the doors for us both to get out. Riley grabbed her crossbody purse, throwing it over her shoulder as I walked around and shoved my hands into my hoodie and waited for her to continue. "No promises, Cole. If it makes you feel any better, so far I like the location and outer appearance of this one than I did the others. So hopefully the inside seals the deal."

Shit, hopefully. I thought to myself as my realtor Alena, who had found and sold Ib and I on The Champ near this same area, greeted us with an infectious grin. Her tall frame then led the way to the entrance of hopefully one of the homes I'd bring my baby girl or boy to one day, but that was left up to Riley now. It was all in her hands.

-----

"So...?"

"It was nice," Riley stated blandly as she reached across the table and swiped three fries off my plate. She left me frowning at her uninvited candy red coated nails and lack of clarification.

After a long hour of closely examining each floor, every corner of every bedroom, the faucets, the doors, the bathrooms and any other random space and object Riley and I could find, all she had to say was that this particular location was nice? What did that even mean?

As I hauled my eyes away from my food and up to her face, watching as she stuffed her mouth, I was left even more clueless than I was before. I just wasn't understanding what her problem was, but I for sure knew now that it had nothing to do with the places we toured, but it was in fact something personal. Especially with this last one. I for one loved it. It was way more spacious, a reasonable price for a monthly bases and it was in the center of a more civilized neighborhood. On top of that there was a pool in the back, a parking garage and a park not too far where many of the families populated every day. This was after all a domestic locale; a bit private and peaceful, something I thought would be the cherry on top of every other detail that should've satisfied Riley. Keyword: should've.

"What the hell does that mean, Ry?" Her forehead furrowed together at my word choice and tone, one that was agitated, while she shrugged and prepared herself to beat around the bush once again.

"It means, it was nice. I liked it, and it seems like a nice place for a small family to reside in."

"Okay...?" I waited for her to elaborate a tad bit more as I nodded, persuading her to press on. Riley only leaned forward to steal a handful of fries again, then digested them just in time to muffle her words on purpose.

"What more do you want me to say, Lamarr?"

"Tell me that you like it enough for me to sign the lease. Tell me you're impressed and pleased with it enough that I can go to New York tomorrow and start packing my shit up to move here. Give me more than these dull ass, unreasonable responses you've been giving me all day about all these cribs!" I exclaimed as she plopped back into the cushion of the booth and sighed.

As if we were attached to each other by a string, I inclined forward and wiped the ketchup from the corner of her lips as she pouted and avoided my rant.

"Talk to me, baby girl."

"I just...I think it's too far. It's literally almost thirty minutes away from my condo, meaning if something were to happen and the baby and I needed you, you'd be out of reach."

"And what else don't you like?"

"That's it," she fibbed, her teeth gnawing into her bottom lip being the dead giveaway. I remained still with my elbows propped on the marble table top, gawking back at her uncomfortably. "What? It is!"

"You sure about that?"

"No..." Riley dragged out slowly. "I jus–"

"You still don't want me to move here, do you?" I quickly interjected.

"No, that's not it Lamarr. Don't get me wrong, initially I thought it was a horrible idea. I thought you were jumping the gun by moving here solely because I figured you were doing it for me. I absolutely believed that for the longest. That then created this fear that you moving here so quickly after we made it official would rush us. I was afraid we would be moving too fast and it would just have us crashing and burning before we could barely test the waters. All I want is for us to make it, and I just feared that taking that step so soon would stunt the growth and ruin us."

"And now?"

"Now? Now I don't mind." Riley confessed faintly as her lids that she reflexively shut fluttered open and her gaze settled on me. "For one, I'm pregnant with our baby and I want you here with me every step of the way. I want to be able to share every moment with you and not via Facetime. Two, and my main reason is before this news, waking up to your presence almost every morning and going to sleep with it felt amazing and I don't want distance in our relationship if it doesn't have to be there. If we're both happy here in L.A. and together, then why not?"

"You're still not getting to the problem. What's stopping you from giving me a simple yes or no on these condos, Ry? We gotta compromise here so that we can be together like you just said you wanted."

"I don't know. They're ju—"

"Just say it, Riley." I breathed out, becoming exhausted with the back and forth, tit for tat.

"I think you should just move in with me." she blathered, tossing her hands up. "It's economical, more convenient and I want you there with me. Right there, by my side. Not a half an hour away or ten minutes. Not in Beverly Hills, Universal City or all alone in a condo smack dead in Hollywood. Plus, you're a well behaved rapper for the most part with sense and money, groupies in this city are attracted to that and I'm not having it. So move in with me, and we can save up for that house you've always wanted with a huge backyard surrounded by trees and white folks down in North Carolina."

"Did you really just say that? Shit, you remember that?" I quizzed as smug smile played along my lips and a surge of heat bruised my cheeks.

"I remember everything you tell me," she revealed so nonchalantly, as if it were no big deal. Yet to me, it honestly meant the world. "So, what do you say?"

"You got enough space for me?"

"I have two closets, we can put our shoes in the smaller one and clothes in the larger one. You've seen the bathroom, it's huge as well as all the other rooms."

"What about your guest room?"

"It's the baby's now. I was thinking since it's fairly large itself, we can put a bed in there for when our moms want to come visit. If they don't mind, they can sleep in there with the baby. We can set it up so that it's comfortable and assemble the bathroom attached to it the same way. As for when friends and other family members visit, they'll just have to stay at a hotel. We wouldn't want it to be too crowded in our home with a newborn anyways." Riley established.

This woman had this shit planned out to a T, everything sounding flawlessly outlined as if she had been plotting on this moment for weeks.

"Luckily neither of our immediate families are that large, so that shouldn't be a concern."

"Yep, and if you want to redecorate everything to fit your taste