2

Janet

I sat at the piano as I played a melody. A glass of wine sat on my piano, sometimes shaking slightly if I struck at a chord too hard. The door to my home opened and with it came in my son and my bodyguard, Joey.

He always picked Eissa up from school. They both came running my way once they heard the pianos melodies sounding.

Eissa made it to me first. "Mommy!"

I stopped playing and hugged him. "Hey my prince. How was school?"

"Good! I'm on blue!" He yelled out excitedly. "My teacher let me read to her today too!"

"Really? That's great E." I replied.

My son dug in his backpack and pulled out a book. "Can I read to you today?"

"Mommy has to write a couple things today. Do you have any homework?" I changed topics.

He looked down for a moment before putting his book up and shaking his head. "Oh. Well no. I don't have any homework."

Sighing, I suggested, "How about we have bathe time early and then after mommy gets done writing her song, we can watch whatever movie you'd like. How's that sound?"

"Seriously? You'll watch it with me?"

"Seriously. Go run your water. I'll be there soon."

"Why can't Nanny Tiff run it?" He asked me.

I sent him a look. "Because I told Eissa Al Mana to run it. Go run it, let me talk to Uncle Joey."

He knew better than to talk back that time and simply turned around and headed up the steps of my home and towards his bathroom.

"You and that boy are going to kill each other when he grows up and really starts challenging your authority." Joey spoke up.

"Oh I rebuke that." I disagreed. "Let's not even speak that into existence, cause I'm already trying to get him to stop talking back now."

Joey and I were close. He was my bodyguard first, but once I had Eissa, he somehow morphed his way into becoming his as well. We were family, and most knew that messing with me came with the consequences of him.

He replied with, "Every time I pick him up from school, he's always alone and reading. J, I know you sent him to school to be social, but maybe that's not going to happen. He just isn't the social type yet."

"But I need him to be Joey. You know this family. Joe would kill us if we didn't have some type of sociable life. That's how we became who we were. We could never be shy around that man."

Joey nodded. "Oh I know. I know very well."

"I tried taking a different and lighter approach with E, but maybe I shouldn't have."

Sometimes, I regretted the decision of letting my soon grow up in a looser and less formatted way in life. I was the opposite of my father in the means of raising my son.

E would have to do something really drastic to even make me think of picking up a belt. Discipline was held in the household, it just wasn't as important.

Joey answered my last statement. "You made the right decision. Look at your niece."

I rolled my eyes at the mention of Paris. "Okay, you didn't even have to mention her as a example J."

He shrugged. "Oh well. It's true though, and you can't say it's not. They raised her strict like Joe and she wilded out the first moment she got a chance to. At least his wildness is to a minimum."

"He's still not social Joey. He's a Jackson for Christ sake."

"No sweets. He's a Al Mana. I told you to not name that lil boy after his terrorist looking daddy."

"Joey!" I exclaimed as my eyes widened. "That's mean!"

"I don't give a fu—."

"Mommy! My waters ready!" Eissa's voice cut Joey off before he could cuss.

"Okay! Mommy's coming prince!" I chuckled at Joeys face. "I guess that was God saying watch your mouth."

He rolled his eyes. "God knows my heart. Now back to what I was saying, maybe if you would have given him the last name of Jackson, we would be here right now because he would have come out the womb socially inclined."

"I really don't think it works like that." I replied monotoned.

"In my book it does. Anyways, tell my Eissa I'll be back to get him from school tomorrow like usual and that we'll go get his ice cream since it's Friday."

I arched a eyebrow at that. "You've been feeding my child ice cream every Friday?"

"Noooo." Joey put his shades over his eyes. "Who said that?"

"Joey, don't give him ice cream every Friday. It doesn't work like that."

"Yep. Mhm. I got it. No ice cream every Friday." Joey pretended to write it down before heading for the door and mumbling. "I'm going to do it anyways."

"I heard that!" I yelled after him.

He turned around and chuckled as he closed the door slowly while stating, "Oh I didn't whisper Jan."

Shaking my head, I climbed the steps towards Eissa's bathroom. When I entered, I saw that he was in the tub playing with his toys and trucks.

"Eissa, what have I told you about putting all these toys in the tub?" I scolded.

My son simply shrugged as he kept playing.

"Answer me Eissa Al Mana."

When I called him by his whole name, he knew that I was serious. He looked down and mumbled. "You tell me not to put so many."

"Exactly. Now give me some of them so I can dry them off and put them up while you bath."

He sighed and grabbed a couple and handed them out towards me. When he did, I noticed he had a bruise on his right side.

I grabbed the toys and sat them on the counter. "Eissa... what happened to your side?"

My son looked up at me with widened eyes before covering the bruise up. "N-nothing."

"Don't lie to me. Where did you get that from?"

Slowly, he replied. "Some boys at school, they pushed me."

"Excuse me?" I questioned for I was already getting pissed off.

Oh, that school was going to hear from me. Soon.

Very soon.