Page 88 of 4 Corinthians

Krude: It was sound advice!

Exodus: Nigga!

Judge: Madea really should’ve beat you more as a child.

Mercy: Hey now don’t start with my brother-cousin.

Krude: Thank you, sister-cousin. I hope you dunk on somebody in your next game.

Cross: Y’all really have to stop calling each other that. It sounds like y’all parents were kissing cousins.

Krude: Doing things that would have them in jail anywhere but the Deep South. 😉

Madea: Genesis!

Granddaddy: You really get that shit from your mama side for real.

Krude: Madea, I know you are not acting like you innocent. Didn’t I see that lube and handcuffs in your drawer at Judah’s birthday party? OG, y’all nasty.

I dropped the phone back on the counter and rested my forehead against it.

“Are you going to help me or not?”

“Or not,” I answered him, shaking my head. “I refuse to support your habit.” I didn’t lift my head, but I knew my son well enough to know that that answer wouldn’t do.

“I’m calling Madea,” he declared. “She will help me.”

“My grandma is going to tell you the same thing.” I lifted my head in time to see him picking up my phone.

He dialed her number, then put the phone on speaker.

“I don’t know why that boy acts that way. I think your granddaddy dropped him a little too many times when he was a baby,” Madea answered.

“He said you were the one who dropped him,” I told her, laughing.

“I probably did,” she replied. “Ain’t no telling which time he was dropped that did the trick though.”

“Madea,” Judah said. “Krude is cheating.”

“I know, baby,” Madea told him. “I’ma beat his ass like I should’ve did when he was younger.”

“You want to borrow my belt?” he asked, and I laughed as I walked away from the island. “I got a new one the other day. I can bring it over to your house when we come over later for dinner.”

“Yeah baby, bring it,” she laughed. “Until then, stop playing that game with him. He is on punishment.”

“But Madea, I’m in the hole,” he said, shaking his head. I went back to cleaning the kitchen as they talked.

“By how much, Judah?” she asked before I could. Krude bet the boys like they were grown men.

“Like three hundred dollars!” he told her. “He cheated on the last two games. I don’t know how he does it.”

“Oh hell,” she sighed. “Judah, stop playing that game with that man. I will handle the debt.”

“No, ma’am, you can't do that,” Judah said, shaking his head. His face was twisted as if Madea had told him something he didn’t approve of. “A man can't ever have a woman pay his debt. That’s not how it goes. I’m a man Madea. You can't pay what I owe.”

“Who told you that?” I asked him.

Judah looked up from the phone to me. “Krude,” he answered. “He said a grown man handles all money situations. He’s the head of the house, and a woman is the heart; she’s supposed to spend it, live a soft life, and be happy.”