Tears Fall at Night-The Blessed One Box Set (Praise Him Anyhow and Blessed and Highly Favored Series) by Vanessa Miller

How do you think it looks for people to see my Mom dropping me off at school?”
    Carmella parked the car, turned the engine off and said as innocently as possible, “I hope the fact that I’ll be auditing a few of your classes and helping out in the office this week won’t drop your cool points with your friends.”
    Dontae inhaled and then exhaled slowly, making signs with his hands as if he was trying to get in a Zen kind of mood. “Please tell me this is a joke.”
    “No joke,” Carmella said as she got out of the car. She began walking towards the front doors of the high school, but noticed that Dontae wasn’t walking with her. She turned and saw him still sitting in the car looking about as miserable as a teenager could before being prescribed anti-depressants. Good, Carmella thought. He’ll think twice before goofing off at school again. Carmella strutted back to the car, knocked on the passenger side window and yelled, “Come on, boy. We don’t want to be late to your first class.” Okay, she didn’t have to keep rubbing it in, but she was determined to drive her point home.
    “This ain’t right,” Dontae said as he got out of the car and stalked off toward the school building.
    She closed her passenger door since her son left it wide open as if by magic, the door would close itself. Her Lexus SRX could do a lot of things, but closing its own doors wasn’t one of them. She let Dontae rush ahead, because she needed to sign in before going into any of the classrooms.
    The school secretary was at her desk when Carmella walked in. “Good morning, Mrs. Bell, how are you doing today?”
    “Oh, Mrs. Marshall, how nice to see you. How’ve you been?”
    “Things are going well,” was Carmella’s statement of faith. “I was hoping that I could audit a few of Dontae’s classes today.”
    “I don’t think that would be a problem. Just sign in right here.” She pointed to the sign-in sheet. “And I’ll get an approval for your day pass.”
    “I might want to come back a few more days this week if that would be possible.”
    Mrs. Bell smirked, getting the message. “Turning the screws on him, huh?”
    “I’m throwing everything I’ve got at him, while still praying for a miracle.”
    “Okay, let’s see if we can rustle one up for you.”
    Carmella sat down in the administrative office, waiting to receive her pass so she could stalk her son all day long. She only prayed that he would forgive her for what she was about to do. Maybe years from now when he became a huge success at whatever he decided to do with his life, he’d call and thank her for this—or maybe not.
    Instead of the school secretary bringing her the day pass, Carmella looked up and saw Ramsey headed her way. She stood and gave him a hug, “Hey Ramsey, I didn’t mean to bother you.”
    “No bother at all. You can have the pass and audit all of Dontae’s classes, but I was hoping that we could maybe go about this another way.”
    “Like what?” Carmella asked, trying her best to concentrate. Ramsey was regal and gorgeous all at the same time. He was captain of the basketball team when they were in high school and she was on the cheerleading squad. That was many years ago, but she wanted to grab her pom-poms and give this brother a “Rah! Rah! Sis-Boom-Bah!”
    “I can call Dontae down here and let him know that you’ve been okayed to attend all of his classes anytime you want.”
    Carmella was catching on. She added, “And then we can give him the opportunity to beg me not to do him like this and let him promise to do his work, right?”
    “Right.”
    “Let’s do it,” Carmella said. She hadn’t really wanted to humiliate her son, but she couldn’t think of any other way to get her point across. Ramsey escorted her to his office and she sat down and waited for Dontae.
    Ramsey sat down behind his desk and stared at her in a way that made Carmella squirm. “What?” she asked when he kept on staring.
    “Nothing, I