Page 8 of Love & Vendettas
“I know how long I’ve been gone. Fuck! Go home. I’ll be right behind you.”
“Are you leaving?” I Essence asks.
“I told you I can’t stay.”
“I’m tired of coming second to your family, Isaiah. You need to choose tonight. If you can’t, there will be consequences.”
“Are you threatening me?” he asks as I walk into the living room.
“I’m just saying. Make your choice. I won’t play this game with you much longer.”
I slam out of the door and head down the street, running past my house and not stopping until I reach the basketball court.
“Aye, Zaire. You up for a game?” Parker asks.
“Nah, I ain’t feeling that.”
He bounces the ball toward the other guys on the court and walks my way.
“Aye, yo’ wassup, dude? You look like you ’bout to kill a nigga.”
“Might be.”
“Who?”
“My dad.”
“Oh,” he replies grimly. “Essence?”
I glance sideways at him. “So sick of this shit.”
“I know. It wouldn’t be so bad if the whole neighborhood didn’t know. Or if he didn’t do it right across the street, and one door up from your place. I mean, all our old men fuck around. At least the ones who are still in our lives.”
“Yeah, but not where the whole neighborhood knows.”
“Nah, they usually do like my old man and go across town.”
“They don’t go across town. They go a few neighborhoods over. Your daddy is the only one going across town.”
“That’s because he’s fucking that white woman,” Parker declares, shaking his head.
“I just don’t get it. I mean, Essence left his dumb ass. Why would he fuck it all up for her?”
“Sometimes the pussy’s just that good, man.”
I look at him sideways again and nudge him with an elbow. He cracks a smirk and starts laughing.
“What? I’m just saying.”
“You ain’t saying shit, my guy. You’ve only been with Natasha Stanley. That’s the only pussy you know,” I reply, cracking up laughing.
“Yeah, whatever. That’s all I’ve told you about.”
“On the real, let me get up out of here. I need to get Baby D some diapers. He ran out a while ago, and Moms is gonna be bitching about diaper rash in a minute. Don’t know if my daddy’s pulled his dick out of Essence long enough to figure it out.”
Parker starts walking down the block with me.
“How do you know that’s where he’s at?”
