“You sound stupid! What do boys I got? If you and I were on good terms, you would have taken the clothes out of the dryer when I told you to. You purposely chose to take your time, and?—”
“Stop! Both of you, please just stop! Creed, and Legend, ya’ll are brothers. Twin brothers at that! What the fuck is wrong withya’ll? So, because ya’ll got mad about some fuckin clothes in the laundry, ya’ll decided to fight about it? I had my headphones in my ear, listening to music while I packed my bag, and I heard a loud noise, so I rushed out here to see what was going on, and I see my fuckin sons throwing down, like two niggas on the street that are enemies! I get it. Ya’ll are not going to always get along, but it doesn’t have to resort to this. Ya’ll share blood! Ya’ll are supposed to fight for each other, not with each other!” her voice was trembling with so much rage, and those tears that she had been holding in eventually fell.
She was going to break her neck to tell our pops what happened when he got here, and that was going to be another issue. My pops knew that me, and Legend were beefing. According to him, he wasn’t going to get in the middle of our shit. He called us stupid for going this many days without speaking to one another, but I knew that after my mama told him about this fight, he was going to insert himself in the middle and make us hash out whatever issues that we had.
She stood there crying, looking at both of us with disappointment in her eyes.
“I don’t even recognize my own kids right now. This is not the way that me, and Sevyn raised you two. I was just telling your dad the other day that it’s breaking my heart seeing the two of you walking around here not speaking to each other, but he got on me, telling me to stay out of it, and let you two hash it out on your own. Legend, and Creed, ya’ll used to be inseparable at one point. Ya’ll want to know the sad part about this shit? While ya’ll are in here, fighting like strangers, you gotta know that nobody in this world is going to ride for either one of you harder than the very same person that ya’ll just tried to knock out. Me, and you dad are always telling ya’ll that friends will come and go, but the brotherhood that ya’ll have will be forever. So, marinate on that. I can’t wait for your daddy to get here, so that I can tell him whathappened,” were her last words before she turned on her heels, and she walked the long hallway, going back to her bedroom.
I stood out here in the hallway, and I watched Legend as he got up. The laundry room was up here, and it was right down to the hall to the left. This nigga walked his ass over there, and a minute later, he walked out of the laundry room, carrying the basket in his hands that held his clothes. I shook my head at him, watching him as he went back to his bedroom.
“That’s all you had to do in the first place. You tried to be petty and ended up getting your ass beat!” I said, keeping it going.
“Creed, go in your fuckin room before I put my hands on you!” my mama yelled from the hallway.
“Yeah, go in your room before you get your ass beat again,” he whispered it, so that our mama didn’t hear him.
“Beat again? Nigga you got a knot in between your eyes, your bottom lip busted, and bleeding, and I did a number on your chest. You didn’t beat shit!” I whispered right back, not wanting my mama to hear me.
I knew that she would make good on her threat, and bring her ass back out here, and put her hands on me. Legend didn’t even respond. He just went back in his room, and he closed the door.
Now that he’d gotten his clothes out of the dryer, I was able to take mine out of the washer and place them in the dryer. I went back in my room, and I walked into my bathroom that was attached. The first thing that I did was look at myself in the mirror, and my nose still had the blood lingering there from Creed punching me. I ran the water, grabbed a washcloth, and I cleaned my nose, and washed my mouth out with water, since blood was oozing from my mouth from being hit there too. There weren’t any scratches on my face or anything, but you could see some on my arm. Once I finished cleaning myself off, I turnedthe water on in the shower, and I hopped in, where I stayed inside for about fifteen minutes.
Inside the shower, I allowed so many fucked up thoughts to flood my mind. I was at a point in my life right now, where I just wasn’t happy.
No matter what I was doing in life, my thoughts would always go back to the night that I got caught in Vivian’s bedroom, and the shit that I’ve been dealing with since it happened. There was no case with that. Ever since my pops came down to the police station, and he called them all out on the illegal shit that they’d done that night, there was never a case that went on after that. I just hated what that shit did to my reputation. Niggas that I was cool with on the baseball team were pulling me to the side, asking me if it was true that I’d raped Vivian. When I would snap at them, and tell them that I didn’t, that’s when they would want to know if we’d have sex. Even though Vivian had gone on social media, and she put a video out, explaining the truth, people still were going to believe what they wanted to, and there were so many people that still believed that me, and her had sex.
When I’d finally gotten my phone back the next day after all that shit happened, I had so many missed calls, and text messages from so many people. Vivian called me so many times, and she sent so many messages to my phone, apologizing for the mess. I never responded back to any of her messages, neither did I choose to call her back. I did what everyone around me was telling me to do, which was block her phone number. I even blocked her on social media. In school, I would still see her, and whenever I did, I would go out of my way to go in another direction, so that we wouldn’t have to speak to each other. I did appreciate her for getting online, and telling the world the truth, but I just couldn’t fuck with that girl. I should have never fuckedwith her in the first place, and none of this shit would have happened.
It was my future that I was worried about. Thinking about my future, and possibly what I might not have anymore, had me up at night, and zoning out like right now, being in the shower, and that’s all I could think about. I only had two years left of high school, and even though that was enough time, life just moved so fast, so I know that these two years will be over in no time.
The fears of me blowing my shot were haunting me. On some slick shit, and just to give myself some kind of peace of mind, I ended up reaching out to that recruiter that hit my pops up a few weeks ago. I only did it, just to see if he was still checking for me. I couldn’t get through to him though. Every time I called, I would get his assistant, telling me that he was either in a meeting, or his favorite one was telling me that he would reach back out to me when he was available. Shit had me wondering if I was already blacklisted. I was taking that as them, basically telling me that I was no longer a priority. I worked so fuckin hard to get to where I was at right now, only for one situation, and the lies that came from it to fuck me up like this.
Shaking my head, I eventually got out of the shower, and I grabbed a towel, wrapping it around my body. I walked out of the bathroom, and I dried off in my bedroom, slipping on some briefs, a fresh pair of basketball shorts, and a black tee. I grabbed the lotion that I had on my dresser, and I put it on my legs, arms, and my face.
As I was doing that, I heard the doorbell ring, and it wasn’t long until I could hear my mama in the hallway, moving fast, trying to get downstairs to the door, so that she could go, and snitch. That’s why I be snitching on my pops to her ass, so now I didn’t feel bad that I was doing it because at first, I lowkey felt bad that I be going to him, telling him what she be doing. I only was snitching because I was desperate to get back on his goodside. I told him about all the shit she be doing, like leaving me, and Legend in the house late night, and she doesn’t bring her ass back until the wee hours of the morning.
Since she was all the way on the first level of the house, I couldn’t hear what it was that she was telling him, but I’m sure that she was being dramatic with whatever she was saying. I shook my head, grabbed my bookbag for school, packing it up, making sure that I had everything in it, since we were going with him for the weekend, and we would leave from his crib Monday morning to go to school. I had uniform, and clothes at his house, so I didn’t have to pack that. All I needed was my phone, and my bookbag. Once I had those things, I walked out to the laundry room, where my clothes were dry, and I brought them to my bedroom, so that I could fold them. I only got one shirt folded when my bedroom door opened, and I turned around, and it was my pops standing on the other side of the door.
“Come downstairs, and go outside in the backyard,” so much authority was in his voice. I threw the shirt down on the bed that was in my hands, sighed, and I walked out of the room.
As I was walking out, I could see Legend going down the stairs, so I’m assuming that he’d got to him first. I took the stairs down, and when I did, my mom’s small suitcase was already down here, waiting by the door, so I’m assuming that when we walked out, she was going to leave at the same time as us.
I made it outside in the backyard, and Legnd was already sitting down. My pops was out here already too, and he was standing. He was in his chill, laid back clothes this evening. Well, it was chill and laid back for him because he was already dressed up, wearing suits, and shit. The brown, and crème colored button up shirt, that was a crochet material was hard as fuck, and something that I would wear. The shirt was short sleeve, and you could check out how cut up, and ripped my pops arms were. I swear I be in the gym, working out, trying to get his build.He wore crème trousers, and just like everything that he would wear, you could tell that he’d taken the trousers to get tailored because they were fit just for him. The classicNikedunks that he had on, I’d never seen him in those before, so they had to have been fresh out of the box. Nobody in the world was fuckin with my pops when it came to his watch collection. ThePatek Philippe Nautilustime piece on his wrist was so fuckin hard! I couldn’t wait until I made it to the MLB, so that I could go out, and purchase fancy time pieces like that for myself.
“Either one of you could start explaining whenever ya’ll ready. I come knock on the door, and your mama standing on the other side, with bloodshot red eyes. The mama that carried both of ya’ll in her womb for damn near a year, opened the door for me, crying about how she had to break up a fight between you two niggas. Jump in at any time, fill me in, and let me know what the fuck is going on,” his voice was calm, but you could tell that he wasn’t playing.
“He gotta watch the way he talk to people, pops. Even before me, and Creed started beefing, I’ve always told him that he has a way of coming at people like he’s the headperson in charge, and we work for him. He coming at me, demanding me to take my clothes out of the dryer, as if I’m a worker of his. You know I don’t even like confrontation like that. Had he come in my room, showing me respect, asking me to take my clothes out, instead of demanding it, none of this would have happened. I would have stopped what I was doing and took my clothes out of the dryer. It ain’t what you say to people, it’s the way you say it,” Legend spoke first, his eyes going from me, and my pops, as he explained what happened.
“Man, here you go trying to play that innocent twin role. You always try to act like you’re the good twin, that don’t give any problems, while I’m the one that comes with all the madness. Man, I asked you to take your clothes out the dryer, and youdisrespected me too, keeping your back turned to me, not even looking me in my eyes, as you told me that you’ll do it when you finished what you were doing. You was moving all slow, putting those clothes away in your closet,” I shot. Our pops stood there, shaking his head.
“Ya’ll sound like some motha fuckin immature ass kids, going at it about taking clothes out of the dryer. Creed, I know you, man. You was looking for a problem. If you genuinely wanted his clothes out of the dryer, so that you could put yours in, you would have went to your mama, told her to take them out, so that she could put them in his room for him. Problem solved right there. You knew the second you went in Legend’s room, demanding him to do some shit that you needed him to do, that shit was going to go left. You came looking for a problem, and you got it. This how we going to solve this though because that shit lame as fuck for ya’ll to be walking around this bitch with the same fuckin face and not talking to each other. This what we gone do. Stand up. Both of ya’ll,” my pops said. I sighed, and I stood up out of the chair, and Legend stood, doing the same thing.
“You are your brothers keepers. Hug that shit out,” he said, and I turned my head to look at him like he was crazy.
“Pops, come on. Man, you tripping. I’d rather you take my phone, and my game system. Ain’t no other option?” I asked him.
“Yeah. It’s another option. Me, and you can have part two of the fight, and I can have your top lip match your bottom lip. That’s always an option too,” his ass said. I shook my head.
