“Nigga, you fell asleep out here. Now you’ve got fucking bird shit on you. I told you you needed to put a damn covering on this balcony, but you thought cleaning bird shit was cool. Get your ass up and get in the shower. Hollow will be here in a minute, and I’m about to fix us some breakfast when they drop the groceries off.”
“Has he called yet?”
“Who?”
I gave her a knowing look.
“Oh, no. Not yet. Now go.” She pushed me off towards the bathroom.
As soon as that hot water hit me, instead of feeling lighter, I felt heavy. It was a feeling of death all over me. The OG’s always said you would know what it feels like when death was coming. It tended to always come when a nigga was trying to get his life together.
“I gotta get this shit right,” I mumbled, as I grabbed my washcloth and soap.
I could hear the doorbell and smell the bacon when I got out of the shower. Wrapping my bottom half with a towel, I grabbed my toothbrush and brushed my teeth. I was starting to miss Adore giving me my weekly facials. Life had been fucking us up that we couldn’t enjoy any of the shit we used to do.
“Here go this bullet in the legs ass nigga,” Hollow said, taking a seat at the table.
I don’t know if I wasn’t in the mood or if I was still dealing with the thought of death. Adore placed plates in front of both of us before she set her plate down. She had my apple juice with a little slush in it and all. That small gesture did bring a smile to my face.
“So, you plan on being a man or being ignorant when you meet this nigga? Let me kno’ now so I can be there. I would hatefor my sister to damn near lose her life again at the hands of you,” Hollow said, filling his mouth with hot grits.
I guess this was his way of trying to get under my skin. Not going to lie, he almost got me.
“I just kno’ when that nigga see you, he gon’ lil’ boy the shit outta you. Got yo’ girl ‘round this bitch takin’ care of you and shit,” Hollow continued.
It was that right there that always tended to take me over the edge. That’s what everyone thought when they saw me. A little nigga that lets his bitch control him with money. Adore never gave that. She was able to triple because of me. Truthfully, I was in the streets more than her. A real boss was never seen.
“Yeah, I see his ass over there seething,” Hollow said with a smile. “Do boy ass nigga.”
That was it, I grabbed the table and threw that bitch into the wall. There was food and juice everywhere. All the while, Hollow sat his ass in the chair with a strip of bacon hanging from his mouth.
“There it is…you don’t like to be called a do boy. That’s the first thing that nigga gon’ say to you. Is this the emotion you’re gonna give?” He asked.
I stood there with my nostrils flared and fist balled up. Thankfully, I didn’t have a gun on me because I’m sure that bitch would’ve been aimed at Hollow right now. My eyes went to Adore. This was the first time I saw a little fear in her, and it made me soften up.
“You emotional. I kno’ it’s that lil’ boy inside of you. If you can tame him, you can conquer anything, my nigga,” Hollow told me.
“I just watched two of my homeboys die. My girl almost died, and now we got a nigga playin’ chess wit’ our lives. So yeah, I might be a little too emotional,” I said.
“Good,” Hollow replied.
That one word threw me off.
“It just means you human, nigga. The problem is you let that shit control how you move.”
“You think I don’t kno’ that?”
Adore got up to start cleaning my mess.
“Adore, stop. I’ll clean it. Just go,” I waved her off. “I think me and yo’ brother can have this conversation without you. We won’t kill each other.”
“I think you don’t kno’ how to fix it,” Hollow told me.
Hollow had a way of talking like he was talking down on you.
“Aye, watch how you talk to me, nigga. Why you always talkin’ down?”
“See,” he pointed. “You didn’t hear shit I said. You heard how I said it. You react to tone instead of the fuckin’ content. That typa’ shit makes you predictable to nigga like Rico. I kno’ you’ve been in the streets since a jit. I respect it. But as a street nigga with education, we kno’ how to move a lil’ different, and I think Rico is an educated street nigga.”
