Frog was the first to come over to the bed and push me out of the way.
“Listen, ma’am, I don’t know all that’s going on with y’all, but please stitch my shit up, and look at my ankle.”
Islah nodded, not sayin’ too much as she moved through my niggas, taking bullets out and stitching up the ones that needed it.
She was almost done with Kev when Carlos came in with the shit that I asked him to buy. I took it from him and took it into Islah’s room.
Carlos walked over to her when she was done with Kev and told her what he wanted her to look at. She looked at that nigga—really all them niggas—with care. She was gentle, she cared, she even held a conversation with them a lil’ bit, but me, I got the cold shoulder.
I went into her room and set the lil’ shit up I got for her and waited for her. In my head, I went over everything I wanted to say to her and reminded myself to watch my tone. Once I was done, I walked back into the other room and saw that she was done.
“Iight, is that all you needed from me? You gonna let me go now?”
I tilted my head at her.
“Why did you think I would be letting you go?”
“Because I did what you needed, and it’s nothing else for me to do,” she responded.
I shook my head. “You are not going anywhere but in the other room. I got something for you.”
She folded her arms across her chest.
“I don’t want shit in that other room. I just want to leave.”
The air in that room was thick. All them niggas was looking back and forth at us, and she was embarrassing me.
“Islah, I need to talk to you in the other room,” I said low, softly, trying to control my tone.
She looked me up and down.
“No.”
That was all she said.
I laughed it off.
“Come on, baby girl, I got something in there I think you would like. I am trying to make this shit better.”
“Make it better by letting me go,” she fired back.
I walked over to her and yanked her by her arm into the other room, damn near tossing her on the bed, slamming the connecting door closed behind me.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I asked her. “Do you want me to be the nigga I am right now?”
“You don’t have to be this nigga! You are choosing to.”
“Nah, Islah, you are making me. You have made all this shit happen, lil’ do you know.”
“Lil’ do I know?” she fired back. “Gio, I don’t want to be here, and I don’t want to be with you! You took me from my party; you brought me here. I don’t even know where the fuck I’m at!”
I took a pause, wanting the energy in the room to calm down, and I changed the subject.
“Listen, Islah…baby girl. I am trying to make the best outta this so we can get back on the same page.”
Islah laughed as she looked over the room.
“So you think putting me in a room with you and your niggas watching me is gonna fix us?”
