Mike folded his arms and looked Marv over for another second. "I ain't gone lie..." he smirked. "You look like shit."
Marv rolled his eyes. "Fuck all y'all."
I stared at him thinking,yeah there he go. That sounded more like my cousin. Marv shifted a little, trying to sit himself up a little higher before cursing under his breath. Just watchinghim struggle was enough to tell me that bullet damn near tore his ass apart. I reached over without saying nothing and hit the button to raise the bed instead. He looked at me, nodded, then settled back against the pillow.
"Appreciate it fam," he muttered.
"Yeah," I said. "Don't get used to me being nice."
He smirked. "Fuck you."
"I was wondering when my cousin was gone show back up. Thought they replaced your ass with somebody polite."
Mike stayed leaned against the wall near the window with his arms folded. Nobody said much for a second because we were all doing the same thing, looking him over making sure we wasn't missing nothing the doctors hadn't told us. The swelling had gone down some since the first day, but he still looked like he'd gone twelve rounds with death and barely won.
"You scared Grandma," I finally told him.
His eyes drifted toward the ceiling. "I know."
"She damn near moved in this hospital."
"I know man, I heard." He replied looking regretful. If that was one thing we didn’t play about, it was Barbara Jean. She loved her grands just as much as we loved her. She raised us all to stick together although we gave her hell growing up, just some bad ass knuckle heads running the streets of Liberty City.
"You know she cussed me out?"
That made him laugh a little. "What she say?"
I shook my head. "Said if anything happened to you, it was my fault because I should've been watching you. I told her I been done with this street shit." I responded with a lot of truth in it. That dog for the hustle was just in me, but my family refused to leave the streets. I was well respected and people knew what was up with me but this real-estate mogul shit for me, is where the real money is.
He smiled, but it didn't last long. "She always did blame you for everything."
I leaned back in the chair with seriousness behind my eyes. "Because she know you hardheaded."
"Nah..." he said with a tired grin. "She know you older."
Kev pointed between us. "I ain't jumping in that shit."
"Smart man," Mike chuckled.
The room settled down again. The joking had done what it was supposed to do and lighted it up, taking the edge off because we all needed that little laugh before getting into the reason I really came up there. I pulled the visitor's chair closer to the bed, resting my forearms across my knees while looking him dead in his face.
"Aight." I said watching his smile disappear. "What happened?"
Marv let out a slow breath and rubbed the back of his neck. "I been trying to piece this shit together ever since I woke up."
"So piece it together." I told him meaning business.
He looked over at me. "I left the warehouse by myself."
I nodded for him to keep going.
"I made one stop like I was supposed to," He paused, squeezing his eyes shut for a second. "Then after that everything happened fast as fuck. I remember seeing a car pull up beside me and next thing I know, they started shooting. I couldn't even tell you how many of 'em it was," Marv continued, staring past me like he was trying to watch the whole thing play back in his head. "Two... maybe three. Hell, I don't know. I just know bullets started flying, and I wasn't about to sit there and let them kill me."
"So you shot back," I said.
"The fuck you think?" He looked at me like I asked the dumbest question on earth. "I ain't just finna let a muhfucka Swiss cheese me."
“Just making sure you ain’t gone soft on me. Keep going.”
