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“I’m going to be good. I need to see what’s going on so I can make sure y’all are straight to leave out.”

“We should just stay in here and wait until whatever they’re doing is done,” I said, trying to get him to see things my way. I could tell he wasn’t feeling it and would still go out there regardless of what I said or how I felt about it.

“I can’t protect you in here without knowing what’s going on out there, Xiyah. Just give me a minute to see what the fuck is going on, okay? I promise I’ll be back.”

Sighing, I nodded and told him, “Okay.”

As we waited for Hasan to come back inside to get us, I couldn’t do anything but think about whether or not he was okay. I knew I said that I wanted nothing to do with him, but I didn’t want to lose him either. I wasn’t sure how long we sat there waiting, but I knew I went through so many emotions that I wasn’t really ready to deal with.

“Alright, y’all can come out,” Hasan said, coming up behind us.

“What was that all about?” Oaklyn asked the question I wanted an answer to as well.

“Just some niggas out there beefing about somebody stepping on their shoes. Nobody was hit, though. Just a motherfucker trying to prove he was tougher than the next nigga,” he said, shrugging as we all stepped outside.

Thirty minutes later, the shooting and the haunted house were over, and now I could put that shit behind me. Oaklyn thought I was playing, but she was coming back by herself next year. I’d made up my mind about that. I wasn’t going to keep putting myself through this shit to be a good friend. And now that the shooting had happened up here, I was good. Not saying they couldn’t happen anywhere, but it was one more reason I shouldn’t have had my ass up here in the first place.

“What are you about to get into?” Hasan asked, pulling me into his body.

Slipping out of his arms, I stepped back. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Oaklyn and Takoda flirting, and I was going to ask her ass about it later. She swore up and down she couldn’t stand his ass, but from the looks of it, she was trying to hop on his dick the same way that she was campaigning for me to do with Hasan.

“Uh, I’m going home to get dressed for the party tonight.”

“Nah, come with me.”

“I can’t. My costume and everything I need are back at my house.”

“Then, we’ll go grab it first.”

“No, Hasan. I’m going home.”

Gripping my hand, he pulled my body into his again. “Stop playing with me and get in the car, Xiyah.”

Laughing, Oaklyn turned to me, “Well, I guess I’ll see you at the house then, friend. It’s okay. I can get dressed and meet you at the party.”

Being that Hasan was already pulling me toward his car, I knew that there was no fighting either of them about where I was and wasn’t going. I was riding with him whether I liked it or not. And unfortunately for me, I wasn’t putting up a fight about it either, even though I knew I should’ve been.

The entire ride back to my house, I kept telling myself I wasn’t getting back with his ass, and we weren’t going to have sex. He had no right to tell me that I couldn’t break up with him. If I wanted out of our relationship, then that was what we were doing. He was just going to have to get with the program.

“Why you over there looking like that?” he asked, turning on the block for my house.

“I’m just trying to figure out how I ended up in your car when I planned on never talking to you ever again,” I said, shrugging.

“You do know that you set yourself up for failure when you thought that shit would ever work out for you, right? I don’t know how the fuck you convinced yourself to think that I was going to let you go over some stupid shit like what that bitch is trying to pull.”

“It’s not just about you dodging me or my question, Hasan.”

“Then what the fuck is it about, huh? You’re mad about some stupid shit. Literally some shit that you made up in your fucking head because of the next bitch. Some shit you know in your heart that I would never fucking do to you!”

“Forget it,” I said, shifting my body to look out the window.

I really didn’t want to have this conversation with him. He was going to see things the way that he wanted to, and I was going to do the same. Besides, when I wanted to talk, he wasn’t trying to hear it, so there was no need for us to talk about it now.

FOUR

HASAN

After taking Xiyah to get her stuff, I brought her back to my condo in the city. No one had been here but her and my family. It was my place of peace, and I had gotten so used to her being here with me that the shit hadn’t felt right in weeks. Now that she was back, everything felt right again. Now, I just had to get her ass back on the same page with me.