by Love Belvin
“How were you supposed to earn money that young?”
“By figuring it out. He said he’d give me a few years, but I was on the clock.”
“Did he expect you to follow his footsteps and sell drugs?” That prospect angered me.
I grew up with guys who only had that as an option to survive, but many of them didn’t have fathers to provide. Their fathers were either dead, imprisoned, or strung out on something.
I could feel the mattress tremble from laughter spurring from his belly. “Nah. Flippin’ chickens wasn’t an option for me. I hated it at first.”
“Why?”
“Because all my niggas was trappin’. It was all we knew. The difference was I didn’t do it. Couldn’t do it. It kinda interfered with our social time. They’d be on the block and sometimes when it was hot, I had to sit in the damn house by myself until their shift was up.”
A fluttery laugh shot from my lips. “Shift?”
“Yeah. For the projects, they took shifts. There were other crews competing for sells. If you wanted that money to stay in your click, you had to hustle. So I’d sneak and sit through shifts with them.”
“But you didn’t sell it yourself?”
“Nah.” He chuckled sexily. God, help me; he smelled like a masculine flower garden. “I wanted to bad as hell. I even tried to threaten them to put me D, but that ain’t work. The O.G.s were everywhere and they reported every fuckin’ thing back to my father. That had my crew shook.”
I cracked up at that.
“But…” He wiggled onto his side on the small mattress. “we eventually got over it. I chilled on trying to be something my pops and the General was fuckin’ hell bent on keeping me from.”
My cackle quieted and mind raced with this new information. Rut turned out to be full of wonder, a true anomaly. He had a full fledging business for Christ’s sakes. That isn’t mentioned with other stories about him of the scandalous type.
“Hey,” I called out softer than I intended.
But Rut hummed he was listening.
“I started my business around eight years ago, too—well,” I needed to clarify. “I began making products.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Mmmhmm…” I nodded, knowing he couldn’t see me. “It was before I met Jimmy, of course. I did it for fun. Something to exercise my brain between…growing up, you know?” Rut lay muted, but I knew he was listening. “When I moved in with Jimmy, I told him I’d like a room for my ‘hobby.’ He wasn’t too crazy about me having a mess room. To entice him, I requested the smallest one in the house, which is the washroom outside of the family room. It just so happened that we’d transform the family room into his bedroom once he couldn’t get around anymore.”
That fact saddened me. Jimmy was less than half the man I met. He was lively and well-known. Since he’d fallen ill, the only person consistent with visiting and checking in was Eli Richardson, and not even he came around weekly. He was a busy man, I understood more now working in the front office.
“Hey,” he croaked just when I thought he’d fallen asleep.
“Yeah?”
“What’s ableist?”
“As in ableism?”
“I guess.”
“Where did you hear it from?”
“Jeremy. That’s one of the things he called me.”
I swallowed hard, eyes swinging in the dark. His partner and childhood friend called him an ableist.
Gosh, Rut…
“That bad?”
I mewled, “Probably.”
Then I felt him rustling in the sheets. He groaned as he reached for me. “Fuck him.”
Rut pulled me on top of his big body to straddle, and with natural ease, I did. This meant only one thing: it was time for bed.
My groin toiled, orgasm eminent as his tongue kneaded my clit. His mouth roved over the lips of my sex furiously. Heat dispersed from my core, reaching from my arms and fingers to my legs and curled toes.
“No!” I panted, grasping for his hard, broad shoulders underneath the backs of my thighs. “Rut…” I swallowed. “Not another one. Not like this.” My pants were audible.
All those words and I couldn’t say I wanted him inside me. I wanted to be chest to chest with him. Mouth to mouth. But I wasn’t given a choice. Like yesterday, I was rolled over this morning, hours after I checked on Jimmy, and his face was busy between my thighs.
Was this his thing? Did Rut enjoy morning cunnilingus?
And he was generous—my god, he was unselfish with this act of pleasure. Rut had already given me a spine-shattering orgasm while lying on my side. And now with me on my back and his big hands on my cheeks, pulling me into his face—
I exploded.
Arms swinging in the air, shoulders leaping fitfully, and thighs flapping around his head as my hips rolled. And I took his lingering licks on my sensitive nub until my entire frame collapsed from exhaustion. I couldn’t catch my breath and endured the zings racing across my body.
“What were you tryna say?” his thick, graveled morning tenor susurrated.
I couldn’t speak at first, utterly shattered at this point.
After a few moments, I was able to whisper between wheezes, “I wanted you to…”
“To what?”
“To come…up.”
His face folded. “To stop?”
I managed to lick my dry lips. “To…”
“To what, Parker?” His tone was edgy.
“To…do it.”
His eyes flashed wild. “To fuck?” he breathed.
“Well…” I panted. That word irritated me, but it was what he was used to. “I guess.”
Rut immediately shook his head, resolute. “Nah. Nope!”
My heart fell in my chest. “Why not?”
“Because that gets you in trouble!”
“Who? Me?”
He shrugged. “I ‘on’t know. You. Me. Us, maybe. Just no.”
“But we already…” I felt lightheaded and not just from the orgasm. “So is this all we do?”
Rut didn’t answer. Neither did he look at me in the gray lighting of the early morning sun rising.
I rolled my eyes, my tongue swiped my lips. “What if I just…”
“What?” His head whipped to face me.
“What if I wanted to kiss you?”
“I ‘on’t know. Like… How?”
My eyes went wild with disbelief. “Like this!” My arm managed to lift from the bed and I pointed to his glistening mouth. “With you wearing me like lip gloss.” He didn’t answer at first. “I don’t understand. Why did you go down on me this morning?”
Half his face went up in the cutest smirk. “I liked the taste of your lip gloss from yesterday.”
“Well, can I taste it, too?” I hated how whiney my words fell.
But Rut was on me. He leaned down, taking me at the sides of my face and kissed me. At first, it was a yank of my bottom lip then his tongue pushed through. And oh, my skittles… His morning breath and my personal musk mixed with his cologne and heat had my head lifting just to get closer to him. I wrapped my legs around his thighs and tried to pull him into me. With more patience than my own, he dropped lower and I inched up until I could feel his erection at my core.
Rut lips brushed against me, sharing my gloss, and he curled his tongue around mine. As ridiculous as it sounds, he felt loss to the kiss. He angled his head and his breathing grew choppy. I lifted my sex, communicating my willingness. My need. I rolled against him then moaned.
Rut’s head flew up, eyes wild. “No!” he growled.
Wha—
Out of breath again, I asked, “Why did you go down on me yesterday if you didn’t want sex? You didn’t know how I tasted then.”
Rut’s eyes rolled down and closed. “I really don’t know,” he murmured.
“Okay, so you asked her to attend the funeral with you? That’s a milestone for you. Wouldn’t you agree?” The therapist lady cocked her head to the side.
Her eyes w
ent squinty and I knew she was beasting for me to say something corny as hell.
“I ‘on’t know about all that. But I can’t front, it’s like some of those weird things I told you I’ve been noticing.”
“Your thinking about her.” Her head rocked slowly back and forth. “Post-thoughts and questions from previous conversations flood your mind when you’re not with her.”
“I ain’t say it like that, but… Yeah, I guess.”
“Has she asked anything of you yet?”
“What do you mean?”
“Like for money…” She shrugged. “Tickets to a game? New shoes? A bag? To get her nails done?” she began to sing. “Gas money? A bundle of Brazilian hair?”
She asked me to fuck her…
And I had crazy mixed feelings about that. Asking for sex was a tool of manipulation from chicks, too. They thought if they fucked you good they could get the bag that way.
“Nah. None of that.”
“Okay.” She glanced down at her wrist for the time.
“That’s it?”
Her head shot up and lips parted. “Did I miss something?”
I sat up on the chaise. “You ain’t got nothing to say after a question like that?”
“About her not asking you for anything?”
“Yeah.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s been almost an hour, and that was my agreement with you.”
“What?”
She sat back in her fancy ass judgement chair across from me. “I agreed when you began talking in these sessions last week to a challenge. I said you not dismissing her could be an opportunity to learn something different. You’re still in the race. We’ll just have to allow time to run its course at this point.”
But that’s really it, though?
I shook that out of my head, needing to move on to another matter.
“I… Uhhh…” I hesitated for a minute, something I wasn’t used to doing. “About that one rule.”
“You slept with her?” Her brows rose to her hairline.
Damn, she was quick with it!
“No!” I shook my head. “Not at all.” Then I sat still, hesitating again. “I ate her pussy, though.” Then I thought to make clear. “And I ain’t gone stop.”
Unless Parker tells me to…
She swung her chin toward her right shoulder, probably stumped. Then she scratched her forehead.
“I can’t police your bedroom—”
“Shiiiiit… Damn right, you can’t!”
“And I don’t want to. My only hope is sex doesn’t damage something with the potential of being groundbreaking for you, Amare. Your perception and history with women is extremely fragile and jaded. I understood the possibility of you not being able to carry it through, but—”
“I have! I swear to you, I ain’t put my dick in her since that first night we met.”
“Oh, and I believe you!” she perked up in pitch. “I completely do. It’s just that sex is gravely complicated and irreversible.”
“Doc,” I chuckled. “Women are complicated, but their asses can definitely be reversed in Rut’s World.”
“Hi!” Her green eyes were big as fucking saucers when she swung the door open. I almost forgot where I was. “We haven’t met.” Her open hand flew to me like a jab. “I’m Mandee! I live across the street from Mr. Wright and Parker.”
I looked down at her pale white hand trembling in the air.
“What up.” I switched stances and pulled out my wallet. “Rut.” I peeled off a few bills and put them into her hand. “Parker ready?”
I saw when her smile fell. Honestly, I didn’t give a shit. I wasn’t in the mood for Parker running late either as I looked over ol’ girl’s shoulder.
“Oh!” She turned to look behind her before turning to face me again with her eyes toward the ground. “She’s wrapping up the last of the food. I’ll go get her.” She shuffled away from the door clumsily. Then she looked at me over her shoulder and raised the money. “Thanks for this!” I noticed she didn’t make eye contact with me this time either.
I stepped in, hearing voices in the kitchen. But the whishing sounds to my right yanked my attention. It was Wright’s room. The two doors were wide open and more obvious than the digital sounds of the room were a set of eyes directly on me. At first, I froze. The man was on his death bed. I didn’t know much about ALS before Parker but since her, I learned it’s a downhill disease. Wright would die; it was just a matter of when.
There was something for real alive in his eyes. Something that wasn’t helpless at all. Call me crazy, but he starred at me like he wanted me to see him. Like he wanted to see me. Being the type of man who never bowed my head for nobody, I wouldn’t start today.
As I walked into the room, I remembered where my foul mood began. Right there, as I crossed the threshold of his room. Two nights ago, I came down to see about Parker when she took too long with her usual check in on Wright. I stood at the doorway and saw her lay over his bed, singing to him. Her voice wasn’t loud, neither was it strong, but it was soothing as hell. That made me listen in when she began to talk to him.
“Do you feel better?”
I didn’t hear anything, of course, because Wright couldn’t speak.
“Jimmy, if you don’t blink, we can’t communicate.”
More silence.
She took a deep breath. “I couldn’t tell if that was one blink or you said no with two blinks, and I think you know this. Please don’t do that,” she cried.
Not with tears but with her heart in her throat. She really cared about this dude and it became so clear in the few minutes of ear-hustling.
“Okay. Have it your way. It’s not like I’ve lied to you. Yes, I’ve waited all week to tell you he’s been staying here. You say you don’t like it, but you also said you remember freeing me. You said you remember telling me before you lost your voice to go and date other people. That was two and a half years ago, Jimmy. I haven’t even given my number out to a guy since meeting you, let alone spent time with one.”
Things went silent again.
“Do you want me to tell him to leave?”
My heart thundered in my fucking chest at that offer. I would only leave if Parker wanted me to. Fuck Wright! He owed her more than just letting company come over after putting his hands on her.
Parker let go of a breath. “Here you go, not answering again. You know that upsets me, Jimmy.” Her voice broke. Parker was close to crying. “I need you to communicate to know you’re not in pain.”
Nothing from Wright.
Parker took a long breath then stood to walk over to the chair near his hospital bed. “Okay. Then I’ll sit here until you answer.”
Parker never came back to bed. When I left out that morning, I peeped her curled in that chair asleep with her mouth wide open. And because I was so mad, I didn’t stay here last night. When I shot her a text to tell her, she didn’t seem so disappointed.
My eyes combed the room. It was my first time this deep inside. I turned to look over my shoulder to be sure Parker wasn’t there. Then I moved closer and saw he was frowning, mean mugging me with his eyebrows bunched together. Wright had one shoulder higher than the other and one leg curled, but both clearly atrophied in his paralyzed state. Still, dude was throwing me rocks.
“This ain’t no black or white situation. I respect it’s ya place and all, but I believe her when she says y’all ain’t together and ain’t been together basically since you put your hands on her.” I shifted in my stance. “I swear if I could spend time with her outside of here I would, but I’m sure you know you monopolize all her time. If she ain’t here taking care of you, she at her lil’ gig at the front office.”
His mouth didn’t move. I knew this, but for some reason, I was ready for it to. I was expecting something from him because I knew it was foul spending nights at his crib, knowing damn well I fucked his girl—ex girl. But I couldn’t stop. I wouldn�
��t. Parker wasn’t the type of chick you could stand down from.
“I ain’t never meet a fema—” That didn’t feel right. “A gir—” Fuck! I couldn’t talk. “A woman like her before. I’m not gonna stop being friends with unless she tells me to. Until we can figure out a better situation, I’ll just…” I took a breath and brushed my palms down my face.
Compromising or explaining myself to anybody but Divine or a coach wasn’t a usual occurrence for me. This shit was hard.
But I can’t walk away from her. Not right now, at least…
“I’ll make myself invisible until the situation changes.” I turned to leave.
Then something hit me. I went back to Wright’s bed, but this time close enough to touch him. I leaned into him to be sure he heard me.
“I know you can answer questions. One blink for yes…two for no.” Wright’s frown he rocked straightened for three seconds, making it clear as ever he was still in that fragile shell.
“Parker. She a real one?” I shifted closer to his face. “She playing you?” I swallowed hard. “Me?”
Wright’s lids didn’t fucking move, and that made my heart pound in my chest the same way it had been doing when it came to fucking Parker. Then my breathing got heavy, but I tried to play it cool. I didn’t want Wright to know how vulnerable I felt. Why was I asking this man this shit? What did he owe me? Shit… He was dying. I was fucked up for this.
Besides… He probably answering by not answering…
I pushed off the side railing of the bed to finally leave.
Blink.
I froze. A blink! But… Just one? I felt the first of sweat push from my damn pores. He was answering. Wright was giving me the answer that would put all this shit to bed. The answer that’ll prove me right to that goddamn head doctor.
Blink.
Were those blinks together? They were seconds apart.
“That a yes or a no, Wright?” I didn’t mean to growl in his face.
Or did I?
I needed to know. This girl was driving me fucking crazy. My cousin was dead. My fucking ace! And all week, all I craved was her. I understood the timing was fucked up. Hell, we were about to drive down to Jersey for the funeral. But if Wright told me she was playing me, I’d walk away right then and there.
“Parker ‘bout that game life?”
