College Fiend [A$AP Rocky]

Twenty-four

The watch fell to the floor. There was carpet, fortunately, so it wasn’t damaged. Wayne sat propped up on the chair I’d once been sitting on, his head leaning tiredly against the window. He made little whimpering noises, and I wasn’t sure whether it was from the pain of the cut or the pain of this. Me, Quincy, us. Most likely, it was both.

“I only took off the watch to make sure that it doesn’t cut off any blood flow, alright?”

He nodded faintly, his eyes slipping closed and his head nodding back. I wiped tears away from my eyes. Focus.

This time, luckily, he wasn’t wearing any of his signature gold rings, so the watch was all the jewelry that I had to take off.

“Maine, get me a bowl of warm water and some soap!” I called. I could hear Maine’s heavy, rushing footsteps coming toward the bathroom and then into the bedroom. Some of the water spilled from the bowl as he brought it to me, but there was still enough.

“I don’t know if this will hurt or not, but just brace yourself.” I said to Wayne. He didn’t seem to hear me; that was a good thing, anyway. At least it wouldn’t make him reluctant. Carefully, I picked up the bowl and poured it onto the wound. He cringed and tried to pull his hand away, but I held on tight. Next was the soap. For a moment I didn’t even want to put the soap on him for fear that it would burn, but it probably wouldn’t then again. This was just hand soap. So, quickly as possible, I squeezed the soap onto him and rubbed it onto his hand, and then poured more water. I mixed the soap with the water and continued to pour for at least five more minutes before I couldn’t hold on anymore and Wayne finally pulled his hand away. It didn’t seem like he pulled away because it burned, but because he was tired. He curled up into a fetal position in the chair and bit hard on his bottom lip.

“Almost done, baby,” I whispered, my voice heavy with tears. Why was I crying so much? It wasn’t like he was dying, just injured. Hurt.

Maine had already brought me the antibiotic ointment and bandage wrap, so all I had to do was apply it. I used a little bit of the ointment on his hand and then began to wrap it tightly. All the while Wayne was silent with closed eyes.

“Are you sleeping?” I asked. He shook his head solemnly. I helped him out of the chair and onto the bed, since he looked desperate to lie down comfortably. As soon as Wayne’s head touched the pillow he exhaled in relief and even smiled a little bit. I caressed his smooth forehead and he made a subtle purring kind of noise, which only made me want to kiss him. So I did—on his head, on his nose, on his lips. And he smiled, grinned, and eventually chuckled.

“Come closer.” Wayne requested. I curled up under the sheets and lay my head against his warm chest. We lay there for minutes on end, silently, just basking in each other’s presence. He used his thumb to stroke the baby hairs on my forehead, and every so often would turn to look at me and smile and then turn back around. This was for a good bit of time until finally I grew tired of the quiet. What could we talk about?

“Tell me about yourself.” I said.

“Huh?”

“I don’t know much about you, not nearly as much as you do about me. You already know about my childhood from what you heard from my mother, and I told you about the businesses my dad owns and how Shirley used to be our maid. That’s pretty much all there is to me. But what about your past, Wayne?”

He sat up just a little bit, bringing me up with him, and sighed. This was exciting. I waited patiently for him to begin. What kind of past did he have? A boring one? An embarrassing one?

“I was born on October third.” Wayne started. “In Harlem. It’s ugly back there. Nobody lived right, and everyone seemed to have a problem with each other. I never knew my mom, and my dad was really distant. He was always busy killing people and selling drugs. The whole of Harlem knew that my family, the Pierre family, didn’t like this other family called the Oswald family.

“It was an ugly feud that I was born into, but I followed the rules and stayed away from them, especially one of them in my class named Caleb Oswald. My father and his father wanted to set us up against each other to feud like they were—it worked. Caleb and I didn’t like each other at all, and it eventually led to me killing him after our fathers killed each other. After that, the feud continued. When my little brother got killed was when I wanted everything to stop. Back then I was stupid though, and I didn’t realize that killing his murderer wouldn’t make it stop. But I went after the girl that I thought killed him, anyway. She was my age or a year younger, an Oswald. Her name was Taj. She was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen.” Wayne paused. “Well, next to you.”

I laughed shortly.

“My plan was to get her to trust me and then kill her, but I started to fall in love with her. Her father didn’t like it, since we were practically enemies from birth. So we had to leave, flee from him and go to a different state. We were just two teenage runaways in love. And then he killed her.”

“Her father?”

“Yes, he sent some guys to come to the house we stayed at and shoot us. The guys came for me, but ended up shooting her by accident. I still say he killed his daughter, because if he really cared about her, he wouldn’t send people with guns to the house. He’d be more careful.” Wayne began to tear up, and I couldn’t do anything but stare and wait for him to finish. His story was more interesting than I’d imagined. “I wish he would have killed me and left her alone. She…wanted to be a graphic designer, you know? She had big dreams and we were going to fulfill them together.”

“I’m sorry, Wayne.” I said, and I meant it. That must have been horrible to live through, to live past. Yet he seemed like a happy person.

“That’s why I’m so against you being with Quincy, because I can’t lose you. I can’t.”

Wayne closed his eyes and wrapped his arms around me, pulling his my head close to his chest for me to hear his heartbeat. Maybe his intention wasn’t really for me to hear it, but I did anyway, and it felt good. We cried together, for different reasons. By now, my whole life was something to cry about, but and something else I cried for was pity for Wayne and Taj. It would tear him apart inside if I died with Quincy; he’d maybe kill himself just like Sheena did, just like I wanted to earlier. But Quincy wouldn’t let me die. He wanted to protect me just as much as Wayne did, if not more.

But who seemed like the more dangerous person wasn’t what mattered, nor was it who wanted to protect me more; it was who I loved. And that was where the problem lied.

I loved them both. Endlessly.