A Losing Game

"Bigger Than Any One of Us"

            "Rod, it's okay. You and Reece were together before you got locked up and you were together after. Do you wash your cover and sheets regularly?"

            "I do."

            "Then I'm good." He sat down on Roderick's bed as Roderick went over to his laptop to put some music on. While Roderick's back was turned to him, Jacory began snooping around on Roderick's bed and found the photo that Roderick kept under his pillow. He smiled and asked, "What's this?"

            Roderick looked back and asked, "Whoa, what you doin'? Gimme that."

            Jacory put the photo behind his back so that Roderick couldn't grab it and laughed while asking, "You keep a pic of me under your pillow? My tenth-grade class pic? I mean, I did look cute as hell that day. This is the pic in the yearbook from that—" He quickly remembered the photo was taken just months before Roderick got in trouble.

            "Yep, I didn't even get to finish that school year at Braxton-Jacobs High. All because I wanted to play gangsta and sell drugs."

            "No, you got caught up because Don Don snitched on you. You know, we haven't talked much about what happened last week."

            "That's because we don't have to talk about it. That nigga is dead and gone."

            "And I shot him. I can't believe I shot somebody."

            "You didn't kill him."

            "I would've if I had to. That's the part that still bothers me whenever I think about it, Rod. Had it been me that walked up and saw him standing over you about to kill you, I would've killed him. He just wasn't going to stop until you were dead. He was sick for doing that to Angelique. He gave his word that he wouldn't try anything and he just...did it anyway without any regard for how it would affect her."

            Roderick turned back to his laptop and started the playlist he'd created in iTunes. As the laptop began playing Tyrese's "Shame," which was still somewhat new at that time, he looked back at Jacory and asked, "What would you have done had he killed me?"

            "What?"

            "Would you have still killed him had he killed me before you or Escobar could get to him?"

            "I don't even wanna think about that."

            "Mookie, I gotta know."

            Tears began to build in Jacory's eyes as he admitted, "Yes, I would've killed him had he taken your life. Rod, there was a point during my time in that warehouse before you arrived that I thought he was going to kill me. All I could think about was how messed up you would've been had Don Don killed me. I was so stupid going to your trap house like that."

            "It's not your fault, Mookie. You know I don't blame you." He hurried over to the bed and sat down beside Jacory, telling him, "I can't even imagine what my world would be like without you in it. You know that. You know how much I love you, Mookie."

            Jacory looked into Roderick's eyes and without any hesitation, he moved in closer to Roderick and kissed his lips. It was their first kiss in nearly two years. Roderick couldn't believe the kiss was happening but closed his eyes and enjoyed every second of it. Jacory kept his lips pressed to Roderick's as his tears of both pain and joy finally began to fall.

            Meanwhile on the northside of the city, Demetrius and Zayvon exited the movie theater together and walked through the large shopping plaza to the Chili's Grill & Bar restaurant. There was a long line but they decided to wait because Demetrius didn't want to go anywhere else. While waiting, Zayvon got a weird feeling and something told him to look back. When he did, he saw his brother and Nate getting out of Nate's Mustang in the parking lot.