The Friend

Rodney

He texted Alicia. He hadn't heard from her since yesterday and normally they talked every day. He needed to get his mind off of this story. Why did he go to the deli at that time and hear that three people were dead?

By the time he got home, Rodney sat in the living room by himself watching TV. Alicia hadn't responded to him yet; he kept gnawing on his thumb, staring at his screen, waiting for her to.

Was something wrong? It was nighttime; she normally would've responded to him by now. What had happened since he had last seen her? He prayed she was okay.

Suddenly, the front door opened and Derek entered. This had to have been the first time Derek left the apartment for some days now.

"Where have you been?" Rodney asked.

Derek stopped walking, "What?"

"I said, where have you been?"

"Nigga, I thought I was 25," and Derek smiled, "I don't need to be answering to you. I'm grown."

He went into the kitchen and pulled out a juice carton, swinging it to his mouth. Rodney reached for the remote on the coffee table and turned off the TV. Derek chuckled and Rodney guessed that he was drunk. It was rare that Derek ever found anything funny unless alcohol was involved.

"Where have I been..." Derek repeated his words.

"It's a normal question to ask people," Rodney rose and went to him.

"Are we normal, Rodney?" Derek asked.

Perhaps they were, but it was not a positive thing. They were normal in that they blended in with the look of the neighborhood. The awfulness of it. Worms in a fading, claret apple.

Feeling anxious, he couldn't hold it in anymore.

"Did you hear about Joel?" Rodney asked.

Derek blinked, "Who?"

"You know, that bum that use to come around here..."

"Nah, what's up with him?"

"He was shot and killed. Him and two other guys."

"Oh?" Derek said.

Expressionlessly, Derek placed the juice cartoon back into the fridge before meeting Rodney's eyes and waiting for him to continue. Rodney felt his lungs squeeze together.

"Didn't you use to sell to Joel?" Rodney asked.

"What does that have to do with anything?" he asked.

"I saw him a few months ago with I think those other two guys that might've been the ones that were killed too—"

"What does any of this have to do with me?" Derek asked, feigning curiousness.

His expression became blank again, waiting for Rodney to go on and in that moment, Rodney couldn't recognize him. All these years he had thought that Derek being an asshole was just that, nothing more, but now he wasn't so sure. Why was he acting like he didn't hear anything about this, like people might not be suspecting him? Two other drug dealers, that were trying to take his business from his neighborhood, are now dead. One of his customers is now dead. An easy and simple motive for him to have been involved was right there.

"You didn't have anything to do with it, right?" Rodney asked.

"No," Derek said.

"I was just hearing people talk and I know that this is your territory and those guys where selling some shit, I think, to that bum—" Rodney said.