Shut Up & Listen

10. puff daddy

"He talmbout its permanent and shit but got his whole ex on his fucking chest. The fuck type'a shit is that?"

"He got her name?"

"Nah." He scoffed with a sneer, "It say jill the love of my life."

"Say you lying Black. Soft ass. Who get some shit like that on em."

"He had to love her for real for real. I want him to feel that way about me. I had thought he did until today. Now, i don't really fucking know." He looked around remembering where he was, "You know they put up a new jail in the city right? You think they would transfer you so we can see you more?"

"What that mean?" He asked, looking his brother square in the eyes. "You done talking about it?" Makaveli called him out for changing the subject so abruptly.

Lonnie shrugged.

Makaveli played with the plastic from the bag of chips Lonnie brought him, thinking. He looked up at his big brother. "Tell him to choose." He told him.

"Choose what?"

"You or the girlfriend. Test his loyalty to you. Then you'll know what's next."

[]

"I don't know if you two have ever met before. He was at the funeral, but didn't really socialize. Understandably." Oz offered. "This is Kwabena's father." He gestured towards the high yellow, 5'11, muscular man sitting on the couch in Oz's living room. He had a long silky ponytail in the color 4 with the sides faded off and a clean line-up.

"His daddy white?" Cole exclaimed. Oz stared at him until he stopped looking so shocked. Cole smiled, "Oh, forreal? I thought you was dead or something. Definitely thought you'd be Black too."

"Well, here I am I guess. And not Black." He chuckled. "My family is from the middle east though. So, Black adjacent." He reached our his hand to Cole.

"I'm Cole." He shook the man's hand.

"You was his best friend?"

Cole nodded.

"Maybe you can help me then."

Cole shook his head. "I ain't no snitch. Plus I wasn't there. If I was there he wouldn't be dead. That's what we did. We looked out for each other." He sat Three down and got him situated in the kitchen. "So what brings you around now?"

"I been trying to get back into Kwabena's life for some time now. He wasn't the most welcoming, not that I blame him. But, somebody took our future away. I wanna know who."

"Yeah? And what're you gonna do when you find out? Take somebody else's future away?"

"Hell yeah."

"I don't think you realize that you took y'all's future away a long time ago. Seems a bit late."

"Colin." Oz scolded thru gritted teeth.

"Oz. One thing about you is you're always going to do the polite thing. Like inviting Cobe's birth father into your home after raising him alone. But, I'm a bit opposite. I, like you, know how much it affected Cobe to not have any biological family around. That shit fucked him up so good and I just don—"

"Stop while you're ahead, son." Oz warned him. "You don't know nothing about this man."

Cole sat on the couch. "Dame call you?" He asked Oz. "He said he was gonna come by too."

There was a knock on the front door and Cole turned his head towards the sound, "That's probably him." He stood to answer the door. But, it wasn't Damon. It was another dark skinned man, built like a line backer and two inches shorter than Dame.