Page 41 of Love Sanctioned

“Exactly what I said. Goodbye, Posydiann. I’m sorry I came around when you asked me not to. I just couldn’t let Junior down. It won’t happen again.” Then she hung up the phone before I could say anything else to her.

I pulled the phone away from my ear and clicked her number again. The call went straight to voicemail. The next one did the same.

I was pissed, so pissed that I threw my phone across the room. It shattered into several pieces after making contact with the exposed brick on the north wall of the room.

“Fuck!”

What the fuck did she mean by doing what was best for her?

I was snapped out of my thoughts by a knock at the door of the restaurant. Then my phone, or what was left of it, began to ring. I didn’t bother picking it up but instead moved toward the front. I was about to grab my piece from the bar when I locked eyes with Killah through the glass. He and Kal were standing there.

I moved toward the door and unlocked it, allowing them in.

“Yo, where the fuck is your phone? I called you three times.” Killah walked in followed by Kal.

I didn’t respond, instead locking the door behind them.

Killah moved around the bar, setting down white Thank You plastic bags. He pulled out the three containers, placing one in front of Kal, one for me, and the other in front of himself.

“You gotta eat, bro. Ma Dukes and Grams is calling me. Not to mention we boutta go handle business so I need your focus and none of that short-tempered caveman shit you are carrying with you right now,” Killah said before I could tell him that I wasn’t hungry. Ever since he came back from vacation, he had been all in my shit, on some older brother motion, getting on my nerves.

I didn’t say anything. I just nodded, grabbed a stool, and pulled it up to the bar then began to eat.

For the most part, everything was silent. The entire time I ate, my mind ran rampant. Mentally going over everything Karsyn said. She didn’t play games, she said things plain but there was always another side to her words and she always meant them. She wasn’t crazy enough to fuck with another nigga. Couldn’t be and I didn’t give a fuck that we were broken up.

“Aight, so I been fucking with this little chick who works in City Hall. Says she’s gonna tell me when the mayor comes back from his little tax dollar paid vacation. So, she did. He’s back in office today, and in about an hour and a half, he’ll be in his office for the rest of the day after the community members committee finishes tearing him a new one,” Kal said.

I nodded.

When we finished eating, we left the restaurant. I requested to make a pitstop, because even though I was going through some things, I couldn’t be walking around here without a phone. I walked into the phone store, told them mine was broken, and requested another one while also opening another line on my account. Ol’ boy tried to tell me to do an insurance claim and all that good shit, but I had stopped paying for insurance years ago. I knew they really didn’t help you in the end. It was just another way for the phone companies to get a couple extra dollars out of you.

“Who’s the line for?” Killah asked, his usual nosy ass self.

“The motherfucker who just blocked me.”

“How are you buying a phone for somebody who just blocked you?”

“Because a motherfucker ain’t gonna block me on shit I pay the bill on.” I watched ol’ boy walk over with both of the smartphone boxes and a bag.

He laughed, then pointed to his forehead. “Glad to know you’re thinking smart, not hard.”

I shook my head at his stupid ass before accepting the bag from the sales associate.

“Mr. Murphy, do you need help setting it up?”

I shook my head. “Nah, I’m straight.” That was the type of stuff I had Junior do. He was good with all the technology.

Once I had the bag in hand, we left the store, joining Kal in the car. I was ready to get this shit over with.

The ride to City Hall was silent on my part while Killah and Kal talked up front. I was in my head, overprocessing. I had to keep reminding myself why I was in this, why every step I made felt so fucking heavy.

No matter what phases I went through coming up, I never felt like I was losing myself, like I was losing parts of me that made up the whole. When Unc died, that shit hit me like a ton of fucking bricks, but she was there. She was a crutch in ways I never knew I needed, but now here I was. Who was my crutch to losing her? Not a motherfucking soul because losing her wasn’t an option. I acted off emotion and overprocessed that shit with her father. I was still overprocessing, but something in me knew I wasn’t losing her, no matter how fucked up all this shit was.

She didn’t even sound the same. Shit, neither did I. I was out here moving like a straight fucking coward, afraid of not being chosen like a bitch, so I was holding back. Karsyn belonged to me, but if that was a fact, what the fuck was I doing?

Pissing in the wind and getting the shit back on me.

I walked into the mayor’s office like it was mine. I even took a seat at the edge of his desk like it belonged to me. Winston looked petrified, eyes jumping from me to Killah then to Kal who took it upon himself to look around the office.