Page 19 of Love & Streetball

“This bitch hit me!” He squawked, dazed.

“You deserved it. You came over here fucking with her,” I said, eyeing the guys behind him, making sure they wasn’t on that.

A few of them were holding their breaths, trying not to laugh at Conley. None of them attempted to come to his rescue. I wish they would try.

“I’m ready to go,” Slim smacked. “This was a bad idea.”

“I should press charges!” Conley hollered.

“Okay police ass bitch,” Slim spat, causing the other guys to fall out laughing.

She gathered her trash, drank the rest of her horchata and took off to the nearest trash can,

“You messed with the wrong one this time, Conley,” I told him, pointing a finger at him.

“Come on, Conley. We came for tacos, not to watch a girl beat you up,” Maxx, a guy with them, joked. That made everyone else start back laughing. I picked my last taco up, stuffed it in my mouth and ran to throw it into the trash can. Slim was already stomping to my car.

I hit the unlock button on my key fob, and she opened the door and instead of getting inside, she grabbed her basketball, shut my door and started walking to the road.’’

“Aye, Slim! Where… Wait up!” I called out to her.

Slim was taking long strides. I jogged to reach her.

“Leave me alone, Kane,” she muttered angrily.

“No. I picked you up, and I’m gonna make sure I get you back home,” I let her know.

“I’m good! I’ll call Vani to scoop me.”

“Maaan, come on. That nigga might shoot me thinking I set you up over here.”

“He might,” she said.

“Do you want my death on your conscience?” I asked, playing right along with her ass.

Slim hiked her shoulders and quickly dropped them. “I’ma still sleep good at night.”

“Damn, that’s cold, Slim. I really thought we were getting somewhere in this…friendship.”

“Friends?” She scoffed.

“Man, can you stop walking for a minute. Those tacos sitting on my stomach.”

“Get in shape,” she shot back, but she stopped.

“I am in shape,” I said, squinting at her. “Let me take you back home before your mama kill the both of us.”

A flicker of worry shown in her eyes.

“Fine,” Slim huffed out. “No stops. No talking.”

“How you gon’ tell me not to talk in my own car?” I said under my breath, following her back to where my car was parked.

I was still going against my pops’ demands about me going to Love Heights. I turned my location off when I went to pick up Slim, and turned it back on when we pulled up at the taco stand. I tried to be quick with my movements. Pops was a busy man, but just in case he found time to check my location, it’d look like I was where I should be in his eyes. I wouldn’t even put it past him to have a tracker on my car.

We rode in silence for a moment. It was just the sound of the wind whipping by. I turned my location off as soon as I exited Heart Heights.

“You didn’t answer my question earlier,” I said after too long of quietness.