Page 92 of Kissed By the Trillest Thug 2

“I still can’t believe this shit.”

Being at Mali’s house was a distraction that I didn’t know I needed. After dinner, we played family games and listened to music. The last thing on my mind was this bullshit. But now, I was back at my place where I had nothing but silence to face the problem head-on. My eyes wandered around the room until they landed on an old storage tote tucked away in the corner of my closet.

I hadn’t opened it in years. Curiosity got the best of me. A few minutes later, I sat cross-legged on the floor with old photo albums spread out around me. There were pictures from birthdays. Park cookouts, little league games, and school award ceremonies. I turned another page and then stopped. It was taken at a fair that had come to town. Ghost looked about ten. Icouldn’t have been older than nine. The three of us stood in front of the Ferris wheel. Me, Ghost, and Pops. All three of us wore matching Karl Kani T-shirts.

I stared at the picture for a long time. My dad… I mean, our dad had one arm resting across my shoulders. His other arm was wrapped around Ghost. The pose wasn’t awkward either. It wasn’t like he was posing with some little boy from the neighborhood. His stance was natural, and he looked comfortable. It was like he’d done it a thousand times before. My thumb brushed across the edge of the photograph. Back then, I thought Pops bought Ghost the same shirt because he didn’t want him feeling left out.

That’s just the kind of man I believed he was. Now, I realized he’d bought three matching shirts because, in his mind, we weren’t two little boys. We were his sons. I swallowed hard. The picture hadn’t changed. The people in it hadn’t changed. Only the truth had. I stared at the picture for what felt like forever before carefully laying it back inside the album. Then I closed it slowly.

Like somehow closing the album would quiet everything running through my head.

It didn’t. I pushed myself off the floor and started pacing my bedroom. One lap. Then another.

Everywhere I looked, I saw my father. I saw his smile. I heard his laugh and his voice.

“Take Giovani with you.”

“Make sure Giovani’s got something to eat.”

“Don’t leave that boy behind.”

I used to think my father just had a soft spot for him.

Now I knew he wasn’t looking after somebody else’s child. He was trying to make sure his own was loved.

“Damn.”

I dragged both hands over my face. Everything felt different. Ghost wasn’t just the boy I’d grown up fighting beside. He wasn’t just my best friend. He wasn’t just the person I called my brother. He was… my brother. Like for real. And somehow that made everything hurt worse. Because while I was sitting here trying to figure out what the hell to do with the truth…

He didn’t even know it existed. My chest tightened. I reached into my pocket and pulled my phone back out.

Ghost

My thumb hovered over his name. One phone call, that’s all it’d take. One phone call and his life would never be the same again. One phone call and he would be stuck how I am. I couldn’t do it, not yet.

I locked the screen and shoved the phone back into my pocket.

“Man…”

Frustration hit me so fast I couldn’t stop it. My fist crashed into the wall beside my bedroom door. The drywall cracked beneath my knuckles and pain shot through my hand, but I barely felt it.

“What the fuck!”

My voice echoed through the apartment before silence swallowed it whole again. I rested my forehead against the wall. My chest was rising and falling with every uneven breath. How was I supposed to look at him now? How was I supposed to sit across from him knowing what I knew? I had to tell him. I squeezed my eyes shut. Ms. Gia had trusted me with the biggest secret of her life, and now I was carrying it too.

I let out a slow breath and looked back toward the photo album lying open on my closet floor. Yesterday, it was just apicture. Today, it was a memory that was hard proof that we were indeed brothers. This big-ass secret had been circling us our entire life, and I still had no idea what I was supposed to do with it.

MJ

Three Months Later…

If somebody would’ve told me the highlight of my first semester of college would’ve been takeout and studying, I would’ve laughed in their face. Yet here we were. Penelope sat on the long end of my sectional with three different textbooks spread out around her. She’d stolen one of my Miami-Dade hoodies weeks ago and, at this point, I wasn’t expecting to get it back. Not that I was complaining. She wore it with a pair of black leggings; her glasses rested low on her nose while she highlighted something in one of her books.

Over the past few months, this had become our routine. One of us would pick up food.

The other would complain about whatever assignment was due next. Then we’d spend hours in my apartment pretending to study while she repeatedly reminded me that English Composition I wasn’t supposed to be this hard. Unfortunately for me, it was. I looked down at the paper sitting in front of me before letting out a dramatic sigh.

“I don’t even know what my thesis statement is supposed to be anymore.”