Page 14 of Adonis Gates
He tried moving around me again but I stopped his ass once more.
“Here you go.” He shook his head. “I knew you was gon’ get on this fake macho shit.”
In lightning speed, I hemmed his lil’ ass up on the door.
“Bro—”
“Who the fuck you think you talkin’ to, nigga?” I spat.
“Man, Donny…”
He tried wiggling free, but it was futile. He knew he wasn’t getting out of my hold unless I wanted him to.
“You don’ lost yo’ mind cursin’ and talkin’ to me like I’m one of ya lil’ fuckin’ friends, my nigga.”
“You not my father, Adonis!” he shouted as tears welled up in his eyes. “Dang man.”
Despite his words bothering me a little, I smiled and released his lil’ soft ass.
When I hemmed him up, he dropped the shit that was in his hands, so he bent to grab it. I snatched his phone and headphones from his hand then journeyed down the hall to his room grabbing his PS5 as well as the cords to his T.V.
“Bro, what you doin’?” he asked, looking dumbfounded as hell. “Why you takin’ my stuff?”
“Because I bought the shit, nigga.” I looked him up and down. “Call down to ACCD and tell yo’ mothafuckin’ daddy to buy you the shit.”
“Donny, bro,” he sighed. “I ain’t mean it like that.” He tried to clean it up, but the damage was done.
“Naw, you meant the shit just how you said it.” I chuckled humorlessly. “But it’s straight. I ain’t ya pops, AP, that much is a fact, but we both know that nigga could never walk a mile in my shoes. I’m the only mothafucka that’s been takin’ care of you, bustin’ my assyour whole lifeto make sure you were good. Even when mama was here; I fed you, I clothed you, housed your dirty ass, just like I’m doin’ now! So, at the very least, yo’ ass gon’ show me some mothafuckin’ respect.”
He dropped his head. I hated for my brother to feel a way but shit I did too. Everything I did, I did the shit with his ass in mind. I did for him before I did for myself. Stopped my whole life for his ass without a second thought. He ain’t ask me to do it, but he didn’t have to. Shit was a given. Putting me and our sperm donor in the same sentence was a slap to the fucking face to me.
“The shit you did today was stupid, Apollo, and could have been avoided. You constantly doin’ dumb shit, tryna paint ya self as this tough guy when that ain’t you. You a good kid with a bright ass future. If me lovin’ you and gettin’ on you when you fumble makes me the bad guy, then fuck it. I’ve been viewed as worse for less. You ain’t gettin’ none of this shit back ‘til I find out what the fuck they doin’ about you at that school.”
“Aight,” he mumbled then looked up at me. “I’m sorry.”
I left him standing there without acknowledging his apology and went to my room to lock the shit up in my safe. I didn’t like taking his shit because I didn’t like wasting money. I bought all the shit and paid his phone billfor him. I didn’t need the shit to be collecting dust or taking up space in my safe, but I wasn’t gon’ reward dumb shit.
He was, at the very least, suspended for five to ten days, so he wasn’t sitting up playing the game and shit all day when he was supposed to be in school. He was gon’ get up and go to the barbershop with me every day, sweep hair and whatever else me and the guys needed him to do. I might even get him a babysitter for the nights that I was out and shit since I couldn’t trust that he would make the right decisions on his fucking own.
I rolled a blunt then went out to my balcony to burn. I tried not to smoke in the crib because I didn’t want the shit to smell like weed. All it would take was for AP to go to school smelling like that shit one time to have those people at my door.
I sat, slouched down in my chair, with my blunt burning slowly. The complex was quiet, but my head wasn’t.
“You not my father, Adonis!”
My brother’s words played on a loop in my head. They hit me more than I cared to admit. I lifted the blunt to my lips and took a long, slow pull. I released the smoke slowly and watched the cloud lift.
I hated getting in my feelings about shit involving Apollo. Just like niggas in the street knew he was a for sure way to get me to nut the fuck up, he knew it too. Hell, he knew it more than them niggas.
I knew I wasn’t his father, and a nigga wasn’t trying to be, but I was here. I’d always been there, and I always would be… but damn.
I lightly tapped the end of my blunt on the edge of my chair to get the ashes to fall as my thoughts consumed me. I didn’t ask for this fucking role, but I ain’t run from the shit either. I was present for everything, signing school papers, taking care of his ass when he was sick, checkin’ him when he got out of line but also applauding him for his wins.
That shit wasn’t enough?
He’d only said the shit to me three times now, but it hit like a ton of bricks every single time. He was always apologetic afterward, but that didn’t make the shit hurt any less. He was only fifteen; angry at the world and angry at me because I was the one in front of him, I understood that, but the shit was still frustrating.
I sometimes found myself angry with my mother when times like this came about. I didn’t want to be emotional and I didn’t want to fight with my brother about shit like this either. I didn’t want to make him cry and shit, and I damn sure didn’t want to feel like I was about to.