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H arlem

I had never been one of those girls who stayed in their man’s skin for days at a time, then I met Kinga. It was like overnight I transformed into the chicks I used to talk about. I didn’t care though. The way I felt about Kinga sent shudders down my spine. He had an effect on me that nobody else could. With him I felt weightless in a world full of weight and responsibility. The problem was I was too obsessed with being in his space. So moments like this, when he was at work and I was at work, I missed him. We hadn’t talked since earlier when he checked in. He was pretty busy then, I could tell by the way he was telling somebody to hand him a hex while also asking me what dinner was tonight. We got off the phone shortly after. For the most part I spent the day doing little things around the shop and also took some pictures of the puppies. There were five of them. Two were standard and the other three deep variations of merle. After this litter I was set to take a break before Tato’s litter in the spring. I needed the break too, as I had finally unloaded the last two puppies from her previous litter. Besides the five puppies at my home, I also still had Bleu, Tato, and Tilly. I needed to get used to having three dogs before I allowed myself to take on another litter.

A knock at my office door made me look up from the puppy crate toward the door. I wasn’t expecting anybody, and Elinor knew not to let anyone back here, or so I thought.

“Who is it?” I called out, irritated by the fact that I was caught off guard by whoever was on the other side of my door.

“It’s me, Har.” The door opened a second after the voice I knew all too well sounded off. Shit, why was it him? What the hell was he doing here?

The door opened and in walked Zax. The very man I hadn’t missed since I blocked him. He’d been an out of sight, out of mind thing.

He walked in with an expression just as sorry as I knew him to be. “Did you block me, baby?” I was grateful he kept his distance.

“Yeah. I think we both have to move on.” I said that but was really hoping he got the hint that I was done… well, I had been done.

“Both have to move on,” he repeated the last part of my sentence, crossing his arms over his chest. He seemed to be in disbelief.

I didn’t respond. Instead I put the puppy back into the encasement with his mom and siblings. Today I only had Tilly and her pups with me today while Tato and Bleu were home.

“You’ve moved on?” he asked after too much silence had passed.

“What does it matter, Zax?”

“It matters because I still love you and I thought we were fixing this. Weren’t we? Tell me I’m not imagining shit here, Harlem.” He sounded defeated but I knew it was just an act. He was the type of man to play on emotions to make you feel what he felt or feel bad about your decisions if they differed from his.

“I thought that’s what I wanted, but it isn’t.”

“What changed?”

“Everything. You asked for a break and made a baby. You let me know that this wasn’t what I wanted or needed. Then I met him. I can’t allow myself to be roped into what I don’t want. I don’t want this,” I responded honestly.

“And if we wouldn’t have taken a break, would you feel this way?”

“Probably not but not only did you manipulate me, cheat on me, and make a baby on me, you expect me to just take you back because you feel like you wanna be with me. Go to hell with all of that.” I shook my head.

“I never chea?—”

“None of that matters anymore because I moved on. And I’m happy. I wish the same for you.”

“Who is he? Somebody you been had around? You played with my feelings. You never intended to forgive me, did you?” He glared at me in a way I had never seen. His face was bunched up, brows knitted together tighter than a yarn sweater. He was pissed.

“I did. Then you had a baby. A constant reminder that I wasn’t enough for you. I wouldn’t dare allow myself to resent a child who didn’t ask to be here behind a man who didn’t think enough of me to wrap it the fuck up.”

“Harlem. This could hav?—”

“Yo, I have heard enough of this shit. My sister is done with your square ass, now let it go and keep it moving. From what I hear, you got a baby to be preparing for.” OA’s voice made me dip my head around Zax. There he stood, at six feet three, against the snug doorway with irritation radiating off his being.

Zax turned around and his attention went to OA. He then extended that sweaty ass hand of his. “Oh, what’s up, OA? How you do?—”

“Get your ass up outta here before I beat your ass in here. I told you if you hurt my sister that was what would happen.”

Zax jumped, pulled his hand back, and looked from me to OA. “It’s a misund?—”

“Get ghost. Now don't come back here.”

Zax did as he was told immediately, peeping that nothing he could say would calm OA down, and not only that, but I wouldn’t be calling him off. When it was just OA and me in the room, I felt his eyes, letting me know something was on his mind.

“Are you talking or staring? Mama taught you that wasn’t polite, didn't she?” I asked, hating to be under his heavy eyes.

He chuckled. “How long have you been messing with Kinga?”

“For a minute. Why? How do you know him?” Since we were in the questioning mood, I figured I’d get mine out there as well.

“In the business I’m in, I know a few people. How did you meet him?” He moved around my office, taking in the photos he had seen a million times before. This was his way of avoiding my eyes.

“Getting my car fixed. Why does it feel like I’m under interrogation? You wanna tell me what’s up?”

He finally turned to face me then shook his head. “Nothing to tell. I’m just tryna figure out how you went from one side of the spectrum to the other. Square to… Never mind. Do you know what you getting yourself into?”

I shrugged. It wasn’t a matter of knowing what I was getting into. Shit, I had already gotten into him and I knew my ol’ infatuated ass wasn’t going nowhere unless he gave me a reason to. “No, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

He shook his head. “Ol’ smart mouth ass. Ain’t nothing I can say, just be safe and be aware of what you getting yourself into.”

His eyes held what his lips wouldn’t utter. OA wasn’t the type to tell me what to do or not but he wasn’t the type to say I told you so either. I saw many similarities in OA and Kinga, so many that I wondered what OA actually meant. Did he speak from experience, seeing as how he’d put Rose, his girlfriend before Toya, through so much between his street dealings and the other girls.

“Does he know you my sister?”

“Uh… I don’t know. I don’t go around throwing my brother’s name out. What is with you men and y’all’s names? Who y’all supposed to be?” I laughed my question off, knowing damn well names held weight.

OA laughed. “Yeah, aight. Anyway, Toya is throwing a party for your nephew. She wants us all to be there and claims my sister ain’t responding to her messages.”

“’Cause I ain’t. That’s your broad, OA. I’on much like her and she doesn't like me either, no hard feelings. For my nephew, I’ma show up, but she acts like I gotta chill with her or be friends with her to be in his life.”

OA laughed. “You know how she is. Shorty just be tripping.”

“Yeah, she does, and like I said, I love my nephew, but I’m not dealing with all that. You said it yourself, she does too much. Talk to her, OA. I wanna be at my nephew’s party but I’m not kissing no ass.” I really didn’t like Toya at all, seeing as how she started out as my brother’s side piece while he had a girlfriend. The situation was so messy but I steered clear, because as much as I liked Rose, I didn’t respect that she allowed him to have other women while they were together. She followed that dumb ass “he knows where home is” ideology, and in the end, it bit her in the ass. OA proved to have a few homes .

“Aight, man. I’ll talk to her.”

I laughed at the stress he displayed. This was good for him.

My brother and I talked for a while longer, him talking shit and being funny as always before he had to leave to take care of something. I had a few more hours at the shop, then I headed home. I didn’t know if Kinga and Aja would be over but I knew what I had planned. I was going home, devouring that last piece of cake in my fridge, and dealing with the pups. Sis was exhausted…sis was me.

After making it home, I settled into my living room, deciding to lounge for the rest of the evening. I wasn’t surprised when about an hour in I received a call from none other than Kinga. I half expected that much.

“Yo, you ain’t sleep, is you?” he asked.

“No, I’m relaxing. Pups are fed and the dogs are asleep. Peaceful bliss. Why, where are you?”

“Leaving Sora’s spot. Aja stayed, as expected. I’m tryna come and be a part of that peace you talking about.”

I smiled. “You’re welcome. As long as you’re coming through to spread peace and not be on that brute shit.”

He chuckled. “I’m going to spread a lot more than peace but we can align that shit when I walk in the door. Until then just talk to me on this drive though.”

I smiled at the request. “I can do that. How was your day?”

“Long but short at the same time. I’m working on a seventy-one Chevy convertible. Shit was smooth but ol’ boy went the cheap way rather than coming to me when he first needed the work done.”

While he talked about the car, I googled it so I’d at least have some sort of idea. “What do you mean?”

“He needed his steering column replaced. I gave him a price and I guess that price was too high for him, so he went elsewhere. Now that has him back in my shop with more problems than he started with.”

“Dang. You sound like you enjoyed it though.”

“I did, sit that’s my dream car lowkey. Hell yeah I’m up for working on it.”

“Then why not buy yourself one?”

“Because I wanna build it from scratch. That way I’ll know what’s under my hood rather than assuming and being clueless about what I have like some of these other fools.”

I nodded. I actually enjoyed hearing him go on and on about his cars and working on them because they were what made him happy.