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  Nasir

  Winter was officially over, and a change in the season meant a change in people. Not only was the sun out in full force, but so was the whole city. It seemed like everybody had come out of hibernation. Just thirty days ago you would have thought Philadelphia was a ghost town. I was kissing Leah in public without worry. But not anymore. The streets were flooded with people enjoying the warmer weather. The difference a month made, I thought.

  “Why ain’t nobody answerin’ the phone?” I thought aloud as I hung up and redialed the shop. Still no answer. I didn’t want to call Leah on her cell phone, but I had no choice, seeing as she wasn’t answerin’ the office phone.

  “Hello,” she answered, seemingly confused.

  “Can you talk?”

  “Yes.”

  “I didn’t wanna call you on ya cell, but ain’t nobody answerin’ the office phone.”

  “Oh, everybody done left.”

  “It’s only four o’clock. Y’all niggas got a hour left.”

  “It’s the first day of spring. It’s all nice outside. Niggas was itchin’ to get off. And since ya dad was in a good mood after the guys finished a car, released it to the customer, and got the check, he told us we could leave early.”

  “Well, shit, I got a hit that I’m about to bring there and the customer wanna come to the shop and set up their claim and try to get in a rental today. Where you at?”

  “I was on my way to get my car detailed.”

  “Can you do me a favor?”

  “What, go back to the shop and help ya customer set up a claim?”

  “Please.”

  “I would if I could, but after I told Kenny that I got off early, he made me an appointment at the detail shop. And if I miss that appointment and come home with a dirty car he goin’ throw a fit.”

  “Man, tell that nigga somethin’ came up. There’s been a change of plans and you had to stay at work a little later.”

  Leah sighed, “All right. Let me call him and see what he say, then I’ll call you back.”

  “All right. And, yo, tell ’im if you miss the appointment, you’ll have one of the workers at the shop detail ya car for you.”

  “Okay, Nasir. Only for you,” Leah said. “But listen, if I do have to wind up gettin’ somebody at the shop to wash my car, can it be you?”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “No! Today, after ya customer leave!”

  “During rush hour? You know that’s the busiest time for a nigga in my line of work.”

  “Look, I’m givin’ up my time for you.”

  “All right. All right. Whatever. Just meet me at the shop.”

  I hung up with Leah and hooked the crashed 2008 Pathfinder I had just got to my tow truck. The owner of the vehicle and I then got in my truck and headed to the shop. On our way there Leah called me back and told me it was cool and she could meet me, but that Kenny didn’t seem too happy about it. She told me that I had gotten her in trouble and emphasized the fact that I owed her.

  Once my customer and I got to the shop, Leah was sitting inside the office with a file out, ready to start the process of setting up a claim. While I unhooked the Pathfinder and found a place to store it in the shop, Leah got to work calling All State for the customer. It took about forty minutes for her to have all the paperwork filled out and signed, for the insurance company to issue a claim number and schedule a day for the adjuster to come out and look over the car, and to have an Enterprise rental-car representative come to the shop to pick up my customer and take her to get a rental.

  Leah had come a long way since she first started working at the shop in January. I watched her work like a proud father. But was turned on like I was her man. At that, I knew it was time for me to go. It had been one of those weeks when I had been trying to keep my word to my girl, Tara, that I would be faithful to her. She had been comin’ at me about distancin’ myself again, and she swore me down that she knew I was messin’ around on her. I denied all claims and smoothed things out with her. And again I told myself to chill on Leah. So after my customer left, I planned to leave right behind him.

  “Good lookin’ out, Leah,” I said as I walked toward the door.

  “Where you think you goin’?” she asked. “You gotta detail my car.”

  “I said only if you miss ya appointment.”

  “And I did miss it. It was for five o’clock. It’s four fifty-six right now,” she said, looking at her cell phone screen. “Ain’t no way I’m goin’ make it.”

  “All right, fuck it,” I said. “Let me knock this out real quick.”

  I walked back toward Leah. I rolled up my sleeves and took my watch off, gently placing it on Leah’s desk.

  Leah reached for my watch and turned it over to look at the face. “What’s this, a Bell and Ross?”

  I smiled and said, “Look at you. You got a nice lil’ eye.”

  She smiled back and said, “And you got a nice lil’ collection of wrist wear. I be noticin’.”

  I chuckled at her comment, feelin’ good that she paid that much attention to me and impressed at her knowledge of high-end watches. That quality made me like Leah that much more. Most girls didn’t know anything past a Rolex.

  She shot me a quick glance, then got up from her chair and headed out of the office and onto the floor.

  I followed Leah over to her car, which was pulled up into the shop. She got inside to roll the windows up while I retrieved the water hose from the side of the shop.

  I had every intention of washing Leah’s car and getting back to work. But it didn’t go down that way. Shortly after I turned on the hose and playfully wet Leah’s shirt, my focus was rerouted. I guessed the cold water made her nipples hard, causing them to poke through her bra and her fitted white shirt. I was instantly turned on and started paying more attention to her breasts than to washing the car.

  She noticed, of course, and flirtatiously asked, “You see somethin’ you like?”

  “I do, yeah,” I said.

  “Then put a down payment on it,” she teased, walking up to me and brushing her body against mine.

  I laughed and said, “Get outta here.” I tried to refocus on washing the car. I truly didn’t want to cheat on my girl that day. But there I was, in a position that I just couldn’t resist.

  Then, without thinking or saying anything more, we found ourselves in each other’s arms, kissing and fondling. The sexual tension between us had always been so thick that whenever we had the opportunity to do so, relieving it became top priority.

  “You tryna get us caught?” I asked, my way of giving myself one more out.

  “By who? Ain’t nobody comin’ in here at this hour,” she whispered as she ground against me vigorously.

  “You right,” I said, falling into her trap.

  At that point I was so aroused I had no win in being faithful.

  I turned the hose off and allowed Leah to have her way with me. She completely took charge, too. She opened her passenger’s-side door and pushed me into the seat. She knelt down in front of me and un-buckled my belt, rubbing my dick simultaneously.

  Meanwhile, I lifted her shirt up over her head and unsnapped her bra. I started haphazardly rubbing and playing with her nipples, all while trying to retrieve a condom from the wallet in my back pocket. I was fully erect as I opened the condom wrapper and started to put it on.

  By that time Leah had pulled down her jeans and straddled my lap. She moved my hands out of the way and thrust me inside her. I almost exploded. She was so wet and so tight. It was so good, I started arguing with myself in my head. First about my girl: Why couldn’t I have the same attraction and feelings for Tara that I had for Leah? If I could, it would have been easy to be faithful. Then I cursed myself out for lettin’ Leah end up with Kenny in the first place. She was supposed to have been mine. All of her—her beauty, her wit, her intelligence, and, got damn, her pussy. I was feelin’ some type of way, like I wanted Leah to stop fuckin’ with Kenny altogether and just b
e my girl. And maybe she had me open, but I was ready to give up Tara for her and everything.

  When we were done, we were both breathing like we’d run a marathon.

  “Yo, roll the windows down,” I said, out of breath. “It’s hot as hell in here.”

  Leah climbed across to the driver’s seat and turned the car on with her key, which was already in the ignition. Then she rolled down the windows.

  Trying to have sex in the passenger seat of a car was hard enough, let alone a small-ass two-seater. We wounded up sitting in the car for a good fifteen minutes, just trying to get our strength back. While we were putting our clothes back on, we noticed the shop’s overhead door started to roll up slowly.

  “Who the fuck?” I blurted out, quickly trying to buckle my belt.

  “Oh my God, oh my God,” Leah panicked as she scrambled to put on her shirt.

  I got out of the car and went to turn the hose back on so that whoever it was coming in the shop would believe us when we told them we were washing the car.

  Just then my dad appeared from under the overhead door.

  “What’s up, Nas?” my dad asked as he walked over toward me.

  “What’s up, Dad?” I returned the greeting. I hosed down the front of Leah’s car, avoiding eye contact with him.

  My dad got close and noticed Leah in the driver’s seat. She smiled and waved.

  “Hi, Mr. Vic,” she said.

  “You just goin’ sit in the car with the windows rolled down while he wash it?” my dad asked. I glanced up and could tell by his demeanor that he suspected something.

  He walked around to the passenger’s side and opened up the door. He pressed the button to roll up the window and then he paused for a second. He reached down in the seat and came back up. Holding the empty condom wrapper in his hand, he blurted, “Y’all was fuckin’?”

  Leah and I didn’t say anything. I lowered the hose, looked at my dad, and rubbed my goatee.

  “Ain’t you Kenny’s girl?” my dad asked rhetorically.

  Leah didn’t say anything. She just looked at me like she wanted to ask me what she should do.

  “Dad, it’s not like that,” I finally spoke up.

  “Nas, you can say what you want. I know what it is.”

  Then Leah decided to speak up. “Mr. Vic, I am so sorry,” was all she could offer.

  My dad shook his head. “Don’t be,” he said as he backed away from the car and walked toward the office. “Nas, let me holla at you.”

  I turned the hose off and gave Leah a look like Fuck as I passed her.

  “Leah, you might as well go ’head home,” my dad called out.

  Leah got out of the car and stood by the driver’s side. “I’m so, so sorry, Mr. Vic,” she offered once more. “You won’t ever have to worry about this again.”

  “I know,” my dad said. “Because you won’t work here anymore.”

  “Dad,” I said, trying to think of the right words that might influence him to give us a second chance.

  “You’re fired, Leah,” my dad said plainly.

  “Dad, seriously, we were just kissing and stuff, and we was about to but we didn’t. And then you walked in. And if you let her keep her job, I give you my word I’ll never do nothin’ like this again,” I pleaded.

  “Mr. Vic,” Leah whined. “I did not mean to disrespect your business. Please, Mr. Vic—”

  “It’s deeper than that, Leah. Now go ’head home before I call ya man and you have to explain this to him,” said my dad coldheartedly.

  Leah broke down in tears, gave me one last look of hopelessness, and then got in her car and drove it out of the shop.

  “Dad, I know we wrong, but you ain’t have to go so hard on her,” I said.

  “I did, Nasir. Because if I didn’t, then I wouldn’t be gettin’ a message across! Do you know what kinda heat you bringin’ to this shop and to our family by messin’ around with that nigga’s girl? If he find out you fuckin’ his girl in my shop, he goin’ want a mafuckin’ war, Nas. And while I can afford one, I ain’t tryna have one over no broad. Me and him already got bad blood. And I did you a favor by lettin’ his girl work in this mafucka despite that. And you turn around and do some shit like this. What is you thinkin’?” my dad snapped. “And what the fuck you not out on the streets for? Huh? It’s the middle of fuckin’ rush hour! Man, go post up. I’ll holla at you later.”

  I wanted to talk to my dad some more to try to smooth things over, but he wasn’t goin’ hear nothin’ I had to say. So I did what I was told and went out on the streets to work. I left the shop mad as shit—at the situation, not at my dad. My dad had a valid point. I was drawin’ by messin’ with Leah behind Kenny’s back. Despite how he got her, she was his girl. And despite the fact that we weren’t close like we used to be, he was still my homie. I was in the wrong. I had to face that. And I told myself that I would have to leave Leah alone once and for all. I knew it was goin’ to be hard, because I was feelin’ the shit out the girl. But it was something I had to do. For real.

  Leah

  I was shook up driving home after Vic caught Nasir and me in the shop. How was I goin’ to explain comin’ home without the car washed? What was I goin’ to tell Kenny was the reason for me gettin’ fired? I couldn’t make up no bullshit excuse, because that would fuck around and prompt Kenny to go to the shop ready to curse Vic out, and then Vic would tell Kenny what it really was. And that would be the death of me.

  Just thinking about the mess I was in had me unable to stop crying. I decided to pull over in the Kentucky Fried Chicken parking lot on Forty-fourth and Market. I had to get my thoughts together and calm myself down. No way I was goin’ home in the state I was in.

  I leaned my head on the steering wheel and cried my last tears. Then I straightened up. I pulled the driver’s-side mirror down and looked at my reflection, then I wiped my face and reapplied my makeup—mascara, eyeliner, and a fresh coat of lip gloss. All the while I was thinking about what I was going to tell Kenny.

  Okay, I thought. As far as the car, the guy couldn’t wait around while I finished setting up the claim, so he promised he would wash it in the morning. Cool. But if I went with that, I wouldn’t be able to tell him I got fired. Well, actually I couldn’t tell him I got fired no matter what. I had absolutely no reason to give him that wouldn’t prompt a bunch of questions and doubts. So hell, I’m not tellin’ him I got fired.

  After about ten minutes of contemplating and coaching myself how I was to act once I got home, I was ready to face Kenny.

  I drove out of the parking lot and made a left onto Market Street. I took it to Forty-sixth and made a right. I took Forty-sixth to Girard, then Girard to Belmont, Belmont across City Avenue, and I went home.

  When I pulled in my driveway, I noticed that all three of Kenny’s cars—the Maserati, the Suburban, and the Impala—were there. Kenny was, indeed, home.

  I walked in the door. The TV was on in the family room, but no one was in there watching it. I turned it off. I went in the kitchen and dropped my pocketbook down on one of the bar stools. Then I got a glass out of the cabinet and put it under the ice then the water dispensers on the Viking side-by-side refrigerator. It was then that I heard Kenny’s footsteps trotting down the steps. I braced myself.

  “What’s up,” he said, upon landing in the kitchen.

  “Hey,” I said softly, sipping my ice water.

  “You got the wheel washed?”

  I shook my head.

  Kenny’s frowned. “Why not?”

  “The claim I had to set up took longer than I expected, and the detailer couldn’t wait. He said tomorrow morning he’ll do it first thing,” I conjured.

  Kenny didn’t say anything. He just sized me up with his eyes.

  “What?” I asked, breaking the creepy silence and trying to lighten the mood in the room.

  Then Kenny blurted out, “I wanna fuck you.”

  My heart sank as I thought about what would happen if I had to pull my pa
nts down right then and there and Kenny got whiff of the fact that I’d just had sex.

  “I’m flattered, but I am so tired. It’s been one of those days,” I said. I put my glass in the dishwasher and went to go up the steps.

  Kenny stopped me as I tried to walk past him. “Come here, man. I don’t wanna hear that you-tired shit. Not today. I been waitin’ for you to come home. You see I ain’t out in the streets,” he explained, pulling me by my arm closer to him.

  “I knooow,” I sang. “But really, Kenny. You don’t understand. I am beat.” I relieved myself of his hold and started toward the stairs again.

  “You cheatin’ on me with one of them niggas at the shop?” Kenny asked, stopping me in my tracks.

  “No! Why would you ask me that?” I responded, neglecting to turn around and look at Kenny.

  “’Cause ever since you got that job you ain’t been wantin’ to fuck me no more,” he complained. “And I know how it be at jobs. A mafucka like you, you like him, y’all start flirtin’, and the next thing you know you stayin’ at work late and y’all fuckin’ on the desk while ain’t nobody there,” Kenny ran down his theory.

  Kenny almost had it right. My desire to have sex had diminished. Not necessarily since working at the shop, but since he tried to give me that fraud case and spare his cousin and the bitch he was fuckin’. That was really what had made me lose interest.

  “Kenny, no, I’m not cheatin’ on you. You’re right, our sex life hasn’t been as active since I started workin’, but that’s only because I’ve been more tired now. Workin’ takes your energy away,” I reasoned.

  Kenny was silent for a moment. Then he said, “I’ma ride with that answer for now. But go up there and lay down for a minute, ’cause I’m tryin’ to get at you tonight, and I don’t want to hear nothin’.”

  “Okay. Fine,” I said, continuing up the steps.

  Oh God, I thought as I got in my bedroom and plopped down on the bed. It may not have looked like it, but the mounting pressure of having to uphold so many lies and secrets was starting to wear on me. I didn’t know how much more I could take, especially now that I had been fired and that was yet another secret I had to keep.