Page 57 of His Hungry Wolf

Titus looked at me and leadingly asked, “Me too, what?”

“You want me to say it?” I asked him, confused.

“Yes, Claude! That’s the point of what I was saying. You need to practice it. And since I’m picking you up, making me obviously a great brother, this should be a short pass.”

“You’re a good brother, too,” I conceded.

Titus smiled. “Thanks, Claude. I really appreciate you saying it.”

“Well, it’s true,” I confirmed. “You’ve been a good brother to me.”

“Thanks. So, how painful was that to say?”

“It wasn’t that bad,” I admitted.

“Now, do that a thousand more times and in a few years, you might be able to tell Merri he has great hair,” Titus teased.

“Fuck you,” I joked.

“What? Too much. How about satisfactory hair? Do you think in a couple of years, you might be able to work up to that?”

“Fuck you, Titus,” I said with a smile.

He laughed.

As much sense as Titus had made, that didn’t change the bind I was in. Thanks to Merri, everyone knew where I had gone and I was going to have to tell everyone I had failed.

“How was your trip?” My mother asked me when I arrived home. “Did you help out your friend?”

“I did,” I told her.

“That’s good. Did you get laid?”

“Momma!”

“I just figured that if you were sneaking off to ‘help’ a ‘friend’ that you’ve never mentioned before, my baby boy was finally gonna see some action.”

“Oh my God, Momma! And I wasn’t sneaking off. I told you where I was going.”

“Sure you did,” Momma said with a smile.

Staring at her, knowing she wasn’t completely wrong, I wondered if she was the reason I couldn’t share anything with anyone. I never questioned whether or not she loved me. But, like Titus’s boyfriend, Lou, Momma was a lot.

“I’m going to my room,” I informed her before collecting my travel bag and heading upstairs.

Lying in bed, staring at the small shadows cast by the setting sun on the textured ceiling, I wondered what I was supposed to do next. In one day, I had lost both the career and the man that I had wanted so badly that I couldn’t admit it.

And, wasn’t it because I couldn’t admit to it that I had lost them? If I had practiced instead of denying my feelings, wouldn’t I now have everything I had ever wanted?

If I had a second chance to do it all again, I would do everything differently. Too bad I didn’t have that chance… Or did I?

Chapter 11

Merri

Sleep. I needed sleep. And once I dragged myself off the ground and into bed, I got it. When I awoke, I saw things in a different light. Literally. I had been so exhausted, that when I woke up, it was past midnight. Having gone 48 hours on 45 minutes of sleep, I had a lot of catching up to do.

“Oh shit! Claude,” I said, remembering everything that had happened.

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