Page 35 of Another Constant

“Your friend? The one you kissed with the dogs? That’s your girlfriend, Uncle.” Her words caught me by surprise.

“What do you know about a girlfriend, Aja?”

“I’m not a baby, Uncle. I know stuff.”

I looked at her for a moment, ready to pop her bubble, but I stopped myself. Instead, I watched her fasten herself then I closed the door.The fuck did she mean she knew stuff?

When I was in the car with it started, I looked at her in the rearview mirror. “The fuck you mean you know stuff?” I couldn’t hold it in.

“I just do.” She never looked up from her tablet.

“Yeah, aight. You bet not have some lil boy at that school thinking he’s your boyfriend either.”

“Ew, Uncle. No, I don't want a boyfriend.”

“Good. ’Cause if I find out you do, ain’t nothin’ going to be pretty. Plus, you are too young for that, baby girl. Stay a kid as long as you can because this adult shit ain’t no joke.”

She was quiet, which caused me to glance in the rearview mirror again. “You heard me, Aja?”

“Yes, Uncle, I heard you.”

I nodded, keeping my eyes and head on the road. I had told Aja no lies. This adult shit was heavy enough to break even the strongest. Just like we planned, we went by the house and grabbed a few things. After that we went straight to Harlem’s. The craving to be near her was new for me because never in my life had I wanted to be near a soul as much as I wanted to be around her little ass.

Harlem made pizza from scratch. Shorty had hooked it up so well that my niece stuffed her face until she passed out on the living room sofa staring at her iPad with Bleu, the puppy Harlem wouldn’t sell me, under her.

“Safe to say she liked it, huh?” Harlem’s voice made me look up from Aja to her. She had gone to get her guest bedroom ready for Aja to sleep in. “The bed is ready.” She then leaned down and picked Bleu up.

I chuckled. “Hell yeah. Then you see how attached to that dog she is? You gotta sell him to me now, baby.” I picked my niece up and carried her in the direction of the guest room right next to Harlem’s bedroom. Once we had Aja settled and under the covers, I cut the lights out and followed Harlem out of the room.

“I told you, I’m not selling you my dog, Kinga. She can come see him whenever she wants though. Shoot when he gets old enough, she can even babysit.”

I chuckled. “Damn.” We then entered her puppy haven as she called it. There were only two puppies and the two mother dogs. One was currently pregnant and the other was seemingly nursing her puppies.

“Now would you like one of those two?” she asked, pointing to the two puppies now greeting their brother she had just lowered.

“Nah. I want the one you want, because I want you.”

“Like how?” Her expression housed mischievousness, the type that was about to have me on some other shit all night.

Chapter8

Harlem

I woke up in his arms but then he had to leave. Not only did he have to get Aja to school but he had to get to the shop. I couldn’t be mad, shit I was too tired to be mad. The way he’d handled my body last night, making sure to have me teetering over an edge I didn’t realize existed, had me forgetting about all of my responsibilities. Until I heard my alarm go off for the third time after I had already snoozed it. Then again I thought it was my alarm, but no matter how many times I pressed the side button on my phone, it kept vibrating. Finally I glanced down and it wasn’t my alarm at all but instead my mother.

“Yes,” I answered, my voice and body filled with the type of exhaustion only a man could aid in creating.

“I’m parked out front and I have bags. You’ll either come out here and help me or let me curse your ass out when I get in the house.”

“Um. What are you doing here?”

“Coming to see my daughter. The only one I have and the one about to get her narrow ass cursed out if she doesn’t come out here and get these bags.”

I lifted my head and stared at the time on the phone. It was barely six in the morning. What the hell was she doing up and out this way? Instead of fussing, I pushed the covers from my body and rose like the dead in a scary movie. It was then I realized I was naked. Of course I was naked, that man had explored my body like a map to a nomad. I didn’t have time to get dressed, so I didn’t. Seconds later a white T-shirt that wasn’t mine swallowed me like a dress and a pair of sleep shorts that were mine graced my bottom. I met my mother at the steps and of course I knew she was still about to have my ass.

“You told me there was no more Zax. So whose shirt are you wearing?” she asked as soon as we were both in the house. I had let my older dogs out while she watched my every move.

“And how do you know it isn’t mine?”

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