Page 27 of Invisible Bars
Chi pulled out his vape pen, took a long drag, and blew out a slow stream of smoke like a stressed out uncle or like he’d just clocked out of a job he hated.
“You really gon’ let her just vibe upstairs like you didn’t just paint the wall with Blu’s skull?”
I didn’t respond right away.
We stood across from Blu Notes, where we parked. The street was quiet now. Nobody dared hang around long after a place that played blues all night fell silent.
Blu’s body had been cocooned in industrial plastic, layered and taped until it looked less like a man and more like a problem ready to be carried. We moved him quickly—no dramatics, no prayers. Then we dumped the bloodied tablecloth in a trash bag with the bullet casing and sanitized what we could; the bleach would do the rest.
I leaned against the whip and folded my arms, with my eyes locked on the upstairs window.
She was still up there. Still breathing. Still twitching.
While Chi talked, my mind kept drifting back toher.
The way her eyes went wide with horror… how she trembled like her body was fighting itself just to stay quiet. That shoulder jerk. That hand flick. The way her jaw clenched so tight it looked painful.
She had Tourette’s—said it herself, barely got the words out while panicking. I’d heard of the condition in passing—never cared enough to learn more. But seeing it up close? On someone like her? It pissed me off.
I wasn’t pissed at her, but at the world. At how someone like her had to live in it, twitching through fear and tiptoeing through triggers. And now she’d seen something she shouldn’t have; witnessed a bullet turn a man into a memory. That shit would eatat her or worse… break her. Either way, I’d be the one holding the pieces.
She cried like she thought I was the kind of man who’d kill her next.I was. But something about the way she whimpered and begged like she was already half-dead… it cracked something in me.
I don’t know why I care; I usually don’t. But this? Her? This is different… and it’s scaring the hell out of me.
“She’s not gonna talk,” I finally said, my voice quiet but certain.
Chi raised an eyebrow. “Did youinterrogateher, or justintimidateher?”
“She was scared,” I slightly defended.
“Nah, she was glitching! Don’t act like you ain’t see that little shoulder spasm mid-plea—she was buffering, bro.”
I didn’t laugh. Instead, I rubbed a hand down my jaw, sighed, and finally revealed, “She got Tourette’s, Chi.”
Chi scrunched his face up in lack of intelligence. “She got awhat?”
“Tourette’s, nigga!” I repeated, slower that time. “It’s a condition that causes her to have tics—movements, sounds, and outbursts she can’t control.”
Chi stared, mouth slightly open, like his brain was buffering now.
“Yo, for real?”
I nodded. “Dead ass.”
Chi’s face twisted with a mix of sympathy and confusion.
“Damn. So... she’s not cursed?”
I gave him the slowest side-eye in human history.
“Nah, nigga! It’s not demonic possession;it’s a medical condition.”
Chi blinked a few more times, processing the information.
“Well, damn. Now I feel bad for wanting to look around for a priest. And how you know so much about that condition? You’re a neurologist now?”
I gave him that classic dry stare. “I’m a grown man who knows how to Google and listen when folks explain their damn condition. You still the same nigga that thought eczema was contagious.”
