Page 20 of Down With the King of the South 4

His voice cracked as he spoke, and that’s when I grabbed his right hand, placed it in mine, and kissed the back of it.

“Mr. King, I—”

“Nah. I’m on my way over there regardless. Respect my wishes, man. If he’s gone, just hang up. I don’t want to hear you say that shit over the motha fuckin’ phone, yo!” Miami barked.

At the same time, his voice cracked again, and tears fell from his eyes. We heard the line make two beeps, and when it did, I started crying myself. We knew that this day was going to come because the doctor had been warning us, but that didn’t make it better.

“Fuccccckkkkkkk!” Miami screamed, punching the steering wheel over and over.

“Baby, pull over. Let me drive us there. Pull the car over, Miami,” I kept saying over and over, but of course, my request went ignored.

Miami drove so fuckin’ crazy on the way to the hospital that not only was I crying because we had pretty much just found out about the death of his father, but also because I was scared out of my fuckin’ mind by how fast he was driving and the way that he was weaving in and out of traffic.

“Shit! I should have never left him there! I just wanted one fuckin’ night to have with you, and now look! I should have stayed! I should have fuckin’ stayed,” he kept saying over and over.

I was supposed to be his backbone, calming him down, but seeing him act like this wasn’t doing anything but making me emotional. I hated to see Miami hurting because since he came into my life, and we started this love for each other, he has been the glue that kept everything together. He has been the one to keep me together since the death of Vonte. He was truly my backbone, and at this moment, it was so tough to be his because I was secondhandedly getting all of the hurt that he was felt, and my emotions weren’t allowing me to be as strong as I should have been.

The whole drive to the hospital, we didn’t say anything to each other. Truthfully, I was scared to even say anything. All I did was continue to hold his hand as I used my other one to wipe my tears that were constantly falling. Since I was a little girl, I always cried when I saw other people crying around me. I was just able to naturally sympathize with people. This was my man that we were talking about. The two of us were just happy as hell about our engagement, and now we had to deal with this.

The timing couldn’t have been more off. It took us about twenty minutes to get to the hospital, and this particular hospital has valet services that ran all night, so Miami quickly got out of the car, and the valet attendant came right on over. I didn’t wait for Miami to come around and open my door like I always did. Instead, I got out on my own because from the looks of things, I would have to keep up with him because he was walking so damn fast. We made it into the hospital, and no one was standing in line to get checked in, so we were able to walk right up.

I’m not sure if the security behind the desk who was checking us in heard the tone of Miami’s voice and was able to see that he wasn’t in a good mood, but she was moving fast as hell to print out our badge for us to put on. It didn’t take long for her to hand us everything that we needed, and shortly after, we were hoping on the elevator.

“You and I haven’t been on a date in God knows how long. Shit is always happening, and with my ole boy being sick, this is where I have been spending the majority of my days. All I wanted to do tonight was take my woman out and ask you something that I’ve wanted to ask you for a while now. In the midst of me doing that, I didn’t think that this shit would happen. Fuck, man!” Miami said as we rode the elevator up.

His head was down, and he was crying. I walked over to him and placed one arm around him while I held the back of his head. With his face buried in the crook of my neck, he broke down. I’d never witnessed Miami like this before. Like, ever. Hearing my man cry just tugged at my heart, but I fought like hell to keep my tears at bay.

Miami didn’t have to express to me how much he loved his father because I knew. The bond that the two of them had was something that I wished Vonte would have been able to have with his father. Yes, they were father and son, but they just clicked like two best friends. I had the honor of meeting Miami’s father a while back, and I instantly was drawn to him. He was a handsome man, and I hoped that when Miami aged, he would look the same way. He was so charismatic, and he just naturally had that good father and good grandfather in him because Taniya loved him, and so did Miami.

I held Miami until we heard the elevator doors open, and that’s when he let me go. He used the back of his hand to wipe his face, and then the two of us stepped off the elevator together. We rounded the corner, and suddenly, we were standing in front of the room that we’d been coming to for the past few months. Having to do this just put me in a bad space, and it just reminded me of when I had to open that hospital door and witness my so

n lying lifeless in that bed.

A huge part of me wanted to stand outside and let Miami have his moment, but I also knew that as his woman, I had to be here right now for him and support him. Lord knows that I didn’t want to witness this, but I still ended up coming inside with Miami. There he was. No machines were hooked up to him, and there were no sounds from the machines filling the room. There was no sadness from looking at him. In the past, I would look at him and become emotional. I could tell that he was fighting.

A huge part of me felt like Miami’s dad stuck around for so long because he knew how badly it would hurt his son when he left. We’re talking about a man who wasn’t even over the death of his mother. Looking down at Mr. King, I swear I saw peace in him. He was exactly where he was supposed to be; where he wanted to be.

“Baby, I know you don’t want to hear this, but look at him. He’s fine. He is in the most peaceful place that he’s probably been in since finding out that he has cancer. He’s okay, and I’m pretty sure that all he would want is for you to be okay. You can’t tell me that you don’t see how peaceful he looks,” I pointed out.

Miami didn’t say anything; he just continued to hold onto his father’s hand. He didn’t break down and cry like I thought he would. If anything, he just stood there. After about five minutes of standing, I went and took a seat in the corner of the room. Miami didn’t come over to where I was until almost thirty minutes later. He grabbed my arm and pulled me up from the chair and then took a seat where I just was, and he sat me down in his lap.

One of his arms came around and held onto the front of my stomach while his head rested on my back. For hours, we stayed like this, and to tell you the truth, I didn’t mind it one bit.

Mahogany Brooks

“I’m so sorry again for your loss, bro. How are you holding up?” I asked Miami as we walked out of the church after his father’s funeral.

The funeral was a little bit over an hour long and very intimate since Mr. King didn’t have much family. His friends from when he attended school were in attendance, and a lot of Miami’s friends had come because he was like a father figure to them in many ways. I hated everything about funerals, but Miami and I had a bond now, and he was like a brother to me, so I had to pay my condolences. From all the good things that were said today at the funeral about Mr. King, I could tell that he was one hell of a dad, one hell of a person, and friend. He was literally nothing like the fucked-up individual that I had for a sperm donor.

I’m sorry, but Jahir couldn’t say a motha fucka thing to me that would get me to forgive his ass. The reason he couldn’t say shit to me is that I know for a fact that had my mama never told me the truth, or in her case, had me go to Jahir to get the truth, that nigga wouldn’t have said shit to me about him being my daddy.

It’s so crazy because back when I was a little girl, I used to wish like hell that Jahir was my daddy because I had witnessed the things that he did for Jashae and me, and I wanted that in father form. Whole time, that nigga was my fuckin’ daddy. I was so mad with that man that I actually wanted to fight his ass. The only thing that kept me from putting hands on his ass was the fact that he was my Jashae’s daddy, and I didn’t want to put her in the middle of it.

The way my heart was set up, I knew that there would never be any hashing things out between the two of us. I was a grown ass, thirty-year-old woman, who didn’t want to hear a whole bunch of I’m sorry's from a grown ass man who had plenty of time to do the right fuckin’ thing.

“Thanks, sis. All I can say is that I’m taking it one day at a time. This shit ain’t easy, but with my fiancée by my side, she’s helping a nigga get through it,” he assured me, and I smiled at his words.

Jashae wasn’t too far from us. She was actually talking to an older gentleman who had said a few words during the funeral. He attended school with Mr. King, and the two of them had run track together.

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