Chapter Twenty-seven
“So, how the heck are you, Mike?” Keithe pulled up one of the sitting lawn chairs on Mike’s covered patio. “You been well, my friend?” Keithe tried to break the ice.
“Nothing too new. Thanks for stopping by.” Mike finally took a seat by his friend after pouring their drinks.
With a sip from a concoction of tea, lemon, lime, and orange Kool-Aid, Keithe really wanted to be the one to apologize first. “Thanks for letting me come over, dude. I really want to ... Look, I’m sorry for getting into it with you. And to think ... over a woman.” Keithe raised his eyebrows, joked, and took another drink. He really didn’t want to go backward since they had squashed the majority of their issues talking at the hospital that day.
“Ha-ha.” Mike squinted his eyes and took a seat. “At least she’s a good woman,” he assured. “A very persistent, needy ... Hmm, a little bit weird ...” Mike twisted his hand in the air like Fred Sanford often did when declaring someone was “fruity.” Keithe didn’t catch on. Even with Kenya admitting to Mike about her personal life the day in the car when he’d picked her up from the hospital, Mike didn’t feel it was his right to share the same with Keithe.
“But a very beautiful, intelligent woman to say the least,” Mike added.
Taking a break to laugh at the additional description Mike had labeled Kenya, Keithe was glad things were back to normal for the both of them.
“Nevertheless ... she was sweet on you.” Keithe held his glass in the air for an impromptu toast.
“Oh, you funny.” With the quickness Mike turned his chair to face Keithe. “I jumped the gun, man. Seriously. I was mad at you. You know. Wanted to get back ’atcha. That was the only reason I went along with going out with her.” Mike was speed talking as if he were pleading with Keithe. “Cute as she is, I knew it was her from the jump you had been digging.” Mike admitted about knowing it was Kenya that Keithe had had the hots for. “I mean, I seen why you had the sweetness for her. So when you ticked me off, I went for her. Stupid. I know.”
Getting a good laugh out of Mike, Keithe knew his friend wouldn’t be able to handle a woman like Kenya. Even if he were really into women.
“You did all that just because I told you that I’m worried about you, man?”
“Joker, when did you tell me you worried about me?” Mike sat back and picked up his own beverage again. He had to sit still and listen to this.
“Don’t start.” Keithe brought the cold drink to his lips.
“See, there you go.” Mike pushed himself to the front of his seat. “You always do that. You like to tell me what I’m doing wrong. You go off on me, man, about my lifestyle—”
“’Cause, dude, what kind of lifestyle is that?” Keithe set his glass down on the high-quality granite, not getting why Mike did not understand where he was coming from. “That is not your life!”
“It is, though! It’s the life I’ve been living since ... forever. This has been my life. All by myself, forever, Keithe.” Mike got heated and stood. Putting some space between him and Keithe was best.
Shaking his head, Keithe wasn’t about to allow Mike to make him feel bad. “Oh, no, dude. I’ve been there the whole way. I was there”—Keithe started counting with his fingers—“when you told your parents. When you got your first so-called heartbreak—”
“What was his name?” Mike tilted his head and squinted his eyes, wanting to see if he was going to make that lie last forever. He waited for Keithe to sweat. “See? There you go. You never, never took this as real. This is my life, Keithe. Yes, you were there ... physically.” Mike lowered his voice, not wanting to blow his steam. “Physically, you were there.” Mike turned his back to Keithe. “But I bet you can’t count on your fingers the times we’ve sat and talked about how I really feel about this ... about me?
“Emotionally and mentally I was there alone.” Mike looked over his left shoulder and into Keithe’s confused eyes. “But that’s all. You never asked what happened, what I was going through, what I really wanted out of life ...”
With a lowered head, Keithe knew it was the truth. Keithe hadn’t wanted all the details of who, where, why, when ... and he definitely didn’t want to know how. He just figured the less he knew the less he would be held accountable for. He never took in that Mike really didn’t understand his own dealings.
“I just thought ...” His words trailed off. He was sad that he just now realized how much he evaded being there totally for his friend when, in fact, Mike had forever been there for him and all of his heartache and pain.
“What? You just thought I was tripping? On drugs? Going through a phase? Whatever you thought, you didn’t ask. You did just like my parents. You disowned what I was going through. The only difference was that you stayed physically.” He looked back into the sky. “I didn’t know anything myself. I didn’t know if it was just a choice I was making, if I had been born this way. Whatever it was, whatever it is ... I would love nothing more than to know, but I don’t know how to let go.”
Biting the inside of his jaw, Keithe couldn’t believe he was having this conversation with his best friend. He knew for a fact he’d avoided this conversation for twenty-plus years and now he felt bad. He now realized while Mike had been his best friend, he in fact hadn’t been the same to Mike.
Standing up with his fist balled inside of his pants pockets, Keithe asked, “But do you think you really want to?”
“What? Want to let go?” There was a pause. A blink. A shutter to his spine. “I look in the mirror and I see a fly dude. I see myself being this fly man, with a fly honey on my arm ... and the next thing that comes to my mind is, just how long will I allow myself to be satisfied with her?”
“Like Vicky,” Keithe reminded Mike, wishing he had listened and truly been there for Mike. If he had, another woman possibly wouldn’t have had her heart broken.
“Just like Vicky.” Mike shook his head, knowing Vicky was just the woman he was talking about. But over the years, there had been a Traci, Claudia, Melissa, Kharla, and the list went on. Even now, and almost, Kenya.
“The Holy Ghost is a keeper. A renewal to your spirit. If you seek to find Him ...” Keithe stopped when he saw Mike waving his hand in the air.
“Now if I’d had someone speak all of that then ... directly into me, maybe it would’ve worked. Not saying it can’t now. But while all the preachers were preaching around me, including my daddy, first ... what they should have done was to take me to shoot hoops and asked me what the deal was. The holy boldness they claimed to have would have asked me dead on ... what my issues were, what I needed to talk about, and how could they help. Instead, they preached from the pulpit and hoped I got it.” He shook his head. “I never did.”
Nodding, Keithe understood. Preaching toward Mike wouldn’t get them anywhere. What Mike needed was his friend to pray for him, pray with him when he asked, and continue loving him through it all.
Wrapping his arm around Mike’s neck, landing him in a choke hold, Keithe placed a kiss on the top of his best friend’s head. “I love you, man. Can you forgive me?”
“Already. I love you too.”