Pain and suffering was what Ant had to endure every time his partner Tone wanted to tag along with him. However, Ant could take the pain because he loved his partner. Dearly! For as nagging as Tone could be, Ant felt committed to him, responsible for him, and driven by him. And Ant no doubt suffered an everyday gray, while forcing his boy to understand that life was meant to be lived and experienced, and not just talked about or bullshitted through.
“Man, you’re the one who keeps talking this stuff about being bored. I’m always out to do stuff,” Tone refuted, decked out again in his red Cardinals baseball jersey. Ant had been compelled to take his own St. Louis Cardinals jersey off, for fear of showing up like twins. He redressed in a plain blue Wilson Athletics T-shirt with his jeans.
Ant had control of his wheels, and control of their destination to the skating rink on Lindbergh Boulevard, northwest of St. Louis, and not far from the airport. On Thursday nights, the grown-ups got their groove on. Tone was simply concerned about how grown they would be.
“It’s gon’ be a bunch of old folks in here, man. Watch,” he continued to complain.
“Aw, man, you probably scared ’cause you can’t skate,” Ant joked.
“I can skate. I just don’t want to run over no old folks.”
Ant stared into Tone’s face in disbelief. “How old do you think people are going to be in here? Seventy? I mean, we’re almost thirty our damn selves. Grow the hell up, man!”
Tone looked away and out of the passenger-side window. “Yeah, I hope they’re our age. You just remember that this was your idea,” he turned and said to his friend.
As soon as they pulled up into the slowly filling parking lot of the skating rink, Tone noticed more couples than singles walking from their parked cars and moving through the short line.
“Are you sure that this is old heads night, or is it couples night?”
“When you get our age and older, most people start connecting like that. We ain’t teenagers no more,” Ant responded. “I’m not out here to meet nobody anyway. I’m just out here to skate. You know, to do something different.”
Tone shook his head and grinned, deciding to leave his partner alone as they reached the front entrance. He knew that he wanted to meet someone regardless of what Ant was there for.
Tone whispered, “Damn, she look good!” referring to the cashier, an attractive sister who was full of body. “Look at that backyard in there,” he added.
Ant smiled and looked the woman over himself. “Are you gonna be collecting money all night, or do you go out there and skate?” he asked her.
She smiled, real reserved, and nodded. “Yeah, I skate.”
“We’ll be out there on the dance floor lookin’ for you then,” Tone interjected.
“My husband will be looking for me too,” she responded as cool as water.
“We don’t wanna see him,” Tone countered as they moved along to the skate rental booth.
Ant stopped him and asked, “Why you always gotta jump in on my shit?”
“Aw, dawg, I saw her first. You wasn’t even payin’ attention.”
Ant shook his head and said, “Anyway, I told you, sisters start hookin’ up once they get a certain age. I bet her husband is having big fun with that! No doubt!”
“No doubt indeed!” Tone agreed with a smile. “That’s exactly why we don’t need to be in here. It’s gon’ be a bunch of old, worn-out, divorced, and kid-having women up in here. We need to hook up with some college girls, or girls who just got out of college. You know, still wet behind the ears and shit.
“Look, it ain’t even that many people up in here yet,” Tone continued whining.
Ant said, “You know, it’s CPT time. Black people always come late.”
“Oh yeah? Well, we black, so how come we up in here so damn early?”
Ant had finally heard enough. He sat down to jam his rented skates on. “Damn, man, can you stop complainin’ so much and just enjoy yourself? I mean, you act like a kid brother sometimes. Are you sure you’re older than me? My name need to be Tone and your name should be Ant,” he added with a chuckle.
Tone said, “You can talk that kid brother shit if you want, but I’ll whip your ass. Now how many kid brothers can do that?”
Ant smiled, tied up his skates, and headed for the disco lights that flashed on the skating rink, while the DJ played the hit song from Usher “You Make Me Wanna …” But when your body hasn’t performed a certain task or used specific muscles for some time, it’s amazing how out of shape you can feel. Both Ant and Tone felt like amateurs. They skated right out into the rink, trying their best to be cool, black, macho men. And it wasn’t working.
“Shit, man! These things hurt my feet!” Tone went back to complaining. “We need some better skates, dawg. They gave us the damn welfare department skates. Mine don’t even turn.”
“They’re not supposed to turn. Your legs are supposed to turn the skates,” Ant said with a laugh. He wasn’t making the curves too comfortably himself. The rentals felt more like stiff ice skates than roller skates. The real skaters had their own wheels, and were grooving along to the bass-driven song as if they were born for it.
By the fifth lap, Tone was already looking to retire. It was a pity, however, that he failed to guide himself to the edge of the rink instead of stopping in the middle of traffic:
BLOOMP!
SQUUEEEEETT!
SQUUEEEEETT!
CLACKK!
CLACKK! CLACKK!
Tone created a three-skater wipeout, with two breakers and three jumpers.
Ant nervously headed for the walls, regaining his balance before he wiped out himself from laughter.
Tone climbed to his feet and gingerly made his way from the rink to recover. I knew this shit was a bad idea, he thought to himself. He felt like his right arm was broken.
Ant made it to his partner, filled with laughter. “You aw’ight?” he asked, still chuckling.
“Shut up, man. I hit my damn funny bone. My arm feel like it’s broke,” Tone responded, cradling his right arm.
“Aw, man, stop whinin’. Who the girl now?”
They stopped right in front of twin basketball machines and read each other’s mind.
“You too hurt to get it on?” Ant challenged.
Tone smiled, worked out his arm, and faced the machines. “We can get it on.”
“I don’t wanna hear no excuses about your arm, Tone. I’m not tryin’ to hear that shit.”
“Just get your money up,” Tone huffed.
“How much we playin’ for?”
“Twenty dollars a game.”
“Twenty dollars a game?” Ant questioned. “What, are you trying to make an income off of me, man? If we playin’ for twenty dollars, we gon’ make it two out of three games,” Ant said as they headed for the nearby change machine.
Another skater headed for the basketball machines before they made their change.
Tone said, “Dawg, we ’bout to play for money over here. You wanna get in on it?”
The brother smiled and shook his head. “Naw. Just let me play a quick game before you get started then.”
Tone sucked his teeth. “Scared money don’t make none.”
The brother ignored him and finished up his game before returning to the skating rink.
Tone looked at his meager score of thirty-two points and said, “Shit, he had reason to be scared. I would have taken all of his money.”
Ant shook his head. He said, “I don’t believe you in here trying to hustle people.”
“Yeah, yeah, just shut up and put your quarters in.”
They played two furious, trash-talking games, with Ant winning them both with the same approach: nailing long, three-point baskets to seal his last-second victories, 56-53 and 64-60.
“Give them twenty dollars up, boy!”
Tone was hesitant. “Wait a minute, man. You know I couldn’t shoot them three-pointers with my elbow being messed up.”
“Naw, naw, man. I told you, I don’t wanna hear that shit.”
“I’m sayin’, dawg, you won off of three-pointers. So let’s play two out of three games where we just shoot short shots, you know, because I’m a handicap right now.”
Ant started to skate away. “Let me go back out here and skate then while your little arm heals.” He didn’t want to take his partner’s money anyway. Tone needed it.
“Yeah, whatever, man. Anybody wanna play me for money!” Tone went back to challenging.
While they played basketball, the skating rink had filled up a bit. It wasn’t wall-to-wall skaters or anything, but it was enough. There were a lot more singles who had shown up with the later crowd as well. Tone didn’t know what he was missing. And although Ant said he wasn’t there to meet anyone, he just couldn’t help himself. The brother had a real weakness for available women. One of the skaters even looked familiar to him. She was in blue jeans and a thin green blouse that trailed in the wind as she skated. Ant put a little extra in his stride to catch up to her, hoping that he wouldn’t wipe her out in a clumsy crash, or look too damned anxious and blow his cool.
“Hey, miss, don’t I know you from somewhere?”
She looked straight into his face, recognized him, and grinned. It was the “piece of me for a piece of you” man. She couldn’t help herself either, smiling at him again. A smile like hers tended to send the wrong message to a man. A message of easiness. Easiness was the last image in the world a woman wanted to present to a full-grown player like Anthony Poole. Knowing as much, Sharron Francis continued to skate away from him. Her reasoning: If he wants me, then he’s gonna have to come and get me, whether I’ve been thinking about meeting him or not. And she had been thinking about meeting him again. Constantly! But she realized the game of seduction and counterseduction had to be played regardless. She couldn’t just stop and talk to him. Especially after smiling like she did. Or could she? Could she just stop all of the bullshit and ask him what he wanted from her without scaring him away like a dog with his tail caught between his hind legs?
Guys just had to play their games. Otherwise, they didn’t seem to know how to function. Besides, the game was good in the beginning. All of the mental foreplay was hard to outright ignore. Yet, how long did men and women have to continue playing games? She loves me. She loves me not. Or maybe she just loves my pocket knot. He wants me. He wants me not. Or maybe he just wants my pleasure spot.
As Sharron skated around the rink to the DJ’s driving rhythms, Ant remembered her. She was the only woman whom he had used his precious line on. How could he forget? He had wasted it on her. Or maybe not. Because she was smiling again. And he still wanted to find out what that meant. That smile. And this time, she was not getting away from him.
“Who was that?” Celena skated in and asked, much swifter on her own skates than Ant could ever hope to be on rentals.
“I don’t know yet,” Sharron answered. “But why don’t you skate ahead so I can find out.”
Her girl looked and grinned. “Oh, it’s like that now.”
“Yes, it is. Now go on somewhere,” she advised, with no apologies.
“Is he that important, Sharron?”
Ain’t it a trip how your friends can know exactly when they’re getting in the middle of a good thing? It almost makes you want to throw them a stiff elbow. Instead, Sharron put on the brakes and let Celena skate right by and out of her damn face, causing Ant to do exactly what he was trying so hard to avoid, clumsily wiping out and taking his chase down with him.
BLOOMP! BLOOMP!
“Damn! Now you done made me embarrass myself,” he complained. “Why did you just stop like that?”
Sharron smiled again and remained sitting while the crowd skated around them.
“Why were you right behind me like that?” she asked him.
Weird. How is it that we can feel an automatic connection to someone we’ve never been around before? A complete stranger.
“Come on now, you knew I was trying to catch up to you. This is the second time you walked away from me,” he answered her. “The first time was on Kingshighway Boulevard.” He wasn’t trying to pick himself up either. They had the floor all to themselves.
“I bet you don’t even remember that,” he added. He knew damn well she remembered. He just wanted to hear her say it.
“Are you going to help me up, or are we just gonna sit here? You did knock me down, you know,” she commented instead. She had a feeling he didn’t exactly need ego boosting, so she wasn’t planning on giving him any.
Ant climbed to his feet and proceeded to help Sharron to hers. And they were on shaky ground, just like they would be on a first date.
Then came Celena again. “Are you okay?” she asked, peeking at Ant.
“Yes, I am,” Sharron stated. She hated to be so frank, but it was time for Celena to experience some of her own blunt medicine.
“Well, excuse me for asking. I’ll just leave you two crash-test dummies alone,” she responded, amusing herself as she skated away.
“You’re the nice one, aren’t you?” Ant asked Sharron with a knowing smile. She didn’t even have to answer. He knew it already.
“Let’s go sit down and talk,” she told him, grabbing his hand to lead him away from the rink.
Ant smiled, realizing who was in charge, and with better skates and form. Or at least until he got the hell off of that rink and out of those cheap rentals.
Sharron lead him straight to the red refreshment booths.
“Are you hungry? I’ll buy you a slice of pizza and a coke,” she told him.
Wait a minute, Ant asked himself. What the hell is she trying to do?
“Naw, I can buy my own food, sweetheart. I don’t need you to do that. Do I look like I’m broke or something? I’m not even hungry.”
Amazingly, Sharron was in a comfort zone. She was just feeling it. Since she knew that he was a player, she planned to have a good time with him. She figured she could use some enjoyment in her life anyway. But while he may have had plans of playing her, she was thinking deeply about playing him right back, and letting him feel the complete impact of his game.
Sharron looked him straight in his eyes and said, “When you asked me if I wanted to make a trade, a piece of you for a piece of me, what exactly did you mean by that?”
In other words, she was effectively saying, Show me what you got. Explain yourself.
Ant smiled as tellingly as she had. She did remember. He was flattered. His precious line wasn’t wasted. Sharron had no idea how much that meant to him.
“So you understood what I was trying to say to you?” he asked.
“Not really. I’m still trying to understand it now. So tell me what you meant.”
Ant frowned at her, not annoyed, just perplexed. “It’s not like it’s some … thousand-year-old riddle or something. I’m just saying a piece of me for a piece of you, like we sharing each other, that’s all. Sharing.”
So far, so good.
Sharron smiled, wanting more.
“Sharing what parts of each other? I mean, is that just physical or what?”
Of course some parts were physical. But it was more than that too. Nevertheless, how exactly could he explain it as a man to a woman, when many women couldn’t understand?
Ant smiled, intrigued by the challenge. He felt like a con man in a million-dollar card game. He was pumped! But like all real players, he showed her nothing but calmness.
“Well, it’s physical, mental, spiritual, and a whole lot of other things,” he answered.
Somehow, Sharron didn’t expect him to use the word “spiritual.” Not a player.
“Spiritual?” she was forced to ask, confused. “Explain that to me.”
“Well, I believe in God. I got to. How else can we explain half of the things in this world? And sometimes, when I’m working on people’s cars, they look at me like I’m a god. Ever since I was a teenager. But I just know what I’m doing. So the concept of God is real. It gotta be. And when a man and woman really get into each other and they start moaning and groaning toward that thing, you know, that climax, that’s more than physical. That’s godly! Spiritual.”
Sharron broke up in laughter. “I can’t believe that you’re actually equating sex to God.”
Ant looked confused. It made perfect sense to him. Why didn’t it make sense to her?
“How can we not equate it to God? How do we reproduce? By sharing each other, right? I’m telling you, sex is godly.”
“I see. So you like having sex that much, hunh?”
Sharron was in a zone, and willing to let it all hang loose. Why not, when she had been so uptight for the past couple of weeks? Ant had caught her at the wrong time. Or in this particular case, it could have been the perfect time. He had been wanting to let himself hang loose as well.
“You don’t like sex?” he asked her. “I mean, when it’s good. ’Cause I’m not talking about that wham, bam, thank-you, ma’am, shit. I’m talking about real, sweaty, deep-breathing stuff. You know what I mean? Howlin’ at the full moon and shit.”
Sharron laughed out loud. “Is that what your women do, howl at the moon?”
“I do it too, when it’s good. It makes it complete. I wouldn’t be giving you a full piece of myself if I didn’t.”
A full piece of himself? Interesting, she thought.
“And what does a ‘full piece’ mean? And how come you don’t say all of me for all of you?”
Ant stopped her in her tracks.
“You know what? Think about that question for a minute. I mean, really. Can you actually give me all of you, and expect to get all of me? That’s unheard of. To do that, you would have to live my entire life with me. I can’t even remember all of that shit. Nor can you. Nobody gets all. The closest thing to all would be identical twins. And everybody who’s ever been around twins can tell you how weird that shit is, that they can be so much alike. But they’re also different, because it’s usually a nice twin and a mean twin. Alter egos and shit.
“So, naw, we don’t give all of ourselves,” he continued. “What we do is give important pieces that build up to a whole, little by little. That way, you’re always looking for that next piece. Because when you give somebody too much too fast, they don’t respect you for that anyway. They get bored with you. So you show ’em something new every day. In full pieces, and none of that half-steppin’ shit. That’s why a lot of guys can’t keep their women now. They don’t know how to go deep enough to reach a woman. Reach her to where she really knows you, trusts you, and respects you. And I’m not talking about for the meantime. I’m talking about for life!”
Enough said. Wow! Sharron wasn’t expecting all of that. Not from a player. It was just supposed to be a line. He wasn’t actually supposed to understand it. And he damn sure wasn’t supposed to be able to explain it. Before she realized it, she was staring across the table in awe. She was speechless. As was he.
Ant had no idea that he could open up to a woman like that. He wanted to. Someday. But he doubted if women could really handle it. The full, unleashed mind of a man. But Sharron had asked him the right questions at the right time, and got the right answers. And wow! With such buildup, what else could they possibly say to each other?
“Hello, my name is Celena Myers.” Sharron’s friend appeared from nowhere and addressed Ant with her hand extended. “And your name is?” she asked him.
“Anthony Poole,” he answered, taking her hand in his.
Sharron hadn’t even asked. Nor had Ant asked for her name. And did it matter? Was a name more important than searching a person’s soul? What could be more important than a person’s views on God, sex, and human life. Given names said more about a person’s parents and culture than they did about the individual being anyway. Nevertheless, it was embarrassing not to know them.
“Sharron Francis,” she announced, with her right hand extended across the table. “And that’s spelled Shar—S-H-A-R—ron—R-O-N.”
Celena frowned, horrified. “Well, what the hell were you two talking about all this time? Y’all didn’t even know each other’s names?”
“What’s up?” Ant’s friend Tone interrupted, crashing in on the party.
“This is my boy, Anthony Wallace,” Ant filled in.
Celena jumped all over that.
“Wait a minute. You both have the same first names?”
“Yeah, but I’m older,” Tone said proudly.
Only in age, Sharron thought to herself. She could tell who was whom between the guys, just like Ant could tell between her and Celena. The party crashing had brought them down from their high and back to earth, because for a minute there, they were both floating with no place to land.
Ant said, “We were just having a deep conversation here.” He was rather annoyed that their friends had broken it up.
“It must have been deep if y’all didn’t even know each other’s names” Celena noted.
“I mean, is a name that important?” Tone asked rhetorically. “Your name could be Jane, Judy, Jackie, Jill, or whatever, and the conversation would still be more important than that. Unless your name was Janet Jackson. Now that would be something else.”
Ant chuckled. His boy Tone never failed to amaze him.
Celena presented the same bundle of surprises for Sharron.
“Well, in some cultures, names actually mean something,” Celena countered.
Sharron let out a long sigh, reading where things were starting to go.
“Can we go back to skating?” she asked her new companion, holding his hand again.
Ant had other ideas in mind, but he went along with it just to regain their privacy. He broke away once they hit the skating rink.
“Look, ah, I don’t mean to hurt your feelings or anything, Sharron, but I don’t really feel like skating anymore. I just wanted to talk to you alone again.”
She slipped into another smile. Now that was a man. She guided him over to another empty spot where they could be alone again.
“Actually, I didn’t want to skate anymore either,” she leveled with him.
“Good. Because my damn feet are killing me! I’m about ready to return these skates. Do your skates feel comfortable?”
They sure looked comfortable. They were all black with black wheels and red tassels.
“Of course they feel comfortable. Rented skates are just to get you rollin’. They’re not supposed to feel good. That’s why real skaters buy their own.”
“So I guess you can tell that I’m not a real skater, hunh?”
“Definitely. So why did you come here tonight?” she asked curiously. “Was it just to meet more women?”
He began to untie his skates as he looked up to answer her. “Naw, it just could have been fate. It was meant for us to meet again. Because evidently you must have been thinking about me.”
She grinned, captured by the truth. “I guess you had too many women on your mind to think about me; you know, with your godly sex and all, howling at the full moon,” she mocked him.
He laughed it off. “Now you gon’ rewind it and play it to death on me. How many people have you told about my line already?”
“Actually, I haven’t told anyone,” she answered. “It was my own private secret. Why? How many women have you used it on?”
“About a thousand,” he lied, just for a reaction.
“That many?”
‘You wouldn’t believe me if I told you, so why bother?”
“Try me anyway. That’s what life is about, isn’t it?”
“All right then. You really wanna know how many women I said it to?”
“I’m asking.”
He said, “One. Some girl named Sharron Francis. And she walked away from me, smiling. Then my boy laughed at me, talking about it wasn’t gon’ work. And I thought I wasted my damn line, and that this girl was gonna go and tell everybody. So I didn’t even want to use it again.”
Sharron couldn’t believe her ears. She was really tickled by it.
“You mean, you went through all of that stress over a line?” she asked him, laughing.
“Well, you obviously remembered it.”
She nodded. “It was different.”
He smiled. “Well … I’m different.”
“Everybody’s different in the beginning,” she said.
“Have you ever had a beginning this strong? I mean, not just physically, but mentally?” Then he grinned, adding, “And spiritually?”
She grinned right back at him. “Honestly, no. But then again, there’s a first time for everything.”
He nodded and pulled off his skates. “You know what your problem is? You think too damn much. You’re trying to have a comeback line for everything I say. Learn to just go with the flow. Just make sure that you don’t lose yourself.”
“But isn’t that what you want me to do, lose myself? Honestly?”
He started to chuckle. A player being called for a hidden deck of cards.
“You know what? I wanna lose myself, too. That’s what women can’t understand. Guys want to fall in love. But then we wake up with nightmares, thinking about that pretty girl way back in high school or junior high who gave us the okeydoke. Then we freeze up and say, ‘Naw, man, I ain’t goin’ through that shit again.’ And that’s the truth. Whether guys want to admit it or not.”
“But you have to admit it. That’s life,” she told him.
“You know what? That is life. You’re right,” he agreed. “So we have to get back on that wild horse and ride it, hunh? Ride it good.”
She smiled at him, mischievously. That deep, penetrating natural smile of hers. “Or, you could let the horse ride you for a change. If you could handle it?”
Hmmm! What a proposition! he thought. And he was definitely interested!
“Dawg, when we first met this girl, you said she wasn’t all that. Now you meet her again at the skating rink, and you spend the whole damn night with her. What’s up with that?” Tone wanted to know. It was after midnight. They were on their way back home.
Ant was too satisfied to even respond. He was driving as if he were floating in a spaceship on cruise control, thirty-thousand miles away from earth. He was already thinking of his future with Sharron. How long would the honeymoon last? They always seemed to die somehow. Crashing and burning into oblivion.
“Hey, man, are you daydreaming or what? YO-O-OH!”
Ant snapped out of his deep thought and said, “What’s wrong with you, man?”
“I’m sittin’ here trying to talk to you, and you over there spacin’ off and shit,” Tone explained.
Ant said, “Look, man, I had me a good night. Aw’ight? So let me just enjoy it in peace.”
Tone said, “Her girlfriend was snotty as hell. That’s all I know,” he complained. He actually tried to talk to her, but Celena wasn’t having it. Nor was Ant paying any real attention to him. He was off in his own world, blocking everything out, even when he arrived up the street from Tone’s mother’s house, off of Grand Boulevard.
“Don’t crash on the way home while you spacin’ out over this girl, man,” his boy advised him as he climbed out of the car. “’Cause it look like she got your ass whipped just through holdin’ hands and shit.”
Ant was in such a love high that he could only laugh.
“I’m whipped without even gettin’ no ass yet, hunh?” he reiterated. “That’s the way it should be. Because once I hit the G-spot, the excitement all fades away,” he told his partner.
Tone stopped and thought about that for a minute with the passenger door still open. “Yeah, I don’t know about this one, man. This girl seem like she go t you on some old spooky-type shit. Fuckin’ voodoo.”
Ant laughed even louder. “Naw, man, you trippin’ now. She ain’t got me that bad. And I got her, too. Don’t forget that. She back home thinkin’ ’bout me now.”
“Yeah, whatever. Go on home and have wet dreams about her. But just remember, I hooked you up with her.”
“What?” Ant questioned with a frown.
“Aw, don’t act like you don’t remember now. You wasn’t even into this girl. I saw her first and made you talk to her on Kingshighway. You was talkin’ some trash that she was too tall.”
Ant nodded. “Aw’ight, I’ll give you that. You spotted her.”
“I know I did,” Tone said. “You just don’t forget that shit,” he added, closing the passenger door. Then he walked off toward his mother’s house.
Ant drove off and remembered that Tone had spotted Dana Nicole Simpson for him as well. He thought about it all, and began to pity his partner as he headed farther south to Nebraska Avenue. How did Anthony Wallace really feel about being second fiddle for so many years? Ant had thought about that before, but never seriously. He figured that it had to hurt. How damaged had Tone’s ego been over those years?
No wonder he seemed to lack drive, direction, and consistency. He was forever being left out and shot down. And while Ant had a great damn time with his life, Tone had only learned how to live through Ant, and his women, and his adventures.
Ant jumped on the phone line as soon as he arrived at home and called up his boy to let him know that he cared. And he did care, because Tone was his lifelong partner.
“I just wanna let you know that I love you, dawg. No doubt.”
“What? Man, that girl done drove you crazy already,” Tone responded drowsily. He was long due for a rest. When you stay up halfway through the night for the majority of the week, the need for sleep will surely catch up to you.
“I’m not thinkin’ ’bout her, man. I’m just talking about me and you now,” Ant told him. “We been through a lot together, man. And I just want you to know that I appreciate you, that’s all. I love you, man.”
Tone paused and let it all sink in, tired or not. “Yeah, man, I guess I love you, too. But I love pussy a lot more, so don’t ever think about gettin’ funny on me, man, calling me up to tell me that you love me after midnight and shit.”
Ant broke out laughing. “Gettin’ funny,” as Tone called it, was absolutely out of the question! Nobody loved the sweet silk of a woman more than Ant did. No doubt!
“You don’t have to worry about that from me, man,” he commented. “So go on back to sleep. I gotta get up early for work tomorrow.”
When they hung up, Ant undressed, laid down, and thought all the way back to their childhood in Jennings. Then he laughed to himself, reminiscing long past midnight on the love he had for his boy, and all of the crazy times they shared together while running the streets that emptied into Florissant Avenue.