Chapter 20
Three years later…
Our house sat behind tall iron gates at the end of a long, curved driveway.
It was a massive three-story mansion built from dark stone and glass.
Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked the city of Heartville, while the circular driveway wrapped around a fountain with our jersey numbers carved into the center.
Inside, the ceilings stretched two stories high, and a crystal chandelier hung above polished marble floors. The living room was filled with custom leather furniture, a wall-sized television, and a fireplace surrounded by black stone.
The kitchen looked like it belonged in a luxury restaurant, with double islands, gold fixtures, top-of-the-line appliances, and a walk-in pantry bigger than most bedrooms. A glass staircase led upstairs to the master bedroom, which had its own sitting area, private balcony, oversized bathroom, and a closet filled with designer clothes and sneakers arranged like they were on display in a store.
Downstairs was where the house really showed my money.
There was a private movie theater, full gym, bar, game room, indoor basketball court, and a sneaker room protected by fingerprint access.
Outside, an infinity pool stretched toward the skyline beside a sunken firepit, covered patio, outdoor kitchen, and a half-court painted in our team’s colors—red and white.
It’s been three years, and both me and Scottie were still in Heartville.
I had two championship rings and she had one, despite making it to the championship.
Those two years the Heartville Hornets lost, I had to deal with the darkness Slim went in for a couple of weeks.
Balling meant so much to her, sometimes she’d forget it was just a game, and that you win some to lose some.
You couldn’t tell Slim that, though. Especially when she was in a dark mood.
Right now, she was swimming in the pool, doing laps for cardio.
Slim had been out there for almost an hour, cutting through the water like she had something chasing her.
Every time she reached the edge, she flipped beneath the surface and pushed off again without stopping.
Her long locs were tied into a thick bun on top of her head, and the red sports swimsuit she wore hugged every curve she had gained over the last three years. She was a woman now at twenty-one.
I stood inside the kitchen watching her through the glass doors with a bottle of water in my hand.
She had already worked out in the gym that morning, ran drills on the court, and watched film from our last game.
Now she was swimming like the season started tomorrow instead of being four months away.
I slid the glass door open. “How many laps you doing?”
Slim didn’t answer. She reached the other side, turned underwater, and came back toward me.
“Scottie.”
She finally stopped at the edge closest to me. Her chest rose and fell as she pushed her goggles onto her forehead.
“What?”
“You heard me.”
“I stopped counting.”
“That mean too many.” I crouched beside the pool and held the water toward her. “Get out.”
“Baaaaby,” she groaned, pouting. My dick bricked up when it shouldn’t have.
I dragged my eyes away from her. “That shit ain’t gon’ work. Get out the pool.”
The second she stood in front of me, I regretted ordering her out. Water ran down her smooth brown skin, disappearing between her breasts before traveling over her stomach. Slim reached for the towel lying across the lounge chair, but I snatched it before she could. She let me dry her off.
“You working the fuck out of yourself,” I told her, shaking my head in disapproval.
Slim spun around, taking the towel from me. “I’m about to shower.”
She stormed away. She hated these type of conversations, but they were needed. Her mama was on her ass too about overworking herself, but Slim was so hardheaded, she didn’t give a fuck.
I followed in the path she’d left in, and closed the sliding door behind me, navigating to our bedroom where I had left the TV on a baseball game. Removing my slides, sat down on the bed and took a call from my mama.
“Hey son,” she said before I could greet her. The tone in her voice had my sitting up straight and a chill running down my spine.
“Mama…everything good?” I quizzed. I wave of something I couldn’t catch came over me. It had my whole body going limp.
“No. No, everything is not. Your father had a heart attack.”
She began to cry uncontrollably as I sat there with the phone hanging from my hand. Her crying told me what I already knew. He was gone.
The bathroom door opened, and Slim walked out wearing a sports bra and lavender colored Nike shorts.
“Kane? What’s wrong?” she whispered, coming closer to me. Her eyes darted to the phone and she took it out of my hand slowly. When she saw it was my mom, Slim put it on speaker.
“Mrs. Stone?” Slim’s voice was shaky.
“My dad had a heart attack,” I mumbled because mama was so distraught, she couldn’t even speak right now.
Slim gasped. Her eyes were stretched. Slowly, she covered her mouth.
“I am so sorry,” she whispered.
I took the phone from her. “I’ll be there in two hours, Ma.”
She croaked out a barely audible, “Okay,” then ended the call.
For a long minute, I didn’t move. I stared at the dark screen of my phone like Mama was going to call back and tell me they revived him. The last time I seen my father was three months ago. He was healthy. He couldn’t be gone.
“Kane.” Slim stood in front of me and all I could do was bury my face into her stomach and cry.
Her hand was at the back of my head, holding me in place.
That saying was true. Fix shit before it can’t be fixed.
Even though we were cordial around each other, me and him never got to the point where we could talk about me and Slim.
This heartache…it had me wondering if this was his karma for not accepting who I wanted to be with.
Slim was a good person, and he just wouldn’t accept her.
Still…he was my father.
I broke.
All the way down.
I buried my face against her stomach and cried harder than I had ever cried in my life.
My shoulders shook, and every breath came out rough.
I couldn’t stop it. I didn’t care that I was supposed to be strong.
I was a big deal in Heartville and was sure the news of my father’s passing will be on every news channel and in the paper by morning.
Slim held me tighter. She didn’t tell me to calm down. She didn’t feed me any of that shit people said when they didn’t know what else to say. She just held me.
“I can reach out to Angel so she can handle the news,” Slim said softly, rubbing my back with her palm in circles.
Angel was both of our publicist. She handled the reports, press coverage, and overall public narratives for me and Slim. I could even respond. I just barely nodded.
“Whatever you need me to do, baby, I got you,” she pressed.
God, I loved her so much.
Dressed in a Tom Ford all black tux, I adjusted the dark shaded covering my puffy eyes. My baby stood beside me in a fitted black dress, her locs pinned back from her face. She reached over and fixed the collar of my dress shirt.
“You need some water?” she asked. I shook my head.
“All I need is you,” I admitted truthfully.
My voice sounded rough. Between crying and barely sleeping, I didn’t have much left in me. Every time I closed my eyes, I heard Mama telling me he had a heart attack.
The funeral director approached us with his hands folded in front of him.
“Mr. Stone? We’re ready for the family.”
I stared at him until Slim’s hand slipped into mine.
“Aight.”
Mama was sitting on a bench near the entrance with my grandmother beside her. She had a tissue balled up in one hand.
“Mama.”
She lifted her head, and her mouth trembled before she could say anything.
I bent down and helped her stand. She held on to my arm with both hands.
“I don’t know how to do this, Kane.”
Neither did I.
I kissed her forehead because I couldn’t find an answer that wouldn’t sound like some bullshit.
“We gon’ walk in together.”
Slim started to loosen her grip on my other hand.
I looked back at her. “Where you going?”
“I was gonna let you walk your mama—”
“Stay right here.”
She nodded and stepped closer.
The church was packed. I recognized teammates, coaches, people from the neighborhood, relatives I hadn’t seen in years. A few faces turned as we entered, but I kept my eyes on the aisle beneath my shoes.
Then Mama made a sound that forced me to look up. My father lay at the front of the church in a navy suit. His favorite one.
“Fuck,” I whispered, forgetting that quickly where I was. Slim squeezed my hand.
We stopped in front of him, and Mama leaned forward, touching his sleeve.
“You look so handsome, baby.”
Her voice broke on the last word.
I looked away, pressing my lips together so hard they hurt. The flowers beside his casket blurred behind my shades.
“Kane?” Mama touched my arm.
I realized everybody was waiting for me to move.
“Go ahead, Ma. I’m coming.”
Slim helped her and my grandmother to the front pew, then glanced back at me. I nodded so she knew I was okay enough to stand there by myself.
For a few seconds, I just looked at him.
“I was still mad at you,” I whispered.
Saying it out loud made my stomach turn.
“I ain’t know the last time was gon’ be the last time.”
My hand settled against the edge of the casket. I wanted him to open his eyes so bad I caught myself watching his face for movement.
Behind me, somebody coughed. The organ played softly. Life kept making noise while my father lay there.
“I love you, Pops.”
I had to walk away after that. By the time I sat down, Slim already had a tissue waiting. She put it in my palm without looking at me, giving me what little privacy she could in a room full of people.
Halfway through the service, the pastor asked if I still wanted to speak. I had told him yes yesterday. Yesterday, I was sitting at Mama’s kitchen table staring at a wall. Standing up in front of my father’s casket was different.
“You don’t have to,” Slim whispered.
“I know.”
I rubbed my hands over my knees, then stood before I could talk myself out of it.
At the podium, I pulled a folded piece of paper from my pocket. I’d spent an hour writing on it the night before. Now the words looked stiff and wrong. I set it down.
“My daddy used to tell me I dribbled too damn much.”
A few people laughed softly.
I looked toward Mama. She was smiling through tears.
“I’d be out there all night practicing, being extra. He didn’t care for the sport, but bought me a hoop and ball anyway. I even caught him watching from the kitchen window sometimes.”
I swallowed.
“I uh…He never told me he was proud of me…for all that I’ve accomplished…but I uh…I just hope I made him happy.”
“He was, baby!” my grandmother shouted, waving a frail arm.
“Me and my father had some things we needed to work through. And I been sitting here all week trying to figure out what I’m supposed to do with that now.”
Slim watched me from the front row, her hands folded tightly in her lap.
“I don’t have an answer,” I admitted. “I just wish I could talk to him.”
My voice cracked.
I lowered my head, trying to breathe, and heard Mama begin crying again.
“I love you, Daddy.”
That was all I could get out.
After the burial, I sat in the backseat of the truck with my tie hanging loose and the door open. People were still gathered near the gravesite. I could hear them talking about coming to Mama’s house, asking who needed a ride, figuring out where somebody had parked.
Slim stood between my knees.
“Your mama’s riding with your grandmother,” she said. “I told her we’d be right behind them.”
I nodded.
She brushed her thumb beneath my eye, catching a tear before it reached my jaw.
“I feel fucked up,” I told her, grabbing the sides of her waist.
“About what, baby?” Slim frowned.
I stared down at her sandals.
“When Mama first called, I thought some foul shit. About him not accepting you. Like this was his karma or something.”
Slim stayed quiet while I forced the rest out.
“I was hurting, and I was mad, but that shit still went through my head.”
She lifted my chin gently.
“You were trying to make sense of something that hurt you.”
“He ain’t deserve to die.”
“No,” she said softly. “He didn’t.”
“I wanted him to apologize to you.”
Her fingers moved over the back of my head.
“I know,” Slim whispered.
“You deserved that.”
“I know that too, Kane.”
I closed my eyes.
She let me sit there until my breathing settled, then leaned down and kissed my forehead.
“You can miss your daddy and still be hurt about what happened. You can do both, baby.”
I pulled back enough to look at her.
Her eyes were red. She’d been taking care of me, checking on Mama, answering calls, making sure I ate something, and I hadn’t even asked how she was holding up.
“Come here,” I told her.
“I’m right here,” she replied.
“Closer.”
Slim stepped closer.
“Thank you for loving me.”
Her hand paused against my neck.
Then she held me tighter.
“You don’t have to thank me for that.”
Across the cemetery, somebody called my name. I lifted a hand to let them know I’d heard, but I didn’t let her go yet.
For once, they could wait. Right now, I was focused on Scottie.
She was my peace. It was fate when I took my ass to Love Grove to hoop that day.
That was the day I first laid eyes on her.
God knew what he was doing forcing me in her life and me not backing down until she gave in. Scottie was made for me.