Chapter 14
Kyla had been preparing for this town hall meeting for a while, and watching her walk into that room and own it the way she did, that made a nigga proud for real. While getting to know her, I realized that when she put her mind to something, she was gonna work her ass off to get it.
The venue was packed. Standing room only.
People from her district who had shown up because they wanted to see for themselves if she was the real thing.
She stood at that podium in a burgundy blazer with her hair pulled back and she talked about her community like she had been living in it and fighting for it her whole life because she really had.
No notes. No teleprompter. Just her and the truth of what she knew and what she planned to do about it.
She talked about youth programs that were underfunded.
About small businesses that couldn’t get loans.
About block by block initiatives that would bring resources directly to the people who needed them instead of making those people navigate a system designed to exhaust them before they got anything.
I sat in the second row and watched people respond to her in real time. Heads nodding. People leaning forward. An older woman in the first row who had her hand over her heart while listening to all the good things to come for her community.
This woman was going to win, I could feel it.
I already knew it before the applause hit when she finished. The kind of applause that came from people who had a good feeling about getting Kyla into that office.
She found me in the crowd when she stepped away from the podium, the look on her face when she saw me standing there did something to me. I rushed over to her, roses in hand and kissed her forehead then her cheek.
“You know you did yo biggest one up there! You got my vote, hands down council woman Bridges.” I said as I kissed her hand now.
She blushed hard before walking off to take pictures and mingle with the residents of the community. I stood close by, and so did her security. I’d never been more proud to have someone on my arms. She was really making a change for the better as a young black woman.
—
I took her to Monarch afterward. Nicest steakhouse in Dallas.
She walked in still glowing from the town hall meeting and I let her have that the whole way through dinner.
We ordered, ate, talked about the questions people had asked her and the ones she felt she had answered well and the ones she wanted to do better on next time.
I made sure that I constantly told her how proud I was, because I meant that.
When the dessert came I reached into my jacket pocket and put the box on the table in front of her.
She looked at it and then at me.
“Open it,” I said.
She opened it slow and when she saw the bracelet she went still for a second.
Rose gold pandora bracelet that she mentioned she wanted.
Of course she could buy a million of her own, but I’d heard when they are gifted to you, they hold a sentimental value.
I wanted to make memories with this woman, and do nice things for her.
I had bought 3 charms and added them. A boxing glove, a microphone, and a number one.
“The boxing glove is a symbol of how we met and my career.” I said. “The microphone is you, it symbolizes you speaking. And the number one is because you’re going to win this election and because that’s what you are to me.”
She looked at the bracelet for a long time, and then she got up from her seat and came around the table and kissed me right there in the middle of that restaurant. I kissed her back, and didn’t give a damn who was looking.
When she sat back down her eyes were bright.
“What are we doing Xavier?” she asked and I immediately knew she meant our relationship status.
I thought about Brielle standing on her porch the other day when I’d popped up to warn her. I thought about everything that was still unresolved and everything that was still sitting on me that I couldn’t put down yet.
“We’re enjoying each other,” I said. “I really like you Kyla. I don’t want to complicate things by putting a label on something before I know I can fully show up for it the right way.”
She looked at me and I could see the disappointment move through her face and I could also see her decide not to make it into something bigger than it needed to be right now.
“Okay,” she said. She nodded once. “I can respect that.”
“Thank you for not making me feel fucked up about it. I care about you too much to possibly set you up for a disappointment. I’m really not wanting to come off as an asshole cause I love being with you.”
“You’re not an asshole. You’re honest.” She picked up her wine. “I just hope you figure out whatever you need to figure out before I get too far gone.”
I looked at her across that table and thought that she might already be too far gone and that the feeling might be mutual but I kept that to myself.
“My fight is in three days,” I said.
“I know.”
“I want you there. I need you there. You my good luck charm.”
She tilted her head. “As the woman you’re interested in or as the photo opportunity.”
I laughed because now after what I’d just said to her, she was always going to be sarcastic when it came to us doing things with one another.
“As the person I want by my side,” I said. “That’s the only reason I’m asking.”
She looked at me for a second and then smiled.
“You know I’ll be there. I’m gonna support you, just like you support me.”
—
We went back to my place that night and what happened between us was different from the first time.
Less urgent. More deliberate. It felt like two people who were starting to understand what they were to each other and were choosing to roll with it anyway.
We fucked til the sun was damn near up. This time, I felt like Kyla thought she had something to prove.
She did all kind of shit that she didn’t do the first night, and a nigga was falling deeper.
When I woke up she was gone.
I reached over and the bed was empty and cool. I checked my phone and saw that she had sent a text. Her ass pulled a hit and run on me like I’d done Brielle at Simone’s house. This shit didn’t feel good at all.
Kyla: You were sleeping so good I didn’t want to wake you. I got a long day ahead of me. Talk soon.
I stared at that text for a second.
I called her. No answer.
I texted back. Nothing.
Something about the way that she text that, it made me feel fucked up. She fucked me good as fuck then dipped on my ass.
—
For two days I heard nothing from her. No calls returned. No texts beyond one word responses that told me nothing. I had a weigh-in and several press meetings, but her ass was nowhere to be found. All that I could think was that she wasn’t okay with us being friends like she said she was.
—
Fight night had arrived and I couldn’t lie like I was focused.
The news of Marcus father being BJ, the man who’s haunted my dreams all my life.
The revelation that Tavarus let my brother sell for him, and possibly set him up to get shot.
The fact that Kyla wasn’t talking to me and the fact that Bri was still heavy on my heart.
So much shit was on my mind, but my life was riding on this fight.
No matter what was going on around me, I had to live in this moment and show up for myself. All that other shit could wait.
The arena was bigger than anything I had ever fought in.
Twenty thousand seats and most of them filled by the time I was walking through the back corridors in my robe with Gutta beside me and Coach Ray ahead of us.
The noise of the crowd coming through the walls like something out a damn movie. My whole city showed up for me.
My brothers, Legal, and my moms was front and center. I vowed to never lose a fight in front of my momma, and I was gone stand on that.
This was it.
Everything my father never got to have.
Everything I had been working toward since the day that Legal walked me out of that courthouse and told me I was going to be heavyweight champion of the world if I applied myself.
Gutta put both hands on my shoulders in the corridor and looked at me straight.
“You been here before,” he said. “Every basement, every cage, every back alley situation where you had no business surviving, you survived all of that shit. This is just a bigger room. Same hands. Same heart. Same nigga that has never once in his life laid down for anybody.” He tightened his grip.
“You go out there and you fight like Hood is watching. Because he is.”
I looked at my cousin and felt everything behind those words and I nodded once. Everything he said was right. I wasn’t new to this shit.
“Let’s go,” I said.
We walked out.
The noise hit me like a muthafucka the second I came through the tunnel and I walked through. I let it be what it was. Twenty thousand people, cameras, lights and my name on the screen above the ring. Xavier Street Hendrix. Twenty eight and zero.
I was almost to the ring when I saw her.
Kyla was sitting ringside beside my family in a fitted black dress with her hair down and when our eyes connected across the crowd she smiled and blew a kiss. And just like that everything else in the building fell away for about three seconds.
I nodded at her.
Then I climbed into the ring. I had to pop my shit. It was no way I could leave here with an L. Her showing up really meant something to me. Although I ain’t want to lead her on, I still cared about her. Heavy.
Darius Kemp was ranked number two in the WBC heavyweight division and he had forty one fights with thirty six knockouts. This nigga was a machine, and he moved into the center of that ring during the introduction like a man who had done this so many times he was bored by it.
He wasn’t bored.
He just wanted me to think he was. This nigga wanted this shit just as bad as I did, and I knew he was gone fight to the death for it. So was I.