Affinity

Chapter 6: A Ghost

            

When I woke up I looked over at my phone noticing the time, it was two in the morning. Rah's arm was still locked around my waist as I strained to reach the nightstand. I scrolled through text messages and missed calls with disinterest. I knew the morning would bring a whole host of challenges we weren't ready to face and the longer I could stave off any kind of communication, the better. My baby was next to me, and he and I were in one piece. This was enough to keep me sane; I turned towards him in the bed just to watch his chest rise and fall.

            I laid back and thought about Travis. Now that he was gone I couldn't refer to him by anything other than his given name. I thought about his last words being to me and not his brother. Of how the bullets lifted him off his feet and threw him up against the wall. That's when I heard it. A voice I wasn't totally sure of, but that held a note of familiarity. Needless to say this didn't mean I was going near the door in any kind of way.

            " Motherfucker you better pick up." I started to formalize a composite sketch in my head of the man I believed to be at my front door as I called the cop who was supposed to be watching my building. I shook Rah awake as I listened to the phone ring, for what seemed like endlessly.

" Ms. Ever?" A question in his voice revealed he'd been asleep minutes if not seconds ago.

" Motherfucker there's someone at my door, and I'm in no way going to answer it. How'd they get in the building!" Rah was now groggily upright, throwing his feet into his sweatpants and reaching for his gun.

" No, I checked him, it's your brother." I dropped the phone and leapt off the bed running full speed towards my front door. I fumbled with the locks as Rah sped to match my pace, I repeated his name under my breath as I worked to let my blood in.

            " Hakim. Hakim. Hakim." The door was finally open, I could now view the combined reflection of Jasmine and I put together.

" There's my baby girl." I leapt into my big brother's arms and wept, it'd been about five years since I seen or spoken to him, and now here he was in the flesh. I didn't let go. I was aware that more than thirty seconds had elapsed and I still had my arms locked around his neck, my legs anchored around his midsection.

" Hey, you must be Raheem. I'm Hakim." Oh, yea. I guess I was supposed to introduce these two, but damn could I have a minute? Or scratch that, just some seconds? Moments in time to study my brother's face and count the similarities it had to my own, to smile up at him and pretend I was the little girl he had to chase after as a child again.

            " Yea, nice to meet you." Thankfully the introductions had happened over my shoulder, because I was still firmly attached to my brother's surprisingly present form. I only relinquished my grip as Hakim attempted to take a step and found it wasn't such an easy feat with me attached to him; I released from him, detracting each limb with fear. I was halfway scared that the moment I couldn't physically feel him he'd disappear into thin air for some years again.

" How'd you know? Where you been? Hi Bruh" The questions were lamented with skepticism; the hello was sealed with a toothy grin I couldn't help. I reached up for another hug and Hakim obliged, lifting me off my feet and hugging me close.

            " First off that sister of yours called me, seems the threat of your safety was enough for her to lift her ban on me and allow me to come on and see my family. I told her I would come see you with her, but I couldn't wait, I had to check on you Abbie. Two, I'm better now that I know your ok. And three, you don't have to keep saying hi I'm not going anywhere." He laughed. I smiled. Our lip movements matched.

" It is dumb early, but your effort is noted brother." Our feet made a collective movement towards the living room where Rah and I took up residence on the couch, his arm pooled around my shoulders, Hakim sat opposite us in an armchair.

            No one spoke for a minute. We all used contemplative silence to take in the scene. I stared across at Hakim unabashedly, feverously; discerning this from a dream was a challenge. I looked to the doorway we'd just come from, taking the dropped card of a detective we'd encountered earlier that night as a sign of the present, satisfied I drew my eyes back to Hakim.

            Here was my brother in the wake of Travis' absence. The brother who'd taken the same path and had therefore been excommunicated from the Ever family, and they never looked back. I say they aggressively, I say it so as not to include myself and leave the assumption that I'd done the same open for interpretation. I looked back often. I thumbed my memories for his smile every time Jasmine broke a grin, I hung to strokes of laughter in my father's bellowing that echoed Hakim's, I'd done it all because I didn't understand it when it'd happened.