Into His Love

Eleven

Isaiah

    "We can take my car. I parked super close," Kimberly says when we get outside. I follow her to her car and climb into the passenger seat. When she gets in and starts the car, a cowboy immediately starts singing on the radio.

    "What the hell .. are you listening to?" I look at her trying my hardest not to laugh.

    "Luke Combs?" She answers confused and pulls off slowly onto the street.

    "You listen to country music?" I ask the obvious question.

    "Yes." She huffs.  "Why is everyone always so surprised when they find out?"   

     "I don't know. It's just .."

   "It's that I'm a black girl listening to country music right?" She glances at me.

   "I guess it is," I state. I've never known a black girl to listen to country music. I scan her face and I can tell that she is slightly upset which wasn't my intention.

   "I didn't mean to offend you or anything. You're just the first person I've met that listens to country that's all." She pulls into the parking lot of the park.

"I'm just going to take that as a compliment." She steps out of the car. I do the same.

"Yeah. It is. You're different." I gaze into her eyes as we make our way to the swings. She surprises me when she doesn't look away like she normally does.

    We make it to the swings and she takes a seat on one. I prop myself again the cool metal pole.

   "You played really well tonight." She tells me, avoiding eye contact.

    "Mhm. Really? So.." I tease cuffing my hand around my ear.

    "Okay! You don't suck as much as your ex-team." She smiles. The swing gently rocks back and forth.

"So, why did you transfer here anyway?" She questions.

"That's a long story." I simply say.

"Nadia and Tavi won't be ready any time soon." She shrugs.

I sigh and take a seat on the swing beside her. This is personal to me. Very personal. But for some reason, I feel as though I can trust her with this information. I know I can.

"We needed to get away from my Dad." She doesn't ask anything, but I can tell by her facial expression that she wants to know more.

"Freshman year my mom found out that my dad was cheating on her. He'd been cheating on her for two years. Two years. My mom forgave him for it all, but they kept on fighting and fighting all the time until she eventually kicked him out. He came by a couple of days after to pick up some of his things from our house and told us that he would be moving away. I was so relieved when he told us this. I felt like me and my mom could finally get away from his bullshit and she could move on and forget about it all. I prayed and prayed that she would find someone who loved her. She found ...Hakeem. Around the same time that they started to get serious, my dad came back into town. It was so much drama non-stop. My dad kept coming around the house to try to talk to my mom or get in contact with me. Hakeem would be there which would make everything so much worse. So my mom decided to move over here without telling him. In the beginning, I was actually okay with Hakeem. He seemed like everything my mom deserved, but once he moved in everything just....changed."

    "Changed?" She furrows her eyebrows. 

    "He just became a completely different person, you know?"