My Hustler’s Keeper by Larissa Page B

serious.”
    “Yeah ma, I’m dead fucking serious,” I tell her, ducking.
    “This is some bullshit.”
    “I can’t do this shit anymore. I need some time to clear my head.”
    “You’re breaking up with me?” she asks, still throwing shit towards me.
    “I just buried my fucking grandmother, my sister is going crazy, and to top everything off the FBI is still on my back. I just need some time to breathe,” I lied.
    My thoughts came to me. I know that Mary is going to find away to get Harmony, which means Joe will be in the mix also. And I need her to follow these niggas by the thread if she has to. I already mapped out the time that I would give this nigga to live. I just need Harmony to keep her in my reach. I am done playing. She has to know something. And this not picking up and then pulling this disappearance act is the icing on the cake for me. Her and Joe are my targets and I will personally blow their candles out like I’m making a wish.
    “So what are you trying to say? You think I’m setting you up?” she asks, stepping closer.
    “Nah, that ain’t even going through my head right about now.”
    “So you wanna break up with me but you can’t give me a legitimate reason as to why?” She has stopped throwing knives and is now standing within arm’s reach.
    “I can’t give you one now Harmony. But I know me and you ain’t gon’ work out.”
    “So just like that we’re done?”
    “Yeah Harmony, just like that.” I watch as her body language tenses up. It’s as if her soul has just left her body, as the tears run free from her hazel eyes.
    “When you get it together Sincere, promise me you’ll come back for me.” She says, as she opens the front door.
    “I promise,” I reply back with no hesitation. “I love you ma but right about now, I don’t know who to trust. And I’m not saying that you’re the one to blame. But before I go and say some shit I will regret I’d rather we end it now,” I honestly tell her.
    “You’re going to regret the day you made me somebody else’s keeper.”
    “So what you saying?”
    “I’m saying you basically gave another person your queen. You know damn well I’m going to have to marry Mary. And instead of letting me help you, you’re basically throwing me to the wolves. It’s not just about you Sincere. All this drama involves us too.” Her words come crushing down on me like a ton of bricks.
    “I love you, Sincere Knight but—.”
    “But what?” I ask, cutting her off.
    “If going through all of this means losing me then in my heart we were never meant to be at all. You supposed to trust me and allow me to be there for you. Not throw me away like leftovers for another person to come and get. I love you and I know you’re trying to protect all of us. But this is not protecting.” Shaking her head she shuts the door, walking out my life.
    “Fuck!”
    I throw a framed picture of us that we had taken on her birthday last year against the wall and watch it shatter into pieces. Man, I hope like hell this plan works. Otherwise I just lost it all.
     

 
    My Hustler’s Keeper
    -16-
    SINCERE
     
    The hurt in her eyes, the pain in her voice is enough to make a nigga lie down and die. Watching Harmony walk out and leave is like Obama without Michelle, impossible to bear. I know what I’m doing is wrong; I could have told her what I had in mind up front. And now here it is Thanksgiving and I still haven’t got the balls to pick up the phone and call her.
    Rumor has it the wedding for her and Mary is scheduled for June 25, about seven months from now. Man, this shit is getting more and more fucked up by the minute. I still haven’t seen nor heard from Joe, and Rayla still won’t tell anyone who kidnaped her.
    “Sincere, you need to get out this bed and go talk to her. Better yet go get her,” Rayla says, coming into the room, interrupting my thoughts.
    “Talk to her and say what Rayla?”
    “I don’t know. Just get the hell up. You’ve