Page 49 of Mimosa

Tally came an hour later to join the festivities and went into the kitchen to cook everyone philly cheese steaks and home fries.

Mims loved being with his family, but he did miss Sonny. Abs sat with him after dancing with Goldie and asked, “Is everything okay?”

“I just saw him, and I already miss him.”

“Must be love.”

“Stop. It’s way too soon.”

Abs laughed and grabbed his hand, holding it softly as he said, “In this life, things take years and years, or they are quick. If love is quick, that’s better than the pain being quick, I figure.”

“Me too, but…what if he figures out that it was too fast and he has to, I don’t know, reevaluate and figures out he doesn’t really like me all that much?”

“I’ve known you for years now, and I loved you quick. I still love you. You’re very loveable.”

Mims kissed him and said, “Thanks, but you’re really easy.”

“Mims! Are you saying I’m a slut?”

“And you would argue you’re not?”

Goldie was passing by on his way to the bar and commented, “Slut. Big slut.”

“Goldie! We are not supposed to slut shame!”

“Who’s shaming?” Mims asked. “We’re all kinda proud of you for being a slut.”

Chapter Fourteen

Mimswasatthecomputer early the next morning, doing things he knew he shouldn’t, but he couldn’t help it.

Getting into certain sites posed a challenge, and there was little more in the world more enjoyable to Mims than that kind of challenge.

He searched out the men he’d met at the party, the woman too, and he got into the police database to see their records.

There was good reason that Franklyn was no longer a police officer. Six different cities, each one he’d been given chance after chance and still, they’d had to let him go.

Haze came in, surprising him enough to make him jump.

“Don’t scare me like that!”

“Sorry, baby. What are you doing?”

“Looking up those cops I met. The leader guy? Franklyn? He was bad from the start and instead of looking for other work, he just kept, I don’t know, precinct hopping. Six cities, ten station assignments, and he just kept being brutal.”

“Police brutality. Yeah, that power goes to their heads. Not all, of course, but some of them. They did a study once, called theStanford Prison experiment, and they had everyday people go into this jail setup. Some were assigned to be guards and others were prisoners. The guards overwhelmingly let the power go to their heads and they became abusive and hateful. They did…terrible things. The experiment was cut short because of that, but…it really opened a lot of eyes to the prison system. Didn’t change much, if anything, though.”

“They think people deserve to be hurt and abused because they broke the law, but I saw an article once that said, with so many laws nowadays, we are all criminals that just aren’t getting caught,” Mims said as he stared at the screen. “But the truly bad ones, like the people in the BBC…”

“They’re the ones with a badge and who commit some of the worst crimes.” Haze moved to sit in the metal chair next to Mims and kissed Mims’s cheek. “Are you doing this safely?”

“Sure, yeah. Lots of bouncing. As usual.”

“Good. How are the rest of them.”

“I haven’t gotten past the leader yet. He was awful! Like over and over got busted for hurting people and he’d just get up and move on to another police station.”

“Yeah. That happens a lot.” Haze stared at the ground while rubbing his hands over his jeans. “Have you…looked up Sonny?”

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