Page 34 of Certified Pressure 2
My mind couldn’t stop driftin’ back to earlier with Ka’mari. Talkin’ about our son, sayin’ shit out loud I swore I would never let leave my mind, cracked somethin’ open in me. For the first time in years, I admitted to myself how bad that shit hurt. Lettin’ it out to her… it gave me air, but it also tied me to her in a way I knew wasn’t good for either one of us.
That’s all me and Ka’mari ever been…fire and ashes. Pain and love mixed up so deep we ain’t know where one end and the other start. We was bound by what we lost, and sometimes thatpull felt strong enough to drown in. But I couldn’t live like this forever. With her bein’ back at the crib, forcin’ me to face my past, I was realizin’ this wasn’t foundation… it was a wound. And I wasn’t tryna build a life off wounds.
What I really wanted was somethin’ that felt natural, easy and not forced. I no longer wanted somethin’ built on pain, or somethin’ I had to bleed for just to stay alive. I wanted a woman I could breathe with, not one I suffocated beside.
And that’s when my mind slid to Pluto.
While starin’ over the rail of my balcony, blowin’ one, my mind kept driftin’ back to her. The night was quiet, the lights from the estate glowin’ across the pool, but I wasn’t seein’ none of that. All I kept seein’ was Pluto. I thought about the way she looked at me the last time we was together, the way her body melted into mine when she came all over my dick. She tried to act like she didn’t need me, but I felt everything she was fightin’ to hide.
The last time we made love had been stuck in my head like a loop I couldn’t cut off. I remembered the way she clawed at my back like she wanted to pull me inside her for real, the way her breath came out hard against my neck when I made that pussy squirt, the way she screamed my name and cried that she loved me… that wasn’t no random shit, and it wasn’t no fling. And I hated that I knew that, ‘cause now every time I told myself to say fuck her, my body, heart and soul laughed at me.
Hell, bein’ with these women made me realize I was a simp for love. Deep down inside, I wanted somethin’ real. I wanted my parents had. I just didn’t know how to really go about the shit.
I pulled on the blunt, slow, lettin’ the smoke burn my lungs, while starin’ at her number sittin’ bold on my phone screen. My thumb kept hoverin’ over it, then slidin’ back, like I couldn’t make my mind up. But I already knew what it was. I needed to call her. Not to talk about us, or to argue, but to handle whatmattered most…Zurie. That lil’ girl ain’t ask for none of this. She was six years old, facin’ a surgery that cost more than her mama and daddy probably ever touched at once in they life. Shit was thirty to forty bands. That’s what Pluto told me, like it broke her heart to even say it out loud.
And I told her I would take care of it. That was how I moved though—when I give my word, I stand on it. It didn’t matter how I was feelin’ about Pluto right now. It didn’t matter how raw she left me two days ago, this was bigger than that. This was about a child’s life, and it wasn’t no amount of pride worth leavin’ a little girl sufferin’.
Still, it cut deep that I was even in this position. I leaned on the rail, thinkin’ about how Pluto made me feel the other night. She left me confused as hell. We had just been laid up, her skin warm on mine, her nails draggin’ through my beard after, her eyes all soft like she ain’t wanna go nowhere. I remember pullin’ her close, smellin’ her hair, thinkin’ maybe this was somethin’ I could give myself to for real. Then the next day, she flipped, puttin’ that wall right back up like none of it meant shit. That’s what made me wanna say fuck her, close the book and move on.
But every time I tried to turn my back, I thought about Zurie’s face. The way Pluto cried when she told me about the seizures, the way she damn near broke when she said the doctors needed money up front to even put her on schedule. That shit stuck to me, and I couldn’t ignore it if I tried.
I flicked ash off the blunt, finished it down to the roach, then killed it in the tray. My phone was still glowin’, her name right there. I didn’t wanna hear her voice, but I needed to. I needed this handled so I could move on. I hit call before I could talk myself out of it.
It rang once, twice then three times. I was ‘bout to hang up when I heard her.
“Hello?”
Her voice was soft and almost made my throat close. I swallowed it down quick and made myself sound cool as hell. “Wus’ good?”
She went quiet like she had to double-check the screen. “Pressure?”
“Yeah.”
“I… hey.” She sounded unsure, like she ain’t know what to say. “I wasn’t expecting to hear from you.”
“We was just together,” I told her. My tone came out flat, but inside I felt everything I was holdin’ back. “But this ain’t about that. I’mma send the money for Zurie’s surgery. I need whatever info you got so my accountant can handle it.”
She gasped a little, then tried to argue. “Pressure, you don’t have to do that?—”
“Pluto, go head with all that shit,” I cut her off. “This bigger than me and you. This about savin’ Zurie’s life. Don’t ever tell me what I ain’t gotta do when I already said I would. You hear me?”
Silence stretched, but I could feel her fightin’ tears through the line. Finally, her voice came back small. “Thank you.”
“Text me everything,” I said. “Hospital, account, doctor, whatever. Do it soon as we hang up. I’mma have my accountant wire forty bands to cover it all.”
“Okay,” she whispered. “I’ll send it. Thank you, Pressure. This means a lot to me.”
I clenched my jaw, starin’ off into the dark. “If it really meant a lot to you, you would’ve been out here wit’ me. Instead, you sittin’ over there like I ain’t been standin’ on how I feel about you.”
She let out a shaky breath. “See, this exactly what I mean. This why I told you I didn’t even want to take the money, because you just gon’ use it to make me feel guilty, like I asked to be in this position. I didn’t choose this. I can’t just leave my sister.”
“That’s cap, Pluto,” I said, my voice low but sharp. “You the one keep choosin’ to keep me at a distance. Don’t flip this shit on me like I’m the reason you feelin’ so fuckin’ conflicted. I told you I would take care of y’all, but you the one who don’t want it. Stop blamin’ yo’ sister.”
“Boy, is you serious right now?” Her voice spicy this time.
“Do it sound like I’m not bein’ serious right now? You playin’ with a nigga like you don’t know what it is with me.”
Her silence hung heavy for a second, then her voice cracked. “It hurts, Pressure. You don’t even understand how bad this hurt. I miss you. I love you. But I gotta do what I gotta do.”
