Page 60 of Falling for Autumn
“I used to know him when we ran the streets. He was one of them little corner dope boys, and sometimes he used to come buy shit from me.”
“Oh, you were one of the big dope boys, I guess, huh?” she teased, placing a piece of shrimp into her mouth.
“I did what I needed to do to survive.”
“Why did you have to do that to survive?”
“It’s what my dad taught us. Polo was in the streets and?—”
“Polo Patterson is your father?”
“Yeah. You know him?”
“He was only one of the biggest names on the streets. People always looked up to him.”
“What the hell do you know about the streets, Autumn?”
“Nothing. You know how teenagers are. Anything anyone else was talking about, especially the popular kids, people tried to act like they knew something about it. I was no different than anyone else.”
I nodded, thinking about how I used to run the streets with my daddy since I was a little kid of six. He would take me with him to collect money, run up on niggas, and pretty much any other business he had to handle.
“Let me find out ya ass was in the streets or fucking with one of them dope boys.”
“I promise that I wasn’t.”
“Autumn.” I was hesitant in my tone, and she instantly picked up on it.
“What’s wrong, Toby?”
“Earlier, you mentioned that he would have the right to see her if he wanted to.”
“Is that going to be a problem for us?”
“I’m not the one with the problem, but I think there’s something that I need to tell you.”
“What’s that?”
I looked around the restaurant, and I began to reconsider my decision. Maybe I should have broached the topic after we were back in our cabin.
“You know what? Maybe this wasn’t the right place to bring this shit up. I didn’t think this through completely.”
She reached across the table and grabbed my hand. “October, I promise not to act out, and I swear that I’ll sit here and hear you out, no matter if I like it or not.”
I pulled my phone out of my pocket. “Get your iPods out, and I’m going to connect them to my phone.”
Autumn frowned at my strange request, but she did as I asked. Once her iPods were connected to my phone, I opened the app and pressed play. I sat back in my chair and swirled my wine around in the glass while she listened. My eyes were glued to her face, and a part of me wished that I could spare her the pain, but alternatively, I knew she needed the truth.
The entire time she listened to the recording, her eyes stayed glued to mine. Autumn never took her gaze away from me. But the shit that bothered me was that she didn’t give a clue as to what she was feeling. Her face was expressionless, and it caused me to worry about what she might be feeling. I didn’t know if shewas angry with me or what she was going through, but I couldn’t hide it from her. The last thing that she needed was to find out what I’d done through some other means.
When she finished listening, she removed the iPods from her ears and put them away. Wiggling her fingers for my phone, she asked, “May I see that, please?”
“Hell nah. Not if you’re about to throw my shit.”
She tilted her head sideways and then shook her head. Her lips were slightly poked out like she was pouting. “I’m not going to damage your phone or do anything to your phone.”
I handed it to her and watched her closely.
“What are you doing?” I asked after she disconnected her iPods from my phone. She was still messing with shit.
