Roland Spencer’s car came to a halt on the gravel outside of the hospital and he sat in it for a few moments considering whether to go inside. It had been a little over four hours since he’d argued with Antwan courtside before the game. Roland remembered wondering how his night could get any worse as he watched Antwan put on the worst performance of his career in front of dozens of scouts. Then he’d heard the sound of a gun firing outside and his blood ran cold. Normally news spread fast in Norman but on this there was nothing. All Roland knew was that someone had taken a shot at Antwan and that his friend Jayson had been hit. He’d tried to get a hold of Michelle Lewis but she hadn’t answered her phone and Jayson’s mother was out of state for the weekend visiting relatives. The only reason Jayson was even still in Norman this weekend was to watch Antwan. Either way both or either of those boys were laid up in that hospital and Roland couldn’t help them sat outside.

He stepped out of the car and made his way across to the hospital. As the gravel crunched under his feet he heard Antwan from earlier that night. “If you’re my friend, be my friend,” the boy had said. Whatever had happened outside that gymnasium, whatever Billy Brown wanted out of him, Roland still cared for Antwan and he was certain the boy would need a friend now more than ever before. It took him some haggling at the desk but after a few minutes Roland was able to find out where Jayson and Antwan were.

He ascended up the narrow stairs of the hospital and felt his heart beating in his mouth with every step. It was hard not to presume the worst or wonder what would happen to him if Antwan had been hurt but Roland steeled himself and put all thoughts of his own interests to the back of his mind. As he reached the top of the stairs he saw a single light from a window along the long hallway of hospital rooms. A figure was stood in front of it.

It was Michelle Lewis. Having heard the footsteps she turned to face Roland and her tired, tear-sodden face became strewn with bitterness.

“What are you doing here?”

Roland lifted his hands into the air as he approached her to signify he meant no harm. “I’m not here to cause any trouble, Michelle.”

“Get the fuck out of here.”

Roland sighed as he thought better of returning Michelle’s insults and instead he chose to stare into the hospital room. Antwan was sat alone beside an empty hospital bed with his head in his hands. The baby blue shorts and jersey were stained with what Roland could only presume was Jayson’s blood and his hands were covered in it. From the boys expression, from his outpouring of pain, Roland knew better than to ask what had happened. Jayson Aaron was dead. There was nothing Roland could do for Jayson but he could still help Antwan.

Roland gestured towards Antwan. “I wanted to see the boy, that’s all, make sure he was okay.”

Michelle wiped a tear from her cheek with the sleeve of her top and then glowered at Roland. She strained to keep her voice down to stop Antwan from overhearing.

“Okay? He watched his best friend die.”

“I understand that,” Roland said earnestly. “I was very fond of Jayson.”

It was true. Though he’d only met Jayson a handful of times he had heard Antwan speak glowingly about him on hundreds of occasions. They had played on the same basketball team growing up, spent birthdays and Christmases with one another, and if Roland had heard correctly Jayson had even stepped up on that whole weed thing.  Roland glanced at Antwan sat alone in that hospital room and thought for a second about what he’d say to him. Whether there was anything he could say.

As he turned back he saw Michelle’s face staring back at him. This time her glower was even more poisonous and she made no attempt to keep her voice down. 

“I knew something like this would happen, I warned Antwan. You’re a bad influence, Roland, you throwing all that blood money of yours at my baby, giving him cars. It was your fault this happened. You put Jayson in the ground, not the boy that pulled the trigger. You hear me?”

A tall shadow was cast over the pair of them as Antwan appeared from the hospital room. His eyes were swollen red from crying and blood was caked in his curly hair.

“Ma,” Antwan pleaded, his voice waving with desperation. “Stop.”

Michelle went to speak but Roland cut over her, taken aback by how distressed the boy was.

“Are you okay, Antwan?”

Antwan nodded feebly.

“Can we go for a drive or something? I need to clear my head.”

“Have you spoken to the Sheriff’s Department?” Roland asked. “They’re going to want to talk to you.”

“I just want to go for a drive, I don’t want to be here anymore, man.”

Roland nodded and placed his arm around Antwan and gestured towards the stairs at the end of the hallway silently. He could feel the boy shaking in his arms and they began to walk. A pair of hands grasped one of Antwan’s bloodstained hands and tried to pull him free from beneath Roland’s arm.

“No,” Michelle commanded angrily. “You’re not going with him. He is the reason all of this happened, Antwan. You’re staying here with me. You understand me? That man is poison.”

Roland watched on awkwardly, choosing to bite his tongue given the circumstances, and gestured to Antwan that he could stay if he wanted. Instead Antwan shook his head with a dismissive sigh and pulled his hand free.

“Just stop, Mom.”

Roland saw Michelle’s face crumple with grief as if she had lost another son. On another day Roland would have scorned her for allowing her obsession with him to supersede the moment but he thought better of it. There had been enough ill will tonight. Somewhere out there Alicia Aaron had gone to sleep completely unaware that her old child was dead. The thought sobered Roland and he shook his head in Michelle’s direction, placed his arm around Antwan’s shoulder, and led him towards the exit.

“You’ll be okay, son.”

[center][b]*****[/b][/center]
Michelle had waited at the hospital for a few hours for Antwan to return from his drive with Roland before it became clear that wasn’t going to happen. She had forgotten that it was Jayson that had given them a lift to the game that night and was stranded at the hospital for a time before she put in a call to Gus Harris. It had taken a few tries but eventually she had woken him and he had agreed to take her home. The journey home had been all but silent. Michelle could barely bring herself to talk about what had happened but Gus seemed to have heard from somewhere. He always seemed to have an idea what was going on in Norman. Though in her tiredness Michelle could swear that his sage-like calm was absent this morning. Gus seemed tetchy, annoyed even, but Michelle put that down to lack of sleep more than anything else.

When she arrived at her home the first thing she noticed was that some of Antwan’s things had gone. Roland must have brought him back here whilst she was waiting at the hospital. Were she not so tired she might have been spitting venom at the thought of that snake being in her home. Instead she close to slump into one of the wooden seats beside the table whilst Gus made her a much-needed coffee.

She blew on it to cool it down before taking a tentative sip that burned the tip of her tongue. She was too tired to care. Suddenly as if compelled out of her by some force outside of her control she found herself speaking.

“It still seems like a bad dream.”

Gus took a seat beside her and let out a tired sigh. “If only it were that.”

“He was such a good boy,” Michelle muttered. “He’d never hurt a soul in his life.”

At seventeen Jayson had been the size of an NFL lineman but not once had Michelle seen him throw his weight around. He was and always had been an empathetic boy that had kept Antwan grounded for the past decade. There wasn’t a soul in Norman that would have a bad word to say about him and without him Michelle wasn’t sure Antwan would make it. Especially not now that Roland had his hooks back into him.

“How is Antwan taking it?”

“Honestly? I couldn’t tell you,” Michelle admitted, ashamed she couldn’t tell Gus more. “He didn’t say a word at the hospital. I tried to get him to wash his hands, take those bloody clothes off, but he didn’t even move. He just sat there with his head in his hands until Roland arrived.”

Gus tutted.

“Jayson was his rock,” He said, drumming fingers along the table. “It’s going to take some time.”

Michelle felt ashamed that even as Jayson laid dead her thoughts where with Antwan instead of him. She hoped that word had reached Alicia or her people and that he wasn’t laid up in that hospital without anyone there for him. Nobody deserved that.

“Have they caught the son of a bitch that shot Jayson?”

Gus nodded. “Handed himself in a few hours ago.”

Her hands shook with rage as she thought about what she would do to Jayson’s killer if she ever laid eyes on him. 

“Yeah, well I hope he never sees the outside of a cell again.”

She looked up at Gus to find that her show of vengeance was not matched in him. He wasn’t baying for the boy’s blood like Michelle was, nor did he seem to wish any harm on the boy, instead he seemed struck by a malaise that wouldn’t budge.

“His name is DeSean Hamilton. I’m going to see his great grandmother once I’m done here.”

Michelle almost spat out a mouthful of coffee at that. “What? Why? That boy killed Jayson.”

Gus shook his head in disbelief and set his cup of coffee down in exasperation.

“That he did, but in his pulling that trigger that woman lost a grandson too, Michelle. I thought you of all people would understand loss cuts both ways in a situation like this.”

Michelle remembered where she was when she learned that Marcus Dixon had been killed. It wasn’t hard to recall. She had been sat around this very table sobbing as her mother tried in vain to console her. She’d lost more than a lover or the father of her child that day, she had lost her brother too, and she knew Gus was making a veiled reference to it. She would have resented him for it had the truth in what he’d said not stung so much. 

Everywhere you went in Norman history seemed to repeat itself and this was no exception. How long would it be before she was sat around this table crying because Antwan had been taken from her? As her thoughts drifted to her own son once more Gus stood up from his seat and reassured her he'd be back in the afternoon. Michelle set her head down on the table and closed her eyes, drifting off to sleep, as she heard her front door click shut behind Gus.