“Fuck!” he cursed himself. He hated the reality of his decision already. He dashed outside and ran his brother’s car down before Derrick could leave the parking area.

“D., hold up, man, come on. Let me ride with you.”

At first Derrick looked tempted to run his brother over. But he backed down and stopped the car just long enough for Ivan to climb inside the passenger seat. Then he zoomed off.

“What the hell you want, man? You got your life now and I got mine, right?”

Ivan ignored his pouting. He said, “So, you had your six thousand, and my six thousand from mom’s life insurance policy, right? How did you spend it all?”

Derrick looked at him and said, “Come on, man. How long you think twelve thousand dollars is gonna last me in Los Angeles? Think about it. I got three sons from three greedy-ass mothers to feed.”

Ivan figured twelve thousand dollars could last his brother a lot longer if it was budgeted properly. So he thought it all over. He said, “You got the mortgage payments for Mom’s house, your regular bills, your life, health, and car insurance, and a minimum amount that you owe each month for the mothers of your three kids. We can figure out a way to work that all out into a budget. In the meantime, you’re gonna have to find steady employment, man, to help me out.”

Derrick asked him, “Doing what? Janitorial shit? Like you said, Ivan, I don’t have no education, right?”

Ivan said, “Look, if that’s what you gotta do, then do what you can, man. At least to keep your own pocket money.”

Derrick said, “I got my own fucking pocket money, Ivan. I can do that. But it’s mainly the house and these kids that I gotta take care of now.”

Ivan nodded and pulled his thoughts together. He said, “Okay, we can work on that. We gon’ figure it all out.”

Then he looked over at his older brother, who continued to drive aimlessly.

“Are you hungry, man? Let’s stop and get something to eat,” Ivan suggested.

It took a minute for Derrick to respond to him.

“Yeah,” he finally grumbled. “Let’s do that.”

Six

Football Party

WHEN THE TWO BROTHERS made it back to Ivan’s apartment that evening, both with full stomachs from dinner, Derrick noticed the collection of flyers Ivan had held on to from his first three promotion events.

He picked one up from the coffee table and asked, “What is this? You’re throwing parties now?”

He looked at Ivan for an explanation of the obvious.

Ivan grinned. “I’m just trying to do a little something extra, man. So I came up with the idea and ran with it.”