June 17, 2042

My son walked in the house distraught. I knew something was wrong before the key even slid in the lock. My Nigga didn’t even check to see if the Ring alarm was activated. It was two in the morning, after all. Niggas like to shoot at stuff this time of night. It was one of those restless nights where I would sit on the couch and watch reruns of Atlanta Braves games from earlier in the day, if they won. That’s when I heard something drop outside of the door. Bullets don’t make metallic clinking sounds outside, so I knew it was him coming home for the weekend. Neither myself nor his mother was expecting him, but we never do. And I resent that he thinks our lives are tame enough to walk in unannounced; maybe my Friday night couch time is reserved for doing a little heroin while his mother sleeps soundly upstairs, I don’t know. I got an Instagram too; a little swinger’s ball could have been the move. But no, My Nigga knows his father’s a lame, it’s baseball season, and- you know what- maybe he DOES let me know when he’s headed this way. One day I’ll read all those notifications that come to my BezoPhone, but probably not. Anyway, my guy walked in and closed the door so loudly, I turned and furrowed my eyebrows at him in the breezeway. “Your mama sleep, boy. Don’t let her come down here; this the only time I can eat these pork rinds without hearing her mouth. Ever since that SZA girl opened that juice bar down the street, all I hear is ‘Garden gang’ this and ‘Control your sodium’ that.”

That boy don’t listen to me, ever. I told him to look at an HBCU; he chose Wake Forest. Now, here I am writing MY name on these student loans for a school that ain’t even lit. I told him those exact words, and he look confused. His mama had to explain the concept of ‘lit’ to him. She also supported his terrible decision to go there. Every story he tells me is of something he experienced at Winston-Salem State, a much cheaper and much Blacker option. I don’t get it at all. I don’t get him, or the audaciousness of these kids in general, though. You know what My Nigga asked me when he was 15? He tapped me on the arm and asked, “Who is Wu-Tang and why aren’t they anything to mess with?”

I thought my ears were going to overflow with blood and explode like I was on that Tesla nigga’s son’s deep-water submarine that blew up a year back. “Son,” I explained to him, “It’s ‘AIN’T nothing to FUCK with’; also…it’s my birthday, nigga, damn.”

I think about that moment every time he comes to me with an issue. If Wu-Tang is for the children, and your little young ass doesn’t know who Wu-Tang is, by default, you don’t know nothing. But whatever, I give My Nigga advice regardless. If he listens and applies any of it? I couldn’t tell you.

Tonight, however, My Nigga was DISTRAUGHT. I turned off the TV and stared at him. He was going through it. His eyes surveyed the rug. The keys dangled in his hand loosely, and I could see he shook slightly before he wiped his eyes. “Aiyo…what’s wrong?”

“Is Mom woke?”

“I just told you she’s not. Why you run to your mother when something’s wrong anyway? I’m sitting right here.”

“Cuz all you’re gonna say is ‘fuck it’.”

I scrunched my face up like My Nigga had just shoved Bhad Bhabie’s nasty ass perfume line under my nose. He didn’t confide in me, and that was bad enough. But waiting to do so with his mother was offensive. My wife, God bless her, doesn’t dispense wisdom quite as salient to My Nigga as she does to people she didn’t give birth to. And I don’t blame her one bit. She’s a very logical person, and logic always gives way to protection when it comes to matters involving her baby. I studied him for a few quiet seconds and motioned for him to sit down. He put his chin in his hand and played with the few beard hairs that danced wildly on his face. I saw his nostrils flare, and those beard hairs moved slightly as he clenched his jaw. That was all that needed to be communicated. “So, who is she?” I asked.

The story flowed out of him without pause like a fountain in a mall terrace. Her name was Deidra. She was a student at North Carolina Central, and someone he had brought over to the house as a friend, which, to me, signified that he wanted something more. My Nigga is very cryptic with things like this, and to introduce her was a revelation. The young lady was cute as a button, quiet and demure, sitting on the love seat and smiling and agreeing with everything my wife said. I knew My Nigga liked her then, but perhaps was too passive in letting her know. I held up a finger to stop him, went to the bar, and poured a small amount of Cabernet Sauvignon into two tumblers. My Nigga looked like he needed a drink. He went on, telling me how he liked her, how they were around each other all the time, and (gasp…) how they had had sex on occasion. She was from Northern Virginia, and had told him that she had a longtime boyfriend back home. By this point, the sniffles became more pronounced, and he stuttered and tripped over words as he spoke. I just listened and nodded, fully aware that this may have been- or still very much is- his first love.

The story went on, as convoluted as emotional retellings tend to be. It was clear My Nigga needed to get this out, and I wasn’t going to interrupt him, save for the glass of wine I poured that he sipped intermittently. I heard a stirring come from upstairs, and thought for a minute his mother had heard him arrive. Apparently he heard it too, because he stared directly up at the ceiling and paused, sliding his wine glass in my direction. After a few moments, and after it was evident that she was still upstairs and oblivious to the two men sipping red wine over a lovelorn tale, he continued. He did indeed like her, and he sat confused and angry over not telling her exactly how he felt. I sat for a few seconds- maybe even a whole minute- while he stared into my eyes with a look I hadn’t seen since he first skinned his knee falling off a bicycle. My Nigga needed help, advice, and guidance. And he relied on me to give that to him. What on earth should he do about this? Why does this hurt so much? And why does this person still invade his thoughts during activities meant to forget about her? It was all there, and I saw it without a word uttered from his mouth. I went to the staircase with my glass in hand, looked up to make sure she wasn’t listening, took a sip from my glass, and whispered, “you a side nigga.”

I can’t describe the look in My Nigga’s eyes, but it was the reaction I both expected and welcomed. His pupils were tiny embers of resolve and anger, hurt and insulted that his father reduced him to some dude this young woman was biding her time with. He sat up, and I knew I had his attention, if not his ire. That completely out-of-context observation had awoken something within him, defiant to not be relegated as someone as unimportant as a ‘side nigga’. “Think about it…she has a boyfriend- had a boyfriend- the entire time y’all were together, right? The ENTIRE time?”

The embers were now fully ablaze. He leaned forward and tilted his head to one side, as if affirming the disrespect that fell upon his ears wasn’t some late night, overserved oversight. I saw his body jerk towards me, and, for a second, envisioned the coming-of-age conflict sons have with their fathers I’ve read and heard so much about. One of my friends had an encounter like that not too long ago. Apparently, his little man thought he was too grown to do some chore or something. We sat in his kitchen as he told the story, stopping right before the interaction between he and his son. God must love drama and awkwardness as much as I do, because as I asked what he did to handle the situation, his son walked in and opened the refrigerator. My man looked right at him, almost as if taking the pulse of his son, and said unflinchingly, “I simply reminded him of a few things…”

His mother was presumably fast asleep, only waking to use the bathroom, so there would be no referee to this battle. My Nigga looked on, and I could tell that he knew I had something to add to my previous statement, which I did. “The entire time,” I continued. “The entire time she was messing with you knowing she had something, or someone, rather, back “here”, right?”

He clenched his teeth, but eventually nodded. “So you a side nigga. But…and I see your face…that’s not meant to be a pejorative term. That’s the young lady you brought to the house, right? Deanna?”

“Deidra.”

“Right. So, Dianna cle…”

“Deidra!”

“Don’t go correc…you know what I mean. So, this girl is clearly into you in some form or fashion. I don’t know why. You can’t dress. Who wears Pumas? Anyway, all I’m saying is maybe you have to play your role until you get off deck and up to bat.”

“I hate baseball. Why is everything a baseball reference with you?”

“Because Tom Glavine pitched us to a Wo…you know what, why do I even talk to you? You don’t even know…name all the members of Wu-Tang.”

“Dad, you know I don’t even know…”

“Exactly! Hush. You don’t know the Purple Tape…BUT do you like this woman? You do, right?”

“…Yeah.”

“And she likes you, too. Maybe she doesn’t know it yet. Maybe she does, but feels obligated to whoever she’s with. And maybe she’s just holding on to him because he’s familiar and comfortable. College can be scary as shit sometimes, and it helps to have people that know you to talk to. Maybe she’s confused. I don’t know. But what I do know is that she’s young. What is she, 19? How old are you, again? 19?”

“20. I’m 20. She’s 20.”

“You don’t know shit; she don’t know shit. Y’all don’t know shit, is what I’m saying. What you DO know is you can be the best side nigga in the world to her until SHE knows you’re somebody tha- don’t lean over on my pork skins, that’s my last bag- that’s down for her. That she understands that clearly and without a doubt. You know what I mean when I say side nigga?

“Yeah, I’m just fucking her until she realizes I want to be with her.”

“Watch your mouth, boy. You don’t talk to your mama like that. We ain’t friends. I ain’t got to like you, boy. While you be thinkin’ bout TV, I’ll be thinkin’ bout the roof. You gon’ sit the-”

My Nigga just rolled his eyes and laughed. “How come you ain’t never like me?”

“What law is there say I gotta like you? Wanna stand up there in front my face and ask a damn ass fool ass question like that? Talkin’ bout likin’ somebody!”

“I’m not watching that while I’m home, Dad.”

“And that’s y’all’s problem. Little niggas can’t appreciate Denzel, God bless his soul. Damn shame that Zuckerberg money he took for Equalizer 8 couldn’t save him. ‘I’m not watching that’, I don’t know where I went wrong with you. But no, I don’t mean just being some dude she can call when she looking for fun. Be the dude she can call when it ain’t sexy time. Be the PERSON she can rely on. You like her, right? Be someone she can talk to about her man, even if it burns you up inside. Because understand, those things do not go unappreciated. Be her friend, son. Be her side nigga that is literally on her side. Very easy to do…if you really like her, no?”

My Nigga just looked off into the distance, looking for an argument that could refute what he just heard. Finally, he shrugged and mumbled and very resigned, “probably. That how it went with you and mom?”

“No, not at all.”

“Y’all never told me how y’all got together, though.”

“And I never will. It was a lot of snap music and this,” I said, holding up the glass of wine.

“What’s snap music?”

“Go on now and get out my face, boy.”

My Nigga smiled and walked upstairs, only to check on his mother before laying down in the guest room, phone in hand and dropping his keys on the ottoman beside his bed.

A.J. Armstrong is the creator of The Fly Hobo and His World of Oddities