Me, You, and Mason

25

"Aye... Aye!" Sage's voice stretched across the parking lot.

The heat could be felt sprouting from the asphalt and raining from above. Between the sweltering temperature and the irritating workday she'd endured, Darcy was in no mood for the heated pursuit of a frustrated lover.

She disregarded his demands for attention, car keys in hand as she journeyed past his vehicle to get to hers.

"You gon' keep ignorin' me?" His steps trailed from his truck. His pace quickened to a jog as Darcy-Ann closed in on her car.

The vehicle unlocked, and the driver's side door was peeled ope— it flew closed with a force that could've only been facilitated by vexed manpower.

"What's up wit'chu, mane? I been callin' you. Been camped out for our lunch break, every damn day, and every day, you walk right past me. What's up?"

"I told you I'd call you when—"

"Nawww, I'on wanna hear dat, Darcy-Ann," he shook his head adamantly.

She scoffed with a near crinkle of her nose. He spoke before she could gather her words, "You can have yo' shit and go through yo' shit, but I'm still yo' man, dig? You ignorin' me and avoidin' me like I done wronged you or somethin'. You trippin'."

"Sage, I'm really not tryna' do dis wit'chu right now. I'm already pissed about some work shit, and I'm starvin' on top'a dat, so I need you to get up out my face right now," she held a hand up to keep him at bay as she opened her car door again.

"I ain't goin' nowhere. I done gave you a week— a whole week, bun. Enough of this shit, a'ight?"

"You standin' here, pressin' me because I need time alone?" she squinted at him.

"I'm not—"

"You makin' demands of me like you own me or somethin'. I can't have no space?"

"You can do that, Darcy, but I need communication. 'Communication.' You remember that? That word you been danglin' over me for forever?"

"I know how to communicate, but I'm not ready to communicate or else I would've called you. I told you that. I literally told you that," she laughed bitterly with a shake of her head.

"Darcy—"

"I said I would call you when I felt like having company, talkin', bein' around you."

Sage chortled although he wasn't amused.

If anything, he was wounded. He suppressed the sting and reconfigured her words in his mind. Her statement wasn't intended to be a dagger, but that didn't keep it from piercing his skin.

He joked the pain away.

"You treatin' me like a trick now?" he smiled. "I come when you call, but if I call, even just to hear your voice and know you're good, I get treated like I'm only good for one thing."

"You're not funny, Sage," she began to sit behind the wheel.

His hands went for her waist. "Wait a minute now. Come on, bun. You don't think you owe me some indication that you're alr—"

"Owe you?" she swatted his hands. "We're not fuckin' together, Sage."

The promise ring she wore begged to differ.

Even so, her words hurt.

It wasn't as easy to hide this time.

"I can't still care about'chu?" he softly prompted, words softened by the blow of her remark.