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Collin was healthy.

My house was paid for.

I didn’t need Xay to survive.

But that didn’t mean his son didn’t need to be financially supported by his father.

And apparently ever since Xay’s entire world came crashing down, that part wasn’t clicking for him.

He answered the phone when it came to Collin.

He’d gone to his doctor’s appointment.

If I told him something was wrong, he responded.

So I wasn’t about to sit there and lie and act like the nigga completely abandoned his son.

But financially?

Shit got real inconsistent real fucking fast.

One week he’d send something.

Next week nothing.

I’d ask him for his half of something and suddenly I was doing too much.

Nigga.

I didn’t self-make Collin.

So this morning?

Family court.

I sat outside the courtroom with my coat folded across my lap, scrolling through my phone when Xay finally came walking down the hall.

Work boots.

Dark construction pants.

Heavy hoodie underneath his coat.

Looking irritated before he even sat down.

He’d come straight from work.

Xay was still doing commercial construction, working full-time for a contractor doing interior build-outs, framing, drywall and renovation jobs throughout North Jersey. According to the paperwork he’d submitted, he was averaging a little over thirteen hundred dollars a week gross depending on overtime.

Enough that I knew damn well I wasn’t asking this nigga for the impossible.

He dropped into the chair three seats away from me.

I didn’t look up.

“You really doing this?”

I kept scrolling.