Free Divine Intervention by Lutishia Lovely

eyes.
    “Not far, baby. I just need to take care of something.” He paused, as if wanting to say something, and then changed his mind. “I’ll be right back.”
     
    A little over twelve hundred miles away, just outside Phoenix, Arizona, Kelvin Petersen sat brooding in his ten-thousand-square-foot mansion. Like the question of where one was when JFK got shot, or the Twin Towers had fallen, or Michael Jackson had died, Kelvin was bookmarking where he was when the love of his life got married and his world collapsed—sitting in a darkened theater room, with a muted ESPN channel serving as the only light . . . trying to get as fucked up as necessary to take away the pain. He was normally a Bud man, but in the spirit of trying to break one habit today, he’d simply traded it for another and even now precariously poured himself another shot, spilling some of the two-hundred-dollar a bottle liquid on his calfskin sofa in this process. “Damn, man, you make a sloppy drunk,” he said to the empty room. He picked up the remote and flipped to ESPN2. When his phone rang, he didn’t answer it. Within seconds, his text message indicator beeped and then immediately his phone rang again.
    “Damn, can’t you see when a brothah don’t want to be bothered?” No doubt it was one of his WIR—women in rotation. Truth be told, he was ready to dump the whole present lot of ten or so and start a new cycle. Sleep with a woman more than a couple times and she started looking for bills to be paid, floor tickets for the next game, or some Benjamins in her wallet. The real fools would even hint at babies, bling, rings, and things. But when it came to Suns star Kelvin Petersen, those babes obviously got things twisted. After finally getting his baby-who-was-not-his-baby’s-mama out of his life, Kelvin swore he’d never get caught up again. Unless it was Princess. If given the chance, I could have gotten caught up with her.
    Kelvin’s phone rang again. This time he sighed, flung back what remained of the Johnnie Walker shot, and reached for his cell. Seeing that the call came from one of his best friends did nothing to lighten his mood.
    “Whatever you’re selling I ain’t buying, a’ight?” he said without hostility but with a cadence that sounded like it was spoken in slow motion.
    “Kelvin, man, are you all right?”
    “In a few hours, I’ll let you know. Other than that, Brandon, I’m just chillin’ . . . wanting to be alone with my thoughts, so if you don’t mind, I’m going to end this situation. I mean, conversation.” Kelvin started laughing at his mistake-turned-joke.
    “Kelvin, pull yourself together, man. I’m calling about your father. It’s serious.”
    Brandon’s words were like a pitcher of ice cubes dumped on Kelvin’s face. His head momentarily cleared. He sat up. The room began to spin. He plopped back against the couch. “You’re talking about Derrick, right?”
    Brandon understood the question. He was one of the few in Kelvin’s circle who’d met both his stepfather, Hans Petersen, and his biological. “Yeah, man, Derrick Montgomery. Joni called me and said that in the middle of the wedding ceremony your dad passed out and was rushed to the hospital . . . by ambulance.”
    This revelation brought Kelvin to his feet. “Damn!” Why’d I have to pour that last shot? “What’s wrong with him, Brandon?”
    “They don’t know. Joni and everybody are at the hospital now, waiting to speak with the doctor... hoping that he’ll bring them good news.”
    “But he’s going to be all right—right?”
    “Joni said he hasn’t come to yet, so they don’t know.”
    “Which hospital is he in?” When Brandon told him, he said, “Okay, man, thanks for the info. Let me get off this phone and make some things happen.”
    “You’re going there, right?”
    “It’s my father, dog. Of course I am.”
    “You want me to come with?”
    Kelvin pondered the question as he walked from the theater room to his