SALUBRIOUS

SB11

Nasiem Fareed

10:51 pm - October 3rd 2023

Nas removed the tattoo gun from his arm before letting out a sneeze. He sniffled a bit before returning to completing his tattoo. After his father daughter date with Demi, he concluded that he wanted to tattoo her name on him. There was a perfect spot on his right forearm, which is exactly where the tattoo was going.

Nas was at the house by himself tonight, since Wham and Sevyn went out for their date night. Music blasted from the TV. Despite how loud it was, the music was helping Nas focus. The tattoo gun no longer brought him pain, after bringing it to his skin so many times, he grew immune to the feeling. Nas slightly looked over at the colors in his collection, swiftly making his mind go to Dakota. He was hoping she'd let him explore with some color, and if she wasn't that adventurous yet, then maybe red. Nas felt like red would look amazing on Dakota's skin tone, hidden in various parts of her sleeve.

Nas stopped for a second to wipe the residue off of his arm, giving him a better look at his progress. Since the thought of tattooing as a profession was up in the air, Nas wanted to start practicing on finishing tattoos in one session. Punctuality was big when it came to tattoos, especially since pain was involved. Thinking about doing tattoos professionally was hard for Nas, simply because he couldn't see himself doing it. Yeah, he loved it, but he couldn't picture himself having a job that didn't require a university education. He felt like this was a case of just taking a leap and walking by faith and not sight. Nas promised himself that his final verdict would be based upon how doing Dakota's sleeve went.

Nas stopped for a second and grabbed his phone, he went to his recent call log and clicked Kimora's contact name. Rather than holding the phone up to his ear, he put it on speaker. Soon, Kimora's voice came through the speaker. "Hey." She greeted.

"Demi went to sleep yet?" Nas questioned, judging by the time, he figured that he missed her by at least 3 hours, but it was worth a try. "Yeah—it's a school night, if she stay up past 7, she'll be awful to deal with in the morning." Kimora explained, followed by a light chuckle.

"Damn...ight." Nas replied. Just before Kimora was about to say something else, Nas cut her off. "She wake up at 6 for school, right?" He pondered. Since he didn't make bedtime, he was making it his prerogative to talk to his daughter before she went to school in the morning.

"Yeah." Kimora answered, causing him to nod his head. "You can stop by to see her before school, if you want—I'll text you the address." She added, causing Nas' eyebrows to furrow together.

"The address? I already got it." Nas voiced in a confused manner. "Me and Demi taking a lil' break from that house...we're in my spot downtown." Kimora announced. Nas read between the lines and estimated that there was trouble between Kimora and her husband at the moment.

"You good?" Nas asked, feeling like it was the right thing to do. At the end of the day, whatever affected Kimora would affect Demi as well. "Yeah..." Kimora replied before sniffling. Nas held the tattoo gun in his hand as he anticipated his next question. Silently, he stared into space while listening to Kimora ever so often sniffle.

"Nasiem." She called out, catching his attention. "Yeah?" Nas queried. He got up for a second to stretch, as he'd been sitting down for a while.

Kimora lightly chuckled, "Goodn—"

"What was you saying when I was at the nail shop with Dem? Before you ended the call, you said you loved me—or something?" Nas blurted out, before she could finish what she was saying.

"I do love you, Nas. And I guess I can't contain it...I been loving you all my life." Kimora expounded, causing Nas to silently sigh. "You don't love me, Kim. You showed me that when I was locked up—you woulda never went 5 years without saying shit to me if you loved me." Nas combated. Frankly, he was still butt hurt about it. No matter how much he tried to suppress it, he couldn't.