The Ugly Side of Me

by Nikita Lynnette Nichols

  I got on Interstate 290 and headed home. I called my boss on the way.

  “Hello, Mr. Duncan. Welcome back,” I greeted.

  “Hi, Rhapsody. Are you stuck in traffic?”

  “No, I’m headed back home. I won’t be in today. I woke up pregnant this morning.”

  “Pregnant?”

  “Yeah. I just found out at the doctor’s office, Mr. Duncan. I need the day off to process it. But I’ll definitely be in tomorrow.”

  “So, I guess congratulations are in order.”

  I exhaled. “I don’t know about that. Maybe they are. Maybe they’re not. It depends on how my baby’s daddy will receive the news.”

  I ended the call with Mr. Duncan just as I was turning onto my street. I saw Malcolm’s truck parked in my driveway. When I exited my car, I noticed him sitting behind the wheel, smoking a cigarette. I walked over to him.

  “Why are you smoking a cigarette?”

  “My bad,” he said and looked at me. “A cigar would be more appropriate for the occasion, huh?”

  I hung my head, then looked up at him. “How did you find out?”

  Malcolm started to speak, but I cut him off.

  “Not out here. Come on in the house.”

  We went inside, and I headed straight for the bathroom. I stripped and showered. After the shower, I put my soiled clothes in the washing machine. I put on my blue terry-cloth robe and slipped into the matching slippers. I walked in the kitchen and saw Malcolm slouched down in a chair at the table.

  “You know that pee you gave me?” he asked me. “It was pregnant pee.”

  So, that’s how he knows. I leaned back against the kitchen sink and folded my arms across my chest. “Oh, my God. The urine test. What did Audelia say?”

  “Besides the fact that she was pissed, because she thought we tried to get one over on her, she was cool. She told me to come back and see her in a year. She wants you to give her a call.”

  I went and sat on his lap. “I’m sorry.”

  Malcolm wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me closer to him. “I just kissed nineteen dollars an hour away. It ain’t your fault, though. We just like to screw, that’s all. But it’s cool,” he said to me. “I ain’t gonna let you go through this by yourself. I’ma hang with you every step of the way. And I don’t want you to pay for nothing. I’ma handle this myself.”

  When Malcolm said, “I ain’t gonna let you go through this by yourself,” I thought he meant being by my side, holding my hair away from my face, while I puked my guts out and running to the convenient store in the middle of the night to satisfy my cravings. And when he said, “I’ma hang with you every step of the way,” I thought he meant supporting my heavy thighs when I held them open during delivery and coaching me on breathing correctly, the way we would have learned in the Lamaze classes. But he threw me for a loop when he said, “I don’t want you to pay for nothing. I’ma handle this myself.”

  I had 100 percent medical insurance coverage through my job. I didn’t have to pay for the prenatal care, and neither did Malcolm, so what was he talking about?

  “You’re gonna handle what by yourself?”

  He looked at me. “You know.”

  I looked right back at him. “No I don’t. What are you talking about handling?”

  “The abortion, Rhapsody. It’s my responsibility, not yours.”

  I stood slowly because I didn’t wanna make myself dizzy. “There won’t be an abortion, Malcolm.”

  He looked at me like I had just told him that grape-flavored Kool-Aid had been discontinued.

  “What?”

  “You heard what I said. I’m not having an abortion.”

  He stood up. “Why not?”

  I raised the tone of my voice to match Malcolm’s. “Why would I?”

  “I’m not ready to be a daddy. I don’t make enough money to take care of a baby. Why would you put me in this position?”

  “Because I’m too old to have an abortion, Malcolm. I may not have another chance to have a baby.”

  “Rhapsody, you can’t be serious about this. What am I gonna do with a baby? I can barely take care of myself.”

  “Look, Malcolm, I’m having this baby. Whether or not you choose to be in your child’s life is up to you, but the fetus that’s growing inside of me is a keeper.”

  Malcolm turned from me and left the kitchen. “This is jacked up.”

  I followed him to the front door. “Where are you going?”

  He stopped, looked at me, and raised his voice when he said, “You’re keeping tabs on me now? Just because you’re pregnant, you feel you gotta know my every move?”

  I remained calm, because I understood the news of my pregnancy was a shock to him, but I wasn’t gonna tolerate any disrespect from Malcolm. “Look, Malcolm, I don’t care where you go, but you better lower your voice. I just thought we could go get a bite to eat and talk about this.”

  He shrugged his shoulders. “What’s to talk about? You already said what you were gonna do, so I ain’t got nothing else to say.” He walked out and slammed my door behind him.

  I went into my bedroom and lay across the bed. I guessed I could understand why Malcolm felt the way he did. He was young. Life, for him, was just beginning. I couldn’t blame him for not wanting to be tied down, but my maternal clock was ticking loud as heck. I hadn’t purposely set out to get pregnant, especially by someone who had to be in the house before the streetlights came on, but, hey, crap happened to a lot of people. I couldn’t let the fact that Malcolm had walked out on me and my baby upset me. I had to be healthy.

  As I lay there on the bed, I suddenly felt drowsy, and at some point I gave in to sleep. I had a dream so vivid, it felt real.

  Malcolm returned at 5:00 p.m. Tuesday evening. He came into my bedroom and sat on my bed. He put his hand on my leg, which stirred me.

  I opened my eyes and looked at him. “Hey.”

  In his hand were his keys to my house and the Navigator. He held them out for me to take, but I didn’t wanna touch them.

  “I can’t do this, Rhapsody.”

  I sat up on the bed. “What are you saying? You wanna end our relationship because I won’t get an abortion?”

  “What relationship? We don’t have a relationship. All we do is screw and fight.”

  I was at a loss for words. I couldn’t think of a single word to say to Malcolm. He laid the keys on the bed, next to me, and stood. From his interior jacket pocket, Malcolm withdrew a folded sheet of paper and gave it to me.

  I took it. “What’s this?” I unfolded it and darn near screamed at what I saw. I was holding a marriage certificate bearing the names Sharonda Taylor and Malcolm Washington. According to the date and time on the certificate, they had gotten married at city hall two hours ago. My hands shook. “What is this, Malcolm?”

  “I married Sharonda this afternoon.”

  “You’re not ready to be a daddy, but you’re ready to be a husband?”

  “I felt it was the right thing to do.”

  I felt like I was talking to a total stranger. “How was marrying Sharonda the right thing to do?”

  “Rhapsody, Sharonda is five months pregnant.”

  My eyes grew out of my head. Surely, I was being punked. There had to be a hidden camera in my bedroom, because there was no way this was happening for real.

  “Five months? You don’t wanna be a part of my baby’s life, but you married Sharonda?”

  “I’m in love with Sharonda, Rhapsody.”

  Malcolm left me completely stunned and horrified. He left me sitting on the bed and walked out my front door. I hopped out of bed and ran to the living room window just in time to see Malcolm get in on the passenger side of Sharonda’s car. I saw her lean over and kiss him, then look toward my window and smile, like she could see me peeking through the vertical blinds. I ran to my bathroom, lifted the toilet seat, and emptied my stomach twice.

  I woke up, drenched with sweat. My bedsheets were wringing we
t, and my hair was matted all around my face. I looked at my digital clock on my nightstand. It was 5:15 p.m. I had slept the entire afternoon away. I searched my bed for Malcolm’s keys, but they weren’t next to me. I closed my eyes and silently thanked God that it was only a dream. I exhaled loudly and reached for the telephone on my nightstand and called Anastasia.

  “Can you come to my house?” I sounded frantic, but I couldn’t help it.

  “Are you all right?” she asked me.

  My voice shook. “No.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  Anastasia got to my house in record time. It was usually a forty-five-minute drive for her to get to me, but that time she did it in thirty minutes. She used her spare key, which I had given her years ago, and let herself in. I was sitting on my living room sofa, with my legs bent beneath me like a pretzel. Anastasia came and sat next to me.

  After listening to me, she let her head fall backward on the headrest of my living room sofa and exhaled loudly. “Rhapsody, how in the world did you allow this to happen?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t plan on getting pregnant, Stacy. It just happened.”

  “That’s some bullswanky, and you know it. If neither you nor Malcolm was using anything to prevent you from getting pregnant, it was planned. But I wanna know why you weren’t using anything.”

  “Because whenever we get together, we never think about it.”

  “You mean, whenever you see each other, you tear your clothes off so fast that birth control is always the furthest thing from your minds.”

  “Something like that,” I said.

  “Humph,” she said. “So, let’s think about this a minute. Here we have a thirty-four-year-old woman who is pregnant by a twenty-one-year-old man who runs a hamburger joint and still lives with his mother. But now that the woman is pregnant, he wants nothing to do with her or the baby because he’s not ready for parenthood.”

  I nodded my head, and Anastasia continued. “Another innocent soul comes into this drug-infested, overpopulated world without a daddy, and the mother is left to fend for the baby on her own.”

  Tears dripped onto my chest. I cracked a sorry smile. “Yep, that about sums it up.”

  I had honestly expected Anastasia to drill into my head how she had warned me not to get involved with Malcolm in the first place. But instead, she was the sister I needed her to be. Anastasia wrapped her arms around me and pulled me close. “It’s gonna be okay, boo. I’ll be your baby’s daddy.”

  “I don’t know, Stacy. Maybe I should get an abortion.”

  She pulled away and glared at me. “What?”

  “I don’t think I can do this on my own, and Malcolm—”

  “Screw him!” she shouted. “You don’t need him. You’re a strong, independent black woman who can take care of herself. What’s growing inside of you is a gift. I don’t care how you made the baby. It’s here now. Get yourself together, Rhapsody, and grow up, ’cause you have a huge responsibility on your hands.”

  Chapter 34

  “Don’t say a word to me,” was the way I greeted my boss Wednesday morning.

  Mr. Duncan sat behind his desk, looking at me as though I’d lost my mind. “Good morning to you too, Rhapsody.”

  I punched my time card and plopped down in my chair. “What’s so good about it?”

  He got up and brought me a beautiful mug he’d gotten in Jamaica. “You don’t even deserve this, but I’ll give it to you, anyway.”

  I loved the mug. I exhaled and looked up at him. “Thanks.”

  “I can see this is gonna be a long nine months,” he said. “I don’t know if this office is big enough for me, you, and your mood swings.”

  I looked into my boss’s face and spoke as calmly as I possibly could. “If you don’t say nothing to me for the next nine months, and you keep that toilet seat down, we won’t have any problems.”

  He threw his hands in the air and went back to his desk.

  I checked my morning report and was glad to see that no train or bus had been involved in an accident overnight and that the city of Chicago’s public transportation system was running smoothly. My extension rang, and I answered the phone on the first ring.

  “Good morning. You’ve reached the CTA’s traffic room. This is Rhapsody. How may I help you?”

  “Hi, Rhapsody. This is Audelia.”

  I was not ready to speak with her just yet. “Hi, Audelia. I was gonna call you today.”

  “You were?”

  “Yeah. I want to apologize for what happened yesterday. Malcolm got high with his friends over the weekend, and I didn’t want him to risk failing the urine test.”

  “Rhapsody, you should’ve called and told me. I probably could’ve gotten around him being tested.” She paused, then said, “Um, you know you’re pregnant, right?”

  “Yep. I found out the same time Malcolm did. Audelia, I hope you didn’t get into any trouble while looking out for Malcolm.”

  “Rhapsody, please. I run this office. Normally, we keep medical records and applications on file for a year, but I threw Malcolm’s out. Have him come back to see me in six months, and I’ll take care of him.”

  “Audelia, you are a godsend. Thank you so much.”

  “I know Malcolm’s gonna be needing this pay with the baby coming and with you taking your six-week maternity leave. I can get him on the payroll just in the nick of time.”

  “We really appreciate everything, Audelia.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don’t look for a baby shower gift,” she said and we ended the call.

  Since the sole purpose of my job and Mr. Duncan’s job was to redirect traffic in case of an accident, we really didn’t have anything to do that day. And I wasn’t about to sit up and look at him for eight hours. I grabbed my purse and keys. “Mr. Duncan, I’m gonna take a walk down Michigan Avenue. If anything jumps off, hit me on my cell, okay?”

  “What if I wanted to go take a walk and enjoy the air?” he asked me.

  I put my right hand on my right hip and shifted all my weight onto my right leg and glared at him. “Well, since both of us can’t leave the office at the same time, because one of us has to answer the telephones, guess which one of us is staying? I’ll give you a hint,” I said. “It ain’t me.”

  Without waiting for a response, I walked out of the office and slammed the door. I walked to the corner of Madison and Randolph Streets, where a Dunkin’ Donuts shared its establishment with a Baskin-Robbins ice cream parlor. The aroma of dark roast coffee beans filled my nostrils as soon as I entered through the door. Yesterday Dr. Scimeca had warned me about drinking too much caffeine, because he knew I was a coffeeholic, but I didn’t care. Without my coffee in the morning, I could be the devil’s sister.

  On the Dunkin’ Donuts side of the café, I stood in line behind two men and waited my turn. It didn’t take long for me to reach the counter and place my order for a medium coffee with extra cream and extra sugar. Because the thin red stirrers weren’t strong enough to stir the sugar that settled in the bottom of my cup, I asked for one of the pink spoons that were given to customers who bought ice cream.

  “Spoo fo I cree only,” the man from Pakistan told me.

  He spoke so fast that I couldn’t understand. “Excuse me?”

  “Buy I cree, get spoo. Spoo not fo coffee. Spoo fo I cree only.”

  Four people had come to stand in line behind me. “I don’t want ice cream. I just want a spoon to stir my coffee.”

  The man pointed to the box of red stirrers that sat on the counter in front of me. “Stir coffee.”

  My temples started to throb, and while I massaged them, I looked at the Pakistani. “Sir, I just want a spoon. May I please have a spoon?”

  By the many exhalations, I knew everyone standing in line behind me was getting frustrated, but, heck, so was I. I guessed the man behind the counter had got frustrated too, because he lost his patience with me and raised his voice. “I toe you. Buy I cree, get spoo!”

  I
mmediately, I lost my self-restraint and raised my voice to match his pitch. “It’s six thirty in the mornin’. Who in the heck do you think is gonna buy ice cream? Now, give me a spoon before I jump over this counter!”

  He gave me two spoons.

  With my coffee in my hand, I walked directly across the street to my favorite bakery and bought myself a cheese Danish. When I returned to the office, I saw a report on my desk that Mr. Duncan wanted me to scan through. I kindly moved it aside, set my breakfast in front of me, and bit into my Danish.

  Mr. Duncan was sitting behind his desk, watching me. “Rhapsody?”

  “What?” I asked nastily.

  “Can you go through the report?”

  “When I’m done eating.”

  “Are you taking an early lunch?”

  Why was he getting on my nerves so early in the morning? I assumed he wanted to get cussed out. “Nah, I ain’t taking an early lunch. I don’t care what time of day it is. If I want to eat something, that’s what I’m gonna do.” I shoved the report aside again. “This doggone report ain’t going nowhere, and if you’re in such a hurry to get it done, then I suggest you look over it yourself.”

  For the next three hours, Mr. Duncan tried his best to keep from talking to me. At eleven thirty he asked if I wanted to order Chinese food for lunch. I declined, and he walked away from my desk like a good little boss. Just when I was about to make my way to the bathroom for what seemed like the fiftieth time, my extension rang.

  “Good afternoon. You’ve reached the CTA’s traffic room. This is Rhapsody. How may I help you?”

  “Hi, baby girl.”

  I was so happy to hear her voice. “Hey, Ma.”

  “Your father and I got two more days till the cruise,” she said excitedly.

  “I know. You’re excited, huh?”

  “Yeah. We got so much stuff to take, we had to go out and buy another set of luggage.”

  “Are you taking your whole closet or what?”

  “Well, we’ll be gone for seven days, and I figured we’ll change at least twice a day. The captain’s ball is on Sunday night, and we have to dress formal for that. Your father has a tuxedo, and I’m wearing the royal blue gown that I wore to your cousin Sheila’s wedding last year.”