Right Before My Eyes

by Michelle Robinson

  Carol, the owner of Sedusa, asked us to bring our own cups. I had cups packed with a knife, forks, small paper plates and napkins. Our dress code for the class was a white wife beater and black boy shorts. Jules helped me pick out Kalena’s outfit; we got her a sexy white lingerie outfit with a tiara. It was perfect for her to wear on their honeymoon night. The class could accommodate ten ladies. Chelsea, Najah, Jordyn, Ashley, Kalena, me, and four of Kalena’s cousins were coming. The limo was my idea. Todd wanted to chip in, so he took care of that for us. A white Escalade was picking us up at seven.

  First stop was Crustacean, our favorite seafood restaurant. They make the best roasted crab and garlic noodles. Kicking it with the divas couldn’t have come at a better time. I needed a cocktail bad. I haven’t decided if I was gonna say something about the email from the exwife, but I damn sure was gonna tell them about Lisa Harris coming over to introduce herself to me. I laughed in the shower. All I could think of was, WOW!

  Chapter 24

  ADORE

  “Girl, it seems like all he’s used to is them hood rats. Give him some leeway. He is trying.” Kalena said.

  “No matter what happens Nee, have some fun,” Chelsea said.

  Najah had another opinion. “I don’t like that he’s in that motorcycle club. Those niccas are dogs.”

  Ashley laughed out loud. “Y’all crazy.”

  “What you think?” Chelsea asked Ashley.

  “Uh, it’s early, but I think it’s kinda good that the drama is coming out, so y’all can get this over with now. Lisa just needs to fall back now. He told her you were his girlfriend and he loves you to her face. There ain’t nothing else to discuss. That’s all a nicca had to say to me and I’m kicking rocks quick! Speed on before you get peed on!”

  We all laughed at Ashley. “Them ghetto hood rats? Not so much,” Kalena chimed in.

  “Trust me, Al’s other chicks were just like her,” she added.

  “Well then, they can get on to loving after this chick backs down,” Ashley added.

  “Yeah? Well, there was another one that he kicked it with too.”

  “Really? Najah asked, shaking her head.

  “We went to the movies to see The Secret Lives of Bees and his phone was blowing up the whole time, and he just told me the deal with her. Her name is Chante and they met at a washhouse four years ago. Her daughter calls him daddy. Anyway, he said he needs to go over there and talk to her and end it so she doesn’t come over acting a fool too. I told him to go handle it. He couldn’t believe that he had a woman that was supportive of the way he was trying to deal with these chicks.”

  “I wonder was there any drama between them before he meet you Nee?” Kalena said.

  “Naw, them girls seem to like sharing.” Najah said jokingly.

  “So, how did that go with Jules and Chante?” Chelsea asked.

  “He said she was still talking about their plans to move in together, but then realized he was telling her it was over and she told him good luck.” I said.

  “So that’s one who’s not a hood rat?” Kalena asked.

  “And you said her daughter calls him daddy?” Najah asked, rolling her eyes.

  “Well, she can start calling him Goddaddy!” Chelsea said.

  We all laughed loudly.

  Najah made more daiquiris while we were packaging the favors. We had to put CDs in their cases and tie bows around them. The bows had little music notes tied to them. I wanted to hear the CD, so Kalena put it on and we jammed to 16 love songs.

  I read the back of the cover. We had some good songs picked by: Mint Condition, Luther, Sade, Anita Baker, Al Green, Outkast, Prince, and Anthony Hamilton, just to name a few. We had 175 favors to do. Ashley was decorating the broom Todd and Kalena were going to jump over. We brought our dresses to try on for each other. We looked good and Kalena was pleased. Mama Len wanted to see us too. She also came by to show us her outfit she had found at Durant Square. It was a nice long chocolate brown dress with a matching short jacket made of taffeta with ruffles everywhere. Some of us couldn’t believe that her dress came from an indoor swap meet, but Ashley confirmed it for us. Mama Len pulled me in the hallway to tell me she had a dream that I had a little girl, and that I was over at her house playing with the baby and she was smiling.

  “So you babysitting then?”

  “Of course,” she confirmed.

  I was so happy about her news. Then it occurred to me that we didn’t use a condom last night.

  Oh, shoot! I never slipped when it came to protection, even if he got the good stuff. He was very well endowed, I must say. I started tripping, but told myself to not panic and to just ask Najah how to get a morning-after pill. It was too soon to get pregnant today! That thought made me laugh.

  I took a deep breath and went back into the kitchen, ’cause Chelsea noticed that I was missing from my post.

  “Chelsea, you sure are turning into a grouch.” Najah said.

  “Yeah we are going to call you Bridesmaidzilla,” I said.

  “Yeah, I’m the bride and I’m not even stressed out or hollering at people,” Kalena reminded her.

  “That’s because Todd makes you watch Bridezilla with him, so you don’t turn into them dumb broads on TV,” Chelsea continued. “Is that how you get a husband now? Ya gotta act crazy?”

  “Well, if I recall, Ms. Chelsea, you displayed an act of that at the Hilton Garden Inn a few months ago,” I reminded her.

  “That was more like an audition for Cheaters, not Bridezilla.

  We laughed. We needed that burst of laughter to get us all on the same page, ’cause the energy was a bit off.

  I didn’t know about Chelsea. She had been trying to stay active lately with the church and hanging around her family more. But she seemed to be getting meaner by the minute.

  “I hope you are not letting Greg turn you into a bitter chick, because we are bigger than that, and you will be ok in due time girlie. So start acting like you’re fine now and your feelings will catch up.” I said.

  Kalena looked up from the CDs and said, “I like that one Nee. Act like you wanna be and your feelings will eventually turn into that, right?”

  “Yep,” I said.

  “That’s game right there,” Kalena admitted.

  Najah gave Kalena a high five, as I smiled and Chelsea digested the thought.

  “I will try that ’cause I just haven’t been feeling like myself lately. I’ve been eating uncontrollably, feeling sick. I think I got the Love Jones or something.”

  “Greg was good to you just not for you,” Najah said.

  Chelsea gave a look that could kill.

  “Yeah, but what kills me is, he said he would never date another girl from our church, and that’s exactly what he did.” I said.

  “You need to change churches,” Kalena said.

  “I have committed myself to my usher ministry for another year.” Chelsea said.

  No one was gonna say nothing to that, ’cause we all knew ya just can’t win with Chelsea and it was best she had the last word sometimes. This was one of those times.

  Ashley hooked that broom up. It was gorgeous when she finished it. Mama Len came into the kitchen and poured herself a drink. When Adore came on, she started dancing. She held her hand up and had her head down with her eyes closed. This was her song. She went in the living room to turn the volume up and she joined in. We spent another two hours unpacking and wrapping the CD favors.

  When we were done, Ashley commanded Kalena to go put on a dress that was hanging in her closet. Ashley was a great younger sister. She was ten years younger but had an old soul. Kalena was puzzled but she didn’t put up a fight at all. Todd had somehow softened her up. She smiled a lot more. I loved it. We all had on black sundresses of different lengths. Ashley bought Kalena one in
white and some cute silver wedges.

  “Okay, but what’s going on now?”

  She looked at us and we shrugged our shoulders. I looked at the clock in the kitchen and advised that she had thirty minutes to get herself together, and she did.

  She was blindfolded when the limo pulled up. She looked amazing. Her hair was pinned up, and her makeup was popping. She glowed in the white sundress. It showed off her nice legs. I could tell that Kalena was losing weight. I could only imagine how cute she would look in her wedding dress.

  When Todd unfolded her eyes, she was so surprised by her cousins appearing out of nowhere. They all kissed and hugged. Her cousins handed her gift bags and cards.

  She couldn’t believe it. She couldn’t figure out how we pulled this off for her. No one ruined the surprise.

  “Get in,” Mama Len told her.

  “Wait, we gotta take pictures,” Ashley said.

  Todd, Brandon and Mama Len were snapping pictures. Todd had a digital camera, Brandon had his iPhone and Mama Len had her camera too. After twenty minutes of the photo shoot, we all got into the limo with our bags, bottles and the cake.

  Kalena wanted to know what the bags were for and we all laughed.

  “Girl, you are in for a treat,” one of her cousins said.

  We said our goodbyes and went off to enjoy Kalena’s mobile bridal shower.

  Chapter 25

  CRUISIN’

  “I can’t fit into my dress!!!” Chelsea screamed into the phone.

  “Calm down girl!” I said.

  “I can’t calm down. The wedding is next week and my dress doesn’t fit. The lady at the place says that she doesn’t have enough time to help me out and whoa it’s me again girl. What am I gonna do?”

  Silence.

  “Nee, are you listening to me?”

  “Girl, I am, but we are looking at cruises online.”

  “Cruises? Online? Y’all just doing the damn thing.”

  “Yeah, we are, huh?” I said, smiling. “He’s never been on a cruise ship and we decided to go for his fortieth birthday.”

  “Oh, when’s his birthday?”

  “Next month.

  “Oh, ok, the whole month,” she asked.

  “Shut up girl, it’s December eighth,” I said, changing the subject. “You need to go pee on a stick and get this over with. Girl you know you are pregnant.”

  “Whatever girl. Oh speaking of which, did you get Najah’s text?”

  “Yeah. I called Kaiser’s pharmacy and picked it up. No charge,” I responded.

  “For real?” she asked.

  “Sure did, boo. So, you keeping yours?” I asked.

  “Nicca, why you keep saying that?” Chelsea asked me.

  “Nicca, cause you are pregnant. Kalena knows it, Najah knows it, I know it, and you are hiding it.”

  I was hollering a little because she needed to stop with this foolishness.

  Silence.

  Chelsea started crying and hangs up the phone.

  I said hello repeatedly, looked at my crackberry and all that I saw was my screensaver—a picture of me with my shades on.

  I sighed.

  “Lord, Jesus,” was all that I could say, and that’s all I needed to say.

  I tried calling her back. She answered with sadness in her voice.

  “I’m sorry to tell you, but I just took an EPT test and yes got damnit, I’m pregnant!”

  “OMG, Chelsea! Have you told anyone?” I asked.

  “No,” Chelsea said.

  Beep.

  I realized my other line was interrupting us. I looked at the screen and it was Drew’s parents’ house. There was no way I could put Chelsea on hold. I let the call go to voicemail. Plus, I couldn’t talk to anyone from the Mills household from Jules’ house anyway. I would call them later when I left here.

  Jules could tell my conversation was important, so he came over and booked our Mexican Riviera cruise to leave two days before his birthday. He kissed me on my head and went into the bedroom.

  I heard him lay on the bed and turn the TV on.

  Chelsea was crying and really finding it hard to get it out.

  “Are you scared, honey? Want me to come over? I won’t talk and ask you anything. I can just hug you and rub your back.”

  She said no, but I asked her to repeat herself because my other line was clicking again.

  This time it was Jason.

  My heart dropped.

  We hadn’t talked in months, and I really was not in the mood for whatever he was calling about. Without realizing what I was doing, I was on Facebook reading statuses until I got to Jason’s and it read: “I’m going going back back to Cali Cali.”

  “What the hey is this?” I thought.

  I commented on his status and typed “Really?”

  I heard some arguing coming from Jules’ bedroom and told Chelsea to hold on a minute.

  “Look here, bitch. I don’t care about what you talking about. I’m doing me and that ain’t got nothing to do with you. I don’t care, you raggedy ghetto ass bitch. I’m with a real woman now, so do what you gotta do. Have a nice life. Whatever. Yeah, whatever. Don’t call me no more!”

  I heard him throw his phone down and he stuck his head out.

  “We gotta talk after you get off the phone.”

  I replied softly and told Chelsea to continue.

  “I slipped up a time or two and it has caught up to me. Here I am pregnant and can’t fit into my dress. I got Kalena hysterical and the wedding is next weekend. I have messed things up.”

  “Girl, we’ll take that dress to my lady and see what she can do. She’s gonna need to add material to the dress or we’ll find a short jacket to cover the back of the dress since it won’t zip up all the way. No worries there, it’s autumn, so it won’t be hard to find one.”

  “Thank you Nee,” she sighed and started crying again. I told her to stop and breathe and promised that it was going to be ok. I wasn’t sure how, but we would figure it out.

  She took three deep breaths and said, “Journee, I really need to go lay down.”

  More waterworks. We said our goodbyes.

  I felt her pain. Thinking about my girl made me sad, but I couldn’t stop wondering who the daddy was since her and Greg had been off since before May. It was November now.

  She would be showing by now if it was him. She was creeping and I couldn’t wait to hear this story.

  I texted both Najah and Kalena, “do y’all know who the baby daddy is?”

  They both replied, “no.”

  Kalena texted, “do you know?”

  I said, “no.”

  Najah texted, “I think it’s Greg’s.”

  I texted her back. “Really? How?” I shouted to Jules to let him know I was ready to talk.

  He appeared in the living room in five minutes.

  When he walked in, I was texting “Ha! How you gone say that and don’t reply! LOL.”

  Jules had a look of trouble in his eyes. This couldn’t be good.

  “I ain’t never told the truth to a woman before. I’ve lied my way into things and out of them. But with you, it’s different, mama. I’m trying my hardest to keep you and it seems like life is always pulling me backwards when I try to step forward.”

  “I understand, baby, but what is it?”

  “Well, mama, my ex-girlfriend is four months pregnant. Not the chick that came over here but another one,” he said.

  “Another one?” I asked. “Ok, so not Lisa that came over here clownin’?”

  “No, not her. I would never let her get pregnant by me,” he said proudly.

  I rolled my eyes. “And it’s not the one who you just went to say it’s over to?
”

  “No not her.”

  Damn. But he got the goods, so such as life.