by N'Tyse
“Chile, please. Sand ain’t rockin’ what he rockin’ or packin’ what he aint lackin’. Ha-ha.”
“Shun, you gon’ get me killed, I swear. You and your bright ideas.”
“You’ll thank me later, honey. Trust that.”
Ever since then, Vincent and I had been an item.
The waitress came over to our table with medium-size crystal glasses of water and warm white cloth napkins. I ordered the special of the night, and Vincent ordered some type of pasta entrée that he said the place was famous for. After we ate and talked a little about life and the things we both wanted out of it, Vincent waved to our server so that she would remove our plates. She smiled at me at least a hundred times before she made a secretive gesture at Vincent.
No more than a minute later, the band, which had been playing soft music, completely stopped, and the band members redirected their attention to the middle of the room, where we were sitting. I looked up to the second floor and saw crowds of people standing there, staring down at us, and those that I had seen outside earlier had now moved indoors. I was now looking all over the place, trying to figure out what was going on and why the music had stopped suddenly. The spotlight used for the band was now shining on me and Vincent. When I looked back up at Vincent, he had already positioned himself on the rug that was underneath our table, with one knee pointing down to the floor and the other facing ahead. He held a shiny silver ring, which I knew had to be platinum. It encased a large, beautiful oval-shaped diamond. I could not believe what I was seeing, and I damn sure couldn’t believe the size of that ring. I tried my best to hold back the tears that were starting to fall, but I failed. Vincent was now staring into my eyes, and I was staring into his. I had hoped for this moment to come, but I hadn’t expected it to come so soon.
“Rene, I love you. You are the best thing that has ever happened to me. You are the most beautiful woman I have ever laid eyes on. Your touch, your smile, everything about you, I admire. I would be the happiest man in the world right now if you promised me that I could wake up to your beautiful face every day of the week.”
I felt my heart skip a beat, and my bladder was calling for attention. Butterflies were floating in my stomach, and chill bumps had broken out. I just knew I was about to faint.
“Please, Rene, make me that happy man today.” He was now reaching for my left hand and still holding the ring in his right. “Rene, will you marry me?”
Everything became a blur. The tears that had welled in my eyes began streaming down my face, causing my mascara to run and my eyes to burn. Any problem that I had had before I walked through those double green doors had disappeared. He and about two hundred other people waited for my response. I was still trying to get a grip and catch my breath. The words that formed in my throat seemed to be stuck, leaving me speechless. After some motivation from the crowd, I was able to bring myself to utter a few words.
“Yes . . . yes, Vincent, I would be honored to be your wife. I will marry you.”
Everyone started clapping and yelling. Glasses were held up in the air, and so were bottles of expensive champagne. People were making toasts to us from afar. The spotlight had moved from our table to the dance floor, and everyone was cheering us on. Vincent and I stood up, and he guided me to the center of the floor. I remembered us dancing the night away, enjoying life, enjoying us.
* * *
Now Vincent watched as the pink plus sign on the test stick grew clearer. He was in shock as much as I was.
“When did we have time to make this baby?” he blurted out. “We hardly ever see each other.” He was smiling, all the while holding the end of the test stick. It was odd, but I was wondering the exact same thing. He started rubbing on my belly and massaging my back, enjoying the fact that he was about to be a father. Finally, I had an explanation for why I hadn’t had a period for two months.
Vincent took me by the hand, led me out of the bathroom and back into the living room. He removed my shoes, my jeans, and then started for my shirt. I lay down on the sofa, in disbelief, too exhausted to leave right away.
“Rene, talk to me, baby. What are you thinking about?”
It was clear that my mind had completely drifted off to some other place.
“Rene, I know this isn’t perfect timing, with our living situation and all, but we can work this out. I say we move the wedding date up.”
I looked at him like he had lost his mind. For one, I didn’t recall setting a date yet, and two, we couldn’t work shit out. I was not about to have this baby like this. I mean, I didn’t believe in abortions, but I was not quite ready for a child. We hadn’t had a chance to enjoy us yet. We were still young. We weren’t even officially married. He wanted to move the wedding date up, but I was in no rush. I wanted us to take our time getting to know each other a little more, even if that meant a long engagement. We hardly knew anything about each other. It was already bad that we had to see each other when my timing was convenient. And when I said our time together was limited, I was talking one day out of the week.
I could never call him from my home. That would get me busted for real. I hadn’t even volunteered my home phone number and prayed he wouldn’t ask for anything more than the cell number I had given him. Sand wasn’t having that shit. No way, nohow. She would be right to suspect something if a man had the nerve to call our house, where she paid all the bills, asking if they could talk to her woman. If you weren’t a bill collector or someone she knew, then you could hang it up. Even though she swore men didn’t intimidate her, I felt like deep inside they did. They possessed something she would never have. And when it was all said and done, she still bled out the pussy once a month, just like I did.
Vincent began caressing parts of my body that he knew would become aroused. I tried to fight it, but there was no use. He sucked on my neck and kissed me from head to toe. He slid his hand in my panties. I grabbed it, moved it back to his side.
“What’s wrong, Rene?” He was looking at me as if I had no say in what he was doing and as if he was mad that I had stopped him.
“I need to be going,” I said firmly. He had already got me in this predicament, and now I had to hurry home to sort this shit out.
“I know you have a sick grandma and all, but can’t you get somebody else to take care of her tonight?”
I looked at him and said no. I was one hell of an actor. I hated lying to him, but I had to—to save my ass and probably his too. I had him believing that I had a sick elderly grandmother who was suffering from Alzheimer’s and could remember only me. He thought that I took care of her every day of the week and that this was the reason why we were able to see each other only when it was suitable for me. I couldn’t bring myself to tell him the truth—that his loving soon-to-be wife was a well-known dyke on the other side of town, whose girlfriend was a popular butch. He would probably spaz the fuck out. Vincent was clearly homophobic. I had seen how he would look at the openly gay men who ate lunch together at some of the restaurants we would go to on his lunch break. “Come on. Let’s leave, Rene. Too many fags around here for me,” he’d once said.
I would never comment. I’d just follow him out the door, leaving behind an unfinished meal. So for that reason, he would never know about that part of my life, which I was trying so hard to escape from. I knew if I uttered the word gay, he would probably ball up in self-defense, praying that the shit wasn’t contagious. That word seemed to make men get all uptight and bent out of shape, as if their manhood were at risk.
Sand had once told me a story about a lesbian femme friend of hers named Ashonda. She’d said Ashonda went to high school with her and had plans to go to college and practice law. One day, Sand, Ashonda, and some of their friends went to a senior ditch party. They were the only sophomores there. They didn’t realize that there were only heterosexual people there until all the well-known thugs in the hood started rolling in. She told me that there were these two guys who kept bugging, trying to holler at Ashonda all night. She said Ashonda kept
turning them down politely, until they became aggressive. They started calling her out her name and saying shit to her just to get her mad. Ashonda got fed up and pulled out her GAY AND PROUD rainbow bracelet and said, “Look, nigga. I don’t do dick. I do pussy.”
Everybody in the place started laughing and making fun of them niggas, teasing them about being turned away from some pussy who preferred a pussy. They thought that Ashonda was trying to make fun of them and embarrass them in front of everybody, which was exactly what she did. They waited until she was driving home alone before they raped and killed her. Sand said Ashonda was on the six o’clock news the next morning. Her body was found covered with garbage in an alley.
That was why I was sometimes frightened to go to the gay clubs and attend the rallies and gay pride conventions. When Sand told me that story, it really shook my ass up something good.
I had a stack of lies on top of lies that I had told Vincent. I knew in my heart that I loved Sand, but I also had feelings for my fiancé. He was the man I wanted to be with. Our life together would be more acceptable and promising than mine and Sand’s, much more acceptable.
But I was not ready to be up front with Sand, either. She would probably ram my head through a brick wall, with her quick-ass temper. How mad she would be to find out that her gay lover also longed for dick. All those nights of lovemaking with her had played out. Sex with Sand was becoming too predictable. More than that, I was restricted from areas that I had never seen. Sand refused to engage in any type of position that called for her to be on the receiving end. Besides all that, I got tired of giving blow jobs to a toy that couldn’t respond with cum in my mouth. I admitted that I was a freak. That was what happened when you were kept in a little shell, protected from the world, never to experience anything or to be able to share experiences. That was what many years in a foster home could do to you. I wanted and needed so badly to be penetrated and touched by a man. My love nest ached to be pounded by something other than that black rubber dick that Sand strapped around her waist at night.
All this stayed in my mind during my drive back home. It was late, and I knew Sand was probably gon’ kick my ass. I unlocked the door and crept on in. I felt like a big-ass teenager sneaking in the house after being warned not to go out, the shit I saw the Huxtable kids do on TV. The hickey on my neck caught her attention. She was looking at me like she wanted to slap the taste right out of my mouth or knock my ass into the middle of next year. I lied through my teeth and told her I had been out running.
Yeah, I’d been running, all right. When I’d seen her walk around that corner as I was pulling up into the apartments, I’d dashed up those steps so fast, you would have thought I was Casper. All you would have seen was my white shirt. I also told her that a mosquito had bitten me. She believed me, I hoped. I couldn’t let her figure out what I was doing. We made love later that night. I was tired and had other things running through my mind, but she appeared to be hot and horny. I had to make love to her, or she really would have started putting two and two together. The shit was boring and tiring, but I managed to fake a couple of orgasms in the process.
When that was all said and done, she turned over and went to sleep. I slept next to her, rubbing my belly, trying to bond with my unborn child.
Rene
Today Vincent and I took our first trip to the doctor. It had been exactly one week and three days since I found out I was expecting. I was still in denial and couldn’t believe there was actually a baby growing inside of me. Vincent was so excited and was already talking about baby names. I had bigger problems on my mind, and they weren’t about trying to decide on a baby name.
Dr. Isaga told me that I was about ten to twelve weeks along, according to my last menstrual. I remembered missing my period for the past two months, but I had just thought that maybe it was from stress. Sand had been stressing lately, trying to get her club ready for opening, and on top of all that, she had found out that her mother had passed away. I knew Sand and her mother weren’t close, but I still did not feel like that was a good enough reason for Sand not to pay her respects at her mother’s funeral. As much as I had begged and pleaded with her, Sand still hadn’t gone. I had even told her I would go with her. Stubborn Sand—that was what I call her now—had still refused. So her stress and worry became mine. Every problem she faced, I had to hear about it.
“Is it a boy or girl?” Vincent was all up in the doctor’s face, walking with him side by side, asking him every question that floated off the tip of his tongue. I was sitting in the phlebotomist’s chair, about to give four tubes of blood. I closed my eyes and let her stick me for the fifth time.
“You have small veins,” she said. “But this one looks good.”
“Finally,” I mumbled under my breath. She had removed the long rubber band that she’d tied around my arm.
“There you go, Mrs. Montgomery. I’m all done.”
I quickly hopped out of that chair and walked back over to my doctor’s station. He was chatting with Vincent, the new proud dad.
“So, we will know if it’s a boy or a girl in about two more months?” Vincent asked.
“Vincent,” I said politely, trying to wave him away from the doctor, who had a room full of patients waiting to be seen. They looked like they were in more need to be seen than I was. One lady looked like she was about to go into labor at any minute. I grabbed Vincent by the arm. “Come on, honey. I’m finished.”
He looked at the bandages on my arm. “Ooh, you got a shot.”
“I had my blood drawn.”
“Same thing,” he said, laughing and teasing me.
I still couldn’t believe I was having a baby. Me, Rene Brown and soon-to-be Mrs. Montgomery, was about to have a baby. When we got back in the car, I predicted what would go down next.
“Rene, I think we should definitely move the wedding date up.” He was driving us back to his house.
“Vincent, how many times do we have to go over this? We can’t move the date up. I am still taking care of Grandma, and she needs me.”
“Rene, I need you. You are pregnant with my baby.”
“I know that. You think that I don’t?” I asked.
“You don’t act like it.”
“Honey, I need time to think things out. Everything is just happening a little too fast for me right now.”
“Rene, you agreed to marry me. You knew that sooner or later a baby was going to come into the picture. It just happened a little sooner than planned, so what is there to think about?”
“I need to make sure that we do things right. I don’t want us to rush into anything.”
“What rush? We’re having a child. This baby is not gonna wait for us to decide if we’re prepared for its arrival. I’m trying to do things right and to marry the woman that I love, who is now the mother of my unborn baby.”
I sat there and took in everything Vincent was saying, but still, I was not trying to hear the wedding bells just yet. I knew that things were about to get ugly, so I tried to prevent an argument by staying quiet, letting him do all the talking, like I did when Sand and I got into it.
He continued to fuss. “I can help you find someplace to put your grandmother, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
Listen to him. Someplace. If I did have an ill grandmother, and he spoke about her the way he had just spoken, we would be having it out for real. But since it was nothing but a made-up lie, it didn’t bother me much.
“We can put her in a nursing home,” Vincent continued. “There’s one around the corner from the house. That way, she will be close to home, and we can both go see after her every day.”
“Vincent, I am not putting my grandma in a nursing home, and that’s final. I really don’t want to hear anything else about it.”
He got quiet. Finally, he looked over at me and asked, “Are you mad?”
“No.”
“Do you love me?”
I was speechless, and no words left my lips. I pretende
d that I didn’t hear the question, but I knew he was going to ask it again.
“Rene, did you hear me?”
“Um . . . what? No, baby. I was thinking about names for the baby. If it’s a girl, do you like the name Mariah?” I had to flip the script and change the subject to avoid his question about love. Love didn’t have anything to do with this right now. If I based my life on who I loved, then I would never be able to leave Sand. That was who I loved. With her was where my heart was.
“Yes, I love that name. Like Mariah Carey, the singer.”
“Yes, that’s who I was thinking of when it came to mind. Little Mariah. She’ll have my long, thick hair, your blue eyes, and pretty, smooth light brown skin.”
“Yeah, she’s gonna be pretty like her mom,” he said.
I couldn’t do anything but blush.
“I hope she has your eyes, though,” he said as he put the Lincoln Navigator in park and reached over to kiss me. I kissed him back. People were watching us from outside, and they were smiling. I wasn’t used to that.
When we got out of the car, his neighbors were waving at us. I waved back, because these folks would soon be my neighbors as well. We walked into the house, and I kicked off my shoes and headed straight for the fridge. I picked up a half gallon of Minute Maid pineapple-orange juice and downed it until the carton was empty.
“Thirsty, are we?”
“Yeah. Very.”
He smiled and walked over to me. He kneeled down on the kitchen floor right where I was standing and laid his head on my stomach. “Rene, I need you. I really, really need you.”
I ran my fingers through his hair. Vincent was ready to share his life with me, but I wasn’t sure if I was ready to share mine with him. I still had unfinished business.
* * *
When I got back home, Sand was not there. I did remember her telling me that she had to meet with some connects, so I knew it would be late when she got home. This allowed me enough time to do what I needed to do without any interruptions from her.