by Candice Dow
She raised her glass and said, “To being happy.”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
We both took a couple of sips before either of us tasted our food. Finally, I was the brave one to taste it first. I put a piece of the chicken and a forkful of pasta in my mouth. My face immediately turned up. It didn’t taste as good as it did the last time, but for the sake of her feelings I was going to stomach it. She smiled at me suspiciously and then she started laughing.
“It’s not good?”
“It’s okay,” I said, struggling to chew the overcooked, unseasoned chicken.
“You don’t have to lie.”
“I’m not lying. It’s okay.”
She tasted her food and pouted slightly. She chewed and her face crunched up like it was sour. She shook her head. “It’s not good. You don’t have to eat it if you don’t want to.” Then she laughed slightly, like she was embarrassed, and I started laughing, too. She said, “Let’s just eat the bread and wine.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
Taylor and I tossed our plates. I was just happy she was confident enough to admit the food was horrible. I didn’t rub it in. Instead, we ate the whole loaf of garlic bread and drank wine. After we were done, I suggested we go relax. She pulled a box of strawberries from the refrigerator and picked up the wine bottle, and we headed up to our bedroom.
She sat on the bed and began to take off her clothes, and I stared at her. She smiled at me and she took the bottle of wine and poured some in between her breasts. I walked over to her and began licking her and massaging her breasts. She rubbed my head seductively. I grabbed the bottle from her and lay her down. Then I poured more on her and grabbed a strawberry. As I tickled one nipple with the top of the strawberry, I swallowed a mouthful of the other. Taylor squirmed and tried to take my sweater off. I stood at the edge of the bed, quickly stepped out of my pants, and pulled my sweater over my head. I grabbed another strawberry and traced up and down the middle of her stomach with it. I carefully grazed her vagina with the strawberry and put her juices in my mouth, while she stroked my dick vigorously. I wanted to put it in her so bad, but I wanted to make her feel good. I spread her legs apart and plunged my tongue into her entrance. She clamped on to my shoulders and made sweet sounds. My hands pressed into her flat stomach, so that I could taste all of her. She was so wet. I had to feel her, and she summoned me to put it in. I climbed on the bed and entered her. She stared at me intensely as I went deep inside. She moaned and rubbed my back passionately as I stroked her. She sucked on my neck and I turned her face to kiss me. She told me how good I made her feel and I stroked harder. She yelled my name and I held her tightly, pumping faster until I came all in her. She sighed, “I love you, Devin.”
I rolled over beside her and said, “I love you, too, TJ.”
My eyes felt heavy and my body was sedated. She began to talk, but I floated in and out of consciousness, so I really wasn’t listening. As I lay there feeling high from her lovemaking, I relished in that although she wasn’t the greatest in the kitchen, she had mastered the bedroom. The trade-off was worth it.
4
CLARK
My period always arrived approximately four days before the doctor’s appointment. When it hadn’t, I was partially excited, but I didn’t want to start rejoicing and be disappointed. I kept it under wraps until we went to the hospital. Kenneth and I sat hand in hand in doctor’s office. Our nurse came in and told me to climb on the table and take my clothes off. I was nervous because I couldn’t lie there and stomach hearing bad news. My heart was racing by the time the doctor entered and greeted us with his signature greeting: “Hey, kids. How’s it going?”
He told me what he was going to do and inserted the probe in me. The nurse pursed her pale pink lips, flicked her midlength blond hair behind her ear, and smiled as she hovered over me. When her bubbly grin finally broke through, it was confirmed. She nodded. “It took; you’re pregnant.”
I looked at Kenneth and covered my face. “Oh my God! Finally.”
Dr. Battle took off his rubber gloves and told me he’d come back after I dressed to answer questions. This was our first positive in five years of trying. I wanted to jump up and down and shout for joy, but I lay there stunned. As I tossed and turned in bed the night before, I concluded that there were other ways to enjoy life aside from raising kids. Thirty-four is the age when your chances decrease, but obviously for me it was the age of fertility.
I noticed a tear in Kenneth’s eye, which brought me to tears. He lifted his black frame glasses and rubbed his eye. He licked his dehydrated lips and smiled. “See, baby, I told you when it was our time.”
“Your first pregnancy, right?” the nurse asked, bobbing her head side to side while she cleaned up behind the doctor.
My eyes shifted and I sat up on the table as I nervously said, “Yes.”
She flipped through the charts. A dingy frown appeared on her face. “So why does it say here, one prior pregnancy?”
Her blue eyes circled as I tried to explain to her with my eyes that the pregnancy she was referring to was a secret. My doctor knew about it, but I’d never told Kenneth. He was against abortions and he’d probably preach to me the whole concept of the universe’s laws of karma. I’d already beaten myself up about it in the privacy of my own mind, damn if I needed someone else’s conviction. I had enough to cope with—the strains on my marriage, my pockets, and my body. I didn’t need judgment, but this airhead had put me in a terrible situation. She was supposed to leave when the doctor left. Why was she still in the room, stirring up drama?
Kenneth glanced at my uncomfortable expression and his thick eyebrows gathered. My heart plunged and a lump sat in my throat. Finally, I said, “I don’t know.”
“Hmmm. Let me go talk to Dr. Battle.”
He could read me, and when the nurse left the room, I didn’t even want to look in his direction. I quickly jumped off the table and stepped into my jeans. From the corner of my eye, I noticed his thumbs twirling in his lap. He huffed uncomfortably as he adjusted his black pants. “That’s strange.”
“Yeah, I know,” I said, still staring at the degrees on the opposite wall while buttoning my shirt.
I wanted Dr. Battle to hurry up and clean this up. He was aware of the pregnancy and the fact that my husband knew nothing about it. It wasn’t pertinent information as far as Dr. Battle was concerned, though. He’d explained to me early on that because of my condition, I probably wouldn’t have even carried that baby to term. He’d lifted that burden from me a long time ago, and now some dumb-ass nurse had brought it back to surface.
I sat stiffly beside Kenneth, and it felt like an eternity before the doctor came in the room. The excitement we should have been feeling was clouded with confusion. Kenneth sat there wondering what the nurse was talking about, and I sat there thinking, This is some bullshit.
Finally, Dr. Battle bopped back in, his white coat swishing from side to side. He was clearly happy that he’d successfully impregnated me. “We did it!”
He stood there as if awaiting a high five, and Kenneth said, “Thanks. I’m very happy.”
Dr. Battle ran his fingers through his thick, curly brunet hair and sat down. Looking at my chart, he fiddled with his wire-framed glasses. He began discussing what I should and shouldn’t be doing. I nodded and began to feel slightly anxious. In my mind, I saw this going differently. I thought I’d be crying and snotting, yet all I could think of was that stupid nurse and prayed that Kenneth brushed it under the rug. We just had to get out of this office fast. I nodded a lot and didn’t ask many questions. Kenneth touched my leg. “Baby, you sure you don’t have any more questions?”
I folded my lips and forced a stiff smile and nodded. Dr. Battle raised his eyebrows. Let’s just go. Kenneth said, “Well, actually, I do.” He pointed to the folder on Dr. Battle’s desk. “Your nurse claims there was a prior pregnancy. Is that correct? Is it possible we had an incident like you told us before where we miscarri
ed and didn’t know?”
Dr. Battle looked at me and quickly composed himself. “I doubt it. It’s probably just a mistype.”
Kenneth said, “Oh, okay. Just making sure.”
“I understand.”
When we left the office, I planned to write Dr. Battle a letter explaining that he needed to train his staff that everything is not an open topic when couples are in the room. That could have been disastrous. When we got to the front desk, the nurse gave me a prescription for prenatal vitamins and a bag of maternity magazines and samples. As she explained what everything was, I just wanted to run. I felt like a thief in a hurry to leave the crime scene. Kenneth stood there waiting for me, with his thick eyebrows gathered together. Finally, we left. Out in the hall, I excitedly grabbed his hand. “Kenneth, we did it! I’m so happy.”
“It’s funny. I couldn’t tell.”
“I just didn’t want them to come in there and say, sike, we’re joking.”
He smiled and said, “And why would you think they would do something so cruel?”
“I don’t know, maybe I was just surprised. I mean, pleasantly surprised. Stunned. I don’t know, but it doesn’t matter. All that matters now is that we’re pregnant, finally,” I said, leaning my head on his arm.
“Exactly.”
We walked out of the building, and despite it being the end of October, the sun was beaming on us, offering us its blessings. I wondered if we should wait until we were out of the danger zone, which is typically after fourteen weeks, to share the news, but I couldn’t. After all these years, all the not-this-time phone calls, I would be cruel to keep my cheerleading squad in the dark. First, I called my mother.
“Ma, guess what!”
She gasped. “Clark, oh my God, what?”
“Why you say, ‘Oh my God’?” I said, laughing, because she obviously knew what I was about to say but didn’t want to hurt my feelings if it wasn’t what she wanted it to be.
“Just tell me. I’m not good at guessing.”
“It worked. I’m pregnant.”
She squealed. “Oh baby, my baby.”
I could hear her crying, and for the first time since the nurse said positive, I got overwhelmed.
“Nobody deserves this more than you. I have waited so long for this.”
She cried in my ear, and tears streamed rapidly down my face. “Thank you, Ma. Thank you so much.”
“You know everything has its season. It’s your season.”
“You’re right, Ma.”
My brother has three kids, two by Tanisha and one by his ex-wife. Despite all those grandkids to love, my mother still couldn’t wait to see her own daughter give birth. It was like it was a rite of passage that somehow defined my womanhood. She sniffed on the other end, and I said, “A’ight, Ma. You’re getting me all emotional. Let me go.”
Then I called my second mother slash best friend slash assistant director for my group home, Ms. Teeny. When she picked up, she was blasting one of those teenage hip-hop songs in the background. She swears you have to listen to hip-hop to relate to the kids, but it seems like she gets more of an adrenaline rush than the kids.
“Ms. Teeny, turn that music down.”
“Girl, that’s my song. What’s going on?” she asked, and finally there was silence in the background.
“Somebody’s pregnant.”
“Those fast-ass little girls, lawd, they gonna kill me.”
“Ms. Teeny!” I snapped.
“What?” she asked, and I imagined she was rolling her eyes.
“I’m pregnant. We had the ultrasound today, and I’m going to have a baby.”
“Aw!” she yelled, half-laughing. “Aw! Lawd, you have given this girl what she wanted. Oh my God, Kenneth is probably doing cartwheels.”
I looked over at him as he drove with a pleasant expression and nodded. “He’s very happy.”
“Happy? He better be doing damn cartwheels.”
Ms. Teeny knew Kenneth before she knew me. She worked for him for several years as the juvenile event coordinator, and they were really close. So she often talked to Kenneth like she was his mother, too. But clearly, over the years, her dedication had shifted more to me.
I looked at Kenneth. “Ms. Teeny said you need to be doing cartwheels.”
“My heart is doing cartwheels. Is that good enough?”
I relayed the message, and she said, “He always has to be so damn serious. Tell him to loosen up his belt strap.”
I looked over at him with his shirt tucked neatly in his pants and his black leather belt pulled tightly and laughed to myself. I dared not tell him what she said, or we’d receive a long lecture on why a man shouldn’t get too chatty with his wife and friends. He claims women lose respect for you when you chitchat with them. Whatever. I wasn’t in the mood for that. I just wanted to celebrate. Ms. Teeny and I talked a few minutes more before hanging up.
Kenneth and I headed to lunch at Baja Fresh. That had become one of our favorite cheap escapes. We both ordered steak quesadillas and sat at a bar top table. He said grace and when he finished, I looked up and he was staring at me strangely. I smiled. “What’s up?”
He said, “I think you were pregnant before.”
My eyes bugged out of my head and my sweat glands expanded. I felt moistness on my nose, my forehead, and under my arms.
“I think they made a mistake. Did you notice how strangely they acted? I feel like we need to get a copy of your medical records.”
“Baby, it doesn’t matter. We’re expecting now.”
“It does matter when we’re paying for this out of our pocket.”
The reason we selected Dr. Battle was because he offers a 10 percent discount on the cost of the transfer following a miscarriage, I assume as a type of consolation. I shifted uncomfortably, because I’d always been the one to question whether they would let us know if we miscarried before the actual ultrasound testing, or even if they could. As I sat there wondering how I was going to flip this around, I huffed, “That’s absurd. Every time, I came on my period before the doctor’s visit. No cramps or anything. There is no way they could have made a mistake.”
“We should at least be willing to make sure.”
“Should we really? Let’s just be thankful that I’m pregnant now.”
“I think we should still look into it.”
Kenneth had a keen sense of discernment. It came primarily from studying people, and it had its pros and cons. Times like this, I hated it and partially hated him for feeling the need to get to the bottom of everything. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but he knew there was something fishy going on. Several times over the course of a few hours, he brought it up. The way the nurse looked. The way the doctor looked to the left when he spoke. He insisted, “Clark, they were lying.”
If I didn’t confront it now, this topic would plague me for the rest of my pregnancy. I wanted to be happy and thankful. I didn’t want my pregnancy to be filled with guilt and suspicion. This was a secret that Tanisha and I shared. She took it to her grave, and now I carried the burden alone. I had never uttered a word to anyone else, except medical professionals. I looked him in the eye and unemotionally said, “Kenneth, I was pregnant almost eleven years ago and I got an abortion. Dr. Battle knows about that, so it’s probably in my records.”
He looked like I’d shot him with a cannonball as his chest slightly sank. He didn’t know what to say. So I continued, “I got pregnant right before Devin went to law school and I didn’t want him not to go because of the baby. So, I got an abortion. Tanisha went with me and she’s the only person that knew. I never even told Devin.”
“Why were you so pressed to hide it?
“I wasn’t at peace with it when I did it. And I’ve never really come to peace with it, and it just got worse when we started trying and I couldn’t get pregnant. All I could think was, I shoulda kept my baby.”
“So how was that possible without any fertility drugs?”
I sh
rugged. “Dr. Battle claims that I probably would have had a miscarriage anyway.”
“Yeah, probably.”
“Yeah, and for some people, PCOS gets worse with age.”
“Yeah, well. I guess if you were smart, you would have kept your baby and you and Devin would be in marital bliss right now,” he said sarcastically.
I took a deep breath and rested my chin in the palm of my hand with my elbow on the table. I stared out the glass window into the woods. The leaves had completely fallen from the trees. The wind blew them around, causing them to make sweeping sounds on the ground. I thought it would make me feel better finally telling someone else, but I felt worse, like I wanted to be gone with the wind, too. For the first time in a long time, Kenneth’s arrogance forced me to fantasize about marital bliss with Devin Patterson.
5
DEVIN
Congressman Grayford announced he wouldn’t be running for another term just two short weeks before the December application deadline. Thankfully, I had stayed in the mix, in the school system, developing my foreign-relations experience through Love My People. My name was relatively popular on the Maryland political scene. My parents had pledged up to a million dollars for the campaign, and Congressman Grayford had made it nearly impossible for anyone else to jump on this opportunity. In fact, he gave me a personal phone call after his announcement.
“Son,” he said, “I’ve held this seat for a long time. I’m passing the torch.”
“Thank you,” I said.
Despite my gratitude, I struggled internally. Taylor was really against this so soon in our marriage. I now had two weeks to get my mind right. I started not to accept the challenge, but then who would represent my people? It was one of those things that I’d set up my entire life for, to run for Congress. Why did I suddenly have cold feet? Or was it Taylor’s voice in my ear?
My head was spinning as I watched Taylor prepare for work. I wanted to tell her my plans, but I had a meeting planned for noon in DC with Curtis Thorpe, the president of the Young Democrats of Maryland, Congressman Grayford, and a few other political move makers. They were expecting to strategize my campaign and I hadn’t even gotten an okay from my wife. I left the house shortly after to escape to my bachelor pad so I could clear my head and think like a single man.