A Rich Man's Baby. Daaimah S. Poole

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      My shift was almost over and thank God. The balls of my feet were hurting from standing up all day. I looked down at my watch. I had only a half hour more of this shit, I thought as I heard the nurse call button ping. I didn’t even have to look to see who it was. It was room 807 again. It was the third time they had pulled that damn cord. The bad thing was, it wasn’t even my patient who was asking for stuff. It was his annoying friends. There were four people by his bed at all times. But what did I expect? It never failed; people always wanted to bother me when I was trying to leave. The only reason I didn’t cuss 807 out was that the patient was an eighteen-year-old kid. He was accidentally shot in his knee. So I felt so sorry for him.

      “Yes, how can I help you?” I asked as I entered the room.

      “Can my man get some medicine?” the patient’s friend asked.

      He had braids going to his back and was wearing a black T-shirt and very long, loose-fitting shorts. He had his made-in-China silver chain hanging over his chest. I read his chart and went to go get him his medicine. When I returned, the same boy was still trying to flirt with me. I pulled the separator so the sixty-something man next to him could get some privacy.

      The young man slid the separator back, and I tried not to laugh in his face when he said, “I like you. You pretty.”

      I said thanks and ignored him.

      Then, before I got all the way out of the room, he said, “I wanted to ask you if I can take you out.”

      “No, thank you.”

      “I’m not eighteen like him; I’m twenty one.”

      “Thanks, but no, thanks.”

      “What, you like doctors? I got just as much as money as any of them do,” he said as he reached in his pocket and pulled out a stack of twenties.

      His friend yelled out, “Man, she don’t want you.”

      And he was right. I was not that desperate yet.

      After work, I couldn’t wait to get home. On the way there, my mother asked me if I could watch my grandfather for her. I didn’t have anything to do. I was off for the next few days. She could leave him home by himself, but he might not be there when she returned. Last summer, he went missing for eight hours. My mom sat him out on the porch to get air, and he took a two-hour walk downtown. They finally found him on a park bench, and he couldn’t remember his name or where he lived.

      “What’s up, Pops?” I asked as I entered the house.

      He gave me his usual unchanged glance and turned his attention back to the television. All he ever did was watch television. Every now and then, he would ask me a question like, “What year is it, Adrienne?”

      I’d answer him. And then he’d wait ten minutes and ask me the same question. Then other nights he’d talk about when he met my grandmother or when he was a boy.

      My mother whizzed past me, trying to put her shoes on while walking out the door. She said she would be back soon and left for her date. I poured myself iced tea and asked “Pops, you want anything?”

      He shook his head no.

      I then kicked my shoes off and stretched out. I sat in the lounge chair on the opposite end of the room from him and closed my eyes. I wished for a better life and placed my jacket over me and got comfortable. I was home on Friday night with my pops. This was not how I envisioned spending my twenties.