A Rich Man's Baby. Daaimah S. Poole

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СКАЧАТЬ Jamil was finishing up the dishes, I went to pick up Kierra from day care. I usually left Kierra at summer camp until two minutes before the summer camp ended. Kierra was a piece of work. She was nothing like Alexis or Jamil. She required so much more attention and time. Or maybe I didn’t remember them because I was so young. At almost five years old, this little girl just asked too many questions. She was really smart and had been reading since she was three and had an unbelievable memory. I’d be at the store, asking myself what was I supposed to get, and she would say, “You need to buy eggs to make a cake for Miss Alberta’s birthday tomorrow.”

      Kierra was already waiting by the door when I walked in. I signed her out, and the first thing she asked was, “Mommy, where my daddy at?”

      “He still at his new house,” I said.

      “Why he got a new house, Mommy?” she asked, looking up at me with her father’s big eyes and fat cheeks. Her complexion was a blend of my mocha skin and her father’s honey complexion. Kierra’s hair was in a cluster of long braids decorated with barrettes at the tips.

      “He needed to have his own space,” I said, grabbing her book bag and opening the car door for her.

      “Why he need his own space, Mommy?” she asked as I fastened her in her booster chair.

      “He just do, Kierra. I’m going to call him for you.”

      I dialed his number and he picked up on the first ring. I passed her the telephone

      “Daddy,” she screamed into the telephone.

      I heard him say, “Hey, li’l mama. Daddy coming to see you tomorrow. Okay?”

      She passed the phone to me.

      “Yeah?” I answered.

      “Is it okay if I come over tomorrow to see the kids?”

      “I don’t care.”

      “Okay, I’ll be there around six. How you doing? You okay?”

      “Yeah, I’m fine. Here you go, Kierra,” I said as I gave the phone back to her. I wasn’t trying to have a conversation with him.

      Chapter 2

      Adrienne Sheppard

      The treadmill was boring me. I read Essence from front to back, and I still had fifteen more minutes. I opened the cap on my Aquafina bottle and took a mouthful. I was trying to make the best of my gym membership that I was paying thirty dollars a month for. But it was not easy to stay focused. I had plateaued at 148 pounds, which was a tight size eight for me. All I wanted was to be back at my size six, maybe even a four. I wanted to get another fifteen pounds off so bad I hired a personal trainer. His name was Kyle. He had me squatting and flexing for the last hour and a half. He was treating me like I was at boot camp, and he just didn’t know I was about to go AWOL. Sweat was pouring down my face and I was so tired, but I saw him approaching, so I sped up a little to actually make him think I was enjoying this body torture.

      “You’re doing good. How you feeling?” he asked, smiling as his muscles popped out of his red shirt and tight black pants.

      I never had a man just smile and have my body just want him. But I didn’t care what he said, this session was over. I took my curly black hair off my neck and pulled it up in a bun.

      “I feel good,” I lied.

      “Okay, I’ll see you this time tomorrow,” he said as he stopped the treadmill.

      “Yeah, I guess,” I said as I jumped off the treadmill.

      “You guess? Hold up. You trying to getting in shape, right?”

      “Yeah.”

      “Well, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

      From the gym I went past my mother Debbie’s house. I’d always lived with my mother and grandparents. My mother was fifty-two with dark roots and blond ends. She had a streak of red blush going up the side of her eggshell-colored cheek and was wearing cherry-colored lipstick. We didn’t even look like we were mother and daughter. I look like my dad’s side, and he is black. My complexion was cocoa-butter yellow, and I had long, black, thick hair. My mother’s hair was brown, short, and thin. I had family on my dad’s side, but they never really accepted me. My dad broke up with my mom when she was pregnant with me.

      Growing up, I was really lost. I didn’t really belong. People would put glue in my hair and hide my book bag. And I got it from black and white kids. I’d always had issues with my complexion and being biracial. I had a big nose and crazy untamed hair growing up. I was just an oddball. So I never made a lot of friends or brought anyone home. Kids at my school would say mean things to me like my mother was an albino elephant and ask me if I was adopted. I got into so many fights from first grade through high school. Somebody always wanted to fight me. I used to be so embarrassed when my mother came up to my school and tried to defend me, because she was white and very fat. Her legs used to be the size of boulders and squished together when she walked. She weighed about four hundred pounds and even needed a cane to get around. I loved my mom and I knew she was a good mom, but other kids didn’t see that. My mom and grandparents gave me a lot of love and attention, but that didn’t make me feel any better. So when my mom sat me down three years ago and said she was getting gastric bypass surgery, I was so excited. I knew it would be a new life for her and for me. I no longer would have to be ashamed of her. She lost two hundred pounds in two years, and got a new life and picked herself up a boyfriend. That’s why I knew I had to stay in the gym; it was in my genes to be fat.

      “Hey, Mom,” I said as I came through the door.

      She gave me a kiss on the cheek as she opened a can of Ensure for my grandfather. He was sitting in his recliner in the living room. My grandparents’ house was filled with decades-old furniture. Mostly wood and crazy burnt orange and green colors. She placed the drink in front of him and he pushed it to the side.

      “I don’t like the way it taste. I want some coffee.”

      “Pop, the doctor said you can’t have coffee. Drink this thing; you need to gain some weight.”

      He looked over at me and took a sip. Henry Sheppard was a stubborn-ass man. Even at eighty-two he didn’t listen to anyone. He was so skinny that his small wife-beater was hanging off his tiny body. My grandmother passed away eight years ago. My mom took care of my grandfather because he was in the beginning stages of Alzheimer’s.

      I sat and talked to my mother for a little while and left. I wanted to get home and take a nap and shower before it was time for me to go to work. I was a nurse at the University of Alton Hospital. I’d been there for two years. It wasn’t exactly what I’d expected. Sometimes I got tired of being around sick people; other times I felt more like a maid than a medical professional. I didn’t even really want to become a nurse, but I had to declare a major so I chose that. People were making good money, and I wanted to be assured of a job when I graduated. I worked my way through college and just stayed busy. I went to a community college; then I went to a nursing program at Jefferson University. I was working the four-to-twelve shift tonight. My schedule varied, and I did a lot of doubles. Sometimes it seemed like all I did was work. And when I wasn’t working, I was sleeping to get rested to go back to work. Sometimes I looked in the mirror and saw dark rings appearing under my eyes from lack of sleep. I thought СКАЧАТЬ