Chapter 8- Eshe
PAST
I didn’t cry until the day I laid back on that table at the abortion clinic.
The medicine they injected into my veins knocked me out cold.
I dreamed of a baby girl with his eyes and a soft halo of an afro.
She stared at me with so much love, I felt it in my bones.
I woke up sad—missing someone I never met. That sadness stayed with me for a year.
During that time, I stopped speaking to everyone except Granny.
Sinica moved to Atlanta after passing the Georgia bar.
She emailed me with the good news, never once asking anything about me.
That’s when it hit me—she never cared. She had always been the taker in our friendship, and I’d always been the one giving.
I deleted her email and blocked her address without a second thought.
Another year passed. The sadness came and went now. I got another job. Same as the last. Just a job.
Granny passed away on a Tuesday. Four days later, Sinica showed up at my door.
“I’m sorry, Eshe,” she said. “If I had known, I would’ve come for the funeral.” She pulled me into a hug, and I let her. I cried on her shoulder without meaning to.
It wasn’t until we pulled apart that I noticed the swell of her stomach. She was pregnant.
I managed a small, hollow smile. I told her I was happy for her, even though my heart sank. My daughter would’ve been walking by now. Maybe even talking.
Then I heard his voice. “Hey, Eshe.”
Just like that, I was angry. I raised my eyes and saw him step behind her, close. Too close. Donte looked good. Like money. He was wearing a high-end Armani suit, his beard was thick, lined perfectly. But his eyes... they were dull. I saw the guilt in them. The sadness.
Sinica looked guilty too—but she also looked happy. She was glowing.
“We have something to talk to you about,” she said.
“We?” I echoed, eyes darting between them.
She looked up at him, her eyes full of something intimate. Love. I knew that look. I used to look at him like that.
“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice ragged. I believed him. But it didn’t matter.
I slammed the door in both their faces. If I let them explain, I’d kill them. And I wasn't trying to go to prison over the two of them.
He came back three months later, talking like I owed him something. Said they’d run into each other at a conference. That he got drunk because she reminded him of me.
I laughed in his face. “I woke up, she was riding my dick,” he admitted, eyes low. “A month later, she showed up in Florida. Said she was pregnant. My mom was there. She talked me into taking responsibility.”
I stared at him like he was rotting in front of me. “Why didn’t you tell her to get an abortion like you told me?” I asked, venom thick on my tongue. Then I spit in his face. It ran down his cheek.
He clenched his jaw, wiped it clean with a handkerchief from his pocket, and kept talking like nothing happened. “I wouldn’t do that again,” he said. “It’s the worst thing I’ve ever done. If I could take it back, I would.” Tears streamed down his face. I smiled inside.
Right then, I decided I hated both of them. Her more than him. She knew he was mine. He was just a selfish coward.
When he reached for me, I didn’t think. I let my body take over.
I fucked him out of spite. Sucked his soul through his dick. Rode him until he couldn’t speak. Until he confessed he still loved me.
I didn’t say it back. I just rolled over and went to sleep.
I fucked him again the next morning. He didn’t go home. Sinica called his phone all night. It made me happy.
If I didn’t get a happily ever after, neither would she.
She called to apologize, and I lied. Told her I forgave them both.
Keep your enemies close, right?
A month later, she called to complain. “He’s never home,” she said. “I feel like I’m doing this pregnancy thing alone.”
“Sounds hard,” I replied, trying not to laugh.
“He’s been working a lot.”
“Maybe talk to him about it instead of me?”
“I will,” she said, pausing. “Thank you again, Eshe. For forgiving us. We never meant to hurt you.”
Donte was beside me in bed while she was complaining about him. Snoring softly. He was on vacation, and so was I. He’d given me twenty thousand dollars of their money so I could take two weeks off to be with him. Said he wanted to spend every second of his vacation with me. So I let him.
We fucked, watched TV, joked like it was old times. He believed the act. I didn’t.
Two weeks later, she had a miscarriage from stress. He came to my door crying. “The baby’s gone.”
I blocked the doorway with my body as the rain poured behind him. “The Lord gives and the Lord takes away,” I said coldly. “Maybe your baby and mine can keep each other company in heaven.”
He stumbled back like I’d slapped him. “That’s fucked up,” he growled.
“No more fucked up than what y’all did to me,” I snapped. “Maybe it’s karma.” Then I slammed the door in his face.
Sinica called over and over after that. I ignored her.
When she showed up, I put on a show. Cried real tears, made her believe I cared. I should’ve won a damn Oscar.
Life went downhill for Donte after that. He got passed over for partner at his firm. His mom got sick. She used her diagnosis to guilt him into proposing to Sinica.
When he told me, I threw a lamp at his head. “Get the fuck out. Don’t come back. I’m done. I’m moving on to a man who I ain’t gotta share.”
His fingers clamped around my jaw, just enough to hurt. He got all up in my face. “Don’t make me show you how serious I am about you being my life,” he said, voice low, vibrating with heat.
I yanked away so fast his grip slipped off my skin. My mouth twisted. “You don’t want to talk regret with me, Donte. I’ll hurt your fucking feelings with all the regrets you left me with.”
His expression flickered—hurt, anger, something else. Then he shrugged, careless and cold-like. He was an asshole. It just hurt less now.
“Okay. Whatever.” He scoffed. “Just know I only ever loved you. That shit gotta count for something.”
I lifted my middle finger. “It counts about this much.”
He didn’t leave. I shoved him hard as hell. He shoved me back.
I swung, hand colliding with the side of his head. His hand shot out, tangled in my dreads.
I growled, teeth flashing, and bit down on his tongue when he tried to kiss me. I tasted blood before he yanked away.
“The fuck, Eshe?” he cursed.
I didn’t stop there. I swung again, caught his lip, split it open. He stumbled back, hand pressed to his mouth, blood seeping through his fingers.
We stood there, breathing hard. Chests heaving. Room thick with rage and everything we’d never said.
He looked at me like I was unrecognizable. Like he’d finally seen the storm he built.
“This what we’ve come to?” he rasped. “You really hate me?”
I didn’t blink. “Yes.”
His shoulders dropped. He turned slowly. Each step toward the door sounded final. But he paused once—half in shadow, half in light—and looked back over his shoulder.
“Don’t call me when you regret this.”
“I won’t.”
I didn’t breathe until I heard the door close behind him. And even then, I didn’t cry.
Three days later, I let him back in. No questions. No apologies. No words about what happened. He showed up, I opened the door, and we fell back into each other like nothing broke— Because technically, we’d been cracked from the start.
But this time, I wasn’t in love.
I kept fucking with him because it felt like a win.
Because he paid my rent while she posted baby bump updates alone.
Because he wore the cologne I liked and she hated it. Every night he spent in my bed instead of hers, felt like checkmate. I didn’t want him back— I just didn’t want her to have him and they be happy.
It was petty. It was toxic. But it made me feel powerful...
Until their wedding day.
Because despite everything— He married her anyway.
Because he chose her.