Chapter 8 Dominique ‘Dique’ Royal #2
I thought about how I grew up…. how Dom, O’Shynn, and me had always had each other, but nothing about our life was regular.
It was love in it, yeah, but there was also blood and business and street shit too early.
We learned quick that family meant loyalty before anything and it was always protection before peace.
Then I thought about Amour…. her little hands, her little laugh and the way she always reached for me now without hesitation.
The way she beamed whenever I showed up.
The way she looked happiest when both me and Keondra were in the same room acting right for once.
Then I thought about Keondra too and that was where it got complicated because for all the chaos we had between us, she wasn’t wrong.
I had been giving her pieces and expecting her to be grateful for crumbs.
I was coming around when I wanted to, sleeping with her sometimes and then acting like it didn’t mean nothing because I was too used to freedom and too comfortable with things staying unfinished.
In all reality she was always just a trick for me, she was never my girl, and a baby came out of it.
Still, how I was moving probably wasn’t fair and the truth is I didn’t really like admitting to myself was that I did like being around them.
I liked this, the park, the food dates and the way Amour kept leaning into my arm while she colored.
Even Keondra fussing at me felt familiar in a way I was starting to want more of.
but wanting something and being built for it wasn’t always the same.
“You quiet,” Keondra said realizing I wasn’t saying shit.
“Because I’m thinking.” I told her looking dead in her eyes.
“About what?”
I looked at her again, really looked at her. “About if I know how to do that shit right.”
She blinked. “Do what?”
“Family,” I said. “The real kind.” For once she didn’t snap back with a joke or attitude.
She just looked at me like she hadn’t expected honesty from me today since I was always bullshitting.
I rubbed my hand over my chin and exhaled.
“I know how to provide, I know how to protect, I know how to show up when it counts, but all that other shit? The everyday shit? The staying? The consistency? I ain’t never really had to do that with a woman. ”
Keondra’s face softened a little bit. “You could learn.”
“Maybe.”
“No,” she said, and there was just enough attitude back in her voice to sound like herself again. “Not maybe… you could.”
Amour looked up at both of us then and held up her crayon drawing. “Look. I drawed us.”
I took the paper from her and looked at it. This shit was terrible. It was three stick figures holding hands and one big yellow sun in the corner, but she had us all there. It was me, her, and Keondra… and for some reason that shit hit me almost as hard as what Keondra said.
“Aight,” I said in a lower tone, still looking at the drawing. “I hear you.”
Keondra didn’t respond right away, but I could feel her watching me across the table, trying to decide if that meant something or if it was just another one of my half-answers.
Maybe I didn’t know yet either, but for the first time, I was actually thinking about it long and hard instead of brushing it off… and that had to mean something.
After we left the food spot, we took Amour to get ice cream because apparently chicken strips, fries, and juice still wasn’t enough food for her little body. By the time I dropped them back off at Keondra place, the sun had already started going down.
Amour was half asleep on my shoulder when I carried her inside.
Her little arms were wrapped around my neck and every now and then she would mumble something in her sleep that ain’t make no sense.
Keondra had already walked ahead of us to unlock the door although I had a key, and I followed her inside the house while she turned on lights.
I laid Amour down in her bed and stood there for a second looking at her.
She had one sock halfway off, ice cream on the side of her mouth, and her little doll tucked under her arm.
“She gone be knocked out for the rest of the night,” Keondra said from the doorway.
“Good. She wore me the fuck out.”
“You act like you wasn’t having fun.” She smiled.
I looked over at her. “I never said I wasn’t.”
She leaned against the doorframe with her arms folded over her chest and just looked at me for a second. She was the type of female a man ended up staying around too long without meaning to cause she was fine as hell.
“I’m serious about what I said earlier,” she reminded me.
I knew she was. “I know, that’s why I ain’t joke about it.”
She nodded and for a second it felt like maybe she was waiting for me to say more.
Maybe I was supposed to, maybe I was supposed to walk over there, grab her face, kiss her, tell her I was ready to play house and be a family man…
but I didn’t and not because I didn’t want to.
I wasn’t gon’ sit there and lie to her when I was still trying to figure out what the fuck I wanted myself.
So instead, I walked over, kissed the top of her head, and headed toward the door.
“I’ll call you later,” I told her.
She looked up at me. “You better.”
“I said I would, didn’t I?”
“You say a lot of shit.”
I laughed and opened the door. “Aight,” I said. “I’m gone.”
By the time I got back in the truck, I made sure the shadows were still in their places.
The sky was dark and my body felt tired in that good kind of way cause it was better being outside with my baby all day than being in meetings, shootouts, or some other bullshit.
I sat there for a second before pulling off, and just as I turned out the apartment complex, my phone rang through the truck speakers.
It was this chick named Tatiana and I shook my head.
I hit the button on the steering wheel. “What’s up?”
“What’s up?” she repeated, already sounding irritated. “That’s how you answer the phone?”
I pulled out into traffic. “Tatiana, I had a long day. What happened?”
“What happened is I ain’t seen you in almost two weeks.” She snapped.
I rubbed my forehead with one hand. “That’s ain’t true. I just seen yo’ pickle head ass.”
“It is true!”
“It’s been like… eight days.” I told her being funny.
“Oh, okay,” she snapped. “So, because it’s eight days instead of two weeks, that make it better?” She was in her feelings, and I couldn’t help but laugh a little. “You laughing?”
“I’m trying not to.”
“You know what, Dique, you always do this,” she said. “You disappear, then pop back up whenever you want like I’m supposed to just be sitting around waiting.”
I switched lanes and looked over at the car beside me. “You not sittin’ around waitin’.”
“How you know?”
“Because you too damn fine to be sittin’ around waitin’.”
That made pause and then she sucked her teeth. “See, there you go thinking you can flirt your way out of everything.”
“I’m not flirtin’.”
“You are flirting.”
“I’m telling the truth. The fuck you want me to say crazy ass girl.” I stopped at a red light long enough to light my joint.
She sighed loud into the phone. “So when I’m gone see you then?”
I already knew where this conversation was headed and I also already knew I wasn’t in the mood for it. “I don’t know yet,” I said honestly.
“You always don’t know.”
“That’s because I be busy.” I hit the joint and exhaled the smoke around me.
“With what?”
I laughed again because I couldn’t exactly say, Oh you know, shootouts, cartel business, my pregnant sister-in-law getting shot at, deciding whether I want to be a family man. “Life,” I said instead chuckling to myself.
“Life my ass,” she hissed. “You probably with another female right now.”
“Nah.”
“You hesitated.”
“I didn’t.” I replied dry.
“You definitely did.”
I shook my head. “See, this why I don’t answer the phone.”
“Boy fuck you.”
“Now why it gotta be all that?” Truth was she wanted to fuck me and was mad she wasn’t getting her way… she wanted some if daddy’s dick.
“Because you annoying.”
“You still like me though.”
“Barely.”
I grinned a little to myself because she sounded just irritated enough to still be interested.
Females like Tatiana always liked a little drama and a little chase with confusion.
That was fun when you was in the mood for it.
Right now though? I wasn’t. Because the whole time she was talking, all I kept thinking about was Keondra asking me for a real family.
That was the problem… once a woman says some real shit to you, all the other shit start sounding a little hollower.
“You know what,” Tatiana said after a second, “I’m done calling you.”
“You say that dumb shit every time.”
“No, I’m serious this time.”
“Yeah, aight.”
“I am.”
“Aight,” I said. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
She got quiet. Then she laughed because she knew I was right. “You so full of shit,” she said.
“And you still gone answer.”
“Probably.”
I smiled to myself and ended the call after that.
I turned T.I’s new track all the way up and finished my joint as I drove for a while without really thinking about where I was going until I realized I was already headed toward my parents’ house.
That’s where I needed to be anyway because when life started lifeing, that was still one of the only places that ever-made sense to me.
I needed real food too, not takeout, not no club food, and not some expensive chef-made shit.
I needed the kind of food that came with the perfect seasoning, and old music playing in the background, and somebody yelling at you to wash your hands before you touch anything.
I needed that food that could only come from ma dukes and maybe, if I was lucky, I’d get a little advice too because for the first time in a long time, I was really stuck with the thought of settling down and that shit was scarier than anything I’d ever been through in life.