Mahogany #3
If it came back positive, I would have a child that wasn’t Duke’s.
Whew. That was crazy. Mind blowing crazy.
My life would look so different. Hell, without the baby my life looked completely different.
He was no longer a part of it. Duke. We didn’t talk at all.
He rarely even came in the house when he picked the kids up.
All communication was done with the kids in the middle.
That was insane to me, considering I spent more than half my life with him as a constant.
After I finished, I shook the test off and sat it on the floor between my feet.
With my arms crossed, resting on my knees, I stared down at it.
I couldn’t look away. I wouldn’t look away.
I kept my eyes centered on the little windows that would house results that would determine the rest of my life.
My heart raced. So hard that I could hear it in my ears.
It didn’t take long for the results to load up. As I stared down at it, it felt like all of the air in my body was sucked out of me.
Positive.
I was pregnant.
Because I needed a false positive, I jumped up from the toilet and headed to the kitchen for a glass of water to refill my bladder. I drank the water, repeated the process and got the same result.
Shit.
Shit.
Shit.
My mind raced. I paced back and forth, hands on my head thinking about what this meant. I’d only been divorced for a year. You know how many people were going to talk shit once word got out if I decided to keep it? You know what Eve was going to say?
My mother was going to call me all kinds of heathens.
She was going to talk shit amongst her church friends and…
Then it didn’t matter. I snapped out of it.
Placing my hands flat on the his and hers sink, I stared up at the mirror.
What the fuck was I doing? I wasn’t that person anymore.
I didn’t care about what people thought.
I huffed, hung my head a bit and shook it from side to side.
That was a lie. I still cared. I’d be lying if I said I walked around carefree, not giving a damn about what people thought about me.
It took a minute, but I realized that was okay.
I was human. That was a human thing. And if it wasn’t a human thing, it was a Mahogany thing.
The difference between now and before was I didn’t let what people thought dictate my actions anymore.
I marched to the beat of my own drum, regardless of what they had to say.
I didn’t put on a facade to get approval.
I didn’t make decisions based on what anyone thought besides myself.
What my momma or anyone else would say didn’t matter.
I had gone no contact with my momma. I’d be lying if I said it was hard to do.
It was quite easy. I made the decision after the day at Sienna’s when I told her what was going on between Duke and me.
She tried to call me a couple of times after that, but every call went to voicemail.
After she sent me a long text message about honoring my vows, and abiding by God’s will, I blocked her.
My father called and tried to be a mediator, but I shut that shit down immediately.
After pouring my heart out to him about the pain and damage my momma caused, he stopped facilitating for her and let it go.
He saw where I was coming from. Especially with the Duke situation and how she handled it.
My dad was and always would be Team Pickles.
I understood how short life was and how she could die any day, but you know what? I made peace with that. I accepted that Eve could die at any moment and I wouldn’t be able to get time back. It might’ve been harsh to say, but I didn’t care. I was in a better place without her in my life, sadly.
My sisters wouldn’t care if I was pregnant.
They would be surprised, of course. But they would support me because they supported everything I did.
Plus, they liked Crescent. Aside from the little introduction at the bar, they didn’t know him.
But they knew a lot about him. I talked to them about him all of the time.
Like a teenage girl with a big crush on a boy.
Every time I talked about him to them, they smiled.
Sometimes they mentioned how much happier I seemed, too. They were happy I’d moved on from Duke.
Then I thought about the kids.
Oh God.
This would just be another thing for them to have to adjust to.
My hands grew clammy and I bit my bottom lip. I felt sick to my stomach, thinking about telling them. If anything pushed me to get an abortion it would be that.
I looked over at the positive pregnancy tests and shook my head. Pregnant. Fucking pregnant.
“What are you going to do, Mahogany?” I asked, staring into the mirror.
For now, I was doing nothing. I needed to tell him, but I decided I’d wait. He’d just asked me to be his girlfriend. I didn’t want to ruin the mood with this.
Taking a deep breath, I turned and opened the door. When I went to walk out, I damn near collided with Crescent’s chest.
“What are you going to do about what?” He asked, staring down at me.
I pulled my lips into my mouth and looked away. “Um.”
He cupped my chin and turned my head to face him. With raised brows, his eye contact deepened. “Transparency.”
At the beginning of us, I was so private.
I kept all of my thoughts bottled up. But these days, I was transparent.
One day we were laying together, and I was, as always, in my head thinking about the future and he pulled my attention away from it.
He asked me to be transparent with him. Said he didn’t need to know every little thing, but when I went quiet and drifted it made him a little nervous.
I gave the man PTSD. So, from that day forward I promised to be open with him.
“I um…” I looked down, shook my head and then looked back up at him.
“Crescent… I’m pregnant.” Before he could say anything, I jumped right in, trying to get ahead of his rejection before he had a chance to mention the abortion.
“I know you don’t want a baby. I was already thinking about aborting it. I don’t—”
“What?” He said, his tone dripping with confusion.
“I know you don’t want a baby. I’m sorry—I—”
He cupped my face, kissed me on the lips and said, “Take a deep breath.”
I listened. I took a shaky deep breath, with my eyes locked on his. He brushed the pad of his thumb over my cheek and pressed his lips against my forehead. We stood there for a second, in silence.
He took a deep breath and finally said, “I don’t want you to get an abortion, Mo. But… the choice… it’s yours.”
“You don’t want me to get an abortion?” I asked, caught off guard.
He pulled away from the embrace and looked down at me with this baffled look.
“Hell naw I don’t.” He paused. “I’ll keep it a buck with you though…
after Nova I said I wouldn’t have any more kids.
She was my one and done. But that was before you.
Before us. I want whatever comes from you.
You hear me? I want whatever comes with you, too.
” He paused again and placed his hand on my flat belly.
“I don’t want you to get rid of my seed.
But if you feel like a baby right now is too much for you to carry, do what’s best for you.
Just know… if you decide to keep it, you won’t have to worry about shit.
I’m all in. In every single way. You won’t have to lift a finger, for real.
I’m prepared to hire the best help. All around.
At Couture, at your crib with your kids, during the pregnancy with this one.
In every single way, Mo. I won’t lie—a nigga would be a little heartbroken if you do decide to abort it.
But I don’t want you to make your decision based on how I feel.
” He tilted my head back a little so we could stare deeper into each other's eyes.
“You hear me? You don’t even have to make a decision right now. Sit on it. Let it marinate and—
“Okay,” I softly said. “I’m keeping it.”
He immediately wrapped his arms around me.
In the middle of him talking, I heard a soft ‘yes’ in my head.
Right after that, glimpses of what could be flashed through my mind.
We were together. I was pregnant. Big bellied pregnant.
The kids were happy. My sisters, my daddy, and friends, supportive.
They were happy. And then I saw me in a hospital bed, surrounded by family and friends, a little buddled up baby resting in my arms. Crescent was happy, staring down at us with tears falling from his eyes.
That was it.
That’s what I saw. In my spirit I knew it came from God.
The vision. He was showing me. Giving me a glimpse into a future I’d always been worried about.
It was almost as if He didn’t want me to make another fear-based decision, so He gave me a little gift.
Before I knew it, I was telling Crescent I’d keep it.
And in my mind, I saw a smile and ‘people’ celebrating.
Gasping, I closed my eyes and for the first time since reading the positive result, felt a sense of calmness. Peace… finality.
“You know you gon’ be my wife, right?” Crescent said, his voice muffled by the side of my neck.
“Mmmhmm,” I mumbled with a light laugh.
“Dead ass.” He paused and pulled away from the hug.
“I’m chilling. For now. But I want you to be more than my girlfriend, Mahogany.
I want it all with you. Everything. But because I know this shit gotta be paced, I’m pacing.
I want to sprint though.” We laughed and he pulled back, dropping to his knees.
He placed his lips on my belly and sat like that for a while before saying.
“This forever. I’m never letting up off you. Off y’all.”
A second later, I felt tears wetting my stomach. I caressed the nape of his neck, and we just stood there, like that, with him crying against my belly, and me crying, leaning against the wall behind me. Happy tears though.
I closed my eyes and thanked God for it all.
The heartbreak, the struggle, that roller-coastery merry-go-round, and everything in between.
The path was gravelly, full of potholes, sinkholes, and uncertainty but for the first time in a very long time—in forever, honestly—I felt like I was on my best path.
One that would get me to that happily ever after I thought I’d never get.
I was getting it. And with the right person.
The End