Chapter 8 #2
I didn’t know what the fuck Denisha needed to talk about, but I knew something wasn’t right.
Tanya called me from the hardware store to let me know about an issue with one of our contractor orders coming in short.
The supplier was trying to push the rest of the delivery to Monday, but that shit wasn’t gon’ work when the contractor needed everything for a job starting Saturday morning.
I put Tanya on hold, called the supplier myself, and got passed around until I finally got somebody who could fix the shit.
They fucked up the order, so I wasn’t getting off the phone until they made it right.
Ten minutes later, the missing supplies were getting loaded onto another truck to be at the store before closing.
After that was handled, I talked with Darius about the festival setup before getting back to the estimate I had been working on when Lace came through. I was checking the numbers when somebody knocked on my office door. “Come in.”
Denisha opened the door and stepped inside, and I leaned back in my chair. She was still fine as fuck. Pretty brown skin, thick ass body, long ass braids down her back. That didn’t mean much anymore, but I wasn’t blind either. What caught my attention was how she was acting.
Denisha usually came around comfortable as hell, whether we were fucking or not. This time, she closed the door and stood there holding her purse with both hands instead of saying whatever the fuck she came to say.
“You good?” I asked.
“Yeah. I mean, I don’t know. Can I sit down?” She looked at the chair across from me.
I nodded and told her to sit down, then watched her put her purse beside her feet and rub her hands over her thighs.
She kept looking away from me, which wasn’t her at all.
Denisha had never had a problem saying whatever the fuck was on her mind, so whatever brought her to my office had her nervous as hell.
“You called me saying you needed to talk, so talk to me.” She took a breath before finally looking at me.
“I found somethin’ out while I was gone.
I ain’t been feelin’ right the last couple weeks.
I thought it was from travelin’ and workin’ all these hours, but then I realized my period never came.
” She started picking at one of her long ass nails while I sat there listening.
“I took a test, then I took two more ‘cause I thought the first one was wrong. They were all positive.”
I looked at her for a minute before asking, “You pregnant?” When she said yeah, that shit caught me off guard, but the way she was sitting there looking at me told me being pregnant wasn’t the only thing she came to say. “Aight. What else?”
“I went to the doctor before I came back ‘cause I needed to know how far along I was before I talked to anybody.”
Something about the way she said that had me sitting back in my chair before I asked how far along she was.
“I’m almost eight weeks pregnant, Smoke.
” That got my attention because the timing was close enough that I knew exactly why she was sitting in my office.
Denisha held my eyes and shook her head before I could say anything.
“I’m not comin’ in here tellin’ you this baby is yours.
I’m tellin’ you there’s a chance it could be. ”
I rubbed my hand over my beard and did the math.
The last time I fucked Denisha was right before she left Bellhaven, and the dates lined up enough that I couldn’t dismiss the shit.
I also knew damn well I wrapped my dick every time I fucked her, but the last time that mahfucka broke.
“You was fuckin’ somebody else ‘round then?”
“Yeah, my ex.” Her answering without hesitating made me nod because at least she wasn’t trying to throw a baby on me just because the dates happened to line up.
“He know ‘bout this shit?” I asked.
“Not yet. I wanted to talk to both of you in person instead of doin’ it over the phone.”
“So, it’s me and this other nigga?” When she confirmed there were only two possibilities, I rubbed my hand over the back of my neck. “Fuck. Aight.”
A baby wasn’t some shit I was gon guess about, and I damn sure wasn’t claiming one based on a calendar. Still, I wasn’t about to act like there wasn’t a chance just because I didn’t want the timing to be real.
“You know how I am. If that baby is mine, I’ma take care of mine. You ain’t ever gotta question that, but we findin’ out for sure.”
“I already knew you were gonna say that.”
“Then you know what it is.” Denisha nodded, and I sat there trying to get my head around the fact that I could have a kid on the way.
If the baby was mine, I was gon’ be a father and handle everything that came with that shit.
There wasn’t anything to debate about that.
The part fucking with me was Lace. We had just gotten back to a good place after eight years of bullshit between us, and now I had to tell her there was a chance another woman was carrying my baby.
Keeping that shit from her wasn’t an option, but right now all I knew was Denisha was pregnant, and the dates put me in the mix. I wanted some real answers before I dropped that shit on Lace, because I already knew hearing it would fuck with everything we had just started fixing.
The rest of the day went by fast. I met Shawn to handle some shit with one of the booths, stopped by the hardware store because Tanya needed me to approve an order, then went to check on a kitchen remodel we had started before Loretta’s job took up most of my time.
By the time I got back to the warehouse, everybody had cleared out except Darius.
He was sitting at the desk outside my office eating out of a Styrofoam container. I walked past his ass, dropped into my chair, and opened my laptop. The same estimate I had already looked at three damn times was still sitting there, and I still couldn’t focus on the shit.
Darius showed up in my doorway with his food in his hand. “What’s wrong wit’ you?”
“Ain’t shit wrong wit’ me.”
“Bullshit. You been off all day.”
I looked up at him. “You watchin’ me now?”
“Been knowin’ yo’ ass since we was lil’ niggas. I work wit’ yo’ ass every day. I ain’t gotta watch you to know when somethin’ fucked up.” He leaned against the doorframe and took another bite. “What happened?”
I looked back at my laptop, then closed the shit because I wasn’t getting nothing done anyway. I wasn’t the type to sit around talking about my problems, but Denisha had been on my mind since she walked out of my office. “Denisha came by earlier.”
Darius stopped chewing and looked at me. He knew who she was. “Aight. What she want?”
“She pregnant.”
His eyebrows went up. “By you ?”
“I don’t know.” I rubbed my hand over my beard and leaned back in my chair. “She don’t know either. The timin’ lines up enough that it could be me or her ex.”
“Damn.” Darius walked into my office and sat across from me. “What you gon’ do?”
“The fuck you think I’m gon’ do? I’m findin’ out if the baby's mine, and if it is, I’m takin’ care of my child, bro.”
“I know you gon’ do that. I’m talkin’ ‘bout Solace.”
That was the shit I ain’t have an answer for. I looked toward the window and rubbed my jaw. “I gotta tell her.”
“You gon’ tell her tonight?”
“I don’t fuckin’ know, D.” I shook my head. “That’s what got me fucked up. I ain’t tryna hide shit from Lace, but I don’t know what the fuck I’m ‘posed to tell her when I don’t even know if the baby's mine. I tell her now, she gotta sit wit’ that shit ‘til I get an answer.”
Darius nodded. “I hear you, but that still sound like some bullshit to me.”
I looked at his ass. “Fuck you mean?”
“You know exactly what I mean. You keep sayin’ you don’t know if the baby’z yours, but you know that shit could be.”
“No shit.”
“So tell Solace that.”
“And have her stressin’ over a baby that might not have shit to do wit’ my ass?”
Darius shook his head. “That ain’t really yo’ call, Smoke. You don’t get to decide what she can handle just ‘cause you don’t wanna be the one to tell her.”
I stared at him, and his ass had the nerve to shrug. “You gettin’ on my fuckin’ nerves.”
“I’m just sayin’. You was mad as fuck at Sol ‘cause she made a decision for both of y’all and ain’t give you shit to say ‘bout it. Now you sittin’ here decidin’ what she should know ‘cause you think you protectin’ her. That sounds familiar as fuck to me.”
I hated that his ass had a point. Me keeping it from Lace until I knew for sure wasn’t the same shit she had done to me, but I knew how it felt to find out somebody had already made a decision about something that affected me.
More than that, I didn’t want Lace hearing this shit from anybody but me.
I just wasn’t in no rush to see her face when I told her another woman might be carrying my baby.
Darius watched me while I sat there thinking about that shit. “You scared she gon’ leave again?”
I looked at him. “Watch it, mahfucka.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I, nigga.”
He nodded and took another bite of his food. “Aight. Then tell her yo’self before this small ass town do it for yo’ ass.”
I rubbed both hands over my face. “You gettin’ real comfortable talkin’ to me any kinda way.”
“Shit, somebody gotta do it. I ain’t scared of yo’ big ass like everybody else.”
“Get the fuck out my office, D.”
Darius stood up laughing and headed for the door. “See? There you go. You sound like yo’self again.”