5. Sunday & Cedar
Sunday & Cedar
Seven Weeks Later – Sunday
I felt like my insides were being snatched out. With the sniffles and lethargic feeling I had the last few weeks, I thought it was just a summer cold. But it had evolved into something else.
I couldn’t keep anything down, and I hadn’t been able to for the last couple of weeks. I lost weight, and my skin was dry and ashen. My supervisor, Heather Daly, insisted that I take a few days to recover.
Today, I felt no better than I had felt all week long. It didn’t seem that I was recovering, and as much as I didn’t want to, I knew that it was time to go to the doctor.
I pushed up into a seated position in bed and grabbed the glass of ginger ale on the nightstand. I took a couple of sips, and my stomach instantly heaved.
“God,” I groaned.
I threw my hands over my mouth, cutting off the prayer that I wanted to utter. I barely managed to throw the covers back, run to my bathroom, and grip the edges of the sink before the dry heaving started.
I looked up into the mirror when I finished, and I was devastated. Not only did I feel horrible, but I looked horrible.
“God, I look like crap,” I moaned and pulled my fingers through my cloud of hair.
The natural color of my fire-red hair was actually sandy-brown, but I dyed it a year earlier.
It was a blend between my mother’s blonde hair and my father’s dark brown hair before he lost his.
I bunched my hair up in my fists. The natural curls were tangled and dull and even matted in some places from where I’d been lying in bed for too long.
I licked my lips and flinched at the burn.
“Something’s got to give, girl. You can’t keep going day in and out like this,” I mumbled.
A knock sounded at my door, and I groaned. Cedar knocked again, and I wanted him to go away. I hoped that if I ignored him, he would assume that I was asleep and leave me alone. I grabbed my toothbrush and the toothpaste. I squeezed some toothpaste on it and immediately turned the toothbrush on.
I was in the midst of brushing my teeth when my bedroom door jerked open, and Cedar made his way into my bedroom. I kicked the bathroom door closed, and he banged on it.
“Sunny, open the door.”
“Wait,” I muttered around the electric toothbrush.
“I did, and you didn’t respond.”
I finished brushing my teeth and used my mouthwash. Afterward, I grabbed the comb and tried to detangle my hair.
Cedar opened the door this time without knocking.
“Cedar, really?”
“You act like you can’t hear me. I was knocking at the door.”
“And I was using the bathroom.”
“You could’ve said that.”
“I was brushing my teeth, couldn’t say much.”
“Girl, give me that before you snatch yourself bald.”
He took the comb from my hand, set it on the counter, and looked underneath my sink.
“What are you looking for?”
“Your misting spray.”
“It’s in the cabinet across from the shower.”
He walked to my cabinet that held my hair supplies and messed around for several seconds. That was how I knew that I didn’t feel good. I couldn’t believe that I’d allowed him to go through my things, let alone think he was about to do anything to my hair.
“Sit down on the toilet,” he ordered.
“What are you about to do?”
“Sit down. Trust me. You’re in good hands, Sunny.”
I sat on the toilet and waited. In a few seconds, he carefully sprayed my hair with the misting bottle until my tresses were extremely damp. He set the mister down and then used the detangling brush to pull it through my hair.
I was surprised at how gentle he was and the patience he used in managing my hair. I began to relax under his attentive hands. It felt so good to be taken care of. When he finished pulling the detangling brush through my hair, he grabbed the comb.
“What are you doing?”
“Trust me.”
“Why should I? You know nothing about hair.”
“Okay. Pray.”
I snickered and was surprised by it.
“You need to go to the doctor.”
“I know. I hate going to the doctor, though. I’m always afraid there’s going to be bad news. Other than for annual exams and my OB-GYN visits, I don’t mess with them like that. I was hoping that I would get better on my own.”
“Yeah. How’s that working out for ya?”
“Screw you.”
“I got a few things for you.”
“Like what?”
“Some stuff to help you feel better.”
“Nothing’s doing the trick,” I groaned.
He tugged on my hair a little, and I squirmed.
“You gotta throw up?”
“No.”
But I held my stomach because I was queasy. I didn’t think that anything would come up anyway. I sat still for about a few minutes before Cedar declared, “A’ight. You’re good.”
I stood and walked to the sink. When I looked in the mirror, my mouth dropped open. My eyes ballooned, and then a slow smile turned my lips up as light shined inside of my heart.
“My mama used to tell my sisters all the time that if you comb your hair, you’ll feel better.”
“Well, I do. But I think that’s because I’m shocked.”
“About?”
“Who taught you to do hair?”
Cedar had plaited my hair in two long French braids to the middle of my back. He had managed to tame my curls, untangle my tangles, and straighten out my matted pieces.
“Tiffany. She forced me to sit and do her baby doll’s hair with her when we were little. Then when she got older, sometimes I used to watch Amber and Tiffany do each other’s hair whenever I was in their room bugging the shit out of ’em.”
He shrugged like it was no big deal.
“I can’t even braid my hair up this well.”
“Is that a thank you?”
“Definitely that. You did a great job, Cedar.”
“All right. C’mon.”
“Where are we going?”
“To the kitchen.”
“I don’t think I’ve got the energy, Cedar.”
“You need me to carry you?”
“Never mind.”
I got up from the toilet and followed him into the kitchen. I instantly noticed the difference in the way our townhome looked and smelled.
“You were off today?”
“Yeah.”
“It smells great in here.”
We took turns cleaning the house, and I had not been able to do anything in the last couple of weeks. The house smelled like disinfectant, bleach, and Lysol cleaning solutions.
“I had to do a little something. Between my work schedule lately and you being sick, the dust was piling up.”
“Or you want to make sure that you don’t catch the cooties?” I teased, laughing.
He winked. “Something like that.”
I loved that Cedar was a very clean person.
That was the only thing that made me hesitant about us living together in the beginning.
I knew that some men could be slobs, and I prayed that he wasn’t one.
If anything, Cedar was more meticulous about cleaning than I was.
He walked to the kitchen counters and pointed to the groceries he had set there.
“I’ve got you several cans of soup, crackers, a few more bottles of ginger ale, orange juice, and some boxes of Tame-a-flu and Denza-Seltzer cold and flu.”
“You’re so sweet. You didn’t have to do that. I don’t know that I’ll be able to keep it down.”
“We’ll—”
Ding. Dong.
“Are you expecting company?”
“Nah. But I’ll get it.”
I remained in the kitchen and started putting things away while he went to answer the door. I felt weak, and I was trembling. I needed to be able to keep something down so I could boost my energy. It didn’t take long before I could hear Janae’s voice at the door.
“C’mon in. She’s in the kitchen, Nae.”
I made my way to the living room because I wanted to sit on the couch rather than at the breakfast nook.
“Ohhh, you bought my baby,” I observed with a pout.
Two-year-old Janaya reached for me with a whimper. “I’m sorry, baby. Tee-Tee Sunday wants to hold you sooo bad. But I’m sick, and I don’t want to give you what I’ve got.”
“That’s why I came over to check on you. I know that you haven’t been answering the door or your phone lately,” Janae stated.
“I told her you’ve been sick,” Cedar informed me.
“I know that Cedar’s been working late because I haven’t seen his truck at the usual times. So, I thought I might come over and cook you dinner or clean up or something. I feel so bad, and honey, you look like you’ve been through the wringer.”
I took a seat on the couch, and Janae followed me. Cedar sat on the arm of the couch beside me.
“I feel like it.”
“What are your symptoms?”
I told her everything that I’d gone through. Janae scrunched her nose and asked something that caused my world to stop spinning on its axis.
“You’re not pregnant, are you?”
I felt Cedar tense beside me. “Girl, no.”
“I mean, I know you haven’t been dating, and you’re on your abstinence sabbatical and all, but stranger things have occurred. Are you sure?”
“One hundred percent.”
Anxiety filled me with her words. Janae kept talking, but panic spread throughout me and warmed my body with a heated flush. How the hell had I not thought about it, realized it, or cared about it until now?
Cedar and I had sex and hadn’t used protection. I wasn’t worried about him having any diseases. I trusted Cedar, and I knew that it had been some time since he’d been with a woman, based on a conversation I’d overheard between him and Chaz.
Janae and I talked a little while longer with Cedar sitting quietly by, watching me. I pretended like I was feeling tired and weak again after fifteen minutes, and she and Janaya left. The minute she left, Cedar was all over me.
“Could that be a thing, Sunny?”
“What? Pregnancy?”
“Yeah. I mean, could that be it?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah?” I said it like, “Duh?”
“When was the last time you had a cycle? We didn’t use anything that night now that I think back on it.”
“Get out of my coochie, Cedar. Damn.”
“That ain’t what ya fast ass was hollering that night, and you damn sure was begging me to get back in it shortly after that.”
I shoved him in the chest. “Boy, shut up.”
“I’m just saying. If you haven’t had one, then maybe that could be it.”
“My cycle is irregular, and it always has been since I first got my period in middle school.”
“You need a test.”
“I don’t need a test.”
“You need a test.”