17. Sunday
Sunday
“ Y ou need to make up your mind what you are going to do, sweetheart.”
“She needs to stay here.”
My mother glared at my father. I had been staying with my brother Nils since I’d returned home.
Thankfully, my boss let me take a week’s vacation.
I planned to work remotely the following week.
I needed time to figure out what I would do about Cedar and me.
I loved and missed my man, but I honestly wasn’t sure how to tell him about the decisions of my past.
The other part that was hard to swallow was that he was comparing me to Taylor, but I knew if it weren’t for my actions, he wouldn’t be. I’d brought this situation on myself, and I knew the only way to resolve it was to be truthful with him. But I was scared.
My father had popped up at Nils’ place after I’d been there for three days, and he apologized for his behavior and words.
I’d cried my heart out because I’d always been a daddy’s girl.
I let him know how deeply he hurt me. He let me know that he only wanted the best for me.
Today, I was having dinner with my parents.
It was weird because I was used to hanging with Cedar and our friends on Friday nights.
“Fine. She needs to make peace with him for the sake of their unborn child, but my God, Sunday, why him? Couldn’t you have found someone more suitable?”
“Someone like who, Daddy? He reminds me of everything Mom says you used to be. Everything that Granma ever said that you were, he is.”
“We’re nothing alike.”
I could hear the anger and frustration in his voice, but underneath that, I heard pain. My mother reached out her hands and grabbed my father’s. “Honey, I think it’s time you told her your story.”
“What story?” I asked, looking back and forth between my parents.
“No, Astrid.”
“You have to, baby.”
My father dropped his head and sighed loudly.
When he looked up again, his jaws were clenched, and he’d locked his fingers together.
His elbows rested on his knees. The casual way that he was bent forward and the exhausted look on his face made him look older than his years.
With a sigh, he began to speak in an exhausted and resigned tone.
“I was twenty and full of myself. It was a Saturday afternoon, and I’d been hanging out with my friends.
I was trying to impress this girl with my new ride, showing her the ins and outs.
A cop car pulled up, and the officers immediately demanded that my friends and I get on the ground and lock our hands behind our heads.
They made the girl stand there while they humiliated us in every possible way they could think of.
“Called us dumb niggers who were good for nothing but running a football, a blight on our race. When one of them said he knew me, I looked up at him. Then he laughed and said, ‘No, that must’ve been your mother who sucked my dick last night. You look just like her down on your knees like that.’ I lost it, Sunday.
I jumped up and attacked him. Lucky for me, I didn’t end up dead. But they both beat the shit out of me.
“They made my friends leave, and I knew that I was dead. The girl was sitting there the entire time crying. When they finished with me, they kicked me in the ribs and hauled my black ass off to jail. I sat in that cell for an entire day before I got my phone call and another week before I even went before a judge. You know what color those cops were?”
“White?”
He shook his head. “No. Black.”
Tears poured from my eyes as I wiped them. That gave new meaning to the phrase, “It be your own people.”
“It was the white judge who dismissed the disorderly conduct and the assault on a police officer charge. You know why?”
I shook my head again.
“A white man who owned the dry cleaners that we were across the street from saw the entire incident. He was good friends with my father, and lucky for me, he had an in with the judge because the judge didn’t want to let me go.
But that businessman told the judge what really happened.
Both officers were fired. And you know the young lady I’d been trying to impress?
Well, I saw her two weeks after my release.
She crossed the street to the other side and acted like she didn’t even see me.
When I caught up with her, she pretended she didn’t remember who I was.
All these were black people, Sunday. And the white businessman who saved my black ass was your mother’s uncle. ”
“Uncle Leano? Granddaddy’s brother?”
My mother nodded, and my father spoke up.
“From that day on, I changed my stripes and never looked back. I learned that it was important to have an education, make the right connections, and stay in your lane. Trying to be anything else will leave you dead. Cedar is the epitome of that. His blackness, pride, and anger will get him and you killed, especially in today’s political climate. ”
“Daddy, it seemed the only thing that you learned from all of that was to hate your own race. And staying in your lane means staying in the black lane, not looking down on your own kind. You’re worse than the white man because you’re prejudiced against your own kind.
Whether you want to face it or not, you’re still a black man.
Just because you married mom, your friends are white, and your kids are biracial doesn’t negate that fact.
Not even the way you speak or where you live changes that. ”
My father’s jaw clenched. “I know who I am! But that doesn’t mean I have to rub it in their faces.”
“My heart breaks for you then. That’s what I love about Cedar. He is strong and proud of who he is. No matter what he has to go through, no matter what he faces, he will always be proud to be who he is and stand for what is right.”
My father wiped a couple of errant tears from his eyes. I moved from my seat on the couch to sit on the arm of his recliner. I wrapped my arms tightly around him, and he hesitated briefly before he returned the hug. He squeezed me so tight I almost couldn’t breathe.
“Daddy, you should have sought counseling for that. It sounds like a very traumatic experience,” I whispered.
He nodded but didn’t speak for a long while. I lifted my gaze to meet my mother’s. She smiled warmly at me and blew a kiss at me. I got the feeling that I’d made strides with my father where maybe she hadn’t been able to.
When we finally relaxed, I looked down into my father’s face. “Is that the reason that you dislike him?”
Slowly, my father nodded. “He scares me. The thought that he could be the target of anyone’s racially motivated actions and it might come back on you and my grandson terrifies me.”
“It sounds like he’s more like you than you want to admit,” my mother pronounced.
“Daddy, that could go either way. It could be white people that do the same thing to us. As a matter of fact, that’s what usually happens.
I will never ask him to or expect him to tone down his ‘blackness.’ Hopefully, one day, you’ll be free enough again to embrace yours.
As it relates to Cedar, he’s a good man.
He’s been a friend for a long time and always looked out for me long before we became involved.
He loves me, Daddy, and he’s very protective of me. ”
“I don’t doubt he is, sweetheart.”
“It took a lot of courage for him to stand up to your father,” Mom stated.
I nodded. “He never meant to disrespect you, Daddy. But there was only so much he could take. You were very rude and disrespectful to us both.”
“And I’ve apologized to you. I feel how I feel about him, though. That boy stood in my home, cursed me, and threatened bodily harm. We can’t be okay after something like that. I’m not the only one who needs to make peace, Sunday.”
“Okay, Daddy. I understand. I don’t know that I can get him to change though.”
“I didn’t ask you to. Man to man, he needs to come to me, and we need to talk about it. Not you.”
“Speaking of, what’s going on with the two of you?” Mom asked.
I told her everything that had transpired since Layla first reached out to me on Instagram, telling me that she wanted to see me. When I finished, we were all three in tears as we recalled those difficult years.
My mother wiped her tears and left the room briefly. When she returned, she held a box of tissues.
“I think it’s time you told him the truth.”
I blew out a breath, and the tears started again.
“Sunday, you have held this in for so long. It’s time that you forgive yourself. Layla has forgiven you and so has Mrs. Robinson,” my mother remarked, referring to Layla’s mother. “The only way that you’re going to heal, baby, is for you to forgive yourself.”
My father nodded at my mother’s advice before he spoke up.
“And the way you know that you’ve forgiven yourself is by telling Cedar what happened back then.
If he loves you the way you claim he does, then he’ll accept you despite what you’ve done.
You lost a lot during that time, and you got help.
I don’t know if you need to return to therapy or what, but you’ve got to move on, Sunday. This baby needs you whole.”
My daddy’s palm rested on my belly, and I couldn’t help the grin that spread across my face. That little gesture showed me that he was learning to accept my life.
“I know, Daddy. I want to be the best mom that I can be for Aspen.”
“And I believe that you will be. I may not like him for you, but you chose him to be the father of your unborn child. He needs to be aware of everything that’s going on in your life that might impact the baby.
And you also need to understand what that man is facing, also.
You’re not telling him everything, and I’m sure that he suspects you’re holding back. ”
“Like I said earlier, he thinks that I’m cheating with Layla.”
My parents both chuckled, and my father continued talking.
“That’s on you, baby girl. You can easily clear up that misunderstanding by having a conversation.
Right now, he probably sees his life as spiraling out of control.
What you’ve got to understand, the most important thing to a man is being able to protect those under his guidance.
His woman, his children, his parents, and his possessions.
“When a man can’t provide for, protect, or give peace to his woman, it leaves him feeling like less than a man.
Those are the basic responsibilities that we want to be able to handle.
Without that, it’s almost like we’ve got nothing.
Any time he feels there’s anything beyond his control when it comes to his woman and his kids, he starts to feel less like a man and doubts his reason for being involved with the woman. ”
I couldn’t help but wonder if my father spoke from experience.
“Is that how you felt that day with those police officers humiliating you in front of that girl?”
“That’s exactly how I felt that day, baby girl.”
I rubbed my daddy’s shoulder, and he pulled me down onto his lap. He kissed my forehead, and I giggled.
“You do realize that you’re not going to be able to do this much longer.”
“Daddy, I haven’t sat on your lap since I was twelve years old. I doubt that I’ll be doing it again anyway.”
I threw my arms around him and closed my eyes. My chin rested on top of his head, and a single tear escaped from underneath my closed lids. I cried for what my father had endured, for what I’d done in my past, and for the destruction I was creating now.
“It’s okay, baby girl. Everything will be all right.”
“You know what it’s time for, Sunday,” Mom declared.
“To go home and face the music?”
“Exactly. I know you were planning to stay with daddy and me for this next week, and as much as I love having you here and spoiling you, you need to make things right with Aspen’s daddy.”
I smiled at the way she worded that.
“I do need to make it right. Come on, Mommy. You can help me pack.”
“All right. And we can have a little girl talk while we are at it,” she declared.
I got off my daddy’s lap and saw him absently rub his knee.
“Sorry. This baby’s put a few pounds on me,” I professed and rubbed my belly.
My daddy smiled brightly at me. “It’s all right, baby girl. It’s all right.”
I left the den and headed with my mom to my old room.