Blindly
Jakia’s puzzle board sat on the coffee table. From the couch, she stared at the pieces trying to mentally place them in their proper spots until her hands were free.
“Please?” Twon begged with a whisper in her ear.
“No and if you ask me again, I’ma put you the fuck out.” Jakia continued patting Carmell’s back.
She went to lay him down because she knew Twon was going to ask to eat her pussy again.
She meant what she said, she was putting his ass out, even if she had to drag him out.
He was trying to reel her in with his tongue tricks.
She hadn’t forgotten them. Sometimes it was a memory that assisted her rose in taking her where she needed to be.
Still, she hadn’t had a scratch too deep for her toys to reach.
Returning to the living room, she quickly moved puzzle pieces around before she forgot where they went. Twon rubbed on her thigh. It made her flinch. Accidentally, she punched him in his chest.
“What the fuck?” he rubbed his chest.
“I can’t do this shit today.” Her hands made exaggerated gestures.
“I’m the one being abused,” he argued.
“Because you don’t know how to just leave me the fuck be.” She sucked her teeth. “Why you can’t just sit there?”
“That’s like asking Adam and Eve to not touch the fruit.” He downed his peach tea Snapple. “Legs been out since a nigga popped in. How you expect me to be around something so sweet and not want to taste?”
“A bitch never said she was ugly.” She snickered. “All I said was jerk off in the bathroom like a normal nigga.”
“Or I can tug on my dick while sopping you up like a biscuit.” He bit at her shoulder.
“Get out,” she said plainly.
“I got a few licks to hit anyway.” He stood, bending down to kiss her forehead. “Hit me if you need me. I’ll be back later.”
“See you.”
“Love you.” He walked out the door.
Every time he walked out that door, he made sure to tell her that he loved her.
Twon never left her enough time to say it back before he shut the door.
There was something genuine about him not needing to hear it back.
That meant it was for her to know. For her to feel.
It wasn’t making her reconsider being with him, but she was fighting with going easier on him.
Like, maybe she didn’t have to hate him.
To call him a friend, she’d have to trust him. His words were sweet, but it wasn’t enough for her to go against what she knew to be fact. He left her hanging. Whenever her thoughts drifted back to that one little big thing, she found herself disgusted with him again.
So much so that when she heard a knock at the door, she considered leaving him out there.
“Forgot something?” she asked, swinging the door open to find her mother and a stranger at her door.
She didn’t hear the response from the professionally dressed black woman standing next to her mother.
Warmth ran through her body as she stared into the eyes of a woman that she never thought she’d see again. A literal chill went down her spine as the woman with her tapped her shoulder. She flinched.
Stephanie barged her way into her daughter’s apartment, not caring about an invite.
“Bitch, come in shit,” Stephanie instructed her social worker inside, slamming the door shut in Jakia’s face. “Girl, I have to go to the bathroom, shit.” She sucked her teeth.
Jakia snapped out of the daze she was in. She hurried to close the door and looked out the peephole. “Aren’t you supposed to be in a mental asylum?”
“Actually, that is an outdated term,” the social worker interrupted.
“Psych ward,” Jakia corrected.
“Well, that’s a better description for a specialized unit in a hospital. They manage short term crisis. Your mother’s stay was at a psychiatric hospital.”
“Mother is generous,” Jakia remarked with an eye roll that warned her not to say shit else to her.
“Well, it ain’t up to you. God made that decision when I pushed you out my pussy.” Stephanie found the kitchen. “You want some water, lady?”
“How are you offering shit in my house?”
“Not my baby is cussing?” Stephanie peeked her head around the corner.
“I haven’t been a baby in a long time,” Jakia argued.
“I guess you grown.” Stephanie shrugged.
“What is happening right now?” Jakia mumbled aloud to herself.
Overwhelmed wasn’t a big enough word to describe what she was feeling.
She hadn’t any time to prepare. Her estranged mother just poofed out of thin air and landed on her doorstep.
To make matters worse, her mother was nothing like the woman that was roaming through her house like it belonged to her.
Stephanie used to be polite. Her tone has been as sweet as it was soft. The woman in front of her was all over the place, her manners were a thing of the past, and she didn’t know what an inside voice was.
“So, we tried to reach the eldest daughter by phone with no luck.”
“Yeah, her phone is as dead as she is,” Jakia replied, staring at her mother walking into her bedroom.
“Why is she here, exactly?” She asked the social worker, stuck in a daze of disbelief.
“Are you expecting me to take care of her? I can’t do that.
” Jakia finally looked at the social worker in the eyes.
“When our patients are released, the goal is always to place them with family. Unfortunately, we are not always able to.”
“Let’s say she has no family. What would happen to her?”
“We’d try and get her a shelter placement. Most often times they end up homeless.
“Fuck,” Jakia mumbled.
“If it helps, your mother is one of our higher functioning patients. She can independently handle basic household tasks like cleaning, bathing herself and laundry. She’s a great cook.”
“If she’s all these great things, why is she unable to live by herself?”
“You have high-functioning addicts that can maintain a job. They pay their bills and every free dime they have goes to their habit. Or they move people in that they have no business around to maintain their addictions. Stephanie wouldn’t thrive on her own.
She’s done the work to heal and its worked almost too well. ” The social worker snickered.
“What do you mean by that?”
“She’s bitter.” She sighed. “She feels she did what she was supposed to do. She followed the rules, built a career, married the love of her life, then had children in what the world deems to be the proper order, and it was all for nothing. Life cheated her. So, she’s now committed to being her most unhinged self. ”
It all sounded too familiar. Jakia felt life cheated her, too.
Her mother represented too much of the past that she was trying to move on from.
For the sake of the child that she was carrying.
For the sake of her nephews. For the sake of her own mental health.
She wanted to be better. Looking at her mother felt like she was looking at a stranger.
She didn’t know who this new version of her was.
“Will you make sure it’s the best shelter in this city?” Jakia asked the social worker.
She sighed with a disappointed nod. “If you truly want her in the best housing situation this city has to offer, then that requires time. I promise to use all of my resources, and favors to get her put up somewhere that she can be successful. I’ll even beg if it comes to it.”
“If?” Jakia asked.
“If you house your mother for a week. Just a week. Otherwise, I’ll have to give her to any center that can take her.”
“You place people like my mom for a living. You should know off hand the best place for her to go.”
“You must also understand that this is a very unique situation. Her behavior problem is new for her. She’s never been this woman before.
She went from not speaking a word to saying a proper sentence using nothing but insulting words.
I need a safe environment. One for her and the other people in need of shelter.
Most importantly, it needs to be a staff that can more than handle her, be gentle with her. ”
“Un-unh.” Stephanie stepped out of the kitchen. “She ain’t got no miracle whip. Fuck am I supposed to do with Hellmans?”
“One week.” Jakia faced the social worker. “One week.”
“That’s all I need?”
Jakia walked her out. When the door opened, cameras flashed while reporters talked a mile a minute. She couldn’t hear anything outside of the repeated clicking of the professional camera flicks.
“Shut the damn door,” Stephanie ordered, getting in front of the two of them. “Don’t got the survival skills or a fucking snail. Neither one of y’all. Now why the fuck them people outside that door like that? What you done got yourself into?”
“I think they’re out there for you,” the social worker interjected. “The questions they were asking sounded like they were for you.” The questions were too vulgar to repeat.
What do you have to say to the victims?
Did you know?
Are you going back to teaching?
How do you feel about your husband killing himself?
Punch after punch they took at her with no care for mother nor daughter’s mental state. Her stomach turned unable to tune out the ignorant questions. Jakia’s throat burned. She didn’t know how to respond or what to do next.
She rushed to her phone. Carmell let everyone know that he was up. Stephanie rushed to him using the sound of his cries. Jakia couldn’t argue with her. One thing at a time.
“Yeah, baby.” Twon answered the phone.
“How far are you? There’s a bunch of press outside of my apartment. I need them to go without ending up all over the 10:00 news with my pistol in the air.”
“Say less.”
All Jakia heard was skid marks as the call ended. She couldn’t be bothered with explaining that she wasn’t his baby. He was coming to save the day and that’s all she cared about.
Stephanie yelled at the door despite both the social worker and Jakia pleading for her to shut the fuck up. It was making Carmell giggle.
“I know y’all better get the fuck away from my daughter’s door,” she yelled.
“Can you just stop long enough for me to change his diaper. He won’t sit still watching you make an absolute fool of yourself,” Jakia argued.