Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
NYROBI
By the time I unlocked the apartment door, I had already rehearsed the conversation with my mama at least six different ways and every single version sounded crazy.
Hey Ma, remember that rich lady from the hospital? Well, she wants me to carry her baby for a whole lot of money.
Yeah, that shit sounded insane no matter how I put it.
I pushed the door open and immediately heard voices coming from the living room. Mama's I expected. The other loud ass voice I would've recognized anywhere.
"Nysheca?...Who else?"
I closed the door behind me and walked farther inside.
My sister was stretched across the couch like she paid bills there, bonnet halfway off her head, one leg hanging over the armrest while she ate out of one of Mama's bowls.
I looked at the bowl, then at her.
"You don't live here."
"And?"
"And why every time you come over here you eating?”
Nysheca scooped another spoonful into her mouth.
"Because Mama love me."
Mama was sitting in her chair with a blanket across her legs.
"I love both my children. One just happens to come see me hungry every damn time."
"See." I pointed at Nysheca. "Even she know."
"Girl, shut up."
I dropped my purse on the chair by the door and walked over to Mama.
"How you feeling?"
"Better."
"You take your medicine?"
"Yes, Nyrobi."
"What you eat?"
Nysheca raised the bowl.
"Apparently not this."
"Leave that girl alone," Mama said.
"I'm just asking."
"You always just asking."
I bent down and kissed her cheek anyway.
She looked better than she had in that hospital bed, but I still didn't like how tired she looked.
Mama had always been the type to keep moving even when she didn't feel good.
Seeing her sitting still for longer than ten minutes was enough to remind me that things weren't completely back to normal just because she was home.
"You been resting?"
Mama gave me a look.
"I ain't helpless."
"Nobody said you was."
"You act like it."
"I act like you just got out the hospital."
"And I'm home now."
"That don't mean your heart magically fixed itself when you crossed the threshold."
Nysheca looked between us.
"Here y'all go."
I turned toward her.
"And where the hell you been?"
"Here."
"Before here."
"Why?"
"Because I ain't seen you."
"You see me now."
I sucked my teeth.
There was no point starting with her. Not yet anyway.
Mama looked at me.
"How was work?"
"It was alright."
"Just alright?"
"Yeah."
She stared at me a little longer.
Mama knew me too well.
"What happened?"
"Nothing happened."
Nysheca laughed from the couch.
"She lying."
"How the fuck you know?"
"Your face."
"What about my face?"
"You got that look."
"What look?"
"Like you got some shit to tell."
I rolled my eyes, but Mama was already watching me closer.
"Do you?"
I should've waited maybe until Nysheca left or maybe until Mama and I were alone. But knowing my sister, she could be laid across that couch until tomorrow if nobody put her ass out.
I sat down.
"You remember that woman from the hospital?"
Mama frowned.
"What woman?"
"The one I told you about. Kaizleigh."
"The lady you met downstairs?"
"Yeah."
"What about her?"
"Well..."
Nysheca sat up.
"Ooooo."
I looked at her.
"Can I talk?"
"I'm listening."
"Nobody was talking to you."
"Still listening."
I ignored her and looked back at Mama.
"She and her husband called me into their office today."
Mama's eyebrows pulled together.
"What you done did?"
"Why I had to do something?"
"Because ain't no boss calling you in no office for nothing."
"They aren't my bosses. Well, technically they own the hotel, but that's not why they called me in there."
"Then why?"
I took a breath.
"They offered me something."
Nysheca leaned forward.
"Money?"
I cut my eyes at her.
"Can you shut the fuck up for five minutes?"
"Well, did they?"
"YES."
Her eyes got big.
"How much?"
Mama waved her hand.
"Let her talk."
"Thank you."
I looked at Mama again.
"They've been trying to have a baby."
Her face changed slightly.
I had already told her a little about Kaizleigh from the hospital, so she knew she'd had problems with pregnancies.
"Okay."
"And they want to use a surrogate."
Mama stared at me.
I waited.
She waited.
Nysheca looked back and forth between us.
Then Mama finally asked, "And what that got to do with you?"
I rubbed my hands against my thighs.
"They asked me."
Mama blinked.
"Asked you what?"
"To be the surrogate."
Nysheca nearly dropped the bowl.
"Bitch!"
"Nysheca!"
"What? That's some shit!"
Mama didn't say anything. That scared me more than if she would've started yelling. She just looked at me.
I shifted in my seat.
"Ma?"
"Hold on."
"For what?"
"I'm trying to make sure I heard you right."
"You did."
"These people want to put their baby inside you?"
"Basically."
"And you carry it?"
"Yes."
"Then give it to them?"
"Yes."
Mama leaned back.
"Lord."
Nysheca was damn near bouncing on the couch.
"How much?"
"Nysheca, damn!"
"Shit, that's important."
Mama looked at me.
"How much?"
See. Everybody had a price. I hesitated before answering.
"Minimum one hundred thousand."
Nysheca jumped off the couch so fast the blanket fell on the floor.
"BITCH, I'LL DO IT!"
I busted out laughing.
"Nysheca!"
"What? Tell them I'm available too. Matter fact, give me that lady number."
"You ain't even let me finish."
"What else is there to finish? Shit all that money? I'll have twins."
Mama shook her head.
"Sit your crazy ass down."
"I'm serious."
"You can't even keep up with yourself," I told her.
"And?"
"And ain't nobody trusting you with no damn baby."
"I can stop smoking."
I stared at her.
"When?"
"For that kind of money? Tonight."
I laughed.
"You probably high right now."
Nysheca paused.
"That ain't the point."
Mama started laughing, and hearing it made me smile.
Nysheca dropped back onto the couch.
"All I'm saying is if you don't want the opportunity, pass that blessing down."
"That ain't no blessing you just pass around."
"Why not?"
"Because they asked me."
"Well, ask them if they got some friends."
I shook my head.
"You are ridiculous."
"Ridiculous with an available uterus."
Even Mama laughed at that.
For a minute, the whole conversation felt lighter than it had in my head.
Then Mama's smile faded.
"You thinking about doing it?"
I looked at her.
"Yeah."
Nysheca stopped joking.
Mama folded her hands over the blanket.
"Because you want to or because of that money?"
"Both."
"Which one more?"
I didn't answer.
Mama nodded like my silence had answered for me.
"That's what I thought."
"Ma, that money could change everything."
"It could."
"I could get us out of here."
"Ain't nothing wrong with here."
"Yes, it is."
"Nyrobi."
"I'm serious. I could get you somewhere better. I could get my car fixed or just get another one. I could pay everything off and actually have something left."
"Okay."
"Okay what?"
"All of that sounds good."
"It does."
"But you talking about what the money can do. You ain't said nothing about what carrying that baby can do to you."
I sat back.
"I thought about that."
"Did you?"
"Yes."
"You ever been pregnant?"
"No."
"Then you don't know how your body gone handle it."
"I know."
"You don't know if you gone be sick every day. You don't know if you'll end up on bed rest. You don't know if you'll have complications."
"I know, Ma."
"And what happens if you get attached?"
That one shut me up. Nysheca looked at me and mama continued.
"You gone feel that baby move. You gone hear the heartbeat. You gone watch your stomach grow. Everybody around you gone see you pregnant, but at the end you gotta leave that hospital without a baby."
I swallowed.
"I know what surrogacy means."
"Knowing what a word means and living through it ain't the same thing."
I looked down at my hands.
"I ain't trying to talk you out of it," she added.
"It sound like you are."
"No. I'm trying to make sure my child ain't so worried about taking care of me that she willing to do anything somebody put money behind."
My eyes went straight back to her.
"This ain't just about you."
"I know it ain't."
"I need this too."
"Need what?"
"To stop struggling."
The room got quiet.
"I am tired, Ma."
My voice came out softer than I meant for it to.
"I'm tired of something always being due. I'm tired of praying that car start. I'm tired of checking my account before I buy food. I'm tired of applying for jobs and getting told no. I'm tired of acting like shit don't bother me because I don't want you worrying about me."
Mama's face softened.
"I ain't asking you to take care of me."
"You don't have to ask."
"That's the problem."
"How is that a problem?"
"Because you think everything that happen to me is yours to fix."
"You're my mama."
"And you're my daughter. Not my husband. Not my nurse. Not my damn savior."
I looked away.
Mama reached over and touched my hand.
"If you do this, do it because you decided you can handle what comes with it. Don't carry nobody's baby because you think you owe me a better life."
"I don't think I owe you."
"Good."
She squeezed my hand.
"Then before you tell those people yes, you better know everything."
"I plan to."
"Doctors?"
"Yes."
"Lawyer?"
"They said I'd have my own."
"Not their lawyer?"
"My own."
"Good."
Nysheca raised her hand from the couch.
"I got one more question."
I sighed.
"What?"
"Do you still gotta fuck the husband?"
My mouth dropped open.
"HOW THE FUCK YOU KNOW ABOUT THAT?"
She burst out laughing.
"You just told me!"
"No, I didn't!"
"You said they putting the baby in you. I'm asking how!"
Mama looked at me.
"She doesn't have to sleep with that woman's husband."
"Thank you!"
Nysheca shrugged.
"Shit, I don't know how rich people make babies."
"Apparently neither did I," I mumbled.
"What?"
"Nothing."
There was no way in hell I was telling both of them I had already embarrassed myself asking the same damn question.
Nysheca stayed another hour, mostly eating up shit she didn't buy and asking me questions about the money like she was getting a percentage.By the time she finally announced she was ready to leave, it was getting dark.
I grabbed my keys.
"Where I'm taking you?"
"Across town."
"Where across town?"
"I'll tell you when we get close."
I stared at her.
"Nysheca."
"What?"
"I ain't driving around all night."
"You not."
Mama looked over from her chair.
"Be careful."
"I will."
"And don't be gone long."
"I'm coming right back."
Nysheca kissed Mama on the cheek before following me outside.
The ride started quiet. She had the window cracked and was scrolling through her phone while I drove. About ten minutes in, I glanced at her.
"When you gone straighten up?"
She didn't look away from her lil foodstamp phone.
"Here you go."
"I'm serious."
"So am I. Here you go."
"You on Molly, you still running around doing the same shit, and every time somebody ask you what you doing with yourself, you got an attitude."
"I ain't got no attitude."
"You got one right now."
"Because I knew this conversation was coming."
I tightened my hands around the steering wheel.
"Mama was just in the hospital."
"I know."
"Do you?"
She finally looked at me.
"Yes, Nyrobi. I know."
"Because you act like shit don't bother you."
"What you want me to do, cry every time I walk in the house?"
"No. I want you to understand she ain't as strong as she act."
"I know that."
"Her heart failure ain't no joke, Nysheca."
"I know."
"She was hooked up to machines. They were checking her oxygen, her blood pressure, everything. I sat there watching her sleep because I was scared something was gone happen if I left."
Nysheca turned toward the window.
I could see her jaw tighten.
"I said I know."
Her voice sounded different that time.
I softened mine.
"Then start acting like it."
She didn't answer.
"She need both of us."
"You think I don't care about Mama?"
"I ain't say that."
"You act like because you the one always there, you care more."
"That's not what I'm saying."
"That's exactly how you make it sound."
I sighed.
Maybe she had a point. Nysheca wasn't me. She didn't handle shit the way I did. When something scared me, I grabbed onto it and tried to control every piece I could. Nysheca ran. Always had.
"You know I'm not saying you don't love her."
She looked out the window.
"I do love her."
"I know."
"I just don't like hospitals."
"Neither do I."
"No, like...I really don't like that shit."
I glanced over at her.
She picked at one of her nails.
"Seeing Mama like that fucked me up."
There it was. The shit underneath all that attitude.
"You could've told me."
"For what?"
"Because I'm your sister."
"And what you was gone do?"
"Listen."
She gave me a little side-eye.
"Without judging?"
"I ain't promise all that."
She laughed.
"Exactly."
I smiled.
"But I'm serious about you getting yourself together."
"I know."
"You ain't gotta become a damn nun tomorrow."
"Good, because I wasn't."
"But this getting high all the time?—"
"Who said all the time?"
I looked at her.
She looked at me.
We both started laughing.
"See, you can’t even lie with a straight face," I said.
"I don't get high all the time."
"Where am I dropping you right now?"
She got quiet.
"Exactly."
"Turn right at the next light."
I shook my head.
"You going to get high?"
"Possibly."
"Nysheca."
"What? At least I'm honest."
"After this whole conversation?"
"Nyrobi, I said I'm gone get my shit together. I ain't say it was starting in the next seven minutes."
I couldn't help but laugh.
"You are a fucking mess."
"But you love me."
"Unfortunately."
She reached over and squeezed my arm.
"Love you too, bitch."
I turned onto the street she pointed toward and slowed down.
"Where?"
"That house right there."
I looked at it, then at her.
"You sure?"
"Yes."
She reached for the door handle before stopping.
"And for what it's worth..."
"What?"
"I think you should do it."
"The surrogacy?"
"Yeah."
I waited for some joke about the money but it didn't come.
"But only if you really want to”… “mama right bout that part," she added.
I smiled a little.
"Look at you sounding responsible."
"Don't get used to it."
"I wasn't planning on it."
She opened the door.
"And if you change your mind, give them my number."
Nysheca was a mess.
I laughed.
"Get your ass out my car."
She climbed out and shut the door before bending down to the open window.
"I'm serious. Two-fifty? I'll stop smoking tonight."
"You said that at the house."
"And I mean it even more now."
"Bye, Nysheca."
"Love you!"
"Love you too."
I waited until she made it to the door before pulling off.
On the drive back home, Mama's words kept running through my head.
The money could fix a lot of shit. But Mama was right about one thing.
All that money was enough to make almost anything sound like a good idea.
Before I gave Kaizleigh and Billion an answer, I needed to make sure I wasn't only thinking about what I could gain.
Because once somebody else's baby was growing inside me, there wouldn't be no pretending I didn't understand what I'd signed up for.