5. Maliah #2
The smile on her face somehow got bigger. I pushed myself up slightly against the headboard and looked at her harder.
“What?” I repeated.
Because whatever this was, she was enjoying it way too much. Her eyes were shining. Actually shining. The sight alone woke me up more than the sunlight pouring through the bedroom windows.
She came in so late last night that I was already knocked out by the time I woke up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom she was on her side of the bed asleep.
I remembered standing there in the bathroom doorway looking at her for a second before climbing back into bed myself.
She hadn’t moved. Hadn’t stirred. Now she looked like she had been awake for hours.
Just waiting on me to open my eyes. I rubbed my face.
“Ma, you’re starting to scare me.”
That only made her laugh. It was a soft laugh. The kind I hadn’t heard in a while. Then she lifted her hand.
At first, I didn’t understand what I was looking at. My eyes moved from her face to the object in her hand. Then back again. Then back down.
The world seemed to stop for a second. I stared. And stared. And stared.
“Eternity…”
My voice came out lower than I intended.
Her smile trembled just a little because suddenly she looked emotional too.
She wasn’t just excited. She was also emotional, and I could read that shit all over her face.
Like she had been carrying this by herself for a few hours and was finally getting to let it out.
I sat up straighter. My eyes never left the pregnancy test. For months we had been doing this dance.
We were in what felt like an endless cycle of hoping, praying, waiting, getting disappointed, and then starting all over again.
The empty spaces in between trying were filled with doctor appointments, deep mental conversations, and more waiting.
There were times when neither one of us said it out loud, at least not to each other, but I knew we were both wondering the same thing.
Maybe it just wasn’t going to happen. The thought hurt every single time it crossed my mind.
And now… Now she was sitting in front of me, smiling like she was holding the answer to every prayer we’d whispered when nobody else was around.
“Are you serious?”
The question barely left my mouth. Eternity nodded, and then the tears in her eyes finally spilled over.
“Yes.”
That was all it took. I grabbed her so fast she squealed. The sound filled the room as I pulled her into my lap.
“Malik!”
I laughed, actually laughed. The kind that came from somewhere deep. The kind I couldn’t remember the last time I heard come out of myself.
“Are you serious?” I asked again.
She nodded against my shoulder.
“Yes.”
I buried my face against her neck and closed my eyes. We just sat there holding each other.
So much disappointment started to build when it came to this baby shit, and somehow it was finally happening. When I pulled back, I cupped her face in both hands.
“You sure?”
She laughed through her tears.
“Babe…”
“I’m asking.”
I needed to know that this was the confirmation that we were finally doing this.
“Yes,” she answered with this huge grin on her face.
I looked down at the test again and then back at her. Then down at it one more time.
I couldn’t stop smiling. A nigga was in utter disbelief.
It’s like I couldn’t stop thinking about it. We were having a baby. Another baby.
Our baby. Eternity wiped at her eyes before suddenly climbing out of bed. I frowned. If she thought that I was on her ass before, then she had to know that I was like Velcro now.
“Where you going?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.
She looked at me like I had lost my mind.
“To tell my kids.”
The excitement in her voice made me laugh.
She was already moving around the room, reaching for her robe that was hanging over the chair near the window.
The smile hadn’t left her face. If anything, it looked bigger now.
She slipped the robe on quickly and tied it around her waist before heading toward the bedroom door.
I sat there watching her. And she was so fucking beautiful.
I was still trying to process what had just happened.
I mean, one plus one equals two, and I had been shooting that club up like my Opp was inside that thing popping bottles, but every negative test felt like this moment would never come.
Just before she reached the hallway, she turned around.
The grin on her face was so wide it was impossible not to smile back.
Then she disappeared out of the room, on a mission to wake up the entire house.
ETERNITY
I couldn’t stop smiling. No matter how hard I tried, it stayed there.
Every few seconds I found myself laughing to myself, shaking my head, or touching my stomach like I could somehow feel something already.
It was ridiculous. I knew it was. But after the last few months of hoping, wondering, and trying not to get too excited every time my cycle was late, I couldn’t help it.
I was pregnant. The thought still didn’t feel real.
Yesterday, when I was out with Tori for most of our girls’ day, I felt sick as shit.
But I didn’t even bother paying it any mind.
By the time I got home and rushed to our bathroom to throw up, I already knew what this was.
With all my children, morning sickness never came in the damn morning.
My night owls all had me bent over the porcelain toilet when the moon was at its peak.
When I woke up this morning, I was relieved that Malik was still asleep because this gave me all the time I needed to take a test and then wait for the results.
I was sure that I would be tossing another stick of disappointment into the bathroom garbage bin.
But instead, two pink lines looked up at me, and I almost screamed in the closed space.
But I didn’t, I grabbed the stick of pride and then sat silently on the edge of the bed until Malik had woken up.
When I left our bedroom, he was still sitting on the edge of the bed looking like somebody had hit him upside the head with a brick.
Every time he looked at me, he smiled again.
Every time I looked at him, I did the same thing.
We probably looked crazy. But I didn’t care.
I was happy. It was the kind of happiness that settled all the way down into your soul.
There was a sway in my hips as I started walking down the long hallway.
The first stop was MJ’s room. I didn’t bother knocking.
He was damn near a grown man I should have knocked first, but this was so damn important.
The second I pushed the door open, he looked up from his phone and frowned.
Whenever I stood in the doorway of one of my children’s rooms, they gave me a glare like my ass didn’t belong there.
These teenagers were going to drive me crazy.
I couldn’t wait to get a baby up in here that would appreciate me being around.
“Why you in here smiling like that?”
The laugh escaped before I could stop it.
“I got something to tell you.”
His expression immediately turned suspicious.
“What?”
I leaned against the doorway.
“I’m pregnant.”
For a second, he just stared at me. Then his entire face twisted.
“Eww.”
“MJ,” I burst out laughing.
“Eww.”
He sat up straighter.
“Nah.”
I laughed harder.
“What is wrong with y’all?” he pointed toward the hallway. “Y’all too old for that.”
I walked into his room, grabbed the nearest pillow that was at the foot of his bed, and launched it at him. He caught it easily while still laughing.
“I’m serious.”
“And I’m serious,” I said with a smirk.
His face scrunched up again.
“I ain’t need that visual this early in the morning.”
The room filled with laughter before his expression softened.
“For real though?”
I nodded, and when I did, his grin appeared.
“That’s what’s up.”
My heart squeezed, and tears came to my eyes, but I wasn’t going to let them fall. This was a happy moment for me. A happy moment for my family.
“Thank you.”
“You know I’m still grossed out though,” he said with a shrug.
I rolled my eyes and left before he could say anything else. The smile never left my face.
If anything, it got bigger as I made my way down the hallway toward Maylee’s room.
She was sitting up in bed when I walked in, watching cartoons. The second she saw me, she muted the television.
“What happened?”
I sat down beside her.
“Daddy and I are having a baby.”
For a moment she just blinked. Then her eyes widened.
“A real baby?”
“Yes,” I laughed.
She looked down at her blanket. Then back at me. Then down again. My smile slowly faded.
“What is it?” I asked.