Big Girls Do Cry (36 page)

“Remember me, Tina? Or are you still going by LaKeisha?” I couldn’t help but smile wickedly when I realized that she was the one with fear written all over her face.

“Oh, shit!” She tried to slam the door in my face, but I put my foot out to stop it. I had purposely worn jeans and sneakers just in case things got out of hand.

“Get your foot out my fucking door.” She tried to push the door closed. Obviously she knew nothing about leverage.

“You keep cursing at me like that and I’m not paying you a dime for the information I need.”

This got her attention.

“You gonna pay me?”

“Yeah, if you give me the information I’m looking for.”

“How much?”

“Five hundred. Now, can I come in?”

Tina—or LaKeisha or whatever she was called—stuck her head out the door and took a look around, as if she was afraid I’d brought the police with me. Satisfied when she didn’t see any, she beckoned me into the house.

She offered me a seat in her sparsely furnished living room.

I remained standing and got straight to the point. “Did you set me up?”

She stared at me silently for a moment. “The money first,” she said, gazing down at my purse.

I don’t know why I was surprised. Considering the dump she was living in, this woman clearly wasn’t bringing home a steady paycheck. Taking money up front for services rendered was probably second nature to her. You should have seen her eyes light up when I handed her the money. She stuffed it in her bra—as if I wouldn’t go down there and get it if I thought she was lying. Truth is, I didn’t want to give her shit other than my foot in her ass, which, I thought, I might end up doing just for GP when I was finished questioning her.

A cat came up and rubbed itself against my leg, and a queasy feeling started to ease into my stomach. “How long have you had the cat?”

“Him? ‘Bout three years. His momma’s around here somewhere. I had her for about seven.” The queasiness got worse.

“Do you even know my husband? Because my husband’s allergic to cats. He couldn’t spend five minutes in this house.”

She lit a cigarette and took a long drag before answering. “The truth is, I never met the man.”

The queasiness now felt like a punch in the stomach. “What the hell do you mean, ‘never met the man’? Why did you tell me you were sleeping with him? Why would you do this to me?”

“Same reason I’m talking to you now. For the money.” She shrugged casually, like wrecking someone’s life was all part of a day’s work. I wanted to reach across the room and slap her ass.

“You ruined my marriage for money?” I stood up, fists clenched. “Do you even know what kind of a person that makes you? Do you care about anybody but yourself?”

“Shoot, for two thousand dollars, I would have ruined my momma’s marriage—if she had ever been married.” She got a little attitude herself, but she didn’t stand up. Lucky for her, because the way I was feeling, I might have knocked her out. “Anyway, don’t be judging me. Look at this place. I’ve seen your house and your car. Your ass is rich. Just go get you another
man.” She took another long drag of her cigarette. “You wanna trade lives with me? ‘Cause we can do that shit anytime you want. “

I needed to leave there soon before I killed that woman. “I got just one more question.”

She shrugged again. “Might as well get your money’s worth.”

I pulled out the pictures of her and Jerome. “Do you know the man in this picture?”

She looked down at the photo and then up at me, but she hesitated to say anything.

“Don’t look at me; look at the goddamn picture. I just want the truth so I can get the fuck out of here.” I took a step toward her. “Unless you want me to take back that money you shoved in your bra.”

She sighed like a petulant child, putting out her cigarette in an overflowing ashtray. “Yeah, that’s Jerome. We grew up together back in Danville.”

“Oh God, no,” I let slip. I was so sick to my stomach that I suddenly felt like I might throw up. I stiffened my back and held my head up high, trying not to let this woman know just how devastated I was.

“Why’d he give you the money?”

“He wanted me to help him split you and your husband up. He said he’d tried everything, but you were too stupid to leave. Said he needed something to push you over the edge so you’d leave your husband. That’s when he asked me how good an actress I was and if I wanted to make some money.”

What hurt the most was that her explanation made sense. It was no secret that Jerome wanted me to leave Leon. I just had no idea he would go to such lengths to make it happen. I had a flashback to the boiling water I’d thrown on Leon and to the fact that I’d actually had the nerve to pull a gun on him. Jerome had succeeded in pushing me over the edge.

“Do you know why he would do this?”

She was starting to look bored. I guess she figured she’d given me my five hundred dollars’ worth of information. “To be honest, he acted like he was jealous. I got the impression y’all were sleeping with each other.”

“Jerome is gay.”

She raised her eyebrows. Obviously, this was news to her. “He doesn’t look gay. And he wasn’t gay in high school, I don’t think.”

“Well, he’s gay now. And when he gets back from vacation, he’s in a lot of trouble.”

“Well, don’t tell him I told you shit. The last thing I need is more drama in my life.”

I turned to leave and then remembered something. “Before I go, one more thing.”

She sighed. “What?”

I looked down at her hand. “Give me back my gotdamn rings.”

“Uh-uh, you gave me these.”

“Have it your way. But don’t be surprised when the police show up at your door to retrieve my stolen property.”

I knew it would only take that one small threat. She rolled her eyes at me and pulled the rings off her finger. I took them from her and stuck them in my pocket. I’d have to be sure to disinfect them when I got home.

I walked out of that house fuming. What the hell was Jerome thinking? He knew how hurt I was when I found the panties in my house. I’d been living through hell ever since I first suspected Leon was cheating. If this all turned out to be some elaborate plan concocted by Jerome, I didn’t think he could ever offer me a good enough explanation. Why would my supposed best friend want to make me miserable?

I remembered that Peter told me there were things about Jerome I didn’t know. Then I thought about what Tina had just told me. She thought Jerome and I were sleeping together. Was it possible that was his motive? Could my gay best friend really be in love with me?

Damn! I’d come to Tina for answers, but I still had questions. The biggest one of all was now that I knew that Leon had probably been telling the truth all along, what the hell was I going to do about him? And how was I ever going to face Michael with this? There was, however, one thing I had to do immediately.

I pulled out my cell phone, then punched in the numbers to my lawyer.

“Johnson and Swartz,” a woman said.

“Hi, this is Loraine Farrow. Can I speak with Brad Johnson, please?”

“Sure, Ms. Farrow. Hold on one minute.”

Some elevator music started playing until a familiar voice clicked in. “Hey, Loraine, what’s up?”

“Did they serve my husband yet?”

“No, not yet. The process server’s going by his office this afternoon.”

“Well, stop him. I’m not sure if I want a divorce.”

“You sure?”

“For now. Yes.”

“Okay, I’m on it.”

“Thanks, Brad.” I hung up.

Rashad had really played me well, but I still couldn’t help but think he was nothing but a damn coward. If he really didn’t want me to move to Petersburg so we could start our own family, why didn’t he just tell me himself? Instead, he had to stab me in the back by going to the one person he knew could do the most damage. Now that my mother had called my landlord, I didn’t even have a place to go. Looks like my plan to start another family with Rashad had blown up in my face.

What Rashad and the rest of my family didn’t count on, though, was that I had another plan. If he didn’t want to help me have another baby, then I would just have to make sure I kept this one. In the end, he’d be sorry he’d taken Egypt’s side. In fact, he might be sorry he ever chose Egypt over me in the first place.

I picked up the phone next to my bed and called the lawyer I’d been corresponding with. Rashad and Egypt might have a good lawyer, but I had a whole team of lawyers at my disposal. Just to cover my ass, I’d sent a copy of the surrogacy papers to my lawyer last week so he could look them over. Now I needed some advice about how I could get out of that contract and take my baby back. Unfortunately, the news he had for me wasn’t good.

After some preliminary legal talk I barely understood, he said, “So, Isis, unfortunately this agreement is pretty airtight.”

“So, basically what you’re saying is I don’t have a fucking leg to stand on?” I wanted to throw the phone across the room.

“I don’t know if I’d put it that colorfully, but essentially, yes, that’s what I’m saying. Legally, that baby is theirs, although your
sister has to go through an adoption process. The fact that he’s the child’s biological father makes their case even more open and shut.”

“I thought as a surrogate I had forty-eight hours to change my mind.”

“You’ve been watching a little bit too much TV. You see, technically this is not a surrogacy case. Virginia law only allows a woman to be a surrogate if she’s married with at least one child of her own. This is a custody and parental rights case. By signing the consent form relinquishing rights to the child, you’ve basically given up your parental rights. Now, we can fight this, but it’s not going to be cheap at all.”

“Wait a minute. Isn’t Prepaid Legal gonna pay for that?”

He got quiet for a second. “No, but we can recommend an attorney at a lower-than-average rate. Our services—”

I cut his ass right off. “Hold the fuck up. When I signed up for this thing, they told me that anytime I needed a lawyer, I could get one. That I’d have a team of lawyers at my disposal.”

“That’s true. And you do, for some basic services. But in certain cases, there is a charge.”

“And this just happens to be one of those cases?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“You know what? This is bullshit right here. I been paying you motherfuckers for over two years, and when I finally need you, y’all want more money. Thanks for nothing, shithead.” I hung up on his ass. And to think the crook who sold me this useless policy just sent me a postcard from the Dominican Republic, talking about how he appreciated my business. Oh, he was gonna get a piece of my mind when he came back from his little vacation paid for on my dime.

I felt defeated, like the whole world was sitting on my shoulders and I had no one to help me carry the weight. And people had the nerve to ask me why I wanted to kill myself. ‘Cause this world ain’t shit, that’s why.

“Excuse me.” A nurse came into my room, wheeling a blood pressure machine. “My name is Jessica, and I’m going to be your nurse for the night. I just have to check your vitals.” She pulled
my medical chart out of the holder on the front of my bed and glanced at it. “Isis. What a beautiful name. Very exotic.”

“Best thing my mother ever did for me was give me that name.”

Jessica laughed. As she checked my vital signs, she made small talk about the weather and about her kids. She seemed a bit distracted, like her mind was somewhere else. It turned out that one of her kids was sick, and she was feeling guilty about being at work, instead of home taking care of him. It was actually good for me to listen to her ramble on about them, because it helped me take my mind off the mess that my own life had become. Instead of treating me like an incubator for Egypt’s baby, which is basically how I’d been treated by my whole family for nine months, she treated me like a human being. She treated me like I was the same as any other new mother on the ward—and that’s when it dawned on me: She had no idea I had given birth as a surrogate.

“Would you like me to bring you your baby?”

Her offer was like a sudden ray of sunshine on a stormy day. My mother wouldn’t even show me a photo of the baby, and here was this nurse offering to bring him to me. I didn’t hesitate to say, “Yes, I would.”

When she returned about ten minutes later, she was pushing a small bassinet. “Let me see your arm. I have to match up your wristband.”

I was nervous. My wristband had my name and some numbers on it, but I had no idea what was on the baby’s band. For all I knew, it had the word
surrogate
in big red letters, and she would take the baby away before I had a chance to even see him.

She lifted him out of the bassinet, and I got my first look at my son since his birth. He was gorgeous, wrapped snugly in a blanket and sleeping peacefully. I felt my eyes fill up with tears, but I tried to remain calm so the nurse wouldn’t suspect anything. She checked the band on his ankle, then the one on my wrist. “Yep, the numbers match. This one’s yours,” she said with a smile as she handed him to me.

My heart melted as soon as he was in my arms. No question about it, he belonged there.

He started squirming. The nurse said, “Maybe he’s hungry. Are you breastfeeding?”

I nodded my head, though technically I wasn’t. How could I breastfeed a baby they hadn’t even let me see? They had brought me a machine earlier so I could pump my breasts. The doctors explained that it’s good for the baby’s immune system to get breast milk, even if it’s just for the first few days. Egypt had me pumping my breasts so she could feed the milk to the baby in a bottle. It was just one more demeaning thing I had to go through, hooked up to a milking machine like a cow, all so my sister and Rashad could have their happy little family.

I pulled up my gown. No one had taught me how to breastfeed, but it just felt right. I can’t explain it; having him in my arms, I felt a natural instinct to nurture my child. My breasts started tingling, like they’d done earlier when I pumped. Another nurse had explained that this was a sign my body was releasing the milk. She said it was purely a hormonal process, but I knew that it was happening now because my body recognized this baby that I’d carried for nine months. He was mine, no matter what it said on some damn piece of paper I’d signed.