Single Mom (52 page)

“How do he and his father get along?” I asked.

“They’re doing much better than they used to, but it seems as if I have a harder time having a normal conversation with his father. I keep wanting to size him up when I talk to him. And I know it’s wrong, but I can’t help it.”

I smiled. I thought that I was the only one she lambasted. I said, “I know exactly what he’s feeling. Trust me.”

“Well, do either one of you know how
I
feel, or how
I
felt?
No
, nor do you think about it. That’s what makes my attitude about this entire thing worse, you two can’t even see my point of view.”

“What about
our
point of view?”

“What about it?”

“We have a story to tell in this thing, too. Nobody wants to listen to
our
story.”

“Because the shit is weak, J.D.! Now don’t get me started on that, okay? Because if you
really
want to let your story be told, then you come out to our next single mothers’ meeting and tell
them
.”

I could imagine the horror of that scene. It would have been a lynch mob. I started to laugh.

“Oh, don’t laugh, because I don’t see a damn thing funny about it! The only thing funny about this is that you would even
attempt
to think that your story held any kind of weight. You men just up and walk away from
things. If it was a case where I had tried to trap you into something and take you to court for a bundle of money, that would be different, but that is
far
from the case here. So I don’t want to hear
nothing
that you have to say. All I care about is that you are back in your son’s life now, and on that note, I think it’s time for me to go before my temperature gets too high.”

I said, “Okay. Well, thanks for listening as long as you did.”

“Don’t mention it,” she snapped at me.

I had worn out my welcome anyway, but right before I hung up the phone with her, I said, “One more question, and you don’t have to answer it if you don’t want to, but what do you think about your relationship with Brock?” I was still curious about that.

“That’s none of your business,” she told me.

“You asked me about Kim.”

“No I did not. I only asked if you were involved with raising her son.”

“Oh, yeah,” I said, backing off. “Well, that must mean that your relationship with him is not perfect, because if it was, you would probably want to brag about it.” I just couldn’t leave it alone.

Denise said, “Try that reverse psychology stuff somewhere else, okay. I get enough of that from Walter’s father.”

“I’m not like him,” I told her.

“No, but you
are
a man,
a black man
, who had a son with a supportive black woman, and you
didn’t
try to marry her and make a family.”

Shit!
I thought to myself. I don’t know why I kept trying to get to her. I guess only my mother could do it. Denise ripped me to pieces every time. All of a sudden, the name “Neecy” didn’t even fit her anymore.

“Well, it’s been nice talking to you, but I have things to do. Okay? I’ll tell your son that you called.”

When she hung up, I just held the phone in my hand and shook my head. I remember when Denise would worship the ground that I walked on. I was her first and only love for nearly five years, then it all just faded away. From an outside point of view, someone would wonder how I was able to get with her in the first place. She seemed light-years ahead of me. Nevertheless, she was dating a truck driver and couldn’t stand Walter Perry, Mr. Money Banks. I guess it really didn’t matter what a brother had, but more so how he treated her. Then again, with some sisters it was the exact opposite.

Little Jay said that Brock treated his mother “
real
good.” I guess he was telling the truth, because Brock had the keys to her castle.

I walked around the apartment and looked at all of Kim’s photos. She was a good-looking sister. She could look even better if she applied herself.
Maybe I could buy her a few things and freshen up her wardrobe and appearance. She was a beginner that I could easily take to winner status, and she had been in my face for a straight half a year, bad breath in the morning and all. I sat there and laughed about it. But before I could work on her, I wanted to save up to buy a car.

I walked into Jamal’s room and gave him another look. He was balled up like a snail. He wasn’t my biological son, but I sure felt close to him. I realized that he could make me really proud one day.

I walked back out into the living room and took a seat on the couch. It was just after nine, and the University of Illinois was playing Cincinnati on ESPN. I sat there and watched the game while thinking about myself, Kim, and Jamal.

What if I
did
marry Kim?
I thought. Then I shook it off. “Naw, she’d probably get too happy, and then shit would start changing too much around here,” I told myself. Women get married and start expecting the world. I liked things just the way they were. But what about having another kid? A daughter. We didn’t necessarily have to get married, as long as we were a family.

I called Kim at work just to ask her about it. What can I say, I felt hyper that night.

“What’s wrong?” she picked up the phone and asked me.

“Why you always think something’s wrong?”

“Well, it’s almost time for me to get off, so if you couldn’t wait, then it must be an emergency.”

“Well, you’re wrong.”

She said, “You just called to tell me you love me then?”

I grinned and decided to humor her. “Yeah, that’s it,” I told her.

“You do?”

She was taking it seriously. I grunted, “Hunh?” as if I didn’t know what she was talking about.

“You really love me, or do you just love my son?”

“Why can’t I love both of y’all? It shouldn’t be a competition thing. I don’t see it that way.”

“So you really love me then?” she asked again.

She was, as they say, fixated on the word. I asked her, “How many times are you gonna say that? You never told me that you loved me.”

“Of course I do,” she told me. She said it as if she had been waiting to tell me for ages.

“I didn’t ask you, I was just stating the fact.”

“Well, I do love you. And I know you haven’t asked me to marry you
or anything, but I love what you’ve done with my son, and I love how you’ve given purpose to his life, and to
my
life.” Because of me, Kim’s New Year’s resolution was to stop smoking weed. She said that I could help her out with it by keeping her stress level down. That was going to be a real challenge. Kim got stressed about everything.

I said, “Wait a minute, slow down with all that. You’re supposed to give purpose to your
own
life.”

“Why don’t you take off from work tonight?” she asked, ignoring me.

She had asked me that before, and I had turned her down. I actually liked going to work, and hadn’t missed one night in seven months.

“Why?” I asked her.

“Well, I’m at work right now, and we really need to talk about things. You know we didn’t do much for Valentine’s Day.”

I smiled. “Yeah, what about it?” You can send a woman hearts and flowers any day. Valentine’s Day was a pain in the ass if you asked me. It was three times worse than Christmas. All that buildup and red shit for one day. At least Christmas was an entire season. But some women went as far as to break off entire relationships for Valentine’s Day expectations and disappointments. That didn’t make much sense at all.

“I just wanted to come home and hold you and my son tonight. Is that too much to ask?”

“And what about if you start wanting to do this
every
night?”

“Come on now, I know better than that. Besides, you haven’t taken off
any
days from work. Don’t you get vacation time or something?”

I hadn’t been on one job long enough to even think about a vacation. My vacations had been getting laid off and fired. I said, “Yeah, you got a point there. Other guys are taking vacations. The boss even took one with his family in January.”

“Yeah, so he shouldn’t be mad at you for taking off
one night.”

“But I still have to let him know in advance,” I told her.

“Do you get any sick days or anything?”

I thought about my father. “Sick days to me are like a curse. I ain’t sick, and I never want to be sick.”

“A lot of other people aren’t either, but if you’re going to get paid for it, then take advantage of it.”

Kim was talking about starting a lot of bad habits.

She said, “Well, I gotta get back to work. Just think about it, okay?”

I hadn’t even gotten a chance to ask her what I had called for. “Damn, do you even want to know what I called for?” I snapped at her.

“Oh, what, besides to say that you love me?”

“I called to ask you what you thought about having a little girl or something.”

“You mean like a baby?” Her voice elevated into a squeal. I was nervous to repeat it but I did it anyway.

“Yeah, like a baby girl,” I told her.

“Oh my God! You’re gonna make me get hollered at.”

“Well, tell them this is an emergency like you said.”

She whispered and said, “You know my tubes are tied.”

“You can get them
untied
, right?” I asked her.

She said, “I don’t believe that you’re asking me this. And why a girl?”

“I just figured it would be something different from raising boys, you know.”

“Now see, we
definitely
have to talk tonight! Call your job right now!”

“We can talk about this in the morning.”

“No we can’t either. If you wanted to talk about this in the morning, then you should have waited until the morning to ask me. But no, you called me on the job, so it must have been on your mind.”

I had gotten myself in trouble. I said, “You know what, you get back to work and I’ll see what I can do.”

“Don’t be lying to me, because I’m gonna be
real
disappointed if you do. Don’t get me all worked up for nothing. You told me you don’t want me to smoke anymore, right?”

“All right, well, let me make this call then,” I told her.

“You promise?”

I shook my head and smiled. I really pushed Kim’s excitement button that night. She was showing how much she felt for me. I guess single mothers
can
open up when they feel like it. I wondered how it was with Denise and Brock. Did she get that excited for him? I had to get her off my damn mind!

I said, “Kim, I promise. Okay? Now let me call the man.”

“Okay, well, I’ll see you in another hour then.”

I hung up the phone and wondered what I had just gotten myself into. It was nearly ten o’clock. How was I going to call off just two hours before work? I didn’t want to start any bad habits, but I had promised Kim that I would see, so I called Roger at his home anyway. Hopefully, he hadn’t left yet.

“Hello,” he answered. His voice was direct and distinctive.

“Hey, Roger, it’s Jimmie Daniels. I may need a favor from you.”

“What’s that?” he asked.

I figured I’d take the honest route. I said, “You know I haven’t asked for a night off in seven months, and I know this is short notice and all, but I have some pressing family issues that came up tonight that I may need to straighten out right away.”

“It’s not anything with your son, is it? He didn’t get in any trouble, did he?” He sounded really concerned. At the same time, he was expecting the worst like so many others expected.

I was proud to say, “No, it doesn’t have anything to do with him, I’m talking about the immediate family that I live with. We want to talk about our future together without always putting things off, because she works during the day, and then we work during the night. And you know, it’s in the heat of the moment and all, so I understand if you can’t—”

“Go ahead and take it,” he said, cutting me off. “You’re right, you haven’t taken any days off yet. And it is short notice, but I’ll let it slide this time. I like the fact that you’re being honest with me instead of making up something. I know when guys are making up stories. I’ve been a manager for a long time, and I’ve heard them all. But during the first few months of the new year, a lot of young families have to rethink things. So this sounds like a legitimate concern. A man with family concerns that are not taken care of will eventually become a stressful worker who can’t perform well on the job.

“So you go ahead and take off tonight and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

I didn’t know what to say. I was shocked! I said, “Thanks, Roger. Thanks a lot!”

“Don’t mention it, just stay on track with your family,” he told me. “The family is the cornerstone of America. You make sure you remember that. A man’s family comes first not just some of the time, but
all
of the time.”

“Well, I’ll see you tomorrow then. Eleven-thirty sharp.”

“Don’t be late,” he joked.

“No sir,” I responded.

When I hung up the phone, I sat back and relaxed like there was no tomorrow. After working for a straight seven months of night shifts, I had no idea how much a simple night off was needed. But I didn’t plan on overdoing it. I’d be right back at work tomorrow, and the next day, and the next day. I was getting too old to fuck up again. I would be turning thirty-five on March second, and I planned to enjoy it like a grown man with a secure future.

I called Kim back and told her the good news.

She whispered, “Baby, we’re gonna have a
lonnng
night tonight. You hear me? I can’t
wait
to get home.”

Jamal was back up and wiping out his eyes. I gave him the phone to cool his mother off.

He said, “Hi, Mom. They won the game again. And J.D. said I could play in the summer leagues.”

He listened for a second and gave the phone back to me.

“He just woke up?” she asked me.

“You can tell?”

“Yeah, I can tell. What’s this summer league about?”

“Basketball.”

“They start that early? He’s only turning seven.”