Page 35 of Without You I Have Nothing To Lose

“Are you going to take your own advice?” I asked.

“It’s not about me right now, Dai. We’re here for you right now. We’ll worry about my situation when we get back.” I nodded and cleaned up my face and washed my hands before going back out and finding my mama and Aiden in the living room, but a man was now with them.

“Daizha, this is my husband, Robert. Robert, honey. This is Daizha.” She introduced us, and he got up to hug me. I tensed and Demetric put his hand out to intervene.

“She doesn’t do well with strange men,” he stated. I saw my mama put her head down and Robert simply stated that he understood. She must’ve told him what happened.

“I don’t want to be intrusive, but Daizha, there’s a reason that you’re here. Your mother informed me that you left home when you were sixteen. She also told me why. I think it’s time that the both of you talked about it. Too much time has been lost already,” Robert said, and I agreed. A few moments went by before I cleared my throat and started speaking.

“Why didn’t you believe me? Why did you blame me and made me out to be a liar? I never gave you a reason to not believe me. You always knew where I was and who I was with. The one time that I knew you would tear the world up behind me, you let me down and I want to know why?” My voice cracked. “Do you know what I had to go through for a whole year? I was alone and scared. You didn’t notice the change in me? You didn’t notice that your once vibrant and outgoing child had basically turned into a hermit? I was not the same, and I attempted to kill myself just to make it stop. I was relieved to get pregnant because I knew he would be dealt with, but I was wrong. You called me a liar and took his side. How could you?” I cried.

“Dai…Daizha, you don’t know how many times I beat myself up about that. At the time, I felt like I did what I had to do to save Vince from getting into more trouble. He was my sister’s only chi…”

I cut her off, “you were supposed to save me, mama! I’m your child…not him!” I yelled.

“I know, baby. I know. It was just that Amanda had asked me to keep her only child safe since she was always looking out for me…I agreed, and it cost me my child and her innocence. Daizha, I’m truly sorry that I didn’t do more to protect you then. When you up and left, it upset me. At the time, I thought it was because you had been caught in your lie. It wasn’t until the police came to my house about a year and a half after you left looking for him because he violated another young lady at his job. He almost beat her to death. She pressed charges, and that brought a slew of other allegations and confessions. By the time he went to trial, he had twenty counts of aggravated sexual assault and is now serving fifty years in prison. Amanda isn’t talking to me, but I’m fine with that. I told her what he did, and she tried to blame you. When I heard it from someone else’s mouth…it made me feel like shit. I can’t apologize enough, Daizha. I should’ve believed you. I just didn’t want to admit that something like that happened to you, especially under my own roof.” I looked into my mama’s eye’s, and I knew she was remorseful. I couldn’t keep holding this grudge against her if I wanted to continue to heal. I already forgiven Vince and Gabe, but that’s my choice and my own sanity.

“I’m glad you said that nigga was in prison, because I came fully prepared to send him to the other side,” Demetric voiced, and I knew he was dead serious. I was just surprised that he said it in front of my mama and his husband.

“Had he not. I wouldn’t bat an eye if you did,” she replied.

“Okay…I see we’re all on the same page now. Let’s go out to eat and celebrate. Daizha…Demetric, y’all cool with that?” Robert asked. Demetric looked down at me to see how I felt, and I nodded.

“That’s fine,” I replied.

“Okay, good. Let me go change and we can go,” my mama said and walked out of the room with Robert behind her.

“So, Aiden. What have you been up to? You all grown up and stuff. You got a girlfriend?” I asked, nosily.

“You still nosy? She be all in your business like that?” he asked Demetric.

“Hell yeah. She can do that though,” he smirked.

“Sucker ass nigga,” Aiden mentioned.

“Aiden!” I shrieked.

“Nah, let lil’ homie live. He ain’t no baby,” Demetric said. Before I could respond, my mama and Robert came back into the room and we all left out. Aiden opted to ride with me and Demetric and talked my head off the whole way.

When we pulled into the restaurant’s parking lot. Aiden got out and when Demetric helped me out, he pulled me into his chest.

“You good?”

“I’m good. Feels like it’s a weight lifted off my shoulders.” He nodded.

“As long as you’re good…I’m good.” He bent down to kiss my lips, and we followed everyone inside. Once we were seated, we jumped right back into our conversation.

“So, Demetric. How did you meet Daizha?” my mama asked.

“Her clumsy self ran right into me,” he revealed.

“I did not,” I lied.

“You did, but it’s cool. You ran right into where you needed to be,” he mentioned.

“Sounds like it’s more than that,” my mama mentioned.

Taking a deep breath, I told my mama what I had been going through since I left and the tears started all over again, but it felt good to let her know.

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