Page 4 of I'm So Mega
“So what! Maggie is in seventh grade. Jeez, Mega.” She stepped in front of me. “I don’t have a problem with you wanting to protect your daughter, but I don’t like the roundabout way that you went about it. You better go talk to your daughter before you go to Croy’s house.”
I got my stuff to take a shower. “I’ll talk to her before I leave, Ruth.” I walked toward the bathroom. “Lil scammer.”
Smack!She slapped me on the back of my head. “I heard that.”
I told her about what our boys said the other night, after she let me smut her out in the most disrespectful way. She still was not the best at quiet sex, so when we did some home renovations, I made sure I soundproofed our bedroom.
After my shower, I got dressed so that I could go hang with my boys at Croy’s house in Summerville. The women were coming here. The kids would be with my mother and Mama Naomi.
I stepped into my son’s room to see what they were doing. They still didn’t have their privileges back. They took their first retest today, and what would you know. They both passed. That was enough for me to know that they didn’t switch places for testing purposes. That was good to know, but I still needed to know why. “What y’all doing in here?”
“We did what you said. We started a book club with Mama. Her and Sissy are reading the same book, and we’re gonna talk about it together. She said we could even do a book review on her TikTok,” Joseph said.
It tickled me to see the excitement on both of their faces. I wasn’t overly surprised by Joseph’s excitement, because he liked to read. Matthew, on the other hand, was going to be an Audible type of dude. “What book are y’all reading?”
Matthew held up the book. “We’re reading Clean Getaway by Nic Stone. It’s about this boy named Scoob and his grandmama. They’re on a road trip through the south, and she’s teaching him all this cool stuff. I didn’t think I was gonna like it, but it’s cool.”
“That’s what’s up. I’ll make sure I read it, too, so that we can all talk about it as a family,” I told them. My heart did a double beat when their eyes lit up.
Joseph sat up from his place on the bed. They were in his room today. “Really, Daddy? You’re going to read it too?”
“Of course, man. Y’all come here and give me a hug before I leave. Y’all going to y’all grandma’s house tonight.” I opened my arms to receive them.
They both jumped off the bed, then ran over to me. I kissed both of them on the head. When Ruth and I lost Megha, I never thought my heart would beat right again. Nothing would ever make me forget about my first baby boy. These two boys in my arms helped restore me. After I loved on them for a few more minutes, I walked the few steps to Maggie’s room.
I took a deep breath before I knocked on her door. This lil girl could be stubborn just like her mama. Actually, more than her mama. I knocked on her door and waited for her to tell me to come in. We respected our children’s privacy, within reason. Yes, they could close their doors, but they couldn’t lock them.
I opened her door after she told me that I could come in. She was on a video call with Kellie. Kellie told me hello before Maggie disconnected the call. “Hey, Daddy.”
“Hey, baby girl. Can I talk to you for a second?” I continued after she nodded her head. “I know you’re mad at me for reaching out to Mr. and Mrs. Armen. I should have told you that I was going to do that. I wanted to talk to his parents, to get to know them, because the world is a crazy place. It’s my job to protect you.”
She gazed at me with those soft eyes that could make me reach in the sky, grab the moon, then buck at the sun if it had something to say about it. “I know, Daddy, but sometimes you embarrass me. I don’t like to be embarrassed.”
My approach to almost everything in life was crass. I could admit that. It was never my goal to embarrass my baby girl though. “It is never my intention to embarrass you. I apologize for that, Maggie. I will not apologize for my right as a father to protect you. How about I just be more mindful on how I do it. Can we compromise with that?”
Her beautiful cheeks lifted. “I guess we can. When him and his parents come for dinner, please be nice, Daddy. I kinda like him.”
I wanted to fight the damn air.Big G, I’m not ready. She’s over here telling me that she likes a boy, like her daddy isn’t batshit crazy.I tried to pinpoint what I had done this time to make Big G mad at me. I hadn’t laid anyone down in over like six years or something like that. I was requested to do a special assignment with Ned and Croy, so I obliged. “Baby girl, I will try my best. I promise.”
“I’m notready for this, man! Why does she even have to grow up?” I asked no one in particular. “Then she’s gonna just openly tell me that she likes him. Curse the day I said I wanted my children to be honest with me.”
I leaned back in the chair on Croy’s deck, which was our favorite hangout spot. Tonight, it was just Ned, TJ, and me. Riker planned to join us, but his five-year-old daughter, Stormie, had planned a tea party for her and her daddy. He would never cancel plans with his daughter, unless he had to. There were plenty of times that Maggie had me sitting in a little chair in her room with an empty teacup, my pinky stuck out, and a tiara on my head.
“That’s kind of what they do, Mega,” Croy said with a chuckle. “Look, Maggie is just going to a dance. I got a grown woman living in what Fiona claims is a mini house, but it’s a full ass house on my land. Her ass has a boyfriend that comes through and stays the night. How the fuck do you think I feel?”
The aggression in his voice was deep. All of our eyes wandered to the left. You could see Croya’s house from the back deck. She was a college graduate with a bachelors and a masters. She was still trying to make her own way, so Croy and Fiona told her to move back home.
“Tell dat nigga he can’t stay da night. Fuck you mean?” TJ’s face was torn up. “I’on got a lil girl yet, but when me and Mekole do have one, I boxin’ off churn in the daycare if they mess with my baby.”
You would think that he was just talking, but he wasn’t. TJ was more of a loose cannon than I was, and he was younger with less patience. When he met his wife Mekole, you would have thought he calmed down. The problem in his situation was that his wife was Fiona’s crazy little cousin who was cut from the same crazy ass cloth. When his crazy activated, so did hers and vice versa. Their son was a little touched, too, to only be one, but I was just going to pray for him.
Croy laughed. “Yeah, you would think that it would be that simple, but not when your wife and daughter are best friends. Fiona said she’s a growing woman and needs her privacy. Talking about at least we have an eye on her.” He took a sip of his beer. “Man, I wasn’t there for Croya’s birth and shit like that, but I remember the feeling when I found out that one of our twins was a girl. Being told you’re having a girl is a different feeling.”
Ned and I understood what he was saying. It was a different kind of protection. I wouldn’t say that it was necessarily more protective than your son but different. The day I found out that Ruth and I were having a girl, I played it cool, but I was scared like hell.
Over Twelve Years Ago. . .
“Ruth, why is Papa laying on you like that? If he squishes my baby, I’m sending him to a damn kill shelter,” I ranted. From the moment Ruth met my dogs, they said fuck me. Damn traitors.
