Page 23 of Love Me Now: Adrian & Kwamé
“Well, seems like you didn’t know about her.”
“‘Cause that bitch kept her from me!” he barked.
“Aht, aht. Watch that shit.” By now, I’d started pacing, feeling like I was ready to crush this nigga’s skull in a hundred different places.
“Fuck you, nigga! Put that bitch back on the phone!”
“Just know… You gon’ pay for that,” I warned him.
“Say, bruh, fuck you! Now, tell that ho I’m comin’ to get mine!” he threatened.
“Aight, bet, nigga. Come get her back in blood!” I hissed.
I hung up, then threw the phone across the room. It hit the wall and surely shattered the screen. The commotion startled a sleeping Jessie and caused Kwamé to flinch in fear.
“Adrian,” she called when I turned to leave the room.
“Gimmie a minute,” I requested, not even looking back. I felt the utter fool rising up inside of me, so I needed a minute tocontrol my emotions. If I said or did anything crazy, Kwamé would’ve walked away from me and never looked back.
Outside on the balcony, I lit a blunt as a million thoughts ran through my head. Scenarios for why Kwamé kept Jessie a secret from Damon wasn’t at the top of my list of worries. I was already planning how to kill this nigga ‘bout mine.
Here it was, I spent my days thinking about Kwamé and Jessie. I held Jessie when she cried, made sure she was clean, fed, and safe. Shit, I played fucking baby dolls with her. She was my damn child! There wasn’t going to be any type of court or no shit like that. Jessie was mine, and shit was going to stay that way.
I smoked enough to calm my racing thoughts, then went back inside to find Kwamé sitting on the edge of the bed. Absently, she rubbed her stomach, and she didn’t even notice that I’d entered the room. Silent, unchecked tears raced down her face. However, she just sat there.
I approached her, then kneeled in front of her. Placing my hands on her thighs, I leaned in to kiss her lips, then softly ran my fingers down her cheeks to wipe away her tears.
“I apologize for blowin’ up. It’s just… I’m man enough to admit that I don’t want another man raising Jessie. Yes, it’s selfish of me, but I don’t give a fuck.”
Slowly, her eyes focused on me.
“We need to talk,” she whispered tearfully.
“I’m right here to listen,” I urged.
She cleared her throat and said, “One afternoon, I invited Damon to my office for a session. He was late and asked if he could come after practice. I acquiesced because he was going through a tragic loss and needed me. He came to my office, we started the session, and everything was fine. At some point, I started feeling sick. He offered to grab me a bottle of water from the cafeteria. I thought nothing of it…”
I didn’t like where this was going, and my face showed it.
She shook her head as tears quickly and thickly skated down her cheeks. “I woke up hours later… A bottle of wine was opened and sitting on my desk. I could taste it in my mouth, and some had spilled onto my carpet. It looked like two people had been having drinks together. I was partially undressed, bleeding, and sore.”
Suddenly, Kwamé dashed to the bathroom, and I knew it was because she had to throw up. I was right behind her and helped her through the convulsing of her body. Quickly, I stepped away to cut the shower on, then undressed myself, her, and drowned us under the shower’s spray. We sat there on the shower’s floor, and I ran my fingers through her disheveled hair.
“I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you,” she cried.
“Shh, mama. It’s okay. I’m right here,” I mumbled while fighting every voice inside my head telling me to kill anyone connected to that nigga.
“I have no memory of what happened. Then, the whole setup… I was afraid. I was afraid to report him, and afraid to say anything to Antonias. I was embarrassed that I allowed that to happen to me. I must’ve driven myself crazy with worry and fear when his next session approached. He showed up with a smile on his face and pretended like nothing happened. I asked him what happened that afternoon. He looked at me like I was crazy. For a while, I psyched myself out and thought I was crazy, too. Mind you, I knew damn well I wasn’t crazy.”
“You were traumatized,” I supplied. “Ya brain was protecting you.”
She nodded. “Reality set in when I found out I was pregnant. I wrestled so badly over whether or not to keep Jessie.” She sobbed then, breaking my heart. “I didn’t want to for obvious reasons. However, I decided that she was my wake-up call. Thelife I was living was mentally and physically sending me to an early grave. Jessie made me slow down.”
“She’s the reason you took the year off,” I surmised.
She nodded again. “He didn’t know until he saw her at the game.”
And even then, that nigga played it cool. Damon was a predator. I was convinced of it. He played this shit too cool, and that made my stomach roll. He surely had other victims.
