by Tracy Brown
“I like him, Camille,” Lily said, smiling. “He’s a real gentleman!”
Camille beamed. “I like him, too,” she said. “If he’s being this sweet while I’m pregnant, just imagine what it’ll be like when I’m not.”
Toya laughed. “You’ll be pregnant again in no time,” she predicted.
Everyone laughed. Camille blushed.
Misa sighed. “I can’t wait for this baby to get here. Shane is so excited to have a cousin to play with.”
Lily nodded. “It’s all he talks about. ‘Is Aunt Tamille gonna have the baby today, Grandma?’ I keep telling him that his cousin will be here very soon.”
Camille smiled as she imagined Shane playing with her baby, the two of them growing up side by side. “I’m so happy that Shane is doing well,” she said. “I love him so much.”
Misa nodded. “He loves you, too.” She looked around at all the people in the room and reflected on how supportive they had all been of her and Camille.
“Thank you, everybody,” she said, seemingly out of nowhere. She noticed the puzzled expressions on all of their faces—all except Camille, who understood completely where her sister was coming from.
Misa continued. “We never got the chance to say thank you to all of you for everything you did over the past few months. I’m not just talking about the trial and the fact that you all were there every single day. But, you’ve all done so much. You’ve opened your homes to us, opened your wallets.” She looked knowingly at Celia, who smiled. “We’re so grateful.”
“We sure are,” Camille chimed in. “We couldn’t have survived all of this without you ladies.”
Toya waved her hand dismissively. “That’s what friends are supposed to do. We stick together, and we will continue to do so.”
Everyone agreed and Misa turned her attention to Celia. “How is Baron?” she asked. “I haven’t spoken to him much since we started planning the baby shower. I’ve been obsessed with baby stuff lately.”
Celia smiled. She was proud of her son for the strides he was making. “He’s still undergoing physical therapy a few days a week. He’s hoping to be able to walk without having to use a cane or a walker eventually. But he’s taking it one day at a time.” She looked at Misa, hoping she understood the underlying message in what she was about to say. “Lately, Baron has been doing some soul-searching and coming to terms with the monster that he used to be. He admitted to me that he’s made a lot of mistakes, hurt a lot of people.”
Misa understood exactly what Celia was saying as she stared directly at her.
“It’s not always easy admitting when you’ve been wrong. So that’s been hard for Baron … he’s being hard on himself. But the first step in correcting a problem is admitting that you have one. He’s finally admitted that to himself and with God’s help, he’ll be okay. I believe that Baron will emerge from all of this stronger than he was before.” She looked around the room at all the women present and realized that was true for all of them. “We all will,” she added.
“I know that’s right!” Lily agreed. “Stronger than ever!”
Epilogue: A New Beginning
“Push!” the doctor was urging Camille as she panted and sweated, her legs spread-eagle on the delivery bed.
It was ten minutes to four on the morning of July 11, 2008, and the baby had decided to arrive on a lucky day—7/11. Camille didn’t feel lucky at all as the pain seared through her. She groaned and grunted as she bore down hard, squeezing Frankie’s hand for dear life. He was amazed by her strength as she crushed his fingers together painfully. “That’s it,” he urged her. “You can do it!”
Camille had called Frankie just after midnight to tell him that her water broke and she was en route to the hospital. He had climbed out of bed frantically and rushed to meet her at the hospital. He had arrived to find that all of her family and friends were gathered in the waiting room, and he had been humbled to find out that Camille wanted him to be by her side. For hours now, he had been coaching her to push, to breathe, and telling her that she was the strongest woman he had ever met.
Camille felt the contraction ceasing and fell back against the bed, breathless and exhausted. “I can’t do it,” she said. “Just take it out.” She looked at the doctor pleadingly.
“You’re almost there, Camille,” the doctor reassured her. “One or two more pushes and the baby will be here.”
“You can do it,” Frankie said, convincingly. “Just one or two more pushes,” he repeated.
Camille stared at him in silence. Had she been in her right state of mind, she imagined that he may have looked quite handsome standing there smiling at her, urging her on. Instead, at the moment he looked and sounded like a complete fucking idiot. He made one or two more pushes sound like an easy task when, in fact, Camille feared that the pain might kill her.
She felt another contraction coming and she squeezed his hand again. “I’m gonna try and push it out one more time. If it doesn’t come out, I’m not pushing anymore.” She said it so matter-of-factly that the doctor just agreed with her.
“One, two, three, push!”
Camille pushed with all her might and Frankie felt his hand go numb. She was straining so hard that he thought she might self-destruct if this push wasn’t successful. She squeezed his hand with such force that he wanted to cry out in pain. Then in one swift motion the squirming baby sprang from her womb and into the doctor’s arms. They cleared out its airways and the baby’s first cries filled the room.
“It’s a girl!” the doctor proclaimed.
Frankie held on to Camille’s hand as they watched their baby being cleaned and bundled. He couldn’t believe the miracle he was witnessing.
“A girl,” he breathed, gripping Camille’s hand tighter.
Camille watched her ex-husband’s face as he laid eyes on his daughter for the first time. She watched his apprehension at the thought of being a father give way to pure love. His eyes filled with tears and he laughed as several streamed down his face. “I have a daughter.”
Camille smiled brightly as she watched him. He felt light-headed, but her hand steadied him as he stood staring at their squirming eight-pound-seven-ounce baby girl. The nurse finally brought the baby to them.
“Let me have her,” Frankie said eagerly. Smiling at the happy dad, the nurse handed the child to Frankie and he took her carefully into his strong arms. He cradled her so gently and so carefully that Camille chuckled a little. “She’s beautiful,” he said.
The baby lay serenely in Frankie’s arms and he couldn’t take his eyes off her. Camille beamed with joy as she wrapped her mind around the fact that they now had a little girl to love forever. The doctor tended to her and the nurses swarmed around her. But all Camille could focus on was the vision of Frankie holding his baby girl.
Finally, Frankie handed the baby to Camille. It seemed like he hated to give her up, but he did. He watched Camille cry as she held her daughter for the first time. The sight of mother and child lying together there that way filled Frankie with such joy. He smiled at them and shook his head in amazement. “She looks like you,” he said.
Camille thought she looked like an angel. “She has your nose.”
Frankie laughed. It was unthinkable to him that he had helped to create this perfect little girl who lay before him, that he and Camille together had formed something so magnificent.
“I want to name her Bria,” Camille said. “What do you think?”
Frankie smiled and nodded. “If you like it, I love it.” He scooped the baby back into his arms again and cradled her close to him, inhaling her scent. “Bria,” he repeated, staring at her chocolate-brown skin, the same color as his own.
“It means ‘beautiful one,’ ” Camille explained.
“She is beautiful,” he said again.
Camille smiled. She had a feeling that Bria would be the apple of his eye from that day forward.
The nursing staff came to take the baby to be inoculated and they ex
plained that Camille would be taken into recovery where she would get rest and have a chance to recuperate. Frankie reluctantly watched as the two of them were taken away.
He wasn’t sure how to feel as he stripped out of his scrubs and left the delivery room. He took a seat just outside of the delivery room and waded through a flood of emotions. He was a father.
He looked around at the staff at North Shore University Hospital hustling to and fro and he took a deep breath. Hospitals had always been a place of sadness, distress, and so much pain in his life until that point. But this time was different. He smiled as he thought of his baby.
Frankie got up and entered the waiting room where Camille’s loved ones sat anxiously. He looked around at everyone and a broad smile crept across his face. “It’s a girl,” he announced proudly. “Her name is Bria.”
Everyone smiled, laughed, and congratulated Frankie. They also flooded him with questions.
“How much did she weigh?”
“How long is she?”
“What time was she born?”
“Who does she look like?”
“How is Camille?”
He fielded their questions happily, still slightly dazed by all the excitement. Celia pulled him into an embrace and he had to resist the urge to cry on her shoulder. He felt so many different things in that moment—gratitude, humbleness, joy, and a little bit of fear.
“Congratulations, Daddy,” she said, rubbing his back as she hugged him. “You’re gonna do just fine.”
He nodded, blinked back the tears that threatened to plunge forth at any moment and took a deep breath. Frankie licked his lips before speaking.
“Misa, do you think I can talk to you in private for a minute?” His voice was low and even, his eyes fixed on Misa’s face.
Lily squirmed slightly, feeling uncomfortable at the thought of Frankie being alone with her child after all that had happened. “Frankie, you can say what you need to say in front of all of us,” she said.
Misa held her hand up to stop her mother from speaking. “No,” she said. “It’s okay.” She looked at Frankie and nodded. She led the way to an empty waiting room at the end of the hall and shut the door behind them. Standing uncomfortably before Frankie, she waited to hear what he had to say.
He stared at her for a long time, thinking about what she had done, thinking about what had been done to her son. Try as he might, he couldn’t hate Misa for killing Steven. Not now that he had heard the truth about his brother’s past.
“I want to tell you that…” Frankie’s voice trailed off and he wiped a few errant tears that fell from his eyes. He hadn’t anticipated that becoming a father would make him so emotional. “Misa, I practically watched you grow up. I remember you when you were younger, when you got married, when you had your son, and I’ve watched Shane growing up, too.” He looked at the floor. “All of the shit that’s happened lately … I can’t front like I’m not hurt by what you did.” He got choked up but caught himself. “But I know you and Shane got hurt in all of this, too. We … we gotta put it behind us. Since Camille and I have this baby, we’re gonna have to be a family. She’s gonna be a part of all our lives and we’re gonna have to be around each other and everything.” Frankie was stumbling over his words and he realized it. But he was powerless to control his stammering. “I just don’t want us to … hate each other…” He bit the inside of his cheek nervously, wishing he could find the words to say what he really wanted to say to Misa.
She watched him struggling and then she spoke up at last. “Frankie,” she said. “I could never hate you, even after all that’s happened.” Misa looked into his eyes as she said it. “I never meant to cause you any pain, and I know that sounds crazy because he was your brother. But from the very start, I was never mad at you. My anger that night was toward him alone,” she said, still too bitter to utter Steven’s name. “I wasn’t thinking about you or about Camille, or even about myself. All I could think about was Shane and what had been done to him.” She shook her head. “But I never intended to hurt you, Frankie. You were always good to me. All those years when Louis was nowhere to be found, it was you and Camille’s generosity that made it possible for Shane and I to have what we needed. I will never forget everything you did for me over the years.” She shifted her weight from one leg to the next as she stood. “You hurt my sister, though. You made it really hard for her for the past few months, and she’s done you no harm. It’s me you were mad at, and I feel like it’s my fault she had to suffer all this time.”
Frankie sighed. “I know I hurt Camille. I can’t take back what I did to her. But, I’m gonna do my best to make it up to her. I just want to be a good father to this baby and I want peace in my family … what’s left of it.”
Misa didn’t reply.
“And it’s not your fault,” he corrected her. “I’m a man and I take responsibility for my own actions. I shouldn’t have treated Camille the way that I did.” He stared back at her. “I’m sorry, too,” he said. “For a lot of things. What happened to Shane was horrible.” He looked down at the floor. “Nothing I can say will fix what was done to him. But I am sorry for what happened.”
Misa looked away. No one was sorrier than she was.
“How is he?” Frankie asked.
Her face spread into a smile instantly. “He’s doing great. He can’t wait to play with his new cousin.” She watched Frankie smile at the thought of Shane playing happily again. “You know,” she said. “I think you’re going to be a great father, Frankie.”
He smiled at that. “I hope so,” he said, rubbing his head as if he wasn’t so sure. “I don’t know the first thing about fatherhood, but I’m gonna do my best.”
Misa nodded. “Well, you’ve got a lot of help coming your way. Regardless of what has happened before today, we’re still a family. Maybe we’re a dysfunctional family, but we’re still a family nonetheless.”
Frankie laughed a little. She was right. He thought about reaching to hug her, but decided against it. Sensing his hesitation, Misa hugged him instead. Frankie squeezed her tightly and was glad that the first steps toward reconciliation had been taken. They pulled away and walked back out into the waiting room where everyone waited eagerly for some sense of what had transpired.
Frankie quickly made his exit. “Good-bye, everybody,” he called out. They all said good-bye and he walked to the elevators. On the ride down, he realized that he hadn’t slept in close to twenty-four hours. He yawned and felt his eyes growing heavy. But before he went home to sleep, he had to make one detour.
* * *
Gillian answered her door wearing one of her old T-shirts and a pair of boy shorts and her hair hung loosely around her shoulders. Frankie bent down, kissed her on the cheek, and entered her Upper East Side town house. It had taken him an hour to get there driving from Syosset and he was drained. Still, he noticed again what a beauty Gillian was.
He had driven there in a fog mentally, still sorting through all the new revelations that had been made about his family, his past, still reeling from the fact that he was now a father. But he suddenly yearned to be in Gillian’s presence. He needed to hold her, to kiss her, and to talk to her, to hear her voice in his ears. He had been avoiding her—in fact, he’d been avoiding everyone lately. It was his way of coping with all that he’d recently discovered. But now, as the emotions plunged forth with the birth of his child, he found himself longing for Gillian’s presence in his life again. He realized now how much he loved her, how desperately he needed her.
“It’s six o’clock in the morning. What are you doing here?” she asked, her voice raspy, sexy to him.
They sat down in her living room and Gillian folded her legs beneath her and pulled a throw blanket across her body. She stared at him closely and could tell that he hadn’t slept. She knew him well enough to tell that he was anxious about something, and she wondered what was wrong. Since the trial had ended, Frankie had distanced himself from her, from everyone. He had moved out
of her house and into a luxury apartment of his own in Downtown Brooklyn. His role in the family business had been scaled back considerably and Gillian had been hoping that it wouldn’t be long before he decided to talk to her about what was happening.
“Camille had the baby,” he said. “A girl.”
Gillian’s expression shifted ever so slightly and Frankie could see that she was getting better at maintaining her poker face. But he knew her too well. He could tell that she was hurt.
She smiled weakly, her eyes sad. “Congratulations. What’s her name?”
“Bria.” Frankie pictured his daughter’s perfect little face and smiled.
“That’s a beautiful name,” Gillian said. She was jealous of Camille for the first time. It was an emotion she was very unfamiliar with. “So what are you doing here?” she asked bluntly.
Frankie looked at her, somewhat caught off guard by her rawness. He longed to tell her what he had come there to say, that he wished she had been the one giving birth to his daughter that morning instead of Camille. He just didn’t know if it would comfort Gillian to know that.
“I love you,” he said.
Gillian stared at Frankie. It had begun to rain outside and she heard the raindrops drumming against her windowpane. It reminded her of the tears she’d shed in secret late at night as she did her best to get over him. He had broken her heart and she wanted to hate him for it.
“Yeah?” she asked.
He smiled at her, knowing she was trying to be tough. He had watched her take the helm of the family business with ease. Being in control of such an empire required her to be stern and direct, unafraid. Gillian was all of those things, and she was respected by their whole crew. Frankie knew that she could handle it on her own. If ever there was a time for him to leave the Nobles family business behind and focus on the task of being a father, this was it. But he loved Gillian, and he didn’t want to let her go so easily.
