Diamond Life

by Aliya S. King

  Ras closed his eyes, drew a deep breath, and put his hands on the doorknob. Cleo was in the waiting room, sitting on the edge of her seat with her legs crossed at the ankle. Her eyes were closed and she had her hands clasped under her chin. Immediately, Ras flew across the room. Before anyone could stop him, Ras had shoved Cleo to the ground and was shaking her shoulders. Cleo struggled to bring her hands up to her face, but Ras was holding her wrists with one hand and trying to smack her face with an open palm with the other hand.

  “What did you do!?” Ras screamed. Two women who had been seated next to Cleo dashed over to the side of the waiting room, their hands covering their mouths. Ras rolled Cleo over to her back.

  “I said, what—did—you—do?” Ras said through his teeth.

  “That’s enough, Mr. Bennett!”

  A tall man with a heavy build and a light Jamaican accent grabbed the back of Ras’s shirt and yanked it hard. Ras fell backward and Cleo stood up and ran into the inner office. A receptionist grabbed Cleo and held her arm, leading her quickly into an examination room, closing the door, and locking it behind her.

  “Inside!” the man barked, pointing to the door Cleo had just walked through. Ras rolled over to his knees and then stood up slowly. He walked into the inner office and past the door of the room Cleo had gone into. He tried the doorknob. It was locked and he shook it a few times before the man pulled his hand away.

  “In my office, Mr. Bennett,” the man said, pointing to a room at the far end of the hallway.

  Ras threw open the door of the office and sat down on a leather couch facing an expansive glass desk.

  “I’m Dr. Montague,” the man said as he stepped behind the desk. He stretched out his hand in Ras’s direction. Ras stared at him, not moving.

  “Why am I here?”

  “Ms. Wright told me that your daughter Reina is in need of a blood transfusion.”

  “Why is she telling you anything about my daughter?”

  “Because she can help you find someone who matches her blood type.”

  Ras stood up.

  “I don’t know what’s going on, but somebody better have some answers. Now.”

  “Have a seat, Mr. Bennett.”

  Ras sat down just as someone knocked on the office door. The doctor quickly went to the door and then turned to face Ras.

  “Keep your hands to yourself.”

  Ras glared at the doctor and didn’t speak. The door opened and Cleo stood there. Mr. Bennet motioned for her to sit on the other side of the office, away from Ras.

  “Ms. Wright,” the doctor said, motioning to Ras. “I think you have something you need to tell Mr. Bennett.”

  Cleo kept her eyes on the floor. Her left knee was bouncing wildly as Ras stared at her.

  “Ms. Wright?” the doctor asked.

  Cleo looked up at the doctor, taking care not to look in Ras’s direction.

  “You have to tell him. His daughter’s life is on the line.”

  Ras leaned over to drop his head into his hands and felt the coolness of the pistol on his stomach. He jumped a bit, adjusting himself. He’d forgotten that he grabbed the gun, and now it felt like it was pulsating.

  Maybe he could leave. Lure her into the car and drive her somewhere . . . Ras shut his eyes tight and dreamt of a world where Cleo didn’t exist. Until that moment, he’d never considered it. Even after Josephine caught them at the hotel and he vowed to himself that he would never see Cleo again, he never really thought that he would ever be truly rid of her. He expected her to always hover around the outer edges of his life, popping up unexpectedly every so often and trying to get a rise out of him. Not once did he ever imagine a life fully free of the woman he’d tortured for over a decade. Ras tried to imagine what Josephine would do, say, or feel if she found out Cleo was dead—out of the picture forever. Would he have a better chance of getting his wife back? Would she be more likely to forgive him if she knew they would never have to deal with her again?

  “He has a gun,” Cleo whispered, pointing at Ras.

  The doctor whipped his head around.

  “Is that true, Mr. Bennett?”

  Ras crossed the room, hooked an arm around Cleo’s neck, and pulled out the pistol, holding it to her temple.

  “Speak,” Ras said. Cleo said nothing and Ras clicked off the safety and squeezed her neck tighter.

  “I said speak.”

  Cleo’s mouth was open, but nothing came out. Ras put his finger on the trigger. Cleo shut her eyes and her entire body tightened.

  “She’s been coming to me for several years,” the doctor said quickly. Ras kept his arms around Cleo’s neck and looked at the doctor expectantly.

  “She’s been having her eggs extracted and frozen. She can’t have children and she wanted to be able to—”

  “No,” Ras said, shaking his head. “No.”

  “Mr. Bennett,” the doctor said, “it is not my responsibility to double-check where my patients receive the sperm for in-vitro.”

  Ras blinked.

  “The sperm?”

  “Of course, I prefer that the sample is extracted here in the clinic. But if that’s not possible, I do supply my patients with semen-collecting condoms that will preserve the sample long enough to bring to the clinic.”

  Ras could hear the words the doctor was saying. But he was unable to fit the pieces of what he was saying together in any kind of cohesive way. He replayed the doctor’s sentences in his mind, still holding the pistol to Cleo’s temple. Key words ran through his head on a loop: eggs, sperm, condoms, eggs, sperm, condoms.

  Ras thought about the hundreds of times he had sex with Cleo. Most times he was drunk out of his mind. He was usually fanatical about using his own condoms. But there were nights that he woke up to her on top of him, riding him while he was in and out of consciousness. Did she use her own condoms then? Did she leave right afterward? Is it really possible that she could have—Ras shook his head. One thing he was absolutely sure of was that Cleo was not pregnant at all last year. So how could she have—

  “Mr. Bennett, can you please remove the pistol from Ms. Wright’s head?”

  “Only if you want me to turn it on you. If not, I suggest you keep talking.”

  The doctor seemed to consider this for a moment.

  “Ms. Wright brought me several sperm samples a few years back. We used them to fertilize her eggs.”

  Ras dropped Cleo to the floor and stood over her.

  “What did you do?”

  Cleo stayed on the floor and propped herself up on her elbows. She looked directly at Ras.

  “I paid someone to carry the baby—”

  Ras dropped to his knees, the gun still in his hand, and stared at her with his mouth open.

  “Reina is my child,” Cleo said. “And yours.”

  Ras was a statue, his hand still gripping the pistol.

  “I planned to raise her myself,” Cleo said. “Just until you realized that you should be with me and then we could raise her together.”

  Ras looked down at the floor and then back up at Cleo.

  “What were you thinking?” he whispered.

  “After she was born, I—I freaked out. And I had the girl turn her over to your great-grandmother. I knew she’d make sure she was given to you and your wife. I thought I was doing the right thing.”

  Ras stepped closer to Cleo, rubbing the side of his leg with the nozzle of the gun.

  “You did not think you were doing the right thing. You were trying to torture me and my wife because you knew I would never be with you.”

  Cleo held Ras’s gaze and said nothing.

  The ringing in Ras’s ears grew louder and louder until he couldn’t hear anything being said. He saw the doctor’s lips moving and his arms flailing about. He saw Cleo, tears streaming down her face, babbling about something he couldn’t hear. Ras opened the chamber of the gun, shook out the bullets and put them in his pocket. He knew if he didn’t disarm himself, he would blow Cleo’s b
rains out and deal with the consequences later.

  Ras shook his head and walked toward the door.

  “I’m going to donate blood,” Cleo said. “As often as I need to.”

  Ras walked out of the office and closed the door behind him. He left the building, got into the car, and drove to the hospital where his daughter and his wife were waiting for him. The entire way there, he thought about how he would tell his wife the truth. And there did not seem to be any words he would be able to say to her that would make any sense whatsoever.

  Back at the hospital, Ras walked slowly to his daughter’s room. He stood outside the door for several minutes, listening to his wife sing to her in French. He pushed open the door and cleared his throat. Josephine turned around and stopped singing in mid-sentence.

  “I need to talk to you,” Ras said. “There’s some things you need to know.”

  “She called,” Josephine said, her eyes boring into Ras’s head. “I know everything. We don’t have anything to talk about. You can go.”

  “I had no idea that she—”

  Josephine took a step toward Ras and her face was so full of rage that Ras was actually afraid of her. He took a step back.

  “If you go now, this won’t be messy. If you stay here . . .”

  “Josephine, we have to talk about this. Reina is going to need several transfusions.”

  “I’ve worked that all out. It will be taken care of. Reina is my daughter. I will not let anything happen to her. But if you don’t leave this room right now, I will do my very best to kill you.”

  “I know there is absolutely nothing I can do to make this right,” Ras began.

  “There’s only one thing you can do that can make this right.”

  Ras’s eyes widened. In that moment, there was absolutely nothing on earth Josephine could have asked him that he would not do. He’d cut off his pinkie toe and eat it if it meant she’d even consider taking him back.

  “What is it?”

  “I need you to get your stuff out of the house. Put it in storage or throw it out. Whatever. And I need you to leave. I need you to leave Kingston. I need you to leave Jamaica. I need you to leave me and Reina—forever.”

  Ras opened up his mouth to speak, but no words formed. There was a calmness to Josephine’s words that chilled him. This was not a woman who was pissed off. This was a woman who was just plain through.

  There was a knock on the door and it creaked open. A tall, thin man stood in the doorway, questioning Josephine with his eyes.

  “It’s okay,” said Josephine. “Come inside.”

  The man crossed the room and hugged Josephine tight.

  “Is everything okay? Is Reina going to be okay?”

  “Yes,” said Josephine. “They found . . . a donor.”

  “How did they find a match?”

  Josephine took the man by the hand. As soon as she touched him, Ras felt an icy rage building up in his chest.

  “This is Bobby,” said Josephine. “He’s a friend of mine.”

  Ras kept his eyes on Josephine, not daring to look in the eyes of the man who was holding her hand.

  “I’m staying here in Jamaica,” said Josephine. “With Bobby. And Reina. I want you to leave and never come back.”

  “You think I’m going to just walk away and leave my child?”

  “You asked me what I wanted!” said Josephine. She began to march toward Ras, but Bobby held her back.

  “I am this little girl’s mother. And one day I will have to tell her how she came to be. How her biological mother created her just to make me miserable. She is still my baby. And I will love her and I will raise her. You don’t deserve me. And you don’t deserve Reina. I want you out of our lives forever.”

  Bobby pulled Josephine back and forced her to sit on the edge of the hospital bed.

  “You should probably go,” said Bobby.

  Ras sized him up. The dude was slim but muscular. He gave some quick thought to going for broke and clocking him in the jaw but thought better of it.

  “Josephine. If you need to talk to me . . .” Ras said.

  Josephine sucked her teeth and waved a hand in the air dismissively. Ras came up to the bed and looked at baby Reina sleeping soundly. He put a hand out to touch her forehead. It was smooth, soft, and warm. Ras kissed his hand and placed it back on Reina’s head.

  “Daddy loves you,” Ras said.

  In the parking lot, Ras turned the car over and eased it onto the smooth road. The primary schools were just letting out and he passed dozens of young children in their crisp white shirts and khakis. The boys wore loosely knotted ties. The girls all had wild hairstyles that had escaped the orderly barrettes and braids that had been painstakingly fastened just hours before. Ras pulled his car over to the side of the road and watched the young people pick their way over the rocks guarding the ocean from the town. He got out of his car and followed, staying just far enough behind that the kids could not see him.

  As soon as he made it over the wall of rocks, a feeling of warmth and comfort enveloped him. Beneath his feet was flawless and pristine white sand. And just beyond, the incomprehensible blueness of the Caribbean Sea.

  Long after the kids had gathered their books and lunch boxes to head home, Ras sat on the secluded beach. His socks were tucked into his shoes, the same way he’d done it years and years ago when he was a little boy.

  As the sun set, Ras focused on watching its every blood-orange move as it dropped lower and lower into the horizon. The wind began to increase and the breeze coming off the water chilled Ras. But still he did not move.

  When he finally stood to leave, hours later, he went back to the home he’d built and shared with his wife. He unlocked the door for what would be the last time, went to their bedroom, and packed one small bag. He caught the first flight back to New York and went straight to the studio.

  Is everything in place?” Jake asked Ian for the third time in an hour.

  “Sir,” said Ian. “The movers will be here at noon. Everything important has already been shipped out. Everything is in place.”

  Jake looked around the empty penthouse. He remembered how happy Kipenzi was the day she moved in. It had been her first real home. And their first real home together. They’d exchanged vows on the very spot where he was standing. He’d had the nerve to envision himself there for years, chasing kids up and down the hallway.

  “You always looked out for my wife, Ian,” Jake said. “I appreciate that.”

  Ian nodded.

  “And you took decent care of me too.”

  “A pleasure, sir.”

  The two exchanged a few awkward glances and then found other things to do in the apartment. Jake realized that even with all of the stuff he owned, he could walk out of that apartment with one bag and never look back. He had his wedding album, a few letters from his mother, random mementos, and his laptop. That was it.

  Five hours later, Jake was in Miami. It was one of the few cities that had areas where he could drive around in a convertible, wearing a T-shirt and shorts, no shades, and still not be hassled.

  His first stop was a local barbershop. The shop went quiet when Jake walked in. He took a seat with the other guys waiting for a turn and opened up a magazine. He pretended not to notice that everyone in the shop was staring at him.

  “Yo,” said a teenager waiting nearby. “Can you sign my magazine?”

  “No doubt,” said Jake, signing the back page with a flourish.

  In the barber’s chair, Jake pointed out what he wanted done in the mirror. For the first time in months, he was getting his haircut. He almost forgot what it felt like to be well-groomed. As the barber edged up his line, Jake rubbed his hands on his thick, fluffy beard.

  “I think it’s time to let this go too,” said Jake.

  The barber nodded and took out a straight razor. When Jake stepped out of the chair, he was a completely different person than the grizzly man who had walked in. He stared at himself in the mirro
r for a long moment. The last time he looked this way, his wife was alive and he felt like his whole life was ahead of him.

  Jake rubbed his now-smooth face. He paid the barber, tipped him with a hundred-dollar bill, and shook hands with the other patrons as he made his way out.

  There was no driver there to whisk him away to the next spot. He’d actually driven himself to the barbershop in his own car. On the ride back to his rented condo, he opened up the sunroof and found a classic R&B station playing Aretha Franklin. He turned it up as loud as it would go.

  Back at the condo, Jake poured himself a glass of lemonade and went out onto the balcony overlooking Biscayne Bay from his bedroom. Miami would be home. Indefinitely. And for the next year, at least, Jake had no plans to do anything except work on staying sober and figuring out the second act of his life.

  Jake looked into his glass, as if there were answers in the ice cubes.

  The doorbell rang and Jake remained still, his eyes in his cup. He took a deep breath and stood up when the bell sounded a second time. Jake went to the door, unlocked it, and stepped back without opening it. The doorknob turned and opened slowly.

  Lily stood in the doorway. She was dressed in a simple button-up shirt and a pair of khaki shorts. She held an overnight bag in one hand that she placed on the floor.

  “Hey,” said Jake.

  “Hey yourself,” said Lily.

  Jake turned and walked toward the kitchen and Lily followed. Jake went to a vase on the counter and took out a single flower. He walked over to Lily and she leaned her head down. Jake wrapped the stem of the flower around her bun and then lifted her chin up to face him.

  “In the card,” Lily said. “You said you wanted to talk to me.”

  “Yeah,” Jake said. “I do.”

  “Well. I’m here. So talk.”