by Zi'ere
In a six star suite, I chill and order all of the room service that I can stand. I have to wait a day to be able to see my dad. While I’m waiting and resting, I order a car service for the next day. I am not going to attempt that drive alone in a state that I’ve never been in, while traveling to a federal prison alone.
There is no more room to leave a message on either one of my phones. After I am satisfied with the best chocolate cake that I have ever had in my mouth, I grow a pair and decide to report to my parole officer.
“Can you talk right now?”
My voice is small because I am shaking in my slippers.
“Kamille, don’t call me with the humble voice like everything is all good! Where in the hell are you?”
“First of all I am going to need for you to lower your voice if you want to talk to me! You aren’t my husband, boyfriend, or daddy!”
“Okay, okay, okay…I’m sorry. Are you okay?”
I can tell that he’s not comfortable but he does lower his voice.
“I’m fine. What about you?”
“I’m going damn crazy! What do you think…?” He starts to shout.
I cut him off. “I’m hanging up now!”
“Wait, wait!”
“Where are you Kam?”
“California.”
“What in the hell are you doing in Cali…”
I hang up the phone in his face. I can understand that he is upset but his children are not born yet. He has no claim to me at all. A few seconds later the phone is ringing again.
“Hello?”
“I’m sorry. Can you please tell me why you are in California and how in the world you got there?”
He is now whispering.
“I flew out here last night because I want to see my dad before I have the babies. He is in prison here.”
“So I brought this on myself by upsetting you?”
“Yes sir, you sure did.”
“I’m sorry Kamille. I swear on everything, I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. I needed to do this anyway.”
“But you can’t be taking off and flying pregnant with my babies!”
“Before you knew anything about these babies, I was doing just fine. Don’t start no shit with me that you can’t win!”
“Alright. I’m not trying to get you upset again. At least until you give birth. But I am going to send Ant out there to be with you.”
“I don’t need Ant.”
“But you needed him at the corner store?”
He has me backed into a corner.
“It’s not my fault they can’t find the third to their ménage trios! That’s on you, not me!”
“So you really don’t get that they were going to make you pay for my decision?”
“I understand that. It’s another reason that I left the state.”
“I’m going to let you do this but when you come home, we are going to have to get some things straight.”
“Whatever!” I hang up on him again.
I’ve never had a male figure in my life, other than him and Pain. They are trying me, unlike anything that I had ever experienced. I begin to get angry all over again. These men want absolute perfection from a woman but they are only giving her mediocre results in return.
Knowing where I am every second of the day, keeping eyes on me every second, not allowing me to leave my own home when I want to begins to look like possessiveness more than protection. I am starting to think that Broderick has no idea what his role is in my life, just like I have no idea what I want it to be in his.
My biggest accomplishment with getting away from Pain was in order to regain my independence. Instead, I find out that I’m pregnant and before I know it, I now have a new owner. He is right on target because boundaries will be on the top of my to-do list when I make it back.
I fall asleep thinking how naive that I have been by not getting my own home. I was so careful in the past. The men that have been in my life for the past couple of years have me complacent. I do not like the feeling at all. I fall asleep wishing that I was a different woman after the storm known as Pain.
103
Because I am visibly a very pregnant woman, the prison correctional officers don’t frisk me too rough. Nonetheless, I still feel violated after the search is completed. I’m over the entire process while I wait at a basic steel park table and on hard benches for a man that I don’t even know. I have not seen Keith since I was really young, maybe since the age of five.
There is a loud buzzing sound and then I hear a series of heavy doors open and then slam shut. Then twenty or so men file into the room, wearing basic white jumpsuits and white tennis shoes. Even though I feel as if I won’t recognize my dad, I know him the instant that he walks into the room. He looks at me and then makes a beeline straight to me.
The fact that I have always been so pale in complexion and the different consistency of my hair is explained away in a matter of seconds, when I see him. He is very fair skinned as well. His hair suggests that he is not completely of African American descent. He’s had a mixture of bloodlines at birth.
We have the same smile. He is maybe right at six feet tall and lean for his age. Despite being in prison, you would have never known that he was capable of committing any crime, let alone first degree murder. I can’t recall a hug from him, which makes me stand to my feet and wait for him to embrace me. He does not disappoint me.
“You are more beautiful than I ever imagined you to be,” he says, as he kisses my cheek and hugs me at the same time.
“Keith?”
“Yes, I’m your daddy, Baby.”
The hand contact has to stop in the visitation room.
We take a seat at the table.
“Where did you go, Keith? Why weren’t you my daddy? I needed you so much. Carla was awful to me. She never loved me, I needed you!”
Before I am aware, my emotions are on Front Street.
“Baby Girl, you are my one and only child. Carla said once I got her father out of the way that we could be the best parents that we could be for you. I came through for her. I murdered her father. I did that because she wanted me too. Then all of a sudden she changed on me. I was on trial and she was on the prosecutions side the entire time.”
My head is spinning.
“Carla and I were still married, up until the day she died.”
“She told me that she divorced you because you cheated on her too many times for her to forgive.”
“Kamille, I never cheated on Carla. If I had cheated do you think that she would have left a policy on her life with me as the beneficiary? She even has a policy on me for you. I have over half a million dollars on my books right now. That came from your mama, Baby Girl.”
I sit back in my chair.
“Well, I see that I’m going to be a grandfather?”
“Did you love me?”
“I have always loved you. You were my perfect gift from the start.”
I’m relieved with his answers.
“Dad, you are going to have two grandsons and a granddaughter at the same time in about six weeks.”
“Triplets?”
“Yes sir.”
“You have aunts who are triplets, Baby Girl.”
“Really?” I am the most excited I have been in a while.
“Yes, they are my big sisters and big in every way. Butts, thighs, and busts, lord they can cook too!”
“Where do they live?”
“That hot trio lives in Vegas. I can give you their numbers. They’ve been looking for you too. But call them before you come, don’t do them like you did me! Those golden girls stay going somewhere.”
I smile.
“I’ve been in here a long time, Baby Girl. But today…this has changed my life. I went to sleep every night torn, knowing that I would never see you before I shut my eyes for the final time. I have so many degrees because I have to keep my mind off you. Now I have grand babies coming…this is too much for a cat like m
e to handle.”
He wipes my face with his handkerchief. I recognize it as one of my mother’s church squares that she carried to church. I get angry with her all over again. She knew where my father was, she knew he wanted to see me and she knew that he loved me but she never said a word.
“I hope that you haven’t been crying with those babies and then they come out crybabies. You are going to be mad as a hellcat, trying to get some rest.”
“Yes Daddy, I cry too much!”
He laughs and it warms my soul.
“I see a ring, so are you married?”
“I was but me and my children’s father aren’t married. I think he is going to ask any day now.”
“Does he treat you right?”
“Ummmm, he’s very protective of me. I guess that is the best way to put it.”
He laughs again. “You can’t blame the man. You are a gorgeous woman. I know that you are smart as a whip. You look financially stable. He’s supposed to be that way.”
“What do you mean I look financially stable?” I giggle.
“Baby girl when these jive turkey’s out here be broke, you can see it in their face. I know the look of pillar to post.”
He is a funny man and I feel at ease with him. The hour and a half long visit went entirely too fast. He makes me promise to be nicer to Broderick and I am to call the prison directly the moment that I go into labor.
Keith even has the pull to be live on Skype during the birth process. Before leaving the prison, I sign the releases for media contact between the two of us. I can’t really explain it but I feel as though my heart is lighter when I finally do walk off of the prison grounds.
I am able to wave goodbye to him again, as the driver helps me into the back of the truck. While the manner in which I chose to make the trip was a spur of the moment decision, I wouldn’t have traded this day for all the money in my bank account. Kamille feels whole for the first time ever.
104
Broderick isn’t home when I skate into the house, as if I have just returned from Wal- Mart and for that I am grateful. I have the time to unpack, get cleaned up, and eat before he comes in. I can’t remember a day that he’s come home after the sun has set. He finds me in the TV room and has a total change of heart when he sees me.
“Baby, I’m sorry that I was being an ass to you at the restaurant. But, please don’t ever leave me like that again. I’m on my hands and knees begging you.”
“Hands and knees mean nothing. You hurt my feelings and my heart.”
I’m happy to see him too but he doesn’t need to know all of that just yet.
“Well, can this speak for me?”
He produces a signature red Cartier box.
Flipping one side open, the massive ring can barely be contained in the box. There is no way that a wedding band can be added because the ring is so huge. The stone is an emerald cut and it’s completely flawless.
“What does this mean?” I ask as if the ring is no big thing to me.
“This is me still on my hands and knees asking the beautiful, respectful, honest, trustworthy and intelligent Kamille Foster- soon to be my children’s mother- to be my wife until death do us part. This isn’t a keep you busy while I cheat deal. This isn’t a pacify my baby mama kind of deal either. This is the real deal fussing at each other over coffee when we are sixty five years old proposal.”
I hold my left hand out. I have to make him sweat a while before I cave in.
“Let me see how it looks. It almost looks too busy for my small hand.”
He proves me wrong. The business is a stunner.
“This has to be done before my babies come because they have to have my last name.”
“Broderick, the kids can have whatever name that I want for them to have, that’s no issue.”
“I want every name on the birth certificate to have the same last name. Now how can that happen without us being married?”
I am on hush mouth.
“Okay.”
I know my answer is not the excitement that he is looking for but I am still salty with him. Even though he has just come home, he wastes no time in attempting to get on my good side but he is going about it all wrong.
He hasn’t even asked how my visit went with my father. I can’t lie and say that I don’t want my children to grow up without their father. I am willing to do double duty with one but I can’t do it alone with three. The way that I grew up will never be the way that my daughter will. Broderick being hands on is a must. Married or not, he is going to have to be there and we might as well be legal.
I am still sitting on millions that he left in my hands before Hawaii. Not once, since the new house has he brought it up. Had he asked, he would have known that to date I have cleaned up right at five million of it. Once it was clean, he was ass out on getting it back.
The next day, I am covered in an ivory calf length designer dress as I say my vows under the direction of the justice of the peace. With the value of the rings that we exchanged, we know an all exclusive wedding is worth millions. But for some reason, Broderick and I are not at all impressed by the bells and whistles like Pain used to do by flashing his money.
The man looks me directly into my eyes as he says his vows. I can feel him down in my soul. Call me crazy but I feel in my heart that this time the love will sustain us and keep us married for many years to come.
Just from the way he has reacted to the babies, I know that he is not going to allow another man to take up home with his children. Through the good and the bad we have enough love to put our children first. Our needs will come second for the next eighteen years. After our paperwork is sealed by the city clerk, he surprises me with a cake tasting at a couture bakery shop. I am able to taste different flavored cakes and frostings, until I can’t take anymore.
That night, I fall asleep closed in the arms of the handsome man who has given life to three little beings inside of my belly. Just because I fall asleep lying down, doesn’t mean that I can stay that way longer than thirty minutes. I have gotten to the stage of being way beyond the point of uncomfortable.
Whoever is not under my ribs is sitting on my bladder. Every time that I get up to feed my face, he is up with me. In the back of my mind, I realize he is paranoid because of the first miscarriage that I’ve had. Either way, if I turn around fast I am going to knock him on his ass. He’s beginning to get on my nerves.
“Why is it that every time I make a move, you are on my damn heels? I feel like Mary and you’re the damn lamb!”
“Okay, I read about this. You are getting cranky. We are moving along into this, right on schedule.”
“I don’t know how many different times that I have to tell you that we are not pregnant! I am!”
“What do you want for a snack?” He runs clear over my words, as if I have not said a word.
“I want some ribs and strawberries.”
I keep a straight face but I am laughing my ass off on the inside.
“Kam, I’m for real?” He is frustrated.
“You asked what I wanted, that is what I want.”
I sit on the stool at the island.
“We’ve got strawberries, I can make you a sundae…but I can’t get ribs until tomorrow.”
“No, Rodger’s Rib Shack stays open twenty four hours. I want extra bread under the ribs, so that it’s all soft and soggy with bar-b-que sauce.”
“Are you serious?”
“Hell yeah. If you aren’t going, then I am.”
I scoot him out of the door.
“You know good and well that you aren’t leaving the house this time of night. I will get it.”
He walks off to head back upstairs.
Instead of coming back down with shoes and keys, he only has his cell phone.
“Uh- uh, I’m not Ant’s baby mama! Get your ass out of here and get my ribs!”
“KAMILLE!”
“I don’t need you to call Ant to do anything for me. I can call him myse
lf.”
That is the right button to press.
“Your spoiled ass is getting out of hand!”
“DID ANT GET ME PREGNANT?”
“HELL NO! STOP SAYING THAT SHIT!”
“I SUGGEST YOU PUT THAT PHONE DOWN AND PICK UP SOME KEYS HOMIE!”
“Man, you have gotten mean as hell! What happened to the sweet, soft spoken woman that you used to be?”
“She turned into a hungry beast with three humans inside of her. Until you can do this trick, keep that bullshit to yourself. I want a strawberry Fanta too. And don’t bring me back any rib tips, I want meaty, tender ribs.”
Instead of hiking back up the stairs to the bed, I go into the TV room instead. I feel better sitting up anyway.
“If your mean ass is sleep when I get back, I’m waking you up! You’re going to eat these ribs tonight!”
105
Flipping through the channels and waiting from him to get back, I am stunned to see Jai’s face plastered all over the news. She has been found dead on the side of a dirt road on her way back from taking the kids to her parent’s home.
According to the news reporter, her body was found while I was in California. The police have no leads and anyone who saw her between Arizona and Vegas should call into Crime Stoppers. I have known the day was coming for a while but I never expected it to find out about it like this. I could have sworn Montrez said he was going to call when it was done. I am in such a panic that I run upstairs to get my phone.
I’m sitting on the side of the bed out of breath when Montrez answers.
“What the fuck happened? You were supposed to let me know ahead of time, so that I wouldn’t find out about this shit on the news and be out of my mind!”
“Kamille, first I need for you to calm down and tell me what you are talking about.”
He is too cool.
I can see him sitting on a block of ice being the wonderful, respectable, serial killer that he is.
“Jai.”
“I haven’t seen her. I’ve been waiting on her to come back.”
“Well she’s came back but it was in a body bag!”
