by Love Belvin
“I ain’t got shit to say to Miss Hot Shot. Fuck her!” MaMa screamed.
“You don’t like me because my mom got high and that exposed your husband. You accept Reign because, to you, that was just a natural jumpoff affair.”
“Get the fuck out!” MaMa shouted and threw her big arm in the air, over the table.
“You see me and have to acknowledge your husband got high,” Wynter fought back. “He dabbled! Get over it!”
“And so did your whorish momma, bitch!” MaMa screamed to the top of her lungs then choked hard.
Van went for his mother, and that’s when I grabbed my wife. Her body was so tense, I could hardly get a grip on her. “C’mon, baby. I got you,” I whispered in her face, trying to lift her. I needed to hold her literally. “Wynter, please.”
She began to shake all over, heavy air pushing through her nostrils, and face spasming because she was fighting a cry.
“I got you,” I whispered again, feeling Danny tap my back, rushing me out.
Then she began to go limp. Before I could decide if it was on purpose or just her body breaking down from being so worked up, I scooped her in my arms and took off for the door. Danny G quarterbacked us down the porch stairs, through the heavy rain and to the truck that was running. I covered as much of her face as I could, but Wynter didn’t flinch as the heavy drops beat down over us. I got her into the back seat and managed inside myself, pushing her over to give myself room. Danny closed the door behind me and hopped in the passenger side.
“We good?” Lil Bruh asked, agitated.
“Nah,” Danny responded because I couldn’t. I was too focused on Wynter’s shivering body. “Just some family drama. Nothing tough.”
“Baby,” I called out to her softly, wiping her face dry. “You good?”
Wynter’s eyes squeezed closed and her face was tight like a knot. Never having known a non-communicative Wynter, I started to panic. What could I do? Was she having a breakdown? By the looks I caught from the people back there listening in, this was news to them, too. My girl’s paternity was kept on the low? She was a secret. She hates secrets. She went with a lie all these years? Why?
And, God, what could I do to calm her?
I grabbed her. “Come. Sit on my lap, baby,” I whispered.
With a quickness, Wynter jumped up and straddled me, burying her face in my neck, and cried harder than I thought I’d ever see of her. My heart jumped in my chest. I was helpless. Why did I let her stay so long? Why didn’t I stop the argument?
My hands brushed up and down her back, trying to soothe her.
“To the apartment,” I called out to the front seat. “Then take us to Teterboro.”
~16~
Holding umbrellas as we trucked it down the pier, Danny G was to my left and Lil Bruh to my right. Wynter was clutched to my chest as I carried her the whole way. It was less than twelve hours before our departure time, but I wanted to get her settled and this getaway started for her. So, we swung by the apartment for her luggage she had waiting by the door as she said, and then straight to the Teterboro airport where my jet was waiting. Within three and a half hours, we were in Miami where the yacht was docked.
The captain and a couple of his staff greeted me with just a nod once they saw I was carrying an adult, who seemed out of it. I was grateful they didn’t do more, like spark a conversation. Another staff member was smart, too, she showed me to our room. This boat was bigger than the pictures showed it to be. We walked up two levels to the third deck for the—what the woman referred to as the—Owner’s stateroom.
She went around to light the room.
“Gently, please?” I asked as I lay Wynter down on the bed.
“Of course,” she promised with a smile and nod.
I removed her shoes and went for her jeans until I remembered we weren’t alone and stood. The woman who’d told me her name less than three minutes ago, stood at the door.
“Is there anything I can get you, Mr. McKinnon?”
“Not right now. No.”
“Very well.” She gestured toward the nightstand. “Anything you need, pick up the phone and hit the yellow button. The call will come directly to me.” She tapped her hip where I assume a mobile phone was.
I nodded and she left, sliding the door closed. Taking a deep breath, I glanced down to Wynter, who rolled onto her side, covering her face. Not gonna lie: I was scared. I’d never seen her this way. But in my spirit, I felt leaving her alone to deal with her pain wasn’t the thing to do. Plus, I wanted to be underneath her, share the same space. So, I had to think of my next move. I was damp, and a little hot from the commute to the yacht then all the way up here to our room. That led me to the idea of washing.
A bath…
Not knowing the layout, I found my way to the bathroom just past the sitting area, and thank god there was a Jacuzzi. I tapped the faucet to get it going and heard a knock. After a jump, I made my way to the door and saw Lil Bruh and some unfamiliar face there with our luggage. I widened the door and they stepped in.
“Where to, bruh?” Lil Bruh asked, moving past the bed.
I shook my head softly. “By the closet,” I exhaled. “I got it from there.”
“A’ight. Your instruments down in the lounge.” He got the last suitcase outside the door and brought it in. At the door, ready to leave, he looked at Wynter then me. “She good, bruh. These next few days gone be good for her. You gone be good for her, Gee.”
After we both gazed at this woman legally and emotionally attached to me, I didn’t respond. Lil Bruh wasn’t looking for one either. He left out, sliding the door behind him. After staring at her more, questioning so much without words, I decided to go check on the bath. Back in the bathroom, I found salts and oils. I used them both to make it good for her. As I left out to head back to the room, I pulled my shirts over my head and remembered her phone. In the truck, I had turned off the ringer and pocketed it, feeling anyone really needing to check in with her would call me. But then my phone kept blowing up from business and other matters, so I cut the ringer on it, too, thinking she had fallen asleep and didn’t want to disturb her.
In my duffle, I found two chargers. We both had iPhones, so I was able to juice them both. Then I pulled out clean clothes for me and grabbed one of my tanks for her.
“Wynter, baby.” I tapped her, my knee on the mattress as I stood over her motionless body. She didn’t respond, but I knew she was awake. “I’m gonna take off your clothes for a bath.”
She didn’t utter a word. I undressed then started on her. In no time, I was carrying her down the short, narrow way to the bathroom and sat her on the toilet. Then I stepped out to clean up our wet clothes. I tossed them in the corner, figuring I could have them cleaned later. Then I checked my phone and saw a few missed calls and a text from Van and Mya. I typed them the same message: We left for a trip and I’d have her call them as soon as she was up to it. I didn’t wait for a response. Instead, I went back to the bathroom, knowing she had to be done on the toilet by now and I’d help her into the water.
When I got back there, Wynter was already in the tub. I paused, considering what that meant for her mood. She’d pretty much been stuck to me since we peeled off from her grandmo—stepmom’s place. But in the Jacuzzi, she lay with her head back and an arm resting over her face. She still wasn’t ready to talk. I was good with that and slowly slid in the tub with her. It was hot but felt good tapping against my muscles. I sat across from her, regretting the distance right away. But it was probably best. She had propellers over there I was sure she could use to relax her. Needing to touch her, I grabbed her foot for a rub.
Things were beginning to make sense. What she said to me last night when I was so vulnerable to her I felt bare to my bones.
“She’s making me work so fucking hard for something I want so bad. Something I needed all my life.”
“What?”
“A home. A place where I feel I belong and am not just being accepted due
to circumstances. A safe, loving place where I’m chosen, not tolerated.”
It now made perfect sense. I got why she was able to walk out of my house for the jet last month with her head held high. She was used to the rejection. She had nowhere to belong. Both her parents were dead. Her mother didn’t seem to have been all that responsible for her since she always lived with her grandparents until they died. Then she moved in with her father, who passed her paternity on to his dead son?
And what about Reign?
From that heated exchange with MaMa, Reign was a jumpoff child, too. How were they able to explain her if they hid Wynter? Then something hit me. That morning, a couple of weeks before she left Jersey, when we were in bed sharing.
“With my mother’s parents gone, my other…grandparents stepped up—well, my grandfather stepped up. He invited me to live with them.”
Wynter didn’t really “live” with them. She stayed temporarily, probably unlike Reign, who was much younger when she moved in. On the low, she shared so much. I just didn’t connect the dots.
“So checkered.”
“Tell me about it.”
“No wonder your mantra.”
“What’s that?”
“Knowing the rhythm of blues.”
“I could write a book on it. And you know the worst of it all—my childhood?”
“What’s that?”
“The secrecy. I hate secrets, especially in families. Your childhood seems to have been shrouded in secrecy. That’s why I want to earn your trust. You don’t have to keep any from me. Let that be the real between us.”
My eyes shot over to her. Wynter hadn’t moved. I didn’t even catch her throat bob from swallowing. She looked smaller over there…in spirit. She looked drained. I didn’t know this Wynter. I’d only met the strong one. She made me feel the rhythm of blues. I’d fight to keep her forever. To conquer the rhyme of love.
I didn’t have the words to heal her. Man, I didn’t know if my arms were big enough to hide her from the pain she was currently struggling with. But I knew the spirit of pain. The pain a pill or cream couldn’t address.
When my demons descended upon me, I did what came easy. I worshipped God with the fruit of my lungs.
Slowly, I sat on the bed, facing the balcony. This time, I was grateful for an empty bladder and a clean mouth as I did it. What was wrong with me? Even feeling as though I’d been run over by a damn tractor trailer, I lusted over his bulky frame. In clothes, Raj’s girth could escape you. That plump V defining his pelvis could be seen from the side, which was my view.
Whore…
The single tear escaping my right eye was met with a swiping rebuke. Today, I would not cry. Today, I would begin with gauging him to see if I could salvage my reputation in his eyes.
He was so protective last night. He held me so that only he could break me and no one else. He bathed me, hummed a tune that eventually turned into a full-blown song. Deep inside my psyche I titled it “Decidedly, Your Vessel.” I could still remember the lyrics.
“No more ‘I can’t’...
No more ‘I’m scared.’
No more doubts...
I’m fighting my fears.
Goodbye, my shadows...
Hello, new battles.
So long, highs and lows...
I’m decidedly, your vessel.”
It was a gospel song, but soothed me in a worldly manner, a romantic one. In my mind, Raj was pledging his unfailing devotion to me, something I never had. He was choosing to fight with me. After leaving the Jacuzzi, he took his time drying me and slipped one of his tanks over my head. He led me out to the bed where I dozed off almost right away. Soft strums of a guitar awakened me gently. He was facing the bed, playing something slow and sweet. I fell under again.
The next time I was semi-awake, I heard him praying. It was a low but steady cadence. The type of praying I’d only heard from him once or twice, but lots from Pastor McKinnon. The last time I recalled awakening it was to the soft sounds of a guitar, similar to the one on the last track Raj released to radio. I squinted and found him sitting at the foot of the bed with eyes locked on me. His presence comforted me. The strings of the guitar soothed me back under.
On a deep exhale, I took to my feet wearily. My body felt weak, but my determination took over. I slid the door to the balcony open and was immediately met with the sounds of the ocean. When I sidled beside him, I realized he had earbuds in. He turned to me almost startled.
I smiled drily as he pulled them out, though the pastiche of his deodorant and cologne dizzied me with lust. That fact shamed me.
“You up,” his chords were thick and hoarse.
“You’ve been singing all night and morning,” I wise-cracked.
Raj snorted. “Literally.”
My surprised gaze climbed up to him. “What?”
He reached over and pulled me beneath him, his thick arms resting on the railing. “I’ll sleep after you eat something. I’ll eat with you.”
He typed something on his phone and slid it into the pocket of his sweats. I could hear him let out a long breath over my head.
“She’s always been bitter, but never that brazen toward me,” I uttered, watching the ripples in the water as we propelled at high speed. “MaMa didn’t want me around. I didn’t know this because my grandparents never forced me onto her and…” I swallowed. “…my father. He was a nice man. Sweet for the most part, but not a leader like my grandfather. He knew his wife refused to accept me, but when my grandparents died, he forced MaMa’s hand. I don’t know how, but she okayed me staying there.”
He didn’t speak, but lay his chin on my head, letting me know he was there with me.
“I heard about Junior, my brother, when I was too young to know who he was. I was told he liked to drink a lot. Hung out at the same bar my mother did. He was honorably discharged from the army and they would now say, suffered from PTSD. He was wild, never being able to hold down a job when he came home. He didn’t get into hard trouble but was arrested a few times. Slept out on the porch, drunk and high at times. My father drank some and would occasionally lace his weed with coke. That’s where he encountered my mother, Van told me.
“One night, my father came to the bar with my oldest brother after a long day at the garage where he worked. They threw a few back and my mother was there. She and my brother knew each other from around the way.” I closed my eyes, inhaled the sea. “My mother had a reputation for being a loosey goosey. Someone had coke, someone else had weed and they went out back and smoked. It happened a few times, a few during which sex happened. Even after Junior died, it continued. On one of those occasions, I happened.” I chuckled. “Right there in the back of a local bar.”
That was hard to share.
“When the shit hit the fan, Van said my father half ass paid child support. My grandparents, who actually took care of me didn’t fight him. They were able to care for me financially on their own. My mother had issues similar to my brother, Junior, only without the trauma from the military. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve wondered what was up with her. She was great to be around and even supervised me, but my grandmother mothered us both and at the same time. It was like she remained a young adult without responsibility as long as I knew her. So, it was natural her parents took in her illegitimate child.” I felt the smile spread across my face at the memory of their love.
“I came around a few times when I was a kid. I never went inside MaMa’s house, but my father would be outside, offering me a lollipop and money as he spoke to my grandfather. I honestly didn’t catch our relation. I just knew him. I saw Van, too.” I laughed. “He didn’t talk much, just watched our father intently. Now, I know it was because he knew everything. He was old enough to track his big brother and father. He knew I was his sister. I learned eventually, too. Remember, my grandparents hardly kept anything from me.
“When my grandfather died, my father picked me up from Ivie’s in an old pickup. He apologized profus
ely for not being connected to me as he should have all those years. He explained in plain terms he was a married man…a fuck up, who didn’t always keep his dick in his pants. He said his wife was angry about me, but he was determined to do what was right. He also had to respect his wife. So, he said everyone had been told I was his oldest son, Junior’s, daughter.”
I could feel Raj’s arms that were now against mine flexing. I glanced down to the shiny metal railing and saw his hands were curled into tight fists.
“That was his agreement with his wife. No one would know he conceived outside of their marriage. And it honestly was cool with me. I’d be on my own soon after anyways. So, I went with it.” I swallowed, feeling cheated now. “I later theorized his arrangement with MaMa was as such because they’d learned about Reign by then. He’d had another child on her. That one was with an unstable mother, too. But Reign’s mother didn’t have the support mine did. Reign needed housing at a young age, unlike me.”
I chuckled. “You know he named her? Ironic it was weather related like mine. Wynter and Reign.” I shook my head, remembering joking about it with Van years ago. “Van went with the lie, too, even though he didn’t get it. Hated it actually. We were good friends from the start. We hung out a lot before I moved in. Junior was dead and didn’t need to be consulted about the lie. And so was my mother. I felt like my real parents—my maternal grandparents, Charles and Sallie—were now gone, and that’s how I settled it in my mind.” I let out a long breath.
“Until Reign.”
“What happened then?” his heavy chords produced. “And how did all this get past Wanda?”
“Reign was the cutest kid I’d ever seen when I met her. She was about seven and I was fifteen. I actually met her before my grandfather passed. My father brought her by the hospital to drop off his child support payment and see about us. He never said she was his daughter, but I had this strong suspicion. And when I spoke to Van afterward, he confirmed. Van said our father did tell MaMa about her. And MaMa’s acceptance was different. She wasn’t happy, but she didn’t fight him on bringing her around once in a while. And I mean only occasionally. I saw that for myself. I’d been staying there for close to a year before she visited. When she did, it was because her mother was sentenced to prison.”
