“Loaded questions are for smooth talkers. Yuh a smooth talker because you are a lawyer.”
I smiled. “I am paid very well to be a smooth talker.”
“I hear dat.” She put the sauce from the pot on the back of her hand and tasted it. Once she got the flavors, she salted it again and closed the lid as it simmered on low.
“Are you Muslim?”
“No... I respect Goo’s decision to be Muslim, which is why I didn’t add pig tails in my red peas soup. Never know when he comes over.” She chuckled.
“A mother’s love.”
“And your mother?” Her question was innocent, but it knocked the wind out of me. She could tell the question triggered something inside of me, but she didn’t back down from the question. “Speak on it, guh.”
My eyes watered as I looked at her.
Ms. Sharon brought her chair closer to me and grabbed my hand. “She’s gone?”
“Yes.”
“Long time?”
“Since I was a child.”
She softly rubbed my hands, as she stared at me. Her hand rubs soothed me as she pursed her lips and wiped the tear that fell down my eyes. “A long time without a mother’s love, eh?”
“Yeah.” I sniffled and wiped my eyes.
She leaned forward and pulled me into her, and I allowed her. Her arms wrapped around me as she rocked softly.
“It’s alright, Baby… it’s alright. Relax… you not in a courtroom, you don’t need to be tense.”
My shoulders relaxed, as she held me. We sat in her kitchen as she rocked me slowly and didn’t say a thing. Tears wouldn’t stop coming down my face because I felt the same good energy I felt whenever Goo hugged me; he got it from his mother.
Their embrace made me feel complete.
As if none of the fucked-up shit in my life was happening. I finally relaxed my arms, and put my arms around her, as she kissed my cheek.
“He brings home a guh that doesn’t love hugs, and that’s all he loves.” She chuckled to herself, as she kissed the top of my head. “You come to me when you need a hug… I don’t care what time, you come, hear?”
“Yes, Ms. Sharon.”
“Sweet precious… always having to be the strength. Never getting to break, because who has time for that, right?”
“Right.”
“It’s okay to break at times. It reminds us tough girls that we are human and have feelings… the tears wash that rock exterior.”
I gently pulled back, and she wiped my face. “I feel like all I do is cry these days and I hate it.”
“Crying is good for the soul. Doesn’t make you weak, it makes you real.”
I smiled at her. “Thank you, Ms. Sharon.”
“You done cried in my kitchen, you bet to call me mommy. I don’t know where you and Goo stand, but I can tell that you will be my daughter-in-law. He has prayed for you, spoken about you so much that I feel like I know you.”
“Gerald has been thinking we’re going to be together since the first time we met.”
She raised her brow. “And here you are in my kitchen.”
