“I had a hysterectomy at a young age due to abuse. So I knew I would never have my own children. At first, we were going to go through a private agency to adopt a baby. I knew I wanted a baby that was younger than six months old. Then, we decided we would go through CPS. Kids were less likely to be adopted through CPS. That was how we met you. You were four months old and had been with CPS for three months.”
“So where was I for the first month of my life?” I asked with a frown.
“With your bio mom. She brought you to the CPS office with all your things. She said she could no longer care for you.”
She fidgeted slightly, so I knew there was more that was gonna fuck me up.
“Tell him, Sid,” my dad said.
“She said she was raped, and she just couldn’t bare raising you.”
I slid my hand down my face. “So I was the product of a rape?”
My mama shook her head. I was confused. I glanced over at my dad as he grabbed my mama’s hand.
“No. She was raped like right after she went home from the hospital. Your bio dad was drunk and wouldn’t take no for an answer. She was still bleeding. She was in so much pain, the CPS worker said. Thankfully, she didn’t suffer any internal injuries. She didn’t have help though. Her mama was a crackhead, and she never knew her father. She refused to give you to your bio dad. She pressed charges on him, but he wasn’t in jail long. When he got out, he tried to give us problems.”
“After what he did to her, he was still trying to get me?”
“Yes. When he saw how much that shit was gonna cost, he let it go. We weren’t going to just hand you over. We’d had you for like a month or two at that point. We were attached to you after the first day. Nobody could tell us that you weren’t ours. We have similar features, and we’re all dark complexioned. Hell, sometimes I forget we adopted you,” my dad said and chuckled.
I gave him a tight smile. “There’s no telling who I would have become had y’all not adopted me. So . . . you kept up with her, Mama?”
“Yes. She reached out first though. She checked with CPS to see if you’d been adopted, then left her info with them for me to contact her. I was a little skeptical at first. I didn’t want to have a repeat of what your bio dad tried to do. I eventually contacted her. I shared pictures with her until you were like seven or eight. After she stopped reaching out, I called her to find out her number had been disconnected. I don’t know if she couldn’t pay the bill or if she lost the phone and got a new number.”
“So you never heard from her again?”
“No.”
“This woman had a picture of me as a kid. She seems slightly ratchet. Was her mom that way?”
“Yeah, slightly, but she was nice,” my mama said, then chuckled.
“Did you get her number?” Mama asked.
“Her friend sent her number to me. She was on the plane with a rapper named SOLA. They are best friends.”
“Oh! That’s the one Sonya told Noah about,” Mama said excitedly.
“Aunt Sonya talks too much.”
My dad chuckled. “I dare you to say that shit to her face.”
I frowned. “I ain’t crazy.”
“Well, you know I’m the attorney for YKMN. So, I can know official business. Noah is supposed to call me tomorrow after their Zoom meeting.”
“Awww shit,” my dad said.
I frowned. “What?”
“You’ve ‘been’ with her,” he said, holding up air quotes.
I huffed. “Yeah, man. A couple of days ago and again before I left Houston.”
“And you feelin’ her. I know that shit, because you ain’t looked that way about a woman since you were in high school.”
I slowly shook my head. I fell in love easy in high school. I was chunky in school until like my senior year. I didn’t get a lot of attention from girls. So when I did, a nigga was all in.
