I leaned over and kissed her cheek.
That seemed to satisfy her enough.
When I stepped into the dining room, Pops sat at the head of the table fully invested in the newspaper, glasses resting low on his nose while a half-finished glass of whiskey next to him.
The man looked retired for exactly five seconds until he sensed me walk in.
“Ey, Pops, what it do?” The greeting came out smoothly. It was pure New Orleans, the kind of slang that belonged to this place, this city, this life.
He lowered the newspaper immediately, expression shifting from focused to genuinely pleased.
“Son!” he exclaimed. “Well, isn’t this a pleasant surprise.”
“Damn,” I said while pulling out a chair. “Didn’t know my presence sparked so much joy around here,” I joked.
Mama took a seat. “Don’t flatter yourself. You’re still hard-headed and stressful.” She smiled softly while resting her hand over mine, and added, “I do enjoy seeing you, though.”
I smirked faintly.
Mama cleared her throat. “Well, it’s not every day that our one and only sonvoluntarilycomes over for dinner, so this visit clearly has some good news attached to it.”
Across the table, my father watched me carefully over the rim of his glass. Unlike Mama, he noticedeverything.
“I hope so,” he muttered calmly. “Or there will be bad news following behind it.”
There it was… the reminder.
The week before, he’d already warned me that if I still hadn’t made anything happen on my end regarding finding asuitablewife that he was moving forward with aforcedarrangement himself, meaning, he’d already found some politically perfect woman he approved of and planned to start pushing her into my life whether I liked it or not. The old man wasted absolutely no time preparing backup plans.
I pulled my chair out slowly before sitting down.
“Actually…” I cleared my throat once. “I do have news.”
Mama immediately perked up. “Ouuuu! Well, what is it?”
I glanced between both of them once before finally revealing, “I have a surrogate.”
Mama blinked and Pops’ brows pulled together slightly.
Then both of them spoke at the same time, damn near in the same confused, shocked tone.
“A surrogate?”
“Come again?”
I exhaled slowly before briefly explaining how the arrangement happened. By the time I finished speaking, they still looked stunned.
Then suddenly, my mama gasped loudly. “So… I’m about to be a grandma?!”
Really, Ma? After everything I just laid out, that’s your takeaway?
I couldn’t say that without her possibly throwing a roll at my head, so instead, I replied, “Yeah. Looks that way.”
“Oh my God!” she squealed suddenly before jumping up from the table and hurrying around it toward me. “I don’t care how the baby was made! I’m getting my grandbaby!” she laughed emotionally before grabbing my face and kissing my forehead.
I couldn’t help but laugh a little at her reaction.
Then suddenly she froze.
