Resting there gently and carefully, as if I already knew I had to protect something.
I closed my eyes.
And for a second, just a second, everything else faded. The questions. The rumors. Zay’s voice in the car warning me aboutthe babies Xavier already had on the way. My parents. All I could feel was this quiet, fragile connection to something that hadn’t even fully formed yet.
To him.
A piece of him.
A piece of us.
My throat was tight, and I finally felt dangerously close to hope. And that’s when I knew, I couldn’t tell anyone.
Not my mom.
Not my dad.
Not Yaya.
Not Zayden.
Not anyone.
Because the second I told anyone, it would come with questions I couldn’t answer and judgment I couldn’t carry. So I kept it to myself. I held it close. I couldn’t protect X that night, but I would protect the X in my tummy. Xander is beautiful, I thought. Whether it’s a boy or a girl. I remember that in a Greek mythology book I was obsessed with, Xander meant “protector of humankind.” Xander would protect me from loneliness, and I would protect my baby from the world's woes.
October 2006
Ididn’t want to see a doctor.
I had been ignoring the clinic emails since I moved onto campus in July. They kept popping up in my student portal like reminders I didn’t want to see.
Free health services.
Confidential appointments.
Walk-ins welcome.
I told myself I didn’t need it. I told myself I was fine. Women have been carrying babies for years. I told myself that my body knew what to do. I thought that as long as I kept quiet, Xander was mine. Told myself I was protecting my miracle from the loud, ugly world. As long as I took the prenatal vitamins that I brought over the counter at the local mom-and-pop pharmacy, I could carry Xander without anyone interfering.
When my parents called, they noted that I sounded a bit better. I assured them I was adjusting to school. When they began to discuss Thanksgiving and Christmas plans, I asked to stay on campus. My mother began her dramatic ass protest, but once I told her I didn’t need home opening up the Xavier wound, she agreed that me remaining on campus would be best. My dadoffered to rent a house in my college town for the holidays, but I told them I was thinking about signing up for mission work over Christmas. My dad was elated at the idea of my tapping back into religion.
After the call, I sighed in relief. I knew I couldn’t keep the secret of Xander forever, but I needed to keep it long enough that no one would try to force me to terminate my blessing. I had started writing at least five different letters to X to tell him we were pregnant, but I couldn’t get past the second line on each draft.
For starters, I didn’t know which prison he was in, and I even tried to ask YaYa once, but she changed the subject on the phone as if she hadn’t heard me. Then, when I got over that hurdle and told myself I could call each prison pretending to be his mom or his wife, I didn’t know what to say.
Would I ask him how he’s doing? That seemed dumb. Of course, he wasn't doing well. My brother, Jared, and I wrote about TV shows. We both watched Flavor of Love and wrote about the contestants that have been eliminated and how we were more appalled than anyone wanted Flav’s ass. But Jared and I were never on bad terms, and this has been our norm since I was in middle school.
Would I tell Xavier that he would be a dad again? But what if he asked me to take Xander to meet a host of kids that also began with the letter X? I couldn’t bring myself to do it, so Xander remained mine and mine only.
I glanced at the clinic emails again. That morning felt different. I sat on the edge of my bed longer than usual, my hand resting against my stomach.
Sometimes, I talked to my baby. Not loudly, but little phrases so they got used to the sound of my voice. I read somewhere that a baby begins to recognize the sound of their mom’s voice in the second trimester, and if my calculation was right, I was there.
I would whisper little phrases to Xander:
You good?
Mommy loves you!
