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I held my daughter in my arms as I reached out and pulled my wife into me. I had both of my babies under me, and I swear they were having a damn crying match. Mahogany buried her head under my arms as she softly cried.
“I’m not good at this, Jabari. She… she hatesss me. I know she hates me,” Mahogany kept saying.
I swear that was her favorite thing to say. Since Jamaria’s birth, Mahogany hadn’t said one positive thing about herself when it came to her mothering. My God, this was the same damn woman who pushed her own damn baby out by herself, without the help of anyone. She wasn’t giving herself any credit.
“Bae, you trippin’ like a motha fucka right now. You smoked my weed out of my stash in the room?” I questioned.
I was dead serious because she was talking crazy, and I was still picturing the daze that she was in when I walked into the room a few moments ago.
“Bari, I’m serious!” she cried, pulling away and wiping her eyes.
“I’m motha fuckin’ serious too, shorty! You gotta be on some good dope because you talking crazy. How a one-month-old baby hate you? She don’t even know what hate means. You don’t smell the shit coming from her diaper? That’s why she’s crying, shorty, not because she hates you. You be saying reckless shit, man. Go take a shower. I got her,” I said, and she shook her head.
It’s like she was determined to be the one to stop Jamaria from crying.
“I’ll change her,” she said, trying to get Jamaria from me, but I curved her. She kept reaching for her, and that only made the baby cry even harder.
“Mahogany, chill out, yo! I got her. Go take a fuckin’ shower or something. You pissing her off, trying to take her from me,” I said, and the moment I said it, I regretted it because she already felt like our daughter liked me more than her. Her body froze mid-reach of her trying to take Jamaria, and I could tell from that alone that I’d hurt her feelings.
“You know I ain’t mean it like that. Let me change her diaper, and then I’ll give her to you, aight?” I asked her.
“You did mean it like that, Jabari!” she cried and shoved me. “You don’t have to throw it in my fuckin’ face that she likes you better than me,” and with that, she marched her ass out of the room, all the while, still crying.
In seconds, I heard her open and slam the bedroom door to our room. I pulled down on my chin hair as I laid my daughter down. She had stopped crying, and right now, she was just making little noises.
“Your mama crazy as hell. Don’t even worry about having no little brother or sister because I’m not knocking her up any time soon. God, I hope you don’t get her attitude.” I spoke to my daughter as if she really knew what the hell I was even talking about.
I changed her diaper, and the whole time, I swear I had to hold my breath because her little ass smelled like death. Once I had her out of her clothes, I brought her into the bathroom that was inside her room and sat her in her flower foam tub that was in the sink. Mahogany was usually the one who gave Jamaria her baths, but I would try it for the first time tonight.
Mahogany swore up and down that she wasn’t a good mom, but right now, as I gave my baby a bath, I found myself doing all of the little things that I would see Mahogany do at night. I cleaned between her little toes, wiped in the little crevices of her baby fat, all the stuff that I would see my wife doing. When I finished, I wrapped her little body up in a pink unicorn bath towel and carried her back into her room. It took me about another ten minutes to lotion her body and to find a onesie to put on her.
Like this shit was nothing to me, I carried her down the stairs and prepared her bottle, all the while holding her. Once it was fixed, and I put it into the bottle warmer, we went over to the couch so I could feed her. Her little greedy ass attacked that bottle. In the middle of me feeding her, my phone started ringing in my pocket. I was able to pull it out without letting the nipple slip out of Jamaria’s mouth, and when I saw who it was, I sucked my teeth. I knew that I couldn’t keep avoiding her because, at the end of the day, this was my ole girl.
The reason she was calling was that our daughter was a month old, and she still hadn’t seen her yet. She’d only seen her on the pictures that I would send to her. She’s been hounding me since Jamaria was born about wanting to see her. As her grandparent, I could see why she would want to see her, but my wife wasn’t allowing that shit right now, and I couldn’t do anything but respect it. As badly as I wanted to ignore her call like I’d been doing the rest of them, I didn’t. I picked the phone up and put it on speaker as I laid it on the armrest of the sofa.
“What’s up,
ma?” I asked, looking down at my daughter and falling in love with her pretty self all over again.
I held the bottle for her since she couldn’t do it on her own yet, and as I did it, she had her little hand wrapped around my pinky finger. That little motion just spoke volumes to me. I swear it spoke so much love.
“I know you don’t want to hear this, but prior to you getting with this girl—”
“My wife. Who’s not a girl either. Who’s a grown ass woman,” I said, feeling the need to correct her.
I heard her suck her teeth, and I was prepared for her to say some slick shit to me, so I could either say some slick shit right back or just fuck around and hang up the phone on her ass. I didn’t believe in being disrespectful to the woman who birthed me, but at the same time, I wasn’t about to let the woman who birthed me disrespect me or anyone around me. Period! She had gotten way too fuckin’ comfortable when it came to talking about my wife.
“Whatever she is to you! I feel like prior to you getting with her, you never used to go days without calling me back or responding to text messages. I just want you to know that I’ll be in Miami tomorrow, and I hope that I get the chance to see my daughter,” she let me know.
“Ma, with all due respect, ain’t shit change. If you came down here with hopes of seeing Jamaria, then let me know how much money you spent on your plane ticket, and I’ll send you back your money right now. My wife don’t want you around—”
“Your wife! Nigga, what about you? You going to let that skinny bitch run you? I thought you were a fuckin’ man!” she yelled.
I could hear the anger, the disdain, and even what sounded like hate all in her voice. Sighing, I pinched the bridge of my nose as I removed the bottle from my daughter’s mouth because she’d fallen asleep. I stood up with her in my arms, laying her little body on my chest as I patted her back, so I could burp her. At the same time, I picked up the phone to check some shit right quick.
“Best believe my wife don’t run me, but I damn sure listen to her. She couldn’t stress enough to me how she didn’t want you around our child until you came at her with an apology, and the motha fucka had better be genuine because, other than that, you’ll continue to see Jamaria only through pictures. That skinny bitch that you are referring to is my wife, and I’ll cut off all ties with any motha fucka for disrespecting her, and that includes your ass. My wife don’t speak bad on you, so show me and her the same respect and don’t speak bad on her either. I am a fuckin’ man because if I wasn’t, I would have been on the first thing smoking to Georgia to slap you in your damn mouth for disrespecting my wife. I would have slapped you before for even bringing that bitch around my wife when I wasn’t there, and—”
“Ohhhh, that’s what this is about? Are we still even having this conversation after months of it fuckin’ happening?” she asked, as if her having Kenyatta around my wife wasn’t a big ass fuckin’ deal.
