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“No,” I said, but my father did not move or object.
“Daddy, say it’s not real,” I implored him, bracing myself.
I watched a tear form in the corner of his eye.
“Can’t even say anything to your family, can you?” Jr said. “After all these years of supporting Jack and his mother—taking them on vacations and making sure Jack got into your alma mater—I heard you even went to the parents’ weekend with his mother—of doing the right thing by them and you can’t do the right thing by your own family and just tell us the truth? From your own mouth?”
My father gnawed at his lip and got up from the table with a kind of sad resolve that let me know he’d never admit anything Jr was saying.
“That’s right,” Jr spat to his back as he walked away. “Just leave us and go about your business of doing good in the community. Make sure you stop by Jack’s!”
“Oh, no,” Nana Jessie said, getting up to follow my father.
“How could you treat your father like that?” my mother cried.
“No,” Jr said. “How could he treat us like that?”
I felt ill—like I was about to vomit what little food that was in my stomach onto the table. I couldn’t take it anymore. And then I remembered that this wasn’t even what I’d feared when I sat down at the table.
“Evil is as evil sees,” May uttered hard-heartedly.
“What?” Jr asked, and we all looked to her.
“You heard me,” she said. “You should know about treating people wrong.” She pulled the envelope from beneath the table and I felt my tonsils quiver as she flung it to the center.
“What’s that?” my mother asked.
“Now who needs to tell?” May said to Jr. “Who needs to man up to his family now?” Her voice grew to a scream.
“You don’t have to make me man up to a damn thing,” Jr announced boldly. “I know exactly what it is.”
“What?” my mother pressed.
“It’s about my son.”
“Your son? What? What are you talking about?”
“I have a son, Mama. His name is Jethro III and he’s going to be coming to live with me,” Jr said proudly.
“A son with who?” My mother looked at May.
“He’s not your son, you jackass,” May said.
“What?” Jr asked.
“Look at the letter. That boy ain’t no more your son than he’s mine.”
“What?” I said, reaching for the envelope, which had fallen closer to me at the table. I pulled out the letter and opened the results.
“What does it say?” Jr asked.
“You’re not the father.” I read the results and they plainly said that there was less than a five-percent chance that Jr could be the father of Kim’s child.
“I’m not?” Jr’s expression quickly shrank. I tossed the results to him. “It can’t be true. He looks just like me. He’s mine.”
“It is true, Jr,” May said. “You lay down with a whore and now you have whore problems.... Let that woman lay up in your father’s house and paid her off all these years ... and for some child that’s not even yours.”
“You let a woman live where?” my mother asked.
