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“My dad is still on the board of surgeons at Bellmore General,” I started. “My mom moved to Chicago after their divorce, and I see her whenever I get a free moment. I’m feeling like I need to make time for a free moment because seeing her would probably help me feel a lot better about losing Rob.”
“So, I noticed you immediately mentioned work when you talked about your father, but you were more open and emotional when it came to your mom…”
“And I noticed that you’re psychoanalyzing me,” I frowned.
“Being a killer means I have to understand people’s thoughts and words. So, yeah…I have a habit of doing that. You just noticed?” she laughed.
“I guess I never minded until it was about my parents.” My fingers skimmed her bare shoulder. I marveled at the way goosebumps trailed my touch. I loved the way her body reacted to me. It made me want to fuck her over and over just to find different ways to make her come.
“Well, now I want to know what’s up with you and your dad since he works for the hospital, too.” She wet her lips and pulled in a deep breath.
“I used to worship him. The same way I did with Maasai. He’s the one who taught me that Godwins save lives. He taught me that we had the power in our hands to give life or take it away.”
“Ah,” Sanai nodded, holding her finger in the air. “He’s the reason for your God complex.”
“Something like that,” I agreed. “He taught me that life was sacred and to protect it and that’s why the Godwins have always been doctors or at least prevalent in the medical field. I have some cousins and aunts who are nurses, too.”
“So if he’s as wonderful and noble as he sounds…why don’t you sound happy when you talk about him?” I loved and hated how perceptive she was.
“Damn, baby girl. You just want to dig all in my shadows, huh?”
“I do,” she laughed and her eyes held a sparkle that I hadn’t seen before.
Our words fell quiet for a few beats, then I said, “I built my entire moral philosophy on the fact that life is sacred and should be protected. That to harm another living being meant you’d let your dark side have control and you couldn’t be trusted to make sound decisions.”
“Wow, judgy much? No wonder you hated me.”
“I didn’t hate you as much as I thought I did or we wouldn’t be right here, right now.” I dropped a kiss on the top of her head and continued stroking her silky golden skin. “But…one night, my parents got into an argument. Something about my dad fucking his assistant. I was shook. He was the last person I would have imagined cheating.
My mother told him she was leaving because she was tired of pretending to be happy and my dad snapped. He choked her. Slapped her. Pushed her against the wall and told her that she couldn’t leave him. That the Godwin image was more important than her dramatic emotions.” I paused and rolled my lips between my teeth. I needed a moment.
Digging up old pain hurt just as much as experiencing it for the first time. Sometimes, it felt even worse because I had time to sit with it and let it fester beneath the layers of smiles and perfection that I’d expertly crafted around myself.
“Shit. I know that must have fucked you up.” Sanai straddled me, taking my face in her hands. “To see the man you built your ideologies around completely go against everything you thought he stood for…” She shook her head slowly, sympathy pulling her pouty lips into a sad frown.
“Yeah. So, after that shit, I pulled away from him. I was about to graduate high school, so it was easy to fall into the routine of being obsessed with med school and integrating into college life. I got a lot closer to my mother and told her that I heard her and Dad arguing that night and that if she wanted to leave him…then fuck the Godwin family image. Leave and move away.
I guess I felt like that was the only way I could help her since I was so paralyzed that night. I always beat myself up for not swooping in to stop him from hitting her. I didn’t bother telling my brothers because I didn’t want their image of our father to be shattered like mine was.
I told myself I’d be a better surgeon than he ever was and that I wouldn’t be a fake ass nigga like him, and I actually would save lives and not hurt another living thing.”
“Oh…Bakari.” Sanai’s shoulders dropped and she leaned in to kiss my lips. “To live life is to be imperfect, babe. You’re always going to cause harm in one way or another. You might not have ever lifted your hand to hit a woman and you might save lives daily, but you’ve broken so many hearts. You’ve stepped on so many feelings. That kind of emotional damage is pain, too.”
Her words rang out like a church bell in my mind.
Fuck.
She was right.
Even though I vowed to never be like my father…I was my own version of him.
“I’m not trying to kick you while you’re down,” she told me gently, stroking my beard.
“I know…and you’re right but that doesn’t make it any less uncomfortable.”
“That’s fair,” she said, moving off my lap. “I can heat up something for you to eat and we don’t have to do anything but chill.” The way my eyes ate her up made me doubt the whole just chill suggestion. She looked so damn good with her natural curls and clean face. I was used to seeing Sanai dressed to the nines with sleek ribbons of ebony hair flowing down her back and her face painted so that she looked like a doll.
This version of her that I’d seen for the past few days was bare and open. I liked it and wanted more of it. I found my eyes absorbing her side profile while she ate and watched the movie she put on TV for us. I didn’t care about whatever was happening on screen. I cared about the way she looked when she was concentrating. I cared about the way she stuck right by my side when she knew I needed her. I cared about the gentle way her hand rested on my leg.
