Chapter 38 - Lost In Translation
I laughed into the phone and Janaie continued to go on about how much she couldn’t stand T’s new girlfriend- a kardashian? I was hardly listening to her, but she had me in stitches.
“Janaie. Why don’t you just go tell that man you love him and get your family back. Y'all both need to stop with the petty drama.” I said in all seriousness and she went mute for a second.
“I wish it was so simple mal but you know just as much as I do that it’s not that easy. Who is to say he don’t love this girl?” She answered and my eyes rolled as I held the phone between my ear and shoulder, bouncing Zion on my knee.
“Please, it is that easy. The only reason I wouldn’t go back to Chris is because I’m happy with J, but trust and believe if I wanted I could have him in a heartbeat and that’s regardless of whoever liked it or not. Go and claim what’s yours Janaie. This isn’t a game anymore you have a child with that man.” I said and heard her sigh on the other end.
I watched J walk into our kitchen and completely disregard my presence as he went straight to the fridge. My son let out a set of babbles as he watched his step father move around the room and just like any other time, Jermaine came over taking him from my arms and blew bubbles over his face, still failing to acknowledge me.
He was still mad about the night before and he needed to let it go.
“My bad girl what you say?” I said cutting janaie’s response off because I clearly hadn’t been listening.
“You want me to call you later? You seem a little busy.” She said and she was right, i was distracted.
“Actually girl yeah, I’ll text you aight.” I said before we both said our good byes and I set my phone down.
“Morning.” I said demanding his attention.
“What up” he said with Zion on his lap as he scrolled through his phone with the hand he had free.
“Look if you’re still mad about last night then quit it. If you took offence to my comment then I apologise.” I said sternly and he finally looked up and met eyes with me.
“I didn’t take offence to nothing, I’m good.” He said sarcastically looking back down at his phone.
I sighed when I realised what was going on and I couldn’t help but smile a little.
“Are you jealous? About what I said about Chris ?” I said as I stood up walking over to him. He chuckled into his bowl of frosted flakes and didn’t look up at me.
“I ain’t jealous of shit.” He stated and my brows furrowed.
“… Well it’s my bad if you felt disrespected.” I replied honestly and he cleared his apparently clogged throat.
“First of all you know I don’t care about that petty shit. It’s disrespectful because he’s the father of your child and he’s made it clear he still wants to be with you, and you know that.” He said with his voice raising and I knew it was going to cause an argument because he knew I hated that shit.
“Don’t. fucking raise your voice at me in front of my son.” I said back, the room fell silent soon after and he chuckled smugly.
“And there you go pointing out the fact that he isn’t my son again.” He said shaking his head down at his cereal .
“He’s not.” I replied harshly and regretted it as soon as I said it.
“You know it’s funny you say that, since I was the one there for you when his bitch ass father told you to get rid of him.” He replied smartly and before he could continue my hand was flying across his face, which was closely followed by zion’s small sobs. I looked down at him and matched his teary eyes with my own.
“God dammit J!” I said in a higher tone than I would have wanted. I took Zion off of his lap , took him over to his high chair and placed him in it as I tried my hardest to calm him down. And after a little he finally settled.
After a few moments of no dialog between both J and I , he stood to his feet , put his bowl into the dish washer and began exiting the kitchen.
“Where are you going” I gave in grabbing onto his arm and he looked down at my hand latching onto him, he took his free hand, held onto mine which was holding onto his and plied me off of him.
“Away from you.” He answered staring into my eyes and quickly turned to walk towards the back door of the house. I was wrong, I knew I was. But he was dead out of line too. He knew better than to be bringing that shit up in mixed conflict. I don’t know, but I was becoming so fed up of arguing with him. I barely saw him and when I did we were arguing most of the time. We should’ve been planning our wedding, house shopping, or at least enjoying each others company.
This is not how I was hoping for the day to go. And it didn’t help that I was feeling so under the weather and I still had a meeting with a party planner to discuss Zion’s 1st birthday party which was coming up in just under 3 months.
“I’m sorry baby.” I said when I looked down at my son before lifting him out of his high chair.
I stared down at Chris’ email address flashing on my screen and like any other time I rolled my eyes. Perfect timing.
“yo” he said as soon as he could see me and his brows furrowed when he saw our son in my arms.
“Why’s he crying?” He asked with concern and just like any other time I was honest.
“Me and J got into an argument. He hates when I raise my voice.” I answered and his eyes softened.
“Don’t be fighting around my son. It’s not cool .” He said with so much authority in his voice that I almost felt like I was being told off.
I didn’t reply to him though.
“Why are you calling?” I asked subtly and he let out a long breath before speaking.
“Neveah birthday coming up, I wanted you to bring zee down.” He stated and I unintentionally frowned.
“What?” He asked noticing and I sighed slightly.
“Nothing. But I’m supposed to be going to see my mother that week.” I stated and he huffed already telling me he wasn’t too happy.
“I’m sorry. It’s her birthday then too and I’m really trying to rebuild me and her relationship.” I told him and he sucked his teeth low but even with bad reception and thousands of miles, I caught his attitude.
“What?” I shot and he didn’t speak at first.
“… Nothing. But if you change your mind. I would really appreciate it.” He said clearly upset but I didn’t want to sell him any dreams
“I won’t.” I replied and he nodded before suddenly cutting our conversation short.
“Okay. Well I’ll holla.” He said and I would’ve rolled my eyes and commented on his attitude any other time but I couldn’t be bothered for his comeback, not Chris, not today.
“Okay. Bye.” I replied shortly and we both ended the call.
I sighed after thinking about J. I really hate fighting this nigga but it’s like now all we do is fuck or argue. Most would say it was the passion, but I was old enough to know it wasn’t. I was passionate about him and I knew he was about me, but this anger we had toward each other, this unspoken tension, it was unhealthy and we were both clearly unhappy.
____________
For the next 24 hours we completely acted like each other didn’t exist. I wish I could tell him everything that was on my mind, everything that was bothering me and just be real with him, but God forbid he lied to my face, I would kill him in his sleep. I would rather leave it at what it was than push it, but as a result I was moody and grumpy around him which was ultimately breaking us down.
I sat on the edge of the tub with my underwear on, I had been planning to take a bath for the last 15 minutes but the pain in my stomach was so intense that it was making it particularly hard for me. I lifted my head from its thrown back state when I heard my sons loud cries.
I sighed loudly in a mix of emotions and went to tend to him, when I did turn out of the bathroom though my first sight was Jermaine entering from the other end of the room, I assumed he heard zee’s cries also and came to see to him thinking that I was in the shower.
I looked away from him and walked to my son just as he stepped forward.
I sucked my teeth slightly when Zion’s sobs didn’t stop.
“Zion please.” I said bouncing him to try and stop his cries but it just got worse. I was frustrated with everything and I wanted to just cry with him.
“Lemme try.” J said putting his arms out to take Zion but I shrugged him off and I heard him suck his teeth when Zion continued whaling. Eventually I got fed up and passed him to j and after a few moments in his step fathers arms he settled until his cries were just small babbles.
I watched in frustration and disbelief, and all of a sudden an overflow of emotion came over me.
Jermaine’s brows furrowed when the tears fell from my eyes and I turned away from him too upset to stand and went over to our bed.
“What the hell is wrong with you.” He asked in genuine confusion yet concern in his eyes. I didn’t want to cry but “ I can’t help it, I’m tired, and you won’t speak to me and Chris is mad at me and Zion’s clearly coming down with something and I feel horrible.” I said crying more and I heard Jermaine suck his teeth behind me.
“Stop being childish babygirl.” He said bluntly and I rested my head in my arms.
“Don’t talk to me” I said in annoyance and he chuckled.
“You crying because I ain’t speaking to you and now you’re mad because I spoke to you.” He stated as if I was an idiot who couldn’t understand what he was saying.
“Yeah because you’re being an asshole.” I replied and he chuckled.
“You know what I ain’t even gone stand here arguing with you. When you figure out what you want and how the fuck you should speak to your fiancé then get back to me.” He shot and walked over to Zion’s crib and laid him down as he slept before storming out.
“Yeah? Well you know what fuck you! How bout that!” I shouted in anger and heard him shout a few curses back before the door completely shut.
Fuck that I’m not about to sit here crying over this fool. I thought as I stood up again, I groaned remembering that I’d had the shower running for so long that the water had probably ran cold by now. I dragged my feet along till I reached the bathroom, unlike I had suspected, the water was actually piping hot. Perfect.
I got done in the bathroom and to my surprise and benefit, Zion was still fast asleep.
As always I got him dressed first and luckily he stayed asleep throughout that process. Once I was done doing that I packed his diaper bag and began getting myself together.
I sat at my vanity with nothing but my silk robe on and placed various cosmetic products down before attempting to begin drawing my brows.
-
“You good?” Jermaine asked with concern all over his face. I shook my head no, wiping my mouth and sat on the ground suddenly feeling woozy.
“You want some water?” He asked again and I looked up at him with a death glare.
“Please” I replied and watched him walk out before returning with the bottle of water that had previously been sat on my bed side.
“I told you to stop with all that diet mess.” He threw , seemingly annoyed. My face twisted up at him.
“What mess?” I replied challengingly. I knew what he was talking about because he’d been getting onto me about my new diet for weeks. Insisting that I didn’t need to lose any weight, I looked perfect to him, and there was no such thing as “too thick”.
I watched the side of his face move as he went on lecturing me , his face moving to express how he felt about what he was saying. Not that I was taking any of it in.
“-I’m anaemic.” I said cutting him off mid-sentence. His lips sealed initially, then reopened after a quick swallow.
“I get sick around this time of year, when the weather changes…” I trailed off, blinking up at him. Blankly.
“I ain’t know that..” He replied in slight shock. My mouth fell into a short frown and my shoulders shrugged.
“There’s a lot you don’t know about me. Just like there’s a lot of things I don’t know about you…” I trailed off yet again, I couldn’t help the hostility in my voice or how obvious it was that I had a problem.
“What are you even talking about? If you want to talk baby girl just spe-”
“Why didn’t you tell me you fucked Jen ?” I blurted out before I could hold my tongue. He let my words settle, then sat up straight before letting out a sigh and rubbing his hands over his face.
“I’m not doing this right now.” He said moving to stand up. And I didn’t stop him, I just sat there, basically naked, and gathered my thoughts before moving to follow behind him.
“Why would you walk away when I’m trying to have a conversation?” I asked coming up behind him with my silk robe once again gagging loosely off of me.
“It’s late I don’t want to talk about that shit. Nor do I want another argument.” He said plainly and laid back on the bed, instead of leaving the room like I thought he would.
“I’m not arguing. I just want to understand.” I spoke tightly.
“You want to understand what Malika? You want me to explain myself? For what? It won’t make you feel any better.” My mouth formed a small O and I let out a breathe.
“Are you serious? You lie to me for months and have me out here looking like booboo the fucking fool and come at me like this?” I went off in anger. I couldn’t believe this fool.
“It was before we got together. We were talking, nothing serious. Had sex regularly, bout 3 months. Probably had 2 meaningful conversations in that space of time. I cut her off just before we met and I never spoke to her again.” I felt sick listening to him speak. He made it sound so simple, even though he knew it was fucked up.
“You could have told me. I told you everything, you could have told me.” I said with my eyes glossing over.
“I could have but it wouldn’t have helped, by time I found out the two of you were friends , you’d already starting acting like you were Thelma and Louise. And at the time I knew you hadn’t spoken to any of your other friends and I didn’t want to fuck up ya’ll friendship. I knew you needed one. I just figured if we stayed out of each others way it would be best for us all.” He explained and I blinked taking in his words.
“So it was your idea to hide it from me?” I questioned finally and he opened his mouth to say something other than
“Yes or No J.” I said interrupting his speech.
“Yes.” He said and I scoffed and stood up.
“I can’t believe you.”
