Royal Rodgers

∞

I picked my phone up and put it to my ear, "Wassup?"

Her sobs scarring my eardrums from the other end of the phone. "Yo, what's wrong?" I asked her.

She said my name repeatedly, in between cries. "Is it the baby?" I didn't understand what was going on.

"No!" She paused. "Can you come get me?"

I sighed at the thought of driving all the way up to Richmond. I was tired of being everyone's personal Uber driver. "Why, what's up?"

She didn't answer me. Instead, her sobs got louder and honestly, I was tired of hearing that shit. "Ight Aleeah, you at your crib?"

She said "No," and told me her exact address while I put it into my GPS. I told her that I'd be there in about two hours before I hung up.

Before driving up there, I stopped at Dawn's house and spotted Antonio leaning on his bike while on the phone. "Padre, non credo di poterlo fare più," he said in frustration.

He nodded at me before I did the same and rang the doorbell.

When the door swung open I was met by Dawn. She didn't say anything. Instead, she walked away, leaving it open so I could come in. I closed it behind me before I saw Clover laying on the couch watching cartoons. "Vera..." I said because I wasn't expecting to see her.

Both she and Dawn looked back at me. "Hey," Clover said dryly before turning the TV off and walking upstairs to the bathroom.

Dawn let out a snortle before she plopped down on the couch, where Clover was once sitting. "Why isn't she talking to me?" I asked Dawn.

She pursed her lips, "You already know the answer to that." She was right, I did know the answer. I sat down next to her before she continued, "Give her some time."

I nodded my head before I asked, "What was he doing here?" Referring to Antonio.

She sighed before she replied, "Don't worry about it."

I looked over at her before I rolled my eyes and said, "Ight, I'm gone." When I stood up, I noticed Clover standing at the top of the stairs.

Dawn noticed too because she smirked at me before saying, "I'm going training tomorrow. Do y'all wanna come?"

I knew what she was trying to do and it was fine with me. "Yeah," I answered, thankful that I'd finally get a chance to talk to Clover without her having a place to run away to.

"No," Clover said harshly.

There goes my dreams of talking to her anytime soon.

Dawn sucked her teeth before she said, "Clover, what else do you have to do tomorrow?"

"I have a lot-" I cut her off.

"Dawn, it's cool. She don't gotta come if she don't want to."

Dawn looked at me scrunched up her face and I could tell that we were about to give her an attitude. "No, she's coming. She has nothing else better to do!" She paused before looking back at Clover. "You're coming!"

"I don't even know how to fight, I can barely throw a punch!" Clover said.

Dawn got up before she retorted, "That's the point."

I didn't want to get in the middle of this conversation. I wouldn't survive the wrath of both of them, so I kept my mouth shut.

I went to open the door and Dawn said, "Before you leave, go say 'hi' to my mom."

I was Ms. Evans' favorite. She always said that I was like the son that she never had. I speed-walked up the stairs and past Clover before I realized that I still had to pick Aleeah up.

I knocked on Ms. Evans' door before she shouted, "Come in, sweetheart." When I opened the door, she looked surprised. "Royal! Come here!" She extended her arms.

"Wassup, Dukes." I bent down to her height and hugged her tightly before I stepped back.

"Dawn tells me that you're expecting..." I didn't respond, verbally. Instead, I nodded my head. There was nothing for me to say.

"Are you afraid?" She asked me, wanting a genuine answer. But I didn't know the answer to that question. But I knew one thing.

"I want the best for my kid. So, that scared shit gonna have to wait," I told her, truthfully.

She nodded her head in understanding of where I was coming from, but disagreeing all at once. "It's normal to be afraid," She paused. "I mean, who wouldn't be afraid of altering their entire life to ensure that their child has everything that they could ever want for."

I was about to respond when my phone began ringing. "Leeah, I'm on my way."

The call was silent until I heard her scream. I immediately hung up the phone and shoved it in my pocket. "Sorry, Ms. Evans. I gotta be somewhere."

She nodded her head before I rushed out of the bedroom, down the stairs, and out of the door. Leaving Clover and Dawn in the question of why I was in such a rush.

When I got out of the house I ran to my car and hopped in before pulling off. I called Aleeah about a hundred times and she didn't pick up not once.

I managed to turn a two-hour drive to Richmond into a thirty-minute one. I pulled up to the cafe, where Aleeah was supposed to be waiting for me and rushed in, looking around for her. When I didn't see her, I yelled, "Has anybody seen a girl? About 5'4?" I described to everyone her height with my hand.

The four people who were in the cafe looked at me like I was going crazy. "She's pregnant!" I yelled.

How could anyone miss a pregnant girl?

Everyone shook their heads. Until an employee pointed to the back of the store. I turned my head and saw the sign 'Restrooms' painted on the wall. I ran down there and walked into the girls' bathroom.

I called for her until I saw a figure balled up on the floor in a bathroom stall. I pushed the door, but it wouldn't open. "Leeah, open the door."

"No."

"What happened?" I asked her, still attempting to push the stall open. She didn't respond so I continued, "Aleeah, open the fuckin' door or I'll crawl under here and drag ya ass out."

I stood there for about thirty seconds. Until finally she stood up and walked towards the door before I heard it unlock. I pushed the door open, accidentally hitting her in the face.

"Oww," she said quietly as she put her hand over her face, hiding it from me.

"Did I hurt you?" I asked before I grabbed her hand and removed it from her face and was met by a black eye and a cut that ran from her eyebrow to her cheek.

Damn!

My face was stuck. I stood there looking at her, my mouth wide opened. "What the hell happened to you?"

She shook her head, not wanting to answer my question before covering her face again, this time with both of her hands. I didn't want to add on to her stress so I grabbed her bag that sat in the bathroom stall. "Come on," I said before I put my arm around her shoulder, guiding her out of the cafe and to my car.

The car ride back to VA Beach was silent. Aleeah slept in the back seat of my car while I drove for about two hours, trapped in my mind.

Aleeah and I hadn't known each other for a long time. About three months ago we hooked up at a party in Richmond. Then a few weeks ago, she calls me and says she's pregnant.

I didn't believe the baby was mine at first, but the first thing that my parents did when they found out was paid for a prenatal test. When the test came back positive, I immediately asked Aleeah to consider an abortion.

"I wasn't ready," was what I told her, attempting to convince her to not have the baby and I was telling the truth. However, she reminded me that it wasn't about me. Instead, it was about "the lives that would be affected if we did or didn't have this baby." She made me realize all of the possibilities that could come from having a child.

Aleeah believed in horoscopes and possibilities- all of the things that I've never thought about a day in my life. When she first began talking about it, I thought that she was out of her mind. Until I actually started to think about it.

Imagine a boy named Joseph. He's only eighteen and he's lived a horrible life so far. He's been contemplating suicide for a while, but he decides to go to college where he sees a girl, Taylor. Taylor notices that Joseph looks heartbroken and defeated. Because she is a libra she goes over to Joseph and talks to him. She tries to comfort him. Joseph and Taylor become great friends and Joseph finally has someone who he can be himself around and just talk to. In thirty years Joseph is a successful licensed doctor and now has two children with Taylor who have worked together to find the cure for cancer. What would've happened if Taylor never walked up to Joseph?

Well, at least that's the bullshit that Aleeah told me. The moral of the story is our kid is gonna cure cancer.

I sighed as I pulled up to my house. I opened the back door of my car before I sat Aleeah up and sat down next to her before I put my arm around her shoulder. Her head fell on my chest and I asked, "What happened?"

"Just some girls." She told me.

"Some girls did that to you?" I asked, using finger quotes around 'some girls'. She nodded her head confirming her earlier statement.

"You sure?" I asked her. She nodded her head again, annoyed that I repeatedly asked her the same question.

I pulled out my phone to text Dawn before Aleeah said, "She kicked me out." It didn't take a genius to figure out that she was talking about her mom.

Aleeah's parents were very religious. They tried to persuade her to get an abortion, but it wasn't what she wanted. They thought that being seventeen with a child was a burden. They thought that it would ruin her life.

Maybe they were right...

"Where are you staying?" I asked her, genuinely wanting an answer.

She shrugged her shoulders before she answered, "Maybe with my uncle, Jerry."

I shook my head in disagreement. "No, you can stay with me. It ain't no way in hell my kid is growing up with that man." Her uncle was known as the neighborhood crackhead in Richmond. I couldn't let her stay there.

It took a lot of convincing, but after twenty minutes Aleeah finally agreed to stay with me until we could figure something else out. Hopefully, it'd be just as easy to convince my parents.

Before going into my house I looked over at Aleeah before I asked, "What are you doing tomorrow?" I knew she didn't have plans prior to asking her, but she did now.