Joshua
"Momma?"
Hearing her say I can come in after I knocked, I entered. Sitting on her bed with a familiar box on her lap, I sat next to her.
"I remember this day." I smiled.
Taking the picture of us the day Caitlyn was born from her, I stared at it.
"Yeah? What you remembered?"
"How calm you were after you busted my ass while in labor." I laughed.
"I don't know who told your ass it was a good idea to go slipping through my amniotic fluid on the floor."
"How was I suppose to know it was that?"
"Just ridiculous." She shook her head and laughed. "What else do you remember?"
"Grandma coming over and us sitting in the waiting room in the hospital till she went in to be with you."
"Mhmm."
"And to this day, I still get angry that he missed Caity being born." I shook my head.
"Same. But I guess we know why now." She shrugged.
Taking the photo from me, she placed it back into the box. Since finding out our father for the lack of a better word, had a bastard child, my mother has been so docile. I knew she was hurt even though they were divorced and I understood why.
"Why it took you so long to leave him?" I finally asked.
"Because I was being selfish." She looked at me. "I was scared to be alone."
"But you had us."
"I know but that's a different kind of loneliness. I loved y'all father with everything in me and felt like if I had given up, I would have been a failure."
"So what was the last draw?"
"You. The way your behaviour had switched. I knew him being in that house longer would have been worse and I love you and your sister more than anything else."
"And that's why you're not selfish. Yeah it took you a while to let go but you did."
"Thank you babe. Now what's in your mind?"
"I want to do something special for Leila. I really messed up this time and even though she accepted my apology, I feel bad."
"What does she like?"
"Clothes and books." I chuckled.
"Well then."
"But she love books more. She's always reading."
"Well, introduce her to some new material. There is an antique bookstore not to far from here, where I take Caitlyn to. They have a reading corner and everything."
"Aight." I nodded. "I'll check them out."
"By the way, where is Caitlyn?"
"Watching television."
"Okay."
"Are you going to do it?"
"Do what?"
"You know momma. You're in the medical field. I know you feel some type of way knowing that boy is sick."
"I don't know."
"If you don't know then that mean you don't want to. Momma we don't owe that man a damn thing. He already not paying child support as he should be as well as alimony."
