Lexus: A DC Girl

Reesie and Her Mother

"Youse stupid as hell!" Antrista yelled into her fifteen-year-old daughter's face. She used an adjacent wall to steady herself. She could hear the blood rapidly passing her ears in route to her head. The pounding was incessant. Trista gently placed her forehead against the cool surface of the wall imagining herself in anther place, another word. "This is some kinda bad dream, right?" She said closing her eyes and rubbing her forehead back and forth against the painted drywall. Pregnant? Nawww! This ain't happening! Is it?

"Why I gotta be stupid?" Charease wanted to know. She pulled away from the white linen sofa, fanning herself with a folded leaf of college ruled notebook paper; her hazel eyes peering at her mother. For a moment, the room was quiet aside from the rapid pounding of the human heart.

Trista broked the silence. "How you not goin' be stupid?" Her eyes rolled from one end of the room to the other, carefully not to land on Charease's cherub face.

"I ain't stupid, Momma." Charease said with no clear indication of her mood, it was a simple, "jus' statin' the facts ma'am" monotone.

Trista choked on her on her spit. "You done got yourself knocked up!"

"I did?" The words were a a barely audible whisper. I'm knocked up. I'm pregnant. Instinctively, Charease moved her hands to her stomach and felt a tiny knot. She pushed it forward and then backward, swearing she could feel something moving insife. Hearing the words, aloud, made her tremble. Her eyes glowed and her heart quickened, beating fast, real fast. Chereese hadn't yet figured out if whether it was from adrenaline, excitement of carrying a human inside of her or because she was scared, real scared.

Reesie pressed her eyelids together, tightly, as not to cry. But an avalanche of tears found their way down her soft, waif like face despite the dam that were her eyelids. I'm only fifteen. What can I do with a baby? I always gotta be the strong one. Strong for my mother, strong for my brothers! Now I gotta be strong for my baby!

Antrista fell back onto her favorite sitting chair, the white one with the well-worn cushions, stringy linen pieces, and exposed yellow foam. Shifting her gaze to Reesie's slightly slanted eyes! "At fifteen years old, Reesie? Fifteen." She can't do this to herself. To me.

"I think I can handle it." Charease stated in a matter-of-fact tone. She actin' like she ain't have me at fourteen. "I can handle it." She said aloud. She stood erect, trying to convince not only her mother but also herself. I can handle it. I can!

"Oh, so you 'can handle it'? Do you even know what's it's like to be a mother?" Antrista snickered.

"Did you? You had me at fourteen."

The motion was too quick for Reesie to register, Trista grabbed a handful of Charease's thick, shoulder length, jet-black, hair, wrapping it around her fingers. "You see me strugglin' wit' five damn kids and nair fava here to help me. I tried." Trista released the super grip on her baby girl's hair and slipped to the floor. Tears relentlessly tumbled out of her cole black eyes. "I did the best I could with what I was given."

"Momma I--" Reesie could barely get her words together.

"You wanna have a baby?" Trista asked. "You wanna ruin your life like this?"

"I don't know."

"What you mean you don't know?" Trista sat back against the couch and pulled her Kool 100s from her right pant pocket. She put fire to the small cancer stick marveling at the swerving white mist; this always soothed her. I wish I had a drink.

Charease peered up at her mother "I don't know about the school thing, but me raise kids Momma, are you kiddin'? I done raised Cell, Ant and Si; they call me Momma more than you! All you wanna do is rip an' run the streets wit' dis nigga an' that nigga. You wanna know where I got pregnant at? Hunh, Momma!" Charease jumped up from her position on the floor. "I fucked him right there where you sittin' at. An' he bust'd all in me!"