Long Time Coming (17 page)

By the third ring, Deidre worried that she would be talking to Johnson's voice mail, but then he picked up."What's up, Deidre?"

His voice sounded hurried, like he wanted to answer her question and get off the phone as fast as he could."Kenisha wants an answer from us. She refuses to tell the kids about her situation until she knows what we are going to do."

He was silent for a moment, but then said, "I don't know, Deidre. You and I have a lot to iron out before we'll even know where we're going from here. Do you really think we should involve kids in this right now?"

"Johnson, you've been talking about adoption for months. And now that we have an opportunity to make that happen, you don't know what you want to do?"

"You know why I don't know, Deidre. So don't put this all on me."

"No matter how upset you are with me, Johnson, these kids didn't do anything to you. And if we wait too long, we could lose them."

Again he was silent.

"I need to let Kenisha know something."

"And I need to pray about this, Deidre. So I can't give you an answer this very minute."

"Thursday, Johnson. You have until then. When you come over for Thanksgiving, Kenisha and I will expect an answer from you." She hung up the phone and sat on her bed for a moment. She hadn't meant to sound demanding, but she couldn't let Johnson hem and haw around this issue. Kenisha deserved some peace in these terrible days to come. She would just keep praying that God would soften Johnson's heart.

K
enisha knew that Johnson had decided to be a father to her children the moment he walked through the door and set his suitcase down in the entryway. This had been a good day for her so far. She had been walking around and helping Deidre prepare the Thanksgiving dinner. She had been on her way to the bathroom when Johnson opened the front door. When she saw the suitcase, she wanted to run and give him a hug. But then sadness crept into her soul, because Kenisha knew that she would break her children's hearts today."Hey, Johnson, how are you doing?"

He smiled."I'm good, how about yourself?"

"Oh, you know how it is, I have good days and bad."She pointed at his suitcase."Does that mean what I think it means?"

Johnson nodded.

"Have you told Deidre yet?"

"No, I haven't talked to her in a couple of days, but I'll tell her after I unpack."

"All right. Well, I've got to go to the bathroom before I have an accident," Kenisha told him as she walked into the bathroom. She was glad that Deidre would have someone to share her life with and that the children would finally have a real father figure in their lives, but as she sat on the toilet and blood that she knew had not come from her menstrual cycle began to trickle out, depression set in, and she silently cried for herself.

When she was done crying for all the days she would never see, the first dates, the prom dates, and the weddings that she would never know anything about, she cried for her children. Kenisha was not one to sit around with a cell phone attached to her ear, ignoring her children. She'd done things with them . . . taught them things. Her kids would miss her, that was one thing she knew for certain. And that was the most painful thing of all to swallow. Not that she could swallow anything anyway, with her throat hurting so bad it felt as if it were closing up on her.

She looked heavenward and asked, "Why, God, why? Couldn't you have found someone else to pick on?"

There was a knock on the bathroom door, and Kenisha jumped."Mama, are you in there?"

It was Jamal. Kenisha smiled. He was her firstborn, the one she had spent the most time with. Would he remember her? "I'll be out in a minute," Kenisha said after she'd cleared her throat.

"What are you doing in there?"

"Just having a little private time, son. I'll be back in the kitchen in a minute. Okay?"

"All right, but hurry up. Mrs. Deidre went upstairs to talk to Johnson, and there's still a whole bunch of food that needs to be cooked before we can eat."

Kenisha wiped the tears from her face as she laughed at Jamal. He was always hungry. It didn't matter how much he ate, he could always make room for more."Grab a banana and sit down somewhere, hungry boy." She flushed the toilet and then washed her hands. She threw a little water on her face to clear away any tear stains, dried her face, and then opened the bathroom door.

Jamal was still standing there. He whispered, "Did you do the number two?"

"No, boy, I just needed some time to myself."

"Good, because I need to go now," he said as he ran into the bathroom and closed the door behind him.

Kenisha went back into the kitchen and finished cutting up the peaches Deidre needed for the peach cobbler she was going to bake. She willed herself not to think about anything but the peaches in front of her and the wonderful meal her children would enjoy in a little while. But when Deidre walked back into the kitchen, Kenisha saw that she had been crying. But she didn't look sad. Kenisha knew that Deidre's joy came from the fact that she would soon become mother to her children.

All of a sudden, Kenisha was tired and needed to lie down."I'm going to the family room for a while," she told Deidre and then left before they could say anything else to each other. Kenisha buried herself under the covers as she lay on the couch and watched some stupid old Christmas movie. She wanted to curl up in a ball to shield herself from the pain in her heart. But a shooting pain soared through her that was so fierce she had to bite down on her lip to keep from screaming.

Diamond and Jamal walked into the family room. She half smiled at them, trying desperately not to show how much pain she was in.

"You all right?" Diamond asked.

Funny how perceptive kids could be at times. They always seemed to know when something's going on. What was that saying—
If mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy?
Maybe kids went through as much turmoil as their parents when there was a bunch of drama going on in the house. She wished she had thought of that when she was going through all that unnecessary stuff with Chico and his crack demon."I'm okay. Why don't y'all sit down and watch television with me? You can watch whatever you want."

"Really?" Jamal said excitedly as he grabbed the remote.

Diamond tried to take the remote away from Jamal."You don't get to pick all the time."

When the tug-of-war over the remote started, Kenisha realized that she had made a big mistake by not designating who would get to choose the first program they watched on television. But she was too weak to referee this remote smackdown.

Thankfully, Johnson came into the room and grabbed the remote."If the two of you are going to fight over the remote, then nobody is going to get it."

"But Mama wanted to watch television with us. She said we get to choose," Diamond informed Johnson.

Kenisha gave Johnson a weak smile as he looked her way."It's my fault," she admitted, even as she hoped that he would take care of the situation and not ask her to do it. She didn't want her children to know that she needed help to get off the couch right now. Not on Thanksgiving. She wanted them to enjoy this day, because, before they went to bed tonight, she was going to break their hearts.

"Okay, then," Johnson said."You two sit down, and what we are going to do is alternate." He pulled a coin out of his pocket and told Jamal and Diamond to pick a side.

Jamal picked heads and Diamond was left with tails. The coin flipped in the air and fell to the ground so everyone could see the results. The coin landed on tails.

"Yes!" Diamond said as she jumped up and did a dance move around the floor.

"No need to gloat, Diamond," Kenisha said as she laughed.

"I'll take that." Diamond pointed at the remote in Johnson's hand.

"Okay, young lady, you get the first pick. But after your program goes off, then it's Jamal's turn. And I'm sure Kennedy will be awake by then, so after Jamal, you two have to give Kennedy a turn. Okay?"

"Okay," they said in unison.

Diamond then turned to Jamal and said, "I'm going to try to find something we both like."

Kenisha was so proud of her children. They hadn't been raised in the best of circumstances, but they were good kids. She was well aware of what people thought about project kids. But she had never raised her children to follow in her footsteps. She knew well that children raised in poverty grew up to live in poverty themselves. It had already happened to her. Martha had raised them in the projects with barely a dime to her name. And Kenisha and Aisha had both ended up in their own project homes with a houseful of kids and scattered daddies.

That's why it had been so important to Kenisha to find someone willing to adopt her children, rather than leave it up to the state to choose someone. She didn't want the state to piecemeal her children off to people who were only taking them in to collect a check. She wanted a better life for her children. And the moment she discovered that Deidre didn't have any children, Kenisha had hoped and prayed that this educated woman with the nice house would want to adopt her children. Kenisha realized that she had been pushy at times, but her children's lives were at stake. And Kenisha would look out for their best interests until she took her last breath.

By the time they had watched their second movie, Kennedy had awakened from her nap and dinner was ready. Johnson brought the wheelchair over and helped Kenisha into it."We've got a spot for you at the head of the table," he told her while wheeling her into the dining room.

"Thank you," Kenisha said.

"Everything looks wonderful, Deidre. Were you and Kenisha up late last night preparing the food?" Johnson asked.

"We cooked the turkey and the ham last night," Deidre said, "but everything else was fixed this morning. Kenisha was feeling pretty good this morning, so we worked together."

"Yeah, Mama fixed the yams and the green beans," Jamal chimed in.

Johnson blessed the food, and then he and Deidre started filling plates. Jamal and Diamond ate as if they had just discovered food existed. Kenisha was so embarrassed, but she didn't say anything. She just couldn't bring herself to chastise her children—not today.

Kenisha, on the other hand, took slow, deliberate bites of her food. She was sure that Deidre thought she was eating so slowly because her throat was hurting. But the truth of the matter was, she would sit at this table forever if she could. But when dinner was finished and everyone had left the dining room, Deidre walked over to Kenisha and asked, "Are you ready?"

"No," Kenisha answered honestly."Do we really have to tell them? Can't I just write them a note, and you or Johnson read it to them after everything is all over?"

"I don't think that's fair to the kids, Kenisha. They already know something is wrong. We need to talk to them. Okay?"

Kenisha wanted to continue expressing her objections, but Deidre was right. Her children deserved the truth, and she had just been too chicken to give it to them. She lowered her head, trying to adjust to the reality that had been forced upon her. When she raised her head, she was in control of the situation once again."All right, let's go talk to them."

Deidre grabbed hold of Kenisha's wheelchair and pushed her into the family room. The kids were getting situated, while Johnson put in a DVD. He turned to the kids and said, "If you want to know what I'm thankful for, it is the birth of Jesus. I'm also thankful that I was able to share this day with all of you. Now, the next holiday that will be upon us in less than a month is Christmas, and I want you all to understand the true meaning of that day, before we get too busy making out lists for all the presents we want."

"But we are supposed to get presents for Christmas," Diamond, the gimme-gimme kid, chimed in.

"Yes, receiving presents is a fine way to celebrate Christmas, but this movie will show you the reason we give presents in the first place. It is a movie about the birth of Jesus and it's in cartoon form, so I think you all will enjoy. Okay?"

The kids nodded, and Johnson hit the play button.

Kenisha wanted to tell Johnson to turn that movie off. No sense filling her kids' heads with all that Jesus nonsense. But as long as the movie was on, she didn't have to talk. So she let the movie play and watched her children as they enjoyed themselves.

When the movie was over, which was way too soon as far as Kenisha was concerned, Johnson turned off the television and looked at Kenisha. Kenisha turned away from him. She looked at Deidre, hoping that she would call this whole "let's tell the children" thing off. But Deidre didn't look like she wanted to play the deception game anymore.

"All right, then," Kenisha said under her breath. She then turned to her children and said, "I need to talk to you guys about something."

"Is it about our Christmas presents?" Diamond asked with a gleam in her eyes.

How Kenisha wished she could talk to them about Christmas presents. Kenisha held back tears as she said, "No, baby, it's not."

The room was silent. Kenisha didn't want to break the silence, either. She was quite content with sitting here looking at her children without saying a mumbling word. But Johnson had to open his mouth and interrupt the peaceful atmosphere in the room.

"Your mother needs to talk to you all about something very important," Johnson said, giving Kenisha a gentle nudge.

Kennedy got off the couch, and went and sat down on Johnson's lap. To Kenisha that was a sign that her children belonged in this house and that they would be all right. She turned to Jamal and said, "Jamal, do you remember when you asked me why I needed this wheelchair, and why we were staying here with the Morrises?"

"Yeah. But you told me that you would tell me when you were ready."

Ready or not . . ."I think it's time for me to tell you what's going on." Kenisha took a deep breath and then said, "You know I had the surgery to get rid of my cancer, right?"

"And the doctor was going to make you all better," Diamond said matter-of-factly.

She had told them that, and naturally they had believed her."That's what I thought. But a couple of months ago, Dr. Lawson told me that the cancer hadn't left and that it had spread throughout my body." She stopped talking again. Kenisha hadn't wanted to talk to her children about this because she knew it was going to be one of the hardest things she'd ever had to do in life. The pain of giving birth to the children was nothing compared to telling them that she wouldn't be there for their prom, graduation, first job interview, marriage. She wouldn't even get to see her first grandchild brought into the world, or know which one of her kids had the first grandchild, for that matter.

"Anyway, I've been getting sicker, and . . . and the doctors don't think I'm going to get any better."

"Are you dying?" Jamal asked with a horror-stricken look on his face.

The look on her son's face weakened Kenisha's resolve not to cry, and the tears began to fall. She would give anything to not have to say those words to Jamal. Living was so hard, why did dying have to be just as hard? She put her hand over her eyes and covered them while she tried to stop the tears from flowing.

Deidre put her hand on Kenisha's back and gently rubbed it. She leaned down and whispered in Kenisha's ear, "Do you need to stop?"

Kenisha shook her head. She wasn't going through this agony again; she was going to finish this tonight. Taking another deep breath and swallowing the lump in her throat, Kenisha looked at Jamal and said, "Yes, baby. I'm dying."