Single Mom (21 page)

“Yeah, that was kind of sick,” I agreed with her.

Denise snapped. “That girl was out of her damn mind! I may get horny sometimes, but I ain’t crazy.”

I smiled. We calmed down and dug into our food after that. I wasn’t sure what else to say. I still hadn’t answered Denise’s question about my intentions toward her. You can think about a lot of different things in life, but then when it comes to making a split-second decision, it can rattle your brains. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing at such a critical time. I still wanted to be patient and think everything through.

“To tell you the truth, Dennis, I really think that we need to slow
down,” Denise finally decided for me. “I mean, I usually didn’t allow too many men around my kids, but after we talked about them a few times, I just wanted to see how you would respond to them. I guess I just wanted to see what the chemistry would be like. And once I saw that they liked you, I pretty much let things get out of hand without really talking about it.

“Honestly, I was a little afraid to talk about them, because I didn’t want to hear that same old lame excuse from you,” she told me. “I mean, you brothers have to understand that when you’re dealing with a woman who has kids, that there’s gonna be complications involved. Some brothers act like your kids are fine when things are going well, but all of a sudden, they’re a burden when you start talking about more than sleeping around.”

“Well, that’s because it’s the truth,” I leveled with her. “Especially when the kids are extra young. I mean, tonight is a perfect example. Your kids are old enough to stay at home and watch videos while we go out, but what if they weren’t? Then we’d have to get baby-sitters, take them with us, or we wouldn’t be able to go out at all.”

“Speaking of which, let me call these boys up right now,” she responded with a smile, excusing herself from our wide, circular table.

I sat there and thought about things. It’s normal for a man to not want a ready-made family. Fatherhood is something you grow into, just like motherhood, and it makes things a lot easier when it’s
your
seed you’re watching grow. I thought about it a few times, but I never asked Denise if she was finished having kids yet. With her career ambitions and all, I just took it for granted that she was. That was another complication I had to think about. A lot of questions I simply had to ask her about. How could I effectively come to any conclusions about where
I
wanted to go, without even knowing what Denise’s boundaries would be?

When she returned, I was tempted to ask her a bunch of things. I said, “What do you think about having more kids?”

“I thought about it. Plenty of times,” she answered. “But I wasn’t gonna do it alone again. And since I didn’t have any stable relations with men, time just passed by.”

My next question got stuck in my throat. Denise jumped the gun on it anyway.

“What about now?” she asked. “Honestly, I don’t know. I mean, of course, I’m in a better situation now than I was years ago, with my sons being older and me being economically secure and all, but it would really have to be something I felt strongly about doing.”

“Yeah, I would imagine so,” I responded with a grin. Having children was no easy business, and I had never been through it before, so it would be a whole new experience for me.

“Actually, I was surprised that you didn’t have any kids of your own,” she told me. “Once you cross that big three-o, you can’t look forward to dating too many men your age who don’t have children. I’ve been around a lot of different situations, especially being a founding member of the Single Mothers’ Organization with Camellia. We’ve heard all kinds of stories. Some men went as far as to even lie about their children. I wondered if
my
sons’ fathers ever did that.”

I asked, “Remember that first night we spent together in that hotel room near the airport?”

She grinned and answered, “Mmm hmm. What about it?”

“Did I sound like a man who would lie to you that night, with all the things that I told you in that room about my past sex life?”

She thought about it. “Yeah, you have a point. You went from A to Z with me. I wasn’t expecting all of that,” she said.

“That took a lot of courage for me to do. And I appreciate the fact that you didn’t up and run away from me after that,” I told her.

“You didn’t say anything that was
that
outrageous.”

“Nevertheless, I put myself on the line for you.”

“And I’ve done the same with you by letting you into my sons’ lives and telling their fathers about you,” she responded.

I nodded with a smile. “It took you a while.”

She smiled back at me. “It was only a matter of time. But even with everything being out in the open now, I still think that we should slow down a bit and get our bearings. I don’t want either one of us rushing.”

I said, “I agree,” right before the waiter asked us if everything was all right. “Yeah, it was a splendid dinner. Everything was perfect. Now we’d like to have the check.”

We did some small talk on the way back to Oak Park, then I walked Denise back to her front door, where we were hesitant again.

“Well, ah, I had a beautiful dinner tonight, how ’bout you?” I asked her.

“Like you said, it was perfect.”

I was speechless, wondering if it was okay to ask for a kiss. I felt ridiculous. Then Denise started to laugh.

“You can kiss me if you want,” she told me.

I smiled. “Was I wet around the lips for one? How’d you know what I was thinking?”

“I’m thirty-four years old, Brock. Give me credit for learning
something
in this lifetime.”

“Momma knows best,” I told her, moving in for the kill.

We had one of those slow, tender kisses that men and women give each other when they’ve been together for a while. It wasn’t long enough for lust, and it wasn’t short enough for a peck. It was somewhere in between.

I backed up and Denise said, “Have a safe trip home. Okay?”

I nodded and smiled at her, taking in all of her beauty, poise, strength, dignity, intelligence, and everything else. I walked back to my car with a bounce to my step, feeling relaxed and secure again. A good slow-down date was just what we needed, especially with me heading out of town. I could have a peaceful trip without thinking too much or too little. It was perfect. So I turned my radio up loud on V103, and jammed with the DJ as I cruised on back to my apartment on the South Side.

T
was only the second week of school, and already I was about to have a heart attack! Ms. Walker, one of Walter’s seventh-grade schoolteachers, was calling to inform me that he had been involved in a stabbing incident at school, and that he was being taken to the hospital for minor stab wounds.

“Which hospital?” I asked her. “Forest Park?” I was already packing up my things to leave, and I had a full schedule that Tuesday.

“Ah, yes,” Ms. Walker responded. She sounded rushed and paranoid. I bet she never imagined having to call a parent regarding a stabbing incident of one of
her
students. Stabbings in junior high school she had probably only heard about on the news. I was embarrassed by it myself, but at the moment, I was too concerned about my son’s welfare to show it. I had just met Ms. Walker and plenty of concerned parents at a PTA meeting at the school that previous Friday.

“Okay, I’m on my way,” I told her.

She wasn’t finished with me yet. “Ah, Ms. Stewart, I think they have a few questions they want to ask you.”

“Well, they’ll have to wait,” I responded, quickly hanging up the phone. I was in a rush to get down to that hospital. I didn’t have time to dispute who “
they
” were, or what “
they
” would want from
me
. I just wanted to see my son.

Fortunately, I had gotten the call concerning my son shortly before
my lunch hour. I told Elmira to reschedule all of my appointments for the day.

Elmira looked at me and said, “All of them?” with a pained expression on her face.

I didn’t want to tell her too much of my personal business, but I knew I had to tell her something.

“Walter was involved in an incident at school that I need to take care of, ASAP!”

Elmira immediately read the panic in my eyes, and the seriousness of my tone. “Okay. I’ll get on it right away,” she said.

“Thank you,” I told her. I was out the door in a heartbeat!

After rushing through lunchtime traffic, I arrived at the hospital, gave the receptionist my name, and asked to see my son.

“Oh, yeah, he’s in room two-fourteen,” the receptionist informed me.

It appeared as if my son’s stabbing was the hot gossip of the day. I noticed the other patients and family members all eying me from the waiting room as I rushed up the hallway and to the stairs. I damn sure was not going to wait for an elevator!

Three police officers were waiting outside Walter’s room; two white men and one black man.

“Are you the mother?” one of the white officers asked me.

“Yes, I am,” I responded, stepping by him and into the room. I didn’t have time for any of their questions at the moment. The only thing on my mind was seeing my son alive, and examining how badly he had been cut.

Once Walter saw me, he dropped his head and was ashamed of himself. I think he was a bit nervous, too, about what I was going to say or do to him.

I forcibly calmed myself and asked him, “Are you okay?”

He nodded. He had white bandages wrapped around both of his hands.

I looked down at them and held them up. “What happened?”

A dark-haired Indian doctor addressed me. “Ah, Mrs. Perry, I’m Dr. Houran,” she said with her hand extended.

I took her hand and said, “I’m
Ms
. Stewart.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” She humbled herself. “Okay, now, Walter
is
your son, right?” she asked, to make sure.

“Yes, he is,” I told her.

“Okay,” she said, relieved. I knew exactly how she felt. Women, of all
nationalities, had it extra tough as professionals. We could not afford to make
any
mistakes.

“Walter has minor cut wounds on both of his hands,” she informed me. “They’re not deep enough for stitches, but they are deep enough to need cleaning and rewrapping with antibiotics at least three times a day. You’ll need to wrap them in gauze, preferably in the morning, in the afternoon, and before he goes to bed. His hands may take up to a week to heal, but they’ll still be sore for a while. So I wouldn’t have him doing anything too strenuous with them for at least a couple of weeks.

“I’ll set up an appointment for him to come back in next week, to check up on his progress,” she added.

I looked at my son’s wrapped hands again, and then back to the woman doctor. “So that means he won’t be able to do his schoolwork.”

She shook her head with a grimace. “Well, he won’t be able to take any notes for a while, unless he can write with his left hand. He has a cut on his right thumb, and that’s going to be awfully sore for at least a week. In fact, sometimes the shallow cuts are a lot more irritating and painful than much deeper wounds.”

“Tell me about it,” I agreed. “I’ve had plenty of paper cuts to attest to that.”

The doctor and I shared a short, controlled laugh. Walter wasn’t laughing though. He fully realized that he would be the one in pain.

Once I knew that my son would live, I was ready to get to the bottom of things.

“Okay, now, what happened?”

All of a sudden, the three police officers decided to inch their way into the room, invading my privacy.

“Ah, if you don’t mind, I’d like to talk to my son
alone
, please. And my lawyer is on the way,” I lied.

“Ah, ma’am, we just want to ask a few basic questions.”

“And you can ask them when my lawyer gets here,” I told them.

Dr. Houran smiled at me. She said, “Are there any other questions you’d like to ask me?”

“Not yet, but give me a minute to think,” I told her with half a smile.

“Okay, well, I’ll leave you two alone. I’ll have the nurse give you plenty of gauze and antibiotic ointment before Walter checks out today.”