“Sure.”
Sure?
“Oh,” she says, unsure of what to say next, not anticipating this response. “I really appreciate it,” she adds, already hating how formal she sounds.
“How much?” he asks.
Ah, there’s the other shoe, she thinks as she scratches her forehead, the smooth skin a familiar comfort.
“Well, uh, it’s a lot–”
“Jahlani. Stop mumbling. I can’t understand what you’re saying,” he clips.
A quiet exhale escapes her lips, a subtle release of tension. “It’s twenty-five.”
“Twenty-five hundred?”
She stifles her scoff, barely able to contain her irritation at his ignorance. The words escape her lips in a hushed tone. “Twenty-five thousand, Dad.”
Silence bears down on the other end of the line. “You’re kidding.”
She sighs, her chest tightening painfully. “Well … you told me to use the credit cards to help me through school and that you would pay me back. And then you didn’t, and the interest collected?—”
“Right, but common sense would tell you to pay it back a little to avoid that, sweetheart. What happened to your big … fancy statesman job?”
She grits her teeth. “Statistician. I’m a statistician, Dad.”
“Okay … well, what happened to that?”
She scratches the back of her head. “It was an internship. I didn’t get paid much. It’s more for the experience.”
“Christ,” he says, his voice gravelly. “Jesus, Jahlani.”
She mutes the phone, pinching her nose as her eyes start to water. She knows she can just end the conversation here and now. She can placate him with her usual routine. But the notification from her bank flashes in her mind as she unmutes.
“Look, I’m not asking for all the money now, I just need enough to hold me over until the semester ends.”
“Jahlani, baby. Hold on. I—” He blows out a breath. She hears shuffling and then a door closes on his end. He whispers now. “Look, I want to give you the money. I do.”
“But?”
“Helen’s pregnant.”
She taps the mute button again, feeling the once-cold leather now warm from her body heat under her fingertips as she grips the armrest. Jahlani forces a smile onto her face, feeling the strain in her cheeks as she unmutes.
“That’s great news, Dad.” She tries to sound strong, but her voice does this strange warble. She clears her throat, exhaling through her mouth. “Congratulations. I’m happy for you. For you both.”
“Yeah,” he says, and she can hear the lightness in his voice as he drones on, oblivious to the damage he is doing. “It was totally unexpected. And we just purchased the house a few months ago, and—it’s a girl! You’ll be a big sister, and?—”
And now you’ll finally have a family that accepts you.
Jahlani recalls the night that he finally left. At that point, he rarely appeared in her bedroom. The last time he set foot in there was to build her four large white bookcases from IKEA that took up the length of the wall. His frame filling her doorway set alarm bells ringing, and when her eyes drifted to the metallic suitcase and duffel bag by his feet, she knew.
At that moment, she was torn. The angsty, hormonal teenage part of her was flustered.
But the rational, pragmatic,sensiblepart of her knew her parents arguments weren’t traditional, and the way her aunts and grandmother would turn their nose up and speak to him whenever they would go over was debilitating, and so instead of throwing herself at him and crying in his arms like she wantedto, she slipped out of her bed, gave him a squeeze around his midsection that she swore wouldn’t last more than ten seconds, and resumed her original position, typing away.
Her father’s voice carries her back to the present. “And, anyway, Jahlani, you see how this isn’t the best time for me financially. But I promise you once the baby is born and Helen’s back at work, I’ll send over the full amount. Okay, baby?”
