People kept saying grief got easier with time, but all I felt was my hatred growing smarter. At first it was just pain, just sobbing and scream-crying in my room and begging God to rewind time. Now it was me thinking about angles, about timing and how to make the world see Kay’Lo the way I saw him.
I’d tried everything to make people see who he really was. I posted that old video I had of him pacing a hotel floor andtalking to himself like he was losing his mind. I started collecting messages and screenshots and little pieces that could be twisted into something ugly enough to stick. I stayed in contact with my lawyer, and I stayed close to my parents while they moved their pieces, and I kept my face sad in public because sadness made people trust you, and it made you look innocent.
Behind closed doors, I was angry enough to choke.
I didn’t want Toni to have her happy ending, or her to have a perfect little family with the nigga who ruined mine. I wanted that picture she kept posting to crack right down the middle. I wanted her to feel the kind of fear that made you stop posting online and start praying in private. And the more I drank, the more that truth settled inside me.
People could call me bitter. They could call me jealous or whatever they wanted, but at the end of the day, my brothers were still dead while Toni was still smiling… and to me, that was a problem.
The Mensah Lake Estate
As the weeks slipped by, I found myself almost entirely living at the lake house Kwame and I owned together. I had come here because I needed somewhere quiet to collect myself, and the silence that used to comfort me had slowly turned into its own kind of noise, yet I kept returning anyway. I woke up each morning with prayer, whispering my son’s name into the air as if heaven might hear me more clearly from a distance. Most days I sat by the window with my crystals in my hand, calling on God to protect Kay’Lo as he faced the worst storm of his life, and I prayed just as hard for my grandbaby. My’Love was already so loved that I sometimes wondered if she could feel it from inside her mother’s womb.
Toni answered my calls every day, and I offered her reminders to breathe and drink her water and lift her feet when she felt heavy. I tried to keep her spirits up even when mine fell. It comforted me to hear her voice because she sounded strong even while her world trembled for the man she loved. She was carrying my first grandchild and every day I pictured what her little face might look like. Holding onto that image helped me get through the worst moments, especially the ones that replayed in my mind without permission.
The courthouse scene still lived under my skin. I never imagined I would ever have to raise my hand to another woman, yet Roderick Lennox’s wife had come at my son like she had forgotten who she was going against. I acted on instinct because protecting my child had always come before decorum, and I didn’t regret it for a single second. I wished it had never happened, but I refused to let anyone touch my child, no matter how angry or hurt they were.
Abeni and Nyroi visited me at the lake a few times during those weeks as well. They brought wine and soft blankets and conversation that felt warm. They didn’t like the idea of me being alone, especially with everything happening to our family, but they respected my space while gently reminding me that I had sisters if I needed them. The three of us sat by the water while the sun set behind the trees and talked about our sons, our fears, our faith, and the husbands we loved even when loving them felt like work.
I loved Kwame more than I loved any man on this earth, yet the weight he put on our family had become too heavy for me to keep pretending I wasn’t suffocating. He had gone behind Kay’Lo’s back and betrayed him, and I still could not make peace with that. I’ve always begged him to try compassion first, but Kwame wanted control more than understanding. His choices caused cracks through everyone, and I had held on for as long asI could, but the strain between him and I had turned every room into an argument waiting to happen. I reached my breaking point quietly. I packed my bags, and I left the man I never thought I would walk away from.
I still loved him. That part never changed. Loving him had never been the problem. The problem was that I couldn’t keep sacrificing my peace for the chaos he invited into our home.
Today I tried to focus on the present instead of replaying everything that brought me here. I had work to do, and being a doula was the one thing in my life that always grounded me. When I received a call from
the woman I was supporting, whose due date had been creeping closer, I packed my bag and drove out to her house without hesitation. Helping bring life into the world was one of the few things that gave me purpose when everything else felt uncertain.
When I arrived, my client was already moving through deep contractions, her body folding forward over the birthing ball as she breathed through each wave. Her husband paced behind her with his hands shaking, and I touched his arm gently to guide him closer.
“She needs you calm,” I told him softly. “Sit with her. Let her lean on you.”
He nodded and knelt behind her so she could rest her back against his chest. I helped her breathe in slow circles until her shoulders loosened, then I led both of them toward the warm birthing tub they had set up in the middle of their bedroom. The soft lights around the rim flickered against the water, and the gentle heat wrapped around her legs when she stepped inside.
She sighed as her body lowered into the water, and each contraction settled differently now, moving through her with more intention and less fear. I knelt beside the tub, placing warm towels along the edge while I guided her through herbreathing. She held my hand when the pressure grew stronger, and I reminded her that her body already knew exactly what to do.
Hours passed like that, with her contractions rising and falling through each surge. She would lean forward against the tub’s edge, moaning low as her husband rubbed her back, then she would sink into the water again, letting it carry some of the weight for her. I kept her hair out of her face, wiped her cheeks when tears slipped down, and whispered to her about strength, trust, and surrender.
She began to shake when her body finally shifted into that primal place all mothers reach, and I moved closer so she could hear my voice clearly. “You’re opening beautifully,” I told her. “Let your body guide you. You’re safe.”
Her husband kissed her shoulder and whispered her name over and over, his voice breaking every time another contraction swept through her. She gripped both our hands, pushing up on her knees as the urge to bear down took over.
When she leaned back slightly, the baby’s head began to crown beneath the water. The room changed then. Birth always had a way of making everything feel holy, and even her husband felt it, because he went silent except for a soft cry he tried to hide.
I coached her gently, keeping my hands under the water as she rode the next wave. The baby slid forward little by little, and when her shoulders eased through, I guided her carefully into the world. She floated up into my hands with her eyes closed and her tiny fingers curled tight.
I lifted her gently above the water and placed her right onto her mother’s chest. The sound she made wasn’t loud, just a soft cry that filled the room like sunlight breaking through clouds. Her mother stared at her with this look that made everything outside that moment feel small. Her husband wrapped his armsaround both of them and pressed his forehead to theirs while tears spilled freely.
I wrapped the baby in a warm towel, checked her breathing, and let the family hold each other while tears and relief mixed together on their cheeks. The mother relaxed against the edge of the tub with her daughter resting on her chest, and her whole body softened knowing the hardest part was over.
I stayed close because birth wasn’t finished yet. The placenta still needed to be delivered, and her body was already shifting into that final stage. I kept my hand on her back and guided her through a few slow breaths until another wave moved through her.
“Whenever your body feels it,” I told her softly, “just let it go.”
She nodded and leaned forward, gripping her husband’s hand. A few moments later her body opened again, and the placenta slipped free into the warm water. I supported it with both hands and placed it into the basin waiting beside the tub.
“It’s complete,” I said, and the expression that lifted her face told me she needed to hear that.
Her husband watched me with wide eyes, unsure of what came next, so I explained each step as I lifted the cord above the water. “We’ll wait for it to turn pale. That’s how we know your daughter has received everything she was meant to.”
