—
The store was packed just like I knew that it would be on a Saturday morning. I was doing what I always did in grocery stores which was exist next to Simone. I would try not to say anything about how long she was taking reading the back of every single box she picked up.
We were on the cereal aisle when something bumped into my leg.
I looked down.
It was a little girl that had bumped into me. Running and not paying attention to where she was going. Couldn’t have been more than three. She had bumped into me and stopped. She was looking up at me trying to decide if she needed to cry about it or not. I crouched down the way you did with little kids.
“You good? Where your people at?”
She just looked at me.
And I looked at her.
And everything in me went completely still.
She was a beautiful little girl. Deep chocolate skin, thick curly hair in two big puffs, round face. She was looking at me with these big dark eyes and I felt something in my chest that I had never felt before in my life and couldn’t explain it. I didn’t wantto explain right now in the middle of a grocery store with my girl right behind me.
She had my face.
Not kind of. Not a passing thing that could be explained. My face on a three year old little girl looking back at me like she recognized something she had never actually seen before.
I was still crouched down when I heard footsteps coming fast.
“Amara—”
I stood up.
Sandra stopped the second she saw me.
Four years since I had seen her. She looked good. Put together the way she had looked when I kidnapped her back then. And she was looking at me with something behind her eyes that I’d say was shock.
Her eyes went from me to Simone.
Then back to me.
“Hi,” she said.
“Hey,” I said.
That was the whole conversation.
She reached down, grabbed the little girl’s hand without another word and moved past us toward the other end of the aisle and didn’t look back.
I watched her go.
Simone stepped up beside me and looked in the direction they had gone and then looked at me with a small smile on her face.
“That baby was gorgeous.” She shook her head a little. “Gutta she looked just like you though. Like exactly like you. She couldbe your twin as a baby. That was actually kind of crazy. Hell, now I’m wondering if our future kid will even look that much like you. You sure you don't know that woman? Cause I've never in my life seen a baby look that much like another person...Good hair and all." she side eyed me for a moment.
I looked at her.
“What?” She was already moving toward the next section. “I’m just saying. You and that baby have the same face. Don't look at me like that. It was a joke.. If that was her moms that shes with, I just know you ain't fuck that old ass lady. Anyway—”
And just like that she moved on and started talking about what else was on her list. I stood in that aisle and nodded along to whatever she was saying and didn’t hear a single word of it. Was that my— Nah, it just couldn’t be. I wouldn’t even allow myself to finish formulating that thought.
—
