We laughed.
“What Truce say?” April asked.
“He don’t know yet,” she said.
All of us: “Girl.”
She held her hands up. “Before y’all jump me, he do know. He just don’t knowIknow he know.”
Fee frowned. “What?”
“He been lookin’ at me like I’m a bomb for two weeks,” Charlee said. “Runnin’ me baths, rubbin’ my feet, cookin’ me food in the middle of the night. I caught him orderin’ prenatal vitamins off Amazon.”
We all cracked up.
“He told his brothers he know,” she admitted. “I overheard him on the phone. He said he just waitin’ to see how long it take me to say it out loud.”
“That sound like him,” I said.
“So what you gon’ do?” April asked.
Charlee chewed her lip. “I don’t know. Part of me wanna be like, ‘Fuck you, I’m not ready.’ Another part of me… scared if I say that, I’m sayin’ I don’t wantus.”
She looked down at her stomach, barely showin’ yet.
“Truce already said we keepin’ it no matter what,” she went on. “He told me that before I even took the test. ‘You not gon’ deny me fatherhood,’ he said. ‘We gon’ figure it out.’”
Her eyes glossed.
“I ain’t never had nobody so sure about me,” she whispered. “It’s overwhelmin’.”
We all went quiet.
Fee reached over and squeezed her hand. “Welcome to the ‘scared but showin’ up anyway’ club.”
I watched them both, Fee rubbin’ her huge belly, Charlee holdin’ hers like she was just realizin’ somethin’ was in there.
April cleared her throat. “Since we announcin’ fears…”
We looked at her.
“I been freakin’ out about the wedding,” she admitted. “Royce been freakin’ out too. But lately… he been showin’ up different.” She smiled a little.
“He set up sessions with Nana,” she said. “Like, real sit-downs. No food, no jokes, just talkin’. We been draggin’ our fear to that table every Sunday instead of lettin’ it sit between us in the bed.”
“Aww,” Fee said. “Look at growth.”
“It’s not perfect,” April added quick. “We still argue. He still gets in his head. I still get in mine. But he not runnin’ no more. And that… that make me feel like we actually got a shot at forever, not just a pretty day with a nice dress.”
Her eyes got shiny too.
Everybody was leakin’ in my damn living room.
I sank back on the arm of a chair, lookin’ at them.
My girls.
Fee: about to be a mama of two, terrified but ready. Charlee: knockin’ on motherhood’s door, cussin’ and secretly excited. April: walkin’ toward a husband, scared but honest.
