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36 CARDEZ MONTAGUE
My pops decided to stay at his place in Harlem since it was closer to his physical therapist. I’d been meaning to come by more, especially since he wasn’t cooped up in the house in Nyack anymore.
He was in his armchair with a glass of Hennessy he wasn’t supposed to be having. His cane was propped on the chair beside him with the TV on low.
“You look tired,” he said when I sat down.
“I’m good. How’s PT going?”
“Pain in my ass,” he grumbled. “My physical therapist keeps telling me I’m ahead of schedule like that’s supposed to mean something.”
“It doesn’t?”
“I’m sixty-three, my ass ain’t that damn old.” He picked up his glass. “Gloria’s been calling me every damn day like I’m on hospice.”
“She’s your sister.”
“She hasn’t called me this much since your mother died.” He sipped his drink and shifted until he found a comfortable position. There was a tightness in my chest that had been there ever since the shooting, this new awareness of my father’s mortality. He wasn’t going to live forever, and Solomon had come close to showing me just how real that was.
“Rosie coming up and cooking for you?” I asked.
He gave me a look. “Cardez, you didn’t come over here to ask me about my health.”
“I care about how you’re doing, Pops.”
“I’m eating. I’m sleeping. I’m doing what the doctors tell me to do.” He set the glass down. “Now say what you actually came to say.”
“Solomon approached Belle yesterday,” I said.
Pops’ face hardened. “Where?”
“A deli in SoHo. He was just talking shit.”
“She good?”
“She was a little shook, but she held it together.”
“Hm.”
“I’m leaking the wedding to the gossip pages. I think he’s planning on hitting it and I’d rather him think I’m soft and be ready.”
Pops smiled. “You might actually be ready to take over this family.”
“Whatever, old man,” I chuckled. “There’s something else.”
“I’m sure there is.”
“I’ve been sitting on this because I didn’t know how to bring it up.” I rubbed my jaw. “Solomon called me last month. He knew Ma before y’all got married.”
Pops scoffed. “So? I told you about the affair. What does it matter that he knew her before?”
“I’m coming to you as a man because I’ve been in this life long enough to know how shit go.” I held his gaze. “Is there any possibility that Solomon is my biological father?”
“I should knock the shit out of you,” Pops said, reaching for his cane. He braced himself against it as he rose slowly to his feet. “First of all, I keep telling you, you don’t know shit. Solomon has a warped view of how shit went. That nigga’s out his rabid ass mind if he thinks you could be his son.”
“How do you know for sure?”
“Because I made sure. You’re my son, Cardez. Don’t let that man’s lies take root in your head. You are a Montague by blood. Period.”
