The Realest Ever

Chapter EIGHTEEN

BAD MATH

The next morning Donovan had to wake everyone up at nine a.m. so he’d have time to make it to church with his mother. He was open to taking Kyra and her kids with him, but she was reluctant.

“I haven’t talked to your mom since I been back,” she said. “I don’t want to show up at her church out of the blue.”

“It’s not out of the blue,” Donovan said as he whipped up a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs, bacon and toast. “And it’s not her church. It’s God’s house. Besides, I talk to my mom about you all the time. I told her I wanted to bring you to church with me.”

“What about the fornication?” Kyra asked with a worried look in her eyes. “I don’t know if I’d feel right going to church after what happened last night.”

“Everyone sins,” Donovan said. “I wish I could be perfect, but there are some things in the bible that I don’t totally agree with.”

That was news to Kyra. “Like what?”

“I don’t know,” Donovan said. “Jonah and the whale. Sex before marriage. Living together before marriage. Things like that.”

“Wow. That’s a lot,” Kyra noticed.

Donovan shrugged. “Not really.”

“You don’t believe in Jonah and the whale?”

“It’s hard to take literally.”

“But you still believe in God?”

Donovan frowned. “Of course.”

“How do you justify all of that,” Kyra asked, “and still be at peace with the man upstairs?”

“What is this, a theological discussion?” Donovan asked. “I just asked if you wanted to go to church with me.”

Kyra laughed. “I want to see your mother first, for lunch or something, before I walk into her church. I know you said everything’s cool now, but I think we need some kind of icebreaker. There will be a lot of people watching us at church. It could be a little awkward.”

“That’s cool,” Donovan said. “How about today? Me and my mom always go to lunch after church. Do you want me to pick you up?”

Kyra shook her head. Truth be told, she was afraid of Beverly Mitchell. The last time she saw her, Beverly was kicking her out of her home, accusing Kyra of corrupting her only child. But it was clear Donovan would do whatever he could to bring the two women in his life together.

“Alright,” Kyra said. “What time?”

“Service usually end at twelve-thirty,” Donovan said. “I’ll pick you up at one. It’ll be fun. I know my mom will be excited.”

“I doubt that,” Kyra muttered.

“As far as your question,” Donovan said, “I don’t try to justify my beliefs. I just pray and ask God to forgive me.”

“You ask Him to forgive you for not agreeing with Him?”

Donovan snickered. “Not exactly, but, yeah, I guess so. Sometimes.”

“And that works?”

Donovan put down his spatula and went to the counter where Kyra was standing. “It works because God knows me better than anyone,” he said. “He knows I love Jesus, and he knows I love you, too.”

Kyra grinned as she looked up at him. She knew God was pleased with Donovan. He loved his mother, went to church every Sunday, and Donovan couldn’t walk by anyone in need without offering to help.

“I decided that I do want to live with you,” Kyra said.

Donovan’s smile was big and bright. “That’s great, Kyra. When?”

“I want to wait until I get my next check,” she said. “So I can buy more furniture for the kids’ rooms. And I want to be able to pay some of the bills, too.”

“Kyra, you don’t–”

She put two fingers over his lips, silencing him. “Donovan, I’m not a deadbeat anymore. If we’re going to be together, then we’re going to do it together. You don’t have to support me. I want to take care of you sometimes.”

“Alright,” Donovan said. “That’s fine.”

Kyra wouldn’t get paid for another 30 days, but at least Donovan knew the exact date she would move in with him. He hugged her tightly.

They were distracted by movement in the doorway. It was Kat. She walked into the kitchen groggily and headed for her mother. She said, “Up,” reaching with both hands. To their surprise, she was talking to Donovan rather than her mom.

“Oh no she didn’t,” Kyra said, but she was tickled pink.

“I’m just as shocked as you,” Donovan replied. He bent to pick up the pint-sized princess. “Oof. You’re getting heavy,” he teased. “Are you hungry?”

Kat nodded. She held onto Donovan with one arm and pointed at the stove with her free hand. “I like eggs.”

“Oh, well you’re in for a treat,” Donovan said. “Eggs are my specialty.”

“Where are your shoes?” Kyra asked her daughter.

Kat shrugged.

“Girl.” Kyra shook her head. “Let me go find–”

“Wait.” Donovan reached to stop her. “Why don’t you finish up with breakfast, and let me help find her shoes?” He handed her the spatula.

Kyra laughed. “Alright daddy day care. You have fun with that. And make sure Q’s out of bed. I woke him up twenty minutes ago, but I haven’t seen him since then.”

Kat was already quite the snitch. “Q playing games. He in there.” She pointed towards the den.

“What?” Kyra was not amused. “That boy knows not to wake up and go straight to no games. He didn’t even ask.”

She started to head that way, but Donovan said, “I’ll take care of that, too. You need to hurry up with breakfast. We’re hungry.”

“We hungry,” Kat agreed.

“And don’t forget the bacon,” Donovan said as he exited the kitchen.

“Bacon!” Kat tacked on.

“I don’t even know where anything is!” Kyra called after him.

“Everything’s in there somewhere,” Donovan yelled down the hallway. “What kind of woman doesn’t know her way around a kitchen?”

Kyra grinned as she pulled the refrigerator open. Donovan was doing everything he could to get her used to the idea of living with him. Kyra wanted to stick to the time frame she gave him, but it was hard to deny herself of something that felt so right.

She found the bacon in the fridge, and she found seasonings for the eggs in the first place she looked. “Talking about I don’t know my way around a kitchen… I know my way around a kitchen,” she muttered as she prepared the meal. She decided to make the best bacon and eggs Donovan had ever seen, to show him she was no lightweight.



≈≈≈≈≈≈≈



Kyra was still in a good mood when Donovan dropped her and the kids off an hour later, but it was short lived. Aunt Ruth emerged from her bedroom when she heard them enter the house. She pulled a robe over her slip and met them in the living room. Aunt Ruth looked tired and frustrated. But she looked like that all of the time, so Kyra didn’t pay her any mind.

“Sorry we woke you.” She ushered the kids to the bedroom, hoping to make it past their mean landlord without any trouble.

“We need to talk,” Aunt Ruth said.

“Oh, okay,” Kyra said. “Y’all go ahead,” she told Kat and Quinell.

Kyra went and stood in front of her aunt, but Ruth walked by her and took a seat on the couch, indicating this would be one of those dreaded sit down kinda talks.

Dammit. Kyra hated coming home sometimes. She thought about Donovan’s offer as she followed her aunt and sat on the loveseat across from her. Donovan said Kyra could move in with him whenever she was ready. She kept his offer tucked away, like it was a get out of jail free card, which made it easier to deal with whatever her aunt was about to say.

“What’s wrong, Auntie?”

“Where’s my money, girl?”

Kyra’s head cocked slowly to the side. “What are you talking about?”

“My money you supposed to pay me when you get your check,” her aunt said. “You got paid on the first. Why you ain’t paid me?”

“Today’s the second,” Kyra said. “Why you tripping about it already? It’s only been one day.”

“Yeah, and you been ducking and dodging me,” Ruth said. Her eyes looked very small through her coke bottle glasses. But her mouth was big. Big and ugly, set in a sneer. She pointed a long, skinny finger at her ungrateful niece. “You knew I wanted my money yesterday. You knew I had plans for that.”

Kyra couldn’t believe this was really happening. Ruth had been an a*shole since the day Kyra arrived with her children, but this was unreasonable. “How am I supposed to know you had plans?” she said. “You don’t tell me nothing.”

“You get paid on the first, and I want my money on the first,” her aunt reiterated.

“Okay, whatever,” Kyra said. “How much money am I supposed to owe you?”

“Fifteen hundred dollars.” Aunt Ruth actually said it with a straight face.

Kyra’s jaw dropped. After taxes and medical insurance for her and the kids, she only made $1,800 for a month’s work at J.T. Elder. She’d be damned if this witch got 85% of it.

“How the hell do I owe you fifteen hundred dollars?”

“Don’t be cussing at me!”

“How do I owe you fifteen hundred dollars?” Kyra snapped.

“What you mean, how? You been living here for two months, ain’t paid no bills, barely bought some groceries. Plus I’m doing all this babysitting. You going out damned near every night with one of your man friends.” Ruth waved her hand. “Girl, you got so many of them, I can’t keep up no more.”

Kyra’s eyes burned. She felt like she might cry, but she refused to let that happen. Her face turned red as she smothered the hurt and swallowed the hateful things she wanted to say.

“The only people I’ve been out with since I got here is Donovan and Roland. I only saw Roland two times. And Donovan watched my kids one of those times.”

Kyra spoke through clenched teeth. Her nostrils flared with each heartbeat. “You told me you were charging one-fifty a week for babysitting while I was at work. That comes out to six hundred dollars. As far as me going out, I only asked you to watch my kids five or six times. You said you were charging ten dollars an hour for that. That should come out to… a hundred and eighty dollars, tops.”

“What about when you didn’t come home all night?”

Kyra shook her head. She rubbed her hands together anxiously. Why did she think Aunt Ruth wouldn’t charge for every hour she spent with Donovan? Whatever! Kyra didn’t care. That was their first night together, and it was worth it.

“Alright, so what’s that? Another hundred and fifty?”

“That’s about right.” Aunt Ruth nodded.

Kyra calculated quickly. The total she came up with made her stomach hurt. “Alright, so, so that’s nine hundred and thirty dollars.” The tears were falling now. She wiped her eyes roughly. “Why you say it was fifteen hundred?”

“The rest is your regular rent,” Aunt Ruth said.

Kyra couldn’t do anything but sit and stare. She was devastated, but she barely reacted. Acting a fool wouldn’t do her any good. She’d been had, plain and simple. Kyra felt stupid. She felt pathetic. She felt lower than dirt. But most of all she felt stupid, stupid, stupid. How did she not see this coming?

“I’m only charging you three hundred dollars a month to live here,” Aunt Ruth said. “That’s a good deal. You not gon’ find nowhere else to live for that.”

No. The truth was Kyra wouldn’t be able to find anywhere to live period because she’d forever be in debt to her manipulative relative. If she paid Aunt Ruth what she wanted, Kyra would be left with three hundred dollars for the rest of the month.

But there was an out.

Kyra’s heart knocked as she thought of Donovan. She didn’t want to move in with him under these circumstances. She wanted to go to him with her head high, her finances in order. She wanted to be independent; in a position to help him for once in her life. She appreciated everything Donovan did for her, but she was tired of always running to him for help.

But she could run, if she wanted to. Kyra fought to keep a straight face. Her mouth was itching to curve into a smile. Aunt Ruth didn’t know that she had an option. She didn’t know that Kyra could grab her kids, jump in her car and hit the highway right now, and never look back.

“You didn’t tell me you were charging me rent,” she said. She was just stalling at this point. She already knew what Ruth would say.

“Kyra, you can’t live nowhere for free. Nowhere. You old enough to know that by now.”

Yeah, and I’m old enough to know how to deal with a snake in the grass like you, Kyra thought.

“Alright, I’ll write you a check,” she said.

She must have been thinking STOP PAYMENT too hard because Aunt Ruth said, “Naw, I want cash.”

Kyra still had her. “Today’s Sunday. I can’t get cash today.”

“You can withdraw it out the ATM.”

“No I can’t. I just opened my account yesterday. I don’t have direct deposit, and my check hasn’t even cleared yet. I can’t get cash till Monday.”

Ruth didn’t like that one bit. It showed all over her face. “Gimme a check now, Kyra, and then bring me my money on Monday. I’ll give you your check back when I get my cash.”

Perfect. “Okay.”

Kyra went to her room. Kat and Quinell watched her silently. They heard everything, and they saw the pain and tears in Kyra’s eyes. She ignored them as she dug through her purse, looking for her checkbook. She went back to the living room and sat across from her aunt. Ruth watched carefully as Kyra wrote a check for fifteen hundred dollars.

“Here.”

Ruth looked at the check for what felt like a long time before she folded it and rose from her seat. She left the room without another word. Kyra returned to her room and told her children no to worry.

“We’re going to live with Donovan soon.”

They were both very happy to hear that.



≈≈≈≈≈≈≈



At twelve-thirty Kyra started watching the clock. Donovan would be leaving church any minute now. He wanted to pick Kyra up and take her to his mom’s house for lunch. He didn’t say anything about the kids going, too, but Kyra had no choice but to take them now. She didn’t feel comfortable leaving them with her aunt anymore. Kyra realized she had to find a real babysitter or daycare for Kat by Monday morning, or she couldn’t even go to work. Kyra chewed off nearly all of her thumbnail as she tried to sort things out.

When Donovan picked her up, she’d bring her kids and tell him about the fight with her aunt. She’d tell him that she was ready to move in with him. Damn. Kyra shook her head. She wished it didn’t have to be like this, but she had no choice.

But it wasn’t like she didn’t want to live with Donovan. He was the man of her dreams and the love of her life. She just didn’t want to go to him crawling, beat up by the world. Kyra sighed and swallowed a big slice of humble pie. She knew Donovan wouldn’t care how she went to him, so she should be happy about it. This was actually a good thing, spurred on by an evil woman.

On Monday Kyra would put a stop-payment on the check she gave her aunt. Better yet, Kyra could do it today, when she got to Donovan’s house. She could pull up her bank account on his computer. That way she wouldn’t have to worry about Aunt Ruth trying to cash the check first thing Monday morning. Kyra grinned devilishly. That would show her! Aunt Ruth thought she was the master manipulator, but Kyra could be a slick bitch, too.

But Kyra wasn’t an evil bitch. She’d pay her aunt for the babysitting. Nine hundred and thirty dollars was more than half her check, but Kyra agreed to pay that, and she would. Aunt Ruth would only be able to complain to the family about not getting the money she was trying to steal from Kyra – not the money she was rightfully owed.

Speak of the devil. Kyra looked up when her aunt appeared in her doorway. Kyra’s whole family was either sitting or lying on the one bed in the room. They all regarded their landlord with either suspicion or fear.

“Somebody here to see you,” Ruth said.

Kyra thought she saw a smirk on her aunt’s face. She checked the clock. It was 12:35. Donovan was early. And he didn’t call to say he was on his way. Kyra didn’t even hear the doorbell. She didn’t care. The sooner she got her kids away from her aunt the better.

Ruth walked away, and Kyra told Quinell, “Put on your shoes. And help Kat get hers on.”

He moved to do what she asked.

Kyra hurried to the front room with love in her heart, but it turned to sheer horror when she rounded the corner and saw who was waiting for her. Kyra was so shocked, she came to a screeching halt and brought a hand to her mouth. Her eyes were as big as quarters. She almost screamed.

Her visitor came all the way from Little Rock, Arkansas. He looked good. But to Kyra, he was the epitome of ugly. She saw drugs and needles and cash and dopefiends. She saw blood-shot eyes, lines of heroin on the kitchen counter and babies crying. Her babies. She saw pain and regret. And she felt it, too.

Leonard said, “Hey, baby.”

Kyra didn’t know her aunt was still standing there until Ruth said, “Hmph.”

Kyra couldn’t find the words to say anything at all.