Page 33 of FWB
“I took a bunch of pills to try and kill the baby, okay!”
I straighten. “You did what? ”
“I took a handful of Xanax to make me have a stillbirth so I wouldn’t have to raise it on my own!
My sister came over to my house after not hearing from me all day.
She used my spare key to get inside when I didn’t answer the door and found me passed out in the bathroom, water and blood seeping from between my legs.
I was scared, Kenny! I can’t do this shit! I don’t know how to be a mother!”
Stunned, I lower the cup to her lips, allowing her to take a deep drink while I process my thoughts. The doctor on the phone said the baby was stable, but what does that mean?
“Is she okay?”
“Who?” Jazmine asks, taking a break from her gulping.
“The baby!” I demand as I snatch the cup away from her mouth. “Is my daughter okay?”
“She’s fine. The pills ended up inducing my labor early since she was so far along. The doctors want to keep her in the NICU for a couple of days to monitor her for any delayed side effects. They think she’ll be fine to be discharged by Sunday.”
“And what are the doctor’s plans with you?”
She huffs out a dry laugh. “I get to be on a seventy-two-hour suicide watch before being transferred to the county jail for abuse of a fetus where I will await psychiatric evaluation to see if I’m fit to stand trial.”
“What happens to the baby?”
“Lilii.”
“What?” I ask, not understanding her.
“I named her Lilii Rose. Lilii with three I’s.”
That’s changing immediately. There’s no way in hell my daughter is going to be named Lilii with three I’s.
I try again. “Okay, so what happens to Lilii when you get taken away?”
She shrugs. “I guess she goes into the foster care system if you don’t want her or if, by chance, you turn out to not be the father. My sister might try to claim guardianship over her, but she’s got three small kids of her own. I don’t know if she can handle another mouth to feed.”
“If Lilii is mine, I’ll make sure she’s taken care of.”
“And what about me? Are you going to leave me in jail to rot? ”
“You’ve made your bed. Now you have to lie in it,” I say, turning to walk out the door.
“Kenny, wait.”
I stop, not turning around to face her again.
“Do more than just make sure she’s well taken care of. Love her. Teach her. Make sure she blossoms and ends up nothing like me.”
I don’t say anything. I just nod once, and walk out the door.
I walk back down the hall toward the nurses’ station, passing the guard outside of Jazmine’s room. He’s snoring in his chair. Psh. Some security guard.
The same nurse is sitting at her desk, typing away on her keyboard. This time she doesn’t look up at me until I start to speak. “Hey, me again. Any chance Dr. Balboa is around and available to talk with me? I’m potentially Lilii Rose’s dad. I need a paternity test. Tonight, if possible.”
She ceases her typing and wordlessly picks up the phone receiver on her desk, pressing three buttons.
A moment later, she says to the person on the other end of the phone, “Yeah, I’ve got the Xany baby’s potential father here.
He’s asking for a paternity test.” After a beat of silence, she says, “Okay, will do.” She hangs up the phone. “You can follow me.”
She leads me down the opposite hallway from Jazmine’s room and through a set of double doors.
She guides me into a room full of lab equipment.
Blood tubes, syringes, and bags of IV fluids litter the workspace.
She tells me to take a seat in the chair with the armrest. I’m not good with blood, so I’m sweating a little.
She notices me squirming in my seat, and her demeanor relaxes a bit. “Chill. No needles tonight. Just a quick swab of your cheeks with a Q-tip.”
Some of the tension leaves my shoulders, but I’m still nervous because of the potential results.
I don’t know what I’m more afraid of, being the father or not being Lilii’s dad.
I haven’t even laid eyes on this kid yet, but she’s already taking up a spot in my heart. “How long before I get the results?”
“They’ll be back in twenty-four hours, but it will probably be Sunday morning before you get a call revealing them,” she tells me as she prepares the sterile testing equipment. She washes her hands at the sink before putting on blue nitrile gloves. Finally, she turns to me. “You ready?”
I nod.
“Okay, open wide and say ‘Ahhh,’” she instructs as she probes the insides of my cheeks and the back of my throat with the Q-tip. It only lasts about thirty seconds, but I still gag.
“This your first time getting tested?” she asks, putting the Q-tip with my saliva in a tube with some type of clear liquid at the bottom, closing the top, and shaking it up.
I nod again. “I don’t make it a habit of impregnating random women.”
The nurse, whose name tag reads EMILY, RN, snorts out a laugh. “Yeah, like I haven’t heard that one before.”
“Look,” I say, getting frustrated with this whole night. “The truth is that that woman in there was a temporary hookup gone disastrously wrong, and now I’m suffering the consequences. End of story.”
Nurse Emily lets out a low whistle. “Sounds like you got yourself into some trouble.”
“You have no idea.”
“Will this be your first kid if she turns out to be yours?”
I nod again.
“You want my advice? Raise her like you wish you were raised. No kid’s life is perfect, but you can at least strive to give her a better life than her parents might have had.”
I sit there a moment, absorbing her words.
She pats my shoulder before saying, “You’re gonna be fine. You’ll figure it out.”
I glare at her.
She shrugs and tells me that I’m free to go, reminding me that I’ll get a call first thing Sunday morning with the results.
I find my way back downstairs and out the front door of the hospital before the tears come. The saltwater stings my eyes as I crumble into a heap of myself, still wearing my coat and tie from tonight’s party.