I had too much respect for Mrs. Murray to picture her so dependent on reefer for a clear head that she couldn’t put it down for the nine months it took to grow a baby. So I left that alone. I wish I hadn’t though. Because I don’t know why I moved on to this next. Before I knew it, I just asked: “Why don’t you do it?”

She finished off the last pinky and wiggled her toes like she had new strappy sandals rather than old jellies waiting. She swirled a fingertip of pink lotion into the ashy gray callus on back of one big toe.

“Do what?”

“Help me. Get rid of it.”

“What you mean, Shivana?”

“Girl, just jump on me …”

“Uh-uh! Noooo. Don’t even ask. I ain’t tryna kill no baby …”

“Come on, Nakesha… please. It ain’t been that long so maybe—”

“Shivana, hell naw I ain’t jumping on your damn stomach! You can forget it. I’m not doing that. Uh-uh. God ain’t striking me down.”

“He won’t strike you down. He’ll strike me down.”

“I can’t do that to you, Shivana. I can’t. I just can’t.”

“Nakesha!”

“No, Shivana!”

Jesse came out of the room.

“Shivana, can we have some—?”

“No!” I spit at her. “Y’all can’t have nothin’ so don’t even ask! Get back in there.”

“Shivana, why you crying?”

“I said get back in there. And don’t come out ’til your mama get home! Matter fact, just go to bed. I ain’t got time for this shit tonight…”

“But it’s not eight o’clock.”

I glared at her. “What did I say?”

Jesse stomped off. I turned back to Nakesha. She was crying.

“I’m not doing that, girl, so don’t ask again,” she said, right before the phone rang. We let it go to the answering machine.

“You have a collect call from the Cook County Correctional Facility from Leroy. Will you accept…?”

Nakesha jumped up before I did.

“Hell yeah,” she said to the operator after she snatched up the phone. “Put that nigga on the phone.”

I knew what she was about to do, and when Nakesha’s mind was set to something she did it. She ran away from me, around the couch, then into the kitchen with the cordless phone, ignoring my pleas to hand it over. I heard Leroy’s deep, dry voice crack in over the phone.

“This ain’t yo’ baby!” Nakesha shouted. “She at work trying to take care of yo’ damn kids.”

“Nakesha, no. Don’t… lemme talk to him.”

“Don’t worry about who this is,” she just continued. “Worry about how you gonna take care of Shivana baby …”

“Nakesha, no …”