The Realest Ever - By Keith Thomas Walker Page 0,10
of the time, and Kyra was not surprised or particularly upset when she learned that his withdrawal method was not effective. She was only nineteen, but most of the other girls in Kyra’s neighborhood had babies by that age. Not one person in Kyra’s life told her she should’ve waited when they noticed her belly growing bigger and bigger.
Kyra went to live with her grandmother because Aunt Joyce didn’t have the time or patience to help raise a brand new baby. Kyra’s relationship with Tommy continued as usual, even though the bun in her oven began to garnish negative attention. Kyra heard rumors that Tommy was still with his ex-girlfriend Alisha. Alisha even confronted Kyra a few times. When Alisha called Kyra a ho, Kyra called her a ho right back. And when Alisha wanted to meet up to fight, Kyra was down for that, too. But thankfully others intervened when they saw how far along Kyra was at that point.
“You can’t be fighting no pregnant girl!” an older bystander warned.
“Her face ain’t pregnant,” Alisha had said. “I can slap the shit out of her.” She had her rings removed, her weave removed and her shoes off already. Alisha had a razorblade hidden in her mouth as well, but Kyra wasn’t afraid of her. She brought half a dozen cousins with her to rival the half a dozen hood rats Alisha brought as backup.
The tension reached a boiling point on Christmas Eve, two months before Quinell was born. Incensed that Tommy was really going to stay with Kyra and start a disgusting family with her, Alisha went to Kyra’s grandmother’s house and knocked calmly on the door. She wanted to rip Kyra’s hair out when she answered, but Alisha maintained her cool until Kyra summoned Tommy to the door.
Tommy called her a bitch, and then Alisha punched him in the chest. She ran away, and Tommy stumbled back into the living room. Tommy tried to tell Kyra that Alisha had something in her hand when she punched him, but Kyra could see for herself. There was a steak knife sticking out of his bony chest. At first Kyra thought he was holding it in his arm pit (Ha ha, you so funny!) but she saw the blood, and she saw the look of shocked confusion in her baby-daddy’s eyes.
She laid him on the couch and watched in horror as Tommy yanked the knife from his wound. The blood began to flow in earnest then. Kyra’s screams brought her grandmother running from the main bedroom. The ambulance responded within ten minutes, but Quinell’s father was pronounced dead an hour after being stabbed. Tommy was only eighteen years old. The doctors said he would’ve died whether he pulled the knife out or not, but Kyra never believed that.
Alisha was arrested, but she managed to get her murder charge dropped to second degree because no one actually saw her stab Tommy and no one could prove she took a knife to the residence specifically to kill the love of her life. Kyra had her bastard child in February, and once again she was right on par with the other girls in her neighborhood. Whether they lost their daddy to the grave or the penitentiary, there were enough fatherless black children in Little Rock to fill several high schools.
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When they got to the library, Kyra had to wait nearly an hour for a computer. But that was okay. She found a couple of romance novels to check out as well as a few DVD’s to watch with the kids this weekend.
When she was able to get online, Kyra checked her career builder site. But by then she couldn’t deny that she was too preoccupied to care about a job at that moment. It had been two days since she sent Donovan a friend request on Facebook. Kyra was dying to know if he accepted it yet.
She abandoned her job search and logged onto Facebook, surprised to see fifteen notifications this time. Most were to inform her that people accepted her friend requests. The last person on the list was Donovan Mitchell. Kyra’s heart shot up in her throat when she saw that Donovan sent her two personal messages as well.
She worked to steady her breathing as she clicked on his name. Kat was trying to talk to her, but Kyra was so excited she wouldn’t have noticed if her daughter recited the whole Gettysburg Address. Two seconds later Donovan’s profile popped up. Kyra found