Derrick

What just happened?

Jaymes Grenier.

That’s what just happened.

“. . . pie recipe. What do you think?”

Taking my mom’s exit, I brake when we come to a light and look at her. “Huh?”

“I can’t put my finger on it and it’s driving me nuts. Cinnamon makes no sense with blueberries.”

What the fuck is she talking about? “What?”

“The pie.” She looks annoyed. “Nita’s pie. The secret ingredient. Have you not been listening at all, Derrick?” Her annoyance quickly turns into an all-knowing smile. “Ahhh. You haven’t been listening. Got something on your mind, or should I say someone?”

“No.”

“I say yes.”

I glower. “I’m not ready.”

A hand reaches over to comfort. “It was a lot to take in.”

And Ace . . . Grenier? Rogers? Damn, she has a kid. “Did you know she had a kid?”

Mom sits up properly in her seat as if she’s just taken the stand. “I did. I’m sorry, but you told me not to say anything about her.”

My betrayed heart speaks for me, “A kid kind of overrules that, don’t you think?”

“Don’t be mad, Derrick—”

“I’m not mad at you. I just . . . I don’t know.” I deserved to know that she started a family with that asshole. But I’m not sure it’s the anger that I was betrayed by her, lied to by my mother, or the jealousy that she has a family with another man that gets me more upset. “Deep down I thought maybe we’d find a way back.”

“You still can. She has a child. She’s not married.”

“Why isn’t she married to Rogers? That’s Reggie’s kid, right?” Some friend he was. Fucker. Moved right in the second I moved out. They wasted no time. I don’t fully blame him for it. I knew he always had a boner for my girl. I guess screwing him over gave him the right to screw me over. She fell for it. She didn’t have to go there, but she did anyway and it felt like everything we had been through together, everything we were to each other meant nothing. She’d told me she loved me. The timeline is obvious. Did they even wait a day? Fuck me. The years apart were a waste of regret, making me regret every time I ever thought of her and for coming back.

When my mom doesn’t respond, I check on her. “What’s up?”

“You don’t want to hear it.”

“One minute you’re going on about pie, the next I’m having to drag information out of you. I want to know. Tell me. What’s on your mind?” I turn down her street.

“He’s a cute kid.”

He is, kind of ridiculously so and I’m not a kid guy. He’s also cool for a five-year-old. The kind I could probably tell a secret to and he wouldn’t tell anyone. None of this surprises me though. Jaymes is his mom.

Jaymes.

Damn.

Just as I pull up to the gate of her complex, she says, “She’s had a hard time, Derrick. I know you’re upset and hurt right now. It was a lot to take in, which is why I thought it better for you to experience it more than just hear things and let your mind wander. She’s a good mother who is working so hard to give not just Ace a better life, but her mom.”

I pull into a spot in front of her townhome and park. “Mom—”

“No, I want you to listen to me. You’re caught in your emotions. I get it. I do, but you need to cut her some slack.” The car door opens and she gets out. When I get out, I glance her way over the roof. “She’s not married to him. She’s single. I think you should know that, but from my perspective, it wasn’t easy for me either. You know I loved you two together. Maybe your soul mate is still out there, or maybe she’s right where you left her. I don’t know, Derrick. I know I look at that little boy and think of you. You were such a sweet and innocent kid before . . .” She doesn’t have to say more than that. You either survive this part of the city or it destroys you. There is no in-between. “I look at them both and think of what could have been. How he could be my grandson.”

Dropping my head down on my arm, I lean against the car. When I lift up, I try to hide the anger. What is usually an emptiness inside me fills with rage. I love her, but I can’t be buried by what she needs when I’m barely holding on these days. “I can’t do this. I can’t live with both my regrets and your disappointments.”

“I’m not disappointed, son. I’m so proud of you. Look at what you’ve accomplished. You’ve made something from nothing. You did that.” She walks to the sidewalk and waits for me. When I hand her the keys, she adds, “You have both changed. I’m not saying you should give it a second chance, but I’m not saying you shouldn’t either.” I roll my eyes, but give in and give her the smile she’s earned for all her efforts. I receive a poke in the stomach in return. “Are you staying or going?”

She’s given me a lot to think about. Jaymes even more. “I should get going.”

“Thank you for driving me. I know Nita was so happy to see you again.” I walk her to her door. With her key in the lock, and her back to me, she says, “I’ll text you the details for Sunday.”

“What’s Sunday?”

“The brunch.” She steps inside. “Love you,” comes rushing out of her mouth as the door starts to close.

My hand slams against the wood of the door stopping it from closing. She peeks out the crack all wide-eyed and innocent. “Nice try, Mom.”

“What?” She shrugs, willing to keep the act going.

“Brunch with Jaymes.”

“Oh, yes, she’ll be there, but you can come with me.”

“I know what you’re doing.”

She opens the door back up and puts her hand on her hip. “What am I doing?”

“Jaymes is off limits. She has a life. You said it yourself. She made that very clear to me too. She’s got no time for any of the bullshit that distracts her from her kid.” I roll my eyes, knowing the romantic soul that is my mother.

“I want you to be happy. Why do you think it can’t be with Jamie?”

“She made it clear she didn’t want to see me again.”

“She told you that?” she asks, suspiciously.

“She didn’t have to. She has a life now, one without me and doesn’t need me intruding on her life.”

A self-satisfied smile appears. “If she didn’t say it, you shouldn’t assume it.” The door starts to close again, but she stops to say, “You’re leaving on the tour again soon, so you’re coming to brunch and I’m not hearing otherwise. Be safe on your drive home.”

This time I let the door close. I don’t know what’s worse—an encounter with your ex-girlfriend that knocks your life out of its regular rotation or a mother determined to nag you to death over said girlfriend. I mean ex-girlfriend. Either way, I know I’m not getting out of brunch on Sunday, and I’m not so sure I want to.

---

Jaymes Anne-Marie Grenier.

She once told me her mother named her Anne-Marie to go with the traditional French last name she acquired once she married Jimmy Grenier, James. He moved her here once they got married and promptly left her when she became pregnant. Upon hearing of Nita going into labor, he sobered up enough to make an appearance just as his daughter was born into the world. Nita saw the man she fell in love with that night as he made promises to take care of them. With tears in his eyes, he apologized for leaving her and said he’d never make that mistake again.

To honor her husband’s commitment to their family she signed the birth certificate—Jaymes Anne-Marie Grenier—after her husband.

They made it a month before his gambling and alcohol addiction kicked back in and they ran out of money. He was gone the next day, leaving Nita with no savings and a newborn to raise on her own. Jaymes said she only saw her mother cry once when it came to her father. I never told her I saw her cry too, or that I had also met her father.

Jaymes was scheduled to close the sandwich shop that night, but needed to study for a biology test the next day. She had forgotten her book at home because she’d been running late. I went by her house to grab it so I could bring it up to her. Her house was like my second home. I had a key and all. So when I was about to leave, and saw a man walking up the path, I didn’t think much of it. He did.

He wailed into me about this being his wife’s house and asked if I was fucking her. I was seventeen at the time. It was as if he wasn’t even aware that he had a daughter a few months younger than me. I was not as big as I am now, but I was growing. I’d already been hazed into Reggie’s gang, got the tat and all to prove it, so he didn’t scare me. But he did cross a line. Especially when he spit on me.

With poor timing, Nita came outside, and defended me. I didn’t need her to. I don’t even know why she did other than maybe it was her mama bear protective instincts kicking in. When he shoved her to the ground, I beat him to damn near death.

Sometimes I think about him, and wonder what happened. Is he dead or alive? I didn’t kill him. He walked away that day, but he never came back either. He wasn’t a man bent on changing his ways, so he was smart enough to stay gone for good.

Sometimes I think about Nita, and wonder why she never told Jaymes what happened. Was she protecting Jaymes or me? I’m not sure. I never thought it right to question her decisions when it came to how she ran her family. I wouldn’t want my family questioned. Things are the way they are now because choices were made along the way that set things in motion. Good or bad, things were set in motion that day. A pact was made with her mom. I vowed I would always protect Nita and Jaymes.

Yet, I drove away, leaving both of them a year later.

Another promise I didn’t deliver on.

Sometimes I think about Jaymes, and wonder how she looked at me like I made the sun shine just for her. When I brought the book to her that night, she sat next to me and smiled like she didn’t have the shittiest misfortune to have James Grenier as a father and a mom who was fighting a battle her daughter never knew about. As I stretched and fisted my fingers under the table, she never saw the pain I was in or how sad I felt for her. She never saw because when I looked into her green eyes, I did what her mother did. I put on a smile and gave her enough love to make her feel whole, to keep that smile on her face, and to give her hope. She may share a name with that fucker, but she would never suffer again because of him, or any other man.

Except me.

“Fuck, Derrick. Get your shit together.” Tommy’s voice floods my internal thoughts. Tilting my head up, Tommy is flipping me off from the sound booth.

Kaz kicks a leg on the stool where I’m propped with my guitar. “You need a break, or what?”

“No, I’m good.”

Johnny doesn’t look convinced when I catch of glimpse of his reflection in the glass, but he lets it slide. “That was too fucked up to fix. Let’s go from the top.”

This time I don’t think about James or Nita. I push away all thoughts of Jaymes and Ace, and play the damn song perfectly. This is my life. My future. My focus. This.

It’s not until I leave the studio that night that I realize how much I’ve hidden behind the bright lights of stardom. Yes, The Resistance is my life, my future. But in my heart of hearts, I know it’s Jaymes I’ve been thinking about for all these years. The biggest regret. The most important dream I’ve yet to fulfill.

I slip into the custom leather seat of my refurbed 1972 Gran Torino Sport and wait for my Bluetooth to connect.

“Well to what do I owe the pleasure?” My mom sounds chipper.

“I’ll come to brunch on Sunday.” I hear her giggles of excitement and shake my head. “Happy?”

“Very,” she says. “It will be fun.”

“Yeah, guess we’ll see.”