Still (Grip Book 2)(58)

I hope we don't regret it.





36





Bristol





I've lived a pretty privileged life.

I know that. I get it.

Beyond the top-percenter privilege my family's wealth afforded, there's  that layer of privilege that's almost become a buzzword: white  privilege.

Confession.

Honestly, I used to get defensive about this somewhere inside. I didn't  ask to be born white, or for the intrinsic advantages that come with it  living in this country. Hell, at first I didn't want to believe it was  real. It's much easier to believe you don't have these immense  advantages through accident of birth than to figure out how you can  balance the scales.

Grip and I managed to get beyond labels like "privilege" or "minority"  or even black and white. Beneath the labels, we found who the other  person really is and how they'll love you in good times and bad.  Unconditional love, by definition, doesn't give a damn about those  labels.

Life is the grand equalizer. It has a way of stripping those privileges,  rendering them inconsequential. Black, white, rich, poor-when it rains,  we all get wet. When it rains, it pours, and sometimes, there is no  shelter. I'm in the storm of my life, or rather a storm is in me,  brewing in me, growing in me . . . a storm of heartache and tragedy for  which there is no privilege, no escape. Not my family's money. Not my  husband's fame. Not my expensive education or my ambition. The hardest  things in life have no escape, no workaround. There is no around, only  through. We trudge through those storms. They toss us to and fro. They  drench us and change us and strip us of the protection we thought  privilege allowed, only to find in the end that we all bleed. We all  suffer. We all die.

God, I'm morbid.

And philosophical.

In short, I'm a bore.

But so is this guy droning on for the last forty-five minutes. It makes  me appreciate how gifted an orator Dr. Hammond is to make prisons and  criminal justice reform sound fascinating, because this guy doesn't.

Dr. Hammond leans over to whisper in my ear, "Glad I'm not the only one struggling."

I snap my head around to meet the amusement in his eyes with a chagrined smile.

"Was I that obvious?" I whisper back. "I thought I looked engaged."

"If that's engaged," he says with a grin, "I'd hate to see checked out."

I pretend to wince.

"I need to work on my fakery. I'm not very good at phony, never have been."

Grip leans over to see me and Dr. Hammond, who sits to my right.

"What the hell are you two talking about?" he asks. "You do realize this banquet is to honor us, right, Iz?"

"Do you feel honored?" His dark brows crest over the rims of his  glasses. "If you honor me by holding me hostage to a bad speech for an  hour and serving me rubber chicken, I'll pass."

A laugh, along with a little water, snorts through my nose. Grip does  his damnedest to chastise me with a look, but he can't hold back his  smile. It's brighter than I've seen in weeks. We needed this-to get out  of LA, away from home. We can't escape the pain. I carry that with me.  Even the little joys, like feeling the first kick, will be overshadowed  by the inevitable outcome, but something about packing a bag and flying  out here to DC lightened things for us some.

Grip and Dr. Hammond are being honored for their work with community  bail funds. I wasn't going to come, but I haven't seen Dr. Hammond-he  keeps telling me to call him Iz, but I'm not quite there yet-in such a  long time, only a few times since the wedding. He and Grip haven't  really revisited his views on interracial relationships, but it's  obvious that his perspective has evolved, at least as far as Grip and I  are concerned.         

     



 

An hour later, the three of us are in the hotel suite Grip and I booked.  Iz does the honors behind the bar because apparently he put himself  through college bartending. He makes a Godfather for him and a vodka  martini for Grip. Meanwhile, I'm sipping yet another water.

I miss liquor. I mean, liquor has been good to me in hard times.

Hello, vodka, my old friend.

I take a deep inhale from the bottle behind the bar, and Grip looks at me like Don't even think about it.

"Just sniffing." I laugh and reluctantly replace the bottle.

"Since you can't drink, did you at least make Grip give up weed?" Iz asks from the leather couch in the suite's sitting room.

"I volunteered, thank you very much." Grip settles onto the couch facing  Iz with his drink in hand. "No easy task in my line of work where you  get high walking into every studio."

"Well Bris has the hardest part." Iz offers a sympathetic smile. "And  then even after delivery you still can't drink for a while. I assume  you'll breastfeed? Hope it's not awkward, but I'm in the daddy club.  Ain't no going back after being in the delivery room."

He chuckles, not noticing that my smile and Grip's have slowly faded to  ash, burned by reality crashing back in on us. I won't breastfeed. My  breasts are the biggest they've ever been, and my milk will come in . . .  then dry up. It will come and go, just like this baby.

"I'm gonna . . . um . . ." I stand, adjusting the neckline and the hem  of the dress I wore to the banquet, keeping my hands busy while my heart  recovers. "I'll be back. Just need to . . ."

I can't. I speed walk faster than a woman six months pregnant probably  should, going back to the bedroom and flopping onto the bed, spread out  like a starfish on the luxurious comforter. I stare up at the ceiling,  hot tears flowing freely from my eyes and puddling in my ears. The  sadness hovers over me. I've never lived with a constant promise of  heartbreak, and many days, it's too much. I often slip away to indulge  in something my mother-in-law encouraged me to do when she first heard  the news about the baby's fate.

I count my blessings.

It is a well-documented fact that I'm not religious-never have been, and  probably never will be, but I understand why some turn to it. I see why  it is such a shaping force in Kai's life. Believing there is something  bigger than you must be comforting when you feel small, dwarfed by  circumstances out of your control.

Blessing number one: Grip

Blessing number two: Grip.

He's so good, he counts twice.

Blessing number three: friends and family who love me. Rhyson and Kai  and Amir and Shon and Ms. James and even my parents-all have been a  source of comfort for us. My mother didn't understand my decision and  urged me to terminate. At first I thought it was the automatic feminist  response, that she assumed I was keeping the baby for reasons that I'm  not. Pro-choice is just that: I get to choose. It's my body, which I've  chosen to share with Grip, and we get to choose. Yes, the path we're on  is painful. To some, unnecessarily painful, but it's what we've decided  to do with this body. We have our reasons, and they're just that: ours. I  kept wondering how my mother could be so cold about her own  granddaughter. Of course, it took Grip pointing out my mother's fear for  me to understand, noting that her concern for me far outweighed her  feelings for this baby. She sees how hard it will be and doesn't want me  to go through what's ahead.

"You and me, both, Mother," I mutter.

The ceiling hasn't changed, but my perspective has . . . some, enough to  gather my emotions and go back out. I don't get to see Dr. Hammond  much, and I don't want to spend the rest of the night in here brooding.

"I'm back." I settle beside Grip, huddling under his shoulder and taking  in his scent. When neither of them responds, I feel the heaviness  weighing the air and note their somber faces. I know what they discussed  while I was gone.

"You told him?" I ask Grip, vulnerability softening my voice.

We don't tell everyone. It's bad enough this shit cloud hangs over the  next three months and dampens so many moments that should be reasons to  celebrate. We don't want to field everyone's awkward questions and  responses the whole time, and we also don't trust everyone to  understand.

"Yeah." Grip scatters a few kisses along my hairline and squeezes my shoulder.

"I'm sorry this happened to you guys." Iz grimaces. "Dammit, that came  out wrong. I can't believe I'm one of those awkward people who says  stupid things at a time like this."         

     



 

"It's okay," I say. "We'll be okay."

I muster a smile to make him feel more at ease, something I find myself  doing all the time lately once people know. I didn't realize how much  time and energy you expend making others feel better about how bad  things are for you. Things are heavy enough without the burden of their  discomfort and pity.

"I know you will. The two of you . . . you guys have something most  people never find. My ex and I certainly didn't have it." Iz drops his  eyes to his drink, rolling the tumbler between his palms before looking  back up to split a glance between us. "I've never apologized for my  views before you married, for the things I thought."