Concrete Rose (The Hate U Give, #0)(46)

“I heard you,” she says, and her voice almost a whisper. “Go get her a ginger ale.”

I go to the kitchen and grab a cold one outta the refrigerator. When I get back, Lisa sitting in front of the toilet. Ma wipe around her mouth with a washcloth.

I pass Ma the soda. She pop it open and give it to Lisa. “This will help settle your stomach.”

Lisa nod and take little sips.

Ma sit on the side of the tub and close her eyes. She take a deep breath. “Haven’t we discussed this stuff, Maverick?”

Ma never told me ’bout the birds and the bees—nah, she told me exactly how babies are made without any dumb metaphors. She bought my first condoms when I was fifteen, when she realized me and Lisa were together a whole lot. That wasn’t her way of saying, “Go have sex.” She made it clear she only want me prepared.

Now I gotta admit I wasn’t. “Yes, ma’am. We discussed it.”

“And you had unprotected sex anyway,” she says.

“Yes, ma’am. It was an accident.”

“An accident is dropping a plate on the floor. Y’all were dumb.”

We can’t argue against that.

Seven wake up, crying. Ma push up from the tub. “I’ll go check on the baby.”

She step over Lisa and walk out. She ain’t looked at me yet.

Tears fill Lisa’s eyes. “What have we done?”

I sit on the floor beside her and wrap my arms around her. Eventually, I help Lisa to the living room sofa so she can lie down a bit. All that crying can’t be good for her, and she can’t go home like this right now. I go to my room to grab a pillow and a blanket.

I find Ma hunched over Seven’s crib, so still she look frozen.

I inch toward her. “Is he a’ight, Ma?”

She wipe her face, and that’s when I realize she crying. “Have I failed you, Maverick?”

Her soft voice hit me as hard as a brick. I swallow the lump in my throat. “No, ma’am.”

“You’re sure? Because it feels like it. I’ve tried my hardest, God knows I have, and yet here we are. Two babies before you’re eighteen. It’s bad enough your father convinced me to let you join a gang for protection.” She shake her head. “Some mother I am. Loving you isn’t enough. Being hard on you isn’t enough. I haven’t been enough.”

I wanna hug her, but I don’t got the right. “Yeah, you have, Ma. I made some bad decisions, that’s all. I’ll do better, I promise.”

She whirl around, and her eyes finally meet mine. They wet with tears. “How, Maverick? What are your plans? What are you gonna do?”

I open my mouth, but . . .

I don’t know.

I think that hurt her the most.

She wipe her face again. “You know what? We’ve been putting this off, but it’s clear that it’s time we take a trip.”

Huh? “A trip? To where?”

“To the person you need the most,” Ma says. “We’re going to see your father.”





Seventeen


It’s the day before Thanksgiving, and instead of baking desserts like she usually do, Ma gon’ make the three-hour drive to Evergreen Prison.

It’s a miracle we going. There was all this paperwork that had to be done so Seven could go. I’m not legally his daddy yet—we need Iesha to make that happen, and I don’t know where she at—so we technically couldn’t do the paperwork for him. Cousin Gary had to call in some favors. It’s stupid that people have to get approved to see their loved ones in prison in the first place.

I pack Seven’s diaper bag on my bed and hold the phone with my shoulder. I wanna check on Lisa real quick. She ain’t told her momma she pregnant yet. She waiting for Carlos to get home. She say he can keep Ms. Montgomery from going too overboard. He supposed to arrive today.

Lisa haven’t told me what she wanna do ’bout her pregnancy. I think she scared to admit she want an abortion. I keep telling her I’m fine with whatever she decide, hoping she’ll go on and admit it.

The phone only ring once before she go, “Hey, Mav.”

I forget her momma got caller ID. “Hey, how you feeling?” I ask. Baby girl dealing with morning, noon, and night sickness. She got her momma thinking it’s a stomach bug.

“I’m okay,” she says, kinda low. “Carlos got here a few minutes ago.”

“Oh. Cool.” That explain why she keeping her voice down. I wanna ask if this mean she gon’ tell them, but I’m trying not to push her, you know? “What you got planned today?”

Lisa snort. “If that’s your way of asking if I’m telling them, nicely done.”

I smile. She know me too good. “Ay, you said it, not me.”

“Mmm-hmm. Well, I’m not telling them today. I wanna wait until after Thanksgiving in case there’s a bunch of drama.”

“Ay, don’t worry. They probably gon’ be mad, but we’ll get through this. It’ll all be over before you know it.”

“Um . . . about that.” She take a long pause. Then, “I wanna have the baby, Mav.”

It’s like an elephant plop down on my chest. “You . . . you do?”

“Yeah. Some girls would make a different choice, and that’s cool. That’s their choice to make. But I wanna be a mom.”