Ramsey's Praise Read online

  Dontae pulled up to the emergency room door, Ramsey and Ronny jumped out and rushed into the hospital and went straight to the information desk. “We’re here for Renee Thomas. Can you tell us what room she’s in?” Ramsey all but demanded.

  “One moment, please.” The receptionist clicked a few keys on her computer and then glanced back up at them. “She’s being x-rayed right now.” She pointed toward the waiting area. “Have a seat and we will call you back once she’s in the room again.”

  “Okay, thanks.” Ronny put a hand on Ramsey’s shoulder as Dontae ran up to them.

  “Did you find out anything?”

  “She’s in X-ray.” Ramsey started walking towards the chairs in the waiting area. “Let’s sit down.”

  For midnight on a Tuesday, the emergency room was full to bursting. But there were a couple of free chairs to the left of the double doors that lead to the emergency room. Dontae and Ronny took those seats and Ramsey leaned against the wall. “Well, at least she’s not in surgery,” Ramsey said, trying to make himself feel better about the situation.

  The double doors opened, a little boy ran out, pulling his mother with him. Head’s swirled around, but they quickly turned away once they realized that Renee would not be walking through the door. “How long does an x-ray take?” Ronny asked.

  The double doors opened again and a woman walked out carrying a small child. Dontae stood up. “Maxine,” he called out. Maxine turned toward them. She smiled once she saw Dontae and then walked over to him. “Is Brielle sick?”

  Maxine lovingly gazed at the little girl in her arms. “Her fever just broke. But she gave me quite a scare.”

  Ramsey hadn’t seen Maxine since the wedding. She’d told him that she was becoming a mom and had no time for dating, so he’d tried to respect her wishes. But that hadn’t stopped him from thinking about her, and dreaming about her beauty. Even at that late hour and with Maxine wearing a pair of jeans and plain white shirt, her beauty still took his breath away.

  “So are you all here for Renee? I saw her back there,” Maxine told them while adjusting the little girl on her hip.

  Ramsey asked, "How's she doing?"

  "Not too good from the looks of it. I just hope that whoever she was brawling with got it a whole lot worse."

  Ronny shook his head, "She wasn’t in a fight. Renee said something about an accident."

  "Oh." Maxine backed off. "I guess I just assumed she'd been in a fight... Well, I hope she recovers soon."

  As Maxine turned to leave, the little girl stretched her arms out and latched onto Ramsey's shirt. “Baba.”

  Maxine tried to unhook the child’s hands, but she wouldn’t let go. “Sorry, she’s in a phase where she calls every man she sees baba. I think she’s trying to say Daddy, but she can’t get her fifteen-month-old mind off of her bottle long enough to make the distinction.”

  Ramsey took the little girl and held her. “Don’t worry about it. What’s her name, again?” Dontae had told him about the child, but he didn’t remember the name.

  “Brielle.” At the sound of her name, Brielle lifted her eyes and looked from Maxine to Ramsey. She was adorable. Ramsey found himself wondering how someone could have given this child away. There must be a heartbroken woman somewhere out there.

  Maxine held out her hands to Brielle. “Come on, little one. Mommy needs to go home and get some sleep.”

  Ramsey pulled the child back into his arms and suggested, “I can walk you to the car if you’d like. It is after midnight... never know what kind of weirdos are lurking out there at this hour.”

  “Baba,” Brielle said again.

  Ronny laughed and then patted Ramsey on the shoulder. “Looks like you finally found a woman who actually wants to be with you.”

  “Ignore him,” Ramsey said in a child-like voice as he talked to Brielle. “He wasn’t raised right. But your mommy is going to make sure you are. Isn’t that right, Brielle?”

  Brielle giggled as Ramsey lightly pinched her cheek.

  “Thanks, but I think we can manage.” Maxine took Brielle out of Ramsey’s arms and began walking way.

  As Ramsey watched her leave, he noticed that Maxine was favoring her left side and had a slight limp. He caught up with her, took Brielle back into his arms, as if they were playing musical chairs with the child. “Come on, let me walk you to your car. Looks like you’ve injured yourself.”

  Maxine laughed, but accepted the help.

  “What happened, did you fall and bruise your leg or something?”

  “More like, I bruised my ego.” They arrived at the car, Ramsey looked as if he wanted to ask for clarification, but was unsure if he should pry, so Maxine went on and told him, “I tripped all over myself during a dance class. I actually entertained the idea of becoming a ballerina in my thirties. But tripping, falling and knocking some of the other dancers down on my way to the ground cured me of that aspiration.”

  Now it was Ramsey’s turn to laugh. He loved the fact that Maxine was this beautiful, accomplished, well-traveled woman who could make fun of her own shortcomings. “I wish I had been there.”

  “No, trust me, you don’t.” She opened her car door.

  Ramsey put the baby in her car seat, and began to miss her being in his arms the moment he let her go. “Does she get sick often?” he asked as he casually, leaned against Maxine’s white convertible BMW.

  Maxine shook her head. “Brielle is a wonderful baby... well; I guess I can’t continue calling her a baby much longer. She’ll be two in a few months.”

  “How long have you had her?”

  “I adopted her thirteen months ago. We’ve been together ever since.”

  “I’ve never dated a mom before.” Ramsey was staring at Maxine as if she was water and he had just pulled himself out of the Sahara desert. “But I don’t mind if you don’t mind.”

  Grinning at him, Maxine said, “I don’t know, Ram. I’m still finding my way around this motherhood thing. And Brielle keeps me so busy I don’t know when I could make the time for a date.”

  “It’s simple, Maxine. You call a babysitter.” Ram lifted himself from leaning on the car. Stepped a little closer to her, kept his voice low as he continued to inch forward. “Don’t you think you deserve a little time to yourself?”

  Looking down at her feet, she said, “It’s complicated, Ram.”

  Ram wasn’t about to let her get away with that. He put his index finger under her chin and lifted her head so that she was looking at him. “Let me uncomplicated it for you. “I really like you, Maxine. I think we would be good together. So, what about you? How do you feel about me?”

  Looking him in the eye, she didn’t shy away from the subject at hand. “I don’t know how good we would be together, but I’ll admit that I find you attractive and enjoyable to be around.”

  “All this praise is giving me the big head.”

  Maxine playfully punched his shoulder. “You know what I mean.”

  He rubbed his shoulder as if he’d been hit by a heavy weight champ or something. “Yeah, I know what you mean... you’re digging me.”

  “Okay, fine. I’m digging you. But I still have a child to think about.”

  “I’ll tell you what. I’m going to give you a few days to fix all the complications and then I’ll give you a call. How about that?”

  To let them know that a third person needed to be considered in the conversation, Brielle started crying like something had jumped in the car and pinched her. “I’ve got to go. And you need to get back in the hospital. Renee really needs you.”

  Confused by that comment, Ramsey asked, “What do you mean by that? Did Renee say something to you back there?”

  Maxine shook her head. “I can just tell that she’s hurting, that’s all.”

  Ram headed back into the hospital with Maxine’s words weighing heavily on his mind. Something was telling him that the kind of hurt Maxine was referring to had nothing to
do with the physical wounds Renee had incurred during whatever kind of accident she’d had.

  As he was entering the hospital, the nurse had opened the double doors and was ushering his brother through. Ramsey rushed over to them and they were being escorted to his sister’s room. “She’s a little groggy from the pain medication so you won’t be able to stay long.”

  “We’ll keep that in mind,” Dontae said.

  “Is she going to be okay?” Ronny wanted to know.

  “She’s taken a few lumps, but she’ll live.” The nurse pulled the curtain back and then said, “I’ll leave the rest for her to tell you all.”

  What rest? Ramsey wanted to ask, but he was too busy staring at his sister. She was laying on the bed with her back to them. Sling on her right arm. They could hear her crying as they approached. “We’re here, Renee. Stop crying, hon. Do you need some more pain meds?” Ramsey kept talking as he walked around the bed. He stopped in his tracks as he caught sight of Renee’s face. One of her eyes was swollen shut and purple. She had black and blue splotches on her face as if she had run repeatedly into an iron fist.

  Ramsey rushed to her bed and put his hand on her side. Renee winced as Ramsey felt the bandage around her ribs. “Who did this to you?” he demanded.

  “I fell.” Renee’s words were more of a mumble. And her face looked even more distorted as she tried to speak.

  “I’ve seen ballers who looked better than you after having three hundred pound line backers pulled off of them. There’s no way a simple fall did all of this to you.” Dontae’s nostrils flexed in anger.

  Ramsey, Ronny and Dontae gave each other the look that said they knew exactly what had happened to their sister.

  “I already told Ronny that I fell."

  "Yeah, but fell into what or who is what we want to know," Ronny said as he stepped forward.

  “The stairs, Ronny.” Renee was still crying, but she was sticking to her story.

  The nurse came into the room. She took Renee’s blood pressure. Dontae pointed at his sister and asked the nurse, "What happened to her?"

  The nurse shook her head. "We don't know. She won’t say."

  "What does it matter? I lost the baby,” Renee sobbed, "I lost the baby."

  “What baby?” Ramsey looked at his brothers, trying to determine if he was the only one surprised by what his sister had just uttered.

  3

  "I'm going to kill him," Ramsey declared after they left the hospital. "He beat that baby out of her on purpose."

  "That would make him a monster… I can't believe that Marlin is like that," Ronny said.

  "Is that because Marlin is investing in your business or can you honestly look us in the face and tell us that you believe Renee fell down some stairs as she claimed?"

  “I sure don’t believe it,” Dontae interjected.

  "Look, I'm as angry as the both of you, but I don't want to accuse someone of trying to kick a baby out of our sister's stomach before we have proof,” Ronny said.

  "Well you wait on the proof. We’re going to Marlin's house to kick his guts out of his stomach and up through his throat," Ramsey said while Dontae sped out of the hospital parking lot and kept moving towards their destination.

  Ramsey had been so furious with Renee for moving in with Marlin six months ago, that he rarely went to their house to check on her. Now he was wondering how many beatings his sister had taken since she started sleeping with the enemy. “We just left her with that monster. How could we do that? We knew it wasn’t right for them to be living together like that.” Ramsey was beside himself with grief. He was supposed to protect his sisters. How had he let something like this happen?

  “Mama tried talking to Renee,” Dontae offered. “But Renee wouldn’t change her mind. She told Mama that God couldn’t care less about whether or not she shacked up before getting married.”

  “We all know that’s not true,” Ronny said.

  “I’ll admit that I tried it once, when I was living in New York.” Ramsey shook his head as memories of that nightmare situation tried to cloud his head. “It was the biggest mistake of my life. I’m a firm believer now. I can guarantee you that I’ll marry the next woman I live with and I’ll make sure I know everything about her background and mental health issues.”

  “Who was this crazy woman you were shacking up with? You’ve made reference to this woman before, but you’ve never told us her name.” Ronny asked.

  “I don’t like to think about her, Ronny. Let’s just concentrate on one nightmare at a time, okay?”

  Dontae pulled into Marlin's driveway. The brothers jumped out of the car the moment it was put in park and began banging on Marlin’s front door. When no one answered, Ramsey went around the back and checked a couple of windows; they were locked. He then checked the sliding door of the deck. It was as if all the angels in heaven were cheering him on as he turned the knob and opened the door.

  “Marlin, where are you?” Ramsey yelled through the house. He didn’t receive an answer back, but Ramsey smelled a rat, so he knew with everything in him, that Marlin was there, he just had to find him. “I’m coming for you, and I guarantee you that this house isn’t big enough to hide you from me.”

  Ramsey searched throughout the house and finally found Marlin hiding in a closet in the master bedroom. Without asking any questions he dragged him out of the closet and punched him.

  "She's lying. I never laid a hand on her," Marlin said while trying to keep himself from falling.

  "Her face doesn't lie," Ramsey punched him again. By the time Dontae and Ronny ran into the room, Ramsey was pummeling Marlin.

  They pulled him off of Marlin. Dontae said, "Calm down, Ramsey, I think he got the message."

  But Ramsey reached out and touched Marlin again with a right hook. “He beat Renee, even knowing that she was pregnant. And for that I could kill him with my bare hands."

  "If you hit him anymore, you just might kill him," Ronny said.

  "I don't care.” Ramsey was too enraged to think straight. “He's an animal and he needs to be put to sleep.”

  Marlin wiped his bloody nose with the sleeve of his shirt. “Your brother’s crazy. He broke in my house. I’m calling the police.”

  "You do that and I'll make sure that Renee files charges against you," Ronny told him.

  Dontae grabbed Ramsey’s arm. “Come on, Ram. We’ve overstayed our welcome here. We might not get another invite.”

  “Now that Renee is out of here, I have no reason to come back to this house.”

  “She’ll be back. Renee belongs with me. And I’m not letting her go.”

  Ramsey lunged at Marlin again, but Dontae and Ronny pulled him back. Ronny then told Marlin, “She’s already gone. You’ll never see her again.” The brothers pulled out two suitcases from the walk-in closet and started pulling Renee’s clothes off the hangers and grabbing her things out of the drawers.

  From his spot on the floor, Marlin yelled back, "You can forget about me investing in your silly little business."

  "No," Ronny declared, as he walked back over to Marlin and pushed his head back to the floor, "You can forget about me allowing you to invest in my business."

  “You tell him, bro,” Dontae said as the three brothers left the house with as many of Renee’s clothes as they could carry.

  ***

  Two days later Ramsey was on Interstate 85 taking Renee to their parents’ house in Raleigh. Renee cried a lot during the three hour drive. She didn’t talk much except to say, “I should have listened to you. I’m so sorry that I didn’t.”

  His sister was bruised and bandaged and her arm was still in a sling, so he didn’t want to be one of those gloating, “I told you so” kind of brothers. Ramsey lightly put his hand on Renee’s shoulder. Trying to reassure her that brighter days were ahead, he told her, “This too shall pass, li’l sis.”

  “Don’t be nice to me, Ramsey. I blew you off for an entire year beca
use I wanted to be with Marlin. I was terrible to you, so it’s just going to make me feel worse if you’re nice about everything now.”

  “Well then you’re just going to have to feel worse, because I’m not about to throw salt in your wounds. I love you, Renee. And I just want the best for you. That was the only reason I was against you getting involved with Marlin. And I certainly didn’t want him moving you in without him putting a ring on your finger.”

  Rolling her eyes, Renee said, “Not you, too.”

  Ramsey kept his eyes on the road and hands on the steering wheel as he probed, “Not me too, what?”

  “Daddy and Carmella got on my case when I decided to move in with Marlin. She and Daddy started talking about God’s perfect plan for my life and all that mumbo jumbo. Carmella took it to another level, though, because she grabbed my hands and starting praying for me.”

  Ramsey really didn’t understand his sister sometimes. She attended church on Sundays, but it didn’t seem as if she was listening to the preacher. Come to think of it, he had no clue of what church she’d been attending in the last year. “Tell me something... have you been attending church since you moved in with that creep?”

  “Marlin doesn’t believe in organized religion.” She shrugged. “To tell you the truth, I’m not so sure if I do either.”

  Ramsey wanted to jump all over that. Their family was full of Bible believing church goers. He’d had his years of absence from the church, but he’d always known that God was real and that He was worthy to be served. How could Renee not believe? But he could feel the Holy Spirit guiding him... it’s not time yet.

  Leaning back against the headrest, Renee blurted out, “I wish I’d never met him.”

  Even though she hadn’t said his name, Ramsey was positive that Renee was talking about Marlin. The pain in her voice was so consuming that Ramsey wished he’d gone back to that house and beat on that loser some more. But in truth, Ramsey knew that he still needed to repent to God for his actions. However, he couldn’t lie to God and pretend to be sorry for what he’d done to Marlin, because he was nowhere near being repentant over that situation.