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father’s church.” I leaned in close to Taylor’s face.
    â€œSo what? I mean, his father is a middle-aged man, so he shouldn’t be retiring anytime soon.”
    â€œWell, actually, he’s having some health challenges so ...”
    â€œOh, I see. So ol’ girl wants Josh to step in for the ol’ man, and Josh turned her down ’cause he’s planning to have his own gig, right?”
    â€œSomething like that,” I said.
    â€œShe still doesn’t have to be so stink about it,” Taylor said, pushing a strand of her weaved hair from her face.
    I stood up with the sign. “No, she doesn’t have to be, but she is.”
    Taylor laughed “Well, it’s your mother-in-law.”
    â€œDon’t remind me,” I said.
    â€œYou’d better be glad you weren’t forced to attend his parents’ church.”
    â€œGirl, you know when I met him he was running from their church. No offense to his parents, but Joshua has always been more comfortable at Missionary.”
    â€œWith all his parents’ stuffiness, I don’t blame him.”
    â€œWell, I think it was more than that. I think he knew if he stayed at their church, he’d never be able to break away. They’d always control him, what he did, where he went ...”
    â€œWho he married,” Taylor completed my sentence.
    â€œGirl, you know they tried that,” I laughed.
    â€œI’m glad you can laugh about it.”
    â€œI can now, but I wasn’t laughing when Mother Benning was steadily setting up Joshua with the members of her social circle.” I shook my head. “That wasn’t funny.”
    Suddenly I began to feel dizzy. I sat down, hoping that the feeling would go away.
    Shortly after drinking a glass of water that Joshua brought me, I felt better. So I continued helping with the decorations. At one point, I stood on a medium-sized ladder taping balloons to the usually dull-looking beige walls. Then the dizziness started again so I climbed down and sat on the floor.
    â€œWhat’s wrong?” Joshua entered the room abruptly.
    â€œI’m dizzy again. Just not feeling too good.”
    He sat down by me and placed my head on his shoulder. Then he cleared his throat and came out with it. His words were soft. “Do you think that you could maybe be ...?”
    â€œI don’t know ... maybe.” My heart raced at the thought.
    He smiled at me, and I smiled back. There was no way he’d know the fear I held in my heart.
    Now fear had a way of tangling my nerves and tearing me apart as the inner workings of my mind proceeded to wreak havoc on my spirit. God said that fear was never intended for us Christians. Mama used to say fear gets the best of folks, specially ones afraid of every little thing, even their own shadow. Mama didn’t believe in being afraid, but heck, she did believe in instilling fear. Taylor and I knew better than to underestimate Mama. She never did play.
    I, on the other hand, wasn’t sure what I believed about fear. Sure, I knew God didn’t give us a spirit of fear but of power and a sound mind. But what did that mean for me? Did that make that churning in my belly every time Joshua talked about babies any less real? Every time he pushed up on me, I’d wondered if it was genuine love and passion, or if it was just a calculated attempt to get me pregnant. Was my frantic, chaotic mind really just a figment of my imagination, or had my fear become a familiar, yet unwelcome part of me?
    In any case, I ended up in the Brooklyn Hospital emergency room, and although Joshua and I both hoped I was pregnant, it turned out to be a disappointing false alarm. Apparently, my blood sugar was low. Imagine that. Low, with all the ice cream I’d been consuming.
    Sometimes it seemed like the thing I wanted the most was the thing that kept eluding me.
    Sure, I was depressed, and yes, I buried my sorrows in Baskin Robbins