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“Eight and a half months?”

“Yes. You mean you didn’t know? Nisa said you were not in favor of her keeping the baby.”

“Eight and a half months?”

I thanked the woman and left the building. I left Gemmia sitting on the sofa, and Nisa sitting in the office. I was walking up the street like a mad woman. Gemmia was running behind me, asking what happened.

“Ask your sister. Ask her what happened.”

“Nisa, what’s going on? Are you pregnant?” Gemmia asked her sister.

“No. I don’t know what that woman was talking about.” I stopped dead in my tracks.

“Are you crazy?” I was screaming now. “Are you out of your mind? You are eight and a half months pregnant! You are so pregnant they can’t even examine you! What do you mean, no? Are you crazy?”

“I mean, I don’t know how it happened. I’ve never had sex.”

“She’s crazy! She is out of her mind! Maybe you never had sex with anybody, but somebody sure had sex with you. You are pregnant, fool. Do you know what that means? What the hell do you mean, you have never had sex? Are you crazy?”

We were standing in the middle of Walnut Street in downtown Philadelphia at rush hour. Hundreds of people were staring at us. I was screaming at the top of my lungs, flailing my arms like a lunatic. The only thing Gemmia could think to say was “Oh my God!” It got worse.

By the time we got home, I was exhausted. I had screamed, cursed, and made a fool of myself. I kept asking Nisa questions, but before she could answer, I was off having another bout of hysteria.

“How?” “When?” “Where?” “Who?” “I have left you home for days. Now that I’m home almost every day, you get knocked up.” “How?” “Where?” “Were you in my bed?” I carried on for hours before I got to the real question. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I didn’t know.”

“Nisa, you are eight and a half months pregnant. Doesn’t the baby move?”

“No. I’ve never felt anything moving in me.”

“The baby has to move, Nisa. It’s ready to be born.”

Then it hit me. She plays soccer at school. The baby is dead! That set me off again. I didn’t know whether to be happy or afraid. If the baby was dead, we didn’t have to worry. But that meant that my child, my baby girl, would have to deliver a dead baby. Oh my God!

The next morning I called every clinic, every hospital, and every birth center in the city. I explained the situation, hoping to get an appointment for a sonogram. The earliest appointment I could get was June third. It was May twenty-first.

The next week was torture. I tried to stay away from Nisa because, though part of me wanted to comfort her, the other part wanted to end her life. My worst nightmare had come to pass. My teenage daughter was pregnant. I spoke to the guidance counselor at school. She said she had questioned Nisa, but Nisa had denied being sexually active to her also. I told her the name of the boy Nisa said was responsible. The counselor said she would track him down. When she called to say that she had no record of a student by that name having ever attended the school, I went crazy again. It never dawned on me that I knew exactly what it felt like to be pregnant, sixteen, alone, and afraid. By the time it did, my grandson was born.

The first face he saw when he entered the world was mine. He took one look at me, his crazy grandmother, and he cried. Oluwalomoju Adeyemi Vanzant (we call him Oluwa) was born May 28, 1991, at 7:11 P.M. He weighed in at six pounds thirteen ounces, just like his mother. He was the most beautiful thing I had seen in a long time. The minute I saw him, I forgot how he got here and I fell in love.

The cycles continue. The patterns repeat themselves. Our children bring our subconscious issues into life. They show us the parts of us that we need to heal. Nisa was my silent cry and search for love. Damon was my irresponsibility and rebellion. Gemmia was my creative genius. It was all staring me in the face. This was not about my children. This was about me. This was about me getting myself together at a deeper level. What my children and my grandson did was push me a