Changing Faces by Kimberla Lawson Roby Read Free Book Online Page B

herself and figured maybe reading a few scriptures just might help. She’d even spoken a couple of prayers, asking God to deliver her from all the anger she was feeling. She’d asked Him to remove the horrid thoughts she was having and the hatred that was consuming her. But this was all Marvin’s fault. First it was this brand-spanking-new personality of his, and now he’d actually stayed out past 1 a.m. She hadn’t approved of his going out after work last night anyway, but staying out until the next morning was unforgivable. He’d never done anything like this before, not the entire time they’d been married, and it was more than she was willing to put up with. All she could hope was that he would never do this again and that she wouldn’t have to keep hearing that voice screaming inside her, begging her to punish him. Begging her to punish him for all his wrongdoing.
    And then there was Whitney, who’d had the audacity to drag up antique news—something that God had already forgiven Charisse for a long time ago. How dare she bring up anything about anybody, looking like Miss Piggy. But Charisse was going to let it slide this time because she knew miserable people craved new company and Whitney was definitely a miserable soul. Had to be, given all the fat she was hauling around, and Charisse felt sorry for her.
    Charisse closed her eyes and recited another prayer until she heard someone walking up the stairway. She knew it had to be Brianna because Marvin and Brandon were still at Brandon’s football game and wouldn’t be home for at least an hour.
    “Brianna, is that you?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Girl, what have I told you about saying ‘yeah’ whenever I ask you something? When you answer me, you answer with ‘yes’ and nothing else.”
    Brianna didn’t bother responding and Charisse heard her walk into her bedroom and close the door behind her.
    Charisse jumped up from the chaise, stormed out of her room and into her daughter’s.
    “Brianna, did you hear what I said?”
    “Yeah.”
    “What did you say?”
    “Yes,” she finally said.
    “And you’d better wipe that silly frown from your face, too, before I do it for you.”
    When Charisse stared at Brianna, she became livid when she noticed too many of Marvin’s facial features. It was another reason she couldn’t stand her. Daddy’s little girl. Daddy’s little sweetheart. Daddy’s precious little gift. It was enough to make Charisse ill. She wanted to like Brianna, but she just couldn’t. Not when she hadn’t wanted to have her in the first place. Even today, she still wondered why she’d been so careless, having sex with Marvin barely eight weeks after Brandon was born and not taking any birth control pills. It had been so stupid of her. And it wasn’t like she’d had any options because she certainly hadn’t believed in abortions. The idea of it all was so ungodly and she hadn’t seen herself committing such a despicable sin.
    Thus Brianna had been born and Charisse had never gotten used to it. And how could she when Brianna had been the reason she’d had to waddle around knocked up, back-to-back with only two months in between? Instead of the normal nine months, her second pregnancy had felt more like twenty. Not to mention having to care for a newborn baby and then carrying another one inside her stomach simultaneously.
    And it wasn’t like Marvin had been any real help to her either. He’d made a ton of dim-witted mistakes and he hadn’t done one thing a real man would have done in his situation. It was almost as if Charisse had become a single parent, and it was the reason she’d decided to wear the pants in their household from then on. She decided that she would run the entire show and that Marvin could, for the most part, take it or leave it. Of course, he had tried to rebel a few times in the very beginning, announcing that he was a grown man and that he wasn’t about to have his own wife bossing him. But Charisse had told