More After the Break by Jen Maxfield

Author:Jen Maxfield [Maxfield, Jen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781626349612
Publisher: Greenleaf Book Group Press
Published: 2022-09-15T05:00:00+00:00

5

A DAUGHTER’S LOVE

AIR DATE: MARCH 11, 2012

“If someone is threatening you, you take heed to what they are saying. Because the person you think loves you, sometimes they don’t love you.”

—TAMIKA TOMPKINS, SURVIVOR

Tamika Tompkins settled back in her hospital bed and admired her new baby girl sleeping in the clear bassinet. It was January 28, 2012, and Sanaa Nia was two days old, with a full head of hair and a strong cry. She also had a big appetite, which kept Tamika awake half the night as she comforted and fed her second child. Big sister Amora, a vibrant two-year-old, was with Tamika’s mom. Tamika could not wait to be together again the next day when doctors said she and Sanaa could go home.

Lulled by the rhythm of Sanaa’s deep breaths, Tamika decided a nap was a good idea. Better to relax now before she was home trying to manage a toddler and a newborn. Tamika drifted off into a light sleep, the only kind of rest a watchful new mom could expect. She smelled her daughter’s sweet scent on her own skin as she dreamed to the sound of raindrops falling outside her window at Newark Beth Israel Hospital.

Tamika’s eyes flickered. Something caused her to wake up—maybe it was the motion in the hospital room; maybe it was her mother’s instinct. As Tamika opened her eyes, she saw that the bassinet was empty. Panic raced through her veins as she tried to reconcile how this was possible. Had the nurses taken Sanaa for tests? Tamika squeezed her eyes shut and opened them again, wondering if her sleep-deprived brain was blurring her vision. Sanaa had to still be in there; she must have just missed her the first time.

No, the bassinet was definitely empty. Tamika turned her head on the pillow to scan the hospital room. And that was when she saw him. Sitting calmly in the upholstered lounge chair cradling their baby in his arms. Gazing down at Sanaa’s delicate features that so closely mirrored his own.

How did he know where to find them? Who told him she had given birth to their daughter? Tamika’s stomach immediately went into knots and her palms were sweating. She stifled a scream in her throat and willed herself to stay calm. The same hands that had punched her were now holding her precious new baby.

“That was the scariest thing,” Tamika remembers. “Like something in a horror movie. I didn’t want to say anything because I was afraid he would hurt the baby.”

It was the first time Tamika had seen her ex-boyfriend in eight months. That was when she filed the restraining order against him, after he punched her in the face but before either of them knew she was carrying their baby. Tamika pretended to sleep while monitoring his every move. When the nurse finally came in, Tamika quietly told her that the baby’s father needed to leave, that he wasn’t allowed to be there. Rahman Nichols stood up without any objection and carefully returned his daughter to the nurse’s arms and disapproving stare.

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