Sasha

I love my husband, but he was driving me straight to the crazy house. All he wanted was to get me pregnant. But I didn't want no kids, and if he found out that I was on birth control, he probably would have killed me.

I could smell bacon frying and knew my husband was trying to pamper me by cooking me breakfast, but I wasn't feelin' it. I was lying comfortably on my black silk sheets, not wanting to get up because my head was throbbing from the Cîroc I drank the night before. I knew I shouldn't have gone out with Melody and Asia. Every time I went out with them, I always drank too much and paid for it the morning after. But this time, as soon as I got home last night, my husband and I got into it.

"Babe, what I tell you about coming home drunk? We trying to have a baby. You need to let loose on the alcohol. If you can't handle your liquor, then I'm not going to allow you to go out with yo' irresponsible cousins," he snapped at me as if I were his teenage daughter.

"Wait a damn minute! What do you mean you not going to allow me to go out? You need to dismiss yo' self with that bull. I may have had a few drinks, but I ain't drunk. You are not my daddy, and you are not going to sit there and tell me where I can and can't go," I spat as I took off my heels. I could feel the heat coming through my pores.

"Babe, I didn't mean it like that. I just want to make sure you stay healthy, you know ... so we can have a baby," he said with compassion.

"You need to stop stressing me out. I'm not able to have any more kids!" I shouted as I walked away from him.

I had tried to convince him that after my miscarriage, my body wasn't strong enough to produce another baby. I really wanted to tell him that there would be no baby. But it didn't matter how many times or the different ways I told him; he wouldn't listen to me.

"Sasha, don't say that. I can feel it. We have been trying hard, and I know you will be pregnant pretty soon. And I can't wait to be a father." He grinned and took me in his arms. Then he continued, "Let's make love right now."

As horny as I was, I didn't want to make love to my husband. He turned me off because he concentrated so hard on making a baby that he didn't pay enough attention to me. He didn't make me feel that passion that I needed to feel while making love to him. There was no connection or affection. All he did was gently slide his shaft inside of me because he thought I would break, pump a few times, explode in me, smile, and then roll over and pray that when we woke up I would be pregnant. He had a stash of pregnancy tests in the nightstand, and he would beg me to pee on the stick the day after he had his five minutes of fame.

* * *

It was not always like that. We had been married for two years, and I used to make passionate love to my husband. He definitely knew how to work my middle, and he knew how to keep my juices flowing. But after I had that miscarriage last year, he was devastated, and he hadn't been the same since.

The only thing on his mind was having a baby and making sure that I kept my body healthy so I could get pregnant and carry the baby full term. I took the miscarriage as a sign that maybe it just wasn't time for me to have a baby. If left up to me, we didn't need any. We had enough running around my family. If I wanted to googoo and gaa-gaa with a baby, I could pick up one of Asia's kids. And the best thing about that was that I could drop their behinds right back to their mammie.

Asia was my cousin, and the girl had more kids than I could remember. She had three, or maybe she had four. Hell, I don't remember; I lost count. And they all looked different. They were all different races and had different daddies. That girl should've been ashamed of herself. And she treated her kids so wrong.

She did take good care of them. She gave them what they needed to survive, but she was so mean to them. She would call them out of their names and holler at them all day. Well, she was nice to her daughter, Angel, because she was her favorite, and she let everyone know that.

Asia, at times, couldn't stand me. I didn't know why because I ain't never done nothing to her. I think she's jealous because I had a husband, and I didn't have any kids to stress me out. And she had a bunch of kids and couldn't pull a good man, let alone a husband, if her life depended on it.

My other cousin, Melody, all I could do was shake my head when it came to her. She was driving herself crazy because she was in love with a man that apparently didn't love her. She was in such denial of being his side chick. Yes, I hooked her up with Rodney a few years back. I thought they could have fun together, but she done went and fell in love with him.

I told her many times not to get all up in her feelings with every man she met, but, naw, she had to get all emotional and attached to the "D" that she didn't know what to do with herself. But I rooted for them. I hoped Rodney would get his stuff together.

"Bebe, your breakfast is served," my husband, Jonathan, said, pulling me from my thoughts. He walked into our spacious bedroom with one of my good bath towels wrapped around his waist and a tray with pancakes, eggs, bacon, and a red rose on it.

Oh, Lawd! He was trying to be romantic so he could pump his wannabe-baby-making-sperm in me after he fed me breakfast. "Thanks, Jay." I plastered on a smile.

"Anything for you, beautiful." He smiled and kissed me on my cheek. "Did you get a chance to take the test this morning? Last night was great. I think I might have hit a home run," he said, rubbing his hands together.

Sometimes my husband could be so corny, and I wanted to slap him upside his head when he said the dumbest things. "Yes, I did. It was negative," I lied about taking the test. I knew it was going to be negative.

"Well, soon as you are done eating, we can try again." He stood and let his towel drop to the floor. Then he put his hands on his hips like he was Spider-Man or Superman — one of those damn superheroes, and said, "Daddy is ready."

Well, I'm not.

I almost choked on my food as I glared at his limp penis. He just didn't know, but there wouldn't be no damn baby coming out of me. And I was tired of his boring sex.

Melody

"Mel, I love spending time with you, but I look at you as only a...