Excerpt of Platinum by Aliya King

Beth dipped her head and slid her shades from her forehead to the bridge of her nose. It was out of habit—not necessity. There wouldn’t be any photographers in the parking lot of her gynecologist’s office at 7:00 a.m. on a Saturday.

She’d only been photographed alone once, last summer, when she went to Riker’s Island after Z punched out a cop at a concert at Madison Square. The paparazzi caught her speeding up to the courthouse to post bail, her dirty blonde hair covering her eyes and tears streaming down her face.

In the doctor’s office, Beth kept her eyes straight ahead, grabbed a clipboard, scanned it quickly and signed it. She returned the paperwork to the receptionist, who gave her a look of half-boredom and half-disdain. Beth wondered if the look was especially for her. Or if every patient got the same look. It could have been that she recognized the name Beth Saddlebrook and wondered what it was like to be married to someone like Z. Or she could have noticed that she marked off “specific problem” instead of “general wellness checkup” as the cause of her visit.

In one of Dr. Hamilton’s examining rooms she sat, her long legs dangling over the side of the vinyl-covered table. A nurse came in to ask preliminary questions. Beth told her she thought she might have a yeast infection; something she knew was not true. The next nurse gave her a cup for a urine sample and then took a vial of blood. They’d test it for whatever they could right in the office and Dr. Hamilton would look over the results before she came in. She’d be able to tell Beth what she really needed to know. Sweat dripped down the small of Beth’s broad back. She was built like a linebacker—and sweated like one. She wasn’t fat. But her mother said she came out of the womb as solid as a concrete wall.

The central air in the doctor’s office made the examination room feel like the inside of a meat locker. But the beads of sweat on her forehead kept popping up. It was as if her body didn’t believe it had escaped from the thick muggy August heat. Dr. Hamilton didn’t do the courtesy knock. She opened the door with such force that it banged against the wall and slammed shut before she was facing Beth.

“You have Trichomonas,” she said and then folded her arms tight across her chest. Like Beth, Dr. Hamilton, was one of those white girls from West Virginia who could neck-swivel better than most black girls from Jersey. And like most white women with roots in the south, she had a no-nonsense demeanor that belied her ethnicity. She had been Beth’s first and only gynecologist. She’d known her since she was 12. Beth pretended to be shocked and confused, raising a hand to her mouth and looking around the tiny room as if the explanation to her latest malady could be found in the glass container of cotton balls or the box of disposable gloves. “You haven’t had enough Beth?” Dr. Hamilton’s eyes bored holes into the top of her head. “Will you leave him before or after he gives you H.I.V.?” Beth flipped her head up to the ceiling and then leveled it at Dr. Hamilton. “My period is late,” she said. “I thought I should come in because–” Dr. Hamilton let out a loud rush of breath–a snort that had tinges of a scream. She turned her back on Beth and went to the door.

“Yeah, she said with a tinge of a scream that sounded like a snort.

“You’re pregnant too. Get undressed. I’ll be back to examine you.” Beth carefully took off her khaki jumpsuit. It was made by a company that specialized in outfits for blue-collar workers: sturdy pants with lots of pockets and work shirts that came in colors like blue, black and khaki and could be used for uniforms. Beth had dozens of the one-piece suits. They were easy, comfortable and hid her body well.

Beth was from Miracle Run, a mining town in West Virginia. Halfway between Ragtown and Bula, Miracle Run didn’t quite live up to its name. No miracles. And nowhere to run. Nothing but dirt, rattlers and of course coal, a thin layer hung in the air at all times, clogging your ears, your brain and your way of thinking. Beth’s four brothers wore the one-piece work outfits as a uniform. She began to borrow them at the age of seven. Now, in Dr. Hamilton’s office, Beth was ten years and five hundred miles away from Miracle Run. And yet, the need to cover her body remained. She lived in a McMansion purchased with the profits of her husband’s tour dates and royalties.

She had a staff of people running her massive house, just three doors away from Reverend Run. But she still felt like she needed to protect herself from dirt. In her life, it was everywhere. She knew women like Kimora Simmons snickered. But she wore her jumpsuits anyway. And Timberlands too. Beth closed her eyes tight and stripped off her bra and panties, stuffing them inside the fold of her jumpsuit. On Oprah, she’d once heard that almost all women were fussy about the way they arranged their clothing before a gynecological exam. No one ever left panties on the outside of that little sad bundle of clothing. Even though they were about to have their legs splayed and their orifices probed, somehow visible underwear would make them feel even more vulnerable. Beth pulled the gown over her body and scooted her butt down low to the edge of the table so Dr. Hamilton wouldn’t have to tell her to.

She stared at the ceiling, calculating. If I’m pregnant, the baby was conceived in early July. Had to be like the 1st of the month ‘cause that was the same day Z came back from Anguilla. She listened closely to see if she could hear Dr. Hamilton out in the hall. When she was sure she heard nothing, she hopped up, went into the pocket of her jumpsuit and took out a crumpled sheet of paper. She positioned herself back on the table just as Dr. Hamilton did a courtesy one-knock and came back in. “You’ve had 17 urinary tract infections,” said Dr. Hamilton, sitting on the wheeled stool and rolling herself up to Beth. She put Beth’s feet in the stirrups and snapped on a pair of gloves. “That’s genetic,” Beth said, bracing herself for the doctor’s touch. Dr. Hamilton didn’t even pretend she was paying attention. “You’ve had gonorrhea, syphilis and you may have HPV, which is the virus that causes cervical cancer. You’ve had seven yeast infections in the past two years because your husband refuses to get treated for it so he can stop passing it back to you.”

Dr. Hamilton did not tell Beth that she was going to put her hand inside of her. Without warning, her left hand was deep inside Beth, probing. Her right hand was pressing into her abdomen. Usually, Dr. Hamilton was quiet during the actual examination, her head cocked to one side as if she could hear Beth’s body speaking to her. But this time, she talked straight through like she was giving a lecture. “You come in here with things I can treat,” she said, her fingers on Beth’s cervix. “And then you come in here with things I can’t. Like herpes. Which by the way, you will have forever, as I’m sure you know.”

Dr. Hamilton removed her fingers from Beth, peeled her gloves off and let out a deep sigh. Beth pushed herself up to a sitting position, trying to keep the gown from slipping off. “I’m not sure if I can continue to treat you,” said Dr. Hamilton, looking over Beth’s file. “If you won’t take any measures to protect yourself and stay healthy, I really don’t want any parts of–” “How far along am I?” Beth asked. Dr. Hamilton rubbed one hand over her face, put her clipboard down on the counter behind her and gave Beth a wan smile. “About six weeks.” “So that means the baby was conceived when? Like around the first? It couldn’t be mid-July right?” Beth’s eyes swept the office for a calendar. “It would have to be around the first of the month…” Beth’s mouth was running so fast, trying to get confirmation that she’d conceived during the right time, that she forgot about the paper in her hand until Dr. Hamilton took it away from her. “What is this?” Dr. Hamilton glanced at the paper and then her face went flush. “A Chinese birth prediction chart? What the–” Dr. Hamilton rolled her eyes. “Do I really need to refer you to a psychiatrist?” “That chart was buried in China 7,000 years ago and it’s 90% accurate,” Beth said, reaching for the paper. “I tried it with my mother and me and all my brothers and it came out right every time.” Dr. Hamilton’s shoulders slumped. She leaned against the door to the room and clutched the clipboard to her chest. “You have four healthy boys,” she said in a soft voice. “Beautiful boys. I delivered every one of them.” They both exchanged a brief look. In her third pregnancy, Beth had been pregnant with twins. Only one survived. Z blamed Dr. Hamilton. Beth did not. “You can not continue to subject yourself to that man’s disease-ridden flesh because he wants a little girl. You just can’t.”

Beth smoothed her hands across her hair, calculating her due date in her head. She felt it this time. She’d never felt like she was having a girl. But this time was different. Beth had read How To Choose The Sex of Your Baby by some guy named Shettles.

He said that boy sperms were faster and more aggressive so if penetration was deep, the boy sperms had a head start. If you just did it missionary style, there was a better chance for the girls to make it. She’d done everything in the book. (She didn’t actually have the whole book. She’d never read a whole book unless it was for school. But she had a photocopied packet of all the important stuff that she’d gotten from her best friend Kipenzi. Kipenzi didn’t believe a word of it but thought it was entertaining). For the past six months, she’d only let Z have sex on top of her. No doggie style, ever.

He whined, begged and complained regularly. On one occasion, when he was drunk, he grabbed her shoulder, forced her onto her stomach and then put one hand underneath her to lift her up. She fought her way out of bed and ran into their oldest son Zander’s room and slept on the floor. 16 year-old Zander found his father passed out in front of the door to his brother Zakee’s room, naked and with vomit on his chest and in his three inch Afro. Zander dragged his father to the master bedroom before one of the other kids saw him there and freaked out. She’d had sex with Z every day in the five days of her ovulation cycle, which meant she had to drive an hour from home to Electric Lady Studios in the village every day for a quickie on the couch in the studio lounge.

She’d kept him away from caffeinated beverages, (the caffeine gave those pesky boy sperms an extra boost), and she’d douched with water and vinegar right before they’d had sex. (According to Shettles, the more acidic the woman’s body, the better chances for having a girl.) Kipenzi had highlighted one line from the excerpt. Something about the chances of having a girl being increased if the woman did not have an orgasm. In the margins of the pages, Kipenzi had written how do you stop yourself from coming? That was one tip Beth didn’t have to worry about. She’d had three orgasms in her life. And none of them were during sex with Z. Or anyone else for that matter. “Bethie?” Hearing the doctor call her by her nickname, the name her mother used to call her, made her head snap up. For a half-second, she thought it was her mother calling her name and her brain rushed with an overload of things she would tell her. I have four boys Mommy. Just like you.

“I’m going to give you a prescription for the Trich. Here’s some information about it,” she said, pressing some brochures into her hand. “Are you taking prenatals?” Beth nodded. She’d be taken a pre-natal vitamin every morning since she was 15 and Dr. Hamilton told her she was pregnant with Zander. “I’m going to refer you to Dr. Browning. He’s just joined this practice and he’s great. I want you to–” Beth reached out and grabbed Dr. Hamilton’s shoulder. “No.” Dr. Hamilton kept her eyes on her paperwork. “I really think he might be a better–” “No.”

The doctor looked into Beth’s face. It was the same round, pasty face that came into her office in Miracle Run almost fifteen years ago. At fifteen, Beth had already reached her full height, nearly six feet tall. Her mother brought her in after finding her on the living room couch with Z. “Caught her with that little nigger from New York City down here visiting family,” her mother said, her fat cheek packed with tobacco. “Need to know if she’s been fucking. So I can put her ass out directly.” Beth’s mother told her to do a full pelvic exam. The young girl screamed bloody murder, bucking and jumping every time the doctor tried to put the speculum inside her.

When Dr. Hamilton told Beth’s mother that she was pregnant, the woman pulled her hand back as far as it would go and smacked Beth so hard that she rolled off the table and landed on the floor. Her gown came off and she was naked, crying and trying to scamper under the table to avoid her mother’s blows. Dr. Hamilton had to pull the woman off Beth and have her escorted from the office. Dr. Hamilton never allowed her back in. But she continued to see Beth through the pregnancy and delivered her son, Zander, with her boyfriend Z standing right next to her, cheering her on and crying at the same time. Then, Dr. Hamilton moved her offices to New Jersey, escaping coalmine country for her own reasons. She thought she’d never see Beth again. But two years later, in came Beth, pregnant for the second time. She was living in Queens with Z, in an apartment in Fresh Meadows. She rode up to Dr. Hamilton’s Englewood office in a new Acura, driven by Z’s manager. A year later, she was pregnant with twins and being chauffeured to the office in a Lincoln Navigator. Now, she drove herself, in one of seven late-model luxury cars, and left the boys with their father or the nanny. Dr. Hamilton had watched Beth grow up. Like all of her patients, in some morbid way, she was also watching her die. But Beth seemed to be looking for a shortcut. Dr. Hamilton took Beth’s hand off her shoulder and scribbled something on her clipboard. “Your due date is early May,” she said. “Make an appointment with the receptionist for two weeks from today.” Beth nodded and exhaled. She kept her hands folded in her lap until the door closed and then reached for her underwear and began to get dressed. There was a knock and she froze. She grabbed her jumpsuit and held it up to her body. Dr. Hamilton kept her body outside the door and let her face peek through. “What if it’s another boy?” she asked. Her eyebrows were creased. “It won’t be. The law of averages are on my side,” Beth said.

“And if it’s a boy?” “Z wants a girl so bad that I think he can will it to happen,” Beth said. “A boy is not an option. We have four already.”

“Look. It could be a boy,” said Dr. Hamilton. “God is just fucking with you at this point. You have to decide if you want to keep creating new life. Or save your own.”

Dr. Hamilton closed the door and Beth pulled her legs through her jumpsuit and zipped it up. She took out the elastic holding her hair back, smoothed her hair down with both hands and then replaced the band. While she reapplied lip balm, lotion and put on her earrings, she thought about what Dr. Hamilton said. She knew Dr. Hamilton thought she was a fool. Not for trying to have a girl. But for trying to have one with Z. How exactly do you explain to a doctor that your husband is your hero because you watched him rob someone in the middle of the day when you were nine years old? How do you explain what it feels like to see a little black boy with dusty hair talk shit to the white man who managed the general store when your own father was scared to ask his boss for a switch to the day shift? How do you fix your mouth to explain that the memory of seeing Z crack a bottle over the back of Leon Tucker’s head for poking Beth with a stick made you swell with pride years later?

And what about her boys? Z gave her a reason to take them and run at least once a month. But then what? Then she became her own mother. What if she couldn’t handle single motherhood? Her mother had left her father and took all the kids. A year later, the state had all of the boys and Beth was pregnant. Beth Saddlebrook had no confidence that she could raise her boys on her own. If nothing else, Z was their father. And in some ways, he was her father too. Of course there were other women. Of course there was drama. Z was a dog. And as such, he was the leader of their pack. Four boys and a skittish den mother who kept coming up pregnant instead of remembering to remove and replace her Nuvaring. It didn’t make sense. And Beth knew that.

She ambled out of the doctor’s office, her slew-foot gait making her seem nine months pregnant when she wasn’t even showing. She left a twenty-dollar bill on the counter and gestured to a nurse to make sure she saw it. Beth pressed a button on her cell phone and waited. She put the earpiece into her ear and took the stairs to the lobby instead of the elevator so she wouldn’t lose the call. “Who dis?” “Boo, it’s Beth. Where’s Z?” “He’s in the basement. In the booth. I’ma tell ‘em to hit you right back.” “No. I need to talk to him now.” “Beth, he don’t like it when I give him calls in the booth.” “Boo. It’s an emergency.” “Hold on.” “This is Dylan, who is this?” Beth rolled her eyes. “It’s me Dylan, put my husband on the phone.” “Beth can I please have him call you right back? I’ve been trying to get him to do these drops for three hours.” “I’ll hold.” Dylan, the other white girl in Z’s life, the one who always knew where he was, inhaled and then exhaled hard through her nose. “Fine. Hold on please.” Beth was two miles away, pulling onto the freeway when her husband finally picked up. “Who-Is-This?” “Baby. It’s me.” “Whats-going-on?-you-aiight-I’m-working-I-can’t-talk.” Z had a marble-mouth, rapid-fire delivery that made it nearly impossible for some people to understand him. Sometimes Beth wondered how he managed to sell ten million records when he could barely speak clearly. “I just left the doctor. I’m pregnant.” “Get-the-fuck-out-of-here! God-is-good-baby. You-know-that? God-is-good.” “I know. It’s just like your grandmother said. Four boys and then a girl.” There was a silence on the other line. “You-know-its-a-girl? How-you-know-already?” “I don’t know for sure. But Z I feel it this time.” “Yo. You-know-my-grandmother-was-a-powerful-woman. She-said-I-wouldn’t-have-nothing-I-really-wanted-til-I-had-a-baby-girl. You-heard-her-say-that.” “I know,” Beth said, “I remember. But Z, I mean, even if…” “Don’t-even-play-like-that-mama. Don’t-fucking-play-like-that. My-grandmother-predicted-my-mother’s-death. She-predicted-everything-that-ever-happened-in-my-life-so-don’t-evenfuckingactlikeyoudontknow. Last-thing-she-told-me-was-that-my-daughter-would-save-my-life. I-don’t-even-know-what-the-fuck-she-meant. But-we-gotta-have-a-baby-girl-Beth.” Beth kept her hands tight on the steering wheel. She heard Z inhale something. “What was that?” “A-Newport-baby-just-a-cigarette-calm-down.” Beth took one hand off the steering wheel just long enough to bite at the cuticle of her thumbnail. “Are you sure? It’s just a cigarette?” “DONT-RIDE-ME-Beth” “I’m sorry Z! I’m sorry. Calm down.” “I-can’t-talk-now. See-you-at-the-house.” “I love you baby.” “Beth. I-love-you-too. Sorry-I-yelled.You-feel-okay.You-need-Boo-to-get-you-something?” “Are you coming home tonight?” “Yes-baby-I’m-coming-straight-home-to-kiss-both-my-baby-girls.” Beth looked up into her rearview mirror to see the grin spreading across her face. She told her husband she loved him and continued home. He didn’t come home for three days.

Fact: There were other women. Beth knew this. Had always known it. And she’d turned a blind eye for years. He didn’t love them. He didn’t need them. He just fucked them. Sex was always a necessary evil for Beth. She lost her virginity at 12 to a beer buddy of her father’s who thought she was 16. She’d never had an orgasm with any man. And it scared the shit out of her when she was able to make it happen on her own. Sex was what you did to calm your husband down, keep him home or apologize. It was not for pleasuring yourself. So he fucked other women. Fine. Beth just didn’t like blatant disrespect. One night in a hotel? Fine. Two nights and now the kids need an explanation? Not cool. On the third night without her husband in bed with her, Beth turned off Frasier and pulled out her laptop. Her fingers flew over the keyboard, taking her to all the gossip sites she scoured. Theybf.com had a huge photo of her best friend Kipenzi pulling her underwear out of her butt outside of a CVS. Beth winced, knowing her friend would be mortified.

She scrolled through all the headlines, looking for her husband’s name. When she reached a story she’d read earlier that evening, she clicked out and went to mediatakeout (You’ll never believe who has HERPES and IS SPREADING IT ON PURPOSE!!!!!!! screamed the headline), then she went to perezhilton and finally concreteloop.

There, in the upper right hand corner of concreteloop were three rotating pictures, highlighting the top stories on the site. A photo came up, under the title Coupled Up! and there was Z. Beth clicked on the picture, enlarging it. And peered close at her computer screen. Z was at a nightclub, wearing clothes Beth had never seen before. He’d often have Boo or Dylan buy him new clothes to avoid coming home. In the picture, he had his hand running through his thick Afro while he leaned over to talk to a woman. The woman was standing on tiptoe, her hand cupping his ear. His mouth was wide with laughter. Beth pulled her knees up and settled the computer on her lap. She brought the screen closer, practically to her nose, as if she could see down to the pixels and understand exactly why her husband was bold enough to be photographed at a club with another woman two days after she told him she was pregnant for the fifth time. The woman was small and thin with creamy, cocoa brown skin. A long sheet of hair hung down her shoulders. One wide brown eye was visible above her hand. She had on fake eyelashes and tons of mascara. From her profile, she seemed plain. This worried Beth. When she saw him hugged up with the cute ones, she never worried. They weren’t really interested in Z. Just wanted to get their pictures on the gossip sites. Z was known to go a week without showering or brushing his teeth just because. It was the plain ones, like this chick, that would hold their breath and deal with his stench just to get pregnant. Z usually tired of his groupies before Beth could even catch one.

But this one. This one she kept seeing around. Her picture was up in the studio; there were paparazzi shots of them at parties, premieres. Boo told Beth he’d been sleeping in the studio for three nights, overwhelmed by creativity and recording like mad. It was a lie. Beth knew he was with this woman. And as always, Z was creeping with a black girl. Beth tried to convince herself that it didn’t matter. But it did. She wondered if he was missing something from her. Is that why he cheated? He loved to run his hands in her stick straight, naturally blonde hair. He was constantly staring into her eyes and commenting on how beautiful they were—the color of the ocean. In bed, he’d hold her hand and point out the contrasts of their skin. Damn you pale as hell, he would say, smiling. He said it like it was a complement. Like it was some worthy feat she’d accomplished down in the Miracle Run coalmines. So why did he always cheat with Black girls? Did he want to run his fingers through their nappy, kinky hair? Did he like to intertwine his hands through fingers that looked like his? What was it? Beth peered harder into her laptop and jumped when she heard her phone ring. She pressed Talk immediately, not taking her eyes off her laptop. “Yeah?” “Beth, I’m so tired.” “Kipenzi, you okay?” “No.” Beth moved her laptop to the bed and sat up straight. “What’s wrong? Where’s Jake?” “Jakes’s in the studio. Beth, I don’t want to sing anymore.” “Is this about the pictures online?’

Kipenzi groaned.

“Pictures? From where?”

“Never mind. Are you okay?” “I’m over it Beth,” Kipenzi said. “I’m really over it. My feet hurt. My throat hurts. I just want to sleep.” “You need a vacation,” Beth said. “No, I need a retirement plan.” “Sleep on it Kipenzi,” Beth said. “Call me first thing in the morning. I’ll bet you’ll feel different.” Kipenzi hung up and Beth refreshed her Internet connection and did a final lap across all the gossip sites, ending at mediatakeout. (DOES she have HEMMERRHOIDS!?!? You will NEVER BELIEVE who was caught DIGGING UP HER BUTT at a pharmacy. NASTY!!!! Click here for exclusive photos!!!!!!!) Beth closed her laptop, slid it into the drawer of her nightstand and turned to her side, holding her belly as she slept.