by Kata Čuić
Maybe he won’t do anything to win.
I could kiss Evie right now.
She digs her heels in. “Yeah, he said cutting the cord wasn’t like he expected either. He figured it would be like snipping string with scissors, but instead it was all spongy and he had to, like, saw away at it with a scalpel. He said the way blood squirted from it was kind of cool though.”
Mayview puts a fist over his mouth and lurches forward. I hope his puke tastes like rotten eggs. The same way his putrid breath smells.
“I, uh…I don’t think I’m welcome for the delivery either. Every time they put her legs in the stirrups to check the action downstairs, she made me step out into the hallway. I guess I’m supposed to wait out here.”
Evie tsks. “Get comfortable, then. This is her first baby, so she could go all night. I labored for nearly twenty hours with this little guy.”
Mayview glances at his smart watch. It’s already seven in the evening. His stomach grumbles. “Who are you, again?”
“Oh…” Evie steps around me, then extends her hand. “How rude of me. Giving you all this advice like a complete stranger. I’m Amira’s sister, Jasmine. It’s nice to meet you.”
Even if Mayview ever saw that nude spread that Evie did way back in college, she looks nothing like her WAG days anymore. She looks like a new mom who hasn’t showered in a few days, has more spit-up on her shirt than seems healthy for the baby, and she’s definitely put on a few pounds since then. It’s kind of hilarious that her disheveled appearance makes her look like a completely different person than the put-together mom who attended a baby shower at my house.
I grit my teeth when Mayview shakes her hand.
“Nice to meet you, too. I’m sure she’ll be happy to have a woman she trusts back there with her.” He smiles that fake plastic shit he gives to the media as he gestures toward me. “You should definitely help her shake off this loser though. He’s nothing but bad news.”
Evie glances at me like she’s meeting me for the first time before returning her attention to Mayview. “I wouldn’t worry about that, Alex. She’s been in love with you forever. Honestly, I’m surprised it’s taken you two this long to settle down and start living your happily ever after.”
Mayview gapes like a fish even though his face turns bright red.
I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing. “I’m actually Alex. That’s B-lake.”
“Oh.” Evie furrows her brow. “How awkward. So sorry about that. Just because my sister works with pro players doesn’t mean I’m a fan. I don’t actually like football.” She stares up at Mayview. “Who are you, again? Amira’s never mentioned someone named B-lake before.”
I do laugh this time. I can’t help it. Evie Falls. Doesn’t like football. Fucking hilarious.
Mayview has no idea who’s pulling his chain like a goddamn professional actress. Actually, it might be he’s just that stupid. If he’d paid attention at the baby shower, he would know this woman is the wife of one of his biggest rivals for the position of top QB in the league. This guy never pays attention to anything that doesn’t extend past the tip of his crooked nose unless it’s on the field.
He glares at Evie and crosses his arms over his chest. “Sure, she’s mentioned me. I’m her friend. The guy who’s supported her throughout her pregnancy.”
Evie’s eyes flit back and forth like she’s genuinely thinking about conversations that never happened in reality.
“No,” she finally drags out. “No, she didn’t mention you. In all fairness, I’ve been kind of busy with her nephew the past few months, but I distinctly remember her blabbing to me how ecstatic she was to have Alex’s baby.”
“It’s not even his baby!” Mayview interrupts.
Evie blinks at him like she clearly thinks he’s lost his mind. “Um, yeah, it is.”
“No, it’s not,” he argues. “I overheard someone yelling about it at the baby shower.”
“Ooh.” Evie winces. “How embarrassing. That was actually me they were talking about. I have no idea who my baby daddy is.” She bounces Robbie on her hip like a prop to sell this shitshow. “Before I cleaned up my act and got married, I was always sleeping around. Amira and I got into it at the baby shower because we’re sisters.” She shrugs. “Sisters fight sometimes.”
My lungs fucking burn from holding in my hysterical laughter. How she’s pulling this off, I’ll never know.
Mayview drags his hands down his face. His eyes are bugging out. He pleads with me, “That’s not your baby.”
I nod, smile, do all the things I would do on camera. The whole time I’m imagining beating his face into an even uglier pulp. “Yeah. She is.”
“Fuck this.” He blows out a breath. “It’s not worth it. You’re getting surgery anyway, so your contract is as good as gone.”
Evie and I watch him stalk away. He stabs the elevator button until he finally gives up and heads down the stairwell.
“Jasmine? Really? I never thought you were racist before, Falls. You know Amira’s Lebanese, not Arabic, right?”
“Shut up. Here. Take him.” She hoists Robbie onto me so fast that I have no choice but to catch him. “I do prefer to get my hands dirty, especially when I’m cleaning up my own messes. Let me see if I can work anymore magic today.”
I watch as she scurries to the nurse’s station. She definitely has a bit of magic left in her because Nurse Ratched immediately buzzes Evie into the secure hallway where the delivery rooms are.
Robbie spits out his binky. It lands on the filthy tile floor with a dull thump. He makes a noise that’s way too close to the sound Pavlov makes when he’s coughing up a hairball.
Slimy warmth spreads across my shirt.
“This is a sick kind of irony,” I say to the kid as I walk us over to his diaper bag. Hopefully, there’s a burp cloth in here somewhere. “I selfishly practiced how to love someone on your mom, and now I’m going to practice dadding with you. Go ahead, little Falls. Do your worst. I deserve it. Your mom just earned her forgiveness. I have some catching up to do.”
He does give me his worst. He shits his pants a million times in only a few hours. Pukes on me a couple hundred times. I’m honestly wondering if I shouldn’t ask one of the nurses to check him out when Rob barrels into the waiting area.
I have never been happier to see him. I hold his baby out. “Please. For the love of God, I can’t take anymore.”
Rob laughs as he scoops his son up and kisses his gross face. He murmurs, “Hey, buddy. Daddy missed you.”
“I think he’s sick,” I mutter as I wipe my shirt down. Again. It doesn’t even matter anymore. I have a clean change of clothes in the go-bag, but it’s in the delivery room with Amira. Evie hasn’t been back out since she went in. “He’s been crapping and puking like a machine. I don’t even know where it’s all coming from. He hasn’t eaten in hours.”
“Get used to it. Babies spit up and crap all the time. It’s normal,” Rob says as he sits next to me. He digs around in the diaper bag with one hand until he comes up with a bottle. “Evie’s in the room with Amira, I take it?”
I forgot Evie pumps breastmilk for bottles. I already suck at this dad thing. Poor Robbie’s probably starving, and I’ve just been waiting here like a chump for his milk lady to reappear. I slump further in my seat. “Yeah. She’s been in there for at least three hours. Amira’s been here since this morning. I think we’re going on…uh…twelve hours of labor. I’m starting to lose track of time, and I’ve also been banned from the delivery room for some unknown reason. I haven’t even seen Amira yet.”
Rob winces. “Evie told me about the shit she found online. Maybe Amira’s pissed about that.”
“No. I don’t think that’s why.” I rub my forehead and try to figure out where everything went so wrong today.
Someone who might have some answers arrives. She reaches for her baby and cuddles him close to her.
“Can I go back now?” I want to jump up, but I can’t. My kn
ee is killing me after sitting here for so long. “Is the baby here yet?”
“Not yet, no. Amira doesn’t want you in there, and I don’t blame her. Labor and delivery are hard enough without the kind of emotional turmoil you’ve put that poor woman through.” Evie shakes her head. “You really stepped in it this time, Alex.”
“I didn’t spray paint her car!”
“You made a bet with the whole team that you could put a ring on her finger by the end of the season?” Evie narrows her eyes at me. “Because just getting her into your bed would be too easy?”
Oh, shit. Oh, fuck.
Mayview.
I should have clocked him when I had the chance.
Labor is a special kind of pain. One that has a finite end point and also results in the happiest moment of a woman’s life. So long as nothing goes wrong. There’s a man somewhere named Murphy who made a law about all the ways everything can go wrong.
The stitches that burn and pull across my abdomen are proof that things can go very, very wrong.
I roll my head toward the other pillow on the bed. “If my mother was here, she’d be telling me that I couldn’t even give birth right. She would insist that I am a weak woman for having a C-section.”
“Your mother sounds like such a lovely person.” Evie smiles at me. “I’m only sorry we weren’t introduced at the shower. If you want, I can call her and explain how laboring for forty-nine hours is the total opposite of weak. The C-section wasn’t optional by that point.”
“I was hoping to recover a little more before calling her at all,” I admit.
The baby and I have been home for two days already after the two days it took to deliver her and then another two days of observation at the hospital. I don’t think two months is too much to ask before inviting my mother to meet her granddaughter after all we’ve been through.
Evie reaches across the mattress to pat my shoulder. “Don’t push yourself. You’re rightfully exhausted after that marathon. You have a beautiful new baby girl to care for. It’s going to take you a while to find your new normal and to bounce back after all that.”
“Thank you for staying.” Tears choke my voice. More tears. More discomfort. More sleeplessness. I thought it would all magically disappear after the birth.
I was so, so wrong. It’s been nothing but more Murphy and his stupid laws.
Evie inches closer and raises her eyebrow, whispering like we’re sharing dark secrets. We’re already sharing a bed, so might as well. “Honestly, you would have had to hire security to drag me away.”
That does sound a little dark. I’m intrigued. “Why?”
She chuckles. “Because you really, really need the help. I had a whole team with me for weeks after Robbie was born—my mom, Rob’s mom who’s a nurse, my grandmother, my sister for a few days. Rob would have lost his mind in the middle of the season trying to balance work while taking care of me and Robbie. Everyone thinks C-sections are so common now that the mother should just bounce back. It’s major surgery. You need rest and time to heal. With a newborn? That means lots and lots of help.”
I am so ashamed to have ever hated this woman even as I’m still jealous of her big, supportive family. I am also going to cry. Again. “I can’t ask you to stay for weeks. That’s not only unfair to you, but also to your husband and son.”
She lifts a shoulder. “It’s the offseason. We were planning on laying low over the summer anyway since Robbie’s so young.”
“All the more reason for him to spend his first summer at home.”
“He’s four months old. Home is wherever I am. I’m here with you for as long as you need me.”
Yes. Definitely crying.
I can’t even make myself stop when someone knocks on the closed bedroom door.
Alex pokes his head in. “Jesus Christ, Falls. What did you do to her this time?”
“Being really emotional after such a long labor and surgical delivery is normal. I completely lost it once after someone didn’t close the screen door to the back patio all the way.” Evie sits up on the side of the bed that used to be Alex’s. She pulls the pillow from behind her and presses it against my stomach. “Here. This will help, so it doesn’t hurt so much to cry. Let it out though. Don’t try to hold it in.”
I couldn’t hold it in if I tried. The pillow really does help. The pain really is nearly unbearable.
A gurgling coo reaches my ears through my ugly sobbing.
Alex limps to the bassinet beside the bed. He lifts out the wriggling ball of limbs that has once again escaped her swaddling. “Ssh. Ssh, little princess. My sweet Layla.” He kisses her round, pink face. “What do you want? Hmm? Tell Daddy.”
The sights and sounds of Alex being the kind of father I always knew he would be stabs me in the gut.
He missed it.
He wasn’t there.
I wouldn’t let him be.
I stole a moment away from him that he can never get back. It doesn’t make me feel better about what he’s stolen from me.
Baby Layla tries her best to eat his face. He laughs and nuzzles her. Then, he limps to the beside and lays her beside me. She wants to nurse, and he’s not equipped for that.
It takes both Alex and Evie to roll me into position. I never realized before how much simple movement depends on a strong core that hasn’t been recently sliced open.
“Can I get you anything?” he whispers as he strokes her soft cheek. “Do you want something to drink? Something to eat? Another blanket?”
I squeeze my eyes shut and shake my head. I can’t look at him anymore. I don’t want to hear his offers of comfort. They’re not real. Tears roll down my cheeks. I’m so sick of crying.
“Let me take the baby for the night, so you can sleep at least,” he begs.
“No,” I rasp.
“I can do it,” he insists. “I flushed the last of the pills. I didn’t get a new prescription from the surgeon. I won’t sleep at all if that’ll make you feel better. Please, Amira? Just let me have a little time with her.”
He’s barely gotten to hold her since she was born. That’s his own fault.
I shake my head again. “She needs to stay near me. I’m her mother.”
“I’m her father.”
I hope my eyes look as scary as he once accused them of being. “We’re your game.”
“No! No, I swear it wasn’t like—” He shuts up as he glances over my shoulder.
I’ve overheard Evie tell him more than once that now isn’t the time to plead his case.
I never want to hear his defense. I know what he’s capable of. The whole world and everything in it are a game to Alex. He plays by his own rules.
If it wasn’t for being so sore, so exhausted, so…overwhelmed, I wouldn’t have even come back to this house. I hate lying in this bed where Alex told my parents he made love to me. It wasn’t love. It was sex.
Sex is power.
He holds all the power.
I want it back.
“We’ll leave as soon as I’ve recovered,” I swear.
“No,” he yelps, then gentles his tone. “No. You two will stay. This is your home. I’m going to leave.”
“I don’t want to stay,” I argue. “I can’t afford this place on my salary anyway.”
I’m not sure I still want the job and the salary that goes along with it. The entire team—every one of my clients—was involved in a bet about whether I would marry this man. I can no longer be impartial in my sessions with the people who violated my privacy and trust so horrifically.
“I’m not going to sell the house.” Alex smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. He looks as exhausted as I feel. Dark circles and puffy bags dull his sharp blue gaze. “It’s still the best rent in all of Orlando. It’s safe for her. And for you.”
“Where will you go?” I hate that it sounds like I care.
He presses his lips to Layla’s tuft of black hair and inhales deeply, his eyes falling closed. “I don’t know yet. My ag
ent is trying his best to keep me on the East coast.”
“What does that mean?” Evie asks this question, not me.
I’m grateful because I don’t have to hate myself for being interested if she does it for me.
“The surgeon sent my prognosis packet to the team. It’s going to be months of rehab. I let the injury go too long, and the bone fragment tore into my ACL. I’ll miss all the off-season workouts and training camp. I likely won’t play for half the regular season. The Sharks let me go,” Alex murmurs.
Evie gasps behind me. “Oh, Alex. Why didn’t you say something?”
He opens his eyes and stabs me with them. “There are more important things than football.”
“Not more important things than winning.” I stab him back.
He coughs out a soft laugh. “I’ll take the loss on this one. I’ll do anything if you won’t cut me out of her life. No matter where I end up, I’ll fly to Orlando as often as possible to see her. I’ll call; I’ll FaceTime; I’ll text. She can’t read yet, but you can read them to her. Please. Please don’t take her from me.”
“You already filled out the birth certificate behind my back,” I hiss. “You named her and didn’t even ask me first.”
“You were recovering. The shift nurse tried to wake you several times, but you were too out of it to do any real paperwork. She found the guy who’d been sleeping in the waiting room for two days straight instead. We each picked a couple of names but wanted to see which one would fit her best after she was born. That was the deal.”
I can’t believe he has the balls to look me in the face and say that when it’s obvious someone was paid off to make that highly unethical paperwork go through. “That was before I knew about your other deal.”
His confident expression crumbles. “Did her sperm donor ever message you back?”
“No.”
He already knows this. He’s only asking to drive the knife deeper into my heart.
“Then, let me be her dad. I’ll be good to her, Brain. You know I will.”
Tears fill his eyes, but my brain is already aware of what a fantastic actor he can be.
“You’ll go wherever you get the best deal, and we’ll never hear from you again.” A woman can dream anyway.