by Anna Lewis
“But… your mom,” Abbie said. Rex’s mom would hate to hear this news, but if she was honest, that was the least of their problems at the moment.
“I know,” he sighed, accepting her point. “I’ll have to phone her and explain beforehand. I don’t know how she’ll take it, but it’s best that she hears it from me first, rather than anyone else.” For the first time since he’d made his bold statement, he started to look a little anxious. “In fact, I’m going to make some phone calls now, set everything up, then I’ll speak to her.”
“Do you need any help? Do you want us to do anything?” Travis asked in concern, but Rex simply shook his head and raced from the room.
Once they were alone, Travis wrapped his arms around Abbie and comforted her in her terrified hour of need.
“Don’t you have anyone you need to call?” she muffled into his chest. “Anyone that needs to know before this all goes public?”
“No,” he shot back quickly, shaking his head. “My parents live in England, so it’s unlikely that they will hear about this. And to be honest, even if they do it won’t matter. They are open-minded people, they don’t mind what I do.”
“What about… your ex-wife?” Abbie said. She still remembered Travis breaking down at the mere sight of her with the man whom she left him for, who was also his former best friend, and she felt like she needed to address that issue.
“I honestly don’t care what either of them thinks,” he replied stoically. “I don’t care what anyone thinks. I’m happy, you’re happy, Rex is happy… we aren’t hurting anyone. Sure it’s going to unleash a lot of media attention which is going to be tough, but we can weather it – I truly believe we can.”
Abbie nodded firmly at that. If these two men could do it, then so could she. They had a lot more to lose than her anyway, and they would protect her through thick and thin. For a brief second, she imagined Greg’s face when he found out the news, and that made her smile even more. He was such a pathetic man, whereas then men he’d been replaced with were so strong and fearless – her happiness was going to crush him like he crushed her…
“Do you mind him going public about us?” Travis asked, dragging her back from her thoughts.
“No, I don’t think I do,” she replied, actually meaning it. “People are already involved enough and to be honest once they know the truth they might start to lose interest.”
She had no idea how true that statement was, but she had to hope. She had to hold onto something before she lost her mind completely…
***
Abbie stood nervously in the side lines with Travis, while they watched Rex step up to that podium. They had wanted to do it all together, but Rex and his publicist had wanted him to do it alone – after all, he was the one that the public were most interested in, so it made a lot of sense.
They gripped hands, nervous for how this was going to pan out, and watched intently as he started to speak.
“Thank you everyone for coming to hear my side of the story,” Rex said over the microphone in front of him. “I have lots to tell you.”
Abbie’s heart raced and her mouth ran dry with pure terror. This was so scary, the worst thing that she’d ever experienced in her entire life, and she had no idea how she was supposed to react to it. Travis was anxious too, frozen to the spot, but he was much better at disguising that – hiding it from his face – so Abbie couldn’t tell. She wanted to cling to him, hold on to him for dear life, but she couldn’t when there were so many people in the room; people that were undoubtedly going to stare at her as soon as the announcement was made. In fact, that thought was so powerful that she even slipped her hand away from his, not wanting anyone to see them touching. If Travis was upset, he didn’t show it on his face. He remained stoic and serious, focused only on what was happening in front of him.
Abbie had discussed it further with her mom, but she wasn’t sure how much she understood, and Rex had told his own family – to a very mixed reaction – so there was a lot riding on this. If the rest of the world could accept what they meant to one another, then their friends and family would come afterwards… surely?
“I would like to start by saying that I would appreciate it greatly if you would all keep an open mind.” He took a few deep breaths, finally looking nervous. “So you have all heard about my girlfriend – Abbie – and her supposed indiscretion.” The room buzzed for a moment before falling into a hushed silence. “Well she did nothing wrong. She is an amazing woman who I love very much…”
What? Love?
Abbie glanced up at Travis, but he didn’t look shocked at all. Her mind was reeling, but she tried to put that information in a box to deal with later.
“Abbie and I are in a polyamorous relationship with Travis Bunney, the man she was pictured kissing, and we are very happy…”
More was said, but Abbie didn’t get to hear it over the questions yelled from around the room. There was so much noise, but she could pick out a few, instantly overwhelming her.
How does that work?
What do your families think about this?
How will this work in the long term?
All of a sudden she felt dirty. She didn’t like all those people picking through her private life like it was public property, and she started to feel overwhelmed. Travis gripped tightly onto her, holding her upright, but she found herself falling anyway.
“We love you,” Travis whispered to her, pulling her from the room. “We both love you very much, and we can make this work no matter what.”
Love.
That was the only word she needed to get her through anything.
***
It wasn’t easy. In fact, the three of them had to live through nearly a year of intense media interest, abuse and confrontation about their relationship. But somehow, with the help of each other, they made it through and came out of the other end of it stronger than ever. They were well and truly in love, and extremely solid. It seemed like their temporary relationship was becoming something permanent after all, which made Abbie very happy.
After the first few months of exhausting media scrutiny, which they all really hated, another celebrity got caught in a drug-addled orgy, and the attention and focus was taken off of the three of them. The respite allowed Abbie to see just how it was all worth it. Now that people had lost interest, she was able to see the relationship clearly, and she liked it. Their lives were much easier, and they’d finally gotten to a place where they were all really happy.
Even their families were starting to come to terms with them, including Rex’s mom who had decided to believe that true love was more important than anything else. They hadn't met her yet, but they felt like that time was coming and they were all prepared for it. They had already suffered one awkward dinner with Abbie’s family. She did not want a repeat experience.
Abbie lived in Rex’s home, and so did Travis these days – most of the time anyway. He kept his own home for when any of them needed space, which helped them to keep as strong as they were. It allowed them to take time out when needed, giving them the breathing space to grow.
But things were about to change all over again. The boys didn’t know it yet, but Abbie was sitting in the bathroom, waiting for that stick to reveal one line or two. They hadn't exactly planned to bring a baby into their situation, but they hadn't exactly been careful either. Abbie was happy though, she knew that if they were strong enough to go through all that they’d suffered, then they could do this too.
Of course, they wouldn’t know who the biological father was, but that didn’t matter. They were a solid family unit, and that amount of love would be enough to keep any child safe and happy.
The long three minutes that she spent waiting for the truth to reveal itself, she imagined how their future would look, and it was all really good. They would remain a solid unit, they would raise their child, and they would be happy forever more.
Tick, tick, tick…
Her eyes finally flickered down
, watching the test reveal itself, and it was the news that she’d wanted all along. Two blue lines… positive.
They were having a baby!
“Travis!” She called out excitedly. “Rex! Come here, you’ll never guess what!”
She raced from the bathroom, too excited to wait for them to join her. She needed to tell them about their new future, and she needed to do it now.
THE END
= Bonus Book 3 of 8 =
Forever Yours
16th September 2016
Another day, another dollar, I thought morosely as I forced myself out of bed. My head hurt like hell, I had an ache pounding right through my whole body, so much so that it actually took me a few moments to realize that I wasn’t in my usual surroundings. My crappy apartment had somehow transformed into one of the much plusher staff rooms at the hotel where I worked, bringing all the memories of the previous night crashing back over me.
I had staggered home after an extremely long shift at the same place I’d worked ever since leaving high school, just to find a burst pipe in my apartment, and water everywhere. Absolutely everything was damaged and I was nowhere near in the right frame of mind to tackle it. I was far too tired, I’d done my usual housekeeping shift, followed by an unexpected stint in the bar, and all I needed to do was go back to sleep.
It had seemed like a really good idea to come back here for a bed at the time, but now waking up here made me feel totally claustrophobic. It was one thing to know that I’d stayed in the same town my entire life, that I hadn’t moved on in the ten years after school, despite my so called ‘potential’, but to have to actually live here for a while was on another level entirely. I didn’t need reminding that I was still ‘just a housekeeper’. Maybe I should’ve been a track star, that was what everyone always thought I would become, but my running dreams had died on the last day of high school, and that was the end of that.
I hated my apartment, but I was going to have to get the plumbing fixed sooner rather than later. Being there was much better than being here. One night was just about my limit!
I grabbed my cell phone and put in the call to the local handyman right away. I knew Luke well, he was another one of the guys who stayed behind here when everyone else left. The only problem was I couldn’t really compare our lives; he was happy, married, in love, I was just... existing. He seemed pleased to still be here, whereas to me it was as if my life was left in limbo, that I was in a bubble that I couldn’t seem to pop.
“Hey, Luke,” I murmured sleepily into the handset the second that he answered. “I’m really sorry, it’s Jenna Smee. My pipes have burst again, only this time it’s wrecked everything. The bathroom and the kitchen are totally flooded. I didn’t even have the heart to check the rest of the place. It’s probably a real mess, I’m so sorry.”
“Okay sure, I know where the spare key is,” he replied, proving just how often I needed him for things. “I’ll take a look today, see what I can do.”
“Thank you, you’re a lifesaver.”
I clicked to end the call with relief flooding through my system, before spotting the time on my phone screen. Shit, I was going to be late if I didn’t get a move on! I was supposed to start work in fifteen minutes, I wasn’t even going to have time for a shower. I would just have to chuck on the uniform I was wearing yesterday morning and get the hell on with it. It was all right, people didn’t pay any attention to the staff anyway... especially not the housekeeping. I could get away with it, just the once.
I checked my appearance in the mirror before I burst from the room, shaking my head in disappointment as I left. I’d barely had time to run a brush through my hair, never mind put any makeup on! This was going to be a day of keeping my eyes fixed on the ground. If I didn’t make eye contact, no one would look at me.
Come on, just get on with it, I scolded myself. The sooner this shift is over, the quicker I can get back home. The sooner I can get back to normal.
I raced through the hallway to grab the cleaning cart from the cupboard, my face heating up with stress the whole time, but before I could get in any of the rooms, my radio buzzed which could only mean one thing. The boss needed me, and once she saw me looking so disheveled I would have a lot of questions coming my way.
“Jenna, can you come down to the reception desk, please?”
Oh God, Deana had said please, that meant she was with someone important, someone I really didn’t want to meet. “Yep, sure,” I replied with a shaky voice. “I’ll be right down.”
I was torn between taking a second to sort myself out and rushing right down to find out what was going on. In the end I decided that being late was going to be the bigger crime in Deana’s eyes, so I gave up and thundered down the stairs. As I got near the bottom, I could see Deana smiling, and the back of a man’s head. My mind whirred, trying to recall any meetings that I should’ve known about, but my brain drew a frustrating blank. Too much was going on in my life at the moment, I couldn’t think of anything.
“Erm, hi,” I said nervously, focusing only on my manager. “Is everything alright?”
“Yes, of course, Jenna. I don’t know if you remember me saying that the new owner is here today?” I nodded, even though I had absolutely no recollection of that conversation. I wasn't even sure that I'd been informed that someone else was buying the place! “Well, he’s here now. Adam Martin. Do you mind showing him to his room? For now, he'll be in staff room eighteen. And then once you've settled in, I will show you around myself, Adam.”
My heart stopped dead in my chest, I felt a dizziness overcoming me, the floor almost fell away completely. This couldn’t be real, could it? This had to be another Adam Martin, there was no way that I could see him ever again. Especially not looking like this, this was a nightmare ‘bumping into the ex’ scenario. And if it was him, then he was living here too. Now I needed to get out more than ever before! I could not stay in the hotel knowing that Adam was here, especially with him as my boss. Not that it was going to be him of course...
“Oh right, sure,” my voice was raspy now, my emotions floating to the surface. I had to still be sleeping, this was some sort of nightmare. I couldn’t even begin to cope. “Okay, Adam, would you like to come with me? I’ll take you wherever you need to be.”
My heart raced liked a jack hammer as I spun around and ran my eyes up his body. At first I was convinced that it couldn’t be him, this body was entirely different to the boy I once knew in high school, but as our eyes connected, and I saw that familiar sparkling green, shock jolted through my system. It was him, of course he didn’t look exactly the same. Years had passed, I had changed too, but still it was a little stunning. I actually couldn’t believe it.
This was Adam Martin, the boy I thought my whole future was shaped around, standing in front of me, staring at me with as much shock in his eyes as I felt. The limbo that I’d been surviving in shattered around me, leaving me cold, alone, and very vulnerable. For the first time in a very long time, I had no idea what was going to happen next, and that scared the living hell out of me. I’d never been so terrified in my whole damn life.
“Erm, yeah, sure,” Adam finally coughed, deciding to take the same route as me, even if I hadn’t exactly chosen it. It seemed that for now we were going to act like strangers, until one of us braved cracking the ice. “Please, show me around.”
As I walked him towards his temporary living arrangement, everything inside of me was freaking out. Things had been boring in the last ten years, but steady. Steady was good. Now, for some inexplicable reason, Adam was back in my life shaking everything up. When he left I assumed that I would never have to see him again, and that was the only thing that helped me to get over the heartbreak.
Mind you, it only took one little glance for me to realize that maybe I wasn’t quite as over Adam as I thought I was. If I couldn’t do it in a decade, without him here, how the hell was I going to manage it with him in my face every single day?
Bleep, bleep.
I glanced at my phone as discretely as I could manage, spotting Luke’s name.
‘Hi Jenna, I’ve just been to check your pipes and it’s a big job. It’ll take a few days for the parts to come in, is there anywhere you can stay?’
Shit, now I was going to be stuck here, living in the same building as my ex-boyfriend, the one who got away. Could this day get any worse?
* * *
9th May 2006
“You don’t have long now, you know?” Sara, my rebellious best friend drawled, popping her gum loudly in my direction. “Do you really want to leave school knowing that you only ever stared at Adam from afar?”
I glanced back over at him, my hot heart racing like crazy in my chest. Adam Martin was my dream guy, the one I spent my every waking moment fantasizing about. Of course he would never notice me, we didn’t run in the same circles, he was cool and popular, he spent his days with the other rich kids, whereas I hung out with other jocks just like me, but that didn’t stop me from creating the most beautiful relationship between us in my mind.
“I know, but what am I supposed to do?” I sighed sadly. “He’ll never go for someone like me, not really.”
Tiana, the incredibly beautiful, well developed for her age, cheerleader slung her arm over his shoulder, as if to prove my point. He was the hot, muscular, popular boy who could have anyone he wanted, whereas I was the invisible girl who was only ever noticed for her running records. Adam went to parties, drank alcohol, and kissed girls. My high school experience was one of training and homework. I wanted to succeed with running, but I also needed to have another skill in case things didn’t pan out in the way that I wanted them to.