by Lane Hart
“That’s exactly what being a father is! An obligation to someone else who didn’t get a fucking say in being born! Even at sixteen, I would’ve done everything I could for you two if you had only let me,” I tell her.
“I know you would have,” she admits. “Which is why I thought it was best not to tell you, because then I would’ve felt guilty for forcing you into a life you didn’t plan on…”
“So having to make sacrifices as a mother was fine for you but not me?” I ask in confusion, and she doesn’t respond. “Don’t you see that I feel the same way? I hate that you had to raise him alone, struggling through school when I should’ve been there to help you.”
“My aunt helped. And it wasn’t your fault,” she argues.
“Yeah, it was. I’m sorry that I got you pregnant and put you in this situation where your parents wouldn’t help you,” I tell her honestly. “God, I wasn’t a child for fucks sake. I damn well knew I should’ve used a condom, but everything happened so fast.”
“Neither of us were thinking clearly through the grief, and I was two years older than you. I should’ve known better,” Meg replies. “But I wouldn’t change a thing. Lennox is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
“Good, I’m glad,” I tell her, feeling a little relieved while at the same time sad that I’m only now getting to know the happiness of seeing my son and spending time with him.
“How did you, I mean, how did you find out he was yours?” she asks hesitantly.
“Nate,” I reply, and I can't help but enjoy seeing her cringe at the sound of his name. “My mom got Lennox from daycare this morning and brought him to Havoc to see the guys and me. Nate was adamant that you were lying because Eli told him the night he died that you two never had…”
“Right,” Megan says, wiping the tears from underneath her eyes. “My boyfriend’s gay lover. Should’ve known…”
“Bisexual,” I amend.
“Maybe Nate is bisexual, but Eli never…forget it,” she says before getting to her feet.
Following suit, I try standing on my still wobbling legs after the sucker punch of a lifetime landed on my jaw. And my dad…I can’t fucking believe he told Megan to lie to me. I get that he loves my mom and is looking out for her mental health, but how could he not tell me?
Meg walks around to the other side of the podium, and then says, “So, um, once I finish up some paperwork I’ll be heading out to pick up Lennox from daycare if you want to come. I could go ahead and add your name to the list for picking him up too?”
“Yes,” I agree even though my palms feel sweaty and my heart is racing.
Wow. Why am I so nervous about seeing him now that I know he’s mine? Maybe because there’s more on the line regarding whether or not he likes me. And also, there’s this huge sense of responsibility for him on my shoulders that’s never been there before.
I’m angry at Megan for keeping Lennox from me, and at both her and my father for lying about him being Eli’s. But I’m also angry at myself for not having shit to show for the last few years of my life. I don’t have a job or money that would let me help take care of my son. I feel like I should’ve done more so that they wouldn’t have felt the need to keep something so important from me. Now that I know, I can’t keep going the way I have been. I need to live on my own and have a steady income to help Meg with the bills and shit.
“You okay?” Meg asks, pausing in her gathering stacks of papers. “Not with everything; I just meant you look a little green.”
“I’m fine,” I declare rather caustically because I don’t want to admit to her that I’m nervous or doubting myself in such a huge role. In fact, I don’t ever want her to see my weakness again after I broke down in front of her today. Otherwise, she’ll continue to think she did the right thing keeping Lennox a secret from me for this long, and that’s definitely not true.
Chapter Fourteen
Megan
When Luke and I walk into the daycare center, we stand silently next to each other watching Lennox at the table pressing shapes into Play-Doh with a few other kids. Someone says something funny, causing our son to throw his head back and laugh.
“That’s another first you stole from me,” Luke whispers through clenched teeth.
“What?” I ask.
“The first time you heard him laugh,” he explains, making me feel terrible.
“I wanted you there,” I whisper to him honestly. “There wasn’t a day that went by during the pregnancy and then after he was born that I didn’t think about you, and fight what I thought would only be selfish of me to tell you, just because I missed you. It didn’t seem fair to take you away from your family and your life here before you even finished high school.”
“Save the bullshit,” Luke responds harshly, so uncharacteristic of the Luke I thought I knew and was getting to know again after spending the weekend together. “I should’ve been a part of his life from the moment you took a pregnancy test. What you did…not only did it hurt me, but he’s the one who grew up without a father. And now, because of your lies, he’ll never know that he’s always had a living, breathing father who loved him even before he knew he existed.”
I blink back more tears before they fall and embarrass me in public. “It wasn’t that simple, Luke. My parents shunned me from the moment they found out. How was I to know your family wouldn’t have done the same? I was trying to protect you.”
“Tell yourself what you want, but I’m not buying it,” he says before he starts to walk over to Lennox. “Do what you need to do so I can pick him up alone tomorrow.”
Before I leave to find the administrator, I watch until Lennox finally looks up and recognizes Luke. His face lights up, then he jumps up from his tiny chair and runs over to him. Unlike the other times they’ve seen each other, Luke picks him up off the ground to hug him, and Lennox’s arms go around his neck like they’ve known each other forever instead of only a few days.
“Hi, Megan,” Brittany, one of the teachers, says with her approach, causing me to quickly wipe away the wetness from my cheeks. “Who’s Mister Lennox’s new friend? And is he single?”
“That’s his…uncle, and no, I’m pretty sure he’s seeing someone,” I lie because there’s no way I’m gonna play matchmaker with Luke. And I wonder now that he knows what this means for our dating. The glare he shoots at me when he turns around and starts toward us says the answer is that it’s definitely over.
“Could I fill out the form for him to be an authorized pick up?” I ask Brittany, knowing the procedure after I did the same thing for Luke’s mom this morning.
“Sure. I’ll grab one and come right back,” she answers, but doesn’t move before Luke comes to a stop in front of us still carrying Lennox on his hip. “Hi, I’m Brittany, one of Lennox’s teachers,” she says, jumping forward and offering him a handshake, which Luke takes.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Luke,” he replies, offering her a forced smile.
“Do you have your driver’s license, so I can make a copy for the paperwork?” she asks.
“Yeah, of course,” he says, lowering Lennox to the ground to pull out his wallet. “How much is your weekly fee?” I hear him ask before Lennox is hugging me.
“Hey, Mommy!” my son says excitedly.
“Did you have a good morning with Grandma?” I ask him while Luke talks to Brittany.
“Yes! And Luke said he’s going home with us!” Lennox exclaims.
“He is. And I bet he wants you to show him your new room and all your toys while I fix dinner.”
“Okay,” my little man agrees with a smile. “I can’t wait!”
“All right, you stay with Luke, and I’ll be right back,” I tell him before I follow Brittany to the front desk and sign all the necessary forms authorizing Luke as a pick-up.
Outside, Luke has Lennox sitting on the trunk of his orange Mustang waiting for me.
“What kind of seat thing do I need to get him so he can ride with me?” Lu
ke asks as soon as I approach and return his driver’s license to him.
“One of the booster seats that has a harness would be best; and then once he’s older, he can use the booster,” I tell him.
“Just let me see the name of the one you have, and I’ll get the same,” he tells me, lifting Lennox to the ground and holding his hand as we walk over to my CR-V.
After Luke types in the name and number on the car seat into his phone and Lennox is strapped in, I ask him, “Do you remember the way to the house?”
“Yeah,” Luke says as he walks away. “I’ll meet you there.”
…
Luke
My son goes a mile a minute until he passes out.
Other than when the three of us sat down for dinner, Meg let me spend some alone time with Lennox. He showed me every toy in his room before we raced pullback cars down the hallway, and he fell asleep right there, face down on the floor. I helped Meg get him in his pajamas and then into his Paw Patrol bed before I kissed my son’s head and tucked him in for the very first time.
“Wow,” I say to Meg once I sink down on her sofa, putting my feet up since I lost my shoes when I first came in. “He’s a handful, but he’s fun.”
“Yeah, he is,” she replies with a smile, taking a seat in the leather rocking chair.
For a few silent minutes, we just sit there together and watch the evening news.
“Are you really staying here tonight?” Meg eventually asks.
“Yes,” I reply. “I don’t particularly care to see my father’s face right now.”
“Oh, okay,” she mutters in understanding. “I guess I can give you the extra house key I have in the morning.”
“Thanks,” I say although the one word is lacking real appreciation. “Does Lennox ever get up at night?” I ask Meg.
“No, he pretty much sleeps right on through until around seven. He’s always been a good sleeper since he was only a few months old.”
“That’s good,” I say, even though it’s just another reminder of all the years I missed. Will I ever be able let go of the anger and hurt she’s caused?
“When I was pregnant, he would kick me and wake me up throughout the night so I was worried that he would be a night owl,” she tells me, her words seemingly working a magic spell on my libido. When Abby was pregnant, I realized I had a serious fetish for pregnant women. The arousal more than doubles imagining Meg pregnant with my child. God, I hate I missed that.
“Do you have any pictures?” I ask. “You know, of you pregnant and him as a baby?”
“Oh, well sure,” she says as she gets to her feet. “My Aunt Pattie and I took a ton of photos. Hold on, let me grab them.”
When she comes back, I sit up on the sofa so that she can take the seat next to me while we go through the big albums.
The first picture is of a much younger Meg with a small bump under her shirt and a sad smile on her face. The next few pages show her stomach growing and her smile warming as time went on. There are a few black and white ultrasound photos before we finally get to the day Lennox was born.
“He was a big baby, a few days past his due date, weighing eight pounds and three ounces.”
“Wow,” I say as I look at the photos that show me glimpses of his life that I missed.
“I was huge right before he came. I could barely walk my stomach was so big,” she says, rubbing a hand over her now flat stomach. “The doctor had scheduled me for an induction, but he came two days before on August twenty-second.”
“Do you wish he was Eli’s? Is that why you lied?” I blurt out the questions I’ve wondered since I found out the truth earlier today.
“What? No, Luke. I missed Eli, but I was still heartbroken from what he did. In fact, I was glad that there was no chance Lennox was Eli’s. If he had been, every time I looked at him I would’ve remembered the betrayal…”
“Sounds familiar,” I say. “Because now, every time I see him it reminds me of your betrayal.”
When I hear Meg’s sudden gasp, I know I’ve upset her; but she deserves it. She shoves the album into my lap and gets up. Only when I hear the bedroom door shut do I start to feel a little bad about my words. They’re true, though, and this is all her fault.
I keep paging through the album for a little longer before starting over at the beginning. My cock lengthens in my pants and goes heavy at the sight of Meg pregnant. And even though I’m livid with her for what she did, I realize not even that is enough to stop me from wanting her.
Unlike the way I wanted her before, this is a different type of desire. Darker. Rather than make love to her, I want to take her harder, rougher to punish her. My sexual experiences are rather limited, but now I can certainly see the appeal of an angry fuck to work out all the frustrations a person you care about causes.
Chapter Fifteen
Luke
“Yo, Senn. Can I talk to you for a second?” I ask as I walk up to the light heavyweight who is currently punishing one of the hanging bags.
“Yeah. What’s up?” he asks, wiping his face off with a nearby towel.
“Do you still have any contacts in the underground?” I ask him quietly.
“Underground?” he repeats with his forehead all wrinkled up in confusion. “Why the fuck would I ever want to talk to any of those assholes again?”
“Was it really that bad?” I ask in all seriousness.
A bark of laughter is Senn’s response. “It wasn’t bad, man. That shit was hell on Earth.”
“How much money did you make per fight?” I ask.
“Not enough to make it worth the days of pain that followed,” he replies, and when I keep staring at him silently, waiting for an actual answer, he heaves a sigh. “Only about five hundred to a measly thousand.”
“That’s five hundred or a thousand more than I currently have.”
When I asked the daycare worker how much Meg paid for Lennox a week, I was shocked when she said it was two-hundred and twenty dollars, a total of eight hundred and eighty dollars a month! Then, Meg also has a rent payment, car payment, phone, utilities, and groceries. All that shit adds up fast. So, I started thinking that if I can get an underground fight a week and win, that should be enough to at least start making a dent in all those bills since I don’t have the experience or degree for a real job.
“No, Luke,” Senn responds with a shake of his head. “There was a day when I would’ve laughed my ass off for a chance to see you getting your balls handed to you by a street thug. But believe me, you don’t want any part of that shit. And Abby would kick my ass, or worse, withhold sex if I helped you do something so stupid.”
“Dude, Abby doesn’t have to know,” I tell him.
“Ha! That’s how every fucked up plan begins, and guess what, they always find out,” he replies. “I won’t have any part in your funeral.”
“Come on, Senn! What if…what if you didn’t have your IFC contract and you needed money to take care of Abby and Eden. What would you do?”
“Back up,” he says, holding up a palm. “Why are you so desperate for money? Don’t you still live with your parents? It’s not like you have a family and shit to support.”
“Actually, I do.”
“You do live at home?” he asks.
“No!” I grumble, swiping a hand over my face in frustration. “I have the other part, but you can’t tell anyone. Not even Abby knows.”
“Abby doesn’t know what? That you have a secret wife and kid?” Senn asks with a chuckle.
“Nope, I haven’t told her that I’ve had a son for three years and just found out.”
Senn’s jaw falls open. “No shit?”
“No shit,” I answer. “I need money, and I don’t have any skills except cage fighting. The IFC is flooded with welterweights, so they’re not gonna give me a contract anytime soon. I’m running out of options.”
“Fuck, man. I get that, I do. I just…I can’t send you down there to the fighting pits.”
Growlin
g in frustration, I tell him, “Fine. I’ll talk to Mace and ask him,” before storming away.
It takes some hunting before I’m finally able to track down Mace. I see the big man with black tats up and down his arm as he leaves the locker room and starts heading for the front door. Jogging to catch up with him, I yell his name to stop him before he drives away in his classic Mustang convertible.
“Hey, what’s up?” Mace asks, propping his back against the car door.
“Got a favor to ask,” I tell him. “Do you still have any contacts in the underground?”
Gritting his teeth together so loudly I can hear it, he says, “Well, Scarfone, the fucker who killed one of my sisters and kidnapped the other, is still behind bars, so I don’t know who the hell is running the pits now.”
I wince at the reminder of what his family has been through but desperation has me plowing ahead.
“You know any fighters' numbers so I could check with them?” I ask.
“Why in God’s name would you want to trifle with that shit?” Mace huffs, crossing his thick arms over his chest. “And let me guess, Senn has already turned you down?”
“I need money, like serious money, more than a minimum wage, entry-level job can pay me,” I tell him. “I can’t tell you why, but it’s important.”
“Worth risking your life?” he asks. “Because that’s what you would be doing if you step into one of their pits. Not only is it illegal, it’s fucking brutal.”
“I know, but the benefits outweigh the risks,” I assure him. “Please, Mace. I can handle myself. Just give me the number of any person who might still have a connection.”
Blowing out a breath to the sky in thought, Mace finally straightens and pulls out his phone. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you. And if you get in any trouble down there, you better call me,” he grumbles. “Here’s the phone number for Vaughan. He was an old fighter who started training guys right before I left. No clue if he’s still in the game or not. Could’ve been busted for all I know.”