A Promised Fate

by Cat Mann

  ****

  My mouth was stale, dry and tasteless. My tongue, a waterless, scratchy piece of sandpaper, licked at my cracked lips and only made the chapping skin worse by pushing salty, old saliva into the broken flesh. The spaces behind my eyes, over my temples, in my jaw – they all throbbed. My muscles were tightly wound coils that begged for a release.

  “Ava?” My raspy voice was with thick and cracked harshly. I patted blindly at the limp blankets where she should have been curled up beside me. She was gone and suddenly the horrid images of the evening before filled my mind, the baio show, Cameron Gallo, the lonely ride home in the limo, my out-of-control anger at Ava, her interview, our fight, my abusive language. The words I threw at Ava had been vile and unforgiveable. I hated myself.

  Crashing my half-sleeping, tingling hand on the nightstand, I fumbled about recklessly with my fingers until I felt the outline of my glasses. Shoving them onto my face, I stumbled to the bathroom and thrust my dry mouth under the cold running water from the sink faucet. My dirty hair hung limply down my forehead and into my tired eyes.

  I heard them below. Awake and talking. Max giggling at something his mom was teasing him about. The house smelled like fresh blueberries, pancakes, bacon, cheesy omelets and strong coffee. My stomached was both ravenous and queasy. I went down the stairs and found Ava and Max perched side by side at the breakfast bar, leaning over a three-dimensional puzzle the three of us had been building together.

  I felt awkward when I walked into the kitchen, like a stranger in my own house. Ava didn't glance at me, and I couldn't bring myself to look at her either. Max was so enthralled with his puzzle that he didn’t notice my arrival or acknowledge the kiss I planted on top of his head.

  Two syrup-smeared plates were pushed to the side of the counter top; there were no leftovers for me to even pick at. Digging out the largest coffee cup we owned, I filled it to the brim. Steam puffed from it like hot smoke rising from a house fire. I would have chugged the caffeine if doing so wouldn't burn the heck out of my esophagus. I stood there in the kitchen and poked at a hardened bagel for a few seconds, unsure of what to do or say. I could tell I was not welcome and the feeling was heavy and depressing.

  Giving up on the bagel, I took my coffee, cupped three Tylenol in my palm and snuck the newest bottle of Ava’s morning sickness Pepto. I retreated to a chair in the living room that is meant to accommodate two. It sits squarely in front of our giant floor-to-ceiling window and is more of a showpiece than a piece of furniture we actually use. The only other time I had ever sat there was on the night of my last birthday, the same night Ava told me she was pregnant. The two of us sat together in the chair and talked, talking led to kissing, which developed into making out and then into making love there. The memory is dear to me. Our nasty fight and the precarious situation it left us in would mar that memory and tarnish our perfect existence, I knew.

  I looked straight ahead at the glass but my gaze was not on the sea. Instead, I watched the reflection of Ava as she moved about in the kitchen. I couldn’t take my eyes away from her. Her hair had been tossed up high in a loose bun. A few strands had escaped the elastic hair tie and twirled in slept-in curls down her neckline. She had on a pair of baggy sweats and a tank top that just barely covered her protruding baby bump. She looked tired but grinned along with Max as he played. The grin didn’t even come close to touching her eyes. She was sad, her sorrow was entirely my fault and I had absolutely no idea of how I was going to fix us.

  At nine thirty, Ava helped Max with his shoes and I realized suddenly that it was Sunday and that we were expected at my parents’ house.

  Ava and Max left the house without me. In a hurry to catch up, I skidded across the living room and through to the laundry room, tossed on a pair of jeans that had been abandoned in a dirty clothes pile on the floor and paired them with an equally dirty and wrinkled shirt. I scurried out the kitchen door, leaving my shoes behind on the mat. Max had noticed the tension in our house and ran ahead of Ava, up the beach towards my parent’s home where he could escape us for a while. I straggled awkwardly behind with my hands shoved in my pockets, not knowing what to do. Ava reached the deck of the house before I did. I suspected I wouldn’t see her for the rest of the day. Best bet was that she would retreat to a corner in the kitchen and busy herself with a recipe assigned to her by my mother and, if I were at all lucky, I would score an empty seat on the couch where I would remain until dinner. The thought was depressing and I refused to allow that to happen.

  “Ava, wait!” I called, jogging up to her. She pushed through the glass door, sliding it forcefully to the side. “Please, let’s talk.” I grabbed her hand in mine and laced our fingers, binding her to me as she stormed into the kitchen. Tugging on her arm, I attempted to coax her gently into turning around. I hugged her palm, silently telling her I loved her. Huge mistake.

  She whipped around to face me. Her eyes were dark and angry. She yanked her hand out of mine and I wrapped my arm around her waist to pull her to me. My eyes pleaded with her to forgive me.

  She snapped at me through gritted teeth. “Get your hand off me now!”

  It was harsh. I deserved it. She was right to be angry with me but it didn’t stop her backlash from piercing my already wounded heart and bruising my severely deflated ego.

  “Ava… Baby…”

  “Don’t “Baby” me, Ari. I really don't care if I ever talk to you again!”

  She didn’t mean it. I knew she didn’t mean it, and so did she.

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” My mom shook her hands frantically in the air. “You two,” she snapped her fingers in my face and then started shouting out commands, “on the sun porch, now! Andy, get in here! We need to talk with our son and our daughter-in-law right away. What has gotten into everybody today? First Rory and now you two! Lauren?!” Lauren poked her head around the corner. “You’re on Max duty.”

  “Okay!”

  Aggie wrapped an arm around Ava’s waist, led her to the sun porch, and then sat her on a cushioned wicker loveseat. She pointed at the open space next to Ava, silently demanding that I sit.

  “What’s going on?” Andy poked his head into the doorway.

  “That is exactly what we are going to find out. Sit.” My dad took orders from my mom like a pro and promptly sat in a chair beside her, across from Ava and me.

  She regarded the two of us for a moment, our arms were crossed over our chests, Ava’s leg was crossed over her knee and faced away from me. Her lips were pinched like the end of a tied balloon and she picked incessantly at the nail polish on her pinkie finger. There was enough space on the two-person loveseat to squeeze even Rory in between us.

  Ava adjusted her hip, drawing her body in even tighter and in doing so, she caused the furniture to squeak. The noise triggered a memory of Ava and me on the same soft, cushion on my mother’s sun porch back when we were dating. The memory was another good one, another one I was now afraid of losing.

  “Who wants to start?” My mom’s shrewish voice ripped my thoughts away from the taste of Ava’s mouth and the way she does this thing with her tongue, kind of circling it around mine as a sort of tease.

  The temperature in the big, open room seemed to have risen several degrees since we sat down, and it kept getting hotter. I gathered a teaspoon-sized amount of saliva, hoping to moisten my desert-dry mouth. Neither Ava or I said a word. She just chipped away until the polish was totally gone and all that was left was a clean, white, crescent tipped fingernail. She moved on to the next finger.

  “Fine. I'll start.” My mother sat tall in her chair and frowned deeply at the display of childish behavior displayed before her. “Whatever this little spat may be about, I can tell you both right now, it’s not worth it. You are both smart people who love, respect, and cherish one another. I think a little introspection will do you both some…”

  “Are we too young to be married? Was this a mistake?�
�� Ava blurted.

  In that small moment, my heart stopped, my eyes watered and I had my first taste of heartbreak. Her words cut me deeper than any insult the two of us had lobbed at one another in the past two days. She doubted us. But she was wrong. She was so wrong. I know in my bones that she and I are right for each other. More than just right, perfect. Ava owns my heart, she has it, I willingly handed the bloody, beating, fist-sized muscle, arteries and all, over to her on a silver platter the very second I locked eyes with her. She is my only and we are meant for forever, for an eternity. We are good together, we are better than good, we are our very best selves when we are together.

  “Ava.” Her sweet name sputtered off my lips and weaved through the web of my fingers that blocked my shocked mouth. “Ava. No, don’t say that.” The tears rolled and my throat tightened around my words until I choked on a sob.

  “Juliet was thirteen when she found her Romeo,” my mother said after struggling to maintain her own composure.

  “Yes. And looked what happened to them,” Ava said.

  “No.” Andy said. “The simple answer to your question, Ava, is no. You are young, but you and Ari are different. You have an old love. Your love has never been selfish or unkind. You two look at each other the way very few loved ones do. You look at each other in awe, in respect and in admiration … but most importantly, you look at each other as necessary for life. Your marriage is not a mistake, Ava. You two are a symbol of who we are.”

  He was right. I would want to die without her. We aren't pathetic, dependent, can’t-live-without-you, lustful teenagers. Ava and I are united in some deep-rooted, unexplainable forceful connection. Our isn’t a want, it's a requirement. Like air, water and food.

  “We want to help. Marriage is stressful. Your mother and I can attest to that. We've been together, living together and sharing a bed, a dinner table, finances -- you name it and we’ve shared it -- since we were sixteen.”

  He squeezed my mom’s knee and she smiled sweetly and said, “We know how you feel, Ava. We know it's hard. Ari has a demanding job, Max is a child that needs a special kind of attention and love. Your family is growing fast considering you haven’t even seen your first anniversary. The first year is always the hardest. But you handle it all so well. I have always been so proud of you two. Why do you feel this way all of the sudden? What’s been happening next door that we don’t know about?”

  Neither of us spoke.

  “Ari, tell us now,” said my father. My parents were beginning to show some impatience. I gathered my breath to answer him.

  Instead, Ava spoke. She turned to face me, only me. She looked me in the eyes, her green eyes burning into my gaze. Her chest rose with a full breath and her rosebud lips parted. “Who are you?”

  I stared back. My stomach somersaulted. Sweat pricked at my open palms. Nervous, my vision blurred and one Ava turned into two Avas. My emotions jumped fast and furiously from major anger to fear to guilt mixed with insecurity and then doubt.

  “I’m, uh...” I stuttered.

  “You haven’t told her?” My mother demanded, looking at me with shame in her eyes.

  “No. At least not entirely. I mean, not yet…”

  The skin around my father’s jaw was white as he clenched his molars and crowfeet lines forked away from his narrow stare. He was furious with me.

  “You’ll tell her. Take her home now. Do it.”

  “I’ll do it here. She’ll have questions. Mom can answer some of her questions … ” A shameful coward, I could not meet anyone’s eyes.

  “Home. Take her home.” He stood and towered over me.