“Yeah. So did I.” I shake my head, and run an agitated hand through my hair. Fuck. I’ve never wanted to hit something so badly.
Since I came back here, it feels like Hols has been stringing me along, like a dog on a chain. I’m sick and fucking tired of her prick-teasing bullshit. And I’m sick of feeling like shit about it every time I see her, and wanna bend her over backwards. Guess now I don’t have to worry, because her baby daddy’s gonna show up on our doorstep before long, and anything she and I had, however meaningful or fucked up, is about to turn to shit.
I grab a shirt from the back of the couch, slip it on, and shoot her a meaningful look. “Clock’s ticking, sweetheart.”
I need a drink, and then I need to go and erase Holly fucking Harris well and truly from my system.
I DON’T need a crystal ball to tell me who’s knocking on my door at four in the morning. I haven’t slept a wink. I slip on my robe, and tiptoe out of my room with Snickers nipping at my ankles. A girly laugh comes from behind Jack’s door. Chelcie. I press my ear against it like a total creeper. The laugh quickly turns to something more, not an outright moan, but close to it, and then Jack orders her to stop wriggling, and my heart drops through the floor. The pounding on the front door starts up again, louder this time, and I jump back like I’ve been burned.
I should have known. He was acting angsty all afternoon, so when he suggested they go to the pub and shoot a few rounds of pool, I didn’t think anything of it. I guess that’s the point—I didn’t think. Of course drinking with Jack always leads to sex. How could it not? I have this insane desire to kick down his door and go completely postal, smashing and crashing my way into the room and swearing until I’m blue in the face, tearing them apart with my bare hands if I have to, but I have no right to do that, because even though he fucked me—no, made love to me—this afternoon, it obviously meant nothing to him.
I swipe the tears from my eyes, and step into the lounge room. I take a deep breath and open the door. Coop’s standing on the other side. No surprise there. His floppy curls have been styled within an inch of their lives into a short buzz-cut on the sides, with the top half left a little too long and straight. It’s kinda like the emo version of Elijah’s hair. He’s decked out in black jeans, a black Misfits shirt, and he has one of those hipster scarves around his neck. He looks good, a little “city”, but just as edible as he always did.
He glances down at my belly peeking out from beneath my robe. For a second I think I see his expression soften, and then he goes completely rigid.
“Is it true?” he demands.
I can only nod.
“How could you keep this from me?”
“I didn’t want to burden you with it, Coop. You gave me an ultimatum. You made me choose between you and Ana, and you didn’t like the outcome. I knew you for a few months; I’ve known her my whole life.”
“I know. I was an idiot. I should have waited, but this? This kind of thing’s unforgivable. Hols? I had a right to know I had a kid.”
“Yeah, maybe you did. But would you have come back just because I was pregnant?”
“I’m here now, aren’t I?”
“You broke my heart when you left, Coop. Forgive me if I’m not forthcoming with contacting you while you and your all-important band are traipsing all over the countryside,” I snap. “Congratulations, by the way. I always knew you’d hit it big.”
Snickers sits at my feet, and growls at Coop. I snatch him up in my arms, and lower my voice. “Look, can this wait for another time, like the morning, maybe? I’m kinda tired from carrying around a kid for the last six months.” I’ve had enough. I spent all night knowing this was coming, and now it’s finally arrived I’m just too emotionally exhausted to deal with it.
“I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” I say, and begin shutting the door.
“Holly.” Coop jams his boot in the way. “Don’t shut me out, please? That’s my baby in there. At least let me talk to you, find out how you’re both doing?”
I sigh, and then open the door enough to allow him to slip through. “Do you want something to drink?”
“No, I’m good,” he says, and takes a seat on the couch. I stand. I’m not sure how I feel right now, other than that this whole situation is fucked, and Jackson’s in there screwing his ex while I’m out here with mine. Coop. The father of my child. I don’t even know where to go with this. I sit down beside him, still far enough away so that we’re not touching one another.
“So, Debbie mentioned you’re twenty weeks along?”
“Twenty-three.”
He doesn’t ask if it’s his. He can do the math. I might be a little forward when it comes to sex and what I like, but I’ve never slept around, especially not when I love someone the way I loved Coop.
Having him back in Sugartown is so surreal. I honestly thought I’d live out the rest of my days without seeing his face. At least, not this close up, anyway. When I thought about Coop—which was a lot, especially immediately after he left—I thought of him playing to crowds of thousands, not sitting in my lounge room, asking questions about his illegitimate, unborn child.
“Do you know what you’re having?”
“A boy.”
That grin that was always my undoing pops out, and he gets this awed look in his eyes. “A boy, huh?”
“Yep, demon seed,” I say, and the smile vanishes. “Sorry, I should probably stop calling him that.”
“You know I’m going to help you with this, right?”
“No, you’re not.”
“Hols, that’s my kid. The band’s making some pretty decent money. I’m not gonna see you go without. Either of you.”
“You don’t really get a choice here, Coop. I’m his mother. I’m the one who’ll be looking after him, and I’m not going to take a hand-out from you, or anyone else.”
“It’s not a hand-out when you’re family, Holly.”
“But we’re not family. We’re just a couple of kids who made a fucked-up mistake, and now our kid is the one who’ll pay for it.”
“He’s not gonna pay for anything, Hols. I wanna be here for you. I wanna help you do this. Maybe we get a place of our own somewhere? Or you could come to Sydney, and live with me. It doesn’t matter, as long as the three of us are together.”
“Whoa, whoa, slow down a goddamned second. I have a home. I live here with Jack, and Ana, and Elijah. I don’t need to move an eight-hour drive away from my support system just to make you happy, Coop. I’m not leaving Sugartown.”
“Okay, fine. I’ll move here. We’ll live with your flatmates until the baby comes, and then get our own place.”
“Are you shitting me right now? What part of I’m doing this alone don’t you get? You had the chance to stay with me, and you chose Sydney. I don’t begrudge you that decision. I always knew you’d make it, Coop, but I’m not in love with you anymore. You broke my heart, and I gave it to someone else,” I say and then pause, because I can’t believe those words just slipped out of my mouth. Coop looks about as shocked as I am.
He swallows hard, and whispers, “Who?”
Behind him, though, leaning against the doorjamb in a pair of faded jeans with his hair tousled from the amazing sex he more than likely just had with Chelcie—his completely fuckable, non-pregnant, perfect-arsed ex-fiancée—is Jackson. I feel my heart falter a little, and then it picks up speed, and thrums to a hummingbird beat. We stare at one another, and then Jack breaks the silence by saying, “You okay here, Hols?”
I nod.
“Who are you?” Coop asks.
“Jackson Rowe. And you are?”
“Cooper.”
Jackson’s eyes narrow down into hard slits. “Ah, the baby daddy returns.”
I silently beg and plead for him not to start. After learning he was in there with Chelcie, after Coop showing up on my door with all these demands about me taking him back, after just admitting to Jack that I’d given him my heart, I didn’t think I could stand any mo
re drama tonight.
“I need to go to bed.” I rise, and glance down at Cooper. This has to be a lot for him to grasp, and I take pity on him when I realise he must have driven for hours just to get here, and now I’m kicking him out before he can even fully absorb what’s going on. “Coop, can we talk in the morning?”
“Come on, Hols. I just spent eight hours in the car to get here. We need to talk about what we’re going to do.”
“Right, ’cause you were so interested in sticking around before you knocked her up.” Jack folds his arms across his broad chest, and leans back against the unused fireplace. “You know what? Why don’t you just fuck off back to Sydney? We got this covered.”
“Jack,” I warn, because he’s getting dangerously close to hitting his stride, and when Jack gets going he doesn’t really back down.
A muscle pops in Cooper’s jaw, his hands are balled into fists. Towards the end of our relationship I saw that face a fair bit, we fought like cats and dogs back then, but I’ve never seen him quite this riled. He gets up off the couch, his eyes promising violence. “Who the fuck are you, man?”
“Who the fuck am I? I’m the guy who’s been with her every second since she found out. I’m the guy that holds her when she breaks down, because she’s afraid of doing this shit alone. I’m the guy who’s been fulfilling all her needs while you and your little punkarse band play a few shows, and call yourselves famous. And I’m the guy who’s always gonna be in her life, no matter what. That’s who I am, so who the fuck are you, other than a sperm donor?”
“Jack, that’s enough,” I say, and push him back before Coop punches him in the face.
“That true?” Cooper asks, staring down at me, like he hopes I’ll deny it.
“Jack and I have been friends a long time.”
“A loooooong time.” Jack supplies helpfully.
“Funny. You never mentioned him.”
“Women usually mention their fuck buddies to you?”
Coop shifts towards Jack, but I jump between them, and shove at Jackson’s chest. “Back off.”
Fucking male posturing. Considering he just got done screwing Chelcie, he’s got an awful lot of nerve pulling this alpha-male bullshit.
“That true, Holly? Has this guy been sticking it to you while you’re pregnant with my kid?”
“Oh, Jack’s been there a long time, Coop—” He pops the P on the end of Cooper’s name. “—long before you ever found yourself in her tight, sweet cunt.” He winks, and then turns to me. “You didn’t tell him I was pretty much your first, did you? I mean, unless you’re counting that doofus from school, that is? Anywhere you think you’ve been with young Holly, here, any place you thought was solely yours, I’ve been there before you, brother. Too many times to count. And that thing she does with her mouth that has your balls tightening up around your ears? Yeah—I taught her that.”
Coop presses in against my back in an effort to get to Jack. It causes my stomach to nudge against Jack’s painfully, and I cry out, but neither of them are paying attention to me. I ease myself from the space between them, because I’m not an idiot. My baby is the most important thing in this room, and they can both beat each other bloody for all I care. Saying that, I still flinch when the first punch is thrown by Coop, and when Jack responds by slamming him back into the coffee table, and riding him down to the floor. A little nostalgic part of me dies as I remember the mind-blowing orgasm Jack gave when he laid me back on it a few weeks ago, and ate me out like he’d ordered Chinese takeout.
For a moment I just watch the two idiots go at one another like stupid hairless apes, and then Chelcie comes bounding out of Jack’s room, dressed in an oversized T-shirt that looks an awful lot like the one Jack had worn out earlier that night. I kinda wanna give into a little violence of my own, and throw her into TV cabinet.
“Jackson,” she squeals, and presses a perfectly manicured hand to her mouth. “What are they doing? Why aren’t you stopping them?”
“Are you kidding? I’m not throwing myself into that,” I say, as Jack stands up after delivering a nasty punch to Coop’s nose. He starts to walk away, but Coop trips him, and he goes down like a tonne of bricks. Coop then straddles his waist, and slams his fist into Jack’s ribcage. Jack wheezes, but the second he catches his breath he head-butts Coop, who yells and slides off onto the floor beside him. For a minute they just lay there, side by side, trying to recover, and then Jack opens his big fat mouth. “Did she ever let you stick it in her-”
I don’t hear the rest of that question, because apparently Coop is up for round three, and then they’re off and pummelling one another again. Chelcie gasps. I glance over at the hallway, Ana and Elijah are running towards us, no doubt to see what all the fuss is about. Snickers is barking, and throwing himself into the fray by playing tug o’ war with the hem of the boys’ jeans.
I shake my head at the whole pathetic scene, and trundle off towards the kitchen. “You’re not going to try and break this up?” Chelcie asks me.
“No. I’m going to fix myself some Vegemite on toast, and then I’m taking my tired arse off to bed. If dumb and dumber there wanna tear one another apart, then have at it, I say. I am too fucking tired, and too fucking pregnant for this shit.” I head into the kitchen, make my toast, and then pick up Snickers and carry him back into the lounge room, where Coop and Jackson are both lying on the floor, wheezing. It looks like Elijah’s stepped in, and kicked both their arses, because he’s standing over the two of them, and threatening murder with his gaze. Coop’s eye is swollen shut, and Jackson’s lip is bleeding. Their clothes are torn, and each of them is sporting injuries from their stupidity. I take a deep breath, and say, “Coop, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Jackson opens his mouth, no doubt to say something stupid again, but I shoot him a scathing look and he quickly shuts it. He presses his hands to his bloody lip and winces, but he never takes his wounded gaze from mine. That look haunts me as I walk back to my room, and I let my toast go cold and then be eaten by Snickers. It haunts me long after I’ve turned out the light, and as I lay awake until the sky outside my window turns to violet, and then burnished amber, and then the cerulean blue of morning.
I’VE NOT seen Jackson all morning, and to be honest I couldn’t give a crap. That shit he pulled last night was not acceptable. I mean, he fucked Chelcie, for God’s sake, and then he turned around, ran his mouth, and beat the shit out of the father of my child. It still seems so odd that that’s a term that’s now in my vocabulary. That Coop and I, regardless of what happens here, will be inexplicably tied for the rest of our lives because of one little swimmer with a hefty backstroke. Fucking ancient condom.
I sit on the veranda, and try not to melt in the merciless heat. I don’t know why, but I put in a little extra effort while getting ready today. It’s not like Coop hasn’t seen me at my worst, but now, as I sit in the sweltering summer sun with my eyes panda-ing everywhere again, I wish I hadn’t.
The screen door bangs back on its hinges, and Chelcie and Jack come striding through it. They don’t notice me on account of all but my belly being swallowed by the love seat. Chelcie’s carrying a tote-full of her belongings, and Jackson’s wheeling her suitcase after her. I try not to let my heart leap out of my chest with glee. She might not be leaving. It could mean she’s just hauling her perfect arse back to Tenterfield, only to return in a few days wielding more shit, and fucking up my life even more.
Jack lifts the case into the boot of the car, and then hugs her tightly. It sucks watching shit like that, because it’s obviously more than just a friendly hug. It’s a hug with complications. It’s a hug for lovers, or ex-lovers—at the very least, it’s a hug between two people who have seen each other’s bits.
He whispers something in her ear and she nods, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. Then he kisses her lips, softly. Not an outright pash, just a lingering peck. Fuck. Why am I dissecting their kisses and hugs? Why the fuck can’t I look away? Bitch makes me all
homicidal.
Just as I’m about to glance away, Chelcie looks up, and sees me staring like a total stalker. She whispers something to Jack, and he turns around and smiles at me. Clearly, they were both unaware they had an audience. I hear her say something to him about leaving her phone inside, and then he’s bounding up the stairs towards me, pulling back the screen and walking in the house. Chelcie walks over to the veranda too, close enough to speak comfortably, but not close enough to punch in the face. It’s as if she’s worried I might go postal and bite her head off. I guess that’s a very real possibility, what with the way she was holding onto Jack a second ago.
“I just wanted to say goodbye,” she says quietly. “I’m heading back to Tenterfield.”
“Oh,” I mutter lamely.
“Come on, Holly, you can act a little happier about that. It’s not like I thought you were my number-one fan, or anything.”
“It’s not personal.”
“I know.”
“Sorry I was such a raving bitch.”
Chelcie smiles. “No, you’re not.”
“You’re right, I’m not. I’m always a raving bitch.”
She laughs. It’s genuine, and sweet, and it makes her whole face light up. Bitch. “I understand why, though. Look, you can tell me to shut up, but I think you should know he’s hurting pretty bad right now.”
“Yeah. Coop kinda did a number on his face there, huh?”
“He did, but we both know that’s not what I’m talking about.”
“Well, he didn’t seem all that hurt last night when he was doing you in his room.”
“He didn’t sleep with me, Holly. And it wasn’t for lack of me trying.”
“But I heard—”
“Two old friends getting drunk.”
“Yeah, I know how that goes, especially when Jackson Rowe is one of the old friends.”
“Things are different now. He’s different.” She sighs, and sits down beside me. “His pride is hurt, so given what I know of Jack, he’d let you think that’s what happened, even if it wasn’t true.”
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