Chat

  “Sleep with him, and you told her that. You know, your biggest problem is that you talk too fucking much, man.”

  “I know.”

  “I hope you’re going to her right now. No matter how much you screwed up, I don’t trust that guy.”

  “I know. I’m on my way there now.”

  “Jason,” Scott sighed, and I heard one of the twins talking in the background. “Nothing that you’ve said or done is unfixable. You’ve known each other for too long, and she loves you, man. You didn’t do anything but tell her that you’re worried. In your own awkward, offensive way.”

  Both of their cars were parked outside their apartment, as well as a Tahoe that I didn’t recognize. I assumed it belonged to the realtor.

  “Thanks, Scott.”

  Climbing the steps, I heard their voices as I made it to the third floor. Their apartment door was ajar, and the realtor was speaking. “…closing costs. They like the updating that you’ve done, even though the kitchen is small.”

  “That was all Alexandra. She has an eye for beauty.”

  Jack. His fucking swanky flattery always turned my stomach, and I hoped it was making Sandy as equally irritated.

  “Thank you,” came her soft reply.

  I paused outside the door.

  I knew that intruding would mean one of two possible outcomes. One, she’d be glad to see me, and would forgive me for insinuating that she’d consider sleeping with him again, or two, she’d turn all red, launch into a litany of curse words, and Jack would smugly tell me to leave.

  I suddenly felt like an intruder, like I had absolutely no place showing up at her apartment.

  Their apartment.

  Yes, we’d been best friends all of our lives, and yes, only three weeks ago, she’d agreed to become my wife. But after her surgery, she’d pulled away, and after enough time had passed for me to realize that I hadn’t succeeded in getting her pregnant, I began to wonder if I was exactly what she’d predicted I’d be.

  A rebound.

  I ran my hand through my hair, trying to think through what the future held for us.

  “Well, then, that’s it. I’ll call you after we close on Wednesday. It’s been a pleasure working with you both,” the realtor was saying.

  I leaned against the wall, watching the older woman walk toward the elevator.

  Finally, I sighed, waiting. If they closed the door, I’d go in. Until then, I would wait, listening, making sure she was at least safe.

  “It’s so empty,” Sandy murmured.

  “It was empty the moment you left,” Jack replied.

  “Don’t. I’ve said everything I wanted to say to you, Jack. Now it’s time to say goodbye.”

  “Will you answer one question for me?” he replied. Her soft exhale made my heart thump against my chest.

  “I guess.”

  “Was it always him? Did you always love him?” He asked.

  The silence echoed throughout the hallway and the empty apartment.

  I waited, holding my breath, for her answer.

  Finally, her soft voice cut through the quiet. “I don’t know that it’s always been him. But it’ll always be him. For the rest of my life.”

  Nothing mattered to me at that moment but her words.

  I tucked my hands in my pockets, waiting, barely breathing.

  “I know he’ll treat you better than I have. I’m sorry that I hurt you,” he said.

  “I’ll forgive you eventually, but I’ll never forget it, Jack. I can’t.”

  “You shouldn’t forgive me.”

  Ah, fuck, the martyr. Sandy’s biggest weakness.

  I waited, ready to rush in at any moment.

  “I will,” she replied softly. “I owe it to myself, and to my husband. To Jason. I don’t plan on suffering you forever.”

  I loved her even more for throwing my name in his face.

  He left as I tucked myself into the shadows of the hallway. He took the elevator, and I waited until she was locking up the apartment before stepping out of the corridor.

  “Hey. I was stalking you. Hope that’s okay.”

  She inhaled quickly, turning to me and closing her eyes. “God, you scared the hell out of me!”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Were you spying on me?” she demanded, turning to the door.

  “I prefer… defending you from the forces of evil. Like Batman.”

  “Which Batman, Keaton or Bale?” she asked, fighting with the realtor’s lock.

  “Keaton of course.”

  “I don’t need a hero.”

  “No?” I took a tentative step toward her, and she turned to face me.

  “No.” She’d left her hair down, and I remembered pulling the pins out one by one earlier that day.

  “What do you need, San?” I urged.

  She bit her lip, her lashes fanning against her cheeks before her eyes lifted to mine. “You.”

  I smiled slowly, raising my eyes.

  “Are you still mad at me for writing on you?”

  She rolled her pretty eyes, scoffing. “I was mad for what you were insinuating, not for writing on me.”

  “Did you like what I wrote?”

  “Jason Brewer Was Here. JB + SQ 4-EVER.” She laughed, shaking her head. “So juvenile.”

  “Want me to write something else?” I teased. “Or better yet, let’s get you a ring. I want everyone to look at you and know that you’re mine.”

  She reached for my hands, tucking them at her waist.

  She covered my hands with hers, splaying them over her belly.

  “Jason, I don’t need a ring. I have a feeling our baby will be very blond. That should do the trick.”

  As her words made sense in my mind, her grin grew, and I reached for her face.

  “What? You’re pregnant? Sandy?”

  She exhaled a tearful laugh, nodding. “Yes. I took a test last night.”

  “You knew this morning? In my office?” I demanded, holding her stomach, my thumbs brushing over her belly through the thin material of her ruffled shirt. “Come on, you need to sit down… are you hungry? Tired? Are you sick?”

  “Jason, I’m fine,” she protested, leaning forward into my arms. “I was sick last night, but other than that, fine. Wait, did you come straight from work? Joplin is still home alone?”

  “Shit!” I glanced at my watch, and she gripped my hand, smiling up at me.

  “I’m making you crazy,” she murmured, and I closed my eyes tightly, dropping my forehead to hers.

  “Sandy. You’re making me so happy. I don’t even have words. And I always have words,” I said, exhaling a laugh against her hair.

  “I love your words,” she replied, tilting her face up to mine.

  “I love you,” I breathed, capturing her lips in mine. I kissed her, thinking about our blond-haired baby that she’d described, and my heart swelled. She moaned softly as I wrapped my arm around her back, lifting her to me. “Baby, I can’t be your boss anymore.”

  “I know,” she managed.

  “And I can’t wait until August to marry you.”

  “I don’t want to wait until August.”

  “How did everything go today? He didn’t try anything with you, did he?” I demanded. She shook her head, locked in my arms.

  “No, it’s over. He knows it. He also knows that I love you.”

  I held her in my arms in the middle of the hallway, swaying with her to the soundless melody that had always existed between us.

  “Boss, we’re in trouble now.”

  She laughed, lifting her eyes to mine. “Brew, it’s your turn to take the blame.”

  “Gladly,” I answered, dropping to my knees to look up at her. “Holy shit, I’m going to be a dad. I’m going to be your dad,” I said to her flat stomach, and she threaded her fingers through my hair.

  “I’m only about four weeks, anything can happen,” she warned, and I immediately caught the nervous edge to her tone.

  “Nothing is
going to happen, don’t worry. Worrying isn’t good,” I chided, lifting her shirt and tucking my head under the white ruffles. She giggled as I pressed my lips to her bare stomach.

  “Jason!”

  “It’s nice in here. He’s a lucky guy,” I teased as she pulled her shirt back.

  “He?” she asked, grinning down at me.

  I rose to my feet, catching her lips again in a soft, promising kiss. “Come on, I want to tell your parents. And my parents. And Scott and Em.”

  “Please, let’s wait,” she begged. “At least until I go to the doctor. I’m so nervous, Brew.”

  “You know you’re coming home with me,” I ordered, and she conceded with a soft smile.

  “Take me home, Jason.”

  I gathered her into my arms, doing just that.

  ~

  We lay in my bed that night, and she was curled in my arms as I scoured the internet on my iPad. “It says that you need vitamins. And folic acid. Wait, are you taking that medication that Dr. Adams prescribed?”

  “No,” she answered tiredly, her long fingers moving over Joplin’s ears. “I wanted to wait until I knew for sure I wasn’t pregnant.”

  “He’s the size of a poppy seed,” I read, running my hand over her curls. “I think we should call your doctor and leave a message anyway, so they’ll call back first thing in the morning-”

  “I know you’re excited,” she said, turning up to face me. “But I’m so, so, so tired Brew. Please just read me some more Tolstoy until I fall asleep.”

  I smiled down at her, nodding and reaching for my phone and opening Anna Karenina. “Baby, for you… anything.” Her chocolate eyes sparkled in the lamplight, and I opened my Kindle app. “Wow. This part’s about you,” I began. “He could not be mistaken,” I read. “There were no other eyes like those in the world. There was only one creature in the world who could concentrate for him all the brightness and meaning of life. It was she.”

  She sighed, closing her eyes. “I love romantic Jason.”

  I grinned, reading until I was sure she was sound asleep.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Sandy

  “I can’t not work.”

  “That’s a double negative. And I thought you were a Lit major.”

  “Jason, it’s not 1955! We have to afford a wedding, and a house, and… I like working.”

  “Really.”

  “Well, I like making money,” I cried, kicking at the ground to swing the hammock in his backyard. The stars filled the night sky, and fireflies dotted the edge of his property like the twinkling lights of a Christmas tree.

  For an entire month, we shared the secret of the baby growing inside of me. After that first appointment and the ultrasound that changed our lives, he drove home, gripping the photo in shock.

  “You called it,” I tried playfully, turning to him.

  “Twins? Two babies. One, two,” he counted the circles drawn on the photo, swerving as he narrowly missed taking out a mailbox.

  “You have to keep your eyes on the road! Yes, two babies, just like you said,” I urged.

  “I don’t deserve to be this happy. Something is going to go wrong.”

  “Jason! Stop it.” I elbowed him, pointing at the road. “Just drive to our parent’s house. I want to tell them. I can’t wait to see their faces.”

  “Maybe we should wait,” he echoed my sentiments from weeks ago.

  “Why? Do you feel like something’s wrong?” I asked.

  “No, nothing’s wrong,” he replied, gripping my hand. “Why, do you feel like something’s wrong?”

  “Jason.” I sighed deeply, resting my head on his shoulder. “We’re going to drive ourselves crazy. Let’s just stop worrying and be thankful. Okay?”

  He’d kissed me, nodding. “Sounds like a plan.”

  Our parents had been elated. When I finally mentioned to my mom that we wanted to move the wedding date up, she beamed, opening up her gigantic file folder and jumping head-first into wedding planning again.

  “Are you sure?” she urged.

  “I’m so sure, Mom,” I’d replied, laughing as my dad made Jason climb up into the attic to help him bring my old baby crib down.

  “Jim! She’s not using a crib from the seventies, not for my grandbabies,” my mom had accused. Jason only smiled, brushing off the dust on the cherry wood.

  “Maybe we can make a shelf out of it or something,” he’d suggested, forcing a proud smile to my dad’s face.

  The wedding date was set for July 14th. With a little more than a month to prepare, we’d taken to spending the evenings in the hammock with Joplin at our feet, stargazing and planning our future.

  “Jason, I know I can’t work for you anymore. But I can still work.”

  “That’s not what I’m saying. I would take another position in a second. I just think that the cost of childcare would be more than your salary. And I don’t want strangers raising my kids.”

  “Our moms offered to help.”

  “I don’t want to rely on them. And we travel so much, and I don’t want you traveling, at least not in the first year.”

  “God, I never knew you were such a chauvinistic, controlling, domineering-”

  He silenced me with a kiss, and I warmed, narrowing my eyes.

  “…-man.” I finished, lying back. He stretched out next to me, tucking his arm around my belly. I was only nine weeks, but definitely had a bump, though he refused to agree with me. I knew that all of my jeans were too tight, and had already taken to wearing mostly loose, cotton skirts.

  “You love that about me,” he said.

  “I know.” I sighed, covering his hand with mine. “I wish you didn’t have to leave. What time is your flight?”

  He groaned. “Ten tomorrow. I’ll be home on Saturday morning. Only one day.” We stared at the sky, and he kissed the back of my neck. “It’s so warm. We could sleep out here.”

  “Okay.” I sighed.

  “Mmm.” He kissed me again, slower, behind my ear, and I felt the familiar waves of intense wanting flowing through my body. Everything was changing; my breasts were tender, my hips were sore, and I was unable to stay up past nine PM.

  And suddenly, I was horny all the freaking time.

  “Make love to me, Jason. It won’t hurt anything.”

  He continued kissing me, his hand sliding down my side. “I just want you to be a little further along. And it’ll make our wedding night that much more intense.”

  “Brew?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I’m going to die if you don’t fuck me right now.”

  He laughed, his hand slipping under the waistband of my sweatpants. “Drama.”

  “Jason, I mean it.”

  His fingers were between my legs, and I arched against the pressure of his hand as his mouth returned to my neck.

  “Just you, baby.”

  He teased me, opening me and gently slipping his finger inside while his thumb pressed to my sensitive nub. I rocked my hips into his hand, coming with tiny, explosive breaths.

  He continued kissing me as my panting evened, and I let my eyes close beneath the heavy-lidded bliss of his skilled touch.

  “How many stars, Sandy?” he whispered, his warm breath on my ear.

  “Two, Jason. One for each of the lives you’ve given me.”

  His contented sigh was the last thing I heard as I drifted to sleep.

  He carried me into the house sometime later, and I woke up nauseated around three AM. I’d learned that the sickness struck me mostly at night and pacing helped ease the queasiness.

  After drinking some ginger ale, I decided to look online for nursery ideas. Jason and I had decided on a beach theme, something that would be gender-neutral.

  I noticed he’d left his browser window open again, and I clicked on Facebook.

  With a grin, I saw that he’d changed his relationship status to “engaged.”

  I never knew that something so insanely simple would make me so blissful
ly happy, but it did. I clicked on his messages and saw that Carissa Steel’s name was at the top.

  Narrowing my eyes, I scanned their conversation.

  Carissa Steel: Twins! That’s amazing. Congratulations!

  Jason Brewer: Thank you. I feel like my life had to fall apart before I could put it back together the way it was always supposed to be.

  Oh, shit. Tears tumbled down my cheeks as I read his words. I couldn’t believe that my Jason could alternate between talking so dirty, and yet come up with these profound expressions of love.

  Carissa Steel: That’s so romantic!!

  Jason Brewer: How are you? How was the signing? Sorry I couldn’t be there.

  Carissa Steel: I’m good. Things are okay. I have another signing in Boston next week.

  My blood ran cold.

  Jason Brewer: I have to go to Boston for work next week, actually. When’s your signing?

  Carissa Steel: Saturday morning! Oh, please tell me you can come!!!

  Jason Brewer: I can probably swing it. I couldn’t get a flight until Saturday at noon anyway.

  Carissa Steel: OMG I’m so excited! I’m emailing you a PDF with two tickets right now!

  Jason Brewer: Just one. Sandy won’t be with me.

  Carissa Steel: Oh… okay. Everything’s still good, though, right?

  Jason Brewer: Yeah, she doesn’t deal with the New England states. I also don’t want her traveling. I worry.

  Carissa Steel: Are you one of those overly cautious new dads? Lol

  Jason Brewer: I can’t help it

  Carissa Steel: So my box of book sex toys is probably collecting dust?

  I was instantly pissed off. How dare she bring that up now, knowing that he was engaged to me, and I was having his child? Children?

  I knew that I should have stopped reading right there and then. Whether it was self-consciousness, curiosity, or whatever, I needed to read Jason’s response.

  Jason Brewer: For a little while

  Carissa Steel: You don’t seem like the kind of guy who can go without

  I hated that she left off the punctuation to that statement. My blood was boiling.