Two Hard

by Amy Brent

  Cole looked down the hall, towards James's room. “Who's the father?”

  Amanda stared at Cole. He caught her staring and looked her right in the eye. She quickly turned away.

  “It doesn't matter,” she said. “He's not around.”

  “When's his birthday?”

  Amanda frowned. “Why?”

  Cole shrugged. “I dunno. Maybe I could send him something. Does he have a bike? He's almost getting old enough to start on training wheels.”

  “He's four.” Amanda shook her head.

  “I was on training wheels when I was five, I think. And riding a two-wheeler by six.”

  Amanda thought it over. James was pretty coordinated. He must have gotten that from his father.

  The conversation lapsed for a few minutes. Cole finished his coffee and set it on the table. “So,” he asked, “when should I pick you up tonight?”

  “Pick me up?” Amanda asked.

  “Yeah. For the wedding? You're still going with me, aren't you?”

  “Oh.” She shrugged, looking into her empty cup. “Yeah. I just figured we'd meet up there, or whatever.”

  He studied her for a long moment, a sad look in his eyes. “Listen,” he said, “if you aren't interested, I don't want you to feel pressured or anything.”

  “It's not that.”

  “Then what is it?”

  Amanda looked down the hall again, towards James's room. How could she explain to Cole everything she was feeling? All of the conflicted emotions, all of the memories, and all of her worries about the future. It was all too much to handle. She couldn't put it all into words.

  The weight of it all started pressing down on her. The more she tried to find a way to explain things to Cole, the harder it was to speak. She felt her chest start to tighten. She choked back a sob. Before she knew it, tears were flowing down her cheeks.

  Cole moved closer to her, wrapping his arms around her. She buried her face against his neck. He held her tight, and his strong arms made her feel safe and protected. It made it so much easier to let it all go. She cried harder than she had in years, all of her frustrations finally coming out. She clung to him desperately, wishing things could be easier. Wishing it were as simple as rekindling her old crush and starting all over again.

  Cole pulled back and brushed his thumb across her cheek, wiping her tears away. She looked up into his eyes. He looked into hers, holding her while she trembled.

  Then he kissed her.

  She knew it was probably a mistake. A small part of her wanted to hold back, to stop. But it felt so safe and warm in his arms, and she hadn't been touched by a man in such a long time. There had hardly been any men after Cole. She had never been able to really trust another man, never been able to let him inside. And then there was her son to consider, and she couldn't just jump into bed with any man without considering how it might affect James. But this was James's father, for better or worse.

  Cole leaned forward, pressing her down onto the couch. His weight on top of her felt solid and real, real in a way she hadn't known in a long time. His hands started roaming her body. She was tense at first, afraid he would judge her, that he wouldn't find her attractive. She wasn't the thin, fit girl she'd once been. She was scared that he would be disgusted to find how much her body had changed, after the toil of childbirth and the troubles of her life since then.

  But he caressed her ample curves with pleasing sounds coming from his throat. He pressed himself down on top of her, and she could feel him growing hard through his pants. His hands slid along her sides, teasing her sensitive skin. Then he started to push up her tank top, exposing her full, firm breasts.

  She tensed up, part of her mind screaming at her to stop. James was in the other room. He might hear them, might walk in on them. She wasn't ready to have that conversation with him. Not by a long shot.

  But when Cole started touching her breasts, his hands felt so strong and warm. She couldn't push him away, couldn't tell him to stop.

  She reached down and started pushing off her pajama pants. Cole grabbed them and pulled them the rest of the way off, exposing her body to him. He had his own pants off a moment later. He laid his body on top of hers, spreading her legs with his knees. She felt his hardness rubbing against her, and despite her reservations, despite her fears, she ached for it. She needed it. It had been such a long time, and she couldn't stand to make him stop.

  She shifted herself to make it easier for him, and within a moment, Cole was inside of her. She gasped and clung to him, holding him close. He grunted in pleasure and started thrusting inside of her, holding her ample hips in his strong hands. She wrapped her legs around him and pulled him tighter with each thrust, biting her lip to hold back her moans.

  As the ecstasy built inside of her, she knew this was something different than the first night they'd shared together, over five years ago. That night had been a drunken mess, and her virginal movements had been awkward and full of fumbles. She had been full of nerves and alcohol, and unable to do anything but let Cole have his drunken way with her. But this time it was something so much more. Even in his eagerness, Cole moved with a tender touch. He held her close, their cheeks pressed together, his warm breath caressing her ear. She felt his need with each movement of his hips, and it felt like so much more than just a physical urge. He wanted her, needed her, and helping him fulfill that need filled her with a warmth and pleasure that went beyond the burning in her loins.

  She clung tightly to him until the waves of euphoria washed over both of them, then they laid there on the couch, panting and covered in sweat. He held her even tighter after it was done, as if he were afraid that she would disappear, that she would leave him for another five years.

  Eventually, she pulled herself from his arms. She wrapped a blanket around herself and got up, feeling awkward in the aftermath. Cole laid on the couch in a daze, looking like he was still woozy from his drinking the night before, combined with the exertion of sex. She looked down at him for a moment, the reality of what had just happened slowly settling in on her.

  When Cole passed back out again, she laid the blanket back over him, then headed for the bathroom and climbed into the shower. The smell of sex covered her, and she didn't want that to be the first thing James noticed when she woke him up for breakfast.

  Though as the hot water poured down over her, she found herself faced with the reality that she would have to tell her son something. What had just happened meant that Cole's presence there was more than just a friend stopping by for the night. She didn't know what exactly it meant, but she knew that it wasn't something she could simply brush off and ignore. She owed her son, and Cole, better than that.

  Chapter 10

  Cole woke up a few minutes after Amanda got in the shower. He looked around blearily at the unfamiliar living room. He was laying naked on the couch, covered by a blanket. Faint traces of morning sunlight shone through the sliding glass door that led out onto the balcony.

  And there was a small child standing in the middle of the room, staring at him.

  “Hi,” the kid said.

  Cole sat up, pulling the blanket over himself to make sure he was covered. “Hey.”

  “Who are you?”

  “I'm Cole.” He gave the kid an awkward little wave.

  The kid continued staring at him, clutching a Nerf football to his chest. “Are you a friend of my mom's?”

  “Yeah,” Cole said. “Yeah, something like that.”

  “Oh.” The kid looked around the room awkwardly. “Do you want to watch TV with me?”

  “Sure.” Cole grabbed his pants off the floor while the kid grabbed the remote and turned the TV on. He pulled his pants on under the cover of the blanket so as not to flash Amanda's son. He didn't want to have any awkward conversations about just what he and the kid's mother had been doing on the couch.

  He expected the kid to turn on cartoons, but instead he put on ESPN. There was a game later in the day, but for now the stati
on was playing the early morning edition of SportsCenter. Cole finished getting dressed while the kid watched the sports commentary and the theories about how today's games would go. Cole's team wasn't playing until Monday night; he had an early morning plane ticket to fly back tomorrow morning, giving him enough time to sleep off any hangover he might get at the wedding tonight.

  “You're James, right?” Cole asked. He was pretty sure that was the kid's name, though they'd never met before.

  “Yeah.” James kept his eyes on the TV, mostly ignoring Cole.

  “You like football?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What's your favorite team?” Cole slid off the couch and sat on the floor next to the kid.

  “The Eagles.”

  Cole made a face. Philadelphia hadn't been one of his favorite teams even before he joined the NFL. Though for a kid living in South Jersey, it was the home team.

  “That's cool,” Cole said. “Think they're going to win the Superbowl this year?” Cole knew that wasn't likely to happen. Philadelphia had only been to a few Superbowls in its entire history. But there was nothing wrong with being polite if it was the kid's favorite team.

  “I dunno,” James said. “I guess.”

  They chatted for a little while about football, not that the kid had the greatest insight into the game. He said his favorite part was when they kicked the ball, and that he didn't like it when the guys in the striped shirts made everyone stop playing. Cole wasn't too fond of the constant interruptions by the refs himself, though it was a bit different when you were the one on the field, staring at a yellow flag.

  “So how old are you, anyway?” Cole asked. He couldn't remember if Amanda had told him.

  “Four. I'm gonna be five in March.”

  Cole leaned back on his hands, thinking that over. Four, going on five. His one night with Amanda, before this morning anyway, had been five and a half years ago. And it had been in June, at Amanda and Michelle's high school graduation party. And he didn't remember using a condom.

  He counted the months, doing the math on his fingers. It added up right.

  Damn, he thought.

  He looked the kid over again. He had a strong jawline, like Cole and his father. Blue eyes, just like Cole. He couldn't really be sure. It might have just been a coincidence. For all he knew, Amanda had been with another guy not long after their encounter together. It was possible someone else was the father.

  But now that the idea had occurred to him, it appeared to be the case more and more likely. He couldn't believe it had never occurred to him before. But it wasn't like he'd expected to come home after five years and find out there was a kid he'd never known about.

  Amanda returned from her shower while he was thinking things over. She was dressed in sweat pants and a t-shirt, and the clothes hugged the curves of her body in ways that gave him ideas. Ideas that he most definitely couldn't act on with her son in the room. With his son, maybe?

  He looked up at her. She met his eyes, and there was something in her gaze that set him on edge. Something about the way she looked at him, and at James. Was she hiding the truth from him? And if she was, why hadn't she ever told him?

  Because he'd walked out on her the morning after they'd slept together. He couldn't blame her, if that was the reason. If he'd ever called her, ever gotten back in touch with her, then maybe she would have had reason to tell him the truth. But she must have felt abandoned. Alone. Stuck with the consequences of that night, and with no one to support her.

  He looked away, unable to meet her gaze any longer. He looked around the messy apartment, with its secondhand furniture and its worn out carpets. She had to live like this because of him. Because he hadn't taken responsibility for his actions. It didn't matter that he hadn't known. He knew it was still his fault.

  “Do you want to stay for breakfast?” Amanda asked. Her voice was tense, but she seemed to be trying to hide it. “I was going to make french toast.”

  “Yeah,” Cole said. “That sounds good.”

  “Yeah!” James said, thrusting his fists into the air. “French toast!”

  Cole went into the kitchen to help out. He and Amanda moved awkwardly around each other, blushing every time they bumped elbows. Cole found the plates and silverware with a little direction from Amanda, then he cleared the old magazines and junk mail off the table to make room. It felt strange for him to be this...domestic. Strange, but good. After the initial awkwardness passed, he and Amanda found a comfortable silence. He tried to imagine doing this every morning. Waking up together, making breakfast together, and spending time together as a family. When he was a kid, he used to love when his family shared meals together. Though by his teenage years he had grown out of that, and he would mostly eat in his room. He'd developed a habit of eating alone in the years since then as well, so much so that he rarely took the girls he dated—or slept with, rather—out to dinner. Usually it was drinks, then heading back to his place or to a hotel room for a romp under the sheets.

  Maybe this was what he'd been missing. The simple peace of shared family time.

  “You hungry, kid?” Cole asked when Amanda started serving the French toast slices.

  “Yeah,” James said. He climbed into a chair. When Amanda set a plate of French toast in front of James, he looked up at Cole and asked, “Can you cut it for me?”

  Cole exchanged a look with Amanda. A slight smile played across her lips.

  “Yeah, sure thing,” Cole said. He sat next to James and cut up his French toast, then added some syrup.

  “You forgot the butter,” James protested, a serious look on his face.

  “Oh. Sorry.” Cole opened the tub of butter and spread some on the French toast. He had a bit of trouble spreading it, since the bread was already cut up. Amanda watched him struggling with it, and she giggled. Cole blushed and smiled at her.

  After breakfast was over, Cole got up and walked towards the door. “I should really get going,” he said. “I need to shower and get changed. My fancy clothes are back at home.”

  “Yeah,” Amanda said. She kept her head down, not meeting his eyes. “Okay.”

  “Did you still just want to meet there?” Cole asked. “I mean… I'd be happy to come pick you up.”

  Amanda turned and looked at her son, probably thinking about what a pain it would be to catch a bus with him to get to the church. She shrugged and gave Cole a small smile. “If you want to come by, that'd be fine.”

  “Great.” He smiled at her. She finally met his eyes. He stepped closer, leaning in for a kiss, but she pulled away, looking at James.

  “I'll see you then,” Amanda said.

  Cole looked at James, wondering how much a kid that age understood about adult relationships and all of the complications that came with them. He supposed it was for the best if he didn't give the kid any reason to ask his mother awkward questions. “See you then,” he said, before he headed out the door.

  During the walk back to where he'd parked his car, all he could think about was Amanda and James. He was almost certain that the kid had to be his. It all added up.

  He just didn't know what he was supposed to do about it.

  He was so preoccupied with his thoughts that be barely noticed the parking ticket on his car for parking too close to a fire hydrant. He pulled the ticket off the car and stuck it in his pocket. Considering everything that last night and this morning had brought about, it was worth far more than the cost of a parking ticket.

  Chapter 11

  Amanda took her time getting ready for the wedding. Michelle had sent over her bridesmaid dress the night before. It was emerald green, and fairly hideous, which seemed to be the norm for bridesmaid dresses. It didn't fit too well either, which was to be expected with how rushed the entire wedding was. There had been no time to go to a dress fitting or to get adjustments made. She had just given Michelle her sizes and hoped for the best.

  Once she finally got herself into the dress, she looked herself over in the m
irror. The dress was tight, hugging her curves a bit more than she was comfortable with, and the top pushed her breasts up so much she was afraid she was going to fall out of it. Though she supposed that Cole would like that.

  When she thought of Cole, she had to stop and sit down on the bed. She still couldn't believe that she had slept with him again. Or that he'd spent the morning with her and James, having breakfast together like a normal family. It was something she'd thought about many times over the years. It was something she thought she could get used to.

  She went to fetch James and get him ready for the wedding. She didn't have a suit or any fancy clothes for him; there was no way she could afford to spend so much money on a suit that he would grow out of in a few months anyway. So she simply dressed him in his nicest corduroy pants and a plain black shirt. He would probably end up getting cake all over it before the end of the night, but that was okay. She'd grown used to living a life filled with stained clothes.

  “Okay, sweetie,” she said as she adjusted his shirt. “Cole is going to come by soon to pick us up, then we're going to go see your Aunt Michelle get married.”

  “Is Cole your boyfriend?” James asked.

  Amanda fell backwards until she was sitting on the floor. She didn't know how to answer that question, especially in a way that a four year old would understand. “I'm not sure. What do you think of him?”

  “He's okay,” James said with a serious nod.

  “Just okay?”

  James shrugged. “We watched Sports Center together.”

  “Yeah, I saw. Did you know that Cole plays football? You saw him on TV the other day.”

  “I did?” James's face scrunched up in concentration. He probably hadn't recognized Cole out of his uniform.

  “Yup, that's right. He's a quarterback.”

  “That's so cool! Do you think he could teach me how to play?”

  Amanda smiled. James had wanted to learn to play football almost since he'd first learned how to talk. Amanda didn't really know the rules, so she hadn't been able to teach him anything, though she took him outside to toss the ball around whenever she could. “I think maybe he'd like that,” she said. “But you know, he probably has to go home after the wedding. He can't stay here if he's going to go be on TV playing football.”