A Pact For Life

by Elliot, Graham

  “Everything looks fine in there. The baby is healthy. How far along did you say you were?”

  “Twenty weeks.”

  “So the last kick you felt was in week nineteen?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well that's a bit early for you to feel kicking. Frankly, I'm surprised you were even able to feel the first kick. It's probably because you're so slim.”

  With the ultrasound finished, Diana wiped the gel off her stomach, stood up, and told the doctor, “Thanks.”

  “It's no problem. Remember, it's important not to panic or get stressed if something like this happens in the future. Almost every time, worrying will do more damage than whatever you might think might be wrong with the baby.”

  Diana nodded that she understood and walked out with her family behind her. The whole ordeal left her legs wobbly and her mind fatigued. As evidenced from the occasional jitter and twitch, her body still suffered from aftershocks of the original trauma.

  The three women walked out of the hospital in much better spirits than they arrived. As they returned to the black Mercedes, Diana turned and hugged her mom and sister with little intention of letting go. She truly was thankful for their protection.

  THE THIRD LAW OF MOTION. i.e.31 EQUAL AND OPPOSITE REACTIONS

  The Diana Young Pregnancy Update

  Estimated weeks till delivery: 15

  Shape of stomach: Two large watermelons on top of each other.

  Food Craving: Popcorn topped with garlic butter.

  Mood: Meh.

  Diana was spread out across the couch - her head on one end, her legs over Cale’s lap on the other. It was Thursday TV night, an event barely indistinguishable from Friday movie night, Saturday movie night, and Sunday TV night. In the span of only a few months, their night-lives had devolved from work and partying to a couch and TV.

  “I got my suit out of storage this morning. It’s pretty wrinkled and dusty. I should probably get that dry cleaned, right?” Cale said as the words ‘suit’ and ‘dry cleaned’ made him shiver.

  Diana replied with one of her longer sentences of the night. “That’s nice.”

  “Isn’t that realtor supposed to call tonight?”

  “Yep.”

  And from there, they sat in static for the next half hour. Static being the best way to describe the TV and appliances as the only source of noise. It wasn’t one of those comfortable, ‘nothing needs to be said’ type of moments though. They both wanted conversation, but conversation didn’t want them.

  It was their phones that cut through the static, albeit temporarily, from the mundane of their night. Cale’s rang out first with The National’s All the Wine, and Diana’s followed a few seconds later with vibration. Acting as the gentleman, Cale leaned over Diana’s legs, and grabbed both off the coffee table.

  Cale’s cell displayed a text message from Brian In The Clouds, his cell phone contact name for Brian. It read:

  We have 10 people wanting a bar crawl. Come on Cale, it’s been too long since the Tall Saints were together.

  Cale replied quickly and without any thought:

  Sorry sir, staying in with D tonight.

  Diana received a text as well, but hers came from a more professionally labeled A. Finnegan. In addition to the routine of movie and TV nights, another routine had recently appeared in Diana’s life – nightly texts back and forth with Andrew. The doctor always texted first, and it was always the same message.

  Hi.

  Diana stared at her phone trying to come up with something smart and witty for a response. She stared and thought for a minute or two until she started to day-dream about her and Andrew - the tall, dark, heart surgeon and the elegant, beautiful, lawyer. Together they would be one of the most powerful couples in Denver. The center of attention at every social event. She knew it was horrible to imagine that life since she was with Cale, but sometimes the more you try to push something out of your mind, the stronger it pushes back.

  Cale entered a state of day dreaming as well. It was one of romanticizing the past. The Tall Saints' bar crawl was an original, Cale Dawkins creation, and as such happened to be some of his favorite events from his wild life. At the apex, the bar crawls were monthly events with 500+ members, t-shirts featuring a silhouette of a cocktail glass with a halo, and open invitations from bars begging for the group to visit. Hell, the bar crawls were such an event that Nick left his laptop and smart phone at home, and Brian swallowed alcohol instead of a pill.

  In the midst of his day dream, Cale conveniently forgot about the ugly side of the crawls. The puking, fights, and spinning rooms were ignored in favor of the camaraderie, the do-no-wrong feeling, and the girls. Those sexy, hilarious, unique, scintillating, and most importantly, numerous, girls.

  Like Diana, he felt it was wrong to want to go to the party since he was with her, but also like Diana, the more he fought against the idea, the more the idea fought back.

  With the phone still in her hands, Diana’s cell started to vibrate again which caused her to drop it in surprise. The phone settled underneath the coffee table.

  “I’ll get it,” Cale said, and Diana slid her legs so he could get up. He picked up the phone, and read the caller ID. “D. Massey?”

  “Oh, that’s the realtor.” Diana replied as Cale handed her the phone. “Well, let’s hope for the best.”

  I got the house!

  In his office, Andrew Finnegan read the text and said to his brother, “Hey, look at that! Diana got the house!”

  “It’s starting to freak me out how close you two are.” Jamie responded.

  “Oh don’t be so afraid.”

  “If you piss her off, who do you think she’s gonna take it out on? The guy who can walk away, or the guy who depends on her for a salary?”

  “Diana’s not like that.”

  “You don’t know her like I do.”

  “And you don’t know her like I do”

  “Yeah, whatever,” Jamie abruptly said and waived four tickets in the air. “Sooo alright then, thanks for the tickets. Are you sure you can’t come?”

  Andrew raised his hands to show off the stacks of charts and folders on his desk and announced, “Life of a professional, little brother. You’ll understand soon enough.”

  Jamie scoffed, “We’ll see about that.”

  As Jamie turned and started to walk out, Andrew hesitantly asked, “Hey Jamie, wait for a second. Before you go, what’s Diana’s boyfriend like? I mean, is he a good guy?”

  “Oh God, I know what this is about. You like her.”

  Andrew's olive oil skin grew a little red and said, “Just tell me what he’s like. Does he treat her well?”

  “I don’t know, I’ve only been around him a few times. He seems like a big partier. When we had our firm party, he put down martinis like no one I’ve ever seen.”

  “Hmmm… you think that’s an artist thing?”

  “Hell if I know. I’ve never heard of his art or seen anything he’s done. Seriously Andrew, she’s my boss. And pregnant! You would get with a pregnant chick who isn’t even carrying your kid?”

  With a sigh, Andrew said, “It’s different when you get older. I remember how I felt about that pregnancy stuff when I was your age. It used to be a huge deal breaker. Now? Dating or even marrying a woman with a child who isn’t yours isn’t that big of a deal. When you’re in your thirties and still single, you’ll understand what I mean.”

  “Wow, I don’t know what’s more offensive, that you think I’m gonna be single in my thirties or that I’ll cave for a preggo?”

  Andrew ignored Jamie’s question and said, “It’s worth raising someone else’s kid to get Diana.”

  Jamie checked his watch and sarcastically said, “That’s truly wonderful. You're such an honorable man, and I wish you the best of luck with that, but I gotta get to the game. Try not to fuck up my life too much, okay?”

  Andrew laughed, “Get out of here, I have work to finish.”

  Jamie turned
and walked out of the office. A few feet down the hall, he yelled out the vintage Cale Dawkins’ line, “I feel like I just got off the world's biggest roller coaster where every seat had a fist-sized dildo facing up!”

  Alone in his office, Andrew grabbed his cell phone and sent Diana a text.

  Congrats on joining the homeowner ranks! When do you want to go out and celebrate?

  He received a reply before he even put the phone down.

  Soon.

  The next morning at Full Steam Ahead, Cale met Brian and Nick, both were still recovering from the previous night’s bar crawl. Despite the pain they were in, they still wanted to brag to Cale about what he missed. Brian especially wanted to gloat. He had forgiven Cale for abstaining from Pharmaceutical Wednesday, but to skip out on a bar crawl was downright Puritanical.

  “I’d say it was the best bar crawl yet. Way better than that one from a few years ago. You know, the one where we had the riot police following us down the road because we terrified the locals.” Brian said. He was still wearing his Tall Saints Bar Crawl shirt.

  Behind the monitor of his laptop, Nick groggily added, “I just finished editing the Tall Saints’ wiki page with last night’s activity. We’ve now had sixteen crawls, walked 44.5 miles, and had seven arrests.”

  Cale dismissed this with, “Oh that arrest count doesn’t…count. They were all misdemeanors. I get like four of those every year.”

  A short-haired, tattooed, girl carrying a tray of drinks came over to their table and said, “Here’s your coffees, bosses.”

  Grabbing the drink before she could set the tray down, Brian gulped it down with life-saving gusto, closed his eyes for a second, and said, “Oh thank God, I needed that. And Julie, stop calling us boss. It makes me feel weird. We’re just three customers who happen to own this place.”

  Julie answered back, “Customers usually pay.”

  “Yeah, but… help me out Cale. My head hurts too much for a comeback.”

  Cale suggested, “Free-loading ruffians? It sounds kinda dangerous.”

  Julie laughed and said. “I like that. By the way, Cale, you look pretty with it for the day after a crawl.”

  “I skipped last night.”

  “Well that explains why you aren’t curled up in the back with the lights off.”

  Brian interjected, “This asshole didn’t go last night because he was too busy watching dating reality shows with Diana.”

  “Oh yeah? Network TV or did you go for really trashy cable?” Julie joked.

  Cale answered, “The trashiest actually. National Geographics’ report on rabbits. It was constant sex, and the bachelor wound up with all the ladies.”

  “Hah, sounds appealing.” Julie said and picked up one of the empty coffee mugs. “Well, you free-loading ruffians, I better get back to the counter. You guys going out tonight?”

  Brian: “I doubt it.”

  Nick: “Nah.”

  Cale: “We’ll see.”

  After Julie left Brian questioned, “We’ll see? Oh my, does Cale the Sober want a drink? Where was this last night?”

  Cale swallowed some coffee. “I can still drink. Just trying to be a little more responsible.”

  “How about this? It’s supposed to be pretty nice out tonight. Let’s smoke some weed and walk around the neighborhood. No destination, we'll just walk till we don’t want to walk anymore. You can be in control of the music.”

  Cale thought about the offer for a moment. It was exactly what he wanted to do. A night out with no set plans, just the Earth below, the stars above, the music around, and marijuana inside. Over the previous couple of months, he had stayed away from all drugs and only had a handful of drinks. With such a long time since he, for lack of a better word, got fucked up, the craving was coming back strong. Now was the time when it would be known if he was in control of his life, or if he was truly addicted to his wild ways.

  When it comes to addiction, everyone knows the common alcoholism/junkie type. Those people can’t even go a day without indulging or else they become monsters, cripples, thieves, or zombies. This was not Cale.

  Cale’s battle was against a different form of addiction. This version can go a day, week, or month without needing anything, but the problem always arises around the two month mark. It starts with a mild itch, but eventually grows into an identical version of the other form of addiction except there’s very little physical dependence, it’s all mental. You feel relatively fine, except for the intense, constant, ‘I'll do anything’ desire in your head. Worst of all, since it’s been a few months since the last time the addiction was satisfied, there is a false belief that you are stronger than the drug. The problem is camouflaged with time.

  These two types of addiction may be different in form, but they share one all important thing – they stay with you until death. This was Cale’s fight, and Brian’s invitation to smoke weed that night was only round one.

  Inside Cale’s head, every excuse for why it was okay to go out was present. It was only the start of the fight though, and people in Cale’s type of fight always come out strong. “I think I’ll skip tonight. Diana would be furious if I came home stoned.”

  Round one finished, only a few thousand more to go.

  Inside Diana’s office that same afternoon, her and Jenny were putting the finishing touches on an organized outline for Andrew's divorce. The hearing was scheduled for the next week, and Diana had worked tirelessly on the arguments. Over the course of her professional relationship with Andrew, she had developed a personal stake in this one.

  Jenny set her packet down and said, “I think it looks good. Do you want to add anything else?”

  Diana held up her hand to signify she was still reading. After a few seconds, she clicked her pen and scribbled something down. Handing Jenny a set of papers full of red marks, she said, “Here’s my changes. I’ll go over them again tomorrow.”

  “Uh oh, does Cale know that you’ll be in work mode this weekend?”

  Diana gave a little laugh. “Good point, I wish I could tell him to stay at his studio this weekend. I'm not sure I can take any more boring nights at home.”

  “Wait, what does that mean?”

  “It’s nothing, forget it.”

  “Is there something wrong with you and Cale?”

  Diana didn’t respond.

  “Is there something right with you and Dr. Finnegan?”

  Again, Diana didn’t respond, but the color of her face shifted from clear32 to a light pink.

  “Ah, that’s what it is, isn’t it?”

  “I… I don’t know. Is it horrible that I can’t stop thinking about Andrew?”

  Jenny knew she had to proceed with caution or else Diana would close herself off and become sheltered with her work. “No, it’s not horrible at all. I don’t blame you. If I was in your position, I wouldn’t be able to get him out of my head either.”

  “But Cale. He’s the father, and I’m sure he’s expecting to get married… that stupid pact.”

  “Would you ever…”

  “I don’t love him anymore.” Diana interrupted and felt her eyes start to water. “He’s like a completely different person than who I fell in love with. All of his independence is gone, he checks with me before he does anything, and is incredibly boring. There’s no humor, or excitement, or even a shred of entertainment. I know I didn’t ever show it, but I loved how unique he was. Now he’s like every other guy I’ve ever dated. But what can I do?”

  “What about just talking to him? I’m sure he can go back to how he was. Just give him a few martinis and he’ll come back around.”

  Diana forced a smile. “You know, you’re right.”

  “I’m sure it will work. Remember, it’s Cale Dawkins we’re talking about.”

  Diana looked down at the paper showing Arguments for the Divorce of Dr. Andrew Finnegan and said, “I know.”

  Diana was spread out across her couch, her head on one end, her legs over Cale’s lap on the other. It was
Friday movie night, and by now you know the routine. Diana however, was planning on throwing a stick in the spokes of routine.

  For some reason, she was nervous to tell Cale to act more like his old self. Here was someone she was going to be bound to for the rest of her life, and she was nervous to talk with him about something that altogether wasn’t that big of an issue.

  “Cale,” Diana asked hoping for a simple, sweet response containing the word, darlin’.

  Cale responded with an, “Uh?” It was a way to say yes, only without using the tongue to create words.

  Diana came right out and said it. Only what she said was something different than what she planned. “Do you still want to get married?”

  “Oh… yeah. Yeah, I do. Do you still want to?”

  “Well, it’s part of the pact that got all this started, so we might as well see it through.”

  Diana made it sound like a prison sentence, something Cale called her out on, “Geez, don’t be too enthusiastic.”

  “Come on, Cale, I didn’t mean it like that. Of course I still want to marry you.”

  “Don’t you think we should start planning for a wedding? Whatever you want to do is fine by me. We can wait until after the baby is born if you want.”

  It was the ‘whatever you want’ phrase that made Diana twitch. “Listen, I need to talk to you about something.”

  Cale’s heart rose for a second, then sunk straight to his guts. “Okay?”

  “This… this blind willingness you’ve had these past few months. It’s just too much. I appreciate the effort you’ve made. Really, I do, but I miss the old Cale.”

  “Believe me, I miss him too.” Cale said as he thought about walking around the neighborhood with Nick, Brian, and a joint the size of a canoe.

  “So why don’t you start acting like that again?”

  “You mean drinking and drugs?”

  “No. I mean you can drink here and there, but I don’t want you high now or after the baby is born.”