Numb

by Lynn Rider

  I gave her an apologetic grin before scooping Luke from her arms. She handed me his bottle and I slid onto the stool.

  “Honey, I’ll be back later.” Cliff walked into the kitchen and planted a chaste kiss on her lips, patted her stomach softly, then came over and kissed the top of Luke’s head. He gave my arm a gentle squeeze. “Don’t be such a stranger, Meagan.”

  He walked out the door and I turned back to Leah. She had a goofy, lovesick grin on her face as she watched him leave. She turned in my direction and wiped it clean. “Spill it. Where in the hell have you been?”

  “Well,” I sighed heavily, “it’s a long story.”

  She looked down at her watch. “Well, you’re in luck. I have all the time you need to tell it,” she finished with a sweet smile.

  I took a steadying breath and spilled every detail. She listened attentively to every word, consoled me when I lost it and when it was all done she looked as deflated as I felt.

  “Fuck, Meagan. What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know, Leah. I know how I feel about Ashton, but I just don’t see the future that I once did with him and that scares me.”

  “Oh, honey, it’s understandable that you can’t see that future anymore. The future you’ve been imagining may not be the future you’ll have. So much is in limbo right now. I think once you know whether or not it’s his baby, you’ll be able to see a future … with or without him,” she said solemnly before taking a deep breath. “I think rather than preparing yourself for whether or not it’s his baby, you need to be preparing yourself for a life without him.”

  My eyes flashed to hers with anger. She smiled.

  “There’s my girl. Fight for him, Meagan. Don’t let this bitch win. She may be carrying his baby who he’ll love, but he’ll never love her and you need to plant yourself firmly next to him so that she knows it. You’re worried that if this is Ashton’s baby, loving him comes as a package deal with baby. Well, make her have the same worry. Having a baby with him comes with the love of Ashton’s life.”

  I threw my arms around her neck. “I love you, Leah Morrison. You’re the best friend I could ever have.”

  “I know. I’m pretty damn awesome. But, Meagan, if you ever get an opportunity to be my neighbor again, you’d better fucking take it!”

  I laughed. “I know. It breaks my heart. I don’t dare tell Ashton how heartbroken I am over it. He’d probably buy it anyway.” I smiled weakly.

  Leah shook her head. “It’s sold. I saw the realtor yesterday,” she said sadly.

  The smell of something cooking lured me into the kitchen when I walked into Ashton’s apartment. I found him slumped over the counter, studying a piece of paper.

  “What’s up?” I asked.

  He stood as he put the paper down on the countertop and walked toward me, pulling me into a tight embrace. “I missed you,” he said softly, cradling my head in his hands.

  “I missed you too. Are you okay?” I asked, searching his eyes.

  He let out a heavy sigh. “I think I’m going to go to Minneapolis for that sonogram, but I want you to come with me.”

  “Why?”

  “I want her to understand there is no future for her and me, even if it is my baby.”

  I felt the sudden squeeze on my heart. Package deal. We are a package deal. Fight for him. It sounded logical when Leah and I were talking, but the realization that I was being faced with in this very moment was scarier than I was tough.

  I shook my head. “I don’t think I’m strong enough.” Tears welled in my eyes.

  “Meagan, I don’t know if I’m strong enough without you. Please.” He pleaded. “As I stood looking at that paper today I thought about the man I’ve tried so hard to be. The man my father wasn’t. If that’s my kid, I need to be a better father, a better man than he was. Please don’t make me choose between the man I’ve worked so hard to be and the man I’ve worked so hard not to be.”

  I felt his words like an invisible slap to the face. “I would never make you choose. This is your choice, Ashton, always has been. You need to do whatever makes you happy.”

  “Don’t you get it, Meagan? You make me happy. You’re all I ever wanted. I know you would never ask me to choose, but I’d choose you every time without question,” he pleaded sincerely, holding my eyes hostage.

  “I’ll go,” I said quietly. He offered a guarded smile, searching my eyes. “I’ll go,” I said firmly, convincing both me and him.

  “What time is your sonogram?” I asked Leah.

  “Two, what time is yours?” She snickered.

  “Ha-ha, very funny. Her sonogram is at three. I’d much rather be going to see my and Ashton’s baby,” I replied dryly.

  “I know, Meg. Keep your chin up. He’s trying to do the right thing,” she said earnestly.

  “I know, that’s why I love him. He’s a good man. I just wish he didn’t have to prove it in this way.”

  I heard the click of the front door. “I gotta go, Leah. Ashton is here to pick me up. Wish me luck.”

  “I wish you luck. Remember, you’re a package deal. He loves you and he’ll choose you if you ask him to.” She giggled.

  “Leah …”

  “Just joking, but that is pretty damn sweet. I love you, Meagan. Call me if you need to talk about anything.”

  “Thank you. I love you too.”

  “Who was that?” Ashton asked from the bedroom doorway.

  “Leah. She was giving me my pep talk.” I smiled and he smiled weakly in return. His eyes scanned down to the overnight bag on the edge of the bed.

  “Are you ready?”

  “As ready as I’ll ever be.” I knew he was talking about the bag, but I wasn’t.

  “Me too,” he said quietly, scooping up my bag from the bed.

  I was surprised to see Dave standing next to Ashton’s SUV when we got to the parking garage. “Hi, Dave. How was St. Louis?” I asked, happy to see him as I climbed through the back door he opened for me.

  “Same old. Same old,” he replied before closing the door after Ashton crawled in.

  We drove to the airport in silence. I knew Ashton was as nervous as I was. People stopped and took notice as we followed Dave’s threatening form through the airport, snapping pictures with their camera phones as we hurriedly made our way through the masses of people. As we rounded the terminal for the small plane, I was shocked to see we weren’t flying commercial. I looked up at Ashton.

  “James.” He shrugged.

  “Then I guess he knows?”

  “Yeah, he stays in tune with his artists. He has a vested interest.”

  We arrived in Minneapolis and checked into our hotel rooms. When we arrived on our floor, Dave headed off toward his suite as Ashton and I turned toward ours. We had two hours to spare and Ashton couldn’t seem to sit still.

  “Ashton, try to relax. Come sit and talk with me.” I patted the couch next to me. He visibly relaxed as he made his way toward me and sat. I climbed onto his lap, straddling it while rubbing his shoulders softly.

  “Tell me why you’re so nervous. Is meeting her making you nervous?”

  “I couldn’t care less about her,” he answered flatly.

  “Okay, so is meeting your unborn child making you nervous?”

  “Yes, I guess when you put it that way it seems pretty dumb.” He slumped his head back on the couch.

  “Tell me what makes you most nervous?”

  “The reality of it. After today, I’ll see it with my own two eyes and know it’s real.”

  “We still don’t know that’s it’s yours,” I interjected.

  “You’re right, but up to this day, even at this moment, I’m not even sure she’s pregnant.” He laughed nervously.

  “Well, that’s unlikely if we’ve come all the way here. She must be pretty certain of it,” I said lightheartedly.

  He took a deep breath and grabbed my hands, holding them tight in his. “Thank you for being here, Meagan. Words can’t express
how grateful I am to have you by my side.” His gaze held his appreciation in their depths.

  I placed my lips to his and softly kissed him. His hand reached around and cupped the back of my neck, pressing me into him harder. As I began rocking in his lap, his phone rang. He groaned in my mouth before pulling away.

  “It’s my attorney,” he said apologetically with one finger extended.

  “Hey, Jim,” he answered, sounding more relaxed than he did a little while ago. Ashton remained silent, listening for several minutes. His brow furrowed and his body tensed as his eyes flashed up to me. “Tell them no. I’ll get on the plane and go right back to New York,” he said firmly. “Hold on Jim.” He covered the receiver of his phone. “She doesn’t want you there.”

  I was stunned stupid, unable to respond briefly.

  Ashton took his hand from the phone and opened his mouth to speak, but I grabbed his arm.

  “You need to go without me,” I insisted.

  He placed his hand over the receiver again. “No, I need you.”

  I shook my head. “No, you need to be better than your dad. I’m asking you to go because you’re a better man than he is. I know it and you know it.”

  “Okay, Jim. Tell them Meagan won’t be in the room, but you make it clear this will be the only time. I’m not here to make her happy,” he snapped and hung up.

  Dave arrived at our suite a little while later.

  “You ready?” Ashton asked.

  I looked to him, surprised he was going against his word.

  “I said you wouldn’t be in the room. That’s the best she’s getting. You’ll be in the waiting room for me,” he said determinedly.

  I nodded and smiled, trying to hide my own nerves. I grabbed my purse and followed him out.

  “Unbelievable,” I heard Dave murmur. A swarm of photographers waited by the doctor’s building adjacent to the hospital.

  “Fucking bitch. This is a setup. Fuck it, Dave, go back to the hotel,” Ashton snapped as we passed the small crowd.

  I met Dave’s eyes in the rear view mirror and gave a faint shake of my head. He drove around the backside of the building.

  “Ashton, you don’t know that she tipped off those photographers. They may have been following her since she announced she was having your baby. It doesn’t really matter, you just need to get in there and do what you said you would. We’ve come all this way. We’re getting in there if we have to storm right through the center of them,” I said resolutely.

  I turned to Dave. “Dave, do you see another way into that building?”

  He nodded. “Of course, I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t. You can enter through any hospital door and walk across the third-floor breezeway. I can’t guarantee there won’t be photographers, but if they’re obvious, hospital security will run them out. We just passed by the outpatient surgery center which appears to be attached to the hospital which is attached to the doctors’ building.”

  I looked back at Ashton for approval. He gave a subtle nod.

  Dave circled back around and dropped Ashton and me off at the surgery center door. There didn’t appear to be anyone lurking around when we made our swift entrance. Dave entered the hospital and grabbed the attention of a young man wearing scrubs.

  “Can you tell us the fastest way to the doctors’ building without getting noticed?”

  The guy raked his eyes over Dave’s extra large frame and swallowed hard. “I can take you.” Ashton and I stepped out and followed. He looked back a couple of times. “You’re that guy from Silver Knight aren’t you?” he finally asked.

  “Yeah, so you can see why we need to be discreet,” Ashton answered.

  The young man nodded then turned and use a security card to open the door. Ashton and Dave cast an appreciative glance between one another as we followed through the doorway.

  We arrived at an elevator and the young man turned to us. “This elevator will take you to whatever floor you need. This is the doctors’ elevator, so it will take you to a secure room. You’ll need to exit that room to get to the main hallway for the floor.”

  Thanks, man, I really appreciate it,” Ashton said genuinely. He smiled in return and walked away.

  “Sixth floor, Dave,” Ashton read off the paper that he’d pulled from his coat pocket.

  I squeezed his hand and leaned into his tense body.

  “How long do you think it will take?” I asked Dave as we sat in the waiting room.

  “I don’t even know if she’s here. I don’t know what she looks like,” Dave said as he watched the reception area.

  “That makes all of us,” I quipped, trying to ease my nerves.

  Dave offered a weak smile in return. “Something just doesn’t feel right about this whole thing,” he mumbled quietly.

  “I agree, but I wasn’t with Ashton back then, so I don’t know that I can really say.”

  “Well, I was and I’m telling you, something doesn’t feel right,” he said flatly.

  I skimmed magazine after magazine but couldn’t focus. It had only been twenty minutes, but it felt like an eternity. I sighed, leaning my head back against the wall and closing my eyes.

  “Meg,” I heard Dave’s anxious voice.

  I opened my eyes to see three men coming at me with cameras. Dave circled me, pushing them away. The other men and women in the waiting room looked at us in horror as these three men took photo after photo of me in my dazed state. I did my best to stay behind Dave’s body, allowing him to lead me from the waiting room and toward the elevator. He warded them off as we waited for it to arrive.

  I didn’t wait for the elevator doors to fully part before stepping inside. Dave guarded the door as it shut, then pressed the floor button panel twice. When the car came to a stop at the fourth floor and doors parted, we stepped out. I looked up to him in silent question.

  “They’re expecting us to be in the elevator when it opens at the first floor. In a few minutes, the stairwell will be clear and we’ll go back where we started and continue to wait for Ashton.”

  I nodded as he pulled out his phone and sent Ashton a message. Once we arrived on the seventh floor, Dave’s phone rang.

  “I know, it’s a fucking circus. Yeah, meet you there.”

  Dave hung up and looked at me. “He’s going to meet us at the surgery center where we came in.” I nodded and followed behind him.

  “Meagan,” Ashton called out when we got off the elevator. I ran to his arms and hugged him tight.

  With my head pressed tightly against his chest, I inhaled deeply to take in his scent. Even standing at this hospital, knowing what he just did and what we may be left to face, I felt at peace in his arms.

  “How did it go?” I asked. He shrugged. “I’m sorry, Ashton. I wish I could have been there for you.”

  His hand circled my arm and pulled me in tighter. “Me too, babe. You’ll be there next time, I promise.”

  “MEAGAN, HAVE YOU SEEN any of the tabloids lately?” Leah asked as soon as I opened my door.

  “Hello, Meagan. How are you? So glad you made it home safely from your hellish trip to Minneapolis. Thanks for inviting me over for dinner,” I mocked her as she walked into my apartment.

  “Sorry. Hi, Meagan. How are you?” She giggled.

  “You know I don’t look at those, even if he’s on the cover,” I said, shaking my head.

  She slammed down a magazine in front of me with a picture of Ashton and a pregnant brunette stepping from a building smiling, laughing even. The headline made me nauseous.

  “Ashton Sneaks Off To Visit With Love Child’s Mother.”

  I couldn’t tear my eyes from it. Through the graininess of the picture, she looked a lot like me. I scrolled through it, promising myself I was just curious about what she looked like and that I wouldn’t read the article. The photos were obviously all shot by the same photographer from a long distance lens because the clarity was affected. But not enough to affect the beaming smiles. the background was blurry,
but it looked like the outside of the hospital in Minneapolis.

  “He sure is smiling awfully hard with someone he claimed to have never met and want nothing to do with,” I remarked as I throw the tabloid on the counter.

  “I agree,” she said apologetically. “How has he been acting since the sonogram?”

  “He seems more like the pre-pregnancy Ashton. When we’re together, it’s like nothing has changed. He’s flirty and confident. There doesn’t appear to be anything burdening him. I’ve been wondering about it, but thought maybe the initial meeting was the most anxiety ridden. Maybe I need to ask him about it.”

  “I don’t know, Meagan. Maybe it’s a good thing they get along. They could be raising a baby together in a few months.”

  I glanced back at the tabloid one last time. “Yeah,” I replied solemnly.

  “Are you nervous?” Ashton asked as we pulled into the doctor’s office garage.

  “Yes, a little. I know it will feel weird after having it stationary for so many weeks. I look forward to my first shower though.” I giggled.

  “I look forward to your first shower too.” He waggled his brows in my direction. “Seriously, Meg. I want you to do everything you can do to get back to playing as soon as possible. That’s all that you need to focus on. I’ll pay for therapy, lessons. Whatever it takes to get you where you were,” he insisted.

  He parked the car and took my hand, leading me into the building. I signed in and waited for my name to be called. Ashton sat with his arm slumped over my shoulder casually as every woman in the place continued to glance in our direction.

  “I think you’re drawing attention,” I whispered to Ashton.

  “Here I was thinking it was you,” he teased as he pulled my head toward his chest and kissed the top of it.

  “Meagan Chambers,” the nurse called out.

  Ashton and I stood and followed her to an exam room. Heads turned in our direction as we walked dutifully behind her; even the nurse turned several times as we walked through the long hallways. Ashton paid no attention to them which made me love him more. He held my hand tightly until he led me up and onto the exam table, then he settled into the seat on the side of the room.

  A good looking doctor who couldn’t be a day over thirty came in with a wide smile. Ashton jumped to his feet and was at my side before the doctor made it to the exam table.