by Holly Rayner
She woke with a jerk and found herself reluctant to try sleeping again, despite being exhausted. She got up instead and started researching ways to deal with blackmail. She didn't find much that would help in her situation, but then again, she hadn't really expected to.
Rather miserably, she started looking at other career options instead. It was a phenomenally depressing task. She wasn't going to be able to work in journalism again most likely. Mitchell would blackball her for the entire industry. She knew he had the connections for it.
She had the communications degrees to go into teaching, but if they saw the video, that would be right out the window. She was sure Mitchell would publish it as soon as he got tired of extorting them, anyway, just for fun. She'd never be the face of anything again. Christ. Maybe she could do radio?
Around lunch, Tessa knocked on her door again, and this time, reluctantly, Kathy let her in. They sat on her bed as Kathy explained everything that had happened, from the Valentine's party to the confrontation with Mitchell.
"What a mess," Tessa muttered. "Have you told the Sheikh yet?"
Kathy shook her head. "I don't know what to say. This is all my fault. He wanted to stay impersonal, but I pushed him to get closer. If I had just kept my distance, none of this would have happened."
"You don't know that," Tessa reassured her. "You don't know what would have happened. From what you described, it sounds like he was pretty into you too."
Kathy shook her head and Tessa took her hand.
"Either way," Tessa said. "You need to tell him. Soon. There may still be a way out of this."
Kathy wasn't so sure. And it was hard to motivate herself to do anything, feeling the way she did. Without her work, it was like all the energy had left her. Still, Tessa was right. She needed to tell Tehar.
She texted him around the time of what had been their nightly phone call, abandoned since Valentine's Day. Just a simple, We need to talk.
It took him about twenty minutes to call her back.
"Hello, Miss Burgess," he said, and she could hear from the first word how very intentionally distant he was keeping himself. No more mistakes. Just business. "Is something the matter?"
"Yeah," she said, rubbing her tired eyes. "We have a problem."
She gave him the short version and then, when he asked, the long version too. Once she'd finished, he fell silent for a few long, tense moments, considering. Kathy waited for his verdict and considered going back to bed. She was so tired. She remembered her nightmare from before and shuddered, dismissing the idea.
"Thank you for telling me," Tehar said at last, clipped and emotionless. "I will speak to my lawyers. This will be sorted out."
"What should I do?" Kathy asked. "I could look into—"
"Nothing," Tehar replied sharply. "Don't do anything. Stay at home; stay under the radar. I will take care of this."
"Shouldn't we at least talk about—"
"I will take care of everything. Just stay out of the way."
Kathy felt his words like a knife. Did he blame her for this? Did he think she would only make things worse?
"What about our arrangement?" Kathy asked. "The baby?"
"I think it's safe to say that plan is no longer viable."
It felt like a cold slap to the face. Kathy didn't answer, holding her breath as she tried to control her emotions.
"I'm sorry, Kathy," Tehar said, the cold distance in his voice slipping for just a moment. She started to answer him, but the call cut off with a click. He'd hung up.
A week crawled by.
Kathy tried to stay busy and keep her mind off of things. She had plenty of personal writing work she'd been putting off. But she struggled to stay focused and motivated. It had always been easy to focus on work before, but now her thoughts kept wandering, mostly to Tehar. She knew he had to cut her off. Even without Mitchell, they had both decided to rebuild and respect those barriers. But it hurt how easy it had been for him. She hated herself for wanting more.
Tessa tried to help, visiting frequently and trying to help Kathy distract herself. But it just wasn't going to work.
"I wish I knew how to help you."
Kathy sat on her couch, wrapped in a blanket. There was a cheesy horror movie on the TV and pizza on the coffee table. Tessa had brought everything, wanting to make up for the night they'd missed together.
Kathy did her best to be appreciative, but she couldn't focus on any of it. It just reminded her of what had happened on Valentine's Day. Tessa looked increasingly unhappy as her attempts to help fell flat. She was curled up on her own side of the couch, picking at her pizza slice.
"If it was just a breakup I'd know what to do," Tessa said. "Even if you'd lost your job. But this… I don't know what to do, Kathy. I don't know how to help you."
"You're doing everything you can," Kathy said with a sigh. "More than anyone could expect of you. I just…I just need to be a mess for a while I think. I'll get through it. I just need time."
"It just isn't fair," Tessa said, strained with unhappiness. "It's enough to lose your inheritance and the house, but your job too, and him…"
"Hey, at least my dad will be happy," Kathy said with a shrug. "He's getting his last wish. I'm not working anymore. That's what he really wanted, after all. I guess this is what I get for trying to get around his will."
"You know he didn't mean it like this," Tessa said gently. "He wasn’t the model father, but I know he didn't mean it that way."
"I don't know that," Kathy pointed out. "That's the point. I have no idea what he meant. I didn't know him at all."
"Then what's the point in assuming the worst?" Tessa asked.
"Well, if he'd actually cared about me he wouldn't have left, would he?" Kathy pointed out, her words lemon bitter and sharp as broken glass.
"I can count the number of times I saw him after high school graduation on one hand. And I could probably do the years from age ten to eighteen on two. He didn't care about me. He didn't want to be around me. I don't think he even liked me. So, I can hardly imagine he'd do something like this for my own good. It's just one last spiteful jab to make sure I really know just how much he wished I'd never been born."
Kathy realized how loud she was getting and cut herself off so hard her teeth clicked together. Tessa stared at her in worried silence.
"I'm going to go to bed," Kathy said and stood up, dragging her blanket behind her. "Thank you for the pizza."
Chapter Nine
Another week dragged past, then another, slow as a creeping glacier. Kathy spent most of it in bed. She felt restless and frustrated, but she didn't know what to do. She wanted to call Tehar, to at least ask for an update, but she couldn't make herself do it. She wanted to fight Mitchell, but she knew that would only make it worse. Tehar had told her to avoid even going outside.
Around the end of the second week, she had defiantly gone out anyway, to the park near her house. It was getting warmer all the time and the plants were running wild. The scent of the orange blossoms was so strong it made her slightly nauseous. She ignored her unsteady stomach to sit on a bench under the shade of their branches.
She was hoping a little sunshine might shake her out of her funk, but she was already beginning to doubt it. She tipped her head back over the back of the bench, her face turned up to the dappled sunlight shimmering through the leaves, and closed her eyes, trying to imagine some kind of better outcome to all of this.
"Kathy?"
She sat up quickly, surprised at the sound of her name. A familiar man in a blue button-up was standing in front of her, his inoffensively attractive features arranged in an unexpected smile.
"Richard," she said, straightening up. "I didn't expect to see you here."
"Just passing through," Richard replied. "I found this great Indian place around the corner. How are you doing? How goes the search?"
"Not great," Kathy answered in reply to both questions. She wasn't sure why she felt compelled to be honest with him, but
she did. "I thought I found someone, but it didn't work out. Now I've probably lost my job because of it."
"Ouch," Richard winced. He stepped closer and sat next to her. "Are you still trying?"
She shook her head, making room for him on the bench.
"I don't think so," she said. "It seems like I was kind of naive to even try."
"Well, I might be biased," Richard said with a shrug, "but I don't think it was naïve, per se. I think maybe you went about it wrong."
"Oh?" The skepticism was clear in Kathy's voice. She raised an eyebrow expectantly.
"You went into it looking for the wrong thing," Richard said. "I think I did too, honestly. I'm being serious here. I was trying to treat things casually even though I knew I wanted a wife and a traditional family. I was scared of committing or coming off as desperate. You were taking people on dates and looking at online hookup sites even though you said you didn't want a relationship. So, I mean, we were both screwing ourselves from the beginning. We were setting ourselves up to be disappointed because we weren't actually looking for what we wanted."
"Wise words, guru," Kathy said dryly. "You should open a yoga studio or something."
"I know, it's cheesy." Richard held up his hands in surrender. "But it is the truth. We were both sending mixed signals."
"We also just didn't like each other very much," Kathy pointed out. "That was also an important factor."
"True." Richard laughed. "But, you know, we could change that if we wanted."
Kathy looked up at him with a questioning frown.
"People have been making less than ideal relationships work since mankind first started cohabitating," Richard said. "I'm not saying it's easy. I don't think any lasting relationship is. But we could make it work."
Kathy sighed and looked away.
"Sorry," Richard said, looking away. "Probably shouldn't have jumped right into that. See what I meant about coming across as desperate?"
"You are desperate," Kathy said flatly. Richard shrugged in unflustered acceptance. "Why does it matter so much to you?"
"I've been thinking about that a lot myself," Richard confessed. "I've been trying to figure out what I want, you know? I think part of it is that, growing up, I always thought I'd have all that by the time I was this age. A family, I mean. I got the job and the nice house, but the wife and kids never happened. And it feels incomplete. My home life wasn't great growing up, so I had this big shiny fantasy of what a real family is like. It's like my oldest, most cherished dream."
"Sounds like you're more into the idea of a family than the reality of it," Kathy said. "What happens when you get what you wanted and it doesn't live up to the dream?"
"Good question," Richard replied. "I don't know."
They were both quiet for a moment.
"So much of it, for me, has been about trying to please my dad," Kathy admitted. "I kind of hated him, but at the same time, I wanted his approval so much. I guess I thought if I could prove myself to him, maybe he'd stay. Maybe he'd care about me. But he's dead. He can't approve of anything now. There's just this stupid ultimatum he left behind. At first, I thought maybe it was some kind of last challenge. Like he wanted me to prove I could be a great reporter and have a family the same way he did. Now I'm starting to think he just never wanted me to follow in his footsteps at all."
"Maybe." Richard leaned back against the bench, contemplating the sky. "Who knows? It's not like you can ask him. He probably wouldn't have given you a straight answer if you did."
Kathy looked at Richard in surprise.
"Everyone keeps telling me he meant well," she said.
"I've got some experience with not-so-great parents," Richard replied. "And whatever way you shake it, this wasn’t a nice thing to do. Anyone who says you have to love your family just because they're related to you can stick that where the sun don't shine. Sometimes parents are monsters. Sometimes they're just not cut out to be parents at all. You're not obligated to excuse their behavior."
"Seems like you're pretty passionate about that," Kathy noted, suddenly wondering what Richard had gone through.
"It took a lot of therapy for me to stop trying to find a way to love the people who hurt me," Richard said quietly. "It doesn't have to be that way. You don't owe anyone your forgiveness."
"Thank you," Kathy said, surprised by how much she meant it. "Really."
Richard shrugged.
"I'm not going to marry you," Kathy said after a moment. "Not ever. But I'd like to be your friend."
"That's probably for the best." Richard laughed. "Yeah. Friends sounds good."
"I was going to go out with my friend Tessa this weekend," she said. "You could come with. You like craft beer?"
"Love it."
"Awesome. Tessa's obsessed. She wants to take me to this tasting thing."
"The Wynwood Beer Festival?"
"Yeah, that one."
"I already have tickets!"
"What a stroke of serendipity. Tessa will be thrilled. I really couldn't care less about beer."
Richard shook his head in amused dismay.
"Yeah, we really shouldn't date," he said with a laugh.
Kathy snorted, then wrinkled her nose in distaste at the sickly-sweet orange blossom scent.
"I have to get out of here," she said. "The orange smell is making me feel sick."
"Really?" Richard frowned, sniffing the air. "I thought it was pretty mild today. I can barely smell it."
"Well, I'm going to throw up if I stay here any longer," Kathy replied. "I'm going home. I'll send you a message about Wynwood later."
"See you there," Richard said, watching her go with a slightly concerned frown. He really wasn't such a bad guy.
Kathy was still feeling unwell when she got home, though it had faded a little away from the orange blossoms. She shook it off, only for it to return in force when she opened the fridge to contemplate dinner.
The box of leftover Chinese food on the top shelf had only been there a day, but the smell hit her like a rogue wave and sent her reeling and dry heaving. She gave up on the idea of food entirely and crawled into bed until the room stopped spinning. What the hell had that been? Maybe she was coming down with something. She went to bed early in the hopes that it would be gone, but the next morning the nausea was still there. She wasn't throwing up, but any strong smell seemed to set her off. Christ, she thought, it’s a good thing Tessa isn't seeing this. You'd almost think I was—
Kathy froze in the middle of retching over the kitchen sink and did some mental math. It was three, almost four weeks since Valentine's Day. She'd never kept careful track of her period, but it was fairly regular. She'd been expecting it the past several days, blaming her bloating and moodiness on the upcoming visit from Mother Nature. But it wasn't here. She swallowed hard and her stomach churned for an entirely new reason.
She pulled on sweatpants and double timed it to the nearest corner store that sold pregnancy tests. Don't panic, she told herself as she hurried home. She probably just had a stomach bug. She was overreacting. It was better to be cautious, but still. There was no chance she was pregnant.
Well, maybe not no chance, she thought, remembering Valentine's Day. But only a very slim chance. Twenty percent, tops. She did a mental tally and ruefully upgraded the odds to fifty percent. Still, she wasn't pregnant. Maybe if she thought it hard enough, it would be true.
She took the test as quickly as possible, then paced, fretting, while the result developed. Then, throwing the first result in the garbage, she did it again. But the result was the same. Sitting on the toilet, Kathy looked at the test stick in her hand and the two little pink lines that indicated a positive result. Then she reached for her phone.
It was hard to say how she was feeling. Perhaps the most honest answer would be to say that she was not. She was having some kind of delayed reaction. Her brain just wouldn't process it. So, she was just sitting there on the couch, totally blank, while Tessa bounced between euphoria
and terror like an emotional pinball. She was pacing in front of Kathy's sofa, brandishing a takeout menu like a baton.
"But this is great!" Tessa said, hitting euphoria again. "You're going to get your inheritance! The family house! This is exactly what you wanted! I mean sure, it’s probably going to ruin your career and QIC Media and the scandal will be awful…" Tessa was dropping back down into terror again, the shift visible on her expression, which just as suddenly lifted. "But just think of the baby! It's going to be so gorgeous, and a prince!"
"I told you," Kathy said, "Tehar's not—"
"Semantics!" Tessa said with a dismissive flick of her wrist. "The point is, you're having a baby! What did the Sheikh say?"
"I haven't told him yet," Kathy confessed.
"Aww, you told me first." Tessa looked briefly touched, then smacked Kathy on the arm with the takeout menu. "I can't believe you told me before the father!"
"This isn't exactly the way we planned it!" Kathy said in her defense. "We were going to use IVF. It was supposed to be clinical and impersonal and guaranteed. God only knows what's happening inside me right now. I could miscarry tomorrow for all we know!"
"So?" Tessa looked baffled. "What, are you going to wait until it's born to tell him? He has a right to know!"
"I know!" Kathy shouted, exasperated. "I just… I'm not ready. I can't have that conversation."
"We need to get you to a doctor," Tessa said, swinging back into worry, tapping the takeout menu on her lips as she thought. "Have you picked an obstetrician yet?"
"No." Kathy put her face in her hands. It was starting to get through to her now. She stared down at her stomach through her fingers. It still looked perfectly normal. Was there really a little life growing in there? A life she had made. Her and Tehar. She remembered the dream she'd had, that first night he'd taken her to dinner. Standing on the shore, holding hands with a child that had the perfect combination of their features…