by M. Clarke
I spread a smile, stepping beside her toward the girls. “Confession.”
Kathy stopped in her tracks, a few yards from the girls, confusion on her face. “Tell me.”
“I’ve always wanted to have kids close to your kids’ ages so they could grow up together.”
Kathy wrapped her arm around my shoulders. “It would’ve been nice, but we still have time.” She winked. “Mr. Right will come along. I’m going to pray.”
I let out a belly laugh so loud the girls crinkled their foreheads at me. “While you’re at it, pray for a million dollars too.”
Kathy nudged my shoulder, her way of telling me to shut up, and then her goofy grin became serious. “If you need to move out…” She held out her hand to stop me when my lips parted to say something. “You can always stay with us. We have a spare room downstairs.”
“Thank you, Kathy. I really appreciate your concern and friendship. I’m going to fix my friendship with Josh. I hate this feeling, this distance between us. It might get worse if I move out.”
Hanna grabbed Kathy’s hand and tugged her through the double glass doors to the ecosystems. “This way, Mommy.”
I held Hailey’s hand as I let her lead me behind them step by step, and when we turned the corner, I gasped. A thick glass tunnel encased us, and a walkway led to the other end. Fish of many colors and kinds swam about in solitude or in groups. Tall plants, pebbles, rocks, and boulders adorned their surroundings. When the shark swam by, we huddled in fear and admiration.
“That was so cool,” Hanna said as we exited the tunnel, her eyes still wide with fascination. “Sharks are awesome.”
“Sharks are scary.” Hailey looked over her shoulder as if the shark would follow her and held my hand for comfort. “I don’t want to go in there again.”
“I agree with you, Hailey,” I stressed. “I don’t like sharks. But they’re gone now. And we’re not going back.”
Hailey nodded with a scowl and then eased her tensed muscles.
Kathy answered her phone when it rang. “It’s your brother. He wants to know when we’re coming home. He’s going to barbecue for dinner so he wants to gauge the time. You know how he is.”
I raised my brows, emphasizing that I did. “I’m fine with whatever.”
After Kathy texted and dropped her phone inside her purse, she asked, “Who’s hungry for lunch?”
The girls were too busy checking out the polar icescape to answer her. But as for me, I thought she’d never ask.
Chapter 7
Josh
Parked at the same spot at Shelly’s house like a stalker, I pulled my nerves together and got out of the car, determined to get some answers. When I knocked on the door, my heart pounded out of my chest in a frenzy. Shit. What am I doing here? Get ahold of yourself, Josh. Think of your child. The logical side of my brain asked, What if she’s not my child? Then you’ve made a complete ass of yourself. But what if she’s mine? More importantly, what if no one was home? What the fuck would I do then? Come back the next day, idiot. I was acting and thinking like a gutless fool.
I turned to leave when no one answered the door, my heart easing to a slower tempo, when the door swung open. An older woman, her black hair peppered with white, appeared. Her gaze locked on mine and then fell down to my shoes.
“Josh?” She gasped, putting her hand over her mouth. The wrinkles around her eyes, more prominent than the last time I’d seen her, defined her age. “What are you doing here?” Her tone dropped to a whisper.
Blinking in surprise, I wondered why she didn’t seem happy to see me. I guessed she felt guilty for lying to me, telling me she didn’t know where Shelly ran off the last time I’d seen her. “Mrs. Cruise. It’s been so long. It’s nice to see you.” I swallowed, trying to be polite, though I wanted to give her a piece of my mind. “Is Shelly home?”
Before she could answer, a voice projected from inside the house. Goose bumps rose on my arms, and all kinds of feelings exploded inside me. My pulse skyrocketed, and I could hardly contain the hammering of my heart. Lowering my head, I inhaled deep breaths, and I held myself together against the anticipation and the possible heartache, all driven by wanting to know the truth.
“Mom. Who’s at the door?”
A face appeared. Her shocked expression slammed into me. Our eyes locked for a thousand seconds. Her eyes flickered with anger and then slowly softened. I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from falling apart, with my fingers flexing into fists. I’d thought the familiar love for her or the hurt would flood back, but I felt nothing. Empty.
“Josh,” she breathed, hardily audible.
“Shelly,” was all I could say in return.
Shelly’s mom slipped away, leaving us alone.
“You look good,” she muttered, her face expressionless.
“So do you,” I murmured, my throat so parched I could hardly speak.
Shelly had cleaned up. Though her hair was still wavy blonde, she didn’t have pink or purple highlights. Her light makeup, compared to the heavy dark eyeliner she used to wear, made her look naturally pretty. And for someone who gave birth, her figure was back to one most women only ever wished for.
Leaning to one side of her hip with her arms crossed, she asked, “What are you doing here? How did you find me?”
I glared at her. Those were not the words I’d expected to hear. Sure, I knew she would be shocked. And I got that she probably didn’t want to see me since she was the one who ran away, but she was being selfish trying to hide the truth from me. That hurt the fuckin’ worst after all we’d been through together.
I drilled my eyes to her and used a tone that left no doubt that I wasn’t fuckin’ messing around. “We need to talk, and I think you know why.”
She winced. Her eyes moved away from mine to the black oak door, she looked behind her shoulder, and then finally back to me. “Okay,” she sighed, sounding defeated. “Come in.”
Two brown sofas sat on either side of the black coffee table. Photo frames adorned the mantel and the side table. A painting of the ocean hung on the back wall. And a bouncing chair and a few baby toys dotted the room, but no baby.
“This way.” Shelly directed.
I passed the kitchen and went out the door to the backyard—small, but simple and clean. Manicured cut grass to the left and cement area to the right. In the center was an outdoor brass table for four with a blue outdoor umbrella jutting out in the middle. Shelly pulled out a chair and sat. Hesitantly I did the same.
“You have a lot to tell me, Shell,” I gritted through my teeth.
Shelly thumped her elbows on the table, covered her face with her hands, and then met my gaze. “Yes, I do. Where to start?”
I scoffed. “How about start from when you bailed out of town without giving me any explanation?” I desperately wanted to ask her if the baby was mine, but I wanted to see if she would tell me first.
She pinched her lips, nodding. “Okay. I’ll start from there.” She paused as if to collect herself by folding her hands and gazed toward the plants along the back wall. “I left without telling you because we were wrong for each other. If I stayed with you, we would’ve been horrible parents. At least one of us needed to act like a parent.”
“Wh-what?” I stammered, anger rushing through my veins like a loose bullet train with no direction. “What the hell are you talking about?” My fists tightened so hard they twitched to punch the table, but I remained calm. Breathe. Breathe. In and out. In and out.
Shelly gestured at the glass sliding door to remind me her mother was inside the house, so I lowered my voice, but my face burned in rage. “We were clean before you got pregnant. We swore we’d get our shit together. You didn’t give me a chance. You told me you were pregnant, and then you told me you had a miscarriage.”
Shelly’s eyes widened, her shoulders tensed. “And you were happy about it. You were far from being ready to be a father. We were wrong for each other. Couples are supposed to make each other
a better person, but you and I…we were so stoned most of the day we didn’t even know what was up or down.”
I slammed the table and bolted up, emanating pent-up frustration and anger. “But we were both clean. Not just you, or me. The both of us. We were clean. You never gave me the chance. Did you take my child away from me? Tell me, Shelly. I need to know. Is the baby mine?”
Tears streamed down her face. She turned aside, unable to meet my eyes, as her body trembled. “Yes. Emma is yours.”
“Emma,” I muttered softly, butterflies fluttering in my stomach from the joy of having a daughter but then terrified at the same time. Holy shit, I had a daughter. Slowly, I sat back down, rubbing my face, taking in the reality of the situation. “You named her after …”
“Your paternal grandmother,” she finished. “I remembered how much she meant to you.”
My heart warmed in blissfulness, and I offered a smile. “Thank you. How old is she?”
“She’s eleven months.”
Eleven months. Eleven freakin’ months I never got to hold her in my arms, and the other ten months I never got to relish the thought of Shelly being pregnant with our daughter.
“You never gave me a chance, Shelly,” I said softly again, defeated. Closing my eyes, I gripped my hair and rested my elbows on the table.
“Well, neither did your parents.” The venom in her tone had me jerk up my head and question her.
My parents despised her because they believed her influence caused my drug addiction, not to mention Shelly being from a low-income family with no social status. I hated my parents for being such snobs, so I paraded her around. It killed my parents’ pride even more. Their only son dated a lowlife in their opinion.
Shelly was my first true love. She introduced me to drugs, destroyed my relationship with my parents, and shattered my heart into so many pieces it couldn’t piece itself back together again. The reason I never fell in love with any other girl or gave my whole heart. No matter how much I wanted to tell her we’d been right for each other at that time, she was right. We were wrong together, but I didn’t want to admit it.
“You know why, Shell,” I reminded her.
“I didn’t force drugs on you, Josh.” Air puffed out of her mouth in anger. “If you truly cared about me, you would’ve controlled your temptation.”
Maybe she was right about that too. “But we had good times,” I tried.
Her lips hinted at a smile. “We did.”
I snapped out of the stupor of our past and reeled back to the present. “Regardless of your reasons, you had no right to keep our daughter away from me. It was outright ruthless, vindictive, and I could go on and on.”
Shelly jerked back, her back bouncing off the patio chair from the intensity of the movement. Her lips spread mischievously, like she had something up her sleeve as she intertwined her fingers together on the table. “You only know the half of it. So let me continue. It all started with your parents.”
“My parents?” My eyes widened in shock.
She shook her head. “Oh, don’t play that game with me Josh.”
“I have no fuckin’ clue what you’re talking about,” I said with conviction.
Shelly’s nose flared. “Then let me remind you. Your parents offered me money, a lot of money, to have an abortion. When I refused, they offered me more to skip town to have the baby so no one in their circle of friends would find out. And I was to never come back. I figured you didn’t want anything to do with our baby so you ran to your mommy and daddy to rescue you. I hated you that day.” Her chest deflated, releasing a long breath.
The truth clicked, revealing the full circle of lies. Of course my parents would have gotten involved. I should have never told them Shelly was pregnant. I’d meant to show them they couldn’t break us apart. It was also my way of letting them know I would marry her soon, and that they would be grandparents.
“So you told me you had a miscarriage.” Everything inside me roared with disgust. I flinched as if someone had punched my gut and yanked out my heart.
“It was a test, to find out how you really felt. When you gave no indication of sadness when I told you I had a miscarriage, I knew in my heart you would never play the role of a father.”
“Again, you didn’t give me a chance, Shell,” I stressed, keeping my tone calm. I had no fight in me. The truth drained all my energy. “You made the decision for me. Do you have a magic ball that tells the future?”
“But you never told me you were going to be there for me.” Tears dampened her eyes. “You walked out on me when I first told you I was pregnant.”
“I came back,” I snapped. “I was in shock. How did you think I would react? We never talked about having a family. We weren’t even married. We were in no shape to raise a child.” I stood up, feeling bile rising in my throat as I paced the length of the cemented area. “This is so fucked up,” I grumbled and then stopped to meet Shelly squarely in the eye. “Do you know where I went a week after you told me you were pregnant?”
“No,” she answered.
“I went to tell my parents you were pregnant, to let them how we’d be a family soon. I had good intentions. Never did I once run to Mommy and Daddy for their help. You knew how much I despised my parents. How could you, Shell? How could you be against us? You should have told me what they said to you. Don’t try to put the blame on me. You could’ve prevented all of this.” I paused, a thought enveloping me. “Maybe you…” She wanted the money more than she wanted me. No. Don’t say it. I didn’t want to know. I couldn’t handle any more hurt.
Tears poured from my eyes not only with my regret, anger, and pain but Shelly’s too. It felt good to let the dam break after all these years, to be able to pull out my resentment and frustration. But a new one replaced it. My parents would hear from me soon after I cooled down. Another layer of brick covered the possibility of forgiving, forgetting, and rebuilding our relationship.
I settled myself in front of her, understanding more of the choices she had made but refusing to agree with them. Perhaps if we had communicated better, we wouldn’t have been in that mess. Perhaps if we’d been sober most of the time, our minds and hearts would have been clear. I couldn’t recall how I reacted, but Shelly obviously did. And truth be known, I wasn’t physically, mentally, or financially ready for a child or a family to take care of. The loser I was, I had been living off my parents’ money.
Shelly sniffed, wiped her tears, and peered up at me with a softer expression, hate and anger gone from her face. “What do we do now? How do we get past this?”
I reached out my hand to caress her cheek out of habit, but I worried if I touched her, the hurt I’d let go would leach back, so I dropped my hand as exhaustion took over me. “First thing first. Before we decide what to do next, I’d like to meet my daughter, and I want to see every picture you have of her.”
Chapter 8
Josh
I tip-toed to Shelly’s bedroom, wondering why Emma didn’t have her own room, and then I realized it was a two-bedroom house—small, but cozy, and perfect for the three of them.
The plain white walls brought out the magenta duvet on Shelly’s bed. A tall, wooden chest took up the other side of the wall. And across from the window was the crib, adorned with a pink bumper and blanket. Tucked under the blanket, Emma lay fast asleep with her pudgy arms beside her head. I became breathless at the sight of her, and at the realization that she was my daughter and I was her father.
Emma had thick, long eyelashes, framed by thin, dark eyebrows that matched her hair. As her chest rose and fell, I stared at her in awe. At the foot of her crib, I fell immediately in love. That tiny being was a part of me. Something inside me awakened, and I wanted more than anything to protect her and be the kind of father she deserved. I would never try to make her be someone she wasn’t, like my parents had to me. My daughter was perfect in her own image, in her own right, and I would foster her to be the best she could be. I swear it, Emma, with all my h
eart and soul.
“She’s beautiful,” I whispered.
“She has your dark hair, your eyes, and your lips.” Shelly moved to the edge of her bed and watched me.
I grinned, proud of the fact she had some of my distinct features. People complimented my bluish-green eyes, thick and long eyelashes, and lips all the time. Women would mention how beautiful my eyes were and how full and kissable my lips seemed.
“She has your heart-shaped face and your cute bunny nose,” I pointed out. Oh fuck, did I just compliment her?
She shrugged, lighting a smile. “That’s what people say.”
I gazed to the musical mobile, stars and moon dangling. “Why did you come back? If what you say is true, and my parents paid you off, why did you come back?”
A long stretch of silence heated the room. As I patiently waited for her answer, my pulse raced and my forehead became sweaty.
“I came back because I couldn’t take it anymore. I felt that you had the right to know you had a daughter. And Emma had the right to know her father. I didn’t want her to grow up fatherless like me. I regret the things I’ve done, things I would have done differently had I been more mature about it.”
I planted my arms on the crib rail, bent lower to rest my chin on top. Shelly never stated for sure, but I had to know. “Did you take the money from my parents before you left?” When she didn’t mutter a word, I knew. “So are you back to get more money from me?”
“No,” she spat, sounding offended. “Of course not. And I took the money for Emma. She has an account. It had to be under my name too, since she’s under age, but I used that money to buy the things she needed. I was on my own, Josh. Don’t try to make me feel guilty for what I thought was right.”
I couldn’t argue what was right or wrong for her, for them. “How long ago did you move back, and when were you going to tell me?”
Shelly grabbed a throw pillow and hugged it, as if to give her some security. “My mom moved out of our previous home and rented this house since the rent was affordable about a month ago. I moved back two weeks ago. I needed some time to adjust and come up with a plan to tell you. I couldn’t just go knocking on your door. I didn’t know where you lived.” She paused, tilting her head. “How did you know I lived here?”