by Amy Daws
“I’m leaving, Finley.”
“Your flight doesn’t leave for two days!”
He marches across the hall into the bathroom and grabs his toothbrush and throws that in with everything.
“Seriously, Brody, where are you going?” I ask again.
He stops what he’s doing and swerves around to face me, bending slightly so he’s eye-level with me.
“I’d rather spend two days in the fucking airport than sleep under the same roof as you again,” he says, his eyes glaring into mine. “I’m sure you understand since I’m basically a piece of shit in your eyes.”
“No, Brody! I never said that! It wasn’t you, it was me!” I cry.
“The not you, it’s me speech, huh? That’s great, Finley. That makes me feel so much better,” he says, wheeling his suitcase out the door.
I scramble off the bed and rush over to the door as he pauses at the top of the staircase.
“Brody, I can’t. I don’t…I just…” I drop to my knees in the doorway at a loss for what to say or do to make him stay.
He looks back at me, “You’ve ruined us, Fin. Us doesn’t even exist anymore. This is all on you.”
He turns on his heel and stomps down the steps and out of the house. I consider throwing clothes on and running after him, but my heart is too busy shattering into a million pieces. I scream loudly and slam my bedroom door. My greatest fear should have never been that Brody would leave me because I couldn’t give him a baby. It should have been that he would leave me because he found out that’s how low I thought of him. This is completely my fault. I don’t even know how to fix this anymore. He’s right. I’ve broken us.
I crawl back onto my mattress and cry the ugliest cry I’ve ever cried.
***
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
“Finley, come on. You have to come out eventually.” Leslie is shouting and banging on my door.
“Fin-Bin, love. I miss my leggy brunette. Please, come and say hello. You can even come out naked,” Frank coos loudly through the door.
I can’t move. I can’t function. I can’t do anything that requires any type of effort. My face feels tight from the massive amount of tears that dried on it last night. I pray hard it was all a bad dream but based on the fact that I’m still naked, I know better.
I grab my phone to see if Brody has replied to my hundreds of calls or texts. Nothing. My heart burns at the sight of my phone’s background. A selfie we snapped on our walk yesterday: He’s nipping at my cheek and I’m laughing. I look so happy. I have no clue who that girl is anymore.
“Finley, please, honey. I think you should talk to us,” Leslie says.
I drop my phone down and look around the room. I see Brody’s white t-shirt rumpled below the mattress. I sit up and pick it up off the floor. I can’t even help myself, I take a big whiff of it and tears overcome me again. It smells like Brody. Clean and manly. Safe and protective. I pull it over my head and stand up to go look out the window.
“Seriously, Finley. You have to at least say something…anything, so I know you’re alive in there,” Leslie’s voice says, in a definite tone.
After staring at the empty skate park for a few seconds and drying my tears, a coldness creeps over me. I trudge over to the door and pull it open, right in the middle of Frank’s eighteenth knock in the last twenty minutes.
Frank looks more serious than I’ve ever seen him. He’s wearing a huge knitted-sweater, a good two sizes too big for him, and skinny dark denim jeans. Leslie looks great, as always, in a short black sweater dress with a thick brown belt notched tightly at her waist. I’m standing there in an oversized men’s t-shirt. I feel like shit.
They both look at me, expectantly.
“You guys look great,” I say, flatly, walking into the bathroom and shutting the door on them. I can hear them both shuffle around outside the bathroom door.
“You guys can hear me peeing right now, can’t you?” I ask.
Silence.
“I know you guys are standing right outside the door,” I say, in a dead tone.
“We’re worried about you, Finny,” Frank says.
I flush and wash my hands and open the door again to their same expectant faces.
“I’m going out for some air,” I say, walking past them.
“Finley, you forgot pants,” Leslie says.
“Correct, Lez. Two points,” I reply, continuing my descent down the steps.
I glance into the living room and see Mitch and Julie cozied up on the couch. Good for fucking them. I bet she can have babies too. I sneer at them and turn to walk out the front door.
“For fuck’s sake Finley, you don’t have any trousers on! Or shoes!” Frank barks from the doorway, but I ignore him.
The brisk fall breeze on my bare legs feels sensational. I luck out to no traffic on the road and walk across to the skate park.
“Damn it, Finley!” Leslie shouts at me.
They both run across the street after me and I stand at the gated entrance into the skate park, threading my hands through the chain link fence and pulling back as hard as I can. I can feel the cold metal cut into my hands and I relish in the pain. It’s a small, microscopic break from the pain in my heart.
“For the love of God, Finley. This is ridiculous! Get back inside, now. That t-shirt barely covers anything on you!” Leslie scolds.
I shake my head and turn to look at her and Frank. Their expressions are so concerned and visibly upset that I glare back at them.
“What do you guys have to be upset about? You have no worries. Nothing. Your lives are carefree right now.”
“I don’t know about that,” Frank says. “Cos I’m currently chasing down a leggy brunette who is wearing nothing but a thin white t-shirt, and I’m fucking gay! I’d say this is a bad fucking Tuesday for me!”
I shake my head back at Frank, not amused.
“Finley, I know Brody left and I’m so sorry, honey. But you have to come inside,” Leslie says, approaching me with her hands.
I jump back from her.
“Don’t touch me. Don’t…just don’t. I can’t take any comfort right now, Leslie. I don’t deserve it. Comfort right now…comfort will…wreck me,” I say, my lip trembling.
“You should be wrecked right now, Finley. You’ve had a crap hand dealt to you and shit…I don’t know,” she says, running her hands through her auburn bob. “Damn! You’re only human, Finley! There’s only so much you can take. I guess I’d rather see you wrecked right now than running around outside half naked, acting all cold and detached. This isn’t my Finley. My Finley is warm, and funny, and emotional. I need you to let me help you, Finley, because I can’t fathom how you…I can’t…” she stops, tears forming in her eyes.
I shake my head back and forth and blink hard with a big puff of air bursting from my chest. My vision of Frank and Leslie blur as my eyes fill to the top with tears.
“Can’t what? Have a baby? Children? I lost him, Leslie!” I cry out loudly and squeeze my eyes tight, allowing the unshed tears to fall out.
“I screwed everything up and I lost him anyways. I can’t have a baby. I can’t have Brody. I can’t fucking let you help me!” I scream, crumpling onto the ground.
Frank and Leslie rush over and kneel beside me, their hands hovering over me, unsure if they should touch me.
“I don’t give a toss what you think you can’t handle right now, Finny,” Frank pulls me into his arms and hugs me hard, stroking his hand down the back of my hair.
“I just don’t understand,” I cry, in a squeaky raspy tone. “I don’t understand why this is happening.”
Leslie’s arms band around me next and I feel her shaking, silently crying along with me. I feel Frank’s hand slip under my legs and he lifts me and carries me back toward the house. I bury my face into his comforting cinnamon smell, unwilling to look around and see how many people are watching me right now.
“Frank,” I say his name, crying, as he deposits me onto
the couch in the living room. His bright green eyes look so sad and despondent. I feel terrible for causing that look on his face. Mitch and Julie jump up out of the love seat right next to the couch and I look at them, completely embarrassed. Without a word, Mitch leaves and comes back in with a hot cup of tea and Julie covers me with a fuzzy blanket.
“We need comedy…I Love You, Man, it is,” Leslie says, smiling at me and rummaging in the DVD case by the fireplace.
“I’ll go make popcorn!” Julie cheers.
“Guys,” I croak. “It’s morning.”
They all pause to look at me.
“Pancakes then?” Julie asks.
“Stuff that,” Frank says, “make the popcorn, Jules. Add extra butter and bring the chocolate too. Who gives a toss what time it is? Mitch, take that tea and shove it up your arse…or go make it an Irish coffee. On second thought, that might be easier. There’s Whiskey in the cupboard,” he finishes, and sits down on top of my feet, rubbing my leg soothingly.
Mitch heads back into the kitchen for the liquor and I smile kindly at my new little family. I attempt to let the funny words of Paul Rudd drown my heartbreak, even if it is for just a couple hours.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Leslie, Frank, Mitch, and Julie all keep me company for the rest of the day, stuffing me full of comfort food and liquor. After a lot of convincing, they let me go to bed early because I told them the crying has taken a lot out of me.
In reality, I just feel like crying again and don’t want them to witness it.
The next morning is worse because I wake up and feel like it all could have been a bad dream. I feel like I could look up and see Brody coming back in from the bathroom. But I know it’s not true.
I pull up his contact and send him a text.
Finley: I just need to know if you’re home or if you’re okay?
After what feels like an eternity, I hear my phone beep and my heart races as I rush over to it.
Brody: Home.
My heart aches at the one word reply. I can’t help myself, so I send one more text.
Finley: I miss you.
I know he won’t reply. He hasn’t replied to my hundreds of other texts and voicemails. I have work to do today anyway, so for at least a little while I have to attempt to be functional.
After a steaming hot shower, that I cried most of the way through because all it did was make me think of Brody, I get myself dressed in a hoodie and jeans. I have a conference call with Val today and I need to get my shit together.
“Finley?” I hear Leslie’s voice call through my door.
“Come in,” I reply.
She walks in wearing her flannel pajamas. She’s holding two coffee mugs. I half smile at her and sit crisscross on the mattress. She hands me my black coffee and tucks in right beside me, letting her knees touch my leg. I know she needs the contact with me right now to help her gauge how I’m doing.
“I’m okay, Lez,” I say, blowing into my cup.
“That was so scary, Finley,” she says, with a serious face.
“I’m sorry. I just…I don’t know,” I say, looking down sadly.
“I hated feeling like,” she pauses, “feeling like I wouldn’t be able to get through to you.”
“I’m sorry I did that to you. I’m sorry for a lot of things,” I say.
“Don’t be sorry, just give me the cracks, babe.”
“Ahhh, the cracks. The cracks,” I harrumph, into my mug.
She sits, silently, waiting for me to continue.
“I messed up, Les. I messed up so, so bad. Brody didn’t care whether or not I could have a baby, he just cared that I thought so little of him. He couldn’t believe I thought he’d leave me over it.”
“Why did you think that, Fin?” she says, rolling from her knees onto her hip.
“I don’t know. I’m still trying to figure that out.” I look up at her feeling a sting in my eyes, “I’m fucked up in the head, I guess!” I say, smiling, tears now running down my face.
Leslie sets her mug down and lays her head on my lap, her auburn hair splayed out on my jeans.
“We’re all fucked up, Finley. Frank hasn’t had a functional relationship with anything but magazine porn since I moved out here. Mitch and Julie don’t speak to any of their family anymore…and I’m pretty sure Mitch has a drinking problem. I have dance-gasms on stranger’s legs at clubs.”
I smile sadly at her.
“You and Brody are the closest we’ve seen to anyone having their shit together. This fight you two had didn’t alter our opinions of that. You guys are amazing. We all have our shit. You just have to stand tall and figure it out eventually I guess,” she finishes.
“I don’t know, Leslie. I was literally on my knees, and he looked at me with so much hatred. So much anger. So much…hurt,” I swallow hard.
“You came out here for a reason, Finley. It wasn’t random. This…” she says, sitting up and looking me in the eyes, gesturing back and forth between our chests, “was no mistake, hon. I adore you. I always have. Frank even adores you. I’ve never seen him warm to someone like he warmed to you. That can’t be a mistake.”
I sigh heavily, swiping at the tears escaping my eyes.
“You just need to figure your shit out before you can even begin to take Brody’s hurt away,” she says, patting my leg.
I nod, soaking in her words. “I just know I don’t want to love anyone else, Leslie.”
“No shit, Sherlock,” she smiles, and I laugh, with more tears dropping onto my lap.
“I fucking love you, Lez,” I say, seriously.
“I fucking love you, Fin,” she replies, and hugs me tightly.
When she leaves I hear a text notification on my phone and my heart leaps with hope that Brody may have replied.
Cadence: CALL ME!
I sigh and press Send on her contact.
Without even saying hello, Cadence starts in on me, “George got a text from Mark that he just picked up Brody from the airport! Early!” she barks into the phone.
“Cadence, I’m not in the mood for a lecture.”
“I didn’t tell him where you were for you to break his freaking heart, Finley!” she chastises me.
“I didn’t break his heart!” I explain.
“Then why is he home already, Fin? He was barely there. He probably spent more time on the damn plane than he did in London. What’d you do?”
“I didn’t do anything, Cade. I…” I pause. “I just told him the truth.”
“That dickhead actually left you because you told him you can never get pregnant?” she shouts, into the phone.
“No,” I say, defeated. “It’s not like that.”
“Then explain please, because I am way too pregnant to have my emotions toyed with like this, Finley.”
“I told him the truth, that I can’t have a baby and that the reason I left him was because I didn’t want him to leave me,” I say in one breath.
“Oh God, Finley,” she says.
“What?” I cry, “It’s the truth, Cadence!”
“Yeah, but jeez…you didn’t need to say it like that, did you?” she says, with her typical big-sister tone.
“It needed to be said, regardless. I’ve been living with this freaking poison in my body and I had to get it out. I had to tell him,” I reply.
“How did he take it?” she asks.
I laugh, haughtily, “Um, not well.”
“Gosh, Finley. I’m so sorry,” she says, in a kinder tone now.
“It’s the shit-hand I’m dealt. I gotta deal with it, I guess.”
“It is a shit hand. It’s going to work out, though. I know it,” she says, confidently.
“I don’t think so, Cadence,” I reply. “You didn’t see his face.”
She doesn’t say anything back.
“How are my M&Ms?” I ask, desperate to talk about something else for a while. I fondly refer to my three nieces as M&Ms because all their names start with the letter M, and it’
s so much easier than spouting out all three names.
“The girls are good. They miss their Auntie. We’re still Skyping tonight though, right?” she asks.
“Of course, I wouldn’t miss my weekly date night with my nieces. How are you feeling?”
“Good! Getting achier the bigger I get, of course, but my due date is coming up so I know that’s to be expected.”
“Well, I’m saving up all my freelance money from Val for a trip home to meet my first nephew. And Frank doesn’t seem to want to take any rent from me, so I think I should be able to swing it.”
“Good, good,” she replies. “So, what is your plan with London and work and everything?”
“I don’t completely know, I guess. But I’m pretty sure if I wanted a job with Faith’s Miracle Jewelry, I’d have it. The owners kind of love me. And I kind of love them.” I smile, picturing them at their dining room table.
“Don’t talk about moving out there forever. I’ll start bawling. I’m way too hormonal to think about that,” she says.
I laugh, “Okay, well, I got Val calling me soon, so I better let you go.”
“’Kay. I love you, Finley,” she says, and I hear her voice crack on the other line.
“I love you, too, Cadence. But hey, are you okay?” I ask.
“Yes, I’m fine. I just miss my baby sister, I guess. Hormones, remember?” she says.
I laugh and we hang up and I ache for the comfort of my sister’s house, hugs, and conversation. Cadence is always tough on me, but I wouldn’t want her any other way.
CHAPTER THIRTY
My conference call with Val goes really well. She is extremely pleased with my assessment of Faith’s Miracle Jewelry and wants me to head back out to the country to go over our offer with them. This is more of a sales job and I’m nervous about having to discuss the specifics of money with this family that is so incredibly kind. But Val assures me that they love me, and if I’m just myself, they’ll gladly sign on the dotted line.
It’s been four days since Brody left and I’m still no closer to having my issues figured out. The thing that perplexes me the most is why I thought so little of him. Why did I think he wouldn’t want me without a child?