Suit (44 Chapters #4)

by B. B. Easton

  “Hi,” I said, probably getting blush all over his jacket.

  “Hi.” Ken wrapped his arms tighter around my shoulders.

  I could hear the photographer’s camera snapping off photos, but I didn’t even bother to look up. I just stood there, in Ken’s warm, buzzing bubble, and decided that everybody else could fuck right off.

  “You look so handsome.” I smiled, tilting my head back to see him better. I ran my fingertips along his smooth cheek.

  Ken smirked down at me. “So do you.”

  “I look handsome?” I wrinkled my nose.

  “Women can be handsome.”

  “Not when they’re wearing a sparkly tulle ballgown and a tiara!” I pointed at the top of my head. “This updo took two hours!”

  “You probably should have dressed like a pharaoh instead of a princess. Have you seen our cake?”

  I snorted. “Oh my God. People keep asking me if we’re going to Egypt on our honeymoon.”

  “Have you seen it in the last fifteen minutes?”

  I eyed him suspiciously. “No…why?”

  Ken’s steely smile widened. “The little bride and groom slid off the top and completely fucked the icing up on one side.”

  I doubled over, as much as my corseted dress would allow, as a series of unladylike cackles tore out of me. “Oh my God! This place is haunted!” I shrieked. “I’m not going back in there!”

  “Didn’t you pay for the bar in advance?” Ken raised an eyebrow at me.

  “You make an excellent point, sir.” I straightened my tiara and took Ken’s proffered elbow. “Lead the way.”

  By the time the ceremony started, I couldn’t give two shits who was late or what was missing or where the fuck my flowers were. I was half-drunk and one hundred percent sure that I’d never made a better decision in my life.

  When Ken and I locked eyes from opposite ends of the aisle, we smiled at each other like old pals. When we took turns reciting our vows—both sets written by me, of course—we tried not to laugh. When it was time to kiss, ours lasted a little too long to be appropriate. And, when the judge announced that we were husband and wife, Ken and I walked down the aisle to “All You Need Is Love” by The Beatles, just like they did in his new favorite Hugh Grant movie, Love Actually.

  After dinner was served and the speeches were made and King Tut’s tomb was sliced, the DJ turned the inside of the manor house into a nightclub, fully equipped with a disco ball, glow-in-the-dark accessories for all the guests, and a wall-rattling pop and hip-hop playlist that included a few ’90s alternative jams just for us.

  My dad put on a top hat and did the YMCA dance. Somebody got wasted and peed in a potted plant next to the dance floor. Juliet spilled her champagne down the front of my dress about an hour before the hem got caught on my high heel and ripped off. And Ken, Allen, and the Alexander brothers serenaded us—yes, Ken sang in front of real people—with some cheesy song from Top Gun.

  Our wedding was a clusterfuck, a total shitshow, from start to finish, but as soon as we were together, Ken and I had the time of our lives. And isn’t that what you want in a partner? Somebody who laughs when you burn dinner and orders take-out? Somebody who looks at a wrong turn on the interstate as an opportunity to listen to your favorite album a little longer? Somebody who loves you at your worst, knowing you’re on your way to becoming your best?

  That night, my husband carried me and my ripped, stained ballgown across the threshold of the house we shared…and into a magical wonderland filled with little votive candles and rose petals the color of our front door. He helped me out of my dress, which stood up on its own after I stepped out of it, and I helped him out of his suit.

  Lying on his back as I climbed on top of his naked body, Ken returned my enthusiastic kisses. As I slid along his length, he lifted his hips to meet me. When I tugged on his sandy-brown hair, he gingerly removed the tiara from mine. While I bit his earlobe and nipped at his neck, Ken carefully plucked each bobby pin from my bun until my auburn curls tumbled all around us. Then, as he massaged my aching scalp, Ken pushed inside me with one slow, deep thrust.

  “Mmmmmm…” I moaned in ecstasy, sucking on the middle finger of his free hand.

  When I looked down at him, Ken met my gaze and arched an eyebrow at me. “How drunk are you?”

  “Preh-y drunk,” I mumbled around his finger.

  He smirked, a wicked gleam in his eye. “Drunk enough for butt stuff?”

  I stilled, mulling it over, and then nodded, Ken’s hand in my mouth moving up and down along with my head. “Definilly drunk nuff.”

  February 2009

  Ken and I were so poor for the next few years, living on his salary as movie theater manager and the pennies I got as an intern while we both finished college, but we never felt it. We had everything we needed—friends and family and our cute little house and cars that still ran despite the fact that Ken was too cheap to do any routine maintenance on them at all.

  But, when I finally graduated, when I finally got my big-girl job, when I finally had money in my pocket and free time on my calendar…baby fever hit. And it hit hard.

  Unfortunately, my husband was immune to that particular disease.

  “Can I go off the pill now?”

  “No.”

  “What about next month?”

  “No.”

  “What about next year?”

  “Um…no.”

  I had been begging and bargaining and pleading with Ken to let me have a baby for almost two years when my new best friend and colleague, Sara Snow, stepped in.

  Sara and I got hired as school psychologists for the same school district at the same time. We met at the new-hire orientation, and it was love at first sight. She was the only person I’d ever met whose sense of humor was even more irreverent and off-color than mine. The things I only thought but didn’t say out loud…she said ’em.

  “Do you think I’ll get fired for listing drowning as one of my intervention recommendations?” Sara looked so innocent with her big brown eyes, long black eyelashes, and cute little Afro that she wore, pulled up in a poofy bun on top of her head, but on the inside, she was pure evil.

  I laughed into my pomegranate martini. “Do it. Nobody reads our reports anyway.”

  “Maybe I’ll recommend parental sterilization while I’m at it. This kid’s mom, BB”—Sara leaned across the table at our regular happy-hour spot, Bahama Breeze, and looked me dead in the eye—“she had a flesh-colored beard…just like Spencer Pratt.”

  I almost choked on my pink vodka. “She did not!”

  “And she was wearing a shirt that said, Chubby and Dangerous.”

  “Shut up!” I coughed.

  Sara smirked and leaned back in her booth. “I shit you not.”

  “Well, I had a parent tell me during a consultation today that her son isn’t doing well in school because he’s a Taurus.”

  “Ha! That’s gonna be you one day.” Sara tipped her half-empty martini glass at me. “I see you with, like, five kids, all named after different constellations, and you’re going to send in notes to the school saying, Please excuse Cassiopeia from school today. Her moon sign is in retrograde.”

  “That’s ridiculous.” I rolled my eyes. “The moon is never in retrograde.”

  Sara chuckled.

  “Besides, I’ll be lucky if Ken gives me one kid,” I grumbled. “He’s dragging his feet so hard, Sara. He wants to wait, like, five more years. And, when I do finally get pregnant, he’s probably gonna want to name the thing something financial, like Cash or Benjamin or—”

  “Dow Jones?” Sara smirked.

  “Exactly.” I shook my head in feigned sorrow. “I’m gonna have an only child named Dow Jones Industrial Average Easton. Pray for him.”

  “If it makes you feel any better, I tested a kid last week whose name was Anointed Love.”

  I snickered. “It does actually. What the hell does he go by?”

  “I dunno.” Sara shrugged. “I j
ust called him Ted.”

  “Ted!” I cackled, drawing glares from the other diners.

  “And, the week before, I tested a kid named Sevenn with two Ns.”

  I paused as I brought my glass to my lips. “Wait. Isn’t that from a Seinfeld episode? Or Married with Children?”

  “Both!” she cried, tossing the last few drops of her martini back. “Hey, have you been watching that new show, Jon & Kate Plus 8?”

  “Dude, I’m obsessed.”

  “So, I’ve decided that Kate needs to divorce Jon and marry that guy from the Bengals, so they can rename the show Kate Plus 8 Plus Ochocinco.”

  I snickered, setting my empty glass on the table a little too hard. “Please tell me you’re never having kids.”

  “Meh, you’ll probably have enough for both of us.”

  “Not if Ken has anything to say about it.” I rolled my eyes.

  Sara’s tipsy mouth twisted into an evil grin. I’d seen that grin. I loved that grin because it was usually followed by her giving me permission to do whatever bad thing I had already been thinking about doing.

  Shaking her head at me like I was a silly little child, Sara said, “We don’t ask. We tell.”

  April 2009

  So, I quit smoking. I quit taking my birth control pills. And I quit fucking asking. I told Ken that, if he didn’t want a kid, it was up to him to keep it from happening. I was done trying to prevent something I wanted so badly.

  I was ready for Ken to put up a fight or at least go buy a lifetime supply of condoms at bulk rate prices, but he didn’t. He accepted his fate with graceful resignation, and a few weeks later, I peed on a stick.

  “Ken, is that two pink lines or one?”

  “Two.”

  “But that second one is really faint.”

  “You just said that second one.”

  “Maybe I should take another test. I mean, I haven’t even missed my period yet.”

  “Then, why are you taking a test?”

  “Because I’ve been getting headaches, and I kind of want to murder everyone all the time.”

  “Isn’t that just PMS?”

  “I DON’T KNOW! THAT’S WHY I’M TAKING THE TEST! Sorry. See? I told you. I’d better take another one.”

  “Look. The second line got darker.”

  “Oh my God. Ken…I’m pregnant.”

  “Congratulations.”

  That was it. Congratulations.

  Fucker.

  I went to the doctor the second I found out with a spring in my step and the sun shining on my glowing face. I was prepared for them to tell me that everything was perfect, that my baby was going to be the smartest, cutest, healthiest baby ever, and that, thanks to my knowledge of early childhood development, I was going to be the best mom ever. Then, they were going to pin a blue ribbon on my shirt and send me on my way.

  They did not.

  “Mrs. Easton,” the doctor said, giving me a stern look over the top of my chart.

  I worried the edge of my paper gown. “Yes?”

  “Are you aware that you are fifteen pounds underweight for your height?”

  “No,” I lied.

  Is that all? Damn.

  He eyed me suspiciously. “Because of your weight, we are going to have to classify your pregnancy as high-risk.”

  High-risk?

  “Honestly, you’re lucky you were able to conceive at all.”

  What?

  “I’m going to be frank, Mrs. Easton.” The doctor set my chart on the counter and leveled me with a no-bullshit stare. “If you do not gain enough weight during this pregnancy and gain it consistently from nutrient-rich foods, your baby is at increased risk of being born preterm or having low birth weight, which, being a school psychologist, you should know could contribute to a variety of developmental delays and health problems.”

  Delays? Health problems? Because of me?

  I walked back into the sunshine in a fog, holding a prescription for antinausea meds in one hand and my concave stomach in the other. My whole life, I’d been sure of one thing and one thing only—that I was going to be a great fucking mom. I’d known it as a little girl, giving bottles to my baby dolls. I’d known it as a teenager when I naturally found myself mothering all my wayward friends. I’d known it as I poured my heart and soul into my preschoolers, literally shedding blood, sweat, and tears to see them make progress. The idea of me being a good mom had never been challenged before, and I vowed, as I sat behind the wheel of my car, glaring up at my OB/GYN’s office window, that it never would again.

  I’ll show you, motherfucker. I’m gonna grow a perfect baby. Just watch.

  I was still just as obsessive about what I ate as I’d ever been, but now, I was counting milligrams of folate instead of calories. I was microwaving my lunchmeat to kill the listeria and abstaining from all caffeine and alcohol. I was making sure to get enough protein and calcium while cutting out processed foods and artificial dyes.

  And, by my first ultrasound, they said I was on track to gain a healthy amount of weight and that my baby looked perfect.

  Perfect. That word was everything I’d hoped to hear, but my joy and relief were overshadowed by anxiety and grief.

  Not about the baby.

  About the call I’d gotten two days before.

  The call I’d been waiting for since the day I met Ronald “Knight” McKnight.

  May 2009

  I never saw Knight again after I moved in with Ken. He’d still called once in a while though. He’d said he was happy for me when I got married. He’d sounded sincere. He’d said he was still getting in a lot of bar fights, which didn’t surprise me. He’d said he wouldn’t live to see thirty.

  He was right.

  The news portrayed Ronald McKnight as a heroic veteran trying to break up a fight at a biker rally. They said he was shot during the altercation and died en route to the hospital. They showed a picture of him on the evening news, looking like an upstanding citizen in his military dress blues.

  I didn’t believe a word of it.

  The Knight I knew wasn’t a savior; he was a reckless, tattooed renegade with an explosive rage problem and a bad case of PTSD. He didn’t break up fights. He started them. And, once he started them, I could see it taking a bullet to put him down.

  But maybe that was just what I wanted to believe. Maybe it was easier for me to sleep at night, thinking Knight had brought his fate upon himself. Maybe the idea of him surviving two tours in Iraq just to be gunned down in the streets of the country he’d risked his life to serve was a tragedy I simply couldn’t bear.

  The pictures from my first ultrasound were still warm in my pocket as I walked into the Ivy and Sons funeral home. The place was packed wall-to-wall with greasy-looking bikers, the smell of cigarette smoke and gas fumes wafting from their leather cuts with every hug and back slap they gave one another. Girls with tattoos and torn black T-shirts wiped their heavily lined eyes as they watched a slide show on the far wall. Most of the pictures were of Knight on his chopper, Knight flipping off the camera, Knight petting one of his several rescued pit bulls while flipping off the camera. But one of them showed Knight posing with his arms around the necks of his club brothers, smiling.

  I didn’t recognize a single person in the photos—or in the room for that matter. No one from our high school had come, but why would they? Knight had pushed them all away, physically in most cases. His real dad was dead. His stepdad had a restraining order against him, and his mom…the last time I’d seen her, she had a pistol pointed at his face. Knight might not have found salvation or inner peace or even a reason to live, but as I looked around the room, it was obvious that he had finally found a family. And they’d loved him very much.

  There was no formal service. No minister directing us in prayer. Just a gathering room full of bikers…

  And one very open casket.

  I noticed it as I turned to leave, over on the far side of the room. No one seemed to be paying any attention to it
. Knight’s MC buddies were all comforting each other and passing flasks around and reminiscing about old times. While Knight just lay there, being ignored at his own party.

  I couldn’t leave without at least saying hello.

  Or, in this case, goodbye.

  My pulse sped up with every step I took closer until it felt like it was going to pound its way right out of my chest. I’d spent almost half my life fearing Ronald McKnight, and suddenly, I was standing right next to him, trying to convince my body that it was safe.

  I scanned his face, instinctively looking for those intense pale blue eyes, those laser-scope pupils that always burned right through my soul, but they were gone, snuffed out forever by two thin, veiny flaps of flesh. Without a whisper of pigment in his eyebrows, eyelashes, or slicked-back hair, Knight’s leveling zombie eyes used to be the only pop of color on his otherwise pallid face. With them closed, his appearance was that of a man wearing a flaccid, flesh-toned rubber mask.

  That was all he was, I guess. All any of us are. Just souls wearing masks.

  But there was no one behind Knight’s mask anymore. I could feel it. He was gone.

  He’s gone.

  I’m safe.

  He’s gone.

  I’m safe.

  It was the mantra I used to repeat whenever I felt that sliver of fear slide down my spine. Whenever I felt those icy-blue eyes watching me from the shadows. But I would never feel that fear again.

  I was free.

  And so was Knight.

  As my heart rate returned to normal, I realized that I had one hand in my jacket pocket, clutching the corner of my sonogram, and the other in my purse, clutching my can of pepper spray.

  I pulled it out and stared at the leather pouch, tattered and worn, my thumb grazing the embossed letters. Unhooking it from my key ring, I took a deep breath and tucked it into the front of Knight’s cut.

  Patting the bulge beneath his leather vest, I whispered, “Bye, Knight,” as my eyes welled with tears.

  There was so much more I wanted to say, but my throat was too swollen with emotion to speak. So, I gave Knight one last look, committing every freckle and frown line to memory, and said it with my heart.