The plane ride had been a few hours long but when they came to see the beautiful sunny beaches of their island paradise, it all seemed to be worth it.
“We finally made it,” Nick remarked as he stretched out in front of her, “We are finally married.”
Hannah smiled back – she was genuinely happy that they had reached this landmark in their relationship and she was excited to see where life would take them next.
On Hayley’s advice, she had decided against telling him about her little rendezvous from that night. In her mind, she justified that it was only a drunken mistake and it would only ever hurt his feelings. It was not worth doing that for something that did not mean anything to her – Nick was the only guy she loved and will ever love.
But in the back of her mind, it still bothered her a little. She had felt secretly awful this whole time even though she pulled out her best smile for all appearances.
Secretly, this thing was eating her apart. And being inside her head for so long, she had begun to grow paranoid thoughts about the encounter.
“Are you ready, my beautiful wife?” he asked her as he came inside the room.
They had decided to go out for a swim but suddenly, Hannah was not feeling up to it.
She looked back at him and sighed, “Yeah – but how about you go ahead without me first and I will come and join you?” she asked.
“Well, if that is what you want,” Nick said slowly, “but don’t keep me waiting too long, Mrs. Nicholas Wright,” he winked at her and then disappeared down the hallway.
Hannah stared after him in the empty space he had left behind him. Today, she felt extra horrible about the whole thing but more than horrible, she also felt sick.
She wondered if it had been any of the food she had consumed at her wedding but then the more paranoid part of her brain started to conjure up conclusions of her own.
And so, for the past ten minutes, she had been browsing the internet on her phone for all possible reasons why she was feeling so. And much to her dread and confirmation of her paranoia, pregnancy listed itself as one of the causes.
Not being able to take the suspense anymore, she went down to the hotel pharmacy wearing a black hoodie she stole from Nick with the cap on and asked for a pregnancy.
Back in her hotel room, she held it in her hands and they shook violently. She hoped that Nick would not come back and see her like this but she had made sure to lock the door on her way in.
Finally, she put the stick to and then waited.
In those few minutes of waiting, her mind conjured up a world of possibilities for her. She wondered what she would do if it turned out to be positive – she could not even imagine it and it made her sick to her stomach.
But then, the result finally came back and it was all that she had feared.
Indeed, Hannah was pregnant.
--
Following the news, Hannah had not known what to do with herself and collapsed on the floor into a fit of tears. She was scared more than anything and did not know what the possible solution for this would be. She loved Nick dearly and was scared that he might leave her once she tells him this news.
She tried to rationalize and tell herself that she is jumping to conclusions but at the moment, she did not know what else to do. She felt utterly alone and knew that she needed to get out of her head.
In order to get some air, she decided to go down to the beach. Hours passed and she found herself sitting at the edge of one of the rocks with her feet covered in sand. The calm sound of the ocean was comforting to her as it felt as though that was the only thing that was calm in her life – all else was plummeting into sheer chaos.
She sat there till the sun went down – it was her way of dealing with the storm that she was in. She did not want this to happen and if they had not fought that day, this situation would have been avoided.
She thought that was very strange how fate worked. But she had a decision to make and she knew that this had gotten too out of hand for her to deal alone.
Wiping away the last of her tears, she made the decision to go back to the hotel room.
Chapter 9
“Hannah!” Nick threw his hands in the air as he finally saw her entering the hotel room door, “Where were you?” he exclaimed and Hannah could hear the worry that colored his tone.
“I am sorry,” she told him, sincerely, “I went down to the beach to spend some time alone, I should have told you before.”
Nick nodded but he did not want her to apologize. “That is okay,” he said, “but please – don’t do that again. You really scared me. Are you okay?” He asked her.
Hannah did not want to lie to him so she shook her head no. “Not really.”
“Hey,” Nick said, turning her around so she could look into his eyes, “Tell me? We are married now and we should not have any secrets from each other.”
Hannah gulped loudly – “What if that secret is big enough to change everything between us?” she whimpered.
Nick knitted his eyebrows together in confusion, “What do you mean?” he asked her.
“I just -,” she breathed out, “I don’t even know how to tell you this Nick.”
Nick squeezed her hand tightly, “You can tell me anything and frankly, anything would be better than this – I am getting scared. Please, let me in,” he tried to coax it out of her.
She felt her tongue being tied – she did not even know where to start.
"You can tell me anything, you know that right?" Nick pressed on - he was beginning to grow increasingly worried at the way she was acting.
"You will hate me," she spurted out and a few tears leaked out from her eyes.
"Just tell me," Nick insisted.
From the way Hannah saw it, she had two choices. She could either still keep it in and not tell him but that would mean that she would be hiding a huge thing from him. Before when it was just restricted to the hookup, that was entirely different in the sense that it did not have any visible consequences. But now that she had found out she was pregnant, she knew that there was bound to be evidence sooner or later.
The second way was that she spill out her guts to Nick and come clean, telling him all about what happened. That also frightened her as she did not know how he would react.
"Hannah," Nick spoke up again, "come on now. You are positively freaking me out."
She sighed loudly and walked over to the edge of the edge of the bed to take a seat - she needed to steady her if she was going to deliver this news to him.
"Nick," she finally managed to breathe out with great difficulty, "I need to tell you something really big."
Nick nodded, "Yes and I have been trying to get it out of you for the past ten minutes. Can you just tell me already? What is it that has you so upset instead of enjoying our honeymoon together?" He asked her.
"That weekend when I went way-," she started but then stopped, unable to find the words.
"Yes?" Nick pressed.
"Well that weekend when I went away, I -," she paused again as her brain jammed on her.
She did not want what to say. Any wording possible of the scenario still made her look terrible and she was scared Nick would think of it as inexcusable and just leave.
"Hannah- just tell me. I don't care how bad it is - but you need to tell me it now. Or else we cannot move forward," he said to her.
She nodded and sucked in a deep breath.
"I'm pregnant!" She exclaimed, finally spurting out the truth without any sort of explanation or backstory.
It was as though Nick had just been stupefied as he looked back at her with a blank expression on his face.
"You're- what?" he tried to formulate the sentence with great difficulty. His head was starting to spin.
Looking at him, tears started to well up in Hannah's eyes. Unable to say a coherent sentence, she just nodded.
"Hold up," Nick began and an edge of defensiveness began to seep into his words, "What do you mean you are pregnant?"
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His questions gave off the impression that he thought that this was some joke and Hannah would burst out laughing any second now- claiming that she managed to get him good.
But there was no laughing and no declaration of this being fake.
“I cannot believe you,” Nick said, now throwing his head back into his hands. “Why did you do this to us?” he questioned her.
“I did not intend for it to happen Nick!” she cried out, “Can’t you see that? I did not want this to happen – any of this,” at this point, she was dead-on sobbing.
“What does that change?” Nick fired back equally as accusingly, “You are still carrying some strange man’s child.”
“I made a mistake!” she repeated yet again.
“You might as well have destroyed our entire relationship,” Nick muttered and then groaned, “I cannot believe you! And all this time, I was feeling guilty about Sam even though you were the one going behind my back!” he shot at her.
Hannah did not have anything to say in response- she knew that he was right about this part and the realization of it felt as though a dagger had cut her open.
“You threw away our entire relationship,” Nick said shaking his head now, “And for what? A wild night and a bastard baby?”
This nearly broke her, “Don’t say that Nick!” she begged, “We have not thrown anything away. We can still make this work just as we always have,” she said.
“How are we meant to make this work?” Nick told her in a tone that was both accusing and understanding.
She had never seen Nick this upset over anything. Usually, they always settled their arguments by talking it out but this time, it seemed like there was no talking it out as none of them saw any solution in sight. Perhaps this situation was impossible to recover from.
Hannah brace herself and took a long breath, “Nick,” she said, “Please tell me this – I do not care about anything else and no one else but I need to know this one thing,” she told him.
Nick looked up back at her but did not say anything.
“Nick,” she kept repeated his name as though it provided a delay in saying the word she was about to say next. Truth was, she was petrified of uttering them out loud because she was scared that she might hear an answer she cannot handle.
“Nick,” she said again, “Tell me – if we can still be together after this,” she finally said the words and it felt as though she had swallowed broken shards of glass whilst uttering them.
A heavy silence fell upon the air around them where there was just the sound of their breathing and not much else. She was scared to look up at him and he did not know what to expect when he saw her face when his mind and heart was giving him so many different signals.
Finally, he broke the silence and it felt as though it had been going on for the past years and not just a few seconds.
He cleared his throat, “Hannah,” he said, sounding pained as though even saying her name hurt, “I am going back. This honeymoon is over.”
And then he stormed out the door.
--
Hannah had been left alone in that hotel room after Nick had made his departure. She did not know whether to stay or leave – she knew Nick had gone back home on the plane without her.
Nick had not answered her question as he left and that gave her the smallest glimmer of hope that perhaps there was still some light at the end of the tunnel for them after all. But it was only a small one as she thought about going back home. The shame and the guilt weighed her down – she would not know what to say to her friends or her family but most of all, she would not know what to say to herself.
But eventually, Hannah knew she had to dust off her knees and get up off from the floor and stop making a damn victim of herself. She had done the deed and now she had to face the consequences – even if it had not been her intention.
Finally, after one whole day of Nick’s departure, Hannah gathered up enough strength to go out and catch a plane for her own self. She had to go back home and face the music.
Hannah did not know what she was expecting as she walked in her apartment – perhaps her old comfort of Nick being there and him wrapping his arms around her to tell her how much he loves her – as he always did.
But more so, maybe she was just expecting that he would be there. Because in her brain, if he left then that would have been an end to things. That would mean that he did not want to make the situation work anymore and that cut her apart.
But when she opened the door to her apartment, she was met with her worst nightmares.
Nick had left.
And this time, there was no note.
The entire room reeked of loneliness and abandonment as she stepped afoot into their bedroom. She did not know what to make of this or what to make of herself now that the worst had happened. Now and she had to deal with it.
Still, he was not entirely gone. He was still present in the stuff that he left behind. He was still present in the rock on her finger that he gave her, though Hannah was not sure anymore what significance that held now. But mostly, he was there in her memory as her brain traced out his name into every cell of her being.
That first night alone as particularly bad one for Hannah as she crouched over in the fetal in her now empty bed – but she had one comfort as she held on to his shirt that was now soaked with her tears with the force she would conjure.
Because as the scent of the fabric hit her nostrils, she would believe for a second that even if it was a lie and even if he had gone, for a second there, he was right there in her arms.
--
Nick found himself parked outside the building he thought he would ever come to under these circumstances but right now, he felt as though this is what he needed.
Slowly and with shaking breaths, he walked over to the front door. He did not know what he was going to say or even why he was here but inside of him, there was this tremendous urge to just come here.
Nick had moved out of their shared apartment as soon as he landed back in town. He had packed up a bag and it had nearly broken his heart – as just a few days ago he what been packing but for entirely different reasons.
He was meant to be going away on a honeymoon with the love of his life but that had turned into one of his worst memories. Honestly, right now it did not even feel as though his wedding had been just a few days ago because that time seemed to look so far in the distant past.
His friend Trevor had kindly offered him a place to stay at his house until Nick sorted out his living situation and he was more than grateful to him.
But right now, the person whose house he stood outside was not Trevor. Indeed, it was someone else entirely.
Finally, he found the courage to push the doorbell. Instantly, he was greeted by a familiar face at the door.
“Nick? What are you doing here! Aren’t you supposed to be at your honeymoon?” It was Samantha and she looked more than a little confused.
Nick shook his head, “Honeymoon got cancelled. Can I come in?” But he had already made his way inside her house before she would even answer.
Samantha looked at him from afar, “Are you okay?” she asked, eyeing him intensely as he made himself home and plopped down on her couch.
“No,” he replied bluntly, “I am the worst I have ever been,” he remarked as though it was as innocuous as the daily weather forecast.
Samantha was starting to grow a little worried now, “Okay Nick. Tell me what is wrong?” she asked him.
“Can you pour me some scotch?” he asked her, “I cannot for the life of me do this sober.”
A few moments and one glass in Nick’s hand later, he was ready to spew out his entire situation to her.
“I think me and Hannah have broken up,” he announced with a hint of melancholy in his voice. His eyes instinctively went to the empty space on his finger where his wedding band used to be and he sighed.
“What do you mean? That is absolutely terrible,” Samantha said, noticeably s
hocked by the news.
“Yeah – she is having some other man’s baby and I do – not know what to do,” he blurted and Samantha stared at him back in shock of the bomb she had just dropped on him.
“You cannot be serious?” she asked him.
Nick smiled to himself – a cynical smile. “Maybe I am not. Who knows? My whole life feels like a joke either way,” he said.
“Stop that!” Samantha scolded him, “You cannot say things like that about yourself. I am sorry it had to happen that way with Hannah,” she said.
It occurred to Nick that Samantha had made her peace almost too rapidly with their breakup as she did not even bother asking the details of the split. Honestly, Nick did not even know if they had actually split up or not because even though he refused to see her now, he still could not deny the fact that he still really loved her and he was afraid that perhaps that was a fact that was never going to change, regardless of what she does to him.
“We did not even get to have a honeymoon,” he whispered more to himself than to Samantha.
“Nick,” Samantha said to him suddenly, “Why did you come here?” she asked him.
Nick did not know what to answer. He wanted to say that it was because she was such a great friend and he wanted to seek out her company but he knew that would be a lie. If he was being honest, he only came here because he knew how upset Hannah would get when the two of them hung out and this was his own brand of revenge on her – extremely petty but revenge after all.
But before he could even answer, he felt Samantha’s hand suddenly on his chest and trailing down. “Nick? I can make you feel better,” she said suddenly in much closer proximity to him as she purred into her ear.
Nick took one of her hands in his and turned to face her. “I don’t think that is possible,” he told her, still holding her hand.
“Nick – I can show you what you have been missing for all these years,” she told him and then, almost suddenly pounced on him, attacking his neck with her lips.
Nick just sat there immobilized. The action of her lips did not do anything for him and he just thought of Hannah more and more, the closet that she got to him.
Romance: My Stepbrother's Plaything Page 50