It Was Us

by Cruise, Anna

  I couldn't help but chuckle.

  “It didn't come,” she continued. “I thought it was just stress or nerves or whatever. So did your dad. We went on our honeymoon and I remember waiting for it to finally show up. It never did.” She smiled and shook her head. “I took a test at the airport.”

  “The airport?”

  “Coming back from Oahu.” She pressed her lips together to hide the smile. “We didn't speak the entire flight home.”

  I'd known they'd had us right away. And I knew we were early, born around 34 weeks. But I'd never done the math, never asked any questions.

  “Was Dad upset?” I asked.

  My mom shook her head. “No. Just surprised. We wanted kids—we just weren't sure about having them right after getting married.”

  I nodded. I knew exactly what she meant.

  “So, anyway,” she said. “If you'd asked me—before you made up your minds—I would have encouraged you to do what you're doing.”

  “Why?” I asked again.

  “Because you remind me an awful lot of me when I was young,” she said. There was a faraway look in her eyes. “And West, in his own way, reminds me of your dad.”

  I let her words sink in.

  She scooted closer to me and reached out for my hand. I let her take it just as I pushed myself into her embrace. Her free arm folded around me and I sank against her chest, breathing her in. Her arm tightened around me and her chin rested on top of my head.

  “But mostly, I think you should do it because I know you can. I know you'll be good at it. And I know that you and West will be good at it together.”

  THIRTY TWO

  WEST

  My phone buzzed. I bolted out of bed and reached for it, my heart beginning to jackhammer as the name on the screen registered in my brain.

  Abby.

  I slid my thumb across the screen.

  Talked to my mom.

  The light from the phone was blinding in my dark bedroom and I had to blink a few times and squint as I typed back.

  Everything ok?

  Yes.

  Yeah?

  Yes. :)Sleep. I'll find you in the morning. Xoxoxo

  I dropped the phone back on the nightstand and sank back into the bed. I was wide awake and my eyes had adjusted to the darkness. I stared at the shadows on my ceiling.

  Abby had gone home and talked to her mom. And it had gone well, at least according to her. I breathed a sigh of relief.

  One hurdle down.

  A million more to go.

  THIRTY-THREE

  ABBY

  “Nothing fits.” I examined myself in the mirror in my bedroom, loosening the drawstring on the black cotton shorts I was wearing. They stretched tight across my belly and hugged my expanding hips.

  Tana was lounging on my bed, her hand buried in a bag of pretzels. “Duh.”

  I glared at her. “Thanks.”

  She bit the pretzel stick she was holding in half. “You're almost four months pregnant, Abs. Nothing is supposed to fit. Well, except maternity stuff. Which you should probably go shopping for.”

  I made a face. “I don't wanna shop for maternity clothes.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because.”

  She arched an eyebrow. “Because...?”

  “Because it makes me feel old. Matronly.”

  She laughed. “Matronly? Uh, you're pregnant, not an old married hag.”

  I smiled. “Gee. Thanks.”

  “Speaking of,” she said, shoving another pretzel in her mouth.

  I tugged a t-shirt over my head. It was one of West's and it should have been loose and baggy. Instead, it looked like I could march myself over to a wet t-shirt contest. Well, a wet t-shirt contest for pregnant chicks. “Speaking of what?”

  “Getting married.”

  “We weren't.”

  “No?” She adjusted herself on my bed so she was sitting cross-legged, the bag of pretzels planted on her lap. “Well, we are now.”

  I joined her on the bed and reached into the bag, drawing out a handful. My morning sickness had ended right at the twelve week mark and I was always starving. Always.

  “When are you and West getting married?”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Who says we are?”

  “You're having a baby.”

  “So?” Getting married was not something we'd talked about. There were too many other things going on.

  Tana rolled her eyes. “Oh, okay. So you're gonna stay here with mom and dad and West'll live in his apartment? You gonna arrange dates for him and the baby, too?”

  “Shut up,” I said, only half-teasing.

  “I'm serious, Abs.”

  “We haven't really talked about it.”

  “Don't you think you should?” When I didn't answer, she sighed. “Not trying to be difficult here. But I'm your best friend. Your best friend who's only in town every few weeks. Your best friend who's getting her ass kicked at school. I need to hound you on my time.”

  I couldn't help but smile. “No shit.”

  “So, what have you guys decided? I mean, besides the fact that you're keeping the kid?”

  I grabbed another handful of pretzels and ate them methodically, one at a time. Because I was hungry, yes, but mostly because I didn't want to talk. We hadn't discussed much of anything in the month since we'd announced the news to my parents. West was still in the thick of baseball season and I was dealing with mom's health issues. Her PET scan had come back normal but her markers were still elevated. There were no clear cut answers but she'd decided to go ahead with a preventative mastectomy.

  “Waiting,” Tana said, nudging me with her thigh.

  “Not much,” I finally said. “We've just focused on the day to day stuff. Work. Baseball. My mom.”

  Her expression softened a little. “She get a date for her surgery?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. Two weeks from now.”

  “And everyone is...okay with it?”

  “The only one who needs to be okay with it is her,” I said.

  Tana's brow furrowed. “I guess.”

  “So, anyway, we've sort of been thinking about other stuff. Stuff that needs attention right now. This?” I motioned to the small bulge my stomach had become. “This can wait.”

  “Well, it can't wait forever,” she said. “It's gonna come out, you know. And you're going to need a plan.”

  I smiled. “I'm aware. And West and I are going to get some stuff settled once baseball is done.”

  And we would. It was the beginning of May. I was going into finals and West was nearing the end of baseball season. Once we got through those things, we could focus on the future. What we wanted to do.

  “You better,” she said. She handed the bag of chips to me and stood up, brushing crumbs from her shorts. “I need to start prepping to be an aunt, you know.”

  “Aunt?” I feigned surprise. “I thought I was a twin, not a triplet...”

  She grinned. “Shut up. You know I'll be a better aunt to that kid than your sister will ever be.”

  She had a good point. I'd seen Annika once since the dinner fiasco, when we'd shared the news with my parents, and she hadn't mentioned the pregnancy. I wasn't sure if it was because she didn't care or if she'd simply forgotten. She was probably too wrapped up in end-of-year sorority stuff to focus on much else. But I also knew she was keeping a low profile because of Mom. She might have been the one who'd said we needed to face reality but she was never one to take her own medicine.

  “You'll be the first to know.”

  “Know what?”

  I folded up the bag of pretzels and leaned back on my bed. “Everything.” A knock sounded and I turned my head so I was facing the door. “Yeah?”

  The door opened and my mom peered into my room. She was in shorts and a T-shirt, her short hair hidden by a baseball cap emblazoned with the company logo. She looked normal, healthy, not someone who was potentially battling a life-threatening illness.

  “Am I
interrupting?” she asked.

  I sat up. “No. We were just talking.”

  She smiled. “Just like old times.”

  Tana and I glanced at each other. Nothing was like old times anymore—she lived five hours away and I was pregnant—but we nodded our heads in unison, anyway.

  “I'm leaving for a doctor's appointment,” she said.

  I sprang to my feet. “Oh. Do you want me to go along with?” I wracked my brain, trying to remember her mentioning an appointment.

  “No, no,” she said, waving her hand. “Just wanted to let you know. I'll be home in an hour or so.” Before I could respond, she closed the door.

  Tana watched me as I sank back down on the bed. “They still okay with everything?”

  “Everything” was code word for the baby. I knew my mom was; she'd always made a point to ask how I was doing, how I was feeling. My dad had taken a more conservative approach but I didn't expect him to fawn over me. After all, I was still his little girl.

  “Yeah, I think so.”

  She nodded. “Good. You're gonna need them.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  She shrugged and reached for the bag of pretzels. “I dunno. Having the baby seems like it's gonna be the easy part. The other stuff? Having someone you're responsible for...for the rest of your life? That's the part that would scare the shit out of me.”

  THIRTY FOUR

  WEST

  “You reek.”

  I kicked off my shoes. “I just got home. How the fuck would you know?”

  Griffin grinned at me. “I could smell you coming up the stairs.”

  I gave him the finger and dropped my keys on the table. I'd skipped out after practice without a shower, tossing my gym shorts and t-shirt on over my sweat-covered body and hauling ass out the door. Abby and I were going out for the first time in forever and all I wanted to do was go home and get cleaned up there.

  “Practice good?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. Fine,” I said absently. I was ready to be done for the season.

  “You and Abby going out tonight?”

  I opened the fridge and grabbed a bottle of water. I twisted off the cap and gulped half of it down in one swallow. “Yep.”

  Griffin nodded from his spot on the couch. I was pretty sure he never moved from there most days. Well, unless he was tending bar or surfing. “Cool,” he said.

  “You?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “I dunno. Mario asked me to cover his shift tonight. I might.”

  I finished the water and set the bottle on the counter. “Tana coming home any time soon?” It had been at least a week since she'd been in San Diego.

  “Nope.”

  “How's that going?”

  Griffin grabbed the remote and aimed it at the television and the screen flickered to life. “I dunno.”

  I turned one of the dining room chairs around and straddled it. “Spill.”

  His eyes locked on the screen, an old episode of Beavis and Butthead. “She's staying in San Luis for the summer.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “What?”

  “Her grades suck,” he said. “Needs to do summer classes if she wants to keep her scholarship.”

  “Oh. Wow.” I hadn't heard any of this. Not surprising, considering everything going on in my and Abby's lives right then.

  “Yeah.”

  I leaned forward, resting my chin on the back of the chair. “You two pretty serious?”

  Griffin glanced at me. “Well, we're not having babies or anything...”

  I shot him a look. “Fuck off.”

  A grin flashed across his face, then disappeared. “Nah,” he said. He fingered the remote, his fingers trailing over the buttons. “I don't know what we are, man.”

  I let out a low whistle.

  “What?” he asked.

  “You're whipped.”

  He shook his head, frowning. “Nope. Not at all.”

  “Bull shit.” I laughed. “You're mopey over a girl. First time I've seen you like this since...” I looked at the ceiling, pretending to think about it. “Huh. Since never.”

  He grabbed the pillow off the couch and fired it at me. I ducked and it hit the wall with a muffled thud. “Whatever, dude.”

  I stared at my best friend for a moment, trying to figure out if he was really bummed about the Tana situation. Maybe he was just pissed his semi-regular lay was going to be gone all summer. He didn't see Tana often—usually only once or twice a month—but they spent most of their time together holed up in Griffin's room. I was pretty sure he was alright with that arrangement. I didn't ask questions and I didn't badger him about whether or not they were serious. They just...were.

  But Griffin didn't mope. Not ever. And watching him sit on the couch, staring seemingly unseeing at the television, made me wonder just how serious he was about Abby's best friend.

  “You got mail,” he said.

  “What?”

  He waved his hand. “On the table. Some letter.”

  I turned so I was facing the table, saw the white business-sized envelope on the surface. I picked it up and ran my thumb along the backside. I pulled out the sheet of paper inside and unfolded it.

  “What is it?” Griffin asked.

  I scanned the piece of paper in my hands, my heart thumping harder as the words sank in. “A letter.”

  “No shit, Sherlock.”

  “A Cape Cod team wants me this summer.”

  “What the hell is Cape Cod?”

  I set the sheet of paper down so he wouldn't see my hand. Because it was shaking. “A wood bat league.”

  “What the hell is that?”

  I sighed. “A big deal. A really fucking big deal.”

  THIRTY FIVE

  ABBY

  I smoothed the shirt I wore, sighed, and raised my hand to knock on the door.

  West answered as soon as my knuckles hit the wood. “Hey.” His smile was sweet and soft and melted my heart.

  “Hey.”

  “What's wrong?” he asked, opening the door wider and pulling me inside the apartment.

  I motioned to the outfit I was wearing. “This is what's wrong.”

  He looked me up and down. “You look hot.”

  I rolled my eyes. “It's a maternity outfit.”

  He grabbed me, his arms encircling my waist. His mouth found my neck and he latched on, his lips moving across my skin, sucking and kissing. “It's black leggings that hug your ass and a purple shirt that shows off your tits.”

  I closed my eyes, letting him continue his tender assault on my skin. “The waistband looks like it belongs to a whale.”

  He pulled his mouth away and grinned. “A whale?”

  I nodded and lifted up the hem of the purple tank top. “See?” I said, pointing out the massive elastic panel in the front.

  “Yep,” he said. “I see.” His hand moved from my waist to my barely swollen stomach and he splayed his fingers across my skin. “I see our baby.”

  My heart skipped a beat and I put my hand over his, holding it in place. “I'm gonna get fat.”

  “No, you're not. You're growing a baby.”

  “I've gained ten pounds,” I told him. “Pretty sure that's not all baby. Not at four months.”

  “I don't care,” he said. “You're beautiful. I love you. No matter how much you weigh.”

  I followed him into the apartment. The television was on and I looked to the couch, expecting to see Griffin, but it was empty. I peered down the hallway and saw the closed bathroom door, could just hear the sound of water.

  “Grif's in the shower,” West said. “Hope you don't need to pee.”

  My bathroom habits were a constant joke. My bladder had gone into overdrive, to the point where I couldn't go much longer than an hour without having to run to the bathroom. It was one of those things that had the potential to be embarrassing but West just laughed it off.

  I smiled. “We should probably go,” I told him.
“At least there'll be a couple of stalls to choose from at the restaurant.”

  He grinned back. “Let me grab my sweatshirt.” He glanced at my outfit again. “You want me to grab you one? It might be cold down by the water.”

  I pointed to my stomach. “Hello? Built-in heater right here.” I could hear him chuckling as he headed down the hallway.

  I leaned up against the dining room table. There was a piece of paper, unfolded, and I glanced at the salutation. It was to West.

  From a baseball league.

  I couldn't take my eyes off it. I couldn't stop reading. I leaned closer, scanning the contents of the letter.

  “Ready,” West said, a navy blue hoodie pulled over his t-shirt. He froze. “What are you doing?”

  I picked up the letter and held it out to him. “Reading this.”

  “Abby—”

  I cleared my throat. “Congratulations.” I tried to make my voice neutral but inside, I was fighting back tears.

  “I'm not going.”

  “What?”

  He shoved his hands into the pocket of his hoodie. “I'm not going.”

  “But it's a wood bat league,” I said. I knew what a wood bat league meant, how important it was. West had told me all about it at the beginning of the school year, when practices had really kicked into full gear for him. It was a summer league, one that every college level player dreamed of getting an invite to. All the Major League scouts trolled the wood bat games, looking for players. It was the chance West wanted, the chance he needed to step up another rung on the baseball ladder.

  “I know,” he said.

  “You've wanted this,” I said. I thrust the letter at him. “This was part of your dream. The big picture. One of the pieces to the puzzle.”

  “I know.” He took a step toward me. “It was. But it isn't anymore.”

  I stared at him. “What? How?”

  “Baseball isn't my dream anymore, Abs.” He took another step, crossing the distance between us. His eyes locked with mine and he pulled me close. “You are.” He cupped my stomach with both of his hands. “And this is. Nothing else.”