Life Interrupted

by Kehoe, Kristen

  No matter how many people help you, or how great of a routine you get into, having a baby makes you different. Having a baby in high school? See you later.

  Which is why by three p.m. on Saturday I’ve run out of options and I’m sending Katie a text baling on tonight. Tripp was right when he said I don’t go out, and really, it’s not always because I don’t have anywhere to be, it’s just too fucking difficult sometimes.

  I just got a call from G who is down with a cold. Apparently, Walter was sick when they went out on Thursday…I blocked the rest of her explanation out, as I don’t really want to know what kind of spit-swapping they did. I was okay assuming that she got a cold from airborne germs. Needless to say, I no longer have a babysitter for tonight. Which means I no longer have a date, which translates into staying single and alone for the rest of my life. Maybe I’ll get a cat when Gracie grows up.

  Since Katie apparently has this exact same thought, I barely press send before my phone is ringing in my hand. Katie’s name blares at me from the screen and I contemplate not answering. I know she’ll just call back so I bite the bullet and press accept.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “What the HELL, Flow? You said you would do this. I promised Doug and he and Richie made plans. You can’t just back out.”

  I hold the phone a good inch away from my ear to keep from going deaf as she yells at me. “Katie, I said I was sorry. G just got sick and cancelled. Stacy and Nick are on some couples retreat—” (aka baby making excursion, since her HOW TO book said spicing up the sex life can lead to pregnancy)—“and mom’s guest lecturing at some sorority about the length of a woman’s sex drive.”

  Unfortunately, I’m not making any of this up. My mom teaches biology and human sexuality. She lectures to thousands of college students each year about how their body works, and how to work their body. I don’t know if it’s more or less mortifying because her oldest daughter is probably taking her advice and getting freaky to get her fallopian tubes working, or because I got pregnant as a teenager, ignoring all biological talks my mother ever gave me as a child.

  “Flow,” Katie says and I can tell she isn’t going to back down. “It’s been two years since you went on something resembling a date. I have a hot guy who wants to meet you.”

  I roll my eyes and wave at Georgina Jones—Tripp’s mom and my boss—as she walks into the office where I’m cataloguing the items that need to be ordered. “Katie, I’m really sorry. I want to go, but I told you, I don’t have anyone to watch Gracie. Can we reschedule?”

  Georgie taps me on the shoulder and I look up. She points to herself and wiggles her eyebrows, mouthing me, me.

  I quirk my brow in an Are you sure? face and she nods double time.

  “Katie, I may have found someone, let me call you back.”

  I hang up the phone, cutting off Katie’s squeal of delight.

  “Georgie, you don’t have to do this.”

  “Oh, hon, I know I don’t have to but please, I’ve been dying for another chance to see my girl. It’s been two weeks since you were over with her.”

  Georgina Jones—not to be confused with George Jones, as she always says—has the eyes of her youngest son, that midnight blue that shines out of thick black lashes, and the charisma and charm that she bestowed upon all three of them. After I had Gracie, she hired me to take the Saturday shift at the auto shop whenever I wasn’t traveling so she could spend more time at home. We both knew it was an excuse, as she’s here most Saturdays for a few hours anyway, but I’m too grateful for the small income to call her on it, and she wouldn’t be receptive if I did.

  If there’s one thing having three boys has taught her, it’s to ignore any and all complaints, suggestions, or statements that don’t support her ideas. It seems to work as her husband and sons treat her like a princess…or a really demanding queen, which suits her just fine as well.

  Since this thought makes me think of Tripp and how he treats me, save the one time he spent the night with me and left me hanging, I shove it to the back of my mind. Not going there.

  “I might be late,” I say and she waves that away with a pfft.

  “I have three grown boys, late isn’t even on my radar. I’ll put her down in her pac-n-play and you can wake her and take her when you’re done or you can stay.”

  I almost tell her for a second time that she doesn’t have to do this, that I can just stay home with her and go out another night. And then I realize that it’s not so much that I don’t want to inconvenience her, it’s that I’m a little nervous to go out. With a boy. On a date. That Katie had to set up because I’m obviously incapable of getting one myself.

  Wow, with that kind of perspective…

  “Thanks, Georgie,” I hear myself say. “I wouldn’t ask you to do this but I promised Katie, and well, it’s been a while since I actually did anything but laundry on a Saturday night.” Again with the perspective. My conviction to go and enjoy myself tonight gets stronger. “You can call me to come get her if she gets to be too much. She’s taken to ordering people around lately.”

  “Good, I’ll give her to Jack for a while and let her boss him around. He needs it.” I laugh, but it sounds forced even to me and she leans over the desk to kiss my cheek. If she sees my panic, she doesn’t call me one it. “Bring over multiple outfits, huh? You know how much I like to play dress up with that girl.”

  ~

  I’m ten minutes late dropping Gracie off and goddammit if I’ll admit one more time that I’m nervous and therefore couldn’t pick a fucking shirt. Halfway through my wardrobe (and I do mean halfway), I realized that everything I own is either a t-shirt or a sweatshirt or some sort of workout shirt. And most of those have suspicious looking stains on them. Digging further to the back, I was sure there must be something somewhat appropriate to wear on a date from my pre-pregnancy days. When I found that this was not the case, I sat dumbfounded for ten minutes. What the hell did I do before I had Gracie? Even more puzzling, how the eff did I get pregnant with Gracie?

  Booze. Lots and lots of booze. Right, mental note: stay sober. Gracie doesn’t need a brother.

  Since no matter how long I stared, ranted, or threw clothing around my room nothing new appeared, I finally yanked on a black razor back tank and a jean jacket with a pair of black skinny jeans and my Chuck Taylors. Katie is no doubt going to kill me.

  At this point, I might beat her to it.

  Jerking the Explorer to a stop in Tripp’s driveway, I can’t help but laugh as Gracie giggles at the lurching motion. I unbuckle her, talking the whole time because like the tantrum with the clothes, I can’t seem to calm myself enough to breathe. I’m panting when I reach the door, not just from carting Gracie and all of her things, but from babbling like an idiot.

  Just as I force myself to stop, to take a deep breath and chill the hell out, the door opens and Tripp is standing on the other side. Shirtless. And sweaty. He smiles and it spreads across his face, reaching his eyes last as he scans me in a very thorough once over.

  Sweet baby Jesus, there goes my breath again.

  While I stand there and stare at him like an idiot, he takes his time staring right back at me. Heat spreads up and over me as his eyes roam down and pause on my legs (that’s right, the one thing I have that Lovely Lauren doesn’t) and I suck in a breath. It might as well be his hands the way I’m tingling. When his eyes travel just as slowly back up, I’m aware that in the background Gracie is reaching for him, garbling out her version of his name as I continue to stand still as a statue with her on my hip and my eyes on him.

  “Hey, Rachel.” I nod at him, not sure my voice is working. Pull it together, Rae, don’t let him know you’re affected. I’m just about to say something—I have no idea what since my breath is still clogged in my lungs and the sight of that deep v that reaches the waistband of his shorts up close has dried up all of the moisture in my mouth—when he speaks again and ruins the moment. “Nice shoes.”

  Dickhead. I’m brok
en out of my worshipful gaze and brought back down to Earth with a thud as he takes Gracie and turns to walk away with a laugh. Mentally chewing myself out for being such an idiot, and then chewing him out for being such a prick, I follow, slamming the door a little harder than necessary. When I reach the kitchen, I’m all smiles for his parents, grateful as always for their support. The fact that Georgie and Jack welcomed me into their family and gave me a job after I got pregnant only made me more indebted to Tripp, which is one of the reasons I’ve never confronted him about our night together—or the every-now-and-then moments since, when he looks at me like he just did, like he could see me as I had been that night. Like he wanted to see me.

  He’s my best friend, and because of that when he asked them to help, his family opened their arms to Gracie and me. I owe him for that.

  Which is another reason I don’t talk about that night. His parents have never been anything but good to me, even when Tripp and I were barely speaking. I think Georgie knows that something happened, but she’s never said anything, just continued to be my second mom and when I showed up at their house pregnant and mortified, apologizing all over myself for being such a disappointment, she wrapped me in a hug and whispered “Griff’s birthday might not be an entire nine months from our wedding day.”

  Of all the things people said to me, it was one that made me realize I still had a fighting chance at finding a life beyond what I’d done in a moment of impulse.

  So, as much as I want to slam my fist into Tripp’s stomach—or his pretty face—at this moment, I don’t, because whatever happened between us, he and his family never left me and when I really needed him, when I was throwing up every morning and sobbing uncontrollably for no reason other than it felt good, he was there. He put together furniture and helped me paint her nursery, brought me ice cream and then sat with me in the hospital after she was born and everyone else was getting ready for New Years parties.

  I take Gracie from him after showing Georgie all of her food and bottles, where her jammies and Lovey are, which books she likes read to her before bed, which blanket she takes. Kissing her a few times, I then go through the routine of high-five, tickle monster and silly spider before I know I have to let her go.

  “She’ll be fine,” Tripp says, and there’s no malice or teasing in it. He knows how hard it is for me to walk away from her sometimes, how hard it is to ask someone to watch her and know that I’m not letting her down, not like I once did. Each time I leave Gracie with someone else during a time that I should normally be with her, I feel a little panicky, like I’m choosing something or someone over her. I don’t ever want her to feel like a burden or an afterthought.

  It’s strange, I never really cared that I only had one parent before Gracie, but now…I guess I just want to be enough for her. Her life is already going to be different, she’s already going to deal with the stigma of teen-mom and no dad; I don’t want her to deal with it alone. Dropping her off is hard, but when Georgie takes her and I see Jack stand behind her and make a face, I remind myself that she won’t ever be alone, just like I wasn’t.

  I kiss her one last time, smiling as she comes at me with an open mouth.

  “Careful, sister, or the boys will be chasing you before you know it.” I run a hand through her curls and then wave to the room in general before leaving. Tripp says my name and I stop, turning to stare at him. His eyes are guarded when he speaks, but I can see something beneath his stance, the way he holds himself, and it makes me yearn.

  “Be safe.”

  My heart sinks but I slap a smile on my face and mock salute. “Aye-aye, captain.”

  Six

  I have to hand it to Katie, Richie is hot. And his name isn’t actually Richie, so he’s even hotter.

  I arrived only ten minutes late to find the three of them already in a booth. Katie took one look at my outfit and sent me her death glare, but I ignored her because, really, what was I going to do about it now?

  When she stood in her micro-mini and skyscraper stilettos (which are both a tad too much for a pizza joint if you ask me) to introduce me to Doug (who’s hand I squeezed just a little too tightly, making him wince after his eyes wandered down my figure in an overt display of appreciation) and then to Richie (who is actually Dean), I had to do a double take. I’d prepared myself for a Doug look-a-like and my strategy was to only glance at him once and then get through the night without doing so again in the hope that his looks wouldn’t matter because his personality would be somewhat engaging, which I knew was a stretch if he was anything like his cousin. But one look at Dean and I had to look again. And again. Personality be damned, I just might stare at him all night.

  He may stand eye level with me, but he certainly weighs more and he definitely does not suffer from the same anorexic or emotional tendencies as Doug, since neither is reflected in his attire. Thank god, Dean is hot. Like, smoking hot. Black hair just a little unruly but not beiber-esque, brown eyes and a strong jaw. Broad shoulders and nice biceps complete the package, and though he’s an inch or two shorter than Tripp, he’s bulkier, like he lifts some serious weights, which kind of makes up for it.

  For once, I feel petite, or at least not like I’ll be the one doing the heavy lifting if the night gets scary.

  Now, we are one pizza down (Dean actually eats so I don’t feel the need to hold back either, hooray!) and we’ve almost completely stopped trying to include Katie and Dougie Fresh into the conversation. Between their intimate touches and smoldering stares, I decided it was safer all around to just exclude them.

  Currently, we are discussing his name.

  “I don’t understand the Richie reference. Is it a nickname? A play on words? Are you loaded? Spoiled? A Richard Gere fan?”

  He laughs and throws his arm over the back of the booth, angling his body so it sits toward mine. Not too close, but close enough to show interest and comfort. Well played, Dean. “Richard Gere? Aren’t you a little young to know who that is?”

  I give him a look. “Please. You’re what, nineteen?”

  He grins sheepishly. “But I have a fake I.D. that says I’m twenty-three.”

  I want to tell him I have a baby that trumps his fake I.D. but I don’t. Instead I shake my head. “I turned eighteen in October. We’re practically the same age.”

  Doug mumbles something that sounds suspiciously like “legal” and I eye him over my water glass. “Katie won’t be eighteen until March,” I say lightly, and he freezes for a moment. I incline my head at him and smile. Challenge accepted, Doug, so watch your step.

  Dean coughs through a laugh and I turn my attention back to him, trying not to wince when I hear Doug mumble to Katie “You’re not eighteen?” She’s definitely going to kill me now, I think before turning back to my date. That’s right people, I’m on a date, with a boy, and did I mention he’s hot? And not an idiot. It’s like I’m Cinderella and my wish really did come true (providing Cinderella’s glass slipper had been a size ten and her dream was about pepperoni pizza and hot boys with washboard abs…and dates that didn’t end in pregnancy tests and tears. Yikes, that’s a lot for old Cindy).

  “So, back to the nickname. Where did it come from?”

  “His real name is Richard,” Doug blurts out and I assume he’s listening to our conversation because he’s no longer sure he should be having one with his underage date. I watch Dean wince. Who wouldn’t? Richard? What’s wrong with parents? “Dean is his middle name.”

  This makes sense, a lot of people go by their middle names, especially if they have a shared first name or a really bad one. I think Richard constitutes as a really bad one, but even so, all that comes out of my mouth is “Your parents named you Dick Dean?”

  I’m not sure why this horrifies me, it’s not like Dean is his last name (I don’t actually know what his last name is yet) and besides, I myself suffer from the double initials game. Rachel Reynolds. R squared. Rae Rae. Fucking adorable. And still, all I can focus on is that one fact. Talk about unfo
rtunate alliteration.

  Katie is staring at me with those laser eyes again, the ones that promise pain and suffering, and for a minute I worry that I’ve just blown this night for both of us. It’s actually Doug that inadvertently comes to my rescue when he starts laughing.

  Dean follows suit and then we’re all laughing and I’m so relieved I feel like crying.

  When we’re done, or at least settled enough that he can speak, Dean nods. “Yep. Which is why I go by Dean and Douglass here is the only one who calls me any form of Richard. Just as a side note, Doug’s full name is spelled with a double s at the end, so inadvertently his parents made him an ass.”

  “It was like a premonition,” I say and Doug, who’s already red, goes from embarrassed to irate in point two. The purplish shade of his face is actually quite adorable. Like a six-year-old throwing a tantrum.

  Dean just smiles and then looks at me. “Your turn. Why Flow?”

  “Because rhythm was taken?” I venture and he smiles.

  “That bad, huh?”

  “You have no idea.”

  “Not even a hint?”

  “I’d rather be called Douglass.” Across the table, I’m pretty sure Doug just squeaked.

  Dean doesn’t bother to hide his laughter. Man, he’s hot and he can make fun of his douchebag cousin. It might be love. “So, should I just call you Rachel?”

  I freeze for a minute and meet his eyes. I want to nod, but for some reason I shake my head vigorously, like one of those girls named Chastity or Tiffany or Candi with an i, like I can’t hear my full name without wanting to punch myself for how stupid it is, when the truth is that I don’t mind my name. I mean, Rachel Reynolds isn’t the best name in the world, but it’s not the worst, either. No, it’s not the name Rachel, it’s the person saying it.

  Idiot, I scold myself. This boy is hot. And he’s here. And available. And he’s not afraid of you, or built like a malnourished teenager who’s mom did major drugs when carrying him. Who cares what he calls you? I do. Maybe I should punch myself.