Indelible You (Imagine Ink)

by Verlene Landon

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MID AUGUST

  ERIKA

  Erika dialed Walker’s number yet again, knowing she would get the same result. Can you say insanity? But, she still had to try.

  He had a right to know about the pregnancy, even if it meant she was risking her future with her child. She refused to tell Andy why she didn’t want the divorce from him, why she needed his protection. If he knew the threat Walker made about a potential baby, he would crush him. Andy had the money, the degree, and the family name to do it, too.

  As much as she feared losing custody of her child—the child born of her love for a man who now despised her, a child she already loved with an unmatched ferocity—she didn’t want to hurt Walker any more than she already had. Erika hoped and prayed he’d have a modicum of understanding now that his temper had time to cool and agree to a joint custody arrangement. She didn’t want to turn the child of their love into an object to be battled over and tugged at in a court case, but she wasn’t going to just give him or her up either.

  Erika believed, or at least wanted to believe, that Walker wouldn’t be cruel, but his words were lurking in the back of her mind, taunting her every time she decided he wasn’t that type of person. Self-preservation seemed to trump the hope that would try to bloom. Somewhere deep inside, a small voice reminded her that he wasn’t the cruel, cold-hearted man that threatened her that night. But that voice was inevitably drown out by his, telling her he wouldn’t allow her to raise his kid.

  She heard old wives tales that claim pregnancy robs a woman of half her brain or something like that, and now she believed it. She seemed utterly incapable of adult rationality. But knowing that didn’t help her override her juvenile attitude toward the whole messed up situation.

  If he couldn’t see past his anger and hurt, she would stay married to Andy and compel Walker to prove the child was his. It was a last resort for sure, one she would implement if he forced her hand in order to keep at least partial custody of her child. She didn’t think he had the money to do that, but Andy had enough to stall long enough for him to see reason. It made her sick to think of that as a possible course of action, but she couldn’t let him take her child from her either. She prayed the threat he leveled that night would never come to fruition, because she wasn’t sure she could follow that path, even if it were the only one left for her to travel.

  Really? Again? How many freaking times can a pregnant woman pee in an hour?

  Tossing her cell on the bed, Erika headed to the bathroom for what, the third time this hour? She just broke the threshold when “Walking on Sunshine” filled the room. Yeah, she definitely needed to change her ringtone. Frozen in place with both fear and hope it was Walker. Could it be? When she managed to shake off her temporary paralysis, and do the pee pee dance back to the bed, the unknown was no more. It wasn’t him, it was Tori.

  As much as she wanted to tell her best friend she would be an aunt soon, she couldn’t. Sure, it was one way to get the message to Walker, but not the right way. Knowing she had to tell him face to face—or at the least, voice to voice—talking to Tori was hard. She wanted to share the news with someone connected to Walker, if that made any sense, and her best friend.

  “Hello.”

  “That’s what I get? Hello? You left twelve freaking weeks ago and only talked to me for maybe three minutes since, and I get ‘Hello?’ Oh, hell no! I better get way more than that chica. Walker’s ignoring my calls and don’t ask me how I know, but he’s been beating the hell out of his place and drinking like there’s no tomorrow. Are you ready to tell me what the hell went down that night or do I have to haul my cookies to the frozen north for answers?”

  Confirmation of her suspicions was a blow she wasn't prepared for. Her actions had indeed sent Walker into a tailspin. If anything happened to him, it was on her shoulders.

  The silence was broken only by Erika’s soft, sniffling tears.

  Tori must have realized it had been pretty bad. “Erika darlin’, I’m sorry, I just thought...I mean, you both love each other so much, it’s sickening. I thought you’d get a snappy divorce, and boom, the two of you would rush off to the courthouse and make it official the minute you could. I can’t imagine what happened to make my best friend quit her job and run off to North Dakota instead of taking a divorce vacay as planned. Or send my brother back to a place I thought to never see him again.”

  Tori was questioning her, but Erika could tell her best friend was really just trying to puzzle it out for herself. Erika was nothing more than a sounding board at this point. “Honestly, I thought the two of you would go at it like bunnies in the backseat, then head to your place, not expecting y'all to come up for air until we put you on the back of a milk carton.” Tori laughed, but it sounded forced and laced with pain.

  Sniffling and smiling for the first time in weeks, a sad smile, but still a smile, Erika mumbled into her smartphone, “His place.”

  “What?”

  “His place. It was supposed to be his place, because it was closer. We got in the truck…like bunnies, as you so eloquently put it. Then we were supposed to go back to his place after and not come up for air, but we didn’t get that far.” Here come the tears again.

  “What the hell could happen between the car sex and his place that was so bad that you two are more miserable than ever? Shit, was the sex that bad? No way, sex can’t be that bad, can it? Ew, wait, don't answer that, we're talking about my brother, after all.”

  “God no, it wasn’t that bad. It was incredible, until I said I was married…during climax.”

  “Ouch. I bet that’s a first, for both of you. Still, didn’t he understand about Andy? I thought for sure he would be ok with it. Well, not ok enough to let you stay married, but you know what I mean.”

  “I don’t know if he’s ok with it, or if he’ll ever be ok with it. He pulled up his pants, said some horrible things, and left. Simple as that. He refused to let me talk. Said married is married.”

  “Shit Erika, I told you to divulge that info before anything happened. You know how he feels about cheating. No wonder he’s tearing up the town. He thinks you’re a cheater and made him one too. You should have led with, ‘He’s gay. My husband’s gay. I’m married, but he’s gay, and I knew it when I married him. We’ve never been anything more than friends. I’m more beard than wife.’ Walker would have let you talk after that because he wouldn’t be picturing you naked and writhing with a faceless man. He would know it wasn’t a marriage marriage, because that’s a deal breaker with him. You knew that, Erika. From the day you met, you knew that. Why didn’t you talk to him before?”

  “Shit Tori, don’t you think I tried? My body had other ideas. All my blood was rushing to my pants while my brain was in his. I tried, I really did, but apparently not hard enough, or I wouldn’t be having this conversation with you. Anyway, what’s done is done, but I need to talk to Walker and straighten things out. I can’t let him go on thinking the worst about himself.”

  “What about thinking the worst about you? All I want is for my two favorite people to be happy, and the only way for that to happen is if you’re together. I already consider you my sister, but I want it official and since I back burnered my mommy plans, I want to be an aunt already, so we need to fix this, pronto.”

  Emotion was suffocating Erika now. She had to get off the phone before she told Tori she was going to be an aunt before telling Walker he was going to be a father. If she thought telling him about her marital status was bad, try letting him find out she’s pregnant from someone other than her. Shit, time to hang up before she hurts him even more by adding insult to injury.

  Successfully ending the call, Erika curled up in a ball, and cried herself to sleep. Again.

  ***

  WALKER

  The pounding in his head was brutal and persistent, so was the freaking doorbell.

  Wait, doorbell? Shit.

  Someone was at his door and that meant he had to stand up an
d walk to the living room without puking or falling flat on his face. Sitting up in bed, Walker had a revelation, of sorts. After he tossed up everything in his stomach, again, he decided things had to change. He couldn’t live like this anymore. He’d done it once before, and it had ended with a three-year stay in the state’s finest. As soon as he could see straight, he’d call his therapist.

  ***

  TORI

  Tori got impatient waiting on his majesty to open the freaking door. Using her key, she entered a foul-smelling, hole-ridden cesspool that used to be a relatively upscale starter house in an up-and-coming neighborhood.

  Walker was spiraling down fast by the looks of this place. Little brother needed to get his shit together, like now, if he was going to be any kind of decent husband and father.

  Sure, Erika hadn’t said so, but the way she reacted on the phone when Tori mentioned being an aunt…the crazy hormones. It was pretty good odds that their one night together would make her an aunt. Even if she was wrong about the baby, she was damn sure going to see to it that they got the chance to try again.

  As Tori neared Walker’s bedroom, her nostrils were assaulted and so was every other sense she had.

  Simply put, he was devastated. But so was she damn it. There was enough of it to go around. He didn’t have a monopoly on the market, so it was time he stopped acting as if he did.

  Her best friend and her brother were destroyed by what happened and that didn’t leave her untouched by the situation. Tori was heartbroken for her best friend who lost the love of her life to a misunderstanding; and for her brother, who had apparently lost his way to the same.

  Shit, this sounds like a plot for a cheesy romance novel. Well, fuck me running, if that’s the case, they all deserve a “happily ever after” damn it. Tori thought as she entered the room.

  Walker was doubled over the trash can beside his bed. His room reeked of loneliness, whiskey, and, of course, vomit. Not to mention the holes in the wall and broken furniture.

  Damn it Walker.

  “How many of these are new Dubya? And how much have you had to drink?”

  “Hi to you too, sis.” Walker looked up from the bin. Her first real glimpse of her brother in weeks rocked her back on her heels, ripping the breath violently from her lungs. He’d lost a significant amount of weight, giving him a gaunt appearance. Red-rimmed haunted eyes that projected his serious need of an intervention met hers. Eyes that begged for an end to his torture.

  God, what was she going to do? Walker couldn’t go chasing after Erika like this. Hell, he couldn’t do anything like this. The look on his face scared the hell out of Tori. She wasn't sure anything could pull him back this time.

  Dropping her purse on the bed, she knelt beside her brother and rubbed soothing circles on his back, much like she remembered doing when they were younger. They have always been close, and that didn’t change as they grew. Tears threatened to slip down her cheeks as she remembered the last time she witnessed her brother like this.

  What am I going to do with you? She thought to herself. Or at least she believed she’d only thought it until her brother answered.

  “You’re not going to do anything, Tor. If I want out of this, I’ve got to do it myself.” He heaved again, then posed the question she knew was coming. One she couldn’t answer with additional information. She couldn’t shade in the blank areas for him. She had promised her best friend, and besides, as much as that knowledge would more than likely save her brother, it could instead push him deeper into this well of despair in which he’s fallen. Also, it wasn’t her place, or her knowledge to share. It was Erika’s and Erika’s alone.

  “Did you know?” God, how much easier it would be to pretend she didn’t have a clue what he referred to. To instead toss around leading answers to prompt him to investigate. Easy, but wrong. She opened her mouth and said the one word that would be like a knife in the back to her baby brother.

  “Yes.”

  From his position of supplication to the trash can, he turned his pleading face toward her. “And you never thought to bring it up? I know you knew, Tor. I never told you, but you knew. What I feel for Erika, you knew, you’ve always known. Didn’t you think I deserved to know that she was mar…” His words were cut off by another round of heaving.

  Tori didn’t miss the fact that he used “feel” instead of “felt.” That lead her to believe this round of heaving was brought on by emotional distress over a word, one he couldn’t stomach, instead of the whiskey. “Just talk to her Walker. You might change your mind once you understand her side.” Damn it, it was all she could do not to scream the answer at the top of her lungs, or at the least, lead him to the correct conclusion. “I spoke to her today, on the phone. She sounds as bad as you do. Can’t you two just talk about it? I know you can be happy together, it’s meant to be.”

  Fighting back her tears, Tori continued, “You’re fucked up sweetheart, worse than I’ve ever seen. Worse than before even. I want my baby brother back, and you’re the only one who can reach him, but you’ve got to want to come back. As much as I want you and Erika to work this out, I want you to work you out more than anything. You’ve got to get a grip Walker. You do. If you want things to work out with Erika and this whole misunderstanding, you've got to step into the light, fight the darkness. I have a feeling, if you can do that, you’ll be in a place where you can talk to her, hear her out. Once you do, I think you’ll see the situation in a different light. See yourself in a different light.”

  Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he collapsed backward, sitting on his feet. His shoulders were slumped and his head was drooping. His entire being spoke of defeat and impending surrender. “There’s nothing to talk about sis. Mar…you know, or not, I did and said things that I can never take back. My reaction to her…status was worse than any I’ve ever had.” He turned sad eyes to his sister, begging her to hate him for what he had done or to love him in spite of it, it was hard to tell. “If she told you what I said, you wouldn’t be here comforting me right now. I can promise you that.”

  That was it then? Finality settled into Tori’s consciousness. Her friend was in too much pain to come to Walker with her heart in her hands, again; and her brother was too deep into that dark place to accept her or fix it himself. She hated it, but she understood. They both needed to heal, get their heads right and back on track. Only then could they reach for each other again.

  She hoped there wouldn’t be too much water under the bridge by the time they were ready. Or if her suspicion of an impending niece or nephew were accurate, it wouldn’t cement the pain of that night, and build a wall between them that they couldn’t or wouldn’t tear down. They could both be such stubborn asses sometimes.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  MID SEPTEMBER

  WALKER

  Waiting for Augusta to arrive, Walker took another shower, but still didn’t feel human.

  Would he ever again?

  He didn’t know the answer to that, but he had to try, for himself first and foremost. If he couldn’t get back to a stable place in his life, there would be no way in hell he could be objective about Erika. What she was, what they’d done, what she made him, and no way it would matter anyway. Dialing Augusta’s number and telling her how far he’d fallen had been a whole hell of a lot harder than he anticipated.

  It had taken him months just to get his shit together enough to want to pull himself back from the edge. He was starting to get way too comfortable teetering over it, enjoying the thrill. He almost didn’t make the call, but four months was long enough. He wanted his life back, or at least some semblance of it. Hollow as it would be, it would still be better than prison. That’s what he had to hold on to, that thought.

  Augusta’s methods were…unconventional to say the least, but she was able to reach that darker side of him when traditional therapy and anger management failed to do so. He would have gone back to prison, more than once, had she not been at his beck and call over the
years.

  This was going to be a real test of her methods, Walker admitted to himself. On top of all the other shit that was heaped on him of late, now he carried even more guilt for Augusta. She worked so hard, and he just took a big dump on all the progress she's made with him over the years.

  When the doorbell brought him out of his shower reflection, he wrapped a towel around his hips and answered the door. Opening it and seeing Gus standing there hit him like a backdraft wave of relief. Then the flames of guilt started to lick away at any comfort he had momentarily managed. Not waiting for an invitation, Gus stepped right up into his personal space and grabbed his cheeks with her petite hands. Bringing his face down to her five foot four view, she locked eyes with him.

  “Our actions may be flawed, but that does not mean we are broken. Walker Reid, you are so much more than your anger and much stronger, you know that.”

  Those words, as Gus spoke them, with all the confidence and love she had, never ceased to make his soul cry out. He grabbed her up in a bear hug that brought her feet inches off the floor, and spun her around, holding her like the life raft she was.

  His state of dress didn’t matter. All that mattered at that moment was she was here, and she would save him, again. Gus never asked him to put her down, she always patiently waited until he was ready to let go. If it was anyone else, this would have been awkward, but with Gus, it was a sisterly bond on top of the therapist-patient relationship, nothing more. It was the therapist bond that he needed, but the sisterly love that brought the guilt.

  When he returned her to her feet, she righted her workout clothes and gave him and his apartment a once-over. “Whew, we’ve got our work cut out for us don’t we? I’ve got to make a few trips to the car, grab some gear and my clothes. While I’m gone, get dressed and collect all the alcohol in the house. Then, I want you to grab three things. Something that represents your current trigger, something that represents your calm place—that thing that can pull you back—and finally, something you can’t live without. Put it all on the coffee table, and move all the other furniture out of the living room.”