Missing Beats

by K. L. Shandwick

  When I closed my bedroom door my tears fell. My situation was hopeless as far as any feelings I harbored for Kane, but I consoled myself with the thought that my life wasn’t really only about me anymore, my baby came first. How could I even think about any man and carry another’s child? How could I even entertain the notion of a normal life when I was carrying a sick baby? It was all a mess, but I’d found the strength to get as far as I had at that point, and I knew I’d continue to take one day at a time, climbing over every hump necessary to take care of my daughter when the time came.

  Being strong also meant allowing myself time to grieve for what I couldn’t have and I cried for my lost opportunities in life to bring up my child. Then I spared a thought for all of those women for whom child bearing hadn’t come easy. I was thankful for the gift of a child no matter what they were like or how it was conceived, and reminded myself that everything happens for a reason. Since Kane had come into my life it had been full of change and discontentment. Reconnecting with him had created emotional turmoil which had left me feeling more than a little restless. With a few weeks to go to the most difficult chapter in my life I regretted that complication.

  *****

  I must have fallen asleep and woke to the sound of soft knocking on my bedroom door. “Is everything alright, Josie? You’ve been up here for almost three hours.” The light was all but gone outside and when I squinted at the clock it was 5:10 pm.

  “Yeah, Mom, sorry, I didn’t sleep well last night and lunch wiped me out.”

  “I’m making some turkey sandwiches with the leftovers, come down and rescue Kane before your grandma tries to elope with the poor guy. He’s been fabulous with her all afternoon, but I think he could use some young company. Jacob went over to Ann-Marie’s house to help her with some imaginary emergency. I wish he’d just admit that he’s seeing her. Your father and I don’t care that she’s divorced with two children. She’s lovely and by all accounts her husband wasn’t a good man.”

  Stretching a little, I rolled onto my other side and sat up on the bed. My hip was stiff from the weight I was carrying and when I stood I felt sore. I let out a groan and my mom came over beside me and hugged me. “It must be tough without Elliott, hon. You are doing a grand job of keeping that baby safe, you’re a brave girl.”

  Hearing my mom say that made me feel dreadful. I was a fraud. Tears sprang to my eyes and I was choked because I wanted to tell her, but I had no clue where to start. Stepping back, I mumbled that I was just going to freshen up and I’d be right down as I made a hasty retreat to my bathroom. As I stood in front of the mirror I had no idea what to feel or what to think. Kane wasn’t going away from my thoughts no matter how much I tried to shut him out. And still I knew that in two days he’d be gone again.

  Chapter 23

  Flirting

  Leftover turkey and cranberry sandwiches on homemade crusty bread was the best comfort food ever. I ate two whole sandwiches when I realized that I had plenty of room from dinner. I hadn’t actually eaten very much because I had been so aware of Kane sitting next to me, and I was eaten up with anxiety about what my grandma was going to say next. The woman had killed my appetite. I had managed to look as if I’d eaten without taking much in.

  Fortunately, grandma had started to look tired, her energy levels zapped by the fact that she was an early riser, the journey to our home, all the heavy food, and her endless flirting with Kane. It was ridiculous that my parents made the two hour journey each way, and the hour they’d spend either collecting her things together to bring her to us or to settle her back when she got home again.

  Soon after we’d finished eating my dad started to prepare her to leave, stating that he wasn’t driving after 10:00 pm because he’d been up since 6:00 am that morning, and if she didn’t leave soon she would have to stay over. It was weird how her personality changed from the flirty, vibrant senior to the frail old lady in a sentence with her son’s stern warning.

  Twenty minutes later they were in the car, my grandma having kissed Kane not once but three times and an extra hug. “Until next time,” she said, before my dad closed the door and sighed with relief that she was finally installed in the back seat of his car for the journey home. I smiled as I waved her off, but inside my stomach was flipping over and over because it meant another one-on-one session with Kane. Frankly, I was beat both emotionally and physically.

  “Now I know where you get it from,” he said, chuckling as we stepped back into the warmth of the sitting room. I wandered over by the fire and sat on the chair nearest the fireplace.

  “Get what?”

  “Your fire. Your grandma is a hoot. She opens her mouth and whatever she’s thinking just falls out,” he commented.

  “So that’s what you think I do?” My baby kicked out in protest when I hugged myself defensively.

  “Damn, Jo, strip off that armor for fuck’s sake. How am I ever going to know the real you again if you won’t let me in?”

  I dropped my arms, aware that my unborn child was as restless as I was. None of this was good for her. My anxiety levels had been through the roof since Kane called and the anguish had continued ever since. The moment I set eyes on him my baby had begun to kick like crazy. I’d been suffering heartburn and felt upset for the majority of the time he’d been at the house. Nothing felt normal while he was around, and in my last weeks of pregnancy I needed normality more than ever.

  “We should talk.” Kane stood, pushing his hands deep into his pockets as he wandered over to the window. Without turning around, he took his hand out of the front pockets and shoved them in the back ones. Flexing his back like he was stiff I heard him take a deep breath. “If there was a guy…a good guy…hell any guy around who was taking care of you, Jo, I’d back off. There isn’t. No. If I’m being completely honest with you, I’d say I was lying about that last statement. I don’t want to back off. I’ve thought about you every day since we were together. I’ve hated the way things went down between us and we shouldn’t have gotten drunk, but we did, and now I’ve got nothing in my head apart from you. What I mean is I’m sorry about how it happened but not sorry that it did.”

  I looked him up and down but he never turned around. “You may not have been here, Kane, but you have still been right in front of me—most days with a different woman on your arm, since you left my place. I’m not angry about that, it’s your life. Women, music, and what else was it?”

  “Music, sex and good conversation, Jo. If you’re going to throw quotes back at me at least get them correct.” Spinning on his heel he walked over and picked up his leather jacket. “Is this really what you want?” Kane stood frozen with his black leather jacket scrunched in his fist. His knuckles were white from the tension of gripping it.“Have it your way, Jo. I’m not going to beg. I came here to tell you how I felt. I’ve done that and even in your condition you won’t hear me. I’m no quitter, Jo, but I can see I’m upsetting you, and out of consideration for your condition and the baby I’ll leave you alone.”

  I stood up and stormed toward the door after him. “You rock in here like you own me, telling me how I feel and why I should be with you, but you’re not listening, Kane. I don’t want you to beg. You’re a great guy, Kane, just not great for me. You think because I’m pregnant you should take care of me? Listen to me, because I’m only going to say this one more time. The life you lead doesn’t interest me. It would depress me more to be around all those women that act like my grandma did today and wonder if that day was the one where you give in and take them up on that offer. I’m pregnant and I care about you, but I’m not desperate for someone to take care of me. I don’t really know you. For all I know you are an alcoholic and may have many STDs. No matter how good you look that’s not an attractive package.”

  Spinning on his heel to face me he leaned in close to my face. He was seething at my attack. “Let me tell you, I am not an alcoholic. Yeah I drink, last time I heard that was legal, right? And as for
STD’s, I have never been with a woman without a condom. Who’s to say you’re not the one with the STD? You’re pregnant after all. That doesn’t happen without an exchange of bodily fluids if my sex education at high school was on point.” Watching Kane’s normally bright eyes turn dark and dangerous worried me. I’d pushed him too far.

  “You know what? This is a waste of time. You are a waste of my time. You’re fucking nuts. I was a fool to think there could have been something special here. Your hostility toward me is not warranted, Jo. Think about that. I’m going to go to my hotel now because I am clearly not wanted around here and I’d hate to think I was upsetting your unborn child by my presence. You know where to find me if you wake up in a more rational mood tomorrow.”

  Kane left without looking back. I stood by the front door until his tail lights grew smaller and my tears blurred their orange glow until there was nothing. I released the breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. I’d got what I wanted…to be left alone. So why does my heart feel like it’s breaking?

  For all of my life Kane had been the one person who drew out my rawest emotions. Ever since the day we left Germany, leaving him after his father’s funeral. Crying in bed on my twenty-first birthday and all the horrible dreams and worries I had about him in-between. All of those sad times in my life were around him. That night the depth of those feelings of loss was with me again. It would be so easy to give in and give myself time with him, but the consequences when it failed would devastate me…us, there is only me to think about. I can’t, I have to stay strong.

  *****

  During the day that followed my parents asked me question after question about Kane and what had happened after they’d left with my grandma. Eventually, I tired of it and snapped at them, telling them nothing was going on and I wasn’t his keeper. Despite regretting my outburst the day before there was no way on earth I’d ever admit I’d been wrong to have behaved the way I had, but I was sorry I had hurt him with the horrible things I said. He hadn’t deserved my wrath, it wasn’t his fault I was in the predicament I had found myself in.

  I found myself staring out at the driveway at every opportunity during that day, willing Kane to come back. I wanted him to defy me for behaving so unpredictable toward him then chided myself for wondering why he would even bother. Kane had it all. I figured he’d probably woken with a clear conscience that morning after my rejection the night before. I’d behaved so spiteful for someone who was ordinarily a level-headed person, and if I was being honest, I had definitely made Kane the catalyst for dredging up all the anger I had suppressed in order to cope with my situation. Why do men have sex and are able to walk away while women like me are left with the consequences?

  For the first twelve hours since I’d gotten out of bed that day I’d felt a huge irritation that Kane had swept into my life for the second time and disrupted the equilibrium I had fought to achieve after he’d left the last time. My whole existence had changed in the past eight months and when I looked back, from that day, I absorbed the fact that my life had never, and would never, be the same again. Why couldn’t life be easier? Unfortunately, from my experience, we didn’t get choices of what happened in our future, but it was predestined from the previous choices made by us somewhere in the past.

  By 8:30 pm that night my gut was rotting like it had been twisted in knots and the blood supply had been cut. The flesh inside was slowly dying and I cursed Kane again for ever coming back. If I was frank, I couldn’t blame him. When he hadn’t, it showed me how serious he was about all the stuff that he’d said during the previous two days. I allowed myself to imagine what he was doing, and pictures of parties and glamorous women appeared in my mind. The whole thing was ridiculous and I was torturing myself about something that I couldn’t change.

  Life was much easier as kids, but unfortunately it never stayed that way. Kane Exeter hadn’t just touched my heart, he’d seeped into every chamber. He was ingrained in every artery and vein by then and my head had been filled not only with those precious memories from our childhood, but the way his gorgeous lust-filled blue eyes darkened as he slid his cock roughly to the hilt inside me, and the roll of his tongue around mine.

  It had been eight months since I’d been with him, but every time I tried to erase the memory of the way Kane had touched me, that firm, possessive touch, it made me weak. The way he wound my hair around his hand and extended my neck as his other hand gently squeezed my throat while his wild animalistic control commanded my body, I felt a pulse in my core. I couldn’t think of one of those things in isolation without the whole chain of movements of every stroke he made on my body coming to mind.

  Approaching 10:00 pm, I couldn’t bear the wait any longer, but deep down I knew all along that he wouldn’t come back, so gave up and went to bed. I was appalled by my brattish behavior but I just couldn’t control my rage around him. Or was it passion disguised as rage? Whatever it was Kane brought out the worst in me, but then again, the weight of what I was carrying, not just physically but emotionally, had begun to weigh me down. I was a girl with a huge burden and nothing in my world was right. I wasn’t ready to be a mother. I wasn’t ready to take responsibility for another human being, when I couldn’t even take responsibility for owning my own feelings. And I definitely wasn’t prepared to take on the care of a sick baby.

  Sliding as easily into bed as someone with a belly my size could, I was torn in half. I hated him for that—for coming back and making me feel what I’d never be able to have. The crushing, tight feeling that gripped my chest made my heart stutter irregularly as my throat closed in and I felt like I was suffocating again. My heart was broken. Missing beats was only one of the symptoms of my baby’s condition, but I had to admit that some had also been missing in mine since Kane Exeter had walked back into my life.

  None of what had happened in the previous forty-eight hours had supported my fragile mental state, and the way I responded to Kane’s visit was less than dignified. I spent another restless night trying to sleep, a habit I had formed since Kane had taken over every thought I had. The dissatisfaction of knowing I would probably live the rest of my life without him; devastated me.

  Eventually, after hours of self-depreciation and loathing, I talked myself back to the position of hope and thought he may have been giving me breathing space again. I even appeased myself with the hope of a slim chance that he’d call in before he left town. If that happened I’d decided I’d tell him about the baby, and all my fears about the future and his lifestyle, how he reacted to that would be his call, but if he left and didn’t call after that, at least I’d know for sure that he’d never come back.

  *****

  Waking with a start, my heart raced and I cradled my bump and felt my baby active in there. My heartbeat was still fast and I had a feeling of dread that made me uneasy. My thoughts turned to Kane and I crept downstairs at 5:00 am because I had a sudden thought that I shouldn’t wait for him to come to me. Guilt had taken its toll on me and I had an overwhelming need to apologize for the way I’d treated him. Sitting at the desk top computer I began to write an email to explain my feelings instead of being angry about the things I could not change.

  Hello Kane, I don’t know how to start this except to say I’m sorry, really sorry. For the previous eight months I have struggled with my feelings on many levels, especially what we did, and how reckless I was with you. You made that effortless for me to do. Since then my whole world has changed in countless ways, and I have no control over my life at present. I wasn’t prepared in any way for your unexpected return nor the depth of my feelings for you, I’ve honestly never felt this way before, nor since. Although Elliott and I were in a new relationship, I had begun to develop feelings for him, and that made what we did even harder for me to understand. I had never regarded myself as someone who could allow a moment of passion or lust to overtake my rational thoughts. Yet, that’s exactly what happened with you. In those intimate moments we shared, nothing
had mattered but you.

  Being a girl that doesn’t trust easily, I’ve never been one that had sex with someone without an emotional tie. I viewed what had happened with us as a betrayal even though it was Elliott’s choice to push me away. My behavior left me both embarrassed about that and regretful that I had maybe thrown away a second chance at an amazing lifelong friendship with you, for the satisfaction of knowing you intimately. Like I said, I wasn’t prepared for that to happen, nor the range of emotions that touched on everything from shame to ecstasy. Those feelings were incredible and memories I’ll never be able to erase from my mind.

  Allowing myself to be caught up in the seductive charm you ooze instead of my usual rational no-nonsense approach to life fills me with remorse and makes me wish that things were different for us now…but they’re not. My situation is what it is and I have had to adopt a hard exterior to keep myself from further hurt by someone as tempting as you. I had thought my barriers were pretty impenetrable from growing up in a military family where I learned to create personal buffers, yet you managed to creep under my skin in a whole different way from that of when we were kids. And from my perspective it’s a dangerous way. The thought of allowing myself to have thoughts of anything but friendship with you scares the life out of me.

  There is nothing in common between us, apart from the army connection, Kane. The only music my family ever had time for was Matt’s tuba and Jacob’s trombone efforts with the marching band back when we were kids. Seeing you again the other day has stirred the strongest feelings I have ever experienced, but I can’t afford to entertain them without you knowing all the facts and finding some solution to the lifestyle you lead. I’m not trying to change you, Kane, I’m trying to make sense of what all of this means. Please don’t make what I’m facing any harder than it already is.