Stumbling Into Love

by Reynolds, Aurora Rose

  “I haven’t talked to Wesley this morning yet. Do you know if everything went okay last night?” I ask.

  Fawn’s face softens as she looks at me.

  “Yeah, last night they got a lead that they needed to look into.”

  “Does Levi talk to you about his cases?” I ask, wondering if it’s only Wesley who keeps his work from me.

  “Never.” She shakes her head as she accepts a cup of coffee from Libby. “I don’t even ask him anymore. He knows if he needs to talk that I’m here for him, but he doesn’t talk to me about work. Does Wesley talk to you?”

  “No.” I bite the inside of my cheek. Maybe I should ask my mom if my dad talked to her about work.

  “I don’t think you’d really want him to talk to you about his work,” Libby says, wrapping her arm around my shoulder while taking a sip of coffee. “I love horror flicks, but I know there is no way that I would be able to handle seeing someone who was really murdered—or hearing about it firsthand.” She shakes her head, then reaches around me to grab the bag of bagels. She pulls one out. “I think them not talking to you about work is their way of protecting you from how ugly the world is.”

  “Who protects them?” Fawn asks as my bagel pops up. “I love that Levi wants to protect me, but I also want to know that he’s not carrying around the weight of everything he sees and does on his shoulders.”

  “I think you do that for him,” I tell her honestly. “He may not talk to you about his job, but I don’t think he needs to. I think you’re his escape from all that.”

  “Exactly,” Libby agrees, handing me a plate from the cupboard above the sink.

  Grabbing a butter knife, I open the tub of smoked salmon cream cheese and slather a thick layer on my bagel. There is nothing better than New York City bagels and cream cheese. Nothing.

  “So what stores are we hitting up first?” Libby asks.

  I know she’s excited about today. She’s a marathon shopper; I swear that after shopping with her for one day, I need the rest of the year to recover. Today is the one day of the year when she can willingly get Fawn and me out of the house to shop with her. It’s going to be crazy since today and the next two days are the craziest shopping days of the year. Everyone is out, and the stores are crowded, making it almost impossible to even move. Why we don’t shop before today like most people, I don’t know.

  “I need to find something for Levi. I have no idea what to get him,” Fawn says as she picks up the second half of my bagel and takes a bite.

  “Lingerie,” Libby says before taking a bite of her own bagel.

  “Isn’t that more of a gift for me than him?” Fawn frowns.

  “No.” Libby snorts, then asks, “Do you even own any lingerie?”

  “No.” She frowns.

  “Well, then, tell me who would it be for?”

  “Him, I guess.” She shrugs.

  “Exactly. It would be for him.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “First stop, Victoria’s Secret!” Libby says.

  I wonder if I should go with her idea, too, because I have no idea what to get Wesley. What do you get the guy you’ve only been seeing for a few weeks? I don’t even know if I should get him anything.

  “I don’t know what to get Wesley, either,” I say.

  Libby chews the bite she just took of her bagel, then swallows.

  “What part of lingerie do you not understand? It’s the gift that keeps on giving. You don’t even need to tell him that it’s a gift; he will just know when he unwraps it,” she says.

  I laugh. “Who the hell is unwrapping your gifts?”

  “No one. I unwrap my own gifts, and I’m damn good at it, too.” She winks.

  I shake my head as Fawn laughs. “I miss you guys.”

  “I miss you, too. We need to have a set night every other week for sister time,” I agree.

  When we all lived together, we made it a point to have dinner together at least two nights a month. We would order in pizza or Chinese food, then lounge around in our PJs and watch scary movies until the early hours of the morning. When Fawn moved out, we let that tradition go, but I want to do that again. I miss how close we used to be.

  “Yes, well, that is if your men will let you up for air long enough to hang out,” Libby huffs.

  I look at her just in time to catch her rolling her eyes.

  “You sound a little jealous,” Fawn states, smiling.

  “Did I not just tell you how good I am at unwrapping myself? I’m so jealous I’m green. I want a man. A real living, breathing man.” She tosses her hair.

  “What about Antonio?” Fawn asks.

  I turn to look at Libby.

  “No, thank you. He’s way too pompous for my taste.”

  “I don’t know . . . when I was in there the other day to pick up my order and saw you two together, your arguing seemed a lot like foreplay.”

  “If foreplay is plotting someone’s death in your mind from start to finish, including getting rid of the body, then you would be right,” she says.

  I know she’s full of it. She’s attracted to him, and it probably makes her crazy that he isn’t falling at her feet like most men do. Libby is beautiful in a timeless way that calls to men, but most people don’t know that she’s a hard worker, she’s ambitious, she’s outgoing, and she’s one of the kindest women I have ever met. Most men just see a pretty face and a perfect body—one that she does absolutely nothing to make that way. She eats like crap and never works out; if I ate like her, I would weigh five hundred pounds.

  “All right, you two need to get ready so we can go. Times Square is going to be insane,” Fawn says.

  I shove the rest of my bagel in my mouth, chew, and swallow. I drink the rest of my coffee, then head to my room and get ready to spend the day with my sisters.

  Sliding into a booth at the back of Jack’s bar, across from my sisters, I smile at Libby and Fawn as they chat about all the things they bought. Pulling my eyes from them, I look around and realize I haven’t been to Jack’s in forever. The last time I was here was at Halloween with my sisters. Jack’s has always been my favorite bar. I love the TVs in every corner playing different sports games, the worn tables that have dings and dents in them, and the crowd of men and women who are all there to have a good time.

  “It’s been a while, Mac,” says Lisa, one of the waitresses, as she comes over to our table to drop off the drinks that we ordered when we first walked in.

  I turn to look up at her and notice then that she’s pregnant.

  “Are you guys ready to order, or do you need a few minutes to look over the menu?”

  “You’re having a baby!” I blurt out.

  She laughs, resting both her hands on her very round stomach.

  “I’m so happy for you!” I get up and give her a hug. She hugs me back before letting me go and shaking her head.

  “Yeah, me and Vick are so excited. I didn’t know I was pregnant until two months ago. I thought I was just gaining weight.” She laughs again, and I laugh along with her.

  “That’s great. Tell Vick I said congrats,” I mutter, feeling a weight settle down around me.

  I don’t know what I would do if I found out I was pregnant right now. As good as things are between us, I don’t know how Wesley would feel.

  “Anyway, enough about me. Are you girls ready to order?” she asks.

  “I think we’re ready,” Fawn says.

  Libby and I both nod. We always get the same thing when we come here. I will have to work out for a week after this, but it’s always worth it.

  “Three cheeseburgers and fries, an order of cheese sticks, and an order of fried pickles.”

  “Sure,” Lisa agrees.

  My stomach twists.

  “I’ll bring your food out as soon as it’s done.”

  “Thanks!” we say in unison before she walks off.

  “Why do you look so pale?” Libby asks as soon as Lisa is gone.

  I don’t
even know how to answer her. I don’t know if I should just tell them that I messed up and had unprotected sex.

  “Earth to Mackenzie!” Libby snaps her fingers in front of my face, and I blink.

  “Wesley and I have had a couple accidents,” I say.

  My sisters share a look before they both frown at me.

  “What does that mean?”

  “We’ve had sex without protection.”

  “Seriously?” Libby hisses, leaning across the table toward me. “What the hell were you thinking?”

  “I obviously wasn’t thinking. But in my defense, the second he touches me, all rational thought goes out the window and I lose my mind. I know that it’s stupid, but it’s the truth. I swear I can’t help myself around him.”

  “If you end up pregnant—” Fawn says, but I cut her off.

  “I know,” I whisper. “Believe me, I know. I’ve got a prescription for birth control, but I have to wait for my period to start this month to begin taking it.”

  “Well, you know Mom would be thrilled,” Fawn laughs.

  I cover my face and groan. Our mom would be thrilled if I got pregnant. She would think she hit the mother lode. With Fawn and me both in serious relationships and me pregnant, she’d probably faint from sheer happiness.

  “What’s the chance of it happening? I mean, it has to be like one in a million, right?” I ask.

  Fawn shrugs, but Libby seems to ponder the question before giving her answer.

  “I don’t know. It’s probably a lot more likely than you think it is. But then again, who the hell knows? There are a million variables that go into getting pregnant. Some women have to use thermometers, calculators, and calendars in order to get knocked up. Let’s just hope you’re like one of those women and not as fertile as Mom.”

  “Yeah, every time Mom said she wanted to have another baby, she got pregnant. So if you’re anything like her, you’re probably already carrying our niece or nephew,” Fawn says, looking at my stomach.

  I cover it with a hand without thinking, then quickly drop it away.

  “Shut up and don’t curse me! I don’t even know what I would do if I ended up pregnant. And Wesley . . .” I shake my head. “I can’t even imagine having to tell him that news. He would probably lock me in a room or roll me up in bubble wrap.”

  “Remind me why that’s a bad thing?” Libby says, smiling at Lisa when she drops off our food at the table.

  “It’s not a bad thing. His crazy possessiveness gives me tingles, but it’s annoying when he’s overbearing. It’s hard to explain—I love it but hate it.”

  “I get it,” Fawn says, taking a sip from her wineglass. “Levi is a little cray-cray, too, but I try not to let him get away with it. I don’t want him to think it’s okay to boss me around or control me.”

  “Exactly. It’s like a game of tug-of-war. He pushes, I pull, then he pushes again,” I say, sliding my glass of wine across the table.

  “I think I’ll stick to loving myself. All this relationship business sounds way too complicated,” Libby mutters.

  Fawn laughs.

  “It is complicated,” I agree, wondering if it might become even more complicated.

  Chapter 9

  NO FREE MILK

  WESLEY

  “Why on earth would a man want to buy the cow when he can just get the milk for free?” Miss Ina asks Mackenzie.

  I see a smile twitch in the corner of my girlfriend’s mouth. Libby, who has been attempting to get a rise out of the old lady since we sat down to Christmas dinner, tips her head to the side and puts on a look that’s way too innocent.

  “How will they know if the milk’s not spoiled if they don’t test it out?” Libby asks.

  Miss Ina huffs.

  Swallowing down a chuckle of my own, I look at my mom. She’s sitting across from us, and I can see her shoulders shaking as she laughs silently.

  When we arrived at the house and she was introduced to everyone, all my anxiety melted away. I should have known better than to be worried. There is no way Katie Reed would make anyone in her house feel uncomfortable. She made my mom and stepdad feel at home, and so did everyone else.

  If I’m honest, today has been nice. When my parents divorced, there were no longer big holiday dinners with lots of family. It was mostly me with my dad on Christmas Eve, then with my mom on Christmas Day. Just us. Always just us. My mom didn’t have any family, and my dad’s family wanted nothing to do with my mom.

  “Child, a man knows everything he needs to know about a woman the very moment they meet,” Miss Ina says. “You don’t need to give your milk away for him to know more. I met my late husband on a Monday and married him that Friday. He knew. We both knew what we were to each other—without any kind of taste test.”

  I cough into my hand to cover my laugh.

  “That’s amazing, Miss Ina, but the world is a different place now. Dating nowadays isn’t like it used to be,” Libby tells her truthfully. “Most people my age want casual relationships until they feel they are ready to start a family. Now most people I know don’t date seriously unless they are looking to have a child, and then they are only looking for someone they believe will be a good parent, not necessarily a good partner.”

  “Bawww,” Miss Ina says loudly, tossing out her hand. “You kids and all your fancy gadgets. You’re always twittering, matching, and farmering.”

  “Farmering?” Libby repeats.

  I wonder what the hell farmering is.

  “Just yesterday, I saw an ad trying to recruit women to be farmers’ wives on the television. What is this world coming to?” She shakes her head as her lip curls up in disgust. “You kids are so caught up in those gadgets you carry around in your hands that you don’t even notice what’s right in front of you anymore.”

  “That’s very true,” my mom agrees, nodding her head. “But Libby is also right. Dating nowadays isn’t what it used to be.” She picks up her wineglass to take a sip. “Even at my age, it was hard finding someone who wanted more than just a hookup.”

  “What is a hookup?” Miss Ina asks, frowning.

  Libby leans to her side, “whispering” loud enough for everyone to hear. “It’s another way of saying that you’re giving your milk away for free.”

  “I know that, girl.” Miss Ina glares at Libby, who smiles.

  When we first got into the car that morning, I could tell that Libby didn’t know what to think of Miss Ina. I don’t know what changed, but about halfway to Long Island, something did. She started giving the older woman a hard time—and has clearly gotten a kick out of getting a rise out of her since then.

  “We didn’t ‘hook up’ in my day. We didn’t live with each other for fun. We didn’t play house. We met, we got married, we moved in together, and we had kids. Then we stayed married until the day one of us died.”

  “I’m glad it’s not like that anymore,” Libby says, looking around the table. “I know some people were happy, but there had to be a lot of people, a lot of women, who were unhappy and unable to do anything about it because society would have cast them out.”

  Miss Ina shrugs. “You’re probably right, but this hooking-up business is not how you find someone you want to spend your life with. If you are constantly looking for the next hookup, as you say, you won’t know when you find the right one.”

  “You’re probably right,” Libby agrees.

  “I know I am. You and your sisters are sweet girls. You deserve to find nice men who want more than just to drink your milk.”

  Hearing Mackenzie snort next to me, I look at her just in time to catch her covering her mouth. “Sorry.” She waves her hand toward Miss Ina, who narrows her eyes.

  “This is the weirdest conversation I have ever heard,” Levi says, picking up his beer.

  Fawn smiles at him, resting her hand on his chest—a hand that is now sporting an engagement ring. When he told me a week ago that he was going to ask Fawn to marry him at Christmas, my first insane thought was th
at he was a lucky bastard. A few months ago, my first thought would have been that he was a crazy fuck.

  Mackenzie has made me want those things for myself—a wife, a family, someone to come home to at the end of the day. She’s my best friend. A best friend I have unbelievable chemistry with.

  “Put down your darn phone, girl.” I look up just in time to catch Miss Ina snatch the cell phone out of Libby’s hand and toss it behind her onto the floor.

  “You . . . oh my god! You did not just do that! I was posting a photo of what the table looked like after we all decimated it!” Libby cries.

  Miss Ina waves her off. “You can’t live life through a phone. You need to live in the moment by being present in the situation.”

  She isn’t wrong about that. People now live on their phones. They date on their phones, communicate with family and friends on their phones. Face-to-face contact has become almost nonexistent.

  “Yeah, but I wanted to share with my friends online who aren’t here to share it with me.”

  “Share it with them firsthand when you see them. Not by taking a picture of the moment and sharing it on your Facesbooks or Intergrams,” she says.

  I smile at that.

  “It’s Facebook and Instagram. I don’t see the people I chat with online often,” Libby says.

  Miss Ina frowns. “Then why do they need to see what your table looked like?”

  “I don’t know. It’s just what you do. You share online what you’re doing and where you have been.”

  “Well, it’s ridiculous, and it takes away from the occasion and the experience. When you’re enjoying a beautiful moment in life, really enjoying that moment, you can remember it in your mind’s eye years later. You can remember what you heard, what you smelled, how you felt. Sometimes the memory will be so clear you’d think you were back there all over again. No picture is going to give that to you. If you don’t put down your phone and look around, when you’re old like me and your sight is starting to go, you will have no memories at all.”

  “You’re right,” Libby huffs. “But you still shouldn’t have tossed my phone.”

  “You can get it after dinner,” Miss Ina says before looking over at a stunned Katie, who is holding her glass of wine inches from her mouth. “Thank you for dinner, dear.”