by Ever Coming
"Absolutely not!" Mae laughed. "You know I have to go back to work, and I can't even begin to think of what kind of comments Francine would make if I came back looking like I was rode hard and put away wet."
"Stop putting ideas into my head if you don't want me to follow through on them, Mae," I warned her.
She pressed a soft kiss to my lips. "Okay, then I guess I really shouldn't mention my recent fantasy about being bent over your desk, arms splayed, while you fuck me like it's the last sex of our lives then, right?" At my pained look, she nodded. "That's what I thought." She tried to take a step back and I held her to me. "Mr. Dahl," she admonished, "I'm trying to preserve your dignity and my reputation."
"Fuck my dignity," I growled. "You can't just say things like that and expect to get away with no consequences, Mae."
"Oh, can't I?" Her look was an innocent charade. "What are you going to do to me."
I spun her around and lifted her to the edge of my desk. Thankfully, she was wearing one of those pencil skirts again. I loved how easy they were to bunch up to the top of her thighs so that I could spread her legs. I did so now and teased a finger under the edge of her panties.
"My, my, already wet." Wet was an understatement. Her panties were soaked. "Have you been thinking about this fantasy during work, Ms. Gomez?"
"There's nothing illegal about thinking, no matter where or when," she said, breathless.
"But surely there's some kind of moral quandary about such actions?"
She wiggled, spreading her legs farther. "My boss seems to be okay with it."
I slid my finger in and she threw her head in a gasp.
"I can't decide whether I want you to scream so Cheryl out there knows exactly what I'm doing to you or if I want you to hold it all in. Which do you think is hotter? Exhibitionism or restriction?"
Her hips bucked at the last word.
"Restriction. I thought it might. You are so focused on being in control, on following the plan. It's liberating, isn't it, to submit to someone else's will? Now, hush."
I brought her all the way with just my fingers and the invisible control of my words. As she came back to herself, I pulled my fingers to my mouth and licked her juices off, savoring each drop. Then I helped her tug down her skirt and held her in a sweet embrace.
"Was that all you called me up here for?" she finally asked.
I huffed a laugh. "Actually, that wasn't on my mind at all. Well, no more than usual, that is. It's hard not to think about pleasuring you, Mae. But I wanted to know, how do you feel about going to New York City with me next week? I have some meetings, but I can't stand the thought of being away from you that long. It'll be a few dinners, a few lunches, but other than that, I'll be all yours."
I was shocked when Mae shook her head. "I'm sorry," she said, "that sounds amazing but I can't do it next week."
In no universe had I expected a no. "Why not?"
Mae stiffened in my arms and stepped away. "I have some personal issues to see to."
"Like what?"
"None of your business," she snapped, and I blinked in astonishment.
"Mae, what is it you're not telling me? Are you afraid of planes? We can take a train."
"It's not that. I have some appointments next week."
I was getting frustrated. "Reschedule them."
Mae's spine was steel now, and she leveled me with the angriest look I'd ever received from her. "You are not my boss, Matt Dahl."
"Well, technically I am," I spit back, my blood pressure rising.
"Well technically, you're being an ass." She grabbed at her purse and yanked it off my desk, but she'd missed one handle and it spilled papers on the floor. I stooped to help her pick them up as she said, "I don't deny there's something going on between us, but that doesn't give you any right to order me about."
Her tirade went on, but I had frozen. The paper I held was a receipt for a doctor. For an obstetrician. With a note about an ultrasound that was scheduled the next week. My brain logged all the details I was too stunned to process at the moment. Suddenly, her voice went silent and I looked into her wide eyes.
"Mae, are you pregnant?"
Mae
“I... I was going to tell you.” I stammered, tears already forming in my eyes. I was, too. I had even picked up a stupid invitation at the drug store when getting the iron I was told I needed. I filled it out as if it were a party, only it was to the ultrasound. It wasn’t the big ultrasound, and it was unlikely they’d be able to tell the gender, but they had offered an early peek and I jumped. Who wouldn’t want a chance to see their baby growing inside them?
Not that my intentions, or even my actions, mattered now. He was already livid, his eyes holding contempt I’d not thought him capable of.
“When?” He took three steps forward, stopping when his eyes met mine. “When were you going to tell me?” His anger was just as palpable, but his voice lowered slightly. He must have seen the fear in them and misinterpreted them as fear of him. He said I would always be safe with him, and I knew it to be true, physically. My fear was that I messed up so royally that there was nothing that could fix this. I was officially Humpty Dumpty.
“As soon as I got the courage.” Tears were now flowing. I wanted to be strong. To take the consequences for my actions with dignity. But I couldn’t hold it together long enough to do so.
“The courage. The fucking courage.” And his anger was front and center again. “This says you’re at fourteen weeks’ gestation.” He waved the paper in front of me. “That means…” He raked his hands through his hair, taking a step back until he was leaning against his desk. “Fuck… you were pregnant when you started moving here.”
“Yes,” I squeaked out. How I was still standing was beyond me. I wanted to curl up into a ball and cry. My knees were all for that plan, struggling to keep me upright.
“And yet you are just telling me now.” He closed his eyes, inhaling and exhaling deeply. I did this to him. I took the strong, confident, sexy man and turned him into a man so upset he needed to follow school boy strategies for cooling down. I was an asshat.
“I was scared.” It was an accurate, yet unacceptable, excuse by anyone’s measure.
“Scared of what?” He opened his eye, watching my reaction to his question. “The truth?”
“Scared of losing you.” That I had anyway went unspoken.
“Turns out that was a good thing to be scared of since that is exactly what you got.” He strode around his desk, taking a seat behind it. His posture telling me, we were done. The conversation and the relationship both over.
“You don’t mean that.” My voice quivered, knowing very well that he meant it with all that he was.
“I don’t mean that?” He shook his head at the insanity of my words. “Mae, you of all people should know I say exactly what I mean. That may be hard for you to grasp considering the way you tuck away key information from the people it matters most to.”
“I deserve that.” And so much more.
“Yes, Mae. Yes, you do.” He no longer was looking at me and instead began to work on whatever he was doing when I walked in. I stood still, refusing to leave even though that was his intention. I could wait him out. I had to. This was important. He was important. Even if I didn’t treat him as such. Finally he caved and began to speak again.
“How long did you think you could hide this from me? Did you think I wouldn’t notice your belly swelling with your child. My child?”
The hurt in his eyes crushed me. He had never once treated me as anything less than important and I had treated him like garbage. His hurt was thrown at him, by me. This wasn’t a fight where we were both kind of wrong. This was one hundred percent my fault. And yet when he said “my child,” my heart allowed in a bit of hope.
“You want the baby?”
“It doesn’t look like I have a choice. Last I checked you took that away from me by waiting until you were out of the first trimester before so kindly dropping a pa
per so I could discover you were pregnant.”
No. No. No. No. No. He couldn’t be saying what I thought he was saying. Not Matt. Not the one I know.
“You don’t mean. You wouldn’t...” I couldn’t even bring myself to say the words.
“You have no idea what I would or wouldn’t and you never will because you hid this from me.” I could no longer see his face beneath my tears. Tears I earned in the worst way possible. “Hid my child from me. A child I had no decision in bringing into this world.”
“You were there when I got pregnant.” Because lashing out was going to make things better. I wanted to kick myself the moment they left my mouth.
“And I used a condom. How do I know you didn’t plan this?”
“Get real, jackass.” I allowed hostility to take over my sorrow. Not because it was legit, because we both knew he didn’t think for a second I planned a baby with a one night stand. I held onto the anger because if I didn’t I was going to collapse on the floor, incapable of doing normal things like standing and walking. “It was your condom and you were the one who put it on.”
Something crossed his eyes as I mentioned him putting it on, but I couldn’t stop to decipher it, for if I stopped, I was going to break down. Instead I acted like any rational woman would—I stormed out. I was halfway down the hall when I remembered the invitation and opened my purse to fish it out. I could leave it with his secretary and let him decide what he wanted to do. He wouldn’t come, but I needed to offer.
It wasn’t there. If that wasn’t a sign, I didn’t know what was.
Matt
I knew I was being a jackass, but when I realized what those papers meant, how long Mae had been keeping this from me, well, saying I lost my cool is a bit of an understatement. My brain had whited out. I never thought I would have kids. I didn’t want to replicate my biological parents' mistakes, and I knew I wasn't good enough to emulate Ms. Gracie. I could barely figure out how to manage a healthy relationship with Mae, and suddenly I had to consider a child?
But Mae, Mae was everything right in the world.
Now that the thought was planted in my brain, I could picture a future with Mae and our child. Mae swinging a little girl around in the air on a warm summer day, both of them in sundresses. Mae kissing a little boy's boo boo before sending him off to keep playing. I tried to picture myself in more of an active role, but every image I saw was of Mae with me hovering in the background. But if I was to be a father, I wanted more than that. I didn't have an example of what a dad should look like, but I had many examples of what one shouldn't. That was a starting point, right?
But had I lost that chance? I could barely remember the words I had said to Mae, but I knew that I had fucked up. And I had let her go. Night after night, I had sworn to myself that I would never do that. Especially after the mess I'd been those two months without her, before I even really knew her. And then the first hard crunch hit our relationship and what did I do? I let her go.
I wished I had someone to turn to, to talk to. But since Gracie died, Mae was the only one I trusted. And yes, I was hurt, and yes, I felt betrayed. But it didn’t change the fact that I wanted her. That I wanted whatever future I could have with her. If that meant me and Mae against the world, okay. But if it meant me and Mae and a baseball team's worth of kids? Well, I wanted that. Whatever made her happy.
Damn my temper.
Now that I had a minute to cool down, regret and fear really started to seep in. I had thought that my fear of losing her had faded after the first week of clutching her tightly to me every night, afraid she would ghost away in the dark and I would never see her again. But this was worse. I'd seen her leave. I made her leave. I knew exactly why she left, and I was the cause. She'd walked out of my office and possibly my life in broad daylight, and that was worse.
I picked up my phone and called her. I called her seven times before I gave up, each call going straight to voice mail.
"Cheryl?" I called on the intercom. "Can you ask Francine to send Mae back up? It's urgent."
"Right away, Mr. Dahl."
I bent my head and studied the floor while I waited. I'd never noticed there were spots of green in the carpet fibers. Finally, the intercom buzzed and I answered it. "Yes?"
"I'm sorry, Mr. Dahl, but it appears Ms. Gomez has had a family emergency and she's taken the rest of the day off. Her manager said she's not certain how long she'll be out of work."
I held back the curses driven by my absolute inability to act. Wait, no... "Thank you, Cheryl." I cut the intercom. I would go to her house. I would beg her to take me back. No, I would beg her to forgive me. I'd been such an ass. I wasn't thinking. My fears, fears I thought I had long conquered had risen up and bit me in the ass. But no more. I circled back to my chair to grab my coat and noticed an envelope on the floor. I snatched it up, a nervous energy rattling my bones.
It was an invitation with details for an ultrasound. Monday. Ten AM. She was going to tell me. Just in her own way, and I fucked it all up. I was man enough to know it was my mess to clean up even if I wasn’t the catalyst. Although, shit. I was, wasn’t I? I was the one who fell asleep before being responsible with my fucking condom.
I desperately wanted to go to her, to make things right. Beg her to forgive me for even implying I might consider something so horrible. But she was ignoring my calls. She'd left work she was so upset. And as determined as I was, I was in no frame of mind to actually make a coherent apology. A new plan began to form in my head and I sat down to plot it out.
Mae
“Ms. Gomez, I need you to fill out and verify all of the information is current and sign here and here. I will also need to make a copy of your insurance card and driver’s license.” I nodded and took the clipboard, knowing the drill. Every flipping time I came, they did the same thing. Something about a new policy. I tried to argue that being pregnant I would be here a lot over the next few months, but they never budged. Probably for the best I had the busy work because it might keep my mind off my insanely full bladder. Might being the operative word.
I sat in the waiting area, pretending to make sure the information was correct and initialing everywhere required before scanning the room. There were people of all ages, but the pregnant ones were easiest to pick out. Not only were they the only ones smiling, because let’s be honest they only time you want a doctor up in your business is because you’re pregnant, but they also came in pairs. All of them except me.
I was alone. I deserved it. I more than deserved it. Didn’t make it feel any better.
I brought the clipboard up to the desk, where the receptionist pointed to line blank line on page four. The one I had intentionally left blank every time. This receptionist, unlike the others, wasn’t kind enough to let the transgression slide.
“You need to fill in all of the information. Father’s name?” I’d seen on Pinterest where new moms sent gifts to their OB’s office as a thank you. It was always something cute and practical. I swore right then and there if I succumbed to the fade, the receptionist in front of me, Barb according to her tag, was not going to be included.
“Montgomery Dahl.”
I turned to the voice that I’d missed more than the coffee I gave up for my baby. He. Was. Here.
Throwing all sense of decorum to the side, I flung myself into his arms, whispering over and over again that I was sorry, and he doing the same. Weren’t we a pair.
“Gertrude. Gertrude Gomez.” My name was being called from the side door. It was my turn and seeing my baby was the only thing that had the ability to pull me from his arms.
“That’s me. I need to go. Please come with me.” I still hadn’t let him go, waiting for his answer as if it were my next breath.
“You’re never getting rid of me again,” he vowed in my ear before turning me in the direction of the voice, grabbing my hand as I made my way there.
The ultrasound was not at all like they had in the movies. I saw nothing of what she said, though s
he said we lucked out, and she was positioned just right so there was no question about her gender. My little peanut was basically a blob from what I could see. That didn’t make it any less magical. She was healthy. I was going to have a girl, and everything looked perfect so far. They still wanted me in for the twenty week measurement scan, but I knew that before I even walked in. Matt needed a bit more reassurance. The smile he wore from the moment the tech said girl, never vanished, even as we made our way out of the office.
Matt drove us home, insisting I shouldn’t be taking a bus in my condition. Not that I argued. I wanted to be with him. The weekend apart was torture. Sheer fucking torture.
“How did you know?” I asked as we rode the elevator up to his place.
“Your invite was under my desk.” Of course it was.
“It was corny, wasn’t it?” It had a baby on it, one holding a congratulations sign and where it said shower, I added, “with me after our baby’s first ultrasound.” At the time, I didn’t know the goop they used meant the shower was a necessity and not a sexy detour.
“It was perfect.” He leaned in, kissing me chastely. Both of us knew if we allowed it to be more, the conversation we needed to have would be brushed aside for a more carnal discussion. “I tried to call you.”
“My phone broke when my purse dropped.” If I’d known he would call, that bad boy would’ve been replaced already. “I need to get a new one.”
“So you weren’t ignoring me.”
I slid my arms around his waist, settling my head on his chest. “How can you ask a woman if she was ignoring the man she loved? That’s not even possible, is it?” I’d never said those words to a man before, and I had planned to hold them in until the timing was better, but they bubbled up and poured out. No more secrets, not even the good kind.
“You love me.” His sing-song parroting of my words had my heart over flowing. This was the Matt I knew and loved. I hadn’t broken that by my foolishness.