by Cranford, B.
He’d been my husband for so long, in my life for so long, that it had seemed natural to get mad, fight, move on, and accept the change. I hadn’t known how big of a change it would end up being.
“I’ll never do that again.” I spoke to the empty room, my voice wavering but somehow still strong, as I made a promise to myself.
Never again would I do something I didn’t expressly want to do just because someone expected me to do it. I would compromise, and I would talk things through with people, but I wouldn’t just blindly go along with something.
That wasn’t the person I wanted to be.
* * *
Seeing Lucas’ name flash on my screen didn’t just make me smile. It also made my insides feel full of wiggly worms. Obviously, something about him had caused a physical reaction from the first day I met him, but every time we talked—in person, over the phone, via email—it changed. Deepened. Which was exactly why I was trying to keep our contact light and infrequent.
Except I was failing on that front, because even though we’d only talked three times before I left Sydney, we’d emailed and video-called way more than that in the six days since then. Like, daily.
Or maybe even more than once daily? Yikes.
Pushing away the runaway thoughts of his effect on me, I took a quick look in the small mirror over the desk in my hotel room. I had to make sure I looked good enough to accept a video call, after all. Swiping the screen at the last second—he was for sure wondering if I was ever going to answer—I tried and failed to stifle a dreamy sigh when his smiling face appeared on my screen.
“There you are.” His voice was a welcome intrusion on my otherwise quiet room. After spending the day with a bunch of people I didn’t know on a boat trip, I’d enjoyed being on my own, stretched out on my bed. For all of five minutes, until I thought about Lucas and how much I missed him.
Which was stupid, considering that I’d been the one to leave him, and Melbourne, behind to continue my trip.
“Hey, I can’t believe I forgot to ask this the other day, but how were the dolphins? I blame you for distracting me.”
Laughing, I watched as he lay back on his couch in a move that was becoming familiar. Not that that had anything to do with the dolphins. “Me distract you? You’re the one sitting there shirtless . . . again. Dolphins were good. I was scared at first, but after a while, I got brave and touched one.”
“And?”
“Not like I expected.” I shrugged. “I didn’t love touching her, but I did get to throw some rings to her and she brought them back on her nose. I wouldn’t do it again, the whole experience, but I don’t regret it either.” I thought about my revelation in the changing room, the decision I’d made about myself and what I was willing to accept and felt a frisson of pride. “Do you think that I’m weird? I know some people are dolphin crazy.”
“I don’t think it’s weird. You’d have a hard time convincing me that anything you did was weird.”
I believed him. Even though I could think of a hundred and fifty things that would undoubtedly make anyone think I was strange, I got the sense that he’d just accept it.
Accept me. Now there was a novel thought after the way Mason had rejected me.
“Normally, I’d try to convince you, but tonight I’m too tired. How was your day?” I moved away from the desk where my phone had been charging, snagging another quick look in the mirror, then sat on the bed. It took me until I’d propped the pillows behind me and settled in with my legs outstretched to realize that Lucas hadn’t answered me. “Luc? Everything okay?”
He looked okay—maybe a little tight around the eyes, but nothing serious—and yet remained silent. Waving my hand in front of the screen to try and get his attention, I said, “Um, you do know that having a conversation usually works better when both people participate, right?”
“What? Yeah, nah, sorry.” Blinking rapidly, his face relaxed. “I got hit on today.”
“Excuse me?” I arched my eyebrow playfully.
“A client. Hit on me.”
“Can’t say I blame her, though I’m curious what your response was.” And I was. Truly curious. Part of me wanted to tell him he’d better have told her to back off. But the other part knew that, despite the connection—the zing—we shared, I’d left for my trip and we’d made no real promises to one another. “Did you charm her like you charmed me?”
Lucas’ head tilted, like he was trying to figure me out. Did he wonder what I was thinking? Did he want me to show jealously? Because I could admit I was jealous—even though I’d left him in Melbourne, it didn’t mean I didn’t want to smack a bitch for daring to look at the man I’d kind of started to consider mine.
A laugh bubbled. I was being a little ridiculous, but I couldn’t find it in myself to care. And when I catalogued all the interactions I’d had with Lucas, thought about all the things he’d said and done to show me that I was the one he wanted, I came to a conclusion.
He was mine. And I would show my jealously.
I’d earned a right to it.
Biting my lip and narrowing my eyes, I didn’t wait for his answer to my question. “I think you did charm her—even if you didn’t mean to. And I bet she looked at you and thought she was the luckiest girl in the world to have your attention.”
Lucas made a throaty sound but didn’t interrupt.
“But I really hope you told her you weren’t interested. That you told her you had someone already.” I brought a hand to my hair, wanting to draw his attention there, knowing how much he loved my curls—the curls that had been the bane of my life for as long as I could remember, even though I’d come to love them more and more over the years. I’d be lying if I said the fact that he enjoyed them so much didn’t also impact the way I thought about them. “Someone who would not be amused that some chick is hitting on her man.”
A sliver of awkwardness, of embarrassment, coursed through me. Was it too much? Had I gone too far? It wasn’t like we’d talked about this. In the conversations we’d had—especially in the ones we’d had before I’d left for Sydney—we’d never talked about being together. Officially.
God, I sound like a high schooler.
We hadn’t made plans, because I hadn’t wanted us to.
I watched as Lucas’ face broke into a smile that said he heard what I was saying and liked it, then clear of all emotion. It was bizarre, seeing the sudden change, the swift wipe of feeling from him.
“Should I have told her to back off?” The question was tentatively asked and still somehow as sharp as a knife. It cut me to hear his hesitation, though I was aware that I deserved it. “We never talked about it. You said—you acted like you weren’t interested in”—he waved his free hand around—“whatever this thing is.”
“I never said I wasn’t interested.”
“Just that you didn’t want to stay.”
“I couldn’t stay, there’s a difference,” I countered, wondering if I was fighting a losing battle. I had left in a wave of uncertainty, that couldn’t exactly be denied.
Shaking his head, he asked again, “Should I have?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
“Why? Because I’m yours?”
“Yes.”
He nodded; a thoughtful smile slowly forming on his face. “Even though you’re there and I’m here.”
“Even though.”
He didn’t say anything for another minute, the silence growing and stretching between us. Then, in a rough voice, he spoke. “Why now? It’s been, what, four weeks? Something must’ve changed.”
Squeezing my eyes shut, I thought about the best way to answer his question and realized I didn’t have an answer. It wasn’t like I’d planned this conversation—it had crept up on me, this feeling of possession that I wasn’t completely comfortable with.
“You’re the one, Bianca. I didn’t realize it at first, but now I know, I can’t stop thinking about it. Our future. Our forever.”
I jolted at the whisper
of Mason in my head, something I thankfully hadn’t encountered as much while I’d been traveling. Except here he was, reminding me of my failed past. My fractured marriage, the settlement of which might have afforded me the chance to take this trip but was also the very same reason I needed to take it in the first place.
“Bianca, you still with me?”
I forced my attention back to the present and nodded. “I don’t know what’s changed. I don’t know if anything has.”
* * *
I was still trying to figure out the answer to Lucas’ question when my phone rang the next morning. The dinging melody reached me through a dream-addled sleep, wispy versions of Lucas asking me if he was mine and what had changed and why over and over fading into ever more indifferent versions of Mason telling me it was my fault our marriage ended.
“Ashton?” I made sure the camera was angled on my face because I didn’t want to give her the standard forehead view that my parents in particular thought equaled a successful video call. “It’s so early.”
“I know, I’m sorry. But I haven’t heard from you in agessssss.”
“And you thought calling me at”—I tapped the screen to see the clock—“six-thirty in the morning was a good way to remedy that?”
“Well, yeah. I waited as long as I could.”
“I hope that means you have super-duper exciting news, which justifies this call.” I raised my eyebrow and gave her a look. One that said I wasn’t amused, even if I was happy to see the familiar face of my best friend.
“I’m pregnant?”
“Oh my god!” I sat up quickly, making sure to keep a tight grip on the sheets and my modesty. We might be besties and have shared space through college, but that didn’t mean I wanted her to see my boobs. “Really?”
Ashton’s face reflected my excitement. “Yes. I mean, I’m pretty sure. I haven’t told anyone else yet, and I haven’t actually taken the test, but . . .”
“But you know.”
“But I know.” She smiled, wide and happy and settled. “Kennedy’s going to be a big sister. And you’re going to be an aunty again.”
“Ash, this is amazing. Like, amazing-amazing. I can’t—oh, why am I so far away again?” My excitement fizzled a little as I thought about the last time I’d heard from my best friend that she was having a baby. I’d still been in South Africa and she had used a sperm donor—her husband, Andrew, not yet back in her life.
“At least this time I know you’ll be back sooner rather than later.” Ash’s words sent a ripple of uneasiness through me. Of course, I’d be back soon. And if not soon, then soon-ish. Last time, I hadn’t yet worked up the courage to tell her that Mason and I had split; she’d thought it was business as usual and that I’d be overseas for the foreseeable future. This time . . . well, this time I might not have had an official end date on my trip, but I was only visiting Australia. I wasn’t living with my husband, who had a job that required he stay in a foreign country.
“I feel like it’s going to be a boy this time. A mini-Andrew.” Ashton’s words cut through my thoughts and before I could respond, she was talking again—a run-on of words in typical, rambling Ashton style. “Can you just imagine it? A little baby boy who looks like my handsome husband and who’ll be able to play with Kennedy. I’m going to find out, of course, and then I’ll be able to plan, but I don’t think I’ll saddle him with Andrew’s cumbersome name, although having a fourth in the family might be kind of fun. Andrew William Duncan the fourth is very distinguished, but a total mouthful, right? Anyway, I couldn’t wait to tell someone and you know my brothers will ask a ton of questions and expect me to have taken the tests already, but I knew you’d be, like, happy for me and accept that I just knew. Not that you can tell them I told you first, just play ignorant, that’s my plan.”
Laughing when she finally closed her mouth and took a couple of long breaths in, I nodded. “Okay, settle down. You’ll get light-headed and faint if you say that many words in a row again.”
She rolled her eyes at me, but I knew she took it for the joke it was. Nonetheless, I kept talking because girl seriously needed to catch her breath and I had things to say myself. “I’m so happy for you, Ash. I’m not feeling the whole ‘the fourth’ thing, but we have a few months yet. We can figure it out.” The ripple of uneasiness grew, a pit in my stomach that made me feel almost sick.
I just couldn’t figure out why.
An image of Lucas intruded on my thoughts and the sick feeling morphed into something else. Longing, our zing and a wave of happiness. I thought about our tryst in the Botanic Gardens, the lack of protection, and what it would be like if Ashton and I were in reverse positions.
Me telling her I was pregnant.
“You okay, B?”
I bit my lip, wondering if I should share what I was thinking. I mean, if not Ashton—my best friend—who else would I share it with? Then again, I didn’t want to rain on her parade, steal her moment, make it about me.
“Yo, I can tell you’re distracted, and I want to know why.” Despite the relative bubbliness of her voice—she rarely sounded anything other than happy these days—I could tell she was serious.
Still . . . “It’s nothing. Let’s talk about Kennedy being a big sister and the fact that I can get you little Australian baby things while I’m here. Maybe they make kangaroo pouches.” Blue eyes narrowed at me. She didn’t even have to say anything, and there I was, spilling my guts. “We had unprotected sex and you know I don’t take birth control anymore.”
“We being you and Lucas, the hot Aussie, right?”
I gave her a Look. With a capital L. “Yes, of course it was Lucas. What the hell, Ash?”
“Just making sure! Keep going.”
“I went to get the morning-after pill, naturally.”
“Naturally.”
“But . . .” I trailed off, drawing in a deep breath and hauling my shoulders back. Sitting up straight, checking once again that the covers covered my nakedness. “What if?”
“What if what?”
“Nothing. It’s not important.” I shook my head, annoyed at my stupid brain for conjuring memories of that mistake in the garden, and at myself for getting carried away all because my best friend was having another baby. “You are important, though. You and my soon-to-be nephew.”
“You know if you ever want to talk, I’m here for you.”
“Duh, of course. Now, tell me more about this baby.”
* * *
It took me less that ten minutes after hanging up with Ashton to decide that I needed to reach out to Lucas. I was pissed at myself for how I’d left things with him the night before—up in the air, with me saying one thing, then another, until finally, I just redirected the conversation without a resolution.
Oh yeah, you heard me. Instead of pulling on my big girl panties and talking to Lucas, I freaked out and started talking about the things I’d seen on my trip—some of which I’d already told him. Smooth. And because he’s a good guy, he let me.
Mason wouldn’t have let me. Not that I was comparing the two.
And honestly, I wouldn’t have blamed Mason. I mean, I could and did blame him for a lot of things—all the things that went wrong, more or less—but if he’d forced my hand the way Lucas didn’t, well, then he’d have had a right.
I tried to think logically about what to say, and about the best way to contact Lucas. I considered calling him again, but I was worried my inner fraidy-cat would reappear and I wouldn’t say what needed to be said. So, with that in mind, I sent a text.
Bianca: I’m sorry about last night.
Admittedly, it wasn’t the most brilliant opening salvo ever, but it was a start. It was an apology and it opened the door to communication and that was a good thing. The best thing.
The thing I’d been aiming for.
What I’m trying to say is: I did what I set out to do. And Lucas replied almost instantaneously, which meant that I could keep my momentum up.
Lucas: You don’t have anything to be sorry about.
I sighed the moment I read his reply, because he was letting me off the hook. Again. Just like he had when he’d let me change the subject the night before.
I fought with my instinct to just say, “Okay, cool, thanks” and tried to think of an appropriate response.
Bianca: I think we both know I do.
Bianca: I know I’m giving you mixed messages.
Bianca: I’m not meaning to.
I looked at the little blue box that held my last message and nodded. Even though it was a stupid excuse—a tired one, given all the times people have hurt others by basically saying it was unintentional and an accident—it was also true. I really didn’t want to mess around with him.
I knew he was interested in more. Hell, I knew I was interested in more, timing be damned. But that didn’t mean I wanted to pursue it; I still had my baggage (metaphorical baggage, though you’ll perhaps be pleased to know I also still had my physical baggage. No lost luggage here. #ExpertTraveler) and was yet to fully unpack it.
The ding of Lucas’ reply distracted me from thinking about my poorly packed, in-dire-need-of-unpacking baggage. It also made me smile.
Lucas: Alexa, play “Hard to Say I’m Sorry.”
Bianca: You’re funny.
Lucas: And you’re not giving me mixed messages.
Lucas: Okay, that’s not true. You are. But it’s fine. We’re fine.
Having only barely avoided doubling up on telling him that saying I wasn’t sending mixed messages was a big, fat lie, I waited a moment to see if he added anything to his claim of being “fine.” If he didn’t send another message, then I was most definitely going to be asking him to explain what “fine” meant to him.
Perhaps I shouldn’t admit it, but I’ve more than once used that word (heretofore known as the F word) as a blow off when I was, in fact, the complete opposite. As in, the other F word: Fucking pissed.