by Xavier Neal
“Precisely.”
I lightly giggle under my breath, knock twice on his door, and let myself in.
Gideon lowers the tablet he had been scolding into and lets his gaze grab the areas of my body it’s obvious his hands want to. Once I’ve shut the door behind me, I saunter over to the desk, loving the way he licks his lips in hunger.
“Hey you.” My butt braces itself against the edge of the furniture directly beside him. “Busy yelling or yelling busy?”
His glower is immediate. “You know that’s not the saying.”
“It is when it comes to you.”
He rolls his eyes and relinquishes the hold on the device. “Are you just here to taunt me? Verbally and…” Gideon steals another glance at my long, bare legs. “Physically.”
A sly smirk spreads across my face. “I have no idea what you’re talking about…”
“Is that so?” He turns in his leather chair to face me. “You have no recollection of the ‘date’ you made me keep this evening? Of the date that’s stopping me from sending Kristen home early, bending you over my desk, and fucking you until security can hear your screams?”
I have to insert my index finger between my teeth to keep from moaning.
“Surely you remember since you snuck by before you went into work to drop me off an ice latte with a love note that was written in…chalk…?”
“It was chalk.”
“Which, I gotta know why the fuck do you have chalk?”
“Couple’s exercise at the shelter.”
“Helping them keep score over whose turn it is to do which chore at home?” He chuckles at his own joke. “By the way, it’s always time for you to do dishes.”
“Excuse you. This is not a 1930’s throwback sitcom. Men can cook and clean, too.”
“Yeah, and as the man who has cooked and cleaned for the past fifteen years of our relationship, I’m saying you can occasionally do more than rinse out your cereal bowls.”
“Hey! That’s an improvement.”
“It is,” he swiftly agrees. “Kinda proud.”
We laugh together at how ridiculous we sound and engage in a short, sweet kiss.
Afterwards, he states, “Thank you for the coffee by the way. It was really thoughtful. I would’ve sent a thank you text, but Mick pulled me into an impromptu meeting that ran dead into another. The day just got backlogged and before I realized it, you were knocking on my door.”
“Everything okay?” I cautiously question.
Gideon gives my leg a gentle graze. “Not exactly. Looks like I may be working through the weekend.”
“What else is new?”
He tries to hide his annoyance over the fact. “At the office instead of from home.”
“What’s going on?”
His mouth twitches in preparation of explaining yet abruptly stops. “Let’s talk about it tomorrow night.”
“OG-”
“Tomorrow night, Lennox,” he firmly says. “You’ve got an interview in the morning. That’s the only thing you need to be worried and focused on.”
I smile sweetly at the sentiment.
There’s really no need to worry. I either get it or I don’t. I either go back to full-time counseling or continuing to help people find love. Okay, hoping I’m helping people find love and not just killing their dating spirit, like I did Gideon’s.
“Wanna practice some of the tougher questions over dinner?”
“First of all, who would that really be fun for?”
He cracks a smile.
“Second of all, no, because you already have dinner plans.”
“I’m not staying through an entire meal.”
“OG-”
“No. I’m meeting this mystery woman, apologizing for wasting her gas, hell, maybe I’ll even offer to reimburse her for it-”
“That borderlines instilling feelings of prostitution.”
“Fair point.” He nods. “Then just apologizing and leaving her money for her to enjoy a cocktail.”
“That’s worse not better.”
His frustration flares. “Fuck. Whatever. I’ll figure it out on the ride over. Regardless, I’m not staying. I’m saying sorry, and then coming home to my beautiful, taco loving girlfriend who is going to have to deal with eating Chinese tonight because we have fancy taco dinner plans tomorrow. You know my policy on back-to-back taco meals.”
“Yes, and you know my love for breaking that policy.”
More snickers are exchanged, and he keeps his smile bright. “And you know my love for you…”
Breathing suddenly becomes impossible.
Oh shit, should I say it back?
Was that an “I love you” or something similar used to gauge the situation, like “I love spending time with you” bullshit? Why am I so bad at reading his cues but an expert on everyone else?
Gideon softens his gaze. “Were you just stopping by to make sure I was going on the non-date, date or was there something else?”
Seeing the perfect opportunity for the announcement, I take it. “Oh, you’re going on the date. And it’s going to be a date, date because it’s with me.”
A dumbfounded expression instantaneously appears.
“I’m date number six.”
His response doesn’t change.
“I’m L, the bi-racial life coach, who loves golf.”
“You hate golf.”
“I love put-put, which is a golf affiliate.”
“It isn’t.”
“It is.”
“There’s no professional put-put team.”
My hand flies into the air to hush him. “Soy yo. I spun the truth as best as I could to keep it a secret, but it’s me.” I give him a small shrug. “I’ve kinda been planning it to be from the beginning.”
The bewildered stare returns.
“Carly thought it would be a good way to test the idea of us out…you know if you didn’t find a match before then.”
His jaw cracks.
“This is basically our first official date, so I couldn’t let you fucking cancel.”
My choice to cuss causes him to chuckle. “What do you have in mind?”
“Well-”
“Can’t Touch This” starts blaring throughout the room alerting me that I’ve got a phone call requesting my attention.
I dig in the purse dangling from my shoulder, silently cursing that it’s flooded with junk. This is why I prefer pants or shorts with pockets. I don’t have to play hide and seek with my cell, a game that it is currently winning.
Once I finally find it, I see Jaye’s name and picture flash on my screen, which instills an unusual feeling of dread.
Gideon immediately notices. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know,” I promptly reply. “Jaye’s calling, and she never calls. She abides by simply policy to text me first unless it’s an emergency.” He barely has time to nod his understanding before I’m rushing to answer. “Hello?”
She groans loudly into the device. “Help. Me.”
“What?! What do you need?!”
“Labor,” Jaye grumbles again. “Gone into labor…”
“What!?!”
“Why are you shouting?” Gideon questions. “Is she okay?”
“Need,” there’s another pause proceeded by more unhappy groaning, “a ride.”
Instead of asking the million questions racing through my mind, I instantly agree, “On it. We’re on our way! We’ll be there ASAP.”
“Where are we going?” Gideon cautiously asks.
“To take Jaye to the hospital.”
“Why?”
“She’s in labor.”
His eyes widen, but he quickly breaks free from the shock to collect his essentials.
After speeding across town, saying a silent thank you prayer that Gideon drove his SUV to work today, and relocating my very miserable best friend from her empty house to a bustling hospital, I have managed to gather one very important thing.
The r
un up to giving birth is a nightmare.
Jaye shifts around in the bed that looks more like a trap she’s stuck in than a place of comfort. “Why is this baby in such a rush to get out of me?!”
“Isn’t that a good thing?” Gideon carelessly questions.
Her stare becomes Samurai sword sharp.
“Don’t poke the bear, OG,” I quiet whisper.
“I am not a bear!” Jaye cries before roaring in pain.
That sound would imply otherwise.
While she has been, “does anyone know a good preacher” scary during this pregnancy, today, due to the situation at hand, she has reached the “may God have mercy on all our souls” level of terrifying. Turns out the worst way to go into labor is when you’re home alone with your beloved father on duty, your mother at the movies with your daughter, and your husband nowhere to be found. Thankfully, I answered when she called, otherwise there would’ve been a chance she would’ve been brought here in an Uber.
“Breathe,” my encouragement receives her scowl.
“Don’t taunt her….”
Gideon and I exchange glares again.
Neither of us are comfortable in this situation. Him even less than me. I haven’t ever been around someone when they were in labor. I’ve always been lucky enough to where I didn’t have to show up until I got the magical “You’re an Aunt” phone call. Had I been forced to do this in the past, pretty sure I would’ve opted for the five-year IUD rather than the three year one in the arm.
A soft sob out of my best female friend breaks our standoff. “I don’t wanna do this alone.”
I spring to my feet and over to her bedside. Taking her hand in my mine, I swear, “You’re not alone, Jaye. Estoy aquí. Gideon’s here. We will not leave you until your husband gets here or one of the nurses gets physical and drags us out.”
Gideon crosses over to join her other side. “And good luck to the one that tries that method. May not be a fullback any more, but I’m still built like one.”
Deliciously so.
My bottom lip slips between my teeth as sexual thoughts start to trample their way to the front of my mind.
He catches on and a similar, sly smirk slides onto his expression.
Unfortunately, our flirting only frustrates Jaye further. “Ugh. Would you stop fucking flirting while I’m waiting for a child to come out of my vagina?!”
The word vagina makes my boyfriend squeamish.
God, I can’t believe I get to call him that.
“Just so you both know, flirting leads to kissing, kissing leads to sex, sex leads to this pain, misery, and murder if my husband doesn’t answer his goddamn phone!”
Politely, I volunteer, “I’ll try him again.”
“Why don’t I try him while you wait with her?”
Gideon’s swift suggestion causes me to sneer.
She may be my best friend, but she’s clearly been taken over by an alien host right now, and I’m not sure I’ll survive on my own.
All of a sudden, Nurse Annabelle cheerfully walks into the room. “How are things in here?”
“Hell.” Jaye unleashes another deep groan of discomfort. “God, the contractions are getting worse.”
The less than five-foot, dark haired nurse, who looks more like she should work in Santa’s Workshop than the hospital, approaches the foot of the bed to inspect the situation. However, her choice in not saying anything sends panic through my system almost as instantly as it does Jaye’s.
“Everything okay?” My best friend’s voice does its best not to shake.
Nurse Annabelle keeps her practiced, plastered polite demeanor. “I’m gonna go ahead and give Dr. Raymond a phone call to come down here. Okay?”
Jaye’s eyes enlarge, and the tears in them are caught by the shitty lighting. “Okay…”
The woman makes her exit as does Gideon, more determined than before to get a hold of Archer.
“That’s not good,” she confesses under her breath. “They only get the doctor when something is wrong.”
“Or…when you’re ready to deliver, right?”
Her chin trembles in fear, yet she nods through it. “Right…”
But then that’s still something that’s terribly wrong because what woman wants to deliver a baby without her husband present?
I give Jaye’s hand a loving squeeze.
She sniffles against her own volition and squeezes back. “Distract me, please.”
“Gladly.” My cheerful agreement gets us both to smile. “You know, I prefer the movie 9 Months to Knocked Up and not just because Hugh Grant was in ways like the English Brad Pitt of the ‘90s.”
A small smile creeps onto her expression.
“Not sure if it’s my favorite Hugh Grant movie though. It’s definitely up there. Hugh Grant was like chick flick catnip back then. He’s probably partially responsible for many women’s English accent obsession in this country. Did you ever watch Two Weeks Notice or Love Actually? It’s like come on. Who can resist that smile tied to the fancy way he talks?”
For the first time since we picked her up, she actually laughs. “Not sure I thought he was that cute.”
“Fine, but you agree. He’s a ‘90’s classic chick flick leading man.”
“He was definitely that…”
Our conversation, thankfully, gets interrupted by the man of the hour. Archer rushes over to the opposite side of the bed from me and embraces his wife tightly. “I’m here! I’m here!”
She melts into his arms and begins to bawl. “Where the hell have you been?”
“Was in a meeting,” he confesses, holding her tighter. “I’m so sorry, babe. So. So. Sorry.”
My eyes dart over to where Gideon is leaning against the wall beside the doorframe.
If we were to have kids, not that I’m in any kind of rush or need to have them pop out of my pussy, part of me fears this exact scenario. I would probably respond just like Jaye. I’d be livid. Sad. Emotional. I would question the same thing I used to about OG. Is work the most important thing in his life?
Archer pulls back to meet her gaze. “I wasn’t expecting you to go into labor for another couple of weeks, otherwise I would’ve had my phone right in front of me.”
Jaye nods as he brushes away the fallen tears.
He tosses me a look of gratitude. “Thank you for bringing her and for being here.”
“Of course.”
His eyes fall back to his wife. “Your mother knows, and she’s going to keep Rainne until we’re ready for her to come up to meet her little brother.”
There’s a small knock on the frame followed by Dr. Raymond entering the room. “Evening. You must be the father.”
“Archer,” he extends his hand towards male, “and I’m also the husband.”
“Good.” Dr. Raymond nods. “Seems you might be here just in time.”
“Delivery?” I hopefully question.
The dark-skinned bald male gives me a warm look. “That’s something I need to discuss with Jaye and Archer in private. All non-family members should now relocate to the waiting room.”
Hiding my disappointment over not receiving a response is difficult. “Oh…”
“We can do that,” Gideon interjects. “We can wait out there, if that’s what you guys want. Or we can go home and come back tomorrow or whenever.”
Jaye shoots me a pleading look. “Do you guys mind waiting? You were so incredible getting me here and waiting with me for Archer. I would love to introduce our son to his Godparents sooner rather than later.”
“Holy shit, we’re Godparents?!” I squeak.
“We were going to sit down and officially ask you two over dinner next week, but…” She spans her hand across her body.
“We’ll stay.” Gideon’s voice is firm, yet filled with awe.
“Thank you,” Archer states to me and then him.
I give Jaye a sweet kiss on the forehead and stroll around to link hands with Gideon.
We direct ourselves
to the practically vacant waiting room, choosing seats in the furthest corner. It doesn’t take long before shock over the situation shoves us both backwards in our chairs. While I thought the events leading up to our first date were a bit un-ideal, I never pictured it would unfold this…poorly.