by Nella Tyler
My words took her off guard because the smile on her face dropped immediately and she stared at me as though she couldn’t understand what I was saying.
“I love you, Lauren,” I continued. “You know you are the most important person in the world to me, right?”
She was starting to look more and more alarmed as I continued to speak. Her eyes lost their contented gleam and suspicion began to take its place. I hated seeing the uncertainty in her eyes, but it wasn’t as though I could make certain assurances.
I was saying goodbye. This was my way of telling her that, but it felt like something altogether different. It felt like a breakup, and that was the last thing I had intended to make it sound like.
“Lauren, I—”
Before I could say another word, she jumped up from the sofa and rushed into our bedroom. Alarmed, I ran after her, only to find her in the bathroom throwing up into the toilet. I had no idea if this was the illness she had been battling the last few days or if this was just a bad reaction to my words. Regardless, I knelt next to her and pulled her hair back while I rubbed her spine soothingly. After a while, she pulled back, but she refused to look at me.
“Are you all right?” I asked with concern.
“Give me a second,” she said and I nodded, thinking she wanted me to be quiet for a little while. I stayed by her side continuing to rub her back.
“No,” she said with effort. “I need you to give me a moment.”
Realizing she wanted to be left alone, I got up and walked back into the hall. I started pacing instinctively, but my thoughts were clouded and confused. When I had rehearsed my speech in my head, it had all been so clear. I wanted to tell her that enlisting was something I had to do, and I couldn’t bear to bring her with me and put her in danger. I wanted her to stay here, and we would find a way to make it work.
Somehow those words didn’t seem enough, though. They seemed like a weak attempt to make excuses for why I was running away so abruptly. I kept pacing as my mind travelled to the moment years ago when Braden had told me he had enlisted in the military.
“Are you serious?” I had demanded. “You could die over there!”
He had smiled seriously and nodded. “I’m not going to lie – it’s a possibility. But this is just something I have to do.”
“Why?” I had asked.
“Because every man has a duty in life,” Braden had replied. “We are all born to fulfill some purpose. Sometimes that purpose is becoming husbands or fathers, sometimes that purpose is looking after our parents, and sometimes that purpose is fighting for your country and protecting your people.”
“Have you told Mom and Dad?” I had asked.
“I told them downstairs a little while ago,” he had nodded.
“And?”
“Dad was proud, Mom was…well, she’ll come around,” Braden had smiled in that deeply knowing way of his.
“She’ll be scared.”
“I know,” he had replied. “And trust me, I took that into consideration. I didn’t just make this decision on a whim, Chase. I really thought about it. I’ve been thinking about it for a year now. I was old enough to enlist last year, but I wanted to make sure it was the right decision. Now, I’m certain of it.”
I had been only fourteen at the time, but even my fourteen-year-old self had registered what a huge and noble thing it was that Braden was doing. He was a hero, even if he didn’t totally believe it yet. I had been scared, just like my mother, but I was proud, too, and in the end, that pride had outweighed the fear.
“You’ll come back, right?” I had asked him.
“Of course I’ll come back,” Braden had nodded. “Any time I get leave, I’ll be flying over to spend time with you guys.”
I had nodded, somewhat satisfied. “How long do you want to stay with the military?” I had asked, wanting to know how long I would lose my brother for.
“Four years to begin with,” Braden had replied. “But, I might choose to extend my term of duty. I intend to make the military my career.”
“What about becoming a doctor?” I had asked. “You always said you were interested in medicine.”
“It wasn’t really medicine,” he had clarified. “I wanted to help people, and I realized recently that there are other ways of helping people. I’ve spoken to a lot of people, Chase; you don’t have to worry about me making a mistake. I know what I’m doing.”
I had nodded. “I’m proud of you.”
Braden had smiled and punched me in the arm. “So does that mean I have your blessing?”
“Of course,” I had nodded. “I only wish I could enlist with you.”
Braden had smiled. “You have a few more years to think about it, but things are different for you.”
“What do you mean?”
“You have Lauren,” he had said with a wink. “She’s a great girl. I wouldn’t run the risk of ruining things with her by leaving for four years.”
“I’d just take her with me,” I had replied confidently.
Braden laughed. “I doubt she’d be happy with that arrangement.”
“No, she would,” I had insisted. “If I told her I wanted to enlist, she would say she wanted to come with me. I know it.”
“You know it, huh?” he had asked.
“I’m as sure about that as you are about joining the military,” I had replied, and Braden’s eyebrows had risen.
“You and Lauren have something special,” he had said. “Despite how young you both are, I can tell.”
I was so engrossed in the memory that I almost felt as though I was back in my childhood room surrounded by piles of dirty laundry and posters of old NFL football stars. That memory of Braden was so clear that I could almost forget he was no longer apart of the living world. He was someplace else – somewhere I could no longer reach him.
When I turned back around, I realized Lauren was standing in the threshold of our bedroom, watching me carefully. Her face was expressionless and her eyes were hooded as she looked at me. I had no idea how long she had been standing there.
“How are you?” I asked.
“I’m fine,” she replied shortly.
“You threw up,” I pointed out unnecessarily.
“I was just feeling a little under the weather,” she replied. “It’ll pass.”
“Maybe we should take you to a doctor?” I suggested.
“I’ve already been to one,” Lauren replied.
“And?”
“Just the flu. I should be fine in a few days.”
“Oh,” I nodded, wondering why her nose wasn’t runny if she had the flu. “That’s good.”
We looked at each for a long time, neither of us saying a word. In that moment, we both knew something had changed. She was looking at me as though she could barely recognize me, and that was more painful than I could have imagined. I tried to break the silence several times, but my words kept getting swallowed up in my thoughts. In the end, it was Lauren who broke the silence.
“Chase,” she started softly. “I need you to tell me what’s going on…because it feels like you’re breaking up with me.”
I took a deep breath. “I enlisted,” I said. It was all I really needed to say.
There was a deep beat of silence. “Oh,” she said at last.
“I met with a recruiter recently, and he talked me through the steps. I have to go to a boot camp to begin my training soon. I start in a week.”
“I see,” she said with a calm that baffled me.
“Lauren?” I said, wondering if she was even processing the news.
“Yes?”
“I know this is out of the blue and I’m sorry for that,” I said. “But I have to do this.”
She looked me straight in the eye. “I know you do. I understand that this is important to you. If you have to do this, then we’ll do it.”
I felt my knees buckle slightly. “Lauren,” I said as gently as I could manage. “I can’t take you with me. It’s too dangerous. I
wouldn’t be able to live with myself if anything happened to you.”
“Chase, I’m not staying here while you go there,” she said emphatically. “That was not the plan. The plan was always to stick together, no matter what.”
“Sometimes…sometimes plans change,” I said.
I saw her eyes grow wide with shock as the full extent of this new reality hit her. I was enlisting. I was leaving for four years, and I was going without her. It was a betrayal, and I could see that in her eyes. I felt my resolve weaken, but it was too late. I had already signed my name to that paper. I had already committed, and there was no going back now.
“I’m a bastard for doing this to you,” I said. “I know that. I don’t want to ask you to stay and wait for me, but I can’t take you with me, either. I just—”
“So that’s it?” Lauren interrupted, her tone sharp and icy. “I have no say in any of this?”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
She looked at me with her cool, green eyes and I saw them harden into hurt bitterness. “No,” she replied. “I’m the one who’s sorry.”
Then she walked into our bedroom and slammed the door on me.
Chapter Thirteen
Lauren
“Lauren?” Beth’s voice was slightly muffled by the closed door, but I could still hear the concern in her voice. “Lauren, you’ve been in there for a while. Are you all right?”
I tried to wipe away my tears, but I knew that my red nose and puffy eyes would give me away. I sighed, did the best I could with my blotchy face, and then opened the door to face Beth.
“Oh, hon,” she said the moment she saw me.
“It’s fine,” I said quickly. “I’m fine.”
“Yes, you look it,” she said gently. “Why don’t you sit down for a bit?”
“That’s all I’ve been doing since you got here,” I pointed out. “You’ve been packing, and I’ve been sitting here feeling sorry for myself.”
“Well, you’re allowed,” Beth said kindly.
I walked into the living room and looked around at the wreckage that was now my apartment. Well, it wouldn’t be my apartment for much longer, I reminded myself quickly. Boxes were everywhere, and it had been emptied of all my belongings. The only things remaining were unequivocally Chase’s. I stared at the collection of memories we had divided up and I couldn’t believe that it had come down to this.
“Lauren?” Beth’s voice came at me as though from a great distance.
“Yes?”
“Can I get you some water?”
“Sure,” I nodded as I looked over at the kitchen. I had hated it for the four years we had been forced to use it, and yet I found myself looking at it with a faint sense of nostalgia that bordered on fondness. Half the time, I didn’t know if it was the hormones or my devastation over the end of my relationship.
Beth handed me a glass of water as she cast a critical eye over my appearance. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked again. “You look very pale.”
“That’s because I’m pale, despite my best efforts,” I replied.
Beth sighed as she too looked around the apartment. “Where’s Chase?” she asked after a moment of hesitation.
“He’s at the track with the guys,” I replied.
“And he knows you’re moving out today?”
“Yes,” I nodded. “I asked him to not be around.”
“Ok,” she nodded as though she didn’t understand something.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said a little too quickly.
“Come on,” I said sharply. “Out with it.”
She sighed. “It’s just…all of this is so sudden. The break up and all that. Is there a possibility that maybe both of you are overreacting?”
I collapsed onto my sofa, sloshing water all over the front of my shirt. I put down the glass uncaringly and Beth joined me on the sofa. “No one is overreacting,” I said as calmly as I could manage. “Chase made a choice and so did I. He’s choosing to enlist, which I accepted. He’s choosing to leave for four years, which I also accepted. But he’s not willing to take me with him, which I do not accept. He’s the one who turned his back on us. I’m just making the next move.”
“Which is to move out?”
“Yes,” I nodded.
“And he was fine with it?” Beth asked.
“He tried to convince me to stay.”
“But?”
I looked at Beth with tired eyes. “He didn’t mean it,” I said.
“What?”
“I’ve known Chase pretty much my entire life, Beth,” I tried to explain. “I know him inside and out. I probably know him better than I know myself, probably because I love him more than I love myself. I know his moods and his expressions. I can even read his silences. He told me to stay when I told him I was moving out, and I could see it in his eyes. He didn’t really mean it. He knows that it’s easier this way; he knows it’s better. He’s just too cowardly to break up with me himself, so he stepped back and let me do it.”
“Oh, Lauren.”
“No, it’s true,” I said firmly. “If he had been sincere, then he would have fought for me to stay. He would have been here now, instead of at the track with his friends.”
Beth fell silent, knowing that there was nothing she could say to that. After a moment, she took my hand and squeezed it. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I don’t know what else I can say.”
“There’s nothing else to say,” I said. “Chase and I are over. It’s sad, it’s tragic, but that’s life.”
“I never thought I would see this day,” she admitted slowly.
I felt all the memories in the apartment gang up on me and the nausea surfaced again. I leapt to my feet ran towards the bathroom, wondering when I could be rid of the dreaded morning sickness. When I came back to the living room, Beth was looking concerned again.
“What was that?” she asked.
“I threw up,” I replied sheepishly.
“Was that simply because of the stress of this breakup or is there another reason for it?” she asked pointedly. “Because I know you’re not sick.”
I sighed, knowing I couldn’t put off this moment for much longer. “I’m pregnant,” I admitted.
“What?” She reacted as I had expected her to. Her eyebrows hit the ceiling and she looked at me in shock. “You told me you took the test and it came out negative.”
I shrugged. “I lied.”
“Lauren!” Beth practically yelled. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
“Because I wanted to tell Chase first,” I said. “And, I didn’t think I could until he had got some distance between himself and the memory of Braden’s funeral.”
“Oh my God,” she gasped. “You’re pregnant, and you’re moving out? And Chase is okay with that?”
“Well…” I said.
“Lauren?”
“He doesn’t know, okay?” I said defensively.
“Excuse me?” Beth looked stunned.
“I never got around to telling him,” I admitted. “Like I said, I was waiting for the right time, and before that time came, he told me he had enlisted and then the world imploded. So, I didn’t really feel like telling him after the fact.”
“When are you planning on telling him?” Beth demanded. “After you’ve moved out? Or after he’s been deployed to God knows where?”
I knew she wasn’t going to like my answer, but I barreled ahead and said it anyway. “I’m not going to tell him at all,” I said firmly.
Beth just stared at me for a moment. “Are you serious?”
“Completely,” I nodded. “I’m not telling him about this baby…and neither are you.”
“Of course I’m not going to tell him,” she assured me. “But I think you should.”
“Well that’s not going to happen,” I said as I walked over to the small mass of books I had collected over the years and started packing them into one of the smaller boxes.
“Lauren,” Beth said as she followed me. “You can’t do that. It’s not fair to him.”
“Him?” I asked incredulously as I rounded on her. “You think this is unfair to him? What about me, huh? He completely shut me out of his life; he’s abandoning me, and he’s gone back on every promise he’s ever made to me. After that, I don’t feel like I owe him anything.”
“And that’s why you’re not telling him?” Beth asked. “Because this is your way of getting back at him for hurting you?”
I sighed, feeling the weight of all these life changes come crashing down around me. “No,” I said quietly. “I…it’s more complicated than that.”
“Explain it to me then.”
“I don’t want him staying for the wrong reasons,” I admitted at last. “He needs to do this, I understand that. But if he knows about the baby, I’m not so sure he’ll go through with it.”
“I don’t get it,” Beth said shaking her head. “Isn’t that a good thing?”
“No,” I said throwing my hands up in the air in frustration. “Of course not because he’ll stay out of a sense of duty, not because he actually wants to stay. He’ll spend his whole life resenting the baby and me and I won’t have that. If this is what he needs to do, then I won’t stop him.”
“He loves you Lauren,” Beth said.
“I don’t doubt that he loves me,” I replied. “But obviously, he doesn’t love me enough.”
I turned away from her and continued packing the books that I was taking with me. I knew that Beth wasn’t done with the conversation, but I knew I was.
“Lauren—”
“I can’t, okay?” I said with passion. “I can’t do this right now. I’ve made my decision, and what I really need from you right now is support. Chase made the choice that was right for him, and that means I have to make the choice that’s right for me. And right now, that means moving out of this apartment, having this baby, and not telling Chase about it.
“I know you think it’s the wrong decision, and I know you think I’m being unfair to Chase, and you know what? You’re probably even right about that. But at this moment, I cannot deal with any of it. I cannot deal with telling him, I cannot deal with having him in my life in a partial capacity. We’re over, Beth, and I need that to be the end of this conversation. Because honestly, I don’t think I can deal with much more.”