I look up at myself in the mirror. My face is red and stained with mascara . I take a deep breath and try to respond as normal as possible. “Yeah, Belle, I’m fine. I will be out in a minute, okay?” I roll my eyes, knowing I did not sound okay when I responded. “You still want to do our Buffy marathon?”
“Yeah, but only if you are sure you aren’t going out with Rex again?” she responds, annoyed.
My eyes tightly shut at the mention of his name, and I know there is no way in hell I can face him after what I just found out. I’m sure he will go out with the rest of the football team tonight anyway. To slutty Christina Thompson’s house, no doubt, and damn it if I don’t want to go over there and pull her long fake extensions out of her stupid head. To hell if I will let her get anywhere near my baby’s daddy now. My baby’s daddy. I stare at myself in the mirror and chuckle to myself. Oh, my God. Me and Rex are parents. This is insane.
“No, I’m sure,” I tell Belle through the door. “Just give me a minute.”
“Alright,” my sister says. “If you are sure?”
“Yup, positive,” I say back, trying not to sound bitchy.
I hear her footsteps as she walks away, and focus back on my reflection. Pregnant? Me? Holy shit! Actually, holy shit doesn’t even begin to do it. How far along am I? Like, if I count back, maybe six, possibly eight weeks. Oh my God! Is the baby ok? Because I went over to Lacy’s house a few weeks back and had a couple of beers with the softball team.
Oh my God! Pregnant! Me?
I grab my belly again and try to imagine Rex and I as parents. I laugh thinking of him changing diapers, holding a bottle, and rocking a baby to sleep. God, could I really do this? Could we really do this? Because all of a sudden, it’s sinking in that I’m going to be a mother, and Lord knows I want to be with Rex, but what if he doesn’t want to be with me? Would I be okay with raising this baby alone if I had to? Because he hasn’t been Mr. Reliable lately. Oh God, please don’t tell me I have to raise this child alone? I look up in the mirror with worry. Breathe Gwen. Just breathe.
Subconsciously, I start doing lamaze breathing that I have seen on TV and in movies. Like an idiot, I start laughing as I realize what I am doing. Okay, we are a long way off from that. But, oh my God. I’m going to be a mommy. A mommy to a perfect little baby inside my tummy right now. I can’t stop smiling. Even if he doesn’t stay, I will be okay. I turn to leave the bathroom, knowing that whatever the future holds, it is me and this little bean right here inside my belly, and oddly, I’m okay with that.
Maybe I’ll pop in quickly to the party at Christina’s. Eva called earlier and said she was headed over there. Maybe she could give me the courage I need to talk to Rex.
No time like the present.
I head for the front door instead of heading to my sister’s room. It’s still early. I can spend time with Rex, maybe tell him what I need to, and still make it back in time for the final season of Buffy.
* * *
Startled awake from the secret I hold in my dreams, I lay in silence for a moment and let the sadness pass. The part where I remember everything that happened later that night and wish I didn’t. Rex stirs next to me, and my heart sinks.
I know I have to tell him. I know that he’ll hate me for the decision I made on my own all those years ago and the secret I withheld when my world came crashing down. I press my palm to my stomach under the covers and wonder how I got here. How I got right back where my nightmares all started.
I look over at him as the moonlight frames his face through the curtains. Rex will always have my heart, no matter how hard I try to fight it.
But the question remains: will he stick around this time and not run away scared? Will he tell me those three little words I always needed to hear? I know the fucked-up shit with his parents and how he never let anyone close. But there was a time he wasn’t scared to let me in when he thought no one was looking. Could we get back to that? If we could, would it be enough?
There is only one way to find out, so I roll to my side and push back against him. Intuitively, he throws his arm over me and pulls me close. A moment passes, and his breathing evens out. A low snore fills the space around us, and I smile, knowing at least he is mine tonight.
16
Rex
10 years ago
Michael hands me a beer as I lean against the railing on the upstairs patio deck. I hadn’t planned to be here tonight. I’d rather be wrapped around the sexy Gwendolyn Coppola. But after she called and left me high and dry thirty minutes before I was supposed to pick her up, I had no choice, and nothing else to do on a Friday night.
“You alright, man?” Michael asks as he leans against the railing next to me. We look into the house in front of us, full of people we know from school, and I frown.
After my parents informed me earlier tonight that they would miss my graduation next month, but please make sure and send them pictures, my head became all sorts of fucked up.
Yeah, right, sure, I’ll send them pictures.
I didn’t even tell them about my full ride to Ol’ Miss. Why the hell would I send them shit?
It’s going to be nice to leave the house next year and get far away from their bullshit. But then again, far away means away from Gwen. And hell, that’s a reality I’m not ready to face yet.
“Never been better,” I say, clinking my glass against his.
His sister begins to walk toward us. Eva Monroe. The girl all the boys at school want, but none of them can have. Too bad I have never looked at her that way, being she is a grade younger than me and is my best friend’s sister. My younger brother, on the other hand, has had it bad for her since the third grade.
