I claw at his back, pulling his shirt, wanting to rip it the way my life just got ripped apart. He doesn’t budge. He lets me fall apart and holds me tight. He doesn’t speak a word, only understands my need to let it all out, even if that means taking it out on him.
“It’s going to be okay,” he says.
“No,” I mumble into his chest. “No, it’s not.”
Footsteps sound behind us. I open my eyes to see Gwen standing in the shadows. Rex pulls back from me slightly. Grabbing both my shoulders, he bends down a little to look me in the eyes. “Want to get out of here?”
I nod through my tears. He pulls me in for a hug. “Alright, blondie,” he says. A few moments pass before he speaks again. “But I’m driving because your track record isn’t so great when you’re mad at the world.”
I pull away from him and laugh, swatting at him a little which earns me a smile. Pulling my keys out of my purse. I hand them to him and he opens the doors. Gwen walks over, pulls me close, and wraps one arm around me as we walk around to the passenger side.
“You know, I’ll kick his ass. Just say the word,” she teases. “But there is only one problem,” she says nudging me. “I think you kind of love the guy, and you know what?” We stop and look at one another before she continues. “I think he kind of loves you, too.”
Tears stream down my face as she pulls me in for a hug before we climb into the back seat. Rex starts the engine and I watch Noah’s house get smaller as we drive down the gravel road away from a perfect love now left shattered for a second time.
Chapter Fifty-Two
Noah
The t.v.’s static buzzes through the lonely house. Laying on the couch, I stare at the ceiling watching the fan turn round and round, counting the blades as they whip overhead. Looking at my phone on the coffee table, I almost cave and pick it up and call her. I want to tell her I was crazy, that this is stupid.
But I don’t.
I stare at my phone, willing it to ring on its own. But I know even if it did, I wouldn’t have the strength to answer it and face her.
I called Becky after her confrontation at my mother’s house and met her at the hospital for a paternity test. My decision to do so has nothing to do with the baby, more so with the mother and her lack of honesty in our past.
They said it could take up to three days for results.
Picking up the beer sitting next to my phone, I sit up and down the contents before walking to the fridge for another.
My mother took Anna May to meet Jolene in town after her shift. Not having to be back at the fire station until tomorrow, today presents itself as the perfect opportunity to drink it all away. To erase my past, my fucked up present, and the future that I am slowly feeling slip once again from my fingertips.
A car door shuts outside as I take my first sip off the new bottle and wonder who could be stopping by. I hadn’t talked to Eva since she left the night before last, and I don’t think she’d just show up after the way we left things. But, then again, I never figured she was one to come across the country, either.
I stand in the kitchen waiting for a knock at the door. Instead, the person just lets themself in. Footsteps sound down the hallway before I see Rex round the corner. I should have known. Instead of greeting his intrusion, I lift the beer to my lips and roll my eyes.
“Well, glad to see you’re taking this so well,” Rex starts in as he glances at the several other beer cans in the trash before walking to the fridge and popping one open for himself.
“Fuck off,” I grumble, trudging back into the living room and taking my position once again on the couch. Rex follows and flops in the chair across the room.
“You know, just because there might be a baby out there with your name on it, doesn’t mean you can’t still live the life you planned on before you found out.”
I roll my eyes. He has no idea that being tied to Becky would never leave enough room for Eva. Becky would make it her life’s work to ruin her. Not only that, but a child is not something that Eva signed up for.
I’m not a fool to believe that a woman would easily forget her future, and stop everything to help me raise a child I didn’t know I had up until a few days ago. Especially not a woman like Eva.
Shit, I almost lost her once to her need for freedom. To her desire to climb the ladder and achieve her dreams. There is no way she’d want to stick around and help me play house for a child that isn’t her own.
When I don’t answer, Rex says. “I told you once, you may just be wrong about Eva and what you’re hell-bent on thinking. Remember? In Memphis. Do I need to remind you yet again that there is more to this, you and her, than you care to admit?”
“She won’t stay,” I whisper. “Not after this.”
“Oh, you think so huh?”
I raise my middle finger at Rex and keep my eyes glued on the t.v. to his left.
“She proved you wrong before, you stubborn ass. What, you don’t think she’d do it again?”
