How is this happening!?
Everything was going fine until right fucking now.
“Why!?” Imogen presses harder.
A part of me understands where my sister is coming from, the betrayal she must feel knowing I’ve been keeping secrets. We’ve always been close, sisters and best friends and we never keptanything from each other. But I’m also getting real damn angry at the accusations and the blatant judgement she is throwing at me. She thinks she can get away with it as my sister.
“How could you do this?” She snaps, “These are people’s lives, Vanessa!”
“You don’t think I fucking know that?!” I yell back, and then wince at myself since I startled Ethan on the floor. His wide eyes snap to us, instantly welling with tears. But before I can move, Kolt is with him, plucking him up from the floor to cradle him to his chest. He nods to me once, a silent confirmation that it’s okay, that he’s got him.
“You think it’s been easy for me, Immy?” I ask, keeping my voice calm even if I feel anything but that, “You think this is what I wanted?”
“I don’t know, Ness,” Immy says, “Isn’t it? You’ve been keeping it a secret around everyone who could have done something about it!”
“What, you think it was a power trip?” I scoff, “Knowing I had Kolten’s son, and his uncles were just a few minutes down the street?”
She quirks a brow, going right to that conclusion.
“You want to know why I never admitted it? You want to know why I kept it a secret for so long!?”
“Please do enlighten me, Vanessa!”
“I was ashamed!” I snap.
Out of the corner of my eye I see Kolt visibly flinch from my words.
“I was ashamed because I fucking fell in love with a man who made it so clear we would never be anything. I gave him mybody, and my virginity because I trusted him. And then he left, and I felt like a naïve little girl who got screwed over.”
Imogen stares at me wide eyed.
“I tried and I fucking tried,” I say, “Over and over, to tell him and when he didn’t answer I got scared. I got scared of telling his brothers in case they didn’t believe me, and then I got scared of them believing me and getting hold of him. I got scared because I haven’t moved on from it and it terrifies me. I’m a mother but I have no idea what I am doing.”
“Ness,” Immy starts.
“And every day I’m fucking terrified because I can’t have my heart broken again. It destroyed me then, it’ll destroy me now, but I have my son to think about. I can’t just stop and give it a chance. And I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to judge me, Immy. I didn’t want people to pity me. I wanted to prove I could do it and be just fine!”
I begin to pace back and forth, feeling hot, my scalp prickling.
“You don’t get to come in here and judge me, Imogen. I am trying. I am still trying and Kolt is here now. He knows. I didn’t try to hide it from him. He’s Ethan’s dad and he’s a good dad too! We are working on it so please, for the love of God, just let me work it out myself.”
Chapter Thirty
Iwas ashamed.
If anything was going to hit hard, that was it.
Vanessa has retreated into herself since her sister left an hour ago, barely spoken to me, barely even looked at me. She looks as if she’s on the verge of tears, eyes glistening, the amber of her eyes like molten gold. She makes coffee, makes snacks for Ethan and tidies, all of it a robotic fashion, but she looks one blow away from falling apart.
And I didn’t know how to help her.
This past week, we’ve fallen into a kind of routine, like we were heading on the right path, and I was going to be able to start fixing what I broke, even if I had to do it little by little, piece by piece.
Since Imogen came in and tore her apart, there’s very little sunshine to see now.
And fuck if that didn’t make me want to destroy a whole damn town.
“Ness,” Ethan is down for his nap, comfortably snoozing on the sofa where I left him after barricading him in with cushions and blankets, and then padding out the floor in case he decides to roll.
