Page 42 of Finding Fate
Her shoulders drop. “I just needed a breather after looking at baby stuff half the trip. I’m always a mess in November even without all those reminders. You’ve just never seen it. His birthday is this weekend. After I get him a small cake and light a candle, I’ll slowly get back to normal.”
She looks away when her eyes water up. I pull her back. “Why do you have to be tough? If you want to cry, then cry. I’ll hold you. Sometimes I have to step away too. You don’t have to suffer through it alone anymore. When you go do whatever you do every year, I want to go with you.”
A tear falls down her face. “I promise I wanted to keep him. I begged my dad the entire pregnancy. He said I was too young to be a mother. I kept him inside of me as long as I could. I held him tight. I prayed for a miracle. But every year I can’t help but wonder if there was something I could’ve done that I didn’t; anything that would have changed his mind. Maybe it would be easier if he had given me an open adoption where they would send me a photo or two every year. He thought it would be too hard, that I’d get too attached, but I just want to know what he looks like. He has a late birthday. He should have started kindergarten this year. Regardless of how hard I try, though, I can’t hate my dad for it, because he could have forced me to abort him and he let me carry him. He let me give him life.”
She’s ripping my heart out of my chest, because with every sentence more tears fall. I grab the back of her head and pull her against my chest, holding her tight. Her arms circle around my waist. “Gab, give yourself a break. I’m not blaming you. You had just turned fifteen. You tried. That guilt isn’t on you. It’s on him.”
“I would talk to him every day. Sometimes it was nothing important, and sometimes it was about you. I introduced him to things like music and told him you were a drummer in a band. I even told him the story of when we met after playing the song they were playing on stage. I read to him. It got to the point he’d start moving when he heard my voice. He knew his name. My best friend was someone that couldn’t even talk back to me. He started crying when Dad took him. He could feel my distress. For days I wondered if he was fussy with those people because he couldn’t hear my voice anymore. I barely slept for weeks like my body was prepared to wake up every few hours. I cried when my milk came in, because it was a reminder that I was supposed to be the one feeding him and changing his diaper. I thought I was dying of a broken heart. I missed you the most then. There were nights I considered packing a bag and catching a train or bus to come find you, but I knew he’d report me as a runaway before I made it to the state line, and then I decided that I didn’t want to strap you down with that heartache and pain, because if I had known going in just how hard it was going to be, I would have made them put me to sleep. One of us deserved to live in ignorant bliss, because I knew you’d want him too, so I took the risk of you hating me and never forgiving me when I told you if you came back, because I knew I couldn’t keep that secret from you if we were together. I couldn’t live with that guilt too. Every November all of that comes back, so yeah, I’m a mess.”
My palms go to her cheeks and I tilt her head back, my face so wet it’s embarrassing. “Every November from here on out, we carry that weight together. We’re in this for life, Gab. I hate myself for not looking for you. God knows I wanted to. If he tries to take you from me again, I’ll kill him.”
Her eyes harden. “No. I went through all that shit to keep you out of jail. So help me God, Maddox Burns, if you leave me to rot in a prison cell, I will kill myself and leave a note to go directly to you, and you can live with that guilt forever while I haunt your ass and torment your mind.”
“Crazy bitch,” I whisper, my lips already expanding. “I love you so fucking much.”
“I’m crazy enough about you to do it. I’m not living without you again. I have nothing left to lose. I’m twenty-one. He can threaten me all he wants, but he can’t do a damn thing to me anymore. If he wants me in his life, he’ll get on board with this.”
I kiss her, my lips lingering on her top one. “I’ll never know what I did to get you.”
“You bought concert tickets.”
I laugh. “Only you would be that literal.”
“We’re two forces of nature, baby. Nothing can stop us.”
Not a goddamn thing. I lift her up my body and walk her to our bed, instantly laying her down. I undo her jeans and start working them down. “If anyone asks, we were reminiscing. No one needs to know we’re this damn addicted to each other. It won’t take long to get a fix.”
A mischievous gleam sparks in her eyes. She removes her shirt and bra. Her mouth tips. “Wouldn’t be a lie. Your bed in your room. Me and you. Take me back.”
I shove my athletic shorts and boxer briefs down, before coming over her with no clothing between us. “Everything else may have been wrong, but me and you, we’ve always been right.”
I buck into her. Sex, love, rock and roll—our life in three words.
Twenty-Five
Gabby
Iwalk to the small outdoor refrigerator after getting out of the pool, grabbing Maddox and me a beer. I often wonder what northern people are doing during the fall and part of the way into the winter months while we southern people can still enjoy a pool. Every year it seems like we have less cool weather.
Maddox is already in the jacuzzi when I make it to the edge, handing him one. The other four are still in the pool, since bellies growing babies are restricted from submerging in hot water. Landon is sitting on the couch in the outdoor living space watching a football game. I don’t know what he has against the water, but he didn’t want to get in. Something about working on the water two weeks at a time makes him not want to be near it in his off time. Whatever. Maybe he just doesn’t want to be around a bunch of couples. Now that I understand. I, personally, happen to favor the jacuzzi much more than the pool.
Maddox holds out his hand for me to take as I step down but moves me between his legs before I have a chance to sit beside him. “What have you found out about school?”
I turn in his arms and straddle him so that I can look at him while we talk, and drink from my beer before setting it on the cement. His joins it. He wraps his arms around my waist, his fingers running down my bottom. “I found one that starts new students every semester. I can start in January. They have payment plans available, but a certain amount is required to be paid by finals of each semester. Then there are books and scrubs and starter kits that are required. I feel like I need to get a job. It’s not cheap. I don’t expect for you to pay for everything just because you love me or feel some sort of guilt over the past. I can help pull the weight.”
“I don’t really want you going to school all day and working half the night, then coming home just in time to shower and fall into bed so you can do it all over again. I’d never see you. We’ve spent enough time apart. I know where my priorities are. I’d rather just work out the finances. This is what I want. It has nothing to do with guilt.”
“Okay.” I turn back around and sit between his legs, laying my back against his front. We’re closer since my hair is bundled on top of my head in a ponytail holder. He laces his fingers with mine, the pair floating on top of the bubbling water. He twists my engagement ring side to side on the top of my finger, which is something he does a lot, like he’s reminding himself it’s there, both of us enjoying being together in the hot water. “It’s hard to believe we’re getting married, isn’t it?”
“Is it hard to believe we’re going to get married? No. Is it hard to believe something I’ve wanted forever is actually going to come true? Yes. It’ll be the best day of my life. I feel like I’ve loved you forever.” I smile when he kisses my cheek, my heart warming, but then I start thinking.
In one sense it will be the best day of my life, because I’ll say I do forever to the only man I’ve ever loved or wanted to love, but in another it won’t. Unlike Maddox, I got to witness the birth of our son and hold him, knowing we loved each other so much we created him without even a thought to what we were doing. That’s also the best day of my life. Even if I only got to experience it for a short while, the moment I had was irreplaceable. Then there is my family.
When I was little I used to imagine getting married in a beautiful cathedral in Greece, just like my parents, where everyone that cared about us attends and watches me marry the love of my life. Then we would celebrate after. Dad believes in tradition, and everyone in my paternal family has married there. He’d never allow it to someone he doesn’t approve of. To him a marriage is no different than a merger in business.
My grandmother on my mom’s side contacts me a few times a year to see me. Sometimes I answer, sometimes I don’t. She only had my old number because I knew she wouldn’t give it to Dad. In the beginning I asked lots of questions about my mom, wanting to know if she’s okay and happy, if she ever thinks about me, but it was always a dead end. They don’t associate with her. The day she left my dad and me they wrote her off, which I don’t agree with. She may have wronged us, but she was stilltheirdaughter.
Maddox’s parents hate me. I’m sure I’m the little whore that almost cost their son years of his life, his freedom. I’m not bitter about it. Can’t really blame them. Attending our wedding is the last thing they’d want. Who knows what they’ll say when they find out. No one would want to witness this union, and considering how much we love each other, it breaks my heart. Maybe I believe in some traditions too. “We should just run away and get married alone.”