Chapter 5
NIC
“ T imes like this it’s a real bummer that I can’t drink.” Lorna breaks the silence once the waiter has left us with a jug of water and a menu to look over.
“You good eating here? I mean, that receptionist gave you a leaflet with shit you can’t eat, right?” I’m still getting over the shock of finding out I’m going to be a father. I keep feeling like I have to get the picture out and look again to believe it.
“Everything on here looks fine, I was just going to have a salad, anyway. My appetite’s not great at the moment.” She smiles as she places her menu down and takes a sip of her water.
“But you are eating?” I check, knowing from the times that my sister’s been pregnant, how important that is.
“Yeah, I’m not great at keeping down my breakfast, but I get better as the day goes on,” she informs me
“How long have you been sick for?” I can’t believe she's kept this from me.
“About a week and a half, at first I thought I had some kind of bug but then my period never came. I would have told you before but it’s not exactly like we get along. I was worried you’d blame me.”
“I don’t blame you,” I sigh heavily, knowing that all the blame for this is on me. I could have put a condom on that night. I have with every other woman I’ve been with. But something about being with her felt different. Not that I’m about to admit that.
“What's done is done, what we have to do is figure out how to deal with it. We can swing by your apartment and pick up your stuff once we’re done here and I know what you said about college and wo?—”
“Wait, what do you mean pick up my stuff?” She stares across the table at me like she’s confused.
“Well, I can’t move into your place, it’s far too small.” I shrug.
“Why does anyone have to move anywhere?” She looks utterly perplexed.
“Because we’re having a baby together. You're going to need me, and so is the kid when it gets here. I have enough space in my apartment for all three of us so it makes the most logical sense.”
“You want us to live together?” She makes no attempt to hide the fact that the idea horrifies her.
“I told you, you're my responsibility now.”
“No, I’m sorry, I…this is too much.” She stands up and starts moving toward the door.
“Lorna, come back.” I chase after her, not caring a damn that we now have the attention of the whole restaurant. “You can’t act as if this isn’t going to change our lives, and I know you probably wish you were doing this with someone else but the reality is, you're not. I’m what you got and I’m determined to do my best at it. Just, please, hear me out.”
She looks genuinely shocked by what I’m telling her, and when she realizes everyone around us is staring, she smiles at them all politely and slowly moves back to her seat.
“Go ahead, tell me why two people who hate each other should move into the same apartment.”
“Because…” I reach across the table and take her hands, “...those two people made a baby, and it’s our job to get this right. If you don’t have to worry about paying rent, you won’t have to take shifts in the restaurant you work at. You can focus on the last few months you have left at college and graduate without overworking yourself. Plus, if we live together I can…you know….take care of you.” As crazy as it sounds, I really like the idea of doing that.
“You want to take care of me?” She looks at me with a sarcastic little smirk.
“Sure, you’ve got my baby in there.” I point to her flat stomach and when she slides her hand across it and makes a tiny smile, I can’t help noticing how cute she looks.
“I just can’t see this working, we don’t agree on anything. You irritate the hell out of me.”
“We agree on the fact we want what's best for our baby and, right now, getting him here and making sure he’s healthy is job number one. You move into my apartment, you quit your job and we figure this out step by step,” I suggest.
“I get my own room.” She scrunches up her forehead. Of course, she would have to turn this into a negotiation.
“I’ll clear out the games room.”
“Games room?” She shakes her head and laughs as she takes a sip of her water.
“Do you want to tell me what’s so funny?” I manage a smile of my own.
“I can’t believe I’m going to agree to this…On a trial basis,” she points her finger at me. “If it doesn’t work out, we’ll have to try another way.”
I nod my head. “And I still hate you,” she adds just before the waiter comes over to take our order, the fact she’s smiling when she says it and looking really pretty, almost makes the words hurt a little less.
We arrive back at my apartment with just the ‘essentials’ we picked up from her place on the way here. I, of course, insisted that she didn’t carry anything, and by the time we get through the door my arms feel like lead weights.
“You can have my room for tonight, I’ll get to clearing the games room out tomorrow while you choose what furniture you want,” I tell her, dumping all her stuff on the couch and watching as she takes the place in.
“It’s nice here.” She moves to the window so she can check out the view. “I didn’t really notice it last time I was here.”
“That's because you were busy getting knocked up.” I decide to lighten the mood and I can’t decide if the snarl she makes back at me is serious or not.
“How has this become our lives?” She flops into the chair by the window looking exhausted.
“I don’t know, but the way I look at it, people try their whole lives to do what we did, and some never get it. We have to look at this as a gift. A real fucked-up, ironic gift.” I laugh to myself as I rest my shoulder against the floor-to-ceiling window that looks out over the city, but it’s not the city I’m admiring tonight, it’s the girl resting back in my chair who’s pregnant with my child. I swear it makes her even more attractive than she was before.
“This is going to be tough, pregnancy does not bring out the best in people, and you already hate me,” she sighs.
“I don’t hate you, you just bug me.” I cross my arms over my chest.
“Well, I’m sure to bug you even more once my hormones kick in, and I already know I’m going to blame you when I can’t fit in any of my clothes.” She’s laughing, but I know she means it, and when I think about her tiny 5ft 7inch frame carrying a big, round belly, I feel my dick twitch.
“Like I said, we’ll worry about things as they come. I guess the first thing we should do is tell our parents. I can imagine Serena’s going to be as excited as she is surprised, that's if Madalina managed to keep it from her.” I suddenly realize that I know nothing about Lorna’s family. I know she used to live with her mom and stepdad, but that was back when she was in high school.
“We can tell Serena, but I’d rather hold back on telling my mom for a little while longer. She has a habit of being erratic about things and I need some time to come to terms with this situation before I have to try and defend it,” she tells me sadly, and it puts a strange feeling in my chest. One that makes me want to move closer so I can comfort her.
“You should make yourself at home, help yourself to whatever you need.” I move toward the door, picking up my keys.
“Wait, where are you going?” She sits up in her chair looking confused.
“I got something to deal with at the club. It’ll probably be a late one.”
I race out the door, closing it behind me and clutching my keys as I take a long, deep breath. What the hell was I thinking insisting she move into my place? It’s a recipe for disaster. I’m already starting to understand why Dario was so overbearing with my sister when she was pregnant. Suddenly, all that matters in the world seems to be this woman who I’ve hated for as long as I can remember. I’m blaming that for the fact I very nearly just kissed her.
Things are complicated enough without me putting something like that on her. I feel bad for leaving her alone here on her first night but it’s been a long, very eventful day and the best thing I can do is put some space between us while I let the fact I’m about to become a father sink in.
I wake up on the couch when I hear coughs and splutters coming from the bathroom, and picking my watch up from the coffee table, I see it’s only six-thirty am. I scrub my face to wake myself up and head down the hall, opening the door and see Lorna, wearing just her underwear as she kneels in front of the toilet, throwing up.
“Shit, are you okay?” I ask, still attempting to wake myself up. It must have been past two when I finally got home. “Is there anything I can do?” I ask.
“Yeah, get the fuck out of here and stop looking at me.” She picks up the closest thing to her, which just happens to be the toilet brush, and launches it at me, missing my head by inches, then retches and starts to vomit again.
“Here.” I kneel behind her and scoop her hair up in my hands, holding it back and trying not to look at the mess she’s making of the toilet.
“Is it always this bad?” I stroke her back, trying my best to comfort her, and when she eventually gets up and answers my question with a nod of her head, I stand back and watch her splash water over her face and get her breath back.
“It usually doesn’t start until after I’ve eaten my breakfast. I guess it’s going to get worse before it gets bet…” She fails to finish her sentence when she turns her head and sees that I’m only wearing my boxer shorts, and suddenly I’m very aware that we’re both standing in a confined space, wearing just our underwear.
“Is there something I can get you?” I step closer to her, feeling like a moth being dragged to the flame. This woman is carrying my child, everything indicates that she belongs to me now, surely it's natural that all I want to do is touch her.
“No, I’m fine now,” she assures me, looking at me strangely as I move closer, and when my hand stretches out to press against her lower stomach she does nothing to stop me, just stands static and watches.
“Last night while I was at the club, all I could think about was this,” I admit, stroking my thumb against her skin and looking down at how it goosebumps. “I need you to know that I’m all in. Whatever you ask of me, I’ll give you.” I’m fully aware of how pathetic I sound, but she needs to know. I reach my other hand around the back of her head and bring it forward, gently kissing the top of it, and then I leave her to think about what I said.