4. Dana #2
"You don’t sound like you’ve only had one,” I breathed. I clutched the bottom of the button-up nervously. I hadn’t imagined that the way I’d felt hours before would become Pompeii so quickly, but there I was.
He’d shrugged, and it only made me angrier. His face had crumpled in on itself for a split second before he’d looked back up at me.
“How many glasses, Cole?” I’d asked, desperately trying to sound calm as I reached for the bottle and took it in my hand.
Some kind of silvery material made a raised emblem of an antlered deer across the front of it, and the label read The Dalmore, 2007 Vintage Highland Single Malt Scotch Whiskey, 46%.
It was strong, and it looked fucking expensive.
Cole’s hand grasped my shirt and pulled me toward him. “Shh, don’t worry about it,” he’d grinned. He stared at me almost longingly, and if it wasn’t for what was playing out, that look would have done things to me that I wouldn’t be proud of.
I’d placed my hand on his cheek, pushed the short strands of dark blonde hair out of his face. But god, the knot in my stomach telling me to run, to disappear before he could become another presence in my life that only disappointed me, was strong.
“Fuck, you look so good in my shirt,” he’d rasped, his eyes raking over my frame the way they had last night. But it didn’t feel the same, didn’t feel like two people meshing together too well — this was not the Cole from last night.
"You could have made yourself a coffee, you know?" I didn't know what else to say.
He curled his hand around the back of my neck in a way that would have made me fall fucking lifeless in his arms the night before. "It's never too early to pick up where we left off last night. Come on, join me. Hair of the dog, they say."
He was grinning and it was kind of cute.
But the sirens in my head made me freeze. "I think we've had enough 'dog' for a while, don't you?" I’d pulled away from him and he shrugged and glanced over at the bottle on the kitchen table.
I turned from him and headed toward the bedroom, my feet going from sticky linoleum back to carpet.
Strewn all around the room on the floor were my dress, my shoes, my underwear, along with my handbag, proof that the previous night hadn't been my imagination.
I frantically got dressed and went back to the kitchen.
“I have to go,” I'd breathed, lifting my hands in surrender as I stepped back. “I have to get out of here.”
“Why?” Cole had asked, his brows coming together as he watched me stand there, disappointed and far more confused than he was. He’d taken the bottle from the table as he took a step toward me, and I moved two steps back.
“Don’t,” I’d said. “Just don’t, Cole.”
“Do you hate me?” he’d asked.
“This is bad, Cole. Really bad. I need you to understand that,” I'd said, my hand sweeping beneath my hair to free it from my dress.
“Not into bad boys?” he’d asked, snorting at his own joke.
“This isn’t bad boy behavior.”
His eyes had turned hard as I slid my heels on, the rejection switching right on. “Fine. Then this fling is over and I'll continue the party without you."
I’d stiffened my jaw and pushed past him, the backs of my eyes burning.
It hadn’t felt like a fling, like a one or two night stand like he was implying, but if that’s what he wanted to pretend that it was, then fine.
“I’m going home,” I’d said, but the words had come out croaky through the knot in my throat.
I’d held back the tears as I blindly found the exit of his apartment with no help from him, shouting out to him to not bother calling me. I’d held them back as I descended the stairs and called for a taxi. I’d held them back the entire ride home, looking a mess and doing the walk of goddamn shame.
But in the safety of my house with no one else around to see me, I’d let myself feel everything.
————
My knees gave out from under me. I gripped the stroller’s handle as my right shin and kneecap hit the cement, a bright bloom of acidic pain lancing out from under my leggings.
Drew’s seat tipped back—he didn’t weigh nearly enough to counteract my stumble—and as he started to kick and cry from the sudden shift in his world, the pain dissipated. He could cry for me.
I picked myself up from the ground and clocked a bench about ten feet ahead. Pushing Drew and limping my way to it, I collapsed onto the cold decrepit wood and caught my breath.
Drew’s little whimpers and cries had a pull on me that I had never thought possible. Every time he cried, a pit formed in my stomach, an ache to soothe and calm him at all costs. I wasn’t sure what I thought motherhood would be like, but there were parts of it that surprised me nearly every day.
I scooped him from his stroller, passing a quick glance at my knee as I bent over.
My leggings had torn, the skin beneath raw and bleeding, but I would deal with that later.
Instead, I leaned back with his little body in my arms, rocking him gently enough so that he calmed and my body didn’t protest too hard.
It was strange looking down at him and seeing his plump little face, the tiny bit of blonde hair that ghosted his head, the little specks of blues, greens, and browns in his eyes.
He’d changed so much in the three months since he’d been born.
No longer was he this intensely fragile, wrinkly little infant.
Now he was an intensely fragile chubby baby.
And god dammit, I loved him.
The more I watched him settle in my arms, the more it cemented in my mind that I couldn’t quit my job.
It worked too well for both of us when Cole wasn’t interrupting my shift schedule by making a surprise appearance.
As much as I loved my job at the Harris Ranch, this one paid so well and was understanding when it came to childcare duties.
I knew Lottie would have gone above and beyond to make the ranch worth it as well.
But I couldn’t lean on her generosity. There was only so much she could do anyway.
Being with the horses meant being there at the crack of dawn and doing that with a baby on my hip seemed almost impossible.
I could have been moved to admin, but again, I needed to figure out my own path and my own way instead of relying on Lottie’s help to make things work.
Plus, I’d barely given the brewery a chance.
I’d only been there a couple of months before my water broke mid-tour, and after my almost two-month long maternity break, I’d come back before I was needed to make ends meet.
I couldn’t just abandon it after only working there for about three months total.
I had to make it work. I had to do this myself—for Drew, for both of us. No matter what.
————
A familiar head of wavy deep brown hair was looking in my front window as I jogged up to the house, my right knee screaming at me.
With her hands cupped around her eyes and her face pressed against the glass, I couldn’t help but chuckle under my breath.
If she’d just called me instead of appearing out of the blue I would’ve just told her I was out, maybe then I wouldn’t have arrived home to find a “peeping Veronica” at my windows.
As silently as I could, I pushed Drew’s stroller with his sleeping body up the little hill of my driveway. “It’s a bit creepy to be looking in someone’s windows, Vee.”
She jumped, her tanned, freckled face meeting mine with a hint of blush on her cheeks. “I thought you were dead!”
My sister could be dramatic, to say the least. Always expecting the worst-case scenario. I was shocked she hadn’t overturned all of the rocks in front of my porch searching for a hidden key.
It was in the little wooden mallard, she would’ve never found it anyway.
“And you didn’t think to call first?” I snorted. I picked up the little mallard and flipped it over, plucking the key out of its belly and giving her a wink. I hated taking my keys with me on runs. “I’m sure if I was dead, you would’ve heard Drew screaming his little head off.”
“Or giggling up a storm,” Veronica countered, side-eyeing my child as if he were the spawn of the devil.
I shoved the key in the lock and opened up the door before replacing the spare in its ducky home. “For the last time, Vee, he’s not the anti-Christ.”
She followed me inside, the screen door slamming behind her and nearly falling off its hinges. For a rental, it wasn’t the worst place imaginable, but it wasn’t exactly very well-looked after by previous tenants. Or me. I had bigger things to worry about.
“Sorry it’s a mess,” I sighed. She hadn’t visited me in about two months.
The last time she swung by was when she was visiting our parents, and thankfully, she hadn’t ended up at my house.
We’d met up at the park instead and then she was off again.
She lived out in Miami the majority of the time, but she was always bouncing from place to place.
I hoped she wouldn’t judge my home and had spent time in worse.
“It’s a bit hard to keep on top of everything while taking care of Drew. ”
“Hmm. I’ll have to work on that,” she mumbled, collapsing onto the sofa in a heap. “What happened to your leg?”
I glanced down at the open wound poking out of my leggings. Shit, it’s swelling. “Tripped on my jog. Just need to wash it out.”
“Looks nasty.”
“Thanks,” I deadpanned. I glanced down at Drew as he drooled over his little white shirt, his eyes practically glued shut. I knew I needed to move him to the bassinet, but god, I didn’t want him to wake up and kick off. “Are you visiting Mom and Dad?”
She blinked up at me. The dull, ugly brown of my sofa almost made her seem less lifelike than she normally did. “No. I came to help.”
“What?”
“You said you were struggling to juggle work and Drew and that the nanny wasn’t always available. I came to help you out.”
Did I tell her that?
“Maybe he’ll be less, uh, evil when he’s not on FaceTime,” she said, glancing at him warily.
“He’s asleep, Vee. He’s not going to start babbling demon summons.”
My sister didn’t know the first thing about looking after children.
She had none of her own and often avoided them as much as she could, though, to be fair, I was the same way before I found out I was pregnant.
Maybe it wouldn’t be so awful if she double-teamed it with the nanny the first few times.
Though I did have a worrying suspicion she’d try to have him exorcized behind my back.
“So where am I staying?”
I snapped my gaze to her quickly. “What?”
“Mom and Dad said I couldn’t stay with them.”
“Jesus,” I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose between my eyes.
Her need to insert herself without asking permission beforehand was something she’d carried with her since adolescence.
The number of times she’d weaseled herself into my sleepovers and parties sat heavily on my mind.
“Well, I’ve got a spare room but I don’t have a bed?—”
“That’s fine. I’ll buy a bed,” she grinned as she cut me off. “I can sleep with you tonight and then tomorrow morning I’ll have one delivered. Problem solved.”
Problem solved. More like a problem created.
The stinging in my knee throbbed. “Fine. Whatever.”