Chapter 4 Two Pink Lines #2
The second time Simone and I hooked up, it was after a heated argument and more akin to hate-fucking than anything.
I didn’t like her reasoning for not inviting Cass, but that didn’t mean that I it wasn’t understandable.
Simone also mentioned that she wasn’t keeping our hookup from Cassidy.
“It’ll help her get over that ridiculous crush she has on you, since you don’t even see her as a person. ”
That jibe from her had hit in the worst way, especially coupled with what happened the next day when I asked Cassidy why she never went to the parties with Simone.
My grandpa was right. I was selfish and thought with my dick and damned if it didn’t get me into a heap of trouble that I couldn’t get myself back out of.
“It doesn’t matter what her plan was. There is a baby on the way and I won’t be my dad.”
“You can be there for her and not get married, asshole. Why would you tie yourself to a person like her anyway?”
“Because she’s not a great person, Jas. She’ll be helping to raise my baby, though. If we’re married and living under the same roof, at least then I can control the situation.”
“What I’m hearing is all the wrong reasons to marry a girl. You’re eighteen-fucking-years old. Don’t do this.”
“My mind is made up. My father had to be bribed into taking responsibility for me. I won’t have my kid grow up thinking that I’m that kind of piece of shit, too. There’s no telling what kind of shit Simone will infect our kid with if I don’t man up and marry her.”
“Can’t argue with that, I guess.”
“So, you’ll be my best man?”
“Yeah,” he agreed. I couldn’t miss the reluctance in his voice, though. “What about her?”
“What do you mean?”
“Who is going to stand up with her during this wedding? She had a bride’s maid or best lady or whatever the fuck they’re called?”
I laughed. “Maid of honor, dipshit. And of course.”
“Please, tell me she didn’t ask Cassidy.”
I looked away and swallowed down every argument I wanted to spew.
It still ached inside to think of the hurt my wedding day would cause.
For Cassidy and also for me because it meant that the dreams I’d once had would be gone for good.
Granted, they already were because Cass was loyal and even if they had their disagreements and she was still a little cool according to Simone, Cassidy would never agree to go out with me.
Even if I never married Simone, there would still be a baby between us and a very obvious history.
“Fuck, do you both secretly hate Cass? I used to think you had a thing for her or something the way you would bail on plans to go hang out with her alone. You know it will kill that poor girl to stand there and watch you marry her best friend, right?”
“I don’t think so. She got over her crush the minute I pointed out how Simone left her out and she realized I was doing the reverse.”
“Why? I don’t get why you treated her that way.”
“I was afraid to lose out on where I was at school,” I admitted. “I knew it wasn’t our time yet, but I wanted to keep her close in some way until…”
“You’re a fucking idiot. And even if she hadn’t been hurt by your half-assed plan, you thought it was going to be okay to sleep with Simone while you bided your time for whatever the fuck you were waiting for in this obscure future?”
“I don’t know. It was so fucking stupid. I was drunk, she kept turning on the charm, and before the end of the night - I guess my liquor-sloshed brain thought no one would find out.”
“Do me a favor, tell Simone not to ask Cass for this. It’s a step too far.”
“She’s pregnant, man. I can’t do anything to upset her.”
“You graduate next weekend,” Grandma said as she straightened the tie I borrowed from Grandpa.
“I know.”
“Why don’t you wait until after you both have your diplomas or she’s further along.”
“Grandma, what woman do you know wants to walk down the aisle all big and pregnant? We want to do this before she’s showing too much.”
“I understand, but what if she loses the baby and then…”
“And then, what? I’m off the hook if we haven’t said, “I do,” yet?
” Her insinuation angered me. “If that were to happen, she would still need me because that would be our baby that is gone. I can’t believe you of all people just said that to me.
” It was made very clear to me what my grandparents thought of Simone - not much.
They had tried, as Jasper did, to get me to wait on marriage.
Grandpa asked that we have a paternity test done first, but Simone was so insulted by that she broke down into violent sobs and I worried for the baby.
There were moments when she and I were alone together that I saw a different side to her.
There was something sad about Simone that she didn’t let anyone else see.
I was sure it had to do with her own father’s lack of presence in her life.
She claimed to know who he was but that he didn’t have any involvement with her life at all beyond sending money to her mother every month.
It was another reason that I didn’t want to let her and our child down.
We both had shitty fathers. I didn’t want to be that for my baby, too.
My grandma left as I stared off into space thinking about the ways my life had gone completely off track in the past month or so. Eventually, Jasper came to get me.
“If you’re doing this, it’s time to get out there.
If not, I can sneak you out the back door and hide you out until we can get a DNA test done.
” He wasn’t joking. I shook my head to let him know I hadn’t changed my mind and then I followed him to my grandparents’ living room where the Justice of the Peace agreed to meet us for the ceremony.
There weren’t many decorations, but my grandma had brought flowers in and arranged them through the room to brighten things up.
Simone came up behind me and sniffled. I glanced around and noticed who was missing. “Where is Cassidy?”
My grandparents both startled at the question as if they hadn’t been expecting her today.
“She refused to come. She said she could still be my friend but that she couldn’t watch me marry you today.
She’s just jealous that I got you and she didn’t,” Simone snapped and the twisted half-grin on her mouth made me want to run like Jasper suggested.
Then I remembered why I had to do this. My baby.
I couldn’t leave him or her to a mother who I couldn’t trust to do the right thing.
My brain stalled and I also remembered the way she leaned on me and cried as she told me about her absent father and how it had left this hole in her heart that she kept trying to fill in the wrong ways and she wanted to change that.
She looked at our marriage and the baby we had on the way as the first step in becoming a better person.
I believed her then. I wondered if her hormones made the mean-spirited way she’d just spoken come out.
“Why would Cassidy have been here?” Grandpa asked.
“She was supposed to be Simone’s Maid of Honor,” Jasper explained.
“That’s just cruel,” my grandma whispered to her husband.
“You’re right, it is cruel that she’d leave her pregnant best friend on a day when Simone needed her the most,” I shot back as I narrowed my eyes on my grandparents. Grandpa shook his head and didn’t bother to hide his disappointment.