Chapter 34 Xander
XANDER
My apartment is empty.
Cold.
Being placed on probation means no surgery for the foreseeable future.
Usually, I’d throw myself into work to distract myself, but with that no longer an option, all I can do is sit at home and wait for the inevitable end of my career.
Not that it bothers me.
Noelle does.
Snow.
Sitting on the couch surrounded by my cats, I try not to think about her but it’s next to impossible.
The decorations twinkle at me, lacking the warmth they had when Snow put them up.
Even the lights are duller despite how I turned them all on to try and give my apartment some kind of homely warmth.
Everything is dull.
Even my own heart.
Willow chirrups softly and kneads her claws into my leg, then burrows in on herself until she’s a perfect circle. Rustle sleeps over my feet and Tiger is spread out along the back of the couch, belly exposed.
Even they aren’t enough to keep the pain at bay.
Every so often, I’m struck with the urge to call her.
Our argument in the hospital two days ago was needed, but I was consumed by anger and disbelief then.
Now that I’ve had time to think things over for the hundredth time, the pain remains but the anger has faded somewhat.
Until my thoughts cycle around to the fact that she lied to me.
Even in her bed she tried to continue the lie as if the truth wasn’t black and white on the paper.
Had I not shown her how much I cared about her?
Was the key to my apartment not enough to show her how much I wanted her to be a fixture in my life?
Risking my career and my reputation was my choice but for Snow, it was worth it and I thought she felt the same.
I was happy for the first time in a long time.
Maybe I missed something.
Maybe she was unhappy and I just didn’t see it, or she really was just in this for the flirting and the sex, the excitement of secrecy.
I sink my fingers into Willow’s fur and she chirrups but refuses to lift her head.
Her warmth seeps deep into my hand and I close my eyes for a moment.
The darkness offers me no comfort.
I spent four hours at the gym and even that wasn’t enough to distract me.
No matter what I do, she’s on my mind and in my heart.
I tried to be a good man for her. I thought I was.
But if she didn’t trust me enough to tell me about the baby, what else didn’t she trust me with?
Thinking about the baby is hard because in the operating theater, for a few hopeful seconds, I thought the baby was mine.
I thought, somehow, our time together had resulted in pregnancy and in those few seconds, I embraced a fantasy I hadn’t considered since my late wife.
Fatherhood.
It’s always been something I wanted out of life, but Claire never wanted children and I loved her enough not to care.
I told myself that my life was fulfilled with the woman I loved and the same would be said for Snow.
But I can’t deny the rise of hope in my heart when I thought she was carrying my child.
Except she’s four months along.
In some ways, maybe this is my fate.
This mirrors the end with my late wife when she kept things from me before my trip.
Had I known she had some chest pains, I never would have flown to be with my sister.
I would have been here with her.
Willow growls softly, alerting me to how my hand has tightened briefly in her fur, so I murmur an apology and soothe her with several pets.
Maybe I really am untrustworthy.
A sudden thump in the hallway drags me from my thoughts and Rustle leaps up from my feet and takes off out of the room.
I move Willow from my lap with one hand and while she chirrups, she remains lazy and immediately curls in on herself on the cushion.
Out in the hallway, I spot Rustle by the front door.
She stretches her paws up the wood and meows loudly.
“Is there someone there?” I ask her, approaching the door.
Despite the pain, a note of hope rises in my chest while I unlatch the door.
It’s not Snow on the other side, much to my sudden disappointment, but I smile anyway as I spot Auriela heading toward her apartment.
“Auriela!” Rushing forward, I immediately take her bag from her. “They discharged you?”
“Xander? Oh, it is you!” She peers up at me with crinkled eyes. “They gave me a full bill of health and turfed me onto the street.”
“I wish you’d called me. I would have come to pick you up.”
“Nonsense, you’ve done enough for me already.” She pats my arm as she reaches her door, then spends a few minutes hunting for her key. “That last nurse I spoke to told me to wrap up warm for the winter and I told her, I said to her, I’m too tough to let some little cold take me down.”
“Auriela, pneumonia isn’t a cold,” I remind her with a smile as she lets herself into her apartment.
“Sure it is. It’s just an angry one.” Shaking her head, she turns to me and holds out her hand for her bag but when our eyes meet, she frowns. “Xander… what’s happened?”
“Hmm? Nothing, I’m fine.”
“Don’t lie to me,” she snaps sharply. “I can tell just by looking at you. Come on, tell me.”
Somehow, Auriela coaxes me into her apartment with Rustle at my feet, and I end up at her kitchen table pouring out every detail of my relationship with Snow, including the secrecy and the danger it brought to my career.
She’s brewed tea and set a mug in front of me by the time I tell her about the baby.
“I don’t know what to do,” I admit, wrapping my hands around the tea mug.
“I feel lied to, like I’m untrustworthy or something.
I don’t know what more I could have done, or what more I can do when it comes to people I care about.
All my life, people have told me I’m standoffish or cold, that I come across as uncaring, and I accept that it’s part of my personality.
But with the people I love? I try so hard and it just… backfires.”
Auriela sits next to me, drawing her shawl around her thin shoulders.
“You are a good man, Xander. You are. And you’re allowed to be upset.
You need to take some time and understand exactly why you are upset.
Feel your feelings, as silly as that sounds.
Too often, men like you bottle things up or ignore the hurt because you think it makes you weak. You’re allowed to feel upset.”
Warmth mists across my eyes. “Auriela… I feel like I’m back in the same spot where someone I care for just doesn’t see me the same way. How could I have been so blind to that?”
“I don’t think you were blind. I’ve seen Snow.
She seems like a nice girl. I won’t pretend to know or understand her reasoning, but I do know this.
” Auriela reaches across and lightly taps the back of my hand.
“Would she lie to you out of maliciousness? I don’t think so.
Like you said, you were putting your career at risk for her and she could have reported that at any time if she wanted to hurt you.
Maybe she was trying to manipulate you or she acted recklessly out of fear.
Pregnancy is terrifying and from what you’ve told me, she’s been through a lot.
Finding out her true motives will put your heart to rest and calm your mind. ”
“Since when did you give such sage advice?” I chuckle softly.
“Since always.”
“And yet you ignore it when it comes from someone like me telling you to stop climbing up all these stairs.”
Auriela laughs. “Listen, I have age on my side, Son. I know a thing or two about love. Your job? I can’t help with that.
But the heart? When you get to my age, you see through all the bullshit and nothing else matters.
So you need to look through the bullshit and you’ll see if she really cares about you as much as you care about her. ”
Truer words were never spoken.
The answers to the questions spiraling in my mind can only come from Snow, so that’s who I have to talk to.
“Thank you, Auriela.”
“Don’t thank me, just let me keep this darling!” She reaches down and ruffles her hands through Rustle’s fur. “Oh, how I’ve missed you.”
Rustle meows and weaves around Auriela’s ankles.
“Rustle can stay as long as she likes,” I say with a smile. “But I will still thank you.”
I share tea with Auriela for half an hour and then take my leave, ensuring her apartment is warm, her medication is accessible, and Rustle won’t be too much of an issue.
Back in my apartment, Willow’s moved to the top of the fridge and sings the song of her people while trying to dislodge one of my fridge magnets.
Tiger remains fast asleep on the couch where I find my phone, but just as I scroll to Snow’s name in my contact list, the screen lights up.
It’s Thea.
I’ve barely hit answer before her voice comes barreling down the line. “I told you so!”
“That’s the last time I text you to keep you updated in my life,” I mutter, pinching the bridge of my nose.
“Leading with ‘she’s pregnant’ would have been a better way to go, actually,” Thea snaps.
I freeze. “How do you know that?”
“As soon as you drunk texted that you were on probation, I tried to call Snow and I got redirected to a nurse who, upon learning I was your sister, was more than happy to tell me.”
“Which nurse?”
“I don’t reveal my sources.”
“Thea, that’s an insane breach of—”
“I don’t care! We’re still at the I told you so portion, okay?”
“I don’t have time for this.”
“Don’t you dare hang up on me! You texted me so I’m here like a good sister should be.”
“And I don’t want to listen to your bullshit.”
“I’m—look, Xander. I’m not bullshitting, but are you seriously telling me you didn’t see this coming?”
“Not like this. Or at all. I was working something out.”
“Oh, yeah? What was it?”
I glance at Tiger’s sleeping form in despair. “Okay, I don’t know. But I was thinking about it and we were keeping everything under the radar, so it was fine.”
“Until she got mangled in a car wreck.”
“She wasn’t mangled.”
“Whatever. Y’know, I want to know how she thought she could hide a baby.”
“It’s resting far back so she’s barely showing as it is.”
“And you didn’t notice while you two were…?” Thea clicks her tongue.
“No! And even if I did, why the hell would I call attention to it?”
“Trying to be a gentleman, huh?” Thea sighs. “Man, this is so fucked. Are you going to lose your job?”
Slowly, I sink down onto the couch. “I don’t know. Snow works under me but not as directly as some others. But I don’t think that matters.”
“Don’t they usually pay the chick off in these situations?”
“She hasn’t done anything wrong. If anyone should be punished, it should be me.”
“So, you are going to lose your job?”
My head ends up in my hand with a groan. “Fuck, I don’t know. Maybe. There’s not a lot I can do.”
“It’s kind of sweet, in a way,” Thea hums. “You care so much about her, you couldn’t even cut into her with a scalpel.”
“It wasn’t about that. I was in shock. For a second, I thought I was going to be a dad, and then the more I realized the truth, the more I knew she deserved better care than me. I was unable to think straight. That’s it.”
“And now you’re about to be jobless.”
“It was worth it, okay? Not that you would know anything about sacrifices for the person you love.”
There’s a sudden silence as my words drift between us as if they’re slowly writing themselves into our minds.
“You love her?” Thea asks.
“I…” Is that why it hurts so much? Why I can’t fathom how she couldn’t trust me? Why it felt so crushing that she kept telling me she was scared?
The woman I love doesn’t trust me.
“You do, don’t you? Holy shit.” Thea sighs deeply. “Normally, I’d be over the moon that someone’s warmed up that soul of yours again, but Xander, can you tell me honestly and truthfully that you’re okay losing your career over her?”
I stare down at the Christmas lights reflecting off the leather on my shoes. “Yes.”
“For real?”
“Yes. I am. Because… because I love her. I love Snow.”
“But she lied to you,” Thea says, and her voice is soft. “Can you say it’s worth it and forgive her for hiding something so huge?”
I press my lips into a thin line, then nod. “If she can be honest with me and tell me her true intentions, then… then yes. I absolutely can.”