Chapter 1
Ariel
No. No, no, no, no. This can’t be happening. It has to be a false positive. It must be. I’ll just go buy a better brand of pregnancy test. YEAH THAT’S WHAT I’LL DO!
10 Pregnancy test later, and I know without a doubt that I’m pregnant. Sitting in the empty bathtub, I curl up and cry. I feel like such a terrible person. This little bundle of joy in my stomach should bring celebration, not a sense of doom, but my life circumstances don’t leave me much room for happiness right now.
“You see that, Sweetheart? Only one of our flowers came back this year. Sometimes I think that’s mother nature’s way of letting us know that no matter how bad life gets, there’s always a chance to grow, and if not grow, at least stay standing tall.” My dad’s words come back to me almost as if he were right here with me. I remember that day. It was the first day of Summer and he wanted us to go replant the flowers we had planted the previous year. When we got out there one little Daisy had come back. He used it as a chance to teach me something like he always did.
Getting up, and dusting myself off, I start planning. I need to escape. I need to run away from him. I don’t have much, but I do have some leftover money that Greg gave me for my dad’s funeral, and the car I inherited from my dad. I had told Greg that it was junk and I had taken it to the impound, but really I hid it. I hadn’t ever planned on running away. I only saved the car and lied about it, so that I’d have a place to be closer with my dad. However, I guess subconsciously I always knew this day would come.
I check the time and it’s still only lunch time. Great! Greg wouldn’t be back for at least five hours. That should give me plenty of time to escape.
First things first I grab trash bags and put all my belongings in them. I take nothing that his money bought. Only things I provided myself.Then I put the pregnancy tests and boxes they came in, and put them in as well. He can’t find out about the baby.
I then take off all the jewelry I’m wearing and put it onto his dresser. Next is my phone, I take the one number I need and write it down. Call me crazy, but instead of taking the page off the notepad I had written on, I take the whole thing. Product of having a cop as a dad, and watching too many movies. I’m not risking him finding out what I wrote. I then reset my phone, place it with the jewelry, take my belongings and go.
On my way out, I stop to say goodbye to Herald -the doorman in our building who has been like a second father to me- and ask him to call me a taxi.
“I’m proud of you, Honey.” Herald says in that fatherly way that warms my heart.
“Don’t be so proud yet. I’ve got to actually get away first.”
“The fact that you’re saying goodbye to me right now brings me sadness, but also so much joy. You’re making it out. I believe in you.” I start crying again. For all the hell I went through, I always had Herald, especially after my dad died. Every time I was laid up in bed because Greg had a bad day, and took it out on me until I was immobile, Herald had bought me soup, called his medic friend to come look at me, and even spoon fed me. With Greg being an infamous lawyer, he wouldn’t allow hospitals. No one could know what he was doing to me. BUT Herald knew, and he was always there to take care of me.
“Thank you.” I hug him for the last time. “If Greg asks, tell him I went to donate some clothes to charity. He should believe you because I do it all the time.”
“Of course I will. He won’t get a thing from me.” I believe him. Through all our days of him taking care of me, I had learned that Herald was a Veteran, and had been through literal torture during a time he became a POW. There’s no doubt that Herald would keep this secret safe until the day he died. He gives me a kiss on the cheek, and sends me to the taxi that’s here to pick me up. When the driver asks me where I’m going, I give him the address to the storage facility that holds my dad’s car.
After picking up my dad’s car, I visit his grave site for one last goodbye. I don’t think he’ll ever know how much I miss him, even before he died. Greg had managed to ruin his life enough to separate us. I wish I could’ve seen who he truly was before I got with him, before I said yes to moving in with him, but I was so blinded by love at the time. Greg was this hotshot lawyer, and he had chosen me to pursue. At first, I felt like I was living in a fairy tale, I don’t know how it all turned into a nightmare.
Staring at my dad’s grave, I trace the letters of his name:
Francis Isaac Rose
1968 - 2023
Beloved Father
His grave is already rundown after one year of being gone, and he’s not where the officers usually get buried in the cemetery. Greg made sure of that. It was the only thing he did in funeral preparations. “He needs to be buried alone, Ariel, he was a disgraced officer, and my money will not be used to give him any kind of special honors.” Tears stream down my face at the memory. My dad wasn’t disgraced, he didn’t fall from grace like everyone said he did. Greg set him up, and no one will ever know the truth. That my dad was a hero, and such a caring man, and he didn’t deserve anything that happened to him.
“I’m so sorry dad. This is all my fault. If I had just listened to you, you’d still be here.” I hug his gravestone, trying to find the warmth I used to feel in his arms. Instead, I find exactly what’s in front of me, a cold, dirty stone. I kiss my fingers and tap the top of the gravestone. “I love you so much, even if I had the worst way of showing it in your last year of life. You would’ve made a great Grandfather to my baby. Bye Dad.” With those parting words, I got up and left.
A couple hours later, I find a small phone store and buy a cheap flip phone. Dialing in the number I had written down before leaving, I wait for her to answer.
“Hello?” Veronica answers. Veronica Andrews was my best friend and roommate in college. We had lost touch after I got with Greg, but I got her new phone number when I had seen her a couple years back. She was at a charity event representing her charity, “The Broken Hearts Foundation.” I’m not exactly sure what they do there, but she’s passionate about it.
She had seen me recovering a black eye in the bathroom at the charity and hugged me. She said that getting out of my situation was something she had seen often, and that she’d be here when I was ready. WHEN not if. She had more faith in me than even I did.
“Veronica. It’s me, Ariel. I’m ready.” She squealed. It took her no time to tell me she was happy for me, and that she had a job for me on her family’s ranch.