3. Sloane #2
He runs his hands through his hair like he’s losing his patience.
Me too, buddy. Me freaking too .
“I’m getting this all wrong. But please, Sloane, you can’t leave. You must stay. It’s?—”
“If you tell me I have to stay here because I’m the vessel for your progeny one more time, I’m going to strangle you, and then Cal will be T.J.’s only male role model. Is that what you want?”
As my husband’s eyes fall shut, I take the opportunity to dart for the door. The bitter fall air has just stolen my breath when I hear the footsteps chasing after me.
“I can’t do this,” I say, my entire being defeated. I don’t want to battle with my husband any longer. I don’t have it in me. I need to wrap my head around this before I talk to him again.
“Are you okay?”
My shoulders sag in relief at the sound of Lo’s voice. I turn around and shake my head. “I don’t freaking know. This isn’t how I thought my day would go.”
This isn’t how I thought my life would go. I never would have pictured myself like this: a pregnant almost-single forty-year-old .
Lo glances back at the building. “Why don’t you come up to the apartment? We can talk alone.”
I shake my head. There’s no way I’m going back in there.
She sighs and loops her arm through mine. “Fine, let’s walk, then.”
I glance down at Lo’s impossibly high black heels and then at my rose-gold Louboutins.
Neither are walking shoes. Especially in this neighborhood.
The inside of the office building is bad enough, but the outside?
On either side of the three-story brick building are almost identical structures.
Some have windows, and some don’t. A plastic bag sways in the wind of one of the open doors and garbage liters the street.
Across the street, is no better. The facade of the bar across the way has seen better days, the sign tilted to the side. It’s the place Sully and I took Murphy, Cal’s son, and T.J. the night we got into this whole mess, so I know, despite its outward appearance, that the food is incredible.
I point there. “The Grasshopper?”
Lo looks both ways, then guides me across the street.
Inside, we settle at the long oak bar. It’s smoother and glossier than it was a few weeks ago, like it’s got a fresh coat of lacquer. The man on the other side is wearing an Irish cap and a friendly smile. “What can I get you ladies?”
God, what I would do for a martini right now. Or a shot. A shot would definitely help. A little Irish whiskey, maybe.
On second thought, that’s a terrible idea.
Irish whiskey is what got me here in the first place.
It’s what we drank twenty minutes before we walked into city hall and got married.
We had it again the night we created this baby.
While the boys played on the old Pac-Man machine, Sully settled beside me at the bar and ordered two Irish whiskeys.
When he slid mine toward me, his blue eyes held mine as he repeated the words he said to me on our wedding day.
“A thousand todays with you will never be enough, sweetheart.”
The words were achingly sweet. They hit the same that night as they did all those years ago.
When we were young and so carefree. They’re words he used to murmur when he was feeling extra romantic.
Sometimes, right before he slid inside me, he’d whisper them between kisses.
They hit just right every time. They never felt cliché because he meant them wholeheartedly.
And I felt the same way. When we were good, there wasn’t another person in the world who could catch my attention.
He couldn’t be lured away either. At least not by another person.
In the end, what stole him from me was his job.
His dedication to the firm.
“I’ll take an iced tea,” I say to the bartender, trying to forget Sully’s words and all the emotions they drag to the surface.
Lo settles on the stool beside me. “Make that two.”
“I know what you’re going to say,” I murmur as the bartender saunters toward the stack of clean glasses.
It’s obvious where her allegiance lies. Yes, she’s my friend, but she loves the firm. It’s her home, and she’s working her ass off to save it. Plus, she’s in love with Cal. I’m not na?ve enough to think our friendship could trump all that.
Everyone has always put that firm first.
She turns on her stool and faces me. Despite the stress radiating off her, she’s glowing. I’m happy for her. It’s tempting to fall in line and do what I know she’ll ask just to keep her this happy.
But I can’t keep putting myself last. It’s time to choose me. To live my own life. It’s why I asked for the divorce. And if I can break my own heart to chase my dreams, then I can figure out a way to let Lo down easy.
“I’m not going to say anything. I just wanted to sit with you.”
“You’re not here to talk me into moving in to that dump now that I’m carrying a Murphy heir in my womb?”
Lo’s lips twitch. “If you’d heard Madame E going on about the incubator, you would be laughing too. She’s eerily accurate.”
I sigh.
Lo puts her hand on mine. “Seriously, she told Terry to be careful of Ginger. Wanna know the name of the woman he was with when he died?”
I shrug.
Her eyes dance. “Ginger.”
My mouth falls open.
“She told Cal he needed fins, hence the fish. Then she told me I’d need ten to replace all of them. It’s been two weeks since the sixth died, but Bubbles the Seventh is holding on strong.”
I snort. Okay, that is funny.
“My point is, I know that Sully sounded like an ass?—”
I glare at her.
Her green eyes flash with humor. “Okay, he absolutely is an ass most of the time.”
My muscles relax a fraction. It’s good to know I’m not the only one who sees it.
“But he was probably just thrown off because he hasn’t believed a single of Madame E’s predictions. He thinks she’s ridiculous. Yet today, you showed up and proved her right.”
“I can’t live there,” I tell her as the bartender slides our drinks in front of us. “I know you’re happy. I get that you’re swept up in this blissful haze where you don’t see how bad it really is?—”
She snorts. “No amount of bliss can hide how awful that place is.”
Relief washes over me. Thank god she’s not as delusionally in love as I thought.
“But we’re doing what’s necessary to save the business,” she continues. “Your reasons for hating the firm are valid, but you’re about to have a baby, and your six-year-old attends an extremely expensive school.”
With a slow sip of iced tea, I narrow my eyes at her. “Yeah, and?”
“Sully needs this job. If he loses the firm, how will he pay tuition and child support?”
I wince. Being reliant on Sully’s money is another sore point, but there’s no sense pressing on it right now. I’ve already aggravated too many tender spots today. “I can’t live with him, Lo.”
What I don’t say, what I can’t admit to anyone, is that I’m scared as hell.
I’ve just begun adjusting to life on my own, and now it’s all gone topsy-turvy.
The idea of having a baby on my own is terrifying, but I don’t know how to be around the man who still makes my heart skip a beat, because the last time I gave it to him, he was reckless with it.