Chapter 8 Savannah #2
“I’m sorry,” Delilah said, sitting up straight. “I know you didn’t just say you might be engaged.” I nodded, and she gave me a horrified look. “To who?”
I winced. “Stewart?”
“Who the fuck is Stewart?” Anna demanded, grimacing like his name tasted bad.
“You mean that guy from work you went out with a few years ago?” Claire asked, looking like she was going to scream or puke or both. “I didn’t even know you were still dating him! Savannah Grace!”
I bit my bottom lip, giving them all a sheepish look. “Maybe.”
“How are you maybe engaged to someone. Either you are or you aren’t,” Brittany said.
“When did it happen?” Tess asked.
“Right before I came home. He proposed, and I…I freaked out and ran here without giving him an answer to be with Mom. He’s been texting and calling, but I can’t bring myself to answer him with everything going on.”
Tess came and sat by me, taking my hand in hers. “Why did you freak out?”
I shrugged a shoulder and gnawed on the inside of my cheek. “I don’t know,” I whispered, suddenly feeling like crying. “He’s a nice guy. He’s stable, he works hard, he’s reasonably attractive, he doesn’t overcomplicate my life, doesn’t come with baggage. On paper, he’s perfect.”
“But does he make your heart race like you said Weston does? Make you feel seen?” Delilah asked, her face somber. “Can you imagine your life with him? Imagine him here with us? With all of us?”
“No.” Something inside me cracked at the admission, something vital that reverberated through the rest of me.
I’d never said that out loud, never let myself think it, really.
But no, Stewart wouldn’t fit in with my family.
He’d think Wild Creek was some podunk rundown town, he’d think he was above all of it, and want us to stay away in Dallas.
And before Mom died, I was happy to stay away, but now? Now I wasn’t so sure.
Tess wiped my cheek. “Sometimes, stable is the good choice. The right choice. Passion feels good in the moment, but it can turn into a fire that burns you down,” she said. When had my baby sister gotten so wise?
The words stung more than I had expected them to, maybe because I had told myself the same thing time and time again, even though it felt like settling for less.
“But that doesn’t mean you don’t still want to walk into it and get burned,” Delilah added. “Some people thrive in the fire.”
I looked at the rest of the girls, all of them giving me looks of concern and silent support, no matter what I chose.
I sniffled, wiping my nose on my sleeve.
“But what if I just love the idea of Weston?” I asked no one in particular.
“Like, the memory of him and what we had? What if I give everything up in Dallas and regret it?” What if I didn’t?
“There’s only one way to find out, Savvy,” Claire said, her eyes soft. “I know it’s scary. I was scared when I started to have feelings for Beau, and I can’t even imagine how terrified you feel with your situation, but you’re never going to know if it’ll work unless you go for it.”
Anna let out a soft grunt that sounded more like discomfort than a sound of agreement or disagreement.
I tilted to the side, looking past Claire to find Anna staring down at her stomach. “Guys…”
“I swear to God if you say your water just broke, I’m walking into traffic,” Delilah said with a horrified and disgusted look on her face.
Anna winced, gasping as she clutched her stomach. “Yeah,” she nodded, “my water just broke. I was having contractions earlier, but I thought they were just Braxton Hicks.” My jaw fell open like a busted hinge.
“Shit!” Delilah screeched, scrambling over the back of the couch like Anna’s head had started spinning The Exorcist style.
“None of us can drive!” Brittany yelled on the verge of tears.
Anna wailed, her face screwed up with pain. I stared at her wide-eyed, frozen.
Claire shot up, clutching her head, her face pale. “Okay, nobody freak out. We’re all capable, intelligent women. We can figure this out.”
“Somebody call my fucking husband!” Anna screamed, fracturing the barely there sense of calm, and everyone sprang into action.
“Joseph’s not answering,” Brittany said, hands shaking as she typed on her phone. “I’m calling Colt.”
“I’m calling Beau,” Claire said.
“And I’ll try Joseph again,” Delilah said.
Tess ran to the kitchen, grabbed ice, and wrapped it in a towel. She put it on the back of Anna’s neck. “I did this when I had Luke,” she said. “It’s a distraction from the pain.”
Anna let out quick, hard breaths like in the movies, and that’s when it hit me. Anna was having a baby. She was having a baby right now. On her couch, if we didn’t get her out of here soon.
“Nobody is answering their goddamn phone!”
Anna sobbed. “I can’t have this baby on my fucking couch, it cost a fortune.”
I looked over at the coffee table at my phone. I reached for it with a trembling hand. “I’m gonna call Weston,” I said, and everyone went silent.
“Are you sure?” Tess said.
“He’ll answer if I call.” I looked at Anna, who had a panicked look on her face. “Trust me. He’ll answer.”
It was just a ride to the hospital, I told myself. But a part of me knew it was more than that; the part the girls had begun to pry out of me after keeping her locked away for years. The part that knew when everything was falling apart, Weston was the one I could run to. The one I wanted to run to.
But I didn’t have the time to dwell on that now. I dialed his number, having memorized it as if it were my own. I put the phone to my ear, my breathing shallow.
The phone rang, and just like I knew he would, he answered before the first ring could even finish. “Savannah?”
“Weston,” I whispered, my voice cracking. Anna cried out, another contraction hitting her.
“What’s wrong? Where are you?” His voice was urgent, bordering on panicked.
I licked my lips. “Anna. She’s…she’s in labor. We’ve all been drinking and can’t drive her. Nobody is answering their phones.”
“Fuck. Okay. We’re at the Bull Pen, so they probably didn’t hear their phones. Don’t worry, Sav. We’re coming, okay?”
“Okay,” I rasped, nodding even though he couldn’t see it. “Please hurry.”
“I will. Sit tight for me,” he said and hung up.
I pulled the phone from my ear, staring at it. “They’re on their way. He said they were at the Bull Pen, so it was loud and they didn’t hear their phones.”
“I’m gonna kill Joseph,” Anna groaned, white knuckling the cushions.
Not even ten minutes later, the guys were here. Joseph carried Anna out to the car, Claire and Beau not far behind with their hospital bags. Colt grabbed Brittany, Delilah, and Tess.
But I was locked in some kind of trance.
I didn’t understand it. I couldn’t get myself to move, to leave with everyone else.
Maybe it was the alcohol, or how fast things escalated with Anna, or the fact that I was pretty sure, after talking to the girls, that I never stopped loving Weston.
Whatever it was, I was glued to the couch.
Weston knelt in front of me. “Savannah?” his voice was soft, gentle.
I blinked slowly. “Huh?”
“We gotta go meet this baby.” His eyes were so blue, so warm as he looked at me.
“The baby?”
He smiled. “Yes, the baby. She’s coming, Sav. You called me, remember?” He looked around the trashed room and chuckled to himself. “Or maybe you don’t. Anna’s sangria had me thinking I was Spiderman and could climb the walls once.”
“You answered,” I whispered. I couldn’t believe it. After all this time, he still answered on the first ring, even on a guy’s night, unlike the guy I had been with for two years, who would’ve let it go to voicemail.
Weston’s eyes searched mine, his head tilting over whatever he saw in them. “Of course I did.”
“You’ve always answered.”
He caressed the side of my face with his good hand. His touch was tender, reverent. “And I always will, angel. Now let’s go. Beau and Claire are waiting for us.”
I didn’t know where I stood with him or how to untangle my feelings for him, but I knew he’d always come for me, always be there no matter what.
So I nodded and took his hand as he led me out the door and to Beau’s truck.