13
Penny
“You and Beck, okay?” Molly asks as we stand shoulder to shoulder in her backyard, watching Ryan watch Emma jump around on the hot pink trampoline he got her for her birthday.
Three years old.
How on earth is she three years old?
She looks more and more like Molly every day, as her wavy brown hair grows longer, and her beautiful green eyes grow wiser.
Where has the time gone?
I blink away the tears threatening to blur my vision and sigh. The past few weeks of my life feel like a blur. I’ve been so busy with secret appointments, blood tests, and google searching, that I’ve barely seen my little girl, and now, Ryan has permanently changed his schedule at work, to have her most afternoons.
It’s a good thing. It is. He pulled his shit together and stepped into his role in their family.
Em deserves a father like Ryan, and Molly deserves a partner that adores her the way he does. But there was a time when mine, Molly’s and Evie’s lives revolved around Emma. We made sure she always had one of us there, giving her our undivided attention. She never set foot in a day care centre. Never needed to. She had us. And now, that’s changing.
I shake off the selfish thought, and instinctively, as my eyes begin to sting, place my hand on my stomach. Immediately, I realise my mistake, and smooth down the material of my light blue sundress, hoping no one caught on, before glancing at Molly, who thankfully, is still completely enamoured by her little family.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“Penny. I saw you guys talking. It looked heated. What’s up?”
What’s up is that the man decided after two weeks of me ignoring his messages and calls, Emma’s third birthday party was the ideal place to try to corner me and force me into a conversation. We do need to talk. I can’t deny that. But this is not the place to do so.
“Oh, nothing. Same old thing. Don’t worry about it. We’re fine. Well, as fine as Beckett and I will ever be.”
But that’s another lie, isn’t it?
I’m getting good at telling those.
I hate keeping things from Molly and Evie. I do, and truthfully, all I want to do right now is lean on my best friends. I want to tell them everything. I want to ask for their advice. For their guidance. But, so far, I’ve managed to hide this pregnancy with baggy t-shirts and flowy dresses, and by blaming my new clothing choices on bloating and overeating, and, as much as it hurts me to do so, I will continue to, until I know that everything’s going to be okay.
Only a few more weeks…
Molly shakes her head at me, and I nervously pick at my thumbnail, until she calls out to Ryan, and asks him to grab another slab of beer from inside.
Just as he heads for the back door, Becketts’ voice booms across the yard. “Penny!” I jerk my head toward the house. “Penny! What the fuck is this?” A moment later, he steps out onto the grass, a blue and white piece of paper in his hand, and a scowl on his face.
All conversations going on around us halt, leaving only the sound of children playing as background noise.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I mutter to myself as I stomp my way over to him.
Someone’s been snooping in my bag.
“Inside!” I hiss as I snag the form from his hand. “You’re making a scene!”
He doesn’t listen, just stands there, staring at me, nostrils flared and breathing ragged. “Beckett,” I warn, shoving at his chest. “Get. Inside. Now.” When that doesn’t work, I lower my voice and look him in the eyes. For the first time since everything went down between us, he looks hurt, and I feel guilty. “ Please .”
He huffs, and before I can say another word, he takes the paper right out of my hand, turns around, and storms back inside. I do the same, slowly closing the sliding glass doors behind us before following him through Molly’s house, down the hallway and into her spare bedroom.
“What the fuck, Penny?” he barks as I close the door behind us. “What is this?”
With a heavy sigh, I turn to face the furious man pacing back and forth in front of the queen-sized bed in the middle of the room and say, “Look. I was going to tell you-”
“Oh, you were?” he replies condescendingly, gripping the print-out I got from the hospital so tightly the edges crease. “When? ‘Cos this appointment is in twelve fucking days, and you haven’t said a damn word.”
Probably after the fact, but I’m not going to say that.
“It’s an ultrasound, Beckett. I told you the last time we spoke that I needed to have some tests done. You’re freaking out over nothing .”
“No. I’m freaking out over you excluding me from my child’s life,” he retorts, tossing the form onto the bed behind him. “You’re seventeen weeks pregnant, and I only know that because it’s written on the damn paperwork!”
I roll my eyes. “Excluding you from my pregnancy is hardly keeping you from your child.”
“Oh, yeah?” he says. “And this?” He tugs a folded black and white sonogram image from the back pocket of his dark blue jeans. “You having this done and not telling me about it? What do you call that?”
Okay, that I feel bad about.
But, in my defence, that ultrasound was done to make sure the baby was alive , and I didn’t plan it. It just happened. And I had every intention of giving him that photo once I was sure the baby was healthy. Hell, I left it in my handbag after it was handed to me, because neither of us should be getting attached until we know…
“Look-”
“Is this your way of punishing me? Is that what’s happening?” he asks, tucking the photo back in his pocket as he continues to pace.
“No.” I sigh, because while that wasn’t my intention, I can see why he thinks that. “You’re not even allowed in the room with me for scans, anyway.” I tell him part of the reason I kept this appointment to myself, hoping it’ll be enough for him to drop the subject.
He freezes mid stride and turns to me. “Says who?”
“The government,” I say, throwing my hands in the air. “The hospital. Everyone . I don’t know. It’s on the paperwork. Read it. All the policies have changed since COVID.”
With a scowl, he spins around, collects the previously discarded form from the cream comforter, and holds it up to his face. “Fuck sakes,” he whispers a moment later before attempting to toss it across the room.
“Well, by all means, throw a bloody tantrum about it,” I say dryly, as the paper drifts slowly to the floor and lands silently at his feet. “You’re a grown ass man, you realise that, right?”
“I’ll sit in the waiting room.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I can call you after-”
“No,” he snaps. “ENOUGH!”
I recoil as if he just slapped me. “Who the fuck do you think you’re talking-”
“The mother of my child . Now, you’re going to stand your stubborn ass right there, and you’re going to listen to me.”
“The hell I am-”
“I’ve been trying to figure out how to do this,” he says, stepping forward and glowering down at me. “How to handle this delicately. But I’ve tip toed around you and your feelings for our entire relationship, and I’m done with it.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“Our relationship came with a fucking rule book, Penny. First, I wasn’t allowed to tell anyone about us, then, when they all eventually found out we were sleeping together, I wasn’t allowed to tell them how serious we were. I wasn’t allowed to sleep at your place, but you sure as shit got free run of mine-”
“That’s not fair-”
“I agree!” His outburst has me shutting my damn mouth.
I wasn’t that bad, was I?
“The list goes on and on, and you know what? Despite all of that, I fell so fucking in love with you it consumed me. Day and fucking night. It still does !”
“Then why did you-”
“Because I’m an idiot!” he roars. “I messed up.” He pounds his chest with one hand. “I told you I loved you at the worst possible time. We imploded, and I fucked up royally. I will regret that night for the rest of my life. I can promise you that, but I can’t change what happened, no matter how hard I wish I could. So now? Now, I’m done playing games. I’m done letting you push me away. You and that kid? You’re mine, Penny. Mine . I will fucking be there at that appointment. Inside, outside, in the damn car, I don’t care. I will be there, and then we’re going to tell everyone about our baby. Understood? No more secrets, or lies, or hiding. Enough . I want to tell my best friend that I’m going to be a father, and I want the mother of my child to stop hiding me and our baby away like a dirty secret!”
“Beckett-”
The speed in which he collects the form from the floor, hands it to me, and then manages to reach the door, is astounding. I jump as he swings it open, and the handle hits the opposite wall, but I don’t give him enough time to escape.
“Beckett!” I yell, running after him as he takes one long stride after another down the hallway. “You can’t just say all of that and then walk away from me!”
“Why not?” he calls over his shoulder. “I’ve seen nothing but your back for months!”
“Oh, real mature!”
I skid to a stop in the thankfully empty kitchen just as he reaches the back door, my heart beating out of my damn chest. Without so much as glancing back at me, Beckett steps back out into the party, and I stand there, glaring a hole into his back through the pane of glass, as I ask myself why all our arguments seem to end with one of us making some kind of dramatic exit.