Chapter 20 Kari
TWENTY
KARI
Max climbed in the truck, started it, and took off towards the house.
He didn’t say a word.
His jaw was working overtime and he took off his hat and tossed it into the backseat, running his hands through his hair.
He didn’t even look at me.
I was in too much shock to say anything, my brain too clouded to even process what I should do or say or what this little meet-and-greet meant for my future. For Max’s future. For our future...or a lack thereof.
This might just be the evening that things come to an end with Max.
My mind traveled back to the afternoon that things came to a sudden halt with Blaine.
Images of his face when I told him the news flashed through my memory like a wrecking ball.
The words he spat at me. The way the door sounded when he left and the sound of it opening again a few days later.
The hope that snuck in my heart through the cracked pieces when he walked into our bedroom.
The look on his face, the look of dejection that demolished any remaining pieces of my heart into splinters.
The sound of the closet opening and the zipper of his bags as he pulled them open. The coat hangers jangling on the metal rods as he took his stuff out of the closet. The sound of my sobs filling in the dead spaces.
The feeling of his breath, hot on my face, as he kissed me goodbye. The sound of his voice telling me he just wasn’t ready and that he couldn’t do it. That he was leaving me.
That he was leaving us...in every sense of the word.
I’ll never forget hearing how empty the house sounded when the front door slammed shut. The last time he’d ever shut it.
I jumped back to reality when Max touched my hand.
“Hey,” he whispered, his voice soft. I glanced quickly up into his eyes. The irritation was still there, but concern overshadowed it.
I tried to smile, but was afraid that I’d lose the small amount of control I had managed to hang onto. I looked in front of me. His house, our house for however much longer—weeks, days, but probably minutes—sat in front of us.
I remembered the first time Max brought me to his home.
The night after we went to Maisano’s the first time.
How I felt such a connection to Max that night.
I ended up sleeping in his bed. I felt my face ease with a smile as I remembered my surprise the next morning.
Random sex was good for me, but I never stayed the night.
It implied too much. But with Max, it just happened as naturally as anything.
Everything was easy with Max.
But feeling it end wouldn’t be.
We sat quietly in the truck, the engine off, both of us sort of working through our thoughts.
He took my hand in his and traced the lines in my hand with his thumb.
“I know all the lines in your palm,” he said, more to himself than to me.
“I know every bend and every deviation. I know them better than my own.”
I smiled through the tears that were stinging my eyes.
“I don’t know what’s going on, but I have an idea,” he said softly.
“I doubt it,” I said, taking my hand from his and climbing out of the truck.
I heard his door open and close behind me.
He met me at the front door, unlocking it and turning off the alarm system.
I sat my purse down on the couch and looked around.
I suddenly felt out of place, so unwelcome.
It was like the house now knew my secrets and was spewing me out like the toxic mess I was.
A ruiner of dreams—that was me.
I couldn’t ruin his, even if it meant ruining myself.
“So?”
“So what?” I asked.
He looked at me patiently. The lines at the sides of his eyes were deep. He was tired. He’d been working so damn hard and now I was going to drop this into his lap. I was going to ruin the image he had of me in his mind; he’d never look at me the same.
But he would understand why I’d been pushing him away. Why the expiration date on our relationship was drawing closer.
“Can we not talk about it?” I asked hopefully.
He heaved out a breath. “If that makes you happy, but we’re gonna have to discuss it sooner or later, Kari.
Something happened with you and him and by the look on his face, he’s not gonna let it go.
And I’ll tell ya what,” he said, taking a step towards me, “I’m not about to sit around and let that happen.
There’s not a chance in hell, sweetheart. ”
“Oh, Max,” I said, my voice cracking. The tears flew down my face like it was a race to stain my dress. I sat on the couch and put my head in my hands, fear mixing with the rejection that was barreling towards me head on.
This was going to happen sooner or later...
“I want you to know that I love you and I’m really sorry for leading you on this long,” I said through my wet fingers.
He sat beside me, trying to pull me into his lap but I resisted. I needed space for this.
Space is something I needed to get used to real quick.
I took a deep breath and gathered my courage.
It was going to take all I had to nuke the best thing that had ever happened to me.
Max
She wouldn’t let me hold her.
There were a lot of things she refused me in our relationship, but that was a new one.
She always let me hold her, love on her.
She may protest and throw up a bit of a fight, but she always let me in the end.
The physical part of our relationship she never had a problem with.
Hell, it was how I communicated with her half the time.
I told her I loved her and she’d balk; I’d love her body and she reciprocated.
So why not now?
“What’s goin’ on?” It sounded more like a plea than I intended for it to, but I didn’t really care. It killed me not to ask her in the truck, but I knew she was working through whatever had just happened and I knew whatever happened was huge and would be comin’ out regardless.
She looked at me sadly, mascara running down her cheeks. “I knew Blaine a long time ago,” she began, her voice wavering. “We were engaged, actually.”
I started putting those pieces together in the truck, a jigsaw coming to life.
“We were going to move to California. We had a marriage license and everything.” Her voice broke and a sob hicupped in her chest.
Good lord...
“I had a surgery when I was a little girl, not long after Mom died. When I was a teenager, I had a lot of cramping and stuff. The doctor said I’d probably never be able to have a baby. There was a lot of scar tissue and stuff.”
She fought back the sobs that were trying to escape. She was struggling to maintain control and the sight killed me. Watching her break broke me.
I reached for her again, not sure where this was going. The words coming out of her mouth seemed to physically hurt her, pain etched across her face. I just wanted to hold her close, but she pushed away. Again.
My breathing was shallow. I hated seeing her in pain like this. I didn’t really even care at that point what happened between her and Blaine. I just wanted to make her better.
She swallowed. “Blaine knew what the doctor had said and he was fine with it because he didn’t want kids anyway.
His parents were drunks and his brother was an asshole, so he didn’t want kids.
He just wanted to live free and happily, not responsible for anything or anyone.
Then one day I missed my period and was really sick and.
..” Kari looked to me, the whites of her eyes red.
“I was pregnant. I was due on my birthday.”
Her hands flew to her stomach without her even realizing it. I wanted to reach out and grab her, hold her to me, but I was afraid it’d shake her outta the moment and she’d stop talking. I could tell she’d held this in for so long, I wanted her to get it off her chest.
For her good. Not mine.
I tried to process what she said, to wrap my head around the points she was making, but I couldn’t get passed the look on her face.
Motherfucker!
“And I was so fucking happy about it.” A smile inched its way across her face.
She looked at me, almost embarrassed. “I’ve never been as excited as I was once the shock wore off.
It was like—like I did something right. Like I wasn’t a failure.
I had never thought much about carrying a baby because I was young and Blaine was my first real relationship, but once I knew that there was a child inside me.
..” Her eyes misted over and she looked to the floor.
“It felt like the most natural thing in the world. I felt like I was a woman.”
I wanted to interject, to tell her a million reasons why she was a woman, but she kept going.
“I couldn’t wait to tell Blaine. I waited for him to come home from work, already imagining which room would be the nursery and how we’d decorate it. I was making mental lists of baby names and things that my mom had read to me as a child that I wanted to read to him or her.”
The tears were pouring down her cheeks, her chest rising and falling so hard. I reached out and brushed some of the tears away with the pad of my thumb, but it was pointless. Each tear was replaced with three more. She didn’t lean into my touch as she usually did. She just sat there like a stone.
It broke my damn heart.
“Blaine came home that night. It was late. I was sitting on the couch...” Her voice trailed off. She turned her head slowly towards me, dragging her eyes with it. “I told him.”
The simplicity in her voice told me the conversation was anything but simple.
“He called me a bunch of names. Said I must have tried to get pregnant on purpose.” She sat up taller, her voice laced with anger.
“He said I wasn’t any better than the other girls out there, trying to trap him with a kid.
He wasn’t home twenty minutes from the time he got there until he left again. ”