27. RJ
RJ
W hat started as “a night here or there” has turned into two weeks straight of us living together.
We’ve gone back and forth between our places depending on when Sophie is around.
I’ve almost convinced her to move in, but we still want to talk to her kids first, and they don’t get home for another few weeks.
We agreed we needed to talk to Raven, but she was busy with a deadline at the newspaper when we got home.
Each time I bring it up, Summer agrees we need to, but the worry creeps in, and I distract her.
Usually with my dick. Sometimes it’s with The Dread Pirate Roberts.
Either way, we end up kicking the can farther down the road.
When I get back from my morning run, Summer’s car is gone.
I’ve spent years without this woman, and now that I have her, I don’t want to spend a second without her.
It’s absurd. She has to work. She’s showing a house.
She’ll be back shortly. But it already feels like an eternity.
It’s the first time our work schedules haven’t aligned since we’ve been back.
As I’m cooling down, doing my post-run stretches, I look over and notice the garbage can isn’t on the street.
I glance at my watch. Fuck me. It’s trash day.
Of course my teenager didn’t do the one chore she has.
She can give me a whole speech on how misogynistic it is to label taking out the trash a “boy chore”—when she’s perfectly capable of doing it—and then not do it.
I race into the house. I’ve got about fifteen minutes before that truck rumbles up this hill, and Mickey’s gonna be pissed if he drove all the way up here for nothing. He’ll probably give me hell the next time he sees me at the bar.
After I grab all the trash on the main floor, I head upstairs to empty the rest of the cans. I should probably check Sophie’s bathroom just in case. She hasn’t been here much this week since she’s been spending the night with some friends, but knowing her, she hasn’t emptied it in weeks.
When I walk in the bathroom, her trash can is overflowing.
And it has no bag in it. Why is it stuffed with toilet paper?
Knowing better than to go through a teenager’s trash, I grab the can and attempt to empty it into the almost-full bag I’m holding.
I dump it blindly, but shit falls out and something plastic clatters to the tile floor.
Holy shit. Is that a pregnancy test?
Sophie is sixteen. Is she already having sex? It feels like an elephant is sitting on my chest as my vision tunnels, my sole focus on the words “Pregnant” on the stick in front of me.
A rumble sounds in the distance snapping me out of my haze. I scoop up all the trash on the floor as I race out of the house right as Mickey drives up. I meet him at the curb as he climbs out of the cab, giving me a fist bump before emptying my can into the back of the truck.
I feel like I’m on autopilot as I try to process the news.
Mickey drives off, and I stumble into the house.
I strip off my clothes as soon as I walk in the bathroom and set my watch and phone down on the counter as I walk into the shower.
When the cold water hits me, I don’t even flinch. I feel numb.