Chapter 18 #2
“Thank you. They are.”
“I’m glad you’re here. I feel like I hardly know them.”
My smile sobered. “I’m glad too.” I reached up, gently running my fingers down her ponytail. “When was the last time you brushed your hair?”
She lifted a shoulder. “It’s been a couple days. It sounds stupid but lifting a brush through my hair makes me so tired. If I start, I can’t finish.”
I couldn’t imagine being so calorie deficient that brushing my hair felt like too much work.
She continued, “Tag usually does it for me. But I’ve been sleeping so much.”
“Tag brushes your hair?”
“Daily. Ever since I moved here.”
I blinked, unable to imagine what that kind of care might feel like. “That’s…so special.”
“It’s my favorite part of the day.” Then she smiled. “I think it’s his too.”
I bumped her elbow. “Where’s your brush?
I’ll get you cleaned up.” After I fetched her brush from her bathroom, I returned and had her turn sideways in the swing.
Careful not to rock us, I gathered her milk chocolate strands in my palm and worked on the knots for long, quiet moments.
Then I weaved her long hair into a thick braid.
“I feel like a burden.” Her words were quiet.
“Why’s that?”
“Just the timing of everything. I can’t even brush my own hair.” A tremble rose in her voice. “I didn’t mean to get pregnant on my honeymoon.”
My hands paused as I tried to hear what she wasn’t saying. “Do you feel embarrassed?”
She huffed. “I feel a little embarrassed. Pregnancies aren’t hard to prevent. So it feels careless, you know?” Her voice disappeared into rising emotions. “We are completely—unprepared for a child.”
“Oh, Bea.” My heart squeezed in pain as I wrapped a rubber band around the end of her braid. I turned her shoulders until she swiveled around in the swing to face me. “Listen to me.”
Hot tears welled in her eyes.
“Do not be ashamed of your love. Never.”
She blinked, tears breaking free and racing down her cheeks.
“I believe things happen for a reason. Even moments of careless passion. But I don’t think you’re crazy for feeling embarrassed or unprepared.
I think feeling thrown by all these changes is very normal.
I promise you, Bea, the moment you and Tag hold your baby”—my own voice quaked—“all the adjusting will fade into a distant memory. Children are a blessing.”
She nodded. “In my head, I know that.”
“And this baby just proves to the world you had an amazing honeymoon.”
A smile broke through her tears as she softly laughed. “We really did.” Light flickered in her eyes, a flame of hope in her discouragement as her hand came to rest on her belly. Her eyes flicked over the distant landscape as if she was looking for Tag. “I love him so much.”
“I know you do.”
“We didn’t even do anything, really. We walked around the Alamo, asked a few random strangers to take a picture of us by the river, and Door Dashed hamburgers to our three star hotel room.” She laughed again. “It was a lame honeymoon if you think about it.”
“You don’t need fancy if you’re with someone you love.”
She flashed me a grin. “Says the woman who went to Jamaica for her honeymoon.”
I pretended to love the memory even though it sent bile up my throat. My laugh sounded hollow. “Well, Jamaica wasn’t my choice.”
“So he surprised you? I don’t think I knew that. He sounds very romantic, Holls.”
“Yep. Very.” It was all the fake I could muster while I racked my brain for a way to change the conversation’s trajectory.
I had zero doubts that my days in the Jamaican sun couldn’t hold a candle to Tag and Bea’s slow strolls through the boring old Alamo.
Worried I might have doubts, Garrett silenced my complaints with limitless under-aged cocktails on the white sand, couples massages in a wind-whipped cabana, formal island dining, and two endless weeks worth of four-times-a-day sex.
How could someone have doubts in Jamaica?
How could someone be anything but happy and sweet on a vacation that cost thirteen grand?
Before I could respond, my phone rang in my back pocket.
Inwardly, I cringed, knowing the girls would ask who it was.
At home, I kept the ringer on silent so they didn’t experience miniature heartbreaks all the time.
But here, I took Meadowbrook’s forwarded hospitality calls so I had to keep the sound on.
As expected, Nora and Izzy flew down the porch toward my spot on the swing, knocking into us so that the swing jolted backward. “Is it Daddy? Is it Daddy?”
I glanced at the number. Florida. “I don’t think so girls.”
“Make sure! Answer!” They demanded so fiercely, I couldn’t refuse them without causing meltdowns.
I didn’t want to disappoint my poor love sick daughters right here in front of Bea.
Quelling the panic and rage rising in my chest, I lifted the phone to my ear only to hear a recording—some sort of scam call. Plastering on a smile, I said, “Nope. Wasn’t him.”
The reactions from the girls were as different as night and day.
Izzy crossed her arms across her chest, a deep frown pulling into her brow. Nora, on the the other hand, flopped across my lap and wailed, “He never calls.”
At some point, I had to tell Bea about Garrett and I, but the topic felt like a huge brick wall. How would I even begin to climb it? I hoped this moment with my girls wouldn’t force me to talk about him before I was ready.
I rubbed my hand across Nora’s curls, gently shushing her. “I’m sure we’ll talk to him soon.”
Izzy, face reddened with emotions, said, “You’ve been saying that since Nora’s birthday.”
And there it was. Nora turned five in April.
Afraid to look at Bea, I glued my gaze to my daughters.
“Can we call him?” Nora whined.
“Maybe later, okay?”
“Now! Right now!”
I swallowed. “Honey, Daddy is working right now.”
Humiliation climbed into my cheeks. My poor daughters had to live with Garrett as their father for the rest of their lives.
My stomach roiled at the thought of all the disappointment they would endure.
All the dreams of a father’s love that would never be answered in him.
All the ways they would question whether it was their fault all along—whether they were worthy.
I knew too well.
I gave them a wavering smile. “I’ll text him, okay?”
“You always say that.” Izzy spat.
“Will we ever talk to him again?” Nora’s gaze clung to me.
“I—I don’t know. I hope so. I think he’s just a little busy.”
They fell silent, understanding what I didn’t say: He’s too busy for us.
Maybe I shouldn’t have said that. I shook my head, aggravated by the screeching sound of my own platitudes.
They undermined the seriousness of his neglect.
In all honesty, I didn’t want us to look bad in front of Bea, and I didn’t want Garrett to look bad.
Why did I protect the man who tore my family to pieces? It didn’t make sense.
“Come on, Nora. Let’s play with Frienda and Kaylee.”
“Okay,” Nora moaned, slowly pulling herself off my lap.
They moved down the porch and plopped onto the front stairs, picking up where they left off with their dolls. Bea and I sat in silence as hopelessness reared its ugly head, wrapping its fingers around my throat. Why did he hurt our daughters like this? I could understand not wanting me, but them?
I reached across my lap, finding a nail bed on my left hand. I dug in, absentmindedly picking as I fought back the wave of anxiety cresting in my heart.
“Hollie?” Bea’s voice was quiet.
I jolted at her voice and quickly tucked my hand under my thigh.
I kept my eyes averted. “Yes?”
“The girls haven’t seen Garrett since…April?”
I took a shuddering breath, unable to keep the tears out of my eyes. “January, actually. The last time he called was April.”
She took a sharp breath of surprise.
“Where is he?”
I shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
The breeze picked up, brushing a curl across my forehead. It was warm, too warm—churning my embarrassment. Silently, I sat there, waiting for the questions to come. Waiting for her to drill me about what happened to us. But she didn’t.
When I finally looked up, her tear-rimmed eyes gently studied me. “I knew something happened.”
“What do you mean?”
“I had a feeling something was going on.”
“But why did you suspect that?”
“Because you’re here, Hollie.”
I let that sink in. My life with Garrett had simmered my relationships with family members down into vapors of mere formality—acquaintances and nothing more. Of course she suspected that something was wrong in the Aldridge paradise.
I pulled my eyes away from her, staring at my girls again—their colors turning into swimming blobs of pink, purple, and brown.
Bea’s hand rested on my forearm. “Talk to me, Hollie.”
“I—” I stopped, shaking my head. “It’s a long, humiliating story.”
“I have time.”
“I don’t even know where to start.”
“The beginning?”
I took a shaky breath. My siblings had lived in blissful ignorance of the Thompson secret for years. What should I leave out? I was able to skirt around the beginnings with Estelle and Jackie that night after the rehearsal dinner, but something told me Bea wouldn't let me off so easily.
“The beginning is ugly, Bea. I’ve never told anyone.”
“That’s a great reason to finally speak up.” I was silent for so long that her hand slipped down my forearms and grasped my fingers, “Did someone hurt you, Hollie? You’re scaring me.”
I shook my head, a few tears racing down my cheeks. “No. It’s—it’s about Mom and Dad. And the stupid way I reacted to something terrible they did. And my marriage—it fell apart, Bea.”
When I glanced up at her, I saw a mirror of my eyes and tears. But instead of fear, courage radiated from her gaze. She squeezed my hand, infusing me with a little bit of her strength. “Tell me.”