Finding Never (21 page)

“
Never,”
Lorri says, opening the door and gesturing wildly. “Come back
inside. We're playing charades!”

“
The
game of champions,” Ty says as Noah touches my arm lightly on
his way inside. I try to follow, but Ty stops me. “Everything
okay?” he asks, and there's this moment that changes everything
because despite my better judgment, I lie.

“
Yep,
everything's fine.”

Then
I spend the rest of the evening wallowing in how I've practically
ruined everything that Ty and I have built together by not telling
the truth. I try to explain to myself that I don't know for sure
yet, but that as soon as I do, I will tell him. It doesn't make
things any easier. Fortunately, with the help of a very small glass
of wine, I manage to make it through the evening which, actually, is
pretty amazing. I have friends and family and everything is so
fucking festive and joyous that it sort of knocks me back a bit.
It's been
years
since I've been a part of anything like this.
And even longer since I was able to whoop Noah's ass at Twister.

Ty
stays a bit more quiet than usual, watches me a bit more carefully,
which in turn makes me want to avoid him. By the time everyone else
is in bed and he and I are standing together in my room, he's ready
to get all pissy about it.

“
Are
you avoiding me?” he asks which sucks because I was.

“
Kind
of,” I admit, refusing to poison the air between us with any
more lies. Ty pulls off his shirt and throws it over the back of my
chair. He's been so cool this whole time and now he's getting
pissed. Not good. Not now.

“
Why?”
he asks me as I strip down to my bra and underwear. The fact that
I'm getting naked isn't lost o
n
him. “And don't try to distract me with sex,” he says as
I drop to my knees and reach for the buttons on his jeans. When I
glance up at him, he licks his lips and takes a massive breath.

“
Why
not?” I ask, all innocent like. I'm not trying to be deceitful
or to hurt him, but I need more time and besides, even after all this
time, I have yet to fulfill my promise of a blow job. Ty and I just
can't seem to last with any other activity than full throttle
fucking.

“
You
are such a tease,” he says as he wraps his ringed fingers in my
hair and opens his pants with his other hand. “How am I
supposed to say no to that?”

29

I
wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat.

Ty
is sleeping peacefully next to me, face blissful and quiet. I stare
at him for a long, long time and try to figure out if I should wake
him up and tell him. I could ask him to take me to the store and we
could do this together, find out together. I trace his nose with my
finger, brush my hand across his gently parted lips. He moans, but
he doesn't stir. He lays still, wrapped in my yellow sheets with one
hand curled above his head and the other resting on his belly just
above his cock. His eyelashes lay across his cheeks, dark and
perfect, and the sculpted perfection of his cheeks is even more
beautiful than I thought possible, bathed in moonlight and the soft
kiss of night.

I
lean over and whisper words across his mouth, soft breathy words
that I know he can't hear, but that I have to say.

“
Forgive
me, I lied to you.” I kiss his mouth lightly, so lightly that
my presence is as noticeable as a butterfly, soft and gentle. “I
want to tell you, but I have to know first. Once I do, no matter
what, I'll say it. I will. I know I will.” I rub my thumb
across one of Ty's eyebrows, the one with the ring in it, and smile
down at him, praying that he doesn't wake up and find me missing.

When
I stand up, I feel dizzy and lightheaded. I can't say if it really
is because I'm pregnant or because I'm just nervous, but it isn't
pleasant. I'm planning on going to Beth's room when I notice that
there are lights on downstairs. I have to see who it is and what
they're doing before I make any decisions. I don't want anyone else
to know except her, except for the woman who's my mom but isn't.

Luckily,
that's exactly who I find.

“
Beth,”
I say, feeling so small and miserable and helpless. I have fucked up
again. I have fucked everything up. I sort of want to die in that
moment. After all that's happened, I couldn't learn, couldn't do
one, tiny little thing differently. My sister is reading a book on
the couch, in the living room where we both lost the man who was our
daddy. I see my father's face floating above the coffee table and
have to close my eyes so tight they hurt. I hear the couch creak and
soon Beth is up and by my side, taking me into her arms and holding
me tightly.

“
What's
wrong, honey?” she asks, and I can't say what I have to say
because it is so friggin' stupid. Beth strokes my hair back and
sways back and forth with me in time to the wind outside the windows.
It's comforting enough that after a few swallows, I can actually
speak the words I hate to speak. As if I wasn't cliched enough, as
if playing the drinking-smoking-fucking bad girl wasn't enough, I had
to go ahead and layer on this, too.

“
I
think I might be pregnant,” I say and start to sob. After all
this time, all these fucks, this particular problem has never
happened to me, not ever. And now it has. With Ty, the one person
in the world that it should happen with. Just not yet. Not now.
“Help me.”

“
Oh,
Never,” Beth says, but she doesn't sound disappointed which is
nice. I had sort of thought she would be. Then again, she's
twenty-three with a two year old, so she really has no room to judge.
“You sound just like me when I found out. Ty?”

“
Of
course,” I say because thankfully, it can only be his. There's
no other possibility unless we're looking at the immaculate
conception here.
Thank God I haven't slept around lately.
I
imagine how I would've handled this back at the dorms, before I met
Ty, when I didn't know the names of the men I was sleeping with. It
might've killed me. “But I haven't told him because I might be
wrong, so … ” Beth nods her head and kisses me on the
forehead. I dash away my tears and vow that those are all I get. I
made my bed and now I'll sleep in it. Besides, I am sick and fucking
tired of crying.

“
Grab
your coat,” she says and then drives us to the store where we
stock up on four different brands of tests, all of them in pretty,
flowery packages that don't even begin to describe how I feel about
this. I wish there was a black and red box, one that said
Are you
knocked up?
on the side because that's the one I would get. It
would be even better if the little plus sign was a middle finger.
That, at least, would be somewhat funny. Nothing is funny right now.

The
clerk rings up the four boxes with raised eyebrows which makes me
absolutely, one hundred percent livid.

“
You
have a problem, you country bumpkin piece of shit?” I ask and
have to leave the store to keep control of my temper. It's been
quiet lately, much quieter than usual, and now this whole thing has
revived it to angry dragon status. At least I don't feel the urge to
go out and drown my pain. That feeling is almost completely gone
now, and I don't think it had anything to do with SOG or my celibacy
and that it has everything to do with Ty McCabe.

Beth
and I drive home in silence. I think she knows that I don't want to
discuss anything with anyone right now.

“
If
you need to talk,” she says when we pull up in front of the house,
but I don't, so I remain quiet and retreat into the downstairs
bathroom to piss on some plastic sticks.

Only
when the double bars and the little plus signs come up on all eleven
tests do I know how much trouble I'm really in.

30

I
can't look at Ty the next morning. I know he knows that something is
wrong, but I just can't tell him what that thing is. It's horrible,
so horrible. I have a feeling that he's going to freak the fuck out
when he finds out. What if he just runs away and leaves me like
this? What am I going to do without him? Still, I promised I would
tell him, so that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to clear the air
between us and go back to being honest. He got one fuck up, so I
should get one, too.

“
Ty?”
I ask as I come up behind him in the kitchen and see that he's in the
process of making us some toast. It's always us. He never just
makes food for himself. Even though he can barely boil an egg, I
appreciate that from the bottom of my heart. It's just one of those
gestures that you can never get enough of.

“
Yeah?”
he asks as I come in and sit down at the table behind him. My heart
is racing like a herd of elephants, drowning out any logical or
reasonable thoughts. I'm in a suspended state of panic right now,
stuck somewhere between knowing what I'm going to do and having no
fucking clue. I'm a twenty-one year old, unmarried college student
with a poor family and a boyfriend who's just quit his job and is
getting ready to move into the dorms.

Fuck.

“
I
was wondering if you'd like to walk to the park with me today.”
We've walked there several times before. It's just down the road
and although it isn't anything special, this park is nearly always
empty in winter giving it this sort of private feel that I like.
When I'm there, it feels like nothing in the world can interfere,
like I'm standing in my own little bubble with only the people I've
brought along with me. Ty, of course, has gone on every walk, so I
figure he'll go on this one just the same, not knowing that I'm going
to drop a friggin' bomb on his head when we get there.
Unfortunately, something in my voice must have tipped him off because
he puts his hands on the counter and closes his eyes.

“
This
has to do with you avoiding me last night, doesn't it?”
No
lies, Never.

“
Yes.”

“
And
the fact that you disappeared on me last night?” My blood goes
cold. He knows I left? Shit, damn, and fuck me. What does he
think? What does he suspect?

“
Yes.”

Ty
breathes out and doesn't breathe back in for the longest time, so
long that I'm suddenly afraid he's dead and gone. It makes my
stomach ache and my heart break in two. Of course, that's just me
overreacting to this horrible, cold lump of fear I have in my belly
that says Ty is going to run out on me, leave me alone with this
partially healed heart and this decision that hangs over my head like
my own, personal rain cloud.

“
Let's
go,” he says, grabbing the pieces of bread from the toaster and
handing one over to me. “Let's go and you can tell me whatever
it is that you need to tell me, but God, Never, if you break my heart
I don't know how I'm going to survive.”

31

Ty
and I bundle up in scarves and coats and boots. I wear a miniskirt
which he raises his eyebrows at because although it may not be
snowing, it's still cold as fuck outside. I put on knee high socks
and wear it anyway. Neither of us wears gloves.

We
manage to escape the house with India's help although I do feel
guilty about leaving my little siblings behind. We've had a few
amazing days at the park, days that rank right up there with some of
the best in my life. We took Darla and Maple down slides, watched a
family of birds in the trees and played chase with bitch-Never. Now
though, it's just me and Ty. Alone. He takes my hand in his as soon
as we hit the porch and pulls out a cigarette from his pocket with
the other. When he hands it to me, I stick it in the pocket of my
own coat. My mouth waters and my hands feel shaky, but I know I
can't smoke. Not anymore. I try to console my addiction by
promising it that this is oh so temporary and that I'll be back to
smoking in no time.
Yeah, nine fucking months,
it complains,
and I soon find myself leaning over next to Ty so I can catch the
hint of tobacco in the air, draw it into my lungs and bathe in it.
Pathetic. I'm as addicted to cigarettes as I was to sex.

“
Want
to tell me what this is about?” Ty asks as we walk down the
driveway and pause at the main road. No cars. Typical. It's always
been quiet out here. I hope that one day, when my mother is gone,
that I can live here again, make the house my own. Beth would
probably snatch it up first, but you never know. Besides, I'd have
to be able to travel if I did that, be able to leave at the drop of a
hat because I don't think I could be stuck in a town like this forever.
As a place to hang my hat it might be okay, especially if I was
between trips to Japan, India, France, Germany, wherever.

“
Not
yet,” I tell him, and I know how bad that sounds, but I want to
be sitting down, want both of us sitting down. It could be a bench,
a swing set, a slide, I don't care as long as we've got our butts on
something for support. After all, this is the kind of news that
rocks your world. Best to take it with the ground a few inches
closer to your head, just in case you pass out.