Make Me Sin (32 page)

M
y mother reacts to my news with her typical aplomb; after a long pause, she simply says, “Oh, sweetheart.”

Then, because it’s the universe’s new favorite thing to screw with me, my father picks up the other phone extension in their bedroom and demands, “What’s ‘oh sweetheart’? What’s wrong?”

“Hi Dad. How are you?” I stall, because he’s not going to react nearly as well as my mother. In fact, I’m betting that some time in the next five minutes he’ll be threatening a lawsuit and throwing things at walls.

“Chloe,” replies my father firmly, “I heard your mother’s tone. Tell me what’s wrong with you.”

Ha. Where to start?

“Technically there’s nothing wrong with me, Dad, it’s just . . . I um . . .” I take a moment to try to gather my courage. When my courage remains cowering under the sofa, I close my eyes and go it alone. “I’m pregnant, Dad. I haven’t seen a doctor yet, but I just took a home pregnancy test and it’s positive.”

Furious silence crackles over the phone. My mother says gently, “Thomas.”

“It’s all right, Mom. I’m mad at me, too.”

“It’s his?”

My father refuses to even speak A.J.’s name. I didn’t tell them about Heavenly, or really any of the details of what happened that day. I only told them we’d broken up, but they’ve witnessed firsthand the state I’ve been in over the past few months, and dislike him intensely just for that.

Well, my mother dislikes him intensely. My father might actually be plotting A.J.’s death.

I listen to my father’s irregular breathing on the other end of the line, and bow my head in shame. “Yes, it’s his. Listen, I know this is . . . it isn’t ideal—”

“Does he know?” my father interrupts.

The thought of informing A.J. he’s going to be a father makes my stomach drop to somewhere in the vicinity of my knees. Talk about awkward conversations. It occurs to me with a blast of disgust that my child might grow up spending alternating weekends with a hooker named Heavenly.

But no. A.J. won’t want any part of this. Remembering the look on his face when he dismissed me so callously is a grim reminder of just how much he won’t want to be involved with anything that has to do with me.

“No. I just found out, right now.”

“And I assume since you’re informing us that abortion is out of the question?”

I’m shocked at the hardness in his voice. “I’m not getting an abortion!”

My mother says soothingly, “Of course you’re not, darling. No one is suggesting that.” Her voice gains an edge. “Are we, Thomas.”

That last bit is directed to my father. I picture them on opposite sides of their bedroom, glaring at one another.

My father starts barking instructions. “You’ll go to London. You’ll stay with your grandmother until it’s born. Dr. Mendelsohn will handle the prenatal care and you’ll have to deliver at home, but it’s the only way to keep it out of the press so that son of a bitch doesn’t find out—”

“What’re you talking about?” I interrupt, hoping that somehow I’ve misinterpreted what he’s said. He can’t be saying what I think he’s saying.

My father growls, “I’m talking about doing the only logical thing that can be done with this disaster, Chloe: private adoption. The records will be sealed, so no one will be able to find out the child’s identity. And once it’s over, we’ll put it behind us. You’ll come home and it won’t be mentioned again.”

He
is
saying what I thought he was saying. The wind is knocked out of me. Immediately following that, I erupt like Mount Vesuvius.

“You are
not
telling me right now that you think I should
hide
a child from his father, right Dad? I’m
not
hearing that, because if I
am
, I’m hanging up this phone and it’s going to be a very, very long time before you and I speak again.
If ever
!
”

Dead silence on the other end of the line.

Finally, with chilling softness, my father says, “He
abandoned
you, Chloe. He took you in when you were most vulnerable, promised to protect you, promised
me
he would protect you, and then he threw you out when he was tired of you. You’ve refused to tell us the details, but I suspect that’s the case. Tell me I’m wrong.”

I can’t, of course. He’s exactly right. But the fact remains, I have an obligation to tell A.J. about this baby, even if I’d much rather stab out his eyes with a fountain pen.

“Here’s what’s going to happen, Dad. Because I know you’re upset, I’m going to pretend we didn’t have this conversation. Then I’m going to make an appointment with a doctor—
not
Dr. Mendelsohn, but a doctor of my own—and then when I’m sure everything is all right with me physically, I’m going to inform A.J. What he chooses to do with the information is his business. And then I’m going to prepare for being a single, working mother, who’s going to make the best of things—” my voice breaks because I’m crying again “—and be the best damn mother I can be. And if you’re interested in having any kind of relationship with
your grandchild
, you’re going to give me moral support even if it kills you. If you’re not interested, that’s your choice. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go vomit!”

I hang up the phone and run back to the toilet, over which I suspect I’ll be spending the better part of the next few months hanging my head.

T
he two-week period between finding out I’m pregnant and the
wed
ding are probably the two most bizarre and emotional of my life.

Because Kat and Nico both have posted pictures of their wedding flower samples to their various social media accounts with credit to Fleuret, the phones at work ring off the hook. Literally. I have to turn off the ringers because the constant shrill noise starts to drive me insane. Magazines request interviews. The local news requests a feature. Every socialite, event planner, and bride-to-be within the continental United States crawls out of the woodwork, clamoring for us to give them quotes on their parties. I have to hire three freelance designers just to handle the daily delivery orders that won’t stop pouring in.

It’s thrilling and exhausting, but most of all I’m grateful for the distraction. I’ve decided not to tell A.J. until after the wedding. It’s going to be bad enough posing for bridal party pictures together, I can’t imagine the hell it would be doing it after he’s told me the baby isn’t his.

At least, that’s the kind of dick move I assume he’ll pull. My expectations of him doing the gentlemanly thing and offering to be involved, even just financially, are nil. He’s already proven he’s not a
gentleman. And if nothing else, he’s taught me to expect the worst.

Though I learn that morning sickness should be renamed morn
ing
-
noon-and-night sickness, the days fly by. I bury my pain in work. I see
a doctor, who confirms what I already know, along with confirming
A.J. didn’t pass me any nifty STDs. I spend too much time surf
ing the web for homeopathic remedies for nausea and books with titles
like
Surviving Pregnancy: A Guide for Mothers without Partners
.

I’m aware that I’m depressed, but there’s not much I can do about it, so like everything else in my life these days, I just accept it as my lot. By the time
People
magazine calls to schedule the interview for the feature on Fleuret they promised Kat and Nico in return for the exclusive on their wedding photos, my emotional roller coaster has taken its toll and I’m strangely numb. I give the interview, smiling woodenly when they take my picture, answering all their questions with a sense of detachment, as if it’s someone else I’m talking about. As if this hasn’t been my dream for years.

I don’t think I have dreams anymore. I think they all died the same day I did, back on that sunny afternoon in spring.

T
he morning of the wedding I wake early, with a terrible sense of doom hanging over my head.

I can’t shake it. Even after I’ve gone for a run, showered, and dressed, I still feel like there’s a laser target on the back of my skull, or that the major earthquake LA has been waiting for is finally about to strike. I gather my bridesmaid’s gown, shoes, jewelry, and undergarments—I’ll
be getting dressed at Kat’s suite at the hotel after I’ve supervised the setup of the flowers—and head out to my car. The wedding’s at five o’clock, and all the flowers need to be in place for pictures by three, so I’m on a tight schedule. But when I open my driver’s door I stop dead in my tracks, looking at what’s been left in a corner of my windshield.

It’s not an origami bird this time. It’s a shiny, metal LAPD badge.

It’s Eric’s badge.

Fear grabs me around the throat and squeezes. I quickly look up and around, but he’s nowhere in sight. I swallow, heart racing, and pick up the badge. I turn it over in my hand; one of those round, yellow smiley face stickers is stuck on the back.

I’ve never seen anything so sinister.

As fast as I can, I stuff the badge into my purse and load my things into the car. In less than two minutes, I’m pulling out of the parking spot, headed to the shop. On the way I call my father. He doesn’t pick up on his cell, or at the house, so I leave a message on his machine.

“Dad, it’s Chloe. I just found Eric’s police badge on the windshield of my car. I have it with me. I’m a little freaked out. Can you call me when you get this please?”

I hang up, taking a corner too fast, ignoring the shout of the pedestrian I nearly run over. By the time I get to the shop I’m a shaking mess.

Trina’s already there, loading the cocktail table arrangements into delivery boxes. She stops short when she sees my face. “What’s wrong, boss?”

I dump my handbag on the counter and run a trembling hand through my hair. “Eric left his badge on my windshield this morning.”

She gapes at me. “Holy shit! He was at your apartment? Isn’t that a violation of the restraining order?”

“I don’t know. The order says he has to stay at least three hundred feet away from me. But I was parked down the street because there’s never any stupid parking at my place. And I don’t even know if it counts if I don’t see
him
.”

“But leaving his badge, that’s like, intimidation or something! Seeing as how you’re the one who got him fired!”

I shoot her a death glare. “Thanks a lot.”

“I don’t mean he didn’t
deserve
it, Chloe, I’m just saying that a former police officer leaving his former badge on the windshield of his former girlfriend—who just happens to be the girlfriend he beat up, resulting in his exit from the police force—that’s totally fucked up.”

“I’m aware. What I don’t know is if we can do anything about it.” I pull at my hair. “And he has to pick today, of all the days!”

Trina stops loading the boxes to stare at me. Behind her glasses, her brown eyes don’t blink. “You don’t think he’d do anything at the
wedding
. . . do you?”