Fated (14 page)

Chapter Twenty-One

I stop at the walk up that leads up to Austin’s house and I smile knocking on the door. He has been amazing and has really been helping out with Kaylee, spending at much time with her as has been possible. We are also planning her first birthday party together; I know it’s a big deal for him considering that he wasn’t there for when she was born. The door opens before I can knock and he smiles at us, and instantly Kaylee reaches out for him. It makes me happy that everything seems to be working out but there is still this awkward
tension that manages to sneak in between us, especially if we are alone around one another late at night.

It hasn’t been easy but with much work, I am sure,
on both of our parts we have managed to keep a bit of distance, and by distance I want to clarify that I mean we haven’t slept together.

“Hey, Kay,” he says as he carries her into the house and leaves the door open so that I can walk through after them. I watch him carrying her into the kitchen as she is laughing, and I can’t help but smile. I can’t help but slowly fall farther in love with him as much as I convince myself that I am not.

“So, how’s the planning with the party coming along?” Austin asks turning to look at me and smiling.

“It’s good. I can’t figure out where I want it to be at though.”

“Why don’t you just have it at your apartment, or here?” He pauses looking over to me, “There’s no point in paying for a place when you have a view like that, plus she’s going to love it no matter where you have it.” He pauses turning around to look at me and the sight of him standing in his house with our child in his arms is almost too much for me to take.

The day of the party I am running around like I am insane. I have decided to just throw the party at my apartment, but you think that because I plan events for a living that planning one for my child would be the easiest thing ever, but I was very wrong it has been more stressful than any party before it. We had managed to make a make shift dance floor on the balcony. I’m freaking out as I pull the cake out of the oven but I let my arm too far into the oven and I burn my forearm on the top of the oven.

“Ow, shit,” I swear as I pull my arm out of the oven cradling it in my other hand.

“Soph, are you alright?” I hear Austin say from behind me. I can only guess that he has just gotten here.

“Yeah, I just burnt my arm.” He steps up to me and smiles.

“Let me help,” he says holding on to my arm and ushering me over to the sink. I feel the water begin to slide over my burn and take the stinging sensation out of it. “Is that helping?” he asks in my ear and his breath on my ear almost sends me over the edge, god it’s been too long since I have had sex. I let my eyes look up to him and out eyes lock. We stand in an intense gaze and I have to contain every ounce in my body to not lunge at him.

“Look at the birthday girl,” I think I hear Mar say in the distance as the door closes. “Oh, Kay let’s leave mommy and daddy alone for another moment.” She instantly says and walks back into the room. We both let out a light laugh and look away. I curse Mar in my mind as he turns the water off, grab
s the cake pans out of the oven and puts them in the fridge, and then walks to the bathroom. I hear Kaylee’s door open again and her and Mar walk out.

“Oh, sweetheart, you look so pretty.” I say walking over to her and lifting her up.

“Did we ruin the moment?” Mar whispers to me and I wave off her question.

“It’s probably for the best anyways.” I shrug off and she looks back to me with sad eyes. “Don’t worry about it
, Mar.”

“Honestly,” she pauses and looks back to the bathroom and lowers her voice, “I just want the two of you to get back together.”

“Oh, what happened to miss, ‘My sister is off limits.’?” I try and most her causing her to laugh aloud.

“That was before I saw the two of you together.”
She admits.

“Thanks, that’s comforting.” I tell her, but we stop talking as we hear the bathroom door open and Austin walks out holding something. “What’s that?” I ask him.

“Burn cream.”

“Burn cream, we have burn cream?” I ask turning towards Mar, knowing that she would have been the one to buy it, but she just shrugs her shoulders. He rolls his eyes as Mar walks back into the bedroom and he motions for my arm. I let my forearm fall into his hand and I gasp as the cold ointment slides on my arm.

“Better?” he asks me and I smile, nodding my head. “Soph, I have to ask, why are you baking the cake yourself? You know plenty of bakers.”

“I know, but there is just something about making her first cake.” He smiles looking up to me.

“Can I help finish it?” He asks, shyly.

“Yes.”

After it has time to cool down I take it out, of course though it has taken longer than I planned for so I am rushing trying to finish it, as the party is scheduled to start in three hours, and my family as well as Jack have flown in from around the country which is why I want everything to be perfect.

“Icing, icing, icing,” Austin sings to himself as he spreads it across the cake. His song makes me laugh to myself, “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing,”
I say, smirking.

“Do you like my song?” he smiles to me.

“Oh, it’s perfect.” I joke and roll my eyes continuing to ice my side of the cake.

“Don’t make fun of my song,” he says and points the spatula at me, but he points it with such force that the icing he has on it flies off and splatters onto my face. I gasp as I look up to him and for a split second I can see a brief worried look on his face.

“Did you just fling icing onto my face?” I ask him trying to act serious but the smile forces it’s way onto my face.

“Yes,” he grins at me as I reach into the bowl of the homemade icing, with my own spatula, and fling it back to him, which hits him in the cheek and he flitches at the impact.

“Oh no, you did not.” He says reaching into his bowl and pulling out a handful of icing and trying to smear it onto my face. I duck and with the motion it ends up throughout my hair. I can’t help but laugh.

“Ah,” I squeal as I lob a handful of it towards him and he ducks as it splatters all over the wall behind him. He
sends one right back at me; finally as I scrape the last of the icing out of the bowl I look to the half iced cake that is sitting on the counter and launch it at him. The cake hits his face and I see it explode in a hundred crumbs around him and he laughs, chasing after me as I try and run around the island in the middle of the kitchen. He finally wrestles me down to the ground and pins me in place.

“This isn’t fair,” I yell, “You are much stronger than I am.” He only laughs
as he wipes his face all over mine spreading the icing from his face to mine and I cannot control my laughter as he pulls down the remainder of the cake and spreads it all over my face.

“Stop, stop, I surrender,” I say as I let my hands fall to the floor. He stares intently into my eyes and he brushes a piece of my iced hair behind my ear, and I cannot break the connection in our gazes. I hear footsteps coming into the kitchen.

“What is going on-,” I hear Paige trail off as she rounds the corner and sees me lying on the ground with Austin lying overtop of me and both of us covered in icing, “I don’t even want to know how this started.” She says instantly turning around and walking back into her room.

“Is she mad?” he asks me as he stands up.

“Nah, as long as it gets cleaned up.” He nods his head and then looks back up to me.

“So, now that we have demolished the cake, what are we going to do?” he asks me reaching down and helping me up. I walk over to my bag and grab out my phone.

“Hey Patty, it’s Sophie,” I say into the receiver as I look up to meet Austin’s wondering gaze. “I have a favor to ask of you.”

Four hours later we are all standing around as the beautifully decorated cake is sitting in front of Kaylee and she is laughing along with us or at us… I’m not really sure.

“Sophie,” I hear my mom
say after we blow out the candles.

“Yeah, mom,”

“Is that icing on your wall?” She says pointing up to the very top of the wall almost to the kitchen and Austin and I look to one another and can’t help but smirk.

Kaylee falls to sleep around eight and Austin offers to lay her down as I sigh and everyone begins to leave and I say bye to my family. Mar goes with our parents back to their hotel to stay for the night and Paige walks with her current boyfriend back to his apartment.

“Sophie,” I look over as Jack is standing next to me, “I have so much to thank you for.” He says looking over to me. I know what he is talking about. When Austin left Miami he was actually crushed. When I went to him hoping to find Austin I could tell that he had been looking for him since he left. The second that he saw me he got upset telling me that he didn’t fucking know where he was and that it’s what was he wanted. At first I thought that he might have meant that he didn’t want to know where his son was, that it was better off that he wasn’t there with Jack, but I understand now that he meant Austin didn’t want to be found. I look across the room as I hear the bedroom door shut and Austin strides over to us. Our eyes lock only for a moment and then both of us look away.

“When are you two going to give in and realize that you’re supposed to be together?” I hear Jack say under his breath.

“Well son,” Jack walks over to Austin and pulls him in for a hug. I watch as he whispers something into his ear and Austin looks stunned, pulling back and his dad places his hands on his shoulders, “Call me sometime, kid.” And then turns around looking to me, “Soph, she just continues to take my breath away. I wish that you wouldn’t have moved to far away, I miss spending time with her.” He embraces me and then walks out of the door. The apartment is quiet again, and I look up to Austin as he sends me a questioning glance.

“He-,” His sentence falls and I know what he is going to ask about.

“I told you that he saw me before I had her. He put two and two together and I was so hormonal when he asked I just started crying. He helped out a lot right before I had her. Came by regularly afterwards and spent a lot of time with her.”

“I’m sorry; I should have never dropped off. I should have left some form of way for you to get a hold of me. I’m glad he helped you out when I couldn’t.”

“Stop,” I tell him walking into the kitchen and reaching into the fridge, grabbing a beer out of it, and pushing it to his torso as I walk outside. I hear the door shut behind him and I walk over to the balcony looking out onto the park. I hear the music cut back on as Ateryu’s I’ll Wait for You comes around me. I feel his presence behind me without even having to turn around.

“Dance with me, Soph.” he says and I turn around and smirk up to him. I watch him slowly back up a bit and extend his hand to me.

I forgot how perfect this song is for our situation and possibly the worse thing is that we both know it. I hear the low hum next to my ear as I rest my head on his shoulder as he leads me around my balcony.

“Today was pretty crazy.” He says to me and I look up to him confused. “It’s just when we met did you think that we would ever have a child together?”

“Not at all,” I look up and he seems to be a bit hurt by my words, “Please, you were a man whore.” And he laughs out.

“I could see it.”
He admits.

“Really?”

“Yeah, why is that so hard to believe? Look, I thought that you were beautiful and you seemed so sweet. Although a little hurt and if I’m honest with you I just want
ed to right the hurt.” I am truly speechless. “You just had that effect on me, it was as if the moment I saw you I knew that you would change my life.” I’m stunned and I can’t think of one good thing to say back to him.

We dance for the length of the song until it patters out and I look up to him and when I see the love in his eyes I cannot help myself, but I let
our faces inch closer together. I feel the light touch of his lips at first and then the intensity that follows through with it. It completely takes my breath away.

He picks me up and before we walk inside of the door I make sure that we turn off the stereo. He carries me back to my room and bursts in through the door.

Chapter Twenty-Two

I wake in the morning to the crying echoing through the baby monitor. I sit up rubbing my face and when I look over the prior night comes cascading over me.

“Fuck,” I say slightly. Before I jump up out of bed and pull some clothes on. As I open the door to go and get Kaylee I hear Mar talking from the living room, “Shit… Shit,” I mutter under my breath as I rush across the hall. I know that we are going to be called out on what happened last night. I walk towards the room and walk into Kay’s bedroom.

“Shh, sweet Kaylee,” I say to her picking her up and she giggles, “I have a small confession to make to you. Do you want to hear it?” she looks up to me and smiles, I know that she slightly understands what I am saying to her, but she won’t be able to understand completely and that she won’t be able to tell anyone what I am saying.

“Kaylee, I have to admit to you that your daddy is in the other room.”

“Da-Da,” she says trying to repeat me.

“Yes, love, he stayed over here last night.” She looks a little confused to me and I sigh as I set her down on the floor and sit with my back flat against the wall. “I only want to do what is best for you sweetheart, and with our track record… well, I just don’t want to confuse you too much with us together and then maybe not later on. I just wish that this was all easier.” I say and she crawls over to me and sits on my lap. “My head keeps telling me that it’s not smart to confuse you with our relationship, but my heart hurts every day without him.” I tell her as I pull clothes out to dress her in, without standing up from the floor. “I love him; more than I ever thought was possible.”

I pick her up and carry her to the living room where Mar jumps up and holds out her hands for her.

“How was your night?” She asks, looking to me as I plop down on the couch next to her.

“Good, look Mar, I need to tell you something-,” I trail at the sound of my bedroom door closing and Mar’s eyes shoot up to mine as I quickly jump up from the couch and walk into the kitchen and start to make some coffee. I hear Austin, somewhat shocked, as he walks into the living room and then I hear Mar say,

“Good morning, Austin.” Then I can only imagine her looking at Kaylee and whispering “Let’s give your mommy and daddy a few minutes alone.”

“Thanks Mar, where is she?”

“Kitchen,” that trader I purposely stand with my back to where I know that he is standing and I don’t turn around.

“Um, Soph,” he pauses taking a deep breath, “Maybe we should just forget about last night. I just think that we should confuse Kaylee. Emotions were just really high since it was her first birthday.”

“Huh, yeah, you’re right.” I smile politely at him. He looks to me almost like trying to make sure that I am alright. My coffee finishes pouring and I look over to him smiling, “Coffee?”

“No, I’ve got practice today. I’ve actually got to get going. I’ll see you later though. Are you coming to the show tonight?” I turn back around so he won’t be able to see the hurt on my face.

“Probably not,” I try and keep my voice even, “I just can’t find anyone to watch Kay.” I know that he knows that I’m lying.

“Alright, I’ll see you later.” I hear his shoes squeak on the floor as he turns around and begins to walk away. I sit in the empty kitchen and I can hear Mar tell him bye and that it was nice to see him and that she
missed him. I hear Kaylee laugh as I can only imagine he picks her up and hugs her, kissing her as well, the image is too much for me and I have to wipe away a rouge tear on my cheek. He doesn’t seem too excited. I sit at the table and when he walks back through the living room we don’t speak or even look at one another, and I’m forced to fight back tears. I wonder if he can see them as they threaten to come out. When the front door closes behind him I let one tear slide down my cheek but wipe it away when I hear the door close in the hallways.

“Sophie, why was he here?” she asks walking out to the living room and staring at me with Kaylee in her arms.

“Mar, don’t play dumb you know exactly why he was here.” I let my eyes cut at her.

“So, are you guys back together?” she smiles but I can’t say the words so I just shake my head
and the tears begin to slide down my face, “Oh, Soph, why not?”

“Because he came out here and said it would confuse Kay, and it was just because it was her birthday yesterday and emotions were high. I mean I
understand what he was saying I was thinking the same thing, but I just didn’t expect him to say it.” I tell her through my sobs.