Forever & More: The Friend Zone series (11 page)

I’m a horrible person, how could I do this. What am I going to do? I cry for what seems like forever before I finally fall asleep. My dreams are filled with Gerber babies with strawberry-blond curls, cherub faces, and gleaming green eyes. For the first time in a while, I feel content and peaceful. If I could stay asleep forever, I would live out my happily ever after in this wonderful place full of happy faces and tender moments.

I stare at the journal for a while wondering how such a beautiful person can carry around such an ugly, dark, tormented soul. I skip a few pages and find another entry.

How do things end up as twisted and distorted as they do? Haven’t I been kind enough? Day after day, I strive to be a good person, to do the right thing and what is considered right by others. Never saying something unkind or rude to anyone. I follow the golden rule and treat others like I want to be treated, but I still get shitted on. Every single time my kindness is taken for granted or thrown back into my face. I try to look the other way, I try to forgive. Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do?

It always happens a second and third time. It’s not worth it anymore. I can’t keep being a doormat to those I care for most. I won’t be. I refuse to be soiled by the mud on the bottom of their shoes as they stomp on my heart again.

I don’t know how it’s possible for my heart to be beating a million beats a second and breaking at the same time, but I can feel each tiny piece thudding rapidly. With each thud, a small piece crumbles into dust until it becomes an avalanche of emotions. I knew Chloe was beating herself up, but it never crossed my mind how badly she was broken. I need to get back to her; she should be awake soon. I close the journal and walk back to the front door.

I grab her stuff, lock the door, and make my descent down the stairs. It’s late morning and people are walking their dogs, jogging down the street and carrying on with their daily routines. I climb back into the Jeep and just sit for a moment. I battle with my small pockets to retrieve my ringing phone. Harley’s name is lit up on the screen.

“Hello?” I answer.

“She’s up,” he exclaims excitedly.

“On my way,” I reply.

I crank the Jeep and head back to the hospital.

A few minutes later, I race through the automatic doors. When I reach the group, I catch a glimpse of a white lab coat. I turn my head to the left to get a better view of the person wearing it and immediately drop Chloe’s belongings at Sara’s feet. The doctor notices me racing toward him and he picks up a chart on the desk next to him. Once I reach him, he gives me a solemn smile before saying, “She’s awake. Follow me.”

I follow without a word. If I thought my heart was racing before, I was dead wrong. It’s beating so fast I could rival the speed of a Cheetah or possibly a Jet. I try to control my breathing, but it’s proving to be difficult since I’m focusing so much on controlling my feet. My feet and heart are currently racing toward the one person in the world that could stop both cold in their tracks.

The sterile smell of the hospital hits my nose, reminding me of horrible experiences and amazing miracles. The white walls flash by me in a blur until we’re stopped outside of Chloe’s cubical. I hear the monitor accompanied by constant sniffling.

Doctor Jacobs comes to a halt; his entire demeanor is making me wary. He silently gestures for me to enter. I take a deep breath and pull the curtain back. The vision before me fills me with something akin to relief, but the emotion is so strong so I’m not sure that relief would be an accurate description.

Chloe’s startled expression quickly morphs from happiness to concern. She glances at the blonde nurse who is sitting on a stool, running some sort of wand over Chloe’s flat stomach. What the hell are they doing? Before I can ask the question that runs through my mind, a whooshing sound fills the room. I glance to Chloe in confusion and then a movement beside the nurse holding the wand catches my eye.

I gasp at the same moment Chloe straightens in the bed, causing the swishing noises to fade and the blip on the screen to go away. I glance at Chloe, the nurse, Doctor Jacobs, then the screen again in complete confusion. Then it dawns on me. My heart stops, skips a few beats, and then runs like a wild horse through an open field. It can’t be!

“Y-You’re pregnant?” I say, more to myself than to her. No one answers the question, so I continue to stare at the monitor. The little blip lazily floats around on the screen. There are arms and legs, a head and a body, it’s plain as day that that’s a baby. Chloe’s carrying a child. My child. Oh shit, I’m going to be a father.

Like two freight trains barreling down on each other at high speeds, last night’s events combined with today’s news crash into each other, I don’t even have time to be happy about becoming a father. When I look from the screen to Chloe’s mournful eyes, she knows I’ve put two and two together. I can’t look at her. For the first time since the day I laid eyes on her, I can’t stomach to be in the same room with her. Of all the vile things that anyone has ever done and I have experienced or heard about, this tops the fucking list. My teeth grind together, causing sharp pains to shoot through my jaw. My fists clench together, pressing my nails into my palms and I’m sure I have drawn blood. The venomous quake that floods my muscles causes me to visibly tremble.

Chloe starts to speak but before any words leave her mouth, my hand slices through the air.

“Don’t!” I scream, startling everyone in the room. “Do you fucking hate yourself that much? How could you? How long have you known? You know what! Fuck you. I can’t even stand to breathe the same oxygen as you right now!” I watch as the tears begin to fall down her pale face. Her hands reach up to cover her shame.

“Look at me! That’s the least you can do, don’t you think? I sat in this fucking hospital day in and day out, praying that you would get well, praying that you would come back to me. When my prayer was answered, I thought everything would be okay. That we would live out our happily ever after. Boy was I wrong, huh! You went into that coma my sweet, innocent Chloe and came back this broken, beaten monster of a bitch that tries to off her own kid! For what? What did that baby ever do to you for you to want to destroy it?” She tries to speak again, but I stop her. “Is it because it was with me? Because it’s mine?”

Her voice trembles. “S-Sk—” Again, I cut her off.

“There is NOTHING that you can say or do to make this right! NOTHING! You just ripped my fucking heart out and stomped on it, Chloe! Do you understand that?” That’s all I’ve got. I’m done. I turn to walk off. Before I exit the cubical, I turn around and say, “I’m the kid’s dad so that means I’m stuck with you. But let me make something very, very clear, I want to know EVERYTHING. Every appointment, ever movement, every sneeze, every step. If you do ANYTHING to harm MY child again, I will move heaven and earth to make sure you get exactly what you deserve. When this kid’s born, it’s coming with me. It needs to be with someone who will love it and take care of it, and obviously that’s not going to be you.” I spin on my heels and march out of the room.

Her agonizing wails trail behind me like wisps of smoke off the fiery tip of a cigarette as I rush down the hall.
How could she?
is the only question that runs through my mind. When I walk out of the door that I had minutes ago entered with hope in my heart, that hope is now replaced with rage.

I enter the lobby and spot Sara sitting in her wheelchair exactly as she was before. I march straight to Sara and watch as her facial features go from optimistic to panic in seconds.

“What’s the matter? Is Chloe okay?” she asks.

“Chloe is peachy-fucking-keen. My baby, on the other hand, may not have had I not found them in time. Did you know?” I seethe.

Harley steps in next to me, crossing his arms across his chest. Brady stands next to him, neither saying a word.

“What? She’s pregnant?” she asks in a confused tone of voice. Her face turns an ashen color and she looks like she may get sick, but right now I don’t give a shit.

“Yeah, and she almost killed my kid last night. I’m fucking done!” I’ve had it with all of this. I can’t breathe, I can’t think, I need to leave. I turn to do just that when Chloe’s bag catches the corner of my eye. I don’t know what compels me to do it, but I grab her journal and head out of the door.

I drive for I’m not sure how long, what I do know is that the sun was still up when I left the hospital and now it’s long gone. The city lights and neon signs have been replaced with evergreens and oaks.

I pull into a little gas station to refuel the Jeep and spot a sign for Victoria Harbour Marina. After I pay the guy at the counter, I take off toward the marina, seems like as good a place as any. I find a spot that faces the water and pull in. The small wakes rock the docked boats and crash against the shore. The moon shines across the wide river and reflects off the black water. It all looks like something off a painting. The low hanging, grey clouds occasionally shadow the moon, setting an ominous mood which matches my own. Animals scurry through the woods, rustling leaves and the chill in the autumn air touches my skin.

This place truly is beautiful. I toy with the idea of buying a houseboat and living here on the water. Spending my days fishing, sunning, and playing my guitar at the local bar on occasion. The life of a drifter. The idea is so tempting I spend an hour planning and daydreaming about it. I should have expected it but regardless, the image of a lightly tanned little boy with strawberry-blond hair and tropical sea green eyes canon balling off the side of the boat slips through my mind and my heart sinks. How could she? After everything we’ve been through.

I realize that I keep thinking about how could she do this to me, when in fact, it needs to be: how could she disregard a human life so easily? This is her child, too, not just mine. She didn’t just do this to me, she did this to a defenseless child, our child. A child who had never done anything wrong. A child that was innocent and unsuspecting. She talks about how people have betrayed her, what about the way she just betrayed this kid, her flesh and blood? How about the way she just betrayed me?

The longer I think about it, the sicker I feel. On top of everything, her journal is sitting next to me, taunting me. Why the hell did I bring it with me? I knew when I found the damn thing that curiosity would get the better of me, I should have never opened it in the first place. Chloe has just been so far gone lately, I was hoping I would find some insight to what’s going on inside her mind.

I grab the black book and open it toward the end. I have a right to know when she found out about the baby. No matter how I try to justify my actions, I still know deep down its wrong to violate her privacy, but I just gotta know.

Every day is a struggle. I struggle to get up. I struggle to shower, brush my teeth. Hell, I struggle to put one foot in front of the other to push me through the motions every single day. When will the pain go away? When will the struggle and sacrifice go away so I can breathe? I don’t know how I would do this without Sara and Skye. Even Harley has become someone I rely on to help push me from one day to the next. I hope that one day, I will find my sanctuary, my relief. Each day I catch a small glimpse of happiness when I wake up in Skye’s arms. But that only happens in the brief moment I smell him and feel his warmth before I open my eyes. When the darkness becomes shapes and images, the dread sets in and takes over completely.

Chloe’s behavior reflects her writing perfectly. It funny how the heart and mind work. Just yesterday, my heart yearned to see her happy, feel the love that used to radiate from her eyes and smile. My mind would constantly be turning over idea after idea on how to please her and make her happy. This whole depressed, sullen Chloe isn’t the person I love, she’s not the person that has taken over my heart. Call me a dick if you want to, but now this woe is me shit is annoying. How the fuck am I supposed to feel sorry for someone especially when that same someone tried to harm a kid. And not just any kid, but my kid—hell, her kid. Our flesh and blood joined together in the most perfect version of ourselves. Then she tried to kill herself along with it.

I may not have had a decent upbringing, but never in a million years would I treat my child the way I was treated. I’ve always wanted to be a dad, to give someone else the love I thought I deserved, and the first chance I get, the one person I loved more than anything in this world tries to take that from me!

I’ll be damned if I’m going to let that happen! I don’t give a shit if I have to sit in the same room with her night and day for the rest of her pregnancy, I will gladly do it to make sure my kid is safe. I’ve known about the baby for less than twenty-four hours and I already love it more than I could ever love anyone. The need to protect my child is strong and surpasses any emotion I've ever had.