Forever & More: The Friend Zone series (20 page)

My lungs won’t work, my heart shatters, my knees buckle, and I fall to the bottom of the tub. Crying with the agony of a man on fire. Wail after wail leaves my body while water rains down on me, washing away the tears that will surely stain my face.

I cry for her, and for my unborn child. I cry tears of defeat, tears of misery and pain. I cry for the pain that she feels in her soul. I cry for the pain my child may feel being trapped in its mother’s stomach, feeling her toxic and painful emotions. The alcohol and medication my child has been swimming in for the past— Shit, I don’t even know how far along Chloe is.

It doesn’t matter right now, I just let it all out. I didn’t have a choice, I’ve been holding it in for so long that I just literally burst with emotions, and the evidence is flowing from my eyes and washing down the drain.

I can hear someone banging on the door; fuck them, they can wait.

“Dude, answer the fucking door!” Bam bam bam. I stand up and cut the water off. I wrap a towel around my waist and head to the door. As soon as there is a crack in the doorway, Brady busts his way in.

“What the fuck?” I slam the door and quickly put the latch in place. “What the hell’s going on?”

“There.” He pants. “There.” He tries again. “There was a toothless prostitute trying to hit on me.” Despite my sullen mood, I crack up. “Shit’s not funny! I don’t know what rotted out her teeth? It coulda been somethin’ in her blood. I don’t fuck around with shit like that.”

I immediately stop laughing. Is he serious? I don’t even wanna know. I turn and go back to the shower, suddenly feeling dirty again.

“What? You’d let ole’ Tamoo out there get at it?”

I look at him and roll my eyes before I shut the bathroom door.

“That’s what the hell I thought. Bitch ain’t gettin’ near my junk,” he mumbles on the other side of the door.

I get in the shower and go through my usual routine. Before I get out, I hear Brady on the phone.

“Dude, suck it the fuck up. We’re MIA, remember? You don’t know shit.” There’s a pause. “No. No. Shut the fuck up for a second. Just stall till the morning and we will go somewhere else. You ain’t gotta know where we go, then you won’t be fucking lyin’ to your old lady.” He goes quiet.

When I walk out of the bathroom, Brady smiles, grabs his crotch, and then moves his hand like he’s cracking’ a whip.

“Dude, did you leave your balls at the apartment with Kasey before you left?” He laughs. “Yeah, fuck you, too, asshole.” He hangs up.

“Welp, my man. You are totally fucked. Chloe thinks you left to be with Jay since you think she tried to kill your kid. Sara’s yapping in her ear about all sorts of shit. You. Are. Fucked. Just so ya know.” He falls onto his back on the bed. “Oh, and tomorrow, we will go hide out in the loft. That way, Harley won’t be lying when he says he doesn’t know where you are. Fucking pussy.”

I grab a beer, turn it back, and empty its entire contents in just a few short gulps. Brady cuts on the 1950s style television and drains his beer. This is one hell of a fucked up mess. I just hope I find what I need to before it’s too late.

When we left the courthouse, there was a flurry of blinding flashes followed by a million people screaming my name, followed by a ton of questions that I never heard. Sara clings to my hand while Harley pushed her through the crowd.

It’s been several hours and I still see stars. I pour a glass of water but look longingly at the bottle of unopened vodka sitting on the counter. Sara wheels her chair back and forth in the living room in fury. I feel really bad for Harley when he gets back. Cold water floods the glass and cascades down my hand in to the sink.

I pull my eyes from the clear bottle and shut the water off. I need to get rid of all the alcohol in the apartment so I won’t be tempted. Not that I would do it, but it still creates an unnecessary longing inside of me. The voice inside my head that’s desperate to forget still whispers that one shot won’t hurt, but I know differently. It will hurt, it will burn my throat, bury my demons, and infuriate them even more, and it will hurt my unborn child.

“Get rid of the vodka,” I demand and head to my room. She follows me. I wish she wouldn’t, I need to be alone. I lie on my back and rest both hands on my stomach. I wish I could feel my little hummingbird move so this motherhood stuff would feel real.

“You wanna talk about it?” Sara asks from the doorway.

“No, I just want to be left alone.” The bite in my tone was more than I intended.

“Geez, hormonal already.” She huffs and rolls down the hall.

I was waiting on that to happen. I just didn’t know how long it would take someone to use my pregnancy as an excuse to ignore my real feelings. I want to be alone because I need to unpack and process, not because I’m pregnant and hormonal.

I stare at the ceiling and watch the blades on the fan spin until I feel dizzy from its movements. I can’t do this, I can’t lay here and go over every detail of this messed up scenario over and over.

I get up and find my suitcase by the door where Harley left it. I dump all the bag’s contents on the bed and throw all the clothes in the dirty clothes basket. My toothbrush is placed back in the bathroom where it belongs. Before I leave the cold room, I open the medicine cabinet, all my medication is gone. Skye must have gotten rid of it; probably for the best, since now I don’t have to do it.

Once everything is put up, I start to climb back into my bed, but my foot hits the corner of something hard. I look down and see my journal. I squat down to pick it up and climb onto the bed. I scoot to the headboard, lean over to my night stand, and grab a pen from the drawer.

Flipping to the back of the book, I open to the last page of the book and begin to write.

I fill you with my thoughts and memories. A time capsule is what you are.

Black and leather just like the heart I once possessed.

But no more

No more will I hide in your pages and bear to you my soul

No more will I let you keep my secrets of new and old

Gone is the past and that’s where it shall stay

In the place where my demons lay

Inside me grows life

New, beautiful, and bright

That’s my future and I’m looking forward to it

The effortless giggles, tender hugs

Everything that will consist of a mother’s and child’s love

I’m blessed I know this now

I will get through, even if I am clueless as to how

I am a mother

I am strong

I will continue to carry on

Although my story doesn’t end, it ends for you

Little black book I bid you adieu

I flip another page toward the front and enter the last entry I will ever write. I can’t keep trapping memories in this book. It’s filled with the sadness that I want to remove from my life. Who knows, maybe I will start a new journal, but for now, I’m done. No more writing my feelings down to hide them away, I’m going to voice them instead. But there is one thing I feel like I need to get out of my system before I get rid of this book. I start to write.

The past few days have been pure hell. I lost it. I don’t know if I did it on purpose or not, but I almost died again, this time by my own hand. Pills and alcohol were my weapons of choice, until Skye saved me. He has a habit of doing that. I don’t want to be the damsel in distress needing saving anymore. I want to be my own hero. I didn’t know I was pregnant, I would have never put myself in that position if I had known. I am mortified and angry with myself for what happened and for almost harming my child. I can only imagine how Skye feels. His hatred for me is understandable.

But no more, no more meds, no more booze, no more of the woe is me bullshit. So what if my ex tried to kill me. Fuck him, I’m still standing and staring him in the eye. I have one friend in the ground and another in a chair. Oh, well, I’m still here and Sara is with me. Do I miss Tom? Yes. Am I angry at him? Yes. Do I forgive him? Yes. I don’t know how real it was, but I know that our conversation in the cemetery allowed him and me both to be at peace. I can’t harbor hatred, it only eats at me.

Skye has left me and maybe it’s for the best. Does it hurt me to my very core? One hundred percent, but I’m going to keep on living. I’m going to make the best of my situation and live my life for myself and for my child. That’s all that matters now. God sent an angel to save me, and save me he or she did. This is my last entry, this is my way of getting out the bad and moving on. In just a few minutes, I will be throwing this in the trash along with the years of resentment, hatred, sadness, and self-deprecating thoughts, I’m done. Dear Journal, this is me telling you to take all this sadness and shove it. Chloe is reborn and nothing will bring me down.

I slam the book shut and get to my feet. While walking down the hallway, into the kitchen, I start wondering if I’m ready for this. The trash can that I’m about to throw my past in is quickly approaching. Without giving myself another second to think about it, I throw the journal in the bin.

Sara and Harley are staring at me from the couch, I advert my eyes to the floor and I quickly retrace my steps back to my room. That felt liberating, I just literally threw my demons in the trash. When I get back into my room, I shut the door and brace my back against the cold wood. With a breath of fresh air and teary eyes, for the first time in a very long time, I feel like I can move on with my life.

This is my fresh start, my do-over, and I’ll be damned if I’m not going to take it. I push off of the door and lie down on my bed. The sun is still lighting up the room with its dim evening glow. Soon, it will be shining on the other side of the world and the moon will be staring in my window. I close my eyes and Skye’s face appears.

My heart hurts with the thought of how he left me. It hurts so bad, I feel abandoned and scared without him, but I know I will survive this. I squeeze my eyes tighter and start thinking of anything and everything I can conjure up to distract myself from the ache in my chest. It doesn’t work though, everything in my world revolves around him and our child. I place my hands protectively over my stomach and start humming “In My Daughter’s Eyes”
by Martina McBride. Don’t ask me why I chose that song, it just jumped into my head.

My eyes start feeling heavy and my body relaxes. I yawn while finishing the last few words of the song.

“Chloe! Get up!” Sara screams from the other side of the door. I grumble and roll to my side.

“Go away!” I shout back.

“Get up and get dressed! We’re going to be late if you don’t hurry.”

“Late for—” I sit straight up. Shit, the sentencing! What time is it? I look to the clock on my night stand. It reads seven sixteen, court starts at eight. The covers fly off the bed and I jump to my feet. I don’t bother with showering, I don’t have the time. I fly through my routine to get ready quickly. Once my teeth are brushed and I’m dressed in black from head to toe, I run through the living room. Sara and Harley are directly behind me when I exit the apartment. We pile in the car and are on our way to the courthouse in record time.

We enter the large, modern building and are met with the same crowd of reporters as yesterday. “Chloe is it true you’re pregnant?” someone shouts. “Where is Skye, Chloe?” Why are they asking about him? “Is it true that the child is not his?” I search the crowd, looking for the person that suggested such a ridiculous thing. “Is it true Todd is the father of the child?” That stops me dead in my tracks. Sara’s chair rams into my heels painfully, but the feeling of metal scraping the skin off of the backs of my feet can’t be compared to the pain that comment caused my heart.

“Where do you get your information?” I shout. “How would you like it if I made sick and false accusations about you or your family members?” I don’t say anything else; even if I could, I wouldn’t know what else to say. Those people don’t care about me, they don’t give a shit that I was beaten within an inch of my life. That the man sitting smugly at the front of this room has caused so much pain and anguish to so many people in my life and feels no remorse for his actions. Those people only care about their paychecks, they’re only worried about them and what affects their day to day.

I enter the same room as yesterday, but this time, it’s packed, almost to the point of overflowing from the amount of people that have showed up to see how this drama will end. With a steeled breath of determination, I enter the room. I look at no one; I keep my attention focused on the American flag hanging on a pole behind the judge’s throne.

I count the stripes, the stars, and the steps it takes me to get to my seat behind the district attorney’s table. The room is silent, and I feel as if every eye in the room is on me, this includes the pair that belongs to the eagle perched on the ball atop the golden flag pole. I take my seat and continue to stare at a blemished piece of polished wood on the partition in front of me. Someone coughs, but I ignore it. Another person clears their throat, but again, my staring contest isn’t interrupted.

Several moments go by before Sara leans over and nudges me with her elbow. “How you doing?” she asks. She knows me better than anyone in this world, including myself, how does she think I’m doing?

I shrug, wanting to save my words in case I’m called to the stand again. I’m not sure if that’s how this will work. Will I have to stand before everyone and beg that Todd be thrown in jail for the rest of his life? The thought makes me shudder with nervousness.

I don’t want to get up there again. That’s why I wore black, to mourn the person he killed that night and to blend into the shadows. To hide in the dark backdrop and just listen to how this will play out. I want to be the fly on the wall—no one notices it’s there, but it’s there listening to what’s going on and watching everyone’s reactions to the situation.

But I’m not that fly, I’m Chloe, I’m here and I’m putting this to rest and moving on. At least that’s what I keep telling myself. The room erupts in a hushed, excited chatter. This grabs my attention and I look up. Todd walks in wearing an orange jumpsuit, his legs and arms are shackled by metal loops linked to cuffs around his ankles and wrists. He’s accompanied by two police officers and a team of state issued lawyers.

I shift in my seat uncomfortably when his menacing gaze lands on me and he smirks. Even when he’s chained like a dog, his cocky demeanor doesn’t falter. I turn my head so that my nose is in the air, snubbing him. It may not be the most mature thing to do, but it’s the only thing I can think of at that moment to seem unaffected by his presence. The moment Todd’s seated, the judge walks in the room.

Everyone stands as the bailiff announces the honorable judge. He goes through the whole speech about what we are here for today, but I hear nothing except my pounding heart. Everyone sits, apart from the district attorney. He walks to the middle of the room and begins his closing argument.

“Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, thank you for your time and for paying close attention to the matter of the State vs. Lucas. You have heard the witnesses. You have heard the prosecution and the defense. I’m hoping that the information that you have listened to has been proof enough that this man is guilty on all charges.” He paces the room.

“The defendant has been proven without a reasonable doubt to have committed the attack on Ms. Thomas. He was found in her home, with the battered knuckles that matched her beaten face. Her blood on his body and his DNA under her fingernails. He has been caught distributing cocaine and has been photographed with Columbian cartel. He was present, gun in hand, at the site of the hotel shooting where his friend and partner Tom Anderson was shot and killed by the pistol in Mr. Lucas’s hand.” He stops to let all of that sink in a moment before continuing.