The XOXO New Adult Collection: 16 Full Length New Adult Stories (217 page)

Dear Holden,

I know it isn’t fair of me to do this in a letter. If I were able to say these words to your face, please believe that I would. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and I’ve come to the conclusion that what almost happened the other night between us would have been a mistake.

I’m not ready for a relationship, even one without strings attached. I thought I was ready to move on, but there are still things haunting me from my relationship with Jack. I hope you can respect that for me to work these things out I need to be alone. I think you’re amazing, and you’re going to find an incredible girl who would do anything to be yours. I’m just not her.

Annabelle

I carefully think out every detail of the letter. I don’t use the word ‘love’ in my signature line. I avoid the nickname he created for me. I need to convince him that I don’t have feelings for him. I need to make him believe my lies.

I place the letter on top of the laptop. The gift was the most thoughtful and amazingly beautiful thing anyone had ever gotten me, but it isn’t mine to keep. Only if I were able to return his affection could I keep such an item.

I phone for a cab and begin packing. I’m not sure how much time I have, but I know I need to be gone before he returns. I should be able to sneak past Bea undetected. And then it will be like I was never here.

***

M
y phone buzzed most of the train ride. Even though it was Kenzie, and I wanted to talk to her more than anyone else in the world right now, I didn’t dare answer it in a crowded public place. I’m pretty sure sharing my current set of tragic circumstances with her is going to set me into a sobbing frenzy.

I’ve spent the past two days on buses and trains, dealing with layovers and sharing cabins with complete strangers. The entire time I’m consumed with the knowledge that my life will never be the same. Once in the hotel, the exhaustion consumes me, and no matter how many times Kenzie tries to call, there is no way I’m waking up for anything.

All night I’m plagued by dreams that cause me to never fully reach that deep state of rest. There is the particularly lovely dream where I’m married to Jack, and when the baby is born, he has Holden’s face. Literally, he has Holden’s man face. I don’t even want to know what my subconscious is trying to sort out with that one.

There is a knock at the door, and my growling stomach is relieved to know within minutes I will be stuffing my face with pastries, eggs, and bacon. I pull my robe tight and open the door. A young man, no more than eighteen or nineteen, greets me, and his accent makes me smile. He’s extremely polite, and though I wish he would simply leave the tray and go, he insists on setting up an entire area at a side table for me to eat. I sign the receipt, making sure I leave the young man a more-than-generous tip.

I sit down, lifting each lid and taking in the smells of all the foods. When I get to the eggs I feel my stomach flip, and I think I might be sick, but then remember I have nothing inside me to throw up. Apparently pregnant me hates eggs. I quickly cover them, and my stomach settles. I down a huge gulp of orange juice and begin devouring the food in front of me, moaning with the first few bites.

Once my ravenous appetite seems to be satisfied, I pull my phone off the nightstand and settle into a side chair. I glance down to see that I have eleven missed calls and four missed texts. Kenzie must really be worried; she always texts me more than she calls me.

I slide my finger across the glass face of the phone, dial her number, and wait for her panicked answer.

“Well, it’s about flipping time!” Her voice makes me grin. I miss her so much, a brief thought enters my mind that I should hop on a plane and head home to see her.

“Sorry, sweetie, it’s a long story.”

“Can’t pull your lips away from your golden-haired hottie long enough to even call your best friend?”

I hesitate, unsure how to even respond. “Not exactly,” I say at last.

“All right, there’s something in your voice, so what’s going on? Did he hurt you? Because I swear to God, if he laid one—”

“No, no Kenzie, it’s nothing like that,” I reassure her.

“So it is something, though?”

“I’m not at the inn anymore.”

“What?” she asks. “What happened?”

I can feel the tears building up in my eyes already, and when I speak, my voice immediately begins to break. “Oh God, Kenzie, I don’t know what in the hell I’m going to do.”

“Okay, calm down, everything’s going to be okay.”

And there they are, the tears, already flowing. “No, I swear, everything is not going to be okay.”

“You need to tell me what happened. Was it Holden? Did he get all stalker creepy on your ass or something?” Kenzie questions, but I can’t answer, trying to catch my breath through the crying. “You’re freaking me out here, honey. Do I need to kick some English tail?

“No, it’s not Holden, he’s perfect. Well, except for the fact that he probably hates me now,” I explain.

“Girl, I have known you for a really long time, and I can’t think of a single person who has ever hated you. Hell, even Jack won’t leave me alone.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Jesus, he’s obsessed or something, calling me all the time, asking me where you are.”

I moan, sobbing even more violently. “Oh, Kenz, please don’t talk about him.”

“Seriously, what is going on?” she demands.

I pause. If there were anyone I was going to tell about my current situation, Kenzie would be it. “Okay, but you have to keep this between us.”

“Are you freaking kidding me? Who in the hell am I going to tell?”

Swallowing hard, I attempt to catch my breath and steady myself. I close my eyes and say the words, “I’m pregnant.”

The line is silent. I wonder if I actually said them out loud or only in my head. I repeat myself, “Kenz? Did you hear me? I’m pregnant.”

“Uh, yeah—I heard you,” she answers, stumbling over her words.

I twist uncomfortably in my seat as the silence begins to linger between us again. “Well, say something.”

“I didn’t know you and Holden were even doing it yet.”

“We’re not. I mean we weren’t, I—it’s Jack’s,” I explain.

“What!” Her tone says everything. In that one word she manages to express the pure and overwhelming panic I am feeling. I wasn’t insane for freaking out. This is clearly as big a bomb as I’d feared.

“I know ... what am I going to do?”

“Wait, slow down, how is this possible? Have you seen Jack at all?”

“No! The doctor says I’m about eleven weeks, which means I was a week or two along when he was screwing Brunhilda—or whatever the hell her name is.”

“How did you not know you were pregnant? Were you still having your rag or something?”

“No—I guess I didn’t think about it. I started puking and feeling shitty. Bea made the comment about being pregnant, and that was when I realized it had been three months since my last period.”

“What? Are you telling me you never put it together that you hadn’t been bleeding since you broke up with Jack?”

“Um yeah, not really helping right now, Kenzie. My life has been pretty messed up over the past few months, so I wasn’t exactly marking that kind of crap down on a calendar.”

“Sorry, you’re right. I’m just trying to process this.”

“I’m screwed,” I mutter.

“Wait, so Holden was pretty pissed about it? Is that why you left? I mean, wow, what a dick.”

“No, well, I don’t know.”

“What do you mean, ’you don’t know?’”

“I sort of left without telling him.”

“You what?” Kenzie gasps.

“What was I supposed to do? Walk up and say, ’Hey Holden, I think you’re a great kisser, and it’s swell you think you’re falling for me, but would you mind raising my douche-bag ex-fiancé’s baby?’ Yeah, no thanks. Better he hates me for running out on him without an explanation than know the truth.”

“You should come home,” she suggests.

“I can’t; I’m not ready.”

“How can you not be ready? You’ve been gone forever!”

“I’m just not.”

“That realtor is hosting an open house on your condo this weekend. There’s going to be a lot going on here you can distract yourself with, and then I’ll be here to take care of you.”

“Ugh, and risk seeing Jack, no way.”

“Wait, what? You’re going to tell him, aren’t you?”

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” I reply honestly.

“He’s a dick, but he is the father.”

“Yeah, you think I don’t know that? I just need to sort this out in my head first,” I say, but I know any attempt to explain where I’m at in my head is pointless since I’m not even making sense to myself.

“So what are you going to do?”

“For now? Stick to the plan. I’m in Edinburgh, and I’m going to go enjoy the sights and check out the places Arthur Conan Doyle talked about in his stories.

“So a bunch of boring stuff?”

“Whatever,” I huff.

“You can’t keep running from your problems, you know that, right?”

“Excuse me? Who am I talking to? It can’t be Kenzie, my nearest and dearest friend who has never actually made a mature decision in her life.”

“Hey chickie, that hurts.”

“Sorry, but I don’t think you should be preaching to me.”

“No preaching, just a polite prompting.”

“Please, just trust me; I’m going to figure this out.”

She sighs. “I do ... I know you will. I’m just worried about you.”

“Well, don’t. I’ll be fine.”

“Okay, promise you’re going to check in with me every few days,” Kenzie instructs me.

“I will,” I assure her. “I love you.”

“Love you, too,” Kenzie chirps, trying to disguise her concern.

No matter how much I try to convince her that things are going to be okay, I’m failing at convincing myself of this fact.

***

M
y stay in Edinburgh was much briefer than I’d originally anticipated. Everywhere I turned there were reminders of Holden. Something as simple as passing by a pub and catching a glimpse of a man sipping his beer made me think of him.

It’s quite infuriating, though I can’t help but wonder if he’s thinking of me as well. In my mind, I want him to forget about me, but in my heart I like to think I’m lingering in his thoughts. Our kisses, the way our bodies touched, or more than the physical, the way we connected.

My original itinerary for the entire trip has changed. The idea of visiting the stomping grounds of famous authors has lost its appeal. Perhaps because that, too, somehow led my thoughts back to Holden. Now I’m only trying to survive. I’m thirteen weeks pregnant, alone, and I have no plan. Rather than thinking about my next step, I can’t get Holden out of my mind.

In choosing my next adventure, I decided to go to a place I always wanted to visit. Greece. It’s the birthplace of democracy and the Olympics, but for me, there is something else drawing me to this place.

When I was eleven, I found a magazine in my mom’s nightstand. It was one all about travel, and inside the pages were amazing pictures of the coastlines in Greece. There were beautiful women staring out at the water, couples walking hand in hand, and even pictures of children smiling. I can remember the incident like it was yesterday. My mother walked in, saw what I was doing, and simply said the words, heaven on Earth, and then walked out. A rare insight into her thoughts that I wasn’t used to getting. She preferred to remain guarded.

Here I am, a place where one of the unhappiest women on the planet thought looked like bliss. If I can’t figure out my messed up life in a paradise like Greece, then I am clearly going about things all wrong.

It’s only been a day, and I’ve already found a quaint waterfront room to rent. It’s a bedroom inside of a home. The owner is an artist from New York who seems content with sharing her space and not her life. This is more than fine with me. Usually when people start sharing details of their lives, they will eventually want to know about yours. Right now my life is the last thing I want to talk about.

My room is up a spiral staircase—almost like a nest up in a tree. There’s a small bathroom and a door that opens to a balcony. The land curves around the harbor; outside of my balcony I can see the city sprawling from side to side on the other side of crystal blue water. The dwelling is built into the cliffside, the water licking at the rocks below.