“He had the advantage of knowing what he was walking into.” I sigh, exhaustion evident in the heaviness of my voice. “Late last night, I was sitting on my bed and a thought hit me: maybe it’s over.”
She blanches, reaching for my hand.
“No, really, Lindsay,” I sputter, my voice cracking. “Maybe it is. Maybe I just accept that we aren’t who we once were and we need to let it go.”
Her eyes fill with tears, her bottom lip quivering.
“What are you doing crying?” I laugh. “You can’t cry or I’ll cry, and I’ve cried enough.”
“I just hate this,” she sniffles.
“I hate it, but I don’t want to hate him. And it’s getting so easy to.”
She looks around the room before settling her eyes on me. “We always said we’d be pregnant together,” she whispers.
I take off around the island before stopping dead in my tracks. A cold rush races across my skin. “Wait,” I gulp. “Are you . . .”
I look up at my best friend and she nods slowly, her eyes filled with trepidation.
“Lindsay!” I exclaim, racing to her side. “Oh my God!”
Tears spill down her rosy cheeks. I grab her and pull her to me. I can’t say anything, the lump in my throat too massive to get around.
I’m thrilled for her, my best friend carrying my niece or nephew that I already know I will love more than any human being on this planet. But at the same time, I’m heartbroken because she’s right. We were going to do this together. Not only are we not doing it together, I’m starting from scratch. Without Tyler.
“I’m sorry, Elin,” she sniffles.
“Don’t you ever say that again,” I laugh, pulling back and wiping the tears from her eyes and mine too. “I’m happy for you.”
“I know. But I didn’t even want to tell you. It just feels so unfair.”
I paste a smile on my face for both of our benefits. “It’s life, and you’re bringing a new one, my niece or nephew, into the world. That isn’t unfair in any way. That’s exciting and exactly how it should be.”
The front door closes, causing us to jump, and his voices rolls through the house. “Jiggs? You in here? Linds?”
I grab the counter behind me for stability. My cheeks are stained with tears, but I’m too frozen, too off-guard, to dry them before he sees.
Ty walks around the corner and his sight lands immediately on me. He stops in his tracks, the playful smirk on his face vanishing. “I, uh,” he stutters, looking at Lindsay. “Linds?”
“Hey, Ty,” she says carefully. “Jiggs is out back.”
He doesn’t move a muscle, only his eyes, and those just enough to find me again. The energy between us crackles, the air thickening by the second.
He pulls his hat off his head, smoothing down hair that’s still damp from a shower. The movement is enough to rustle me out of my daze.
I look away, swiping a tissue off the counter and dabbing at my eyes. My hands tremble as they swipe at my face.
“You okay, E?” His words are so soft, so kind, I would think they weren’t real if Lindsay didn’t look at me, waiting on my response.
I nod my head, but of course I’m not all right. I haven’t been in a long time, but why should he start caring now? Because he has an audience? Because Lindsay is standing there watching?
I focus on her, using her as a crutch to keep me level. “I’m going to go,” I whisper, only meaning for Lindsay to hear.
“Don’t,” Ty says quickly from the other side of the room. “I’ll go. Jiggs said—”
Laughter floats inside the room as Jiggs and Cord return. Jiggs stops in his tracks when he realizes what he’s just walked into. He looks from me, to Ty, then to the ceiling.
I shoot him a dagger, knowing exactly what he’s done.
“Jiggs said what?” Cord asks. He grabs a brownie and has it inches from his face when he looks up. Assessing the situation, knowing Ty and I wouldn’t be in the same place at the same time on purpose, he puts the dessert back on the counter. “I can only imagine what Jiggs said to make this happen.”
“Look,” my brother starts, shoving his hands in his pockets, “you’re both here now. Let’s go outside and have a hot dog and a beer.”
“I didn’t know she was going to be here,” Ty says, directly to Jiggs.
I look at Ty, baffled by the way he used a pronoun to refer to me. “What did I ever do to you?” I scream inside my mind. Instead of saying that or throwing the mug of coffee sitting in front of me at his face, I turn to my brother.
“I asked you if he was going to be here. You said no, otherwise, I wouldn’t be.”