The Winter Baby

by Rhonda McKnight

  “Why don’t you connect your phone?”

  “My battery is at fifty percent and I left my charger in the trunk.”

  Clyde reached into his jacket pocket and took out his phone. He handed it to me. “I think I have some music you like.”

  I took the phone and stared at it for a moment. “I don’t know the—”

  Clyde cleared his throat. “It hasn’t changed.”

  I frowned. “Hasn’t changed?”

  “Yes, I gave it to you that night...” his voice trailed off. The night we broke up in an angry screaming match where we’d said words we never should have.

  “I never opened it that night,” I said.

  We both glanced at each other through our peripheral vision.

  “It’s Kim and the number ten. I haven’t had a chance to change it.”

  I swallowed. Now I remembered.

  “What do you have to hide, Clyde?”

  “Nothing. You want my phone?” He tossed it onto the sofa next to me. “It’s Kim10. Go ahead and look!”

  He’d walked out the door and hadn’t come back for hours.

  I pushed the phone back in his direction. “Why don’t you turn on what you want to hear.”

  “I’d prefer to keep my hands on the wheel. Besides, you’re the one who wanted music.”

  I pulled the phone back to me and swiped the screen. I entered the passcode and went to his music. He had a bunch of playlists. I scrolled through the variety. I came to one titled “Love” and looked at the artists he had saved to the list. Luther Vandross, Al Green, Barry White, and a bunch of nineties artists like Tony, Toni, Tone, Jodeci, Boys II Men, and Xscape. I forgot how much older Clyde was than me. At thirty-seven, he’d been a teenager in the nineties. My finger hovered over the play button for the first song on the list, but then I realized how ridiculous it would be to play “love” when all we had between us was war.

  “See anything you like?” he asked.

  I scrolled down to a list titled “Driving Music” and pressed play for a Ne-Yo song. “Jealous” filled the car and I immediately wished I hadn’t pushed it. I could feel the heat of Clyde’s stare on the side of my neck. I turned my head to look out my window.

  “What is wrong with you? What have I done to make you trip?”

  “You disappear on me.”

  “When I’m working, Kim!”

  “At night?”

  “I work at night. I’m a sports agent.”

  “You’re surrounded by groupies.”

  “Yeah, and the only woman I want is you, but I can’t have you can I?” He dropped onto the sofa. “How long are you going to play this game?”

  “It’s not a game. It’s a way of life.”

  “Not having sex?” Clyde dropped his head in his hands. After a minute, he popped to his feet. “I’m not Stephen, and you’re not going to turn me into him.”

  “You don’t have to tell me that you’re not Stephen. Trust me, I know that.” I crossed the room and picked up my shoes. I slid them on. “How are you two even friends?”

  I could see the hurt on his face. I wasn’t sure what I meant by that, but Clyde had interpreted it to mean far more than I thought.

  “Way to get an insult in.”

  I dropped my eyes. I felt bad about it, but I couldn’t say sorry. I couldn’t take back anything.

  “Why don’t you take my phone and look?” He handed it to me. “That’s what you want anyway, right? Check my text messages and voicemail messages. Look at my pics. Heck, while you’re there go through my social media and emails.” He pushed the phone at me. I met his eyes again. I saw all the disappointment, hurt, and pain I’d felt over the years looking back at me. “Take it. Find my lie.”

  “Kim, are you listening?”

  I shook off the memory and turned to face him. “What?”

  “I asked if you were going to Louisiana?”

  “My mother is on a cruise.”

  “Are you staying in Pine through Christmas?” His voice rose to an awkward pitch.

  “Yes.” His tone made me curious about his plans. “Are you?”

  He glanced in my direction. “I’m not sure.” A beat of silence and then, “If I do, maybe we could go see the new Will Smith movie. It comes out Christmas.”

  Heat rose from my belly. I hadn’t heard from him since our breakup a month ago. Not a phone call or text and now he was trying to hook up on Christmas. “There’s no movie theater in Pine.”

  “There’s got to be one close.”

  “There is no we, Clyde.” I snapped. “There’s you and I and you and I aren’t friends right now so I don’t want to talk about my mother or my Christmas plans.” I looked out the window to my right.

  He was quiet for a few before he said, “You think I don’t know that? That was your choice.”

  I smirked inwardly and mumbled, “A choice you didn’t exactly give me.”

  “It didn’t have to go down the way it did,” he said.

  I turned my head and caught a look at his profile. The cleft in the chin of his square jaw was hidden by the goatee he’d let grow in. Clyde was pretty. Like Brad Pitt dipped in chocolate kind of pretty. His eyes slid off the road in my direction for a second. My heart thumped. His dark brooding irises were sexy even when he was angry. I hated pretty boys.

  “I just want to survive this trip, Clyde. Can we do that?”

  “Yeah, we can sit here and not talk, because that’s what you want and we both know it’s always about what you want.” He cursed and the car swerved a little.

  After he got control of the vehicle, he looked at me again. “I didn’t mean survive literally.”

  He threw up a hand. “Are we talking now?”

  “No, we’re not. But don’t you wreck this van.” I looked back at Tamar. She hadn’t stirred.

  His hands were a vice on the steering wheel. He fussed under his breath and then wiped a hand over his face. “You didn’t have to walk out like that. You didn’t have to break up with me right before the holidays.”

  “So, I guess I should have waited until you dumped me after the new year?” He was silent. “I know I’m right. We’d hit a brick wall. There was no point in dragging it out.” I put my elbow on the window frame and perched my head on my fist. “Let’s stop fighting. I don’t want to hate you. You were good to me.”

  “I never cheated on you. I never even thought about it.”

  I hesitated before admitting the truth he deserved. “I know.”

  I felt the tension from his energy come down. Neither of us spoke. We let the silence grow. In my peripheral vision, I could see him glancing at me, but I didn’t turn. I wasn’t going to look in his intoxicating eyes again, so I closed mine and hoped he wouldn’t say another word. I was weaker for him than he knew.

  Chapter Seven

  Clyde

  The mountainside was coated in snow. Outside of the low hum of the engine, the only sound was the whistling of the wind. Snow was quiet, peaceful, beautiful, but I couldn’t help feeling like it would become our enemy. It had been a long time since I detoured onto Route 33. There were other turns onto smaller roads that seemed to go on forever. I reached for my phone and tried to pull up GPS, but I didn’t have a signal.

  “What kind of detour is this?” Kim asked. It was the first thing she’d said since we’d exchanged angry words almost an hour ago. “It feels like we’re never going to get back to the main road.”

  The fear in Kim’s voice heightened my own anxiety. “I don’t know. I’m not used to this part of the state.”

  “Roads are taken out of use all the time when the weather’s bad.” Tamar interjected. “Sometimes the trip back to the main road is long and winding.”

  The anxiety that had risen in my gut was on overload and I couldn’t shake it. “I hate not having a signal out here. I’m tempted to turn around and go back.”

  “It’ll be just as bad going back. We might as well push forward,” Tamar said.

  I
looked at Kim again. I hated to see her so uncomfortable, especially when I was the one driving. She was really struggling. I’d never let anything happen to her. She looked back at Tamar. I glimpsed Tamar’s reflection in the rearview mirror. Eyes closed and hand resting on her belly, she wasn’t suffering from the same angst as Kim and me. Although unfamiliar at the moment, this area was home to her.

  I felt Kim’s hand on mine. I looked and she mouthed the words, “What’s wrong?”

  I cut my eyes back to the road and then back to her before whispering, “No one else is on this road. We haven’t seen another car. If this is a detour, why aren’t people detoured with us?”

  Kim released a long sigh and let my hand go. “There weren’t many cars on the main road.”

  “True, but there were some.”

  Tamar cleared her throat. “Most locals are in.”

  “Smart of them. This is nearly a blizzard,” Kim said.

  I shook my head. “It’s not a blizzard. It’s heavy snow.”

  “Okay, okay. If heavy snow makes you feel better, I won’t call the blizzard a blizzard.” Kim sighed again.

  We came to a part of the road that was in the mountains as evidenced by the steep incline. I braked and put the car in park. “I don’t trust this hill. These aren’t snow tires.”

  “What are you going to do?” Tamar asked.

  “Make you angry. I’m going back, and we’re going to find a hotel and try again tomorrow when this blows over.”

  “But we’re almost there,” Tamar whined.

  “I’m driving, and I don’t know where we are. I haven’t seen a detour sign in at least five miles. I must have taken a wrong turn.”

  “You didn’t,” Kim said. I looked at her and our eyes connected. For some reason, her confirmation was important to me. I needed the reassurance that I hadn’t gotten us lost. “I was watching too. You followed the signs.”

  Tamar pouted. “Do none of us have a signal?”

  We all looked at our phones.

  “There’s no OnStar?” Tamar asked.

  I turned and cocked an eyebrow at her. “You know this is a rental.”

  She shrugged and rubbed her belly.

  There was no point in delaying the ride back. I’d made up my mind that we weren’t going up the incline. I put my hand on the gear shift.

  “Wait,” Kim said, unfastening her belt. “I’m jumping in back. I need something out of my bag. She opened the car door and then the side door to the back and climbed in with Tamar. My coat came over the seat and landed where she’d been. I watched through the rear-view mirror as bottom up, she leaned across the seat. She turned around and seated herself. A smile covered her face as she waved a small bag of Jolly Ranchers in the air. “I need reinforcements.” Her beautiful smile brightened the vehicle and stopped my heart. She clicked herself into the seat belt and opened the bag.

  “Does everyone have what they need?” I asked. I could only hear candy wrappers unravel from the rear. I put the van in reverse and turned it around.

  “Are you sure we can’t keep going?” Tamar whined again.

  “Sorry, Mrs. Pierce. I don’t know what’s ahead, but I do know what’s behind us so back we go.”

  Kim offered us candy, which we both declined.

  I drove about five hundred feet when the van hydroplaned a little. I slowed down from thirty to twenty miles. And then, suddenly a huge deer leaped from the wooded embankment onto the road and into the van’s path.

  Reflexively, I hit the brake pedal. The van swerved and fishtailed wildly. Screams rose from the rear. I pumped the brakes – gradually, but the van slid to the right, downhill into the ditch. The sound of metal scraping, breaking branches, and brush bumping under the chassis stopped my heart.

  “Jesus!” I had no idea who screamed.

  I would have thought about him myself, but I was too busy remembering my words:

  I know what’s behind us.

  I swallowed every one of them as we plunged into a thicket of bushes.

  Chapter Eight

  Kim

  The wind and the unrelenting pelting of snowflakes against the glass were the only sounds I heard. And then, there was Clyde’s voice. “Are you okay? Are you both okay?”

  I couldn’t answer. I couldn’t move. My heart had left my body. I was sure it was on the other side of the window because I couldn’t feel anything.

  Clyde’s hand was on mine. He squeezed. I looked in his direction and forced a nod. The front passenger side of the vehicle’s airbag had deployed. The grace of God was on my life. I’d just missed that.

  Simultaneously, we careened our necks in Tamar’s direction. She waved a hand. Unlatched her seatbelt and said, “I’m fine.”

  “Are you sure?” Clyde asked.

  “I might have peed myself, but other than that, I’m sure Baby Pierce and I are okay.”

  Clyde sighed. He let go of my hand. “There’s no way we can get this van out of this ditch.” He banged a fist on the steering wheel over and over and then washed his face with his hand before resting his forehead on the wheel. He mumbled curse words.

  I unfastened my seatbelt. “Someone will come by. We’ll flag them down.”

  He raised his head and tense eyes met mine. “Didn’t we just finish discussing how there was no one on this road?” He unhooked his belt and opened the door.

  “Where are you going?” I asked.

  “I’m checking to make sure this vehicle isn’t doing something dangerous like leaking gasoline.”

  My heart leapt in my chest again. Clyde reached for his coat, stepped out, and put it on.

  Tamar and I watched as he circled the van. The hood was banged up pretty good on my side. I could see the damage from where I sat. “I’m surprised both airbags didn’t deploy.”

  “We were blessed. The bushes helped us stop.” Tamar nodded toward the windshield. “We would have hit that tree.”

  I followed her nod. It was a big one and she was right. We were headed right for it.

  I looked back. Tamar was rubbing her belly.

  “Tamar, please tell me someone patrols these roads.”

  She clasped her hands together. “Someone patrols these roads.” She said it too matter-a-factly for me to believe.

  My heart sank. “You don’t mean it.”

  “I did what you asked.” She placed a hand on my shoulder. I reached up and squeezed it. “We need to pray not panic. Clyde is already losing it.”

  The door opened. “I’m going to walk around and see if I can find a house or something.”

  “It’s safe?” I asked. “The van?”

  Clyde frowned. “I wouldn’t leave you if I didn’t know it was safe.”

  I rolled my lip in. “I’m just nervous. Can we restart it? It’s going to get cold fast.”

  Clyde got in and turned the key twice. It was dead. “Sorry. It’s not going to start. When the airbag deployed, it shut the engine off. It’s a failsafe.” He gave me a weak smile. The worry lines around his eyes crinkled. “Thank God you got in the back seat.”

  My heart thumped and tears rose to the surface of my eyes.

  “Let me see what I can find before it gets too cold in here.” He looked in the rear at Tamar. “You’re sure you’re okay?”

  She was doing better than me.

  “I’m good.”

  He looked to me. “While I’m gone, how about going through the bags. Pull out all the warm stuff and combine it in my duffel. I can only carry one bag, so we need to make the most of it.”

  I nodded. Clyde gave me another weak smile and closed the door. The freezing air he’d let in chilled me to the bone.

  My stomach tightened. “What are we going to do?”

  “We’re going to pray.” Tamar read my mind. “And trust God.”

  Chapter Nine

  Clyde

  There was nothing.

  What had I done? How had I let myself and these two women get stuck on a deserted road in a snowstorm? M
entally beating myself up was my special gift. I wanted to stop, retrace my steps for the day, but there was no time. I had to press on. I had to find us some help.

  Because I didn’t remember passing anything on the road prior to our turning around, I made the decision to walk where I wouldn’t drive. I’d hoped there was something ahead. After a while, I was like a man in the desert, fantasizing. Instead of mirages of water, I saw small towns with lights in windows and smoking chimneys.

  But there was nothing.

  I’d walked at least a half a mile. The wind-driven snow beat at my eyes and face. My visibility was trash, but I could tell there was only road, snowcapped trees, and mountains in the distance.

  I was a man who always knew what to do. But I didn’t know now. I couldn’t go back; we’d freeze to death in that van. I didn’t want to go forward; I was leaving the women vulnerable. Stephen and Tamar grew up in this area, but I was not a fan of rural anything. I feared isolated mountain areas since reading Deliverance in high school. I decided to live by my personal mantra: Never look back.

  I trudged through the snow. There was movement in my peripheral vision. I squinted. The deer. The one who had me out here in the first place. I’d never been so angry with an animal in my life. It looked at me and dashed into a thicket of trees. That’s when I saw it. A building about a quarter mile off the road. I raised a hand to my forehead to block some of the snow. It was a church.

  Chapter Ten

  Kim

  I leaned over the seat and opened all three of our bags. First, I emptied Clyde’s and then I began to select items to take with us.

  “What happened between the two of you?”

  I hesitated before offering the neatly summarized version of my response. “We discovered we’re not compatible.”

  “In what way? You’ve been seeing each other since my wedding. You hung out all summer. You went on a great trip in October. You raved about it and him and then the next thing I hear is you’ve broken up.”

  The same way I was pushing my emotions down, I pushed clothing into the bag. “I don’t really want to talk about it.”