by Beth Ehemann
Room for More
Copyright © 2014 by Beth Ehemann
Cover Design by Sarah Hansen of Okay Creations
www.okaycreations.com
Editing by Megan Ward
Interior design by Angela McLaurin, Fictional Formats
https://www.facebook.com/FictionalFormats
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owner.
All rights reserved.
Prologue - Kacie
1 - Kacie
2 - Brody
3 - Kacie
4 - Brody
5 - Kacie
6 - Brody
7 - Kacie
8 - Brody
9 - Kacie
10 - Brody
11 - Kacie
12 - Brody
13 - Kacie
14 - Brody
15 - Kacie
16 - Brody
17 - Kacie
18 - Brody
19 - Kacie
20 - Brody
21 - Kacie
22 - Brody
23 - Kacie
24 - Brody
25 - Kacie
26 - Brody
27 - Kacie
28 - Brody
29 - Kacie
Epilogue - Brody
Acknowledgments
About the Author
This book is dedicated to my “Roommates”. You guys cheer me up on bad days and make the good days awesome. Thank you for making me one, grateful landlord.
Kacie,
I can’t do this anymore. I’m leaving. Actually, I’m already gone. I listened to you when you said things would be great. They’re not great. They suck. I have no freedom, I have to work all the time, and I never get to see my friends. This is not what I wanted and I’ve had enough. Sorry.
P.S. As a favor, I already paid the sitter and left you $100. Good luck.
Zach
Good luck?
I stood in my kitchen, staring down at the black letters, trying to force my brain to believe that I must be reading them wrong. My hands started shaking uncontrollably and my chest tightened as I sprinted to our bedroom and ripped the closet door open—nothing but empty hangers on his side. As I pulled his empty drawers out of the dresser completely, throwing them to the ground one by one, it hit me.
He was gone.
Really gone.
How could he do this? How could he do this now, after three years? Our twin girls were turning one next week. Didn’t he want to be here for that?
The bile started to rise up in my throat as I put my hand over my mouth and ran to the bathroom, getting there just in time. After I was done emptying my lunch into the toilet, I sat back against the bathroom wall and pulled my knees up to my chest, putting my head in my hands.
“Are you okay?” Christina, our babysitter, asked quietly as she appeared in the doorway.
Without looking at up at her, I asked flatly, “Did he say anything to you?”
She sighed. “No. He just paid me and said he left a letter for you on the counter, to make sure you saw it.”
A letter? He scribbled that bullshit on the back of a Lee Auto Parts receipt. That could hardly be classified as a letter.
I couldn’t believe it.
Sure, we got pregnant much earlier than we should have and while it wasn’t planned, we were making it work. It certainly hadn’t been easy so far, but I thought that this was forever. That we were forever. I never imagined he would leave us, and certainly not like this.
Maybe I could stop him, make him change his mind. I jumped up off the bathroom floor and rushed past Christina, heading straight for the kitchen counter where I’d left my purse to find my cell phone. My fingers were shaking so badly, I could barely dial his number.
One ring, two rings, three rings, voice mail.
I dialed again.
One ring, voice mail.
He knew I was calling. He knew I was calling and he was sending me to voice mail. Where was he? What was going on?
My knees felt weak and my head light, like I might pass out, but I managed to make my way over to the kitchen table and sit down. Christina followed me into the kitchen, though she looked like she would rather be anywhere else. She was white as a sheet and nervously playing with the buttons on her sweater.
“Go home, Christina. Thanks for watching the girls.” I was biting my lip so hard I tasted blood, but I didn’t want to break down in front of her.
She let out a huge sigh as relief crossed her face. “Um, okay,” she stammered. “The girls have been napping for about an hour, so… if you need anything, call me tonight.” She started to make her way out of the kitchen, but she stopped halfway and turned back toward me. “Are you going to need me tomorrow?”
I let out a long breath that I had no idea I was even holding in.
“I don’t know… anything. I’ll call you.”
“Okay.” She hurried over and threw her arms around me, but I couldn’t feel a thing. I was numb.
“I’m so sorry, Kacie.”
She let go and turned to walk out the front door, the floorboards creaking behind her as she went.
My mind started replaying all the memories of the last three years with Zach like a movie in my head, scene by scene. We’d met at a bonfire after a football game, and I knew that night that he was the boy I wanted to spend the rest of my life with, or so I thought. We’d had a whirlwind high school romance, full of steamy make out sessions in his truck, sneaking out for late-night walks, and lots of skinny-dipping in the lake. We’d dated for a little over a year before we found out we were pregnant.
Then, when I was eight weeks along, we got the shock of our lives: twins.
I’d almost fallen off the table when the ultrasound technician beamed at me and said, “I hope you’re ready for two!”
“Two what?” Zach said.
I didn’t say anything. I knew. My wide eyes stared at the two little flashing lights on the screen and I needed no further explanation. The next few minutes were a blur as the tech explained to Zach what was happening. I was too busy falling madly in love with the little beings currently occupying about as much space as two gummy bears in my belly. I wasn’t prepared for one baby at eighteen years old, let alone two, but I vowed that moment that for the rest of my life they would be the most important things in it.
I figured Zach would eventually share my excitement and feel the same way.
Wrong.
My first hint should have been halfway through my pregnancy when we received the news that we were going to be blessed with two girls.
Immediately, I started picturing two little girls in matching pink outfits with bows in their hair, asking me to paint their nails when they were old enough. And how lucky were they going to be to have each other? Built-in best friends. I was elated.
Zach?
Not so much.
“Seriously? Shit. If I have to go through this, I was at least hoping for boys. Fuck,” he mumbled on the way home while I sat in the passenger seat rubbing my protruding belly with a smile on my face. I just knew that as soon as he held them,
he would feel the way I was feeling.
They were born eighteen weeks later, weighing in at just five pounds each and absolutely perfect. Zach was as supportive as I expected him to be during delivery, at least in the moments he wasn’t busy texting on his cell phone. My picture-perfect fairy tale was quickly shattered. Our first fight came when the girls were only eight hours old.
“You want to what?” I scowled at him. I could feel my face turning red with anger.
“Calm down, Kacie! It’s no big deal. The guys just want me to come out for a few drinks to celebrate becoming a dad.”
“But they were just born!” I hissed back at him, trying not to focus on my mom in the background, shaking her disapproving head at him. “I was hoping you were going to stay here in the hospital… with us. I thought that was the plan.”
“Babe, I’ll only be gone an hour or so. Then I’ll come back and stay here with you tonight,” he responded, flashing that mega-watt smile that I swear got me pregnant in the first place.
“We’ve waited nine months to meet them. How can you leave now?” I looked down at the two little pink bundles sleeping peacefully, one in each arm. Tears started to well up in my eyes, but I was determined to keep them there.
“Jesus. They’re not going anywhere, Kacie. They’ll still be here when I get back. I just want to see the guys, have a cigar, and celebrate, okay? Come on, just for a little bit,” he cooed, turning on the charm. “Then, when I get back, it’s just you and me and them. We can sit and talk about how awesome our future is gonna be together.”
He knew just how to get to me. “Fine, just for a couple hours. When you come back, you’re here with me one hundred percent, okay? No more phone, no more distractions, just us. Right?”
“Sure thing, babe!” he said as he kissed my forehead. He was out the door before I could say anything else.
I spent the rest of the evening trying not to make eye contact with my told-you-so mom, who hadn’t been a big fan of Zach from the moment she met him. I was going to great lengths to sugarcoat things to make it seem like he was as excited as I was about starting our own family. I obviously couldn’t lie anymore, nor did I need to. She could see it.
Zach never came back that night.
Instead, he showed up the next morning, still wearing the same clothes and smelling like he slept in the bottom of a beer bottle. I made him run in and shower in my bathroom while my mom was downstairs in the cafeteria getting herself some coffee.
I should have known right then that it was the beginning of a very dark, lonely road.
But I didn’t.
Call it denial. Call it stupidity. I put my blinders on and pushed through, determined to do everything in my power to keep my family together. I was hopeful that he would eventually fall as deeply in love with Lucy and Piper as I did and want to be with us forever. When the girls were only a couple months old, we looked at engagement rings. My stupid, naive self thought he had secretly bought one and was paying it off, when in reality he was planning his escape. I felt like such an idiot.
The baby monitor lit up on the kitchen counter, bringing my trip down memory lane to a screeching halt. I walked over and turned the volume up. The girls had woken up from their naps and were babbling and giggling to each other. The sound of their sweet voices usually made my heart swell with joy, but right now each little cackle coming from their bedroom was another blow to my already weak heart. What was I going to tell them when they were older?
Tears slid down my cheeks and the stream quickly turned into an ocean. Sinking to the floor in my kitchen as the world below me fell away, I sobbed and sobbed until I couldn’t cry anymore. I leaned against the cabinet for what felt like hours, wondering what my life was going to be like from this point on. I made a silent promise to myself and to my daughters. I would never go through this again. They deserved better; so did I.
I had my girls and they were all I needed. Failing them was not an option. Suddenly, I was on my own and had to figure out how to not only provide for, but grow and nurture two little girls. It was all up to me. So I did what any normal nineteen-year-old, suddenly single mom would do.
I swallowed my pride and called my mom.
“Zach? At the hospital? Are you serious?” Lauren shrieked so loud into the phone I had to pull it away from my ear for a second.
“Obviously.” I sighed. “I wouldn’t joke about something like that.”
“He totally fell off the grid. I haven’t heard a word about him since he left. And I certainly had no idea he was a paramedic!”
“Me either. Needless to say, I was stunned.”
“What did he say? What did you say?”
“Nothing. I ran. Shocker, huh?” I chuckled nervously. “I pretended to get sick and sprinted to the bathroom. This other nurse, Darla, had to take over the patient while I sat on the floor of the bathroom stall having a full-blown panic attack for fifteen minutes. When I came out, he was gone.”
“Did you tell Brody?”
“Not yet. This just happened yesterday. I haven’t even processed it yet. Nor do I have any idea how to tell him.”
“You told Alexa, right?”
“Nope. You’re the only one that knows so far. Lucky you, huh?” I waited for her to laugh. She didn’t, so I continued, “Anyway, I can’t tell anyone. My mom’s first instinct will be to pack us all up in the car and move across country, and I’m worried that Alexa will go to the hospital and kill him.”
“You know she’s going to lose her mind when she finds out, right?”
“Alexa? Yeah, I know.” I sighed. “Which is exactly why I can’t tell her right now.”
“Kacie!”
“I’ll tell her eventually, just not yet. You know how she gets, Lauren. She’s so protective of us and hot-headed when it comes to Zach. Promise you won’t tell her?”
Lauren sighed, “It’s not my news to tell, so of course I won’t. I just don’t like this.”
“There might not be anything to get worked up about anyway.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Maybe that’ll be the only time I’ll have to see him. Who knows? With any luck, I can put my hours in and escape without ever having to see him again.”
I sat back on my bed and stared up at the ceiling, trying to force myself to believe the lie I’d just told Lauren. The odds of me not seeing him again over the next couple months were slim to none.
“Oh God, Kacie. I don’t even know what to say,” she said.
I had been friends with Lauren long enough to know exactly what she looked like at that moment, even from 4,700 miles away. Her blue eyes were as wide as saucers while her long, perfectly manicured hands were over her mouth. I could hear the wooden floors creaking beneath her feet as she paced her apartment.
“What’s going on?” Tommy called from the background.
“Zach is back!” she called to him.
“No shit!” he exclaimed. “Did Brody kick his ass?”
“He doesn’t know yet.”
“Oh shit. When he finds out, he’s going to kill him. Ask Kacie not to tell him until this season is over so he doesn’t go to jail, okay? I have a lot of money riding on him.”
“Shhh!” Lauren hissed at him. “What are you gonna do, Kacie?”
I took a deep breath and exhaled loudly. “I don’t know. What can I do? If I request a hospital transfer now, either I’ll end up in a field I don’t want to be in or they could make me wait ‘til next semester to switch and finish my hours, which would delay my graduation. I’m stuck.”
“Do you want me to come home?”
“Yes,” I said sarcastically. “Please hop on a plane and travel halfway around the world because I ran into my ex-boyfriend. I love you, but no.”
“You know if you said yes, seriously, I would be on a plane in an hour,” she said softly.
“I know you would and I really do love you for it.”
“So… how did he look?”
“Lauren
!”
“What?” she squealed defensively. “I didn’t mean, like, were you checking him out. I just meant it’s been a long time. How did he look?”
“I don’t know. The same. Older. He had a baseball hat on, so I couldn’t see much.”
“Kacie…”
“What?”
“I know you. There was a ‘but’ coming.”
She does know me well.
“God, Lauren… those eyes. Those big brown puppy dog eyes that both the girls got from him…” I sighed. “They haven’t changed one bit.”
“Do you miss him?” she asked slowly. “Any sparks?”
“Hell no!” I screeched, lowering my voice when I remembered Brody was just a couple rooms away. “Brody on his worst day is a thousand times better than Zach on his best day. It’s not about missing him; I was just caught off guard, that’s all.”
The bedroom door flew open, startling me, as Lucy came flying in. “Mom, can you make us eggs?” she whined. “Brody said he’d do it but we had to pay him a hundred dollars. We don’t have any money.”
I shook my head and laughed. “Sure, honey. Just one sec. All right, Lauren, I gotta get going. I’ve got some hungry hungry hippos and a blackmailing boyfriend on my hands. Plus, I have to work again today.”
“You do? Oh God.”
“Think positive, Lauren. Think positive.”
I didn’t know if I was reassuring her or me or both of us.
“Are you going to tell the girls?” she whispered into the phone.
“You know she can’t hear you, right?” I laughed, winking at Lucy who was sitting at the end of my bed, staring at me. “And the answer to that is a big fat no. I’m hoping he just goes away. Think it’s a possibility?”
“Um, no.”
Lauren and I said our good-byes and I followed Lucy out into the kitchen. The closer we got, the stronger the bacon smell got and all was right in the world again.
Brody was standing at the stove with his back to me. He had on a blue T-shirt that was just tight enough to accentuate his toned back and shoulders. Those same blue pajama pants he wore the first time I’d stayed at his house hung loosely from his hips. The memories of our first morning together made my cheeks flush. I walked up behind him, slid my arms under his, and wrapped them around his waist. I laid my head against his back and closed my eyes as the familiar smell of him calmed my nerves.
