by Nicole Casey
It was nothing less than I had expected but the words still stung, even if they were coming from the world’s biggest hypocrite.
Naturally when Damien learned the truth, everyone else knew it too. He couldn’t wait to get the story out and tar me with the “slut” brush. Needless to say, he broke up with me immediately.
To my surprise, my father didn’t threaten to disown me. He only asked me to step down from the bank so that he wouldn’t have the slight scandal of his unwed daughter affect his stocks and honestly, I was happy to do it. I had more than enough money in my trust fund to keep me afloat and my mind wasn’t on my work at all.
“Why don’t you leave Miami for a while,” Daddy suggested. “Go somewhere new, make some new friends and then when the baby is born, I’ll find him a good home.”
“Who says I’m giving the baby up for adoption?” I had protested but as the months dragged on and I became clumsier and more isolated, I thought about what life would be like for my unborn child.
He has no father; his grandparents won’t consider him part of the family. He’s going to be an outcast in this society, even if we’re not broke.
My father would provide for me but my baby would never be accepted. I was starting to understand exactly how Kennedy had felt when she learned she was pregnant.
All my “friends” thought of me as a cheater, even though they all knew about Damien’s endless trysts and no matter how I tried to explain that I hadn’t cheated, I knew the looks I was getting.
Would any of this fall back on my baby in the end? Coming into the world thinking he was the result of some fling?
The email I had sent to Laz two months earlier had gone unanswered, a fact which stung and angered me. Married or not, he should have had the decency to say he wanted nothing to do with his child. My options were limited. I couldn’t do this alone and I wanted to ensure my child was placed with a decent family. I only had three months left in the pregnancy after all.
“Why don’t you lay back, Ms. Winter and let’s have a look at your papaya, shall we?”
I had to smile at the nickname and I lifted my sweater for the doctor to spread gel over my stomach.
“May I ask why the father isn’t in the picture?” he asked, quite unexpectedly. I stared at him, stunned for a moment.
He’s just doing his job. He’s not being nosy.
“It’s a really long story,” I sighed. “And it’s not very interesting to boot.”
Dr. Charles smiled through his wire-rimmed glasses.
“I’m sure you’re mistaken,” he replied politely. “But I won’t pry if you don’t want to talk about it.”
I was grateful for that at least but a part of me wished he would pry. It would have been nice to discuss my wretched position with an unbiased party.
“He’s a good-looking baby, isn’t he?” Dr. Charles chuckled and I instantly bolted upright. He gaped at me in surprise.
“What’s wrong?”
“He?” I echoed. “It’s a boy?”
He balked, realizing his gaffe too late and I slowly sank back against the table, my mind whirling.
A boy. I was having a baby boy.
What difference does it make? I asked myself. Boy or girl, you’re still on your own with this.
But it did make a difference—a big one. Boys needed a father figure, just as girls needed their mother.
Bull, my rational voice insisted. Many men have grown up just fine with single mothers.
“I-I really am sorry, Ms. Winter. I had no idea you didn’t know the sex of the baby. Most women want to know.”
“I am not most women!” I snapped with venom that had nothing to do with his disclosure. I was nothing like the high-class debutantes that came into his office with a Liberal Arts degree and a husband.
I may have had money but that was where the similarities ended.
“Everything looks good,” Dr. Charles rushed on, suddenly in a hurry to get me the hell out of his office. “See?”
I turned my head and gasped in shock. He had grown so much since my last ultrasound. He had a head now, tiny little hands.
He was real, not just an alien looking thing that hadn’t quite registered with me.
That was my son.
“Jesus,” I heard myself whisper. “He’s beautiful.”
Through my peripheral vision, I saw the OB-GYN’s face relax.
“He’s growing well,” the doctor agreed. “Would you like a printout?”
I started to refuse, just like I had the last two times but it died on my lips.
“Yes please,” I replied softly, feeling ashamed that I had snapped at him. He smiled kindly at me.
“I’ll have it for you at reception.” He studied me for a long moment before speaking again.
“Ms. Winter, I don’t claim to know your situation but you have a solemn look about you that tells me that you’re unsure about this pregnancy. Can I just offer a piece of advice?”
I felt my jaw lock but I nodded anyway.
“No one is ever ready for a baby. No matter how rich or successful they think they are, everyone finds themselves questioning their decision at some point. The key to raising a happy, healthy child is the support system you acquire. Hold them close and hold them dear.”
The words were little cuts into my heart.
What support system?
“I leave you to clean up,” he said, rising from his chair and casting me a final beam before exiting the room.
His absence only made me feel more alone and I didn’t move from my laying position, my head swimming with what to do next.
I slowly rose from the bed, readjusting my shirt and I caught glimpse of my face in the mirror over the sink next to the obstetrician’s table.
From that angle, my protruding belly not showing, I didn’t look pregnant.
I did, however, look as lost as the doctor had suggested I did.
I looked lost because I was lost.
I couldn’t raise a baby on my own. It wasn’t fair to the little boy growing in my womb. He deserved a set of parents who loved each other and him, not some immature girl who got knocked up by a married stranger.
As I made my way out into the waiting area, a deep, miserable feeling of grief overwhelmed me.
I knew I was leaning toward giving my child up for adoption.
There was only one problem with that.
I’d have to get the father’s consent to proceed.
11
Ayla
I didn’t tell anyone I was going to Tennessee. Not that anyone asked. As far as Dad and Mom were concerned, I wasn’t really a person that they were acknowledging these days.
I considered telling Kennedy but she had her own life to worry about too.
Maybe I was worried she’d try to talk me out of it. Or maybe I was afraid she would confirm what I was doing. In any case, I used the plane trip to steel my nerves and prepare myself for when I finally saw Laz again.
I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t imagined a reunion with the father of my unborn child a hundred times since I’d last seen him.
There wasn’t any situation I could imagine that he’d be happy to hear the news that the one-night stand he’d selflessly save was now pregnant with his child, especially if my suspicions were right and he married.
It wasn’t until I’d rented a car at the airport than I began to really panic. What if his wife was there? What would I say to him?
I told myself that it didn’t matter what I found when I got to the mountains. I needed Laz to sign off on this adoption. I’d be as discrete as possible if his wife was there but I couldn’t leave Tennessee without his signature.
My GPS guided me toward the town of Gatlinburg and I found myself marveling at the snow-capped surroundings. I had almost forgotten what the rest of the country saw in the winter, being spoiled by year-round sun and sand.
There was a magic to icicles dangling impartially from eaves of houses and shops. I must have just misse
d a storm.
I bet the kids love the snow, I found myself thinking. I’d spent winters in Aspen and even the Swiss Alps as a child and the wonderment of the season.
I had to dig into the recesses of my memory once I got to the Mountainside Resort. Laz’s place wasn’t exactly on a mail route so I’d have to try and recall exactly how to find the cabin.
What are you doing here? A small voice in the back of my mind cried as I steered the BMW up the icy path. It wasn’t a safe place to go, not while I was six months pregnant and on unchartered roads.
The question wasn’t about my safety though, but one of many second, third, fourth, twentieth guesses I’d had since finding myself knocked up.
No matter what I did, I was sure I would regret it in the end. I was screwed any which way I looked at it.
The air grew thinner as the vehicle slipped up the side of the mountain and I realized I was lost in the mountain woods.
Again.
The stupidity was not lost on me but as I pulled over to the side of the narrow, unmanned road, I had to laugh.
How many times had the universe given me a sign to stay the hell away and how many times had I ignored it?
I wasn’t meant to be up in the mountains, looking for redemption from some man who probably had not thought about me once since I’d last seen him.
And that was what I was doing there, wasn’t I? Hoping that Laz would take one look at me and declare his undying love?
God, I was a hormonal mess and I was about to make things worse if I saw him. I needed to get the hell home and forget I’d ever come before I ruined Laz’s life with the secret I’d been carrying in my womb for half a year.
Who was I really kidding anyway? I wasn’t going to give my baby away, no matter how many times I went back and forth with the idea. I loved my son, a feeling I knew would only grow stronger over the next months and when the doctor lay him in my arms, I knew I would never let him go.
Coming to Gatlinburg had been a huge mistake.
I needed to go home and focus on my child, everyone else be damned.
If only the car would start again.
“Are you mocking me?” I demanded aloud, trying the keyless starter again. “The car was off for two minutes!”
Why had I even turned it off?
The rental refused to turn over and I gaped at the dashboard in shock. It was only then I realized that I was out of gas. The idiots at the rental agency hadn’t filled up the car!
Enterprise was going to get an earful from me when I got back, that was for sure.
In the meantime, I’d have to call tripe A and hope they could find me out there when I wasn’t even sure where I was.
My bemusement turned to fear then and I reached for my phone to call the number Enterprise had given me to call in case of emergency.
To my increasing chagrin, there was no service where I sat.
Don’t panic, I warned myself, carefully opening the door. It was late afternoon and the winter sun was fading, dictating that I only had a few minute to wander for service before having to come back. I hadn’t taken Laz’s advice about the wildlife lightly and if they were hungry in the summer months, I could only imagine what they felt like in the dead of winter.
“Fuck!” I cursed loudly, hoping to hear some kind of movement but the woods were eerily calm. The resort was at least three miles back and I wouldn’t make it before dark. Plus, it was cold. My southern blood wasn’t used to this kind of abuse. Even as I uselessly tried to get a signal, I felt my hands going numb even though it probably wasn’t even freezing.
I had no choice but to go back to the car and hope that someone would come along but even as I thought it, I knew there would only be one person who would come along—a park ranger.
Oh God. I’m going to be sitting here and Laz is going to find me. Again.
What was that line? “Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it?” Yeah, that was me—repeating my same mistakes like the fool I was.
I weighed my options.
Did I return to my car and risk being found by Laz or did I claw around in the dark and the snow, hoping to avoid embarrassment.
It was a no-brainer. I was pregnant and underequipped for a trek in the snow. Humiliation it was.
I hurried back to the BMW and tried the ignition again, knowing that any fumes the vehicle had been running were now officially depleted.
Again, I checked my phone but there was no point. There was nothing I could do but wait out the night and pray I got through it unscathed.
Despite the cold, I nodded off after a few boring hours. It hadn’t been my intention of course but it happened.
I dreamt that I had been kidnapped by this beautiful redhead and tied to a chair while she drilled me about my relationship with Laz. It was Laz’s wife and I tried to deny that I was with him but she didn’t believe me.
“I know you’re pregnant with his child!” she screamed, sounding not unlike a banshee. “He told me everything.”
I tried to escape the bonds but I couldn’t and when I opened my mouth to scream, a fire broke out around us.
“This is what you get when you steal another woman’s husband!” she howled but I was no longer in the chair. Suddenly it was Laz and he looked defeated.
“How could you cheat on your wife?” I demanded, folding my arms across my chest. Now both us women stared at him and his jaw twitched.
“You don’t know the whole story,” he sighed. “You only saw what you wanted to see.”
I laughed but there was no mirth in my tone.
“Now you’re both going to burn in hell!” the redhead yelled. There was an explosion of light and I screamed but I had already woken up—to a flashlight in my face through the window.
“Ma’am! Ma’am are you okay?”
I blinked several times and realized I was shivering with cold. My breaths escaped in uneven rasps and I saw snow had begun to fall all around while I was sleeping.
“MA’AM!” Again, the end of the flashlight knocked against the window and I reluctantly sat up, pulling the driver’s side chair with me.
I touched my belly to comfort my son and to my relief, I felt him move around. At least he was staying warm.
“Ma’am, do you need medical attention?” The man on the other side of the glass was screaming now and I knew I had to open the door and show him I was okay. The glass was far too fogged up for him to see inside. How he knew I was a ma’am was be I needed to get out of there and somewhere to warm myself after all.
Even if I was sure that I was about to see Laz on the other side of the glass.
I moved my stiff fingers to open the door and peered out at the ranger before me. A fusion of relief and disappointment twisted through my gut.
It wasn’t Laz.
“Oh,” the ranger sighed. “You’re all right. I was just about to — “
He stopped talking when I pulled myself fully from the car, my belly extended for him to see my condition as I moved.
“You’re pregnant. Ma’am how long have you been out here?” His voice was fraught with worry. I shrugged, shivering.
“A few hours,” I told him through chattering teeth. “I ran out of gas.”
“We’ll get you somewhere for the night,” he said, eyeing her warily. “You shouldn’t move the vehicle tonight, not under these conditions.”
He extended and arm and guided her toward his Jeep, identical to the one Laz had driven when I’d last been there.
“The Jeep is warm and I have a blanket in the back,” he continued, moving toward his vehicle. “I’ll just bring you back to the office and we’ll get you some gas,” he offered. “But you really can’t be driving around in this weather. The trees have sheltered the worst of it up here but in town, the place is a mess.”
I followed him gratefully and climbed into the passenger side, noting how he didn’t bother to open the door for me as Laz had.
It was such a stupid thought to have but I co
uldn’t help the feeling of wistfulness which overtook me when I thought about it.
“May I ask what you’re doing up here, Ma’am?”
I wished he’d stop calling me “ma’am.” It was grating on my already frayed nerves.
“I got lost,” I replied truthfully. “I thought I knew my way around here but I guess I was wrong.”
The ranger chuckled.
“Ma’am, no one knows their way around these parts unless their native. Who are you looking for?”
He made his way back down the mountainside, steering carefully as he spoke. All I could see were flying pieces of snow in front of us as we moved, the headlights doing very little for visibility.
“A friend,” I mumbled. I changed the subject to stop him from asking me anything else. “What’s your name?”
“Ranger Barkley,” he replied. “You can call me Brad.”
“Thank you for coming to my rescue,” I said, shaking my head as I said it. How many times was I going to expect strange men to get me out of trouble? No, I had to leave Tennessee and its wild weather. I wouldn’t be back.
Why then was I consumed with wistfulness, taking in the dangerous beauty of the landscape.
“I can take you to your friend after we call it in,” Brad continued, circling back to his initial line of thought. “Who did you come to see again?”
Suddenly, a long, log cabin appeared almost before us, startling me but not flustering Brad in the least.
We had arrived at the office.
Slowly I reached for the door handle but my heart was in my throat as I noted yet another green Jeep sitting next to the building. It also looked like Laz’s.
Don’t be dumb. Every park employee probably has one.
“Ma’am?”
I turned my head to look at him, my jaw tightening at being called “ma’am” yet again. He wasn’t doing it to be a jerk—he was probably ex-military.
“Hm?”
“Who are you looking for?”
“Oh,” I breathed, wracking my mind for a name, any name but I knew I wouldn’t get away with making anything up. Brad probably knew every single soul who lived up there, just like Laz. I wouldn’t get away with BS’ing him.
