by Aubrey Irons
The hurt.
The humiliation.
The betrayal.
Bernadette quickly steps forward. “Now, honey, I’m sure this is all just-”
The room starts to spin, and I stumble.
“Oh its just the media being nosey and making stuff up is all, sweetheart!” She pulls me into her, stroking my back as she leads me to a chair against the dressing room wall and sits me down.
I stare at the magazine in my hands, flipping the pages to the article in the pin-drop silence of the room. Tina is apparently telling the press that Austin is “leaving his wife” to be a family with her.
I’m going to be sick.
And a part of me knows I have no real “right” to be upset, even if it is true. After all, we entered into this with knowing exactly what it was - an agreement, an arrangement.
Just business, just a transaction, and nothing personal - no emotions.
So why does this hurt so much.
I stare through the magazine in my hands, feeling numb, and cold.
Because you’re ALSO carrying his child.
And that truth might hurt worse than the screaming headlines in my hands. It’s the knowledge that despite every warning sign, despite every single hesitation my heart gave me and as cringing as it is to even admit to myself, I thought it was real.
For a moment there, I thought we were real, like a complete idiot.
“I have to go.”
Bernadette is saying something, but I don’t really hear her as I half stumble, half tear myself out of my dress. I’m aware of the coldness - the blank, empty feeling inside as I slip back into my clothes and run out the door.
I’m back at Austin’s house - somehow, though I don’t remember even driving myself here. I’m numb, moving on some sort of autopilot as I stumble into the house. Buckley’s there, wagging his tail as he pokes his head around the corner to say hello.
Aside from him, the house is empty.
I’m standing like a ghost in the middle of the living room, blinking, turning, and searching for something though I don’t know what that may even be.
This was home.
For a brief, fleeting moment, it was. This house, and the man who lives here felt like home.
Except now I have no home, because apparently I belong nowhere.
The phone ringing in my hand snaps me out of my daze. I glance down, cringing at Vince’s name across the screen.
He knows.
Of course he knows, and here he is ready to bait me - ready to gloat as he tells me he told me so.
Hell, my own heart wants to say the same thing to me.
I ignore the call, slumping down onto the couch and dropping my face into my hands.
The worst part is, I’ve only got myself to blame. Austin lied? Really? Is it really any sort of surprise to me that a man like that was less than truthful about his involvement with women?
Blaming Austin is easy, except I know deep down, this is on me. This is me, letting my guard down, letting my heart lead me places I had no business going, and wanting to find something in places it was never going to be.
This was me actually believing somehow that money would buy happiness, and I’ve never felt like more of a perfectly silly idiot in my life.
My mother was right. It’s a thought I didn’t think I’d ever actually have, but there it is, burning it’s way to the front of my mind. All the years I spent rolling my eyes at her “marry up and marry rich” mentality, I was the one in the wrong.
Because love is a damn fairytale, and the real world is hard, and cruel, and you make it work by looking after you.
The phone rings again - Vince, again.
This time, I answer.
“Yes or no, Natalie.” His voice is cold.
“Come back to me, take me up on my offer, and this little debt with Austin goes away.”
I’m too numb to even answer, or say anything at all as Vince chuckles.
“I suppose now he can use the money for that kid he’s going to be having with that woman from the tabloids, hmm?”
I’m opening and closing my mouth, trying to finds words but only feeling pain lancing through my heart.
“Natalie,” Vince’s voice sends a chill through me.
“Come with me, and Austin’s debt to the family disappears. Now, do we have an arrangement.”
An arrangement.
Because that’s my life. In the world I live in, that’s my future. I am in fact, my mother, and my sister, and Marnie Summers from Choate, and every other woman standing on a pedestal and ready to be an accessory or a trophy to some rich guy in exchange for a life of comforts and privilege. It’s a truth, an inevitability.
And I’m tired of running from that.
I’m done with pretending somehow I’m different, or that things will be different.
They’re not, and neither am I.
It’s in a daze as I go upstairs after the call, shoving clothes into a suitcase I find in one of the bedroom closets. And I’m numb as I scrawl the note across a paper towel in the kitchen - the irony of this whole thing starting and ending with a ballpoint pen and a napkin not being lost on me.
The ring slides off with the help of a little soap. I pause, closing my eyes and breathing, before finally placing it on the note and stepping back.
It’s time to go.
It’s time to stop pretending and stop running from my life and just play the part I was meant to play.
Goodbye, I think, before I turn and walk out of the best home I’ve ever known.
40
Austin
I’m at drill practice with my passing coach Damon, gearing up for the first game of the season, when fucking Derek comes jogging onto the field.
I frown as he comes huffing towards us in his suit, looking like he’s about to have a damn heart attack as he waves his hands in the air.
“I’ll, uh, give you a minute,” Damon says flatly, nodding at the sweaty Derek stumbling towards us.
“Thanks. Sorry, man. I’ll make sure he’s brief.”
“Make sure he doesn’t die on my field,” Damon smirks, before he heads off towards the water station.
“Austin!” Derek’s face is red and puffing, his eyes looking insane.
“Derek, what the fuck, man, I’m at practice-”
“You weren’t answering your phone!”
I stare at him. “Cause I’m at practice, Der-”
“Tina,” he blurts out, wheezing.
I narrow my eyes. “What?”
“Tina,” he says it again as he looks me in the eye. “Austin-” he shakes his head, his eyes wide. “This shit just went nuclear.”
Oh, shit.
Fuck.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
My phone is still blowing up with shit from teammates, from the management team, from my coach, from Kyle, and of course from my mom, but I’m ignoring all of it as I roar through downtown LA.
I don’t know how the hell Tina’s found the balls to come out with fucking “DNA proof” considering I have literally never touched her, but I’m not even really thinking about that facet of the whole thing right now.
Because I know she’s seen it.
I’ve called Natalie about four dozen times since leaving Damon in the lurch back on that field, all right to voicemail.
Yeah, she’s seen it.
I can’t even imagine what’s going through her head right now - can’t even imagine how much she probably hates me for it. It’s bullshit, of course, but what the hell do you say to “proof” like that? And hell, even if I can prove to her it’s a lie, what then? She’s still just been humiliated across the front cover of a fucking nationally syndicated gossip magazine.
It’s playing out exactly how she said she never wanted it to - with her being left and burned by one of my “dalliances”.
I swore to her it’d never be like this, and yet here we are - another guy in a long history of fathers and fiancés and now husbands royally s
crewing her over.
I brake sharply at the brake-lights in front of me, swerving into the breakdown lane of the 405 and roaring illegally past the traffic.
Fuck it.
Because nothing matters but getting to Natalie right now. Nothing matters but getting home and making this right, and showing her that I am capable of being the man she needs.
Because I’m done lying to myself. I’m done with the “but why should I care” bullshit, because this is so far past a paper-napkin arrangement now.
I gun the engine as I swerve to dodge a road cone, blasting down the off-ramp.
We’ve moved way past that into something bigger, and more real, than either of us saw coming, and I damn well know it.
I just have to make sure she does too.
My house is empty.
“Nat!”
I’m storming through every room in the house, shouting her name, but she’s not answering.
Because she’s gone.
I can feel the blood pumping in my veins, my head spinning as all the fear and all the worst case scenarios from my drive over here all come to fruition. I make a last pass upstairs, as if somehow I’ve missed her, before stumbling back down to the kitchen.
And that’s when I see it, and my heart just fucking sinks.
It’s the ring. The ring I don’t even remember buying, or putting on her finger. But damn if it still isn’t the biggest slug to the gut I’ve ever even imagined.
I hold it up the light, feeling the color drain from my face as I slowly shake my head, not wanting to believe. I look down and see the note, scrawled across the paper towel, and my heard just breaks.
Thanks for everything - you don’t owe me anything. Please keep the ring, and tear up the ice cream napkin. Congratulations.
I’m barely aware of the doorbell ringing. I’m only half conscious of stumbling to the door, the ring still in my hand as I open the door to the man in the suit with a briefcase.
“Mr. Taylor?”
I’m blinking as he passes me the manila envelope with a cold, neutral look on his face.
“Have a good evening.”
No…
Divorce papers. The thing is full of fucking divorce papers - real ones to dissolve our very real marriage.
This is real. This is the end of all of it, sitting right there in front of me. There’s even little post it notes showing the places to sign our names, and she’s already signed her parts.
Jesus Christ.
It’s worse than any game I’ve ever lost, and hurts more than any sack or hit I’ve ever taken. I lost, hard. I played a game, and I got my damn ass handed to me.
Numb, I stumble into the living room, absently grabbing the bottle of whiskey from the bar cart and slumping into a chair. I hold the ring up again and slowly shake my head.
Fuck.
This is what losing the war feels like. And its knowing too late how I really feel that hurts the worst.
I take a swig right from the bottle, allowing the burn to creep down my throat before I raise it up in the air - a toast to no one.
To the time I was married.
Buckley looks up from the couch across the room, whimpering weakly before turning to look towards the front door.
“She’s not here, pal,” I mutter. “She’s gone.”
He whines as he puts his head back on the couch, his tail wagging once before going still.
She’s gone.
I bring the bottle to my lips and take a swig, followed by another.
And then a third.
I’m breathing heavily, my heart pounding in my chest as I bring the ring back up to my face.
I don’t quit at anything. I’ve worked my ass off to get from nothing to the place where I am now. I’ve chased after what I want with every single ounce of strength I have for my entire life.
But when the game’s over, it’s over.
Sometimes, you’ve just gotta know when to go pack up and go home.
The whiskey burns less and less the more I slug back. By the time it’s half gone, I’ve got an old Waylon Jennings record cranked up loud, my fist in the air, and the room blurring around me.
She’s gone.
And somewhere deep down, I knew this was always going to be like this. I knew it from the start and walked right into it.
Over the stereo, Waylon wails about a Good Hearted Woman, and “lovin’ a man in spite of his wicked ways” as I tilt the bottle back.
Walked right into a shot to the heart.
The world goes black.
41
Natalie
“He’s not coming, Natalie.”
There’s a cold feeling in my stomach as I turn away from the window of Vince’s downtown penthouse to look at him. He’s sitting at the dining room table across the large, marble-floored open-concept from me, his hands steepled in front of his face.
I’ve been staring out the window at nothing, like I’ve been doing for the past week and a half since I arrived here with a single suitcase and a mountain of regrets.
Since I walked out of Austin’s house and quietly closed that brief chapter of my life.
Calling Vince back, and listening to that little chuckle of triumph when he agreed to meet me felt like giving up. And coming back here - with everything that means and everything that will mean going forward - feels like quitting.
Because that’s exactly what it is.
But there was never any “winning” at this game, I know that now. This was certain from the start, and there was never anything else for me but this one path that I’ve been groomed to walk all my life.
Even if for one brief moment, I was silly enough to think there was.
I plaster a thin, strained smile at Vince, forcing the somber look from my face. “Hmm?”
Vince sighs, shaking his head. “Your experiment, Natalie. Your little walk on the slumming side.”
I tighten my mouth, shaking my head. “Vince-”
“No-no, dear, we’re past that.”
He smiles benevolently at me - the look he’s been giving me all week like he’s this magnanimous person, forgiving me for my sins.
“No more jealousy, and no more talk of the past.” His smile curls at the corners. “I thought we understood our arrangement.”
Our arrangement - the one that “settles the debt,” as Vince put it when we sat down on that awful day a week ago. The day I signed my soul away. Marriage, a baby as soon as possible, and the family “debt” goes away where Austin is concerned.
You do what you have to do.
Because even after the tabloid story - even after the pain, the betrayal, the humiliation, and the having to come back to Vince, I still can’t bring myself to hate the man that showed me for one brief moment that things could be different.
So now there’s a new ring on my finger and a new man who needs me to smile for the damn cameras.
I’m in a free-fall - stumbling in denial, in pain, and in a sort of numb state about how I got to this point. And I’m lost - lost and alone like I’ve never been before.
Of course, Vince doesn’t know - can’t know - about the pregnancy. Then again, neither does Austin, but that’s the way things will be - the way they have to be. The wedding is next week, booked the second Vince’s lawyer received the divorce papers Austin sent back signed.
So, I’ll marry Vince, and after -
I shudder, the same horrible breaking feeling inside that I’ve felt all week.
After the wedding, I’ll do what has to be done.
I haven’t yet - God no. Nothing has happened with Vince since my return, because I haven’t been able to stomach the idea of even sleeping in the same room.
I don’t know if I ever will.
After the wedding though, I’ll do what has to happen to make sure the debt is paid. It’ll have to be quick, so there’s no doubting it and no question from him that it’s his.
It’s such a psycho thought, like I’m one of those jaded player’s wiv
es. But here I am, pulling the same card I once wrinkled my nose at even considering.
Because debts need to be settled, and even if part of me hates the cocky, smooth-talking Texas boy who I somehow let steal my heart, the other part of me won’t ever be able to.
Because for one small moment in this life, I saw what could be.
Even if it was all just a beautiful lie.
42
Natalie
“So, are you excited?”
I shrug weakly. “Sure.”
Vivian shakes her head and slips her arm into mine as we leave the new, different dress shop where I’ve just been trying on wedding dresses.
Again.
She smiles as she tightens her grip on my arm and steers me across the street.
“Where are we going?”
Vivian grins. “Mother’s recipe for stress and hard decisions.”
I shoot her a questioning look and she rolls her eyes.
“We’re going to get drunk, silly. On gin if we really want to truly become our mother.”
Shit.
Vivian pulls me into an upscale cocktail place, and we breeze through the mostly empty bar room to two empty stools.
“Viv, it’s a little early.”
She shrugs. “Perfect. If only it was breakfast, than we’d really be following Lenore’s recipe.” She turns to the hipster-looking bartender wearing suspenders. “Gin martini, up with olives.”
He looks at me and I shake my head. “Just soda water, thanks.”
Vivian groans. “Nat, I’m drinking before noon on a Wednesday because I am your sister and you need me right now. But I am not doing it alone.”
She turns back to suspenders. “Another gin martini, and please make hers extra dirty,” she says with a flirty wink at the guy.
Shit. Double shit.
She turns to me. “This is going to sound terrible, given that you’re getting married in a matter of days, but…” She gives me a sympathetic look. “It’s only marriage.”
I choke out a laugh, looking down and picking at the cocktail napkin in front of me.
