by Lia Lee
“So?” Randy asked. He looked at me like it wasn’t fair that I’d had fun without him, that he had the monopoly on having fun after a breakup. But I didn’t care what he thought. We had been broken up for a few months now and even though he was making it hard for me to forget about him because he was constantly in my life, I had done things without him that I’d never done before. I had been having fun, and even though I’d resented him for saying I was boring and it was the reason he’d left me, I had never had fun while I was with him.
I now thought that losing him was a blessing in disguise. I wouldn’t be the way I was and having fun if I hadn’t been trying to prove him wrong.
My phone rang. “I have to get this,” I said to Randy and answered before he could respond. It was a reason to shut him up and God knows I needed more of those.
“Hi, this is Rachel from Lost Art Tattoo Studio. I’m calling to confirm your tattoo booking for tomorrow.”
“Absolutely, I’ll be there,” I said, thanking Rachel before hanging up. I thought about the tattoo I was going to get. I was getting it because of Randy, too. He hated women with tattoos. So I was getting more and more. The first had been as a fuck you to him. I had liked the freedom of expression, and even though I was still trying to prove him wrong, I had gotten hook on getting inked and wanted more. I was addicted, I had to admit it.
“Where were we?” Randy asked.
Where indeed? I was sick of this shit. It was a repeat. We were stuck on a loop and we played this game over and over. When was I going to stop? When was I going to stick up for myself and put my foot down? Now the best time.
“You were talking about you. I’m not even sure why I had to be present for that,” I said.
Randy blinked at me, shocked that I snapped. I had never snapped at him. I had let him get away with all his shit like an undisciplined child. I asked myself again why it had taken so long for me to figure out what I needed to do with him. The contrast between Randy and Laird was so big that I couldn’t believe I hadn’t seen Randy for who he was before.
I hadn’t seen myself for who I was, either.
“Why are you being like this?” Randy asked.
I wanted to answer him, say something bitchy, but I suddenly felt lightheaded and my stomach turned. I leaned forward and gasped for air. I took shallow breaths. Breathing in deeply only made the feeling worse.
“Are you okay? You don’t look so good,” Randy said.
I shook my head, pressing my hand to my mouth and jumped up. I ran to my bathroom – thank God I had a private one and I didn’t need to run to the public restroom in the tea room. I fell to my knees and threw up violently into the toilet. I retched, my stomach turned and contracted, throwing my lunch and what was left of my breakfast into the toilet bowl. I dry heaved for a while after my stomach was empty before I finally pushed up. I wiped my mouth with a paper towel and rinsed my face. I looked terrible, my mascara making dark circles after my eyes had been watering and I tried to fix it.
What the hell was wrong with me? I never threw up. Not even when I got wasted, which was its own curse. I had to get home and get in bed. Maybe it was something I ate.
When I came out of the bathroom, Randy was in my chair.
“Get out,” I said to him. I had password protected my email, changing all my passwords to something he wouldn’t know.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“I’m not in the mood, Randy,” I said. I felt like shit. “Just leave.”
He shrugged and walked out of the office like he didn’t have a care in the world. It was so typical Randy. When it revolved around him and his life, he would be more than interested. Seeing that it was my life and he wasn’t a part of what was going on, he didn’t give shit. He hadn’t even cared while we had been together. It should have been a major red flag.
I didn’t know where Randy was headed when he walked out of my office. He didn’t turn toward the elevators to leave. I didn’t care. He was out of my office and I could go home and nurse this awful feeling in my stomach. Ginger tea would do the trick. My mom had taught me that, growing up.
I suddenly missed my parents something awful. I had been to hell and back and I had been fine, but this was the last straw. I wished I could still lean on them.
I grabbed my bag and locked my office before I headed home so Randy couldn’t come back and cause shit. If anyone needed me, they could wait until after the weekend or fetch the keys from me, personally. I was going to crawl into bed and sleep. It was exactly what I needed.
Chapter 8
Laird
On Sunday, Jackson and I headed to the beehives we’d set up. He came to pick me up in his truck, and we drove together.
Jackson stayed in a cabin not far from mine. We had a piece of open land that lay against the mountain where we had set up about ten hives. I hadn’t ever dreamed of being a beekeeper, but the opportunity came about when we had an issue with a swarm of bees making a home in one of the generators.
When the lodge had called out an exterminator, Jackson and I had asked him to move the bees to a beehive for us rather than killing them. We had started harvesting the honey and selling it for extra money.
Neither of us needed the cash – we didn’t have rent or utility payments as staff, and our meals were provided for, as was our gas. But we did it anyway because it seemed a shame to be wasteful.
“It’s been colder than usual. We might not get much,” Jackson said. He pulled his hat off and scratched his head. Jackson wore his black hair shaved short, and with his cold blue eyes, looked rougher than he was. But he was my best friend. Friends were hard to come by out here where the lodge visitors only stayed a short while before going back to civilization – and I liked his company. He didn’t talk much which meant we often worked in silence, but I didn’t mind. When he did talk it was usually something deep. Jackson could be profound when he wanted to be. Quiet people were like that. They took all the time everyone else spent talking to think about things. I liked having him around.
He was right. Honey bees used some of their own honey for energy when it was cold. Since we had started the beehives, I had taken the time to do research. I knew that honey was sold per pound because it was compared to other sweeteners rather than liquids. I knew that we could get between five and twenty pounds of honey from one hive depending on the weather. I knew that bee stings never stopped hurting like a bitch, no matter how many times I was stung.
“We’ll see what we can get,” I said.
We arrived at the hives and climbed out of the truck. The weather was crisp and the mountain air fresh. I suck a deep breath into my lungs and blew it out again. I loved being out here. I had left the city behind because I had realized the rat race had been sucking me in. Every day I was out in the mountains, harvesting honey or riding the trails, I was reminded how lucky I was to be out here.
We put on our gloves and nets to guard against the stings and Jackson carried the smoking gun. Starting at one end, we sprayed the bees to paralyze them for a short while so we could take out the honey and scrape it off. We worked systematically through the hives. I got stung on my arms a couple of times, but vinegar would fix that right up as soon as I returned home. I ignored the pain because complaining about it made me a pussy. I was bigger and stronger than Jackson and he didn’t blink.
Jackson had been right; there wasn’t a lot of honey to be had. We took about five pounds of honey from each hive, leaving honey for the bees to weather the cold.
“This should be a good profit at the market tomorrow,” Jackson said. We sold the honey by the pound, and we could get up to twenty dollars for a pound depending on how clear the quality was. This time, the honey looked great.
“I need a beer,” I said when we arrived back at the truck. I pulled my gloves and net off and threw them in the back. Jackson opened a cooler with cold beers and handed me one. This was our ritual. When we harvested honey we were to men surviving in the wild, talking about things we
never spoke about when were anywhere else. We climbed onto the back of his truck and sat down, sipping our beers, looking out over the hives. The smoking gun lay at Jackson’s feet, and the containers with raw honey were next to it.
“We did good,” I said.
Jackson nodded.
We drank in silence for a while, and my mind jumped to Fiona. She was all I could think about. It had been two weeks since I’d seen her, but I couldn’t stop thinking about her. I flashed on her red hair that mirrored the fire inside her, the green of her eyes that looked like the first leaves that curled open after a season of snowing and her smile that made me melt. I had no idea what was going on. It wasn’t like I hadn’t had one-night stands before. There were women, like Hilda, that I saw in a sexual context a lot more often, and I didn’t struggle with having my mind all tangled up about it.
“Ever struggle to get a woman off your mind?” I asked Jackson.
He glanced at me. “What now?”
“A woman,” I said. “Do you ever get stuck on one?”
“Define stuck,” Jackson said.
I shrugged. “I don’t know, I can’t seem to get this one woman out of my mind.”
Jackson chuckled. “I never figured you for the kind to fall for someone.”
“I’m not,” I said. “Which is why I don’t know what’s going on. What the hell am I supposed to do with a woman on my mind? It’s not like I’m in a position to date. I came out here to get away from all the shit that comes with relationships.”
I had lived in the city once upon a time, making a living in the fast lane like the rest of them. One day, I had woken up and wondered what the fuck I was doing with my life, what it was all for. I hadn’t been able to come up with an answer, so I had sold everything I’d owned except the clothes on my back and come out here to start a new life in a different pace.
I had left women and money and a social image behind and I had never looked back.
“Look, man,” Jackson said. “I’m probably the worst person to ask about relationships and women. I have shit luck when it comes to the fairer sex, and I can’t give you any advice you’ll be able to use.”
Jackson had never had a girlfriend for longer than a few months and the poor guy had the worst luck. If they weren’t after his rough appearance or the sex he could offer them they were trying to change him to fit their image. Sometimes it was both. Whichever ever way it went for him, Jackson was the one that got fucked over every time and I felt for the guy.
I should have known better than to ask him for advice. I felt stupid for bringing it up.
I took another sip of my beer. “Don’t sweat it,” I said.
“She has to have been some woman for you to be stuck on her like this,” Jackson said with a grin. “Good in bed?”
I whistled. “A minx.”
Jackson laughed. “I wish I had a good night. Even sex can be extremely average.”
“It’s the downfall of being secluded out here in the mountains like this.”
Jackson nodded, and we sipped our beer in silence again. Jackson was the only guy I knew I could talk to about this, but women weren’t his strong suit. It was a damn shame. I could have used some advice. I had tried talking to Hilda about it one more time, but her mind was either on my dick or the dick of another. And seeing that I had fucked her a few times, she wasn’t the right person to turn to about a woman.
Jackson wasn’t very lucky in love. He was barely lucky in lust, as far as I could tell. But it didn’t matter. I had to think of Fiona as just some broad I’d had a good night with.
A fuckin good night.
After we finished our beers and chatted about trivial things for a while, we climbed back into the truck, and Jackson dropped me off at the cabin with the honey. I would put it in jars and head down to the market in town in the morning to sell it. Jackson and I always split the profit halfway. I didn’t need the cash, but it kept me busy when there were no injuries to chase after on my four-wheeler. Being busy was all that I needed out here.
When I walked into the cabin to put the honey in the fridge, my mind jumped to Fiona yet again. I had washed my sheets a few times since I’d seen her, and I still couldn’t stop thinking about her. Even without her scent clinging to my pillows, I could conjure up what she smelled like without thinking about it very hard. It was like her ghost hung around in my cabin or something. Which was some weird shit because I didn’t believe in fate and destiny and all the things that women had stars I their eyes about. It couldn’t be anything more than lust with Fiona. That had to be it. As soon as I got laid again I would forget about her.
I needed it to happen quick, then.
Her green eyes and red hair was in my mind, the way her back had arched when I had entered her, her tattoo rippling over her muscles. I couldn’t get the images out of my head.
She had been so shy and subdued the next morning. Maybe she wasn’t as wild and flirtatious as she had come across. If I had thought she was a loose woman that did this everywhere, I wouldn’t have thought about her twice. But despite how she had thrown herself at me, and we hadn’t exchanged names until the moment before I’d dropped her off at the lodge, I had a feeling it wasn’t normal for her to be like that. I had a feeling I was her first in a way.
I didn’t doubt that she’d had sex before. She was too confident about her body for it to have been something she hadn’t done before. But there had been something innocent about her. I wondered where she was now. I wondered if I would follow her there.
I shook my head, trying to get rid of the thoughts. I had always been happy out here in the mountains by myself. I had left the city life behind and never looked back. It had been years of peace and quiet where I had been able to recreate myself. But now, for the first time since I had left, I was considering leaving the mountains. I couldn’t let her test my conviction. I wouldn’t give her that much power. I had to find a way to clear my head and get back to the life I had built for myself here.
Chapter 9
Fiona
Positive. Again.
I had peed on three home pregnancy tests, and they had all come back with the same result. Which meant it wasn’t a mistake like I had prayed for after the first one had come back positive and I had shot to the convenience store to buy another handful of tests.
I had three more tests I could take, but there was no point. I was pregnant, and I couldn’t deny it. I could pee on the sticks all day. It wouldn’t change the results.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
I had been throwing up since Friday. The weekend had been miserable, and I’d spent it in bed taking the time to recover and rebuild my strength, sure I would be ready to go back to the office on Monday. I was married to my job and terrified I would have to take time off. I hated taking time off. I became so bored and started thinking about things like my break up. I had only had to ride it out. Stomach bugs, food poisoning, they all lasted about forty-eight hours, and that was it.
I had gone to the office on Monday as I had told myself I would, but I had thrown up before going in and again halfway through the morning when Jamie had made me a cup of vanilla tea. The smell, which I usually loved, had pushed me over the edge.
With no other explanation for why I felt so rotten, I had started counting days since I’d had my last period, and the number hadn’t made sense to me. But I had told myself I couldn’t be pregnant. I was on birth control. I had only fucked the Viking once. Okay, twice, but it was all in the same night. There was no way I could have been pregnant.
I had Googled my symptoms to be sure but Google was all for being pregnant.
Just the thought of it was enough to make me cry. I was in a bad place in my life, unsure of who I was and what I wanted. I wasn’t okay yet after Randy had dumped me. I had a career I was serious about, and my life wasn’t set up for a child. Not to mention the lack of a man who was willing to be a father figure.
By Wednesday the vomiting seemed to be a regular thing, so I stopped tr
ying to convince myself that being pregnant was impossible and I bought a test.
And now, here I was, freaking out that the one thing that was worse than being dumped had happened to me.
Pregnant.
I put the pregnancy tests in the plastic bag they had come in and tucked them into the bottom of my handbag so no one would find them in the work trash. I had taken the tests at work because I hadn’t been able to wait until I’d gotten home after I’d bought them.
I regretted it now. I wasn’t going to be able to focus on work. Instead, I dialed the number for my gynecologist and booked an emergency appointment. If I wasn’t going to be able to focus on work, I might as well take time off and handle this. Maybe there was a simple solution. Maybe it was a chemical pregnancy. That happened, right? How many women who wanted kids complained about the false hope that came with chemical pregnancies?
And here I was, not trying to fall pregnant at all, and I got three big fat positives.
After I booked the appointment, I left my office and drove to the doctor’s office.
Doctor Maria Sanchez had been my gynecologist for a long time, and I trusted her. She was professional and caring, and she told it to me straight; just what I needed right now.
After I explained what had happened, she took me to the examination room where I lay down on the bed. Doctor Sanchez squirted jelly on my stomach and pressed the probe against my skin. I squeezed my eyes shut and prayed she would tell me something I needed to hear.
“Fiona,” Doctor Sanchez said after a while. “You’re pregnant. There’s no doubt about it. Do you want to see?”
I shook my head. I didn’t want to see. But I turned my head to the monitor anyway. Gray images moved on the screen as Doctor Sanchez moved around.
“That’s your baby,” she said, focusing on a little blob on the screen. “You’re about three weeks along.”
I shook my head. “This can’t be happening.” I breathed out slowly.
Doctor Sanchez looked sympathetic. “Clean up and come to the office. Let’s talk,” she said. She left me to take care of my business, waiting for me in her office. When I was ready, I sat down in front of her and took another deep breath, letting it out slowly.
