by Jen Andrews
She was wrapped in the arms of some douchebag in a white coat with a stethoscope around his neck. It seemed Teagan had a boyfriend, and it seemed this boyfriend was a doctor.
Of course he was. Like I stood a chance in hell against a doctor.
I couldn’t stand to look at it so I moved on to the next text—a photo of Teagan looking up at the doctor while he looked down at her—both wearing contented smiles. In the last picture, Teagan’s arms were wrapped tightly around him and he was kissing her on the head.
“Fuck!” I growled and chucked my almost-full bottle of water out the break room door. What is wrong with me? I scrubbed my hands over my face and through my hair.
“Jer, is everything alright?” I heard my sister’s quiet voice ask from the doorway.
Zoey stood at the entrance with Hannah cradled protectively in her arms. She looked worried and Hannah’s bottom lip was quivering like she might cry at any moment.
“Yeah, Z. No. Hell—I don’t know.” I had no clue what I felt. I just knew it was messing with my head in a way it never had before.
Hannah started crying. I jumped up, went over to them, and held my hands out to her.
“Sorry, Sweet Pea, I didn’t mean to scare you.” I felt horrible when she buried her face against Z’s neck and refused to come to me. Zoey stared at me in confusion. Hannah had never done that before. She always came right to me.
Right then, I felt like the biggest piece of shit. I stepped closer and pulled them both into a hug so Hannah would see everything was okay and she didn’t need to be scared of me. Resting my cheek on her shuddering back, I talked to her quietly until she calmed down.
I pulled away from them, and as soon as I did, Hannah raised her head and looked at me. The sight of my baby niece with big tears rolling down her face tore me in two. It was me who’d made her cry. At that very moment, I felt like crying.
That was until she held her arms out to me. My Sweet Pea had forgiven me.
I reached out and took her from Z and she immediately snuggled into the crook of my neck. She took in a deep breath and let out a big shaky sigh.
“I know exactly how you feel, baby girl,” I said, breathing in her sweet baby scent. At only three months old, I was wrapped around her little finger.
I went and sat on the couch then rocked her while I talked quietly to her. I told her again, how sorry I was for scaring her, and I would never do it again.
I was teaching her to play a game. I held her tiny hand over my mouth so I could kiss it. I always kissed it nice and loud because that made her smile. We would do it over and over, until she grew bored and would smack me on the cheek instead.
Z went over to the fridge and pulled out two bottles of water. She opened both, and handed me one. I nodded a thank you.
“Jer, what’s wrong?” Zoey asked after a few more minutes of silence.
I really didn’t want to talk about it, so I handed her my phone with the last picture of Teagan still on the screen.
“Who is that?”
“The girl of my dreams—and her boyfriend.” She literally was the girl of my dreams. I’d dreamt of her all night last night, which was probably the reason I woke up in a bad mood. I usually slept like the dead, but not last night. I’d tossed and turned the entire night.
“That sucks,” Zoey whispered.
“Yeah,” I agreed.
“Why is Cammie, of all people, sending you pictures of her?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “Does it matter who sent it? She has a boyfriend . . . and he’s a doctor. I can’t compete with that.”
Z glared at me. “Jeremy Douglas James, don’t you ever say that in front of me again.”
Right now, I really felt like shit, but I knew better than to let her get started on how nobody was better than anyone else regardless of how they lived, what they did for a living, or how much money they had.
Teagan was turning me in to some kind of freak. This whole thing was new to me and I didn’t know how to deal with it. I had never felt an attraction to anyone like I did with her.
“Come home with us, Jer. I was getting ready to make lunch when I saw your car out the window. Andy and I have something we need to talk to you about anyway.”
I nodded and stood. Zoey turned off the welder and closed the valve on the gas tank for me because I was still holding Hannah. After she locked the door behind us, we walked up the stairs to their temporary apartment above the shop.
“Hey, how’s it going today, mate?” Andy asked when we walked into the kitchen. It seemed he was fixing lunch now, not my sister.
“Not so good, man. You’re not gonna poison me are you?” I asked motioning to the sandwiches he was putting together.
“Nah, not today. Maybe another time,” he replied casually, piling the giant sandwiches onto plates.
Freakin’ Andy. He always had a witty comeback. But you needed one ready at all times in our family.
Zoey pulled a bag of chips from the pantry and some drinks from the fridge. I followed her to the table, still holding a sleepy Hannah. We sat, and Andy brought the sandwiches to the table, setting them on the place mats in front of us.
Z smirked when she saw her huge sandwich and immediately took half of it and put it on Andy’s plate. “Baby, I’m eating for one now . . . not two,” she noted.
Andy kissed her on the cheek before sitting down. “For now,” he said.
Jesus, he’s already talking about another baby. Z shook her head at him and took a bite of her sandwich.
“What’s going on?” Andy asked me after he sat in his chair.
Since he already knew about Teagan, but he didn’t know what had happened last night, I merely said, “I saw Red last night. Just found out she has a boyfriend.”
“Shit. Sorry, mate.”
I shrugged it off and carefully shifted Hannah to my left side to eat my sandwich with my right hand. “So what did you want to talk to me about?”
Zoey looked over at Andy and set her sandwich back on her plate. She took Andy’s hand in hers as she swallowed her food.
“Jeremy, we have something really important to ask you. We’ll totally understand if you say no, but we hope you’ll say yes. I know it’s going to be a shock for you, but we don’t want anyone else.”
This was serious because she used my whole first name. She only calls me Jeremy when she’s pissed at me. “What do you want me to do?”
“We want you to be Hannah’s godfather.”
If I’d had food in my mouth, I would have choked on it.
“Me? Are you insane? I don’t know anything about kids.”
They both laughed at me.
“Are you sure about that?” Zoey asked as she pointed to Hannah, who was now sacked out on my shoulder. “Let me plead our case before you say no. Please, Jer.”
I nodded, so she continued.
“First off, our baby girl loves you. Look how she is with you. She’s been like that with you since you held her the very first time at the hospital. She trusts you. We trust you, Jer. You’ve been my biggest protector since I was fourteen, and I know you’d protect her with your life if . . .” She took a long pause before she spoke again and her eyes got a bit watery. “If anything were to happen to both of us.”
I had no idea they felt that way. They trusted me with the life of their child?
Their child.
Z was right though, I would do anything to protect Hannah, including dying to keep her safe, and I’d do anything to make her happy.
“I’ll do it,” I whispered. “I would be honored.”
Not surprisingly, Zoey let the waterworks fly after I said yes. She stood and hugged me as tightly as she could without squeezing Hannah.
“Z, you wake up my goddaughter and I’m kicking your ass.”
“Jesus, don’t go all Marlon Brando on me,” she replied and smacked me on the back of the head.
Andy reached over and shook my hand. “Thanks, Jeremy.”
“You’re rea
lly serious about this bro?” I asked Andy, because I was still in disbelief.
“Yeah, mate. Your sister makes a pretty good argument when it comes to you.”
After we finished our lunch, I strolled down the hallway and put Sweet Pea in her crib to finish her nap. I kissed her on the head and ran my fingers over the blonde curls forming in her hair.
“I love you, Hannah,” I said softly as I pulled a thin blanket over my new goddaughter.
On the way back to the kitchen, I ducked into the bathroom to absorb what my sister and Andy had just asked of me.
Me . . . a godfather, who would’ve thought?
I turned the water on in the sink as cold as it would go, and splashed some on my face. After I dried off, I went back to the table and sat down.
“Thank you. I don’t know what else to say . . . just . . . thank you,” I said to my sister and her husband. “This means so much to me. I swear on my life to take it very seriously.”
I choked up a little so I stopped talking before I embarrassed the hell out of myself.
“We’ll need to go see our lawyer sometime next week so we can sign the papers. Make it all legal,” Andy said.
I nodded. “Name the time and the place. I’ll be there.”
The rest of the day, I was on cloud nine. I was still hurt after seeing the pictures of Teagan, but after lunch with Z and Andy, I felt better.
I didn’t feel like a loser anymore. They had given me the best gift I’d ever received.
I would be the best-damned godfather who ever lived.
I was on my back in a tattoo shop, of all places, getting my first tattoo. It hurt like a bitch.
A few hours ago, I had been signing papers giving me the legal right to care for Hannah if something happened to her parents, and in celebration, was now getting it commemorated on my body.
I had her handprint inked on my chest over my heart. Above it, I had the words ‘Property of’ and below it, her nickname ‘Sweet Pea’, all in a script font. My heart was officially ‘Property of Sweet Pea.’ I’d chosen her tiny handprint because she had me wrapped around every single finger.
It was cool when the tattoo artist actually rubbed washable ink on Hannah’s hand and made the template directly from it.
Andy came into the room and sat in an extra chair to watch the tattoo artist finish my tat. “Yours all finished, bro?” I asked him.
“Yeah, all done,” he said, holding up his hands, showing off his new ink.
Andy had gotten not one, but two tattoos today—Hannah’s initial and the initial of his first daughter, Emma, on the insides of his wrists.
“So how many does that make?” I asked. Andy’s body was plastered with tattoos from the waist up.
He smiled proudly. “Zoey’s name was number twenty-eight, so these two make it an even thirty. But, since the New Zealand and Maori tats are all combined into one large design, technically, I only have four,” he said with a sarcastic grin.
Holy shit, he had thirty tattoos. I was barely making it through the one I was getting.
“You must have an extremely high tolerance for pain,” I said.
Andy smirked. “You have no idea.”
“Shit, man. I didn’t mean it that way,” I said.
He shook his head. “It’s fine. I know how you meant it.”
The artist finished my tattoo and rubbed ointment on it as Z and Hannah came in.
She and Hannah took a seat on Andy’s lap. “I got my snowflake tattoos drawn up. Now I just have to wait till this little girl isn’t breastfeeding, then I can get it!”
“Jesus, Z. Quit talking about shit like that in front of me. I don’t need to hear about it,” I muttered as I sat up. Not the visual I was wanting of my sister, of all people.
Everyone in the room laughed when I shuddered. I think Sweet Pea even giggled, but I wasn’t sure.
“Z, can you take a picture of me and Hannah showing off my tattoo?” I asked.
She handed Sweet Pea to me and I held her on my lap while Zoey snapped our picture with my phone and then snapped another with hers. When I put my shirt back on, I changed my screen saver to that photo.
To keep my mind off Teagan, I’d added an extra mile to my morning run. Running was the only time during the day I could clear my head. I’d helped Andy and Z move back to their place when the renovation was finished, and took on more jobs at work to keep busy.
I also made a promise there would be no more screwing around with women before getting to know them. That hadn’t worked out so well for me with Cammie.
Hence the reason for my current state of blue balls. I’d fucking cock-blocked myself.
On the way back to my apartment, I noticed that the neighborhood that I’d lived in for years was deteriorating. There were houses with boarded up windows, trash everywhere, and graffiti covering several flat surfaces.
I slowed my running down to a jog about a half-mile from my apartment. The neighborhood wasn’t getting any better. At a quarter mile away, I slowed down to a walk. Even the street I lived on had turned to shit. I needed to get the hell out of this neighborhood and find a real home. I was going to be thirty in November and all I owned was my car. Plus, now that I was Hannah’s godfather, I needed a safe place for her to play and an upstairs bachelor pad was definitely not the right place.
As soon as I rounded the corner of my building, who did I find waiting for me on my steps?
Nicole.
Not who I was expecting to see at my place before seven in the morning. I stopped in front of her, and noticed she’d been crying.
“What are you doing here, Nic?” I asked, getting straight to the point. I hadn’t seen her in several months and was still angry with her.
“Can I speak to you Jeremy?” she asked timidly. “It’s important.”
Shit, this can’t be good. But, I’d known Nic for years and she obviously had something serious on her mind. No matter what she told me, I’d be honest and upfront with my sister about her visit. “Yeah, sure. Come on up.” I held my hand down to her and helped her off the step. She followed me up the stairs, and I let us inside my apartment.
We took a seat on the couch after I got us each a bottle of water from the fridge. I loosened the cap on hers before handing it to her, and then uncapped mine.
“Thanks,” she said softly. She took a sip and put the cap back on the bottle. “I wanted to say I’m sorry for everything, Jeremy.”
I knew she was talking about Zoey and Andy because she hadn’t personally done anything to hurt me. “I’m not the person you should be apologizing to Nic and you know it.”
Her eyes filled with tears. “I know. I tried to talk to Zoey, Jeremy. I really did. But when I saw her, I chickened out. It was right after Rob . . .” She broke down at that point and cried.
I hated seeing women crying, so I moved closer to her and squeezed her shoulder, but I didn’t do anything beyond that because I didn’t want her to mistake my being nice, as anything other than that.
She calmed down and resumed talking.
“I went to her store and saw her walking in the front door. I didn’t know she was pregnant, Jeremy. Not until I saw her. I didn’t want to stress her out more than she probably already was. Will you please tell her I’m sorry?”
I nodded. “Yeah, I’ll tell her Nicole. But you have to promise me you’ll stay away from her and Andy. That whole thing with Rob was really shitty.” I didn’t want her causing waves where there didn’t need to be any.
She looked truly remorseful. “I know. I don’t know why I made Zoey think I was having sex with Andy, other than doing it for Rob. He was mad because she was seeing Andy. We were doing meth together, and I didn’t know what I was doing. I swear . . .”
Holy shit, I wasn’t aware she’d been doing drugs with him. “Nic, are you clean now? Or are you still doing meth?” I felt like I needed to help her if she were still doing it.
She smiled weakly and shook her head. “No, I’m good. After Rob di
ed, my parents sent me to rehab. I’ve been clean since January.”
“That’s great, Nic. Look, I’ll talk to Zoey and Andy, but don’t expect anything in return from them okay? They’re at a great place in their lives and don’t need any drama.”
She nodded and stood. “Thank you. I knew I could count on you. For what it’s worth, I always thought you were a great guy and a good friend. I know there can’t be anything between us ever again, but I hope we can still be friends.”
“Sure Nic. We’ll see what happens,” I said as we walked out to her car. I opened her door for her.
She started to get in and then turned back and threw her arms around me. She seemed to need it, so I hugged her back.
She pulled away from me and laughed quietly. “You’re all sweaty, go get in the shower.”
“Sorry,” I chuckled as she stood on her toes and kissed my cheek.
“Thanks again, Jeremy. Have a good day at work.”
I pulled in through the back gate of the shop thirty minutes late to work. As I stepped out of my car, Z was walking across the lot from the store to the shop.
She was packing a now four-month old Hannah on her hip, while juggling her giant purse and Hannah’s diaper bag.
Hannah let out a loud squeal when she saw me jogging toward them. She was yanking hard on a handful of Z’s hair. I laughed when I saw Zoey wince and attempt to shuffle her purse and the diaper bag to reach Hannah’s hand.
“Sweet Pea, are you torturing your mama?” I asked, freeing Zoey’s hair from her grip. “That’s my good girl.”
Zoey laughed and passed Hannah over to me. “Morning, bro,” she muttered before she backhanded me hard in the gut.
After we went in through the back door of the shop, I followed her to the office. “Hey, Z, I need to talk to you about something important if you have time.”
She sat behind her desk while I sat in the chair next to it, settling Sweet Pea on my lap. She grabbed at the pockets and collar of my work shirt then smacked me on the face.
