Delia Bay

by Lauren Cooper

  “I’m not going to ask you again. This is a damned hospital” he deadpans, his index finger pointed towards the old laminate floor.

  “There are sick people here, children and new babies being born right this second and here you two are screaming in the damned hallway. Do you need me to take you home?” he directs the last part of his sentence towards me, where I’m leaning against the wall with my hands behind my back like a scolded school girl.

  “Maybe you could help actually” I mumble, flicking worried eyes at Reid who’s still staring at me as if I ripped his entire world to shreds for the second time and then forced fed the pieces to him.

  “With what? I know nothing about babies” Cash shakes his head, sighing dramatically.

  “Reid had a vasectomy. I haven’t slept with anyone else. This baby has to be his, but he doesn’t believe me for obvious reasons” I say a little louder than is necessary but what the hell is the point? The whole of Delia will know about this within the hour.

  “How long ago?” Cash aims his question at Reid who takes a second to lick around his teeth, his own hands going to his hips before he turns towards him.

  “A year or so”

  “What did your post-op results show?” Cash questions professionally. I find myself liking this side of him, it’s a side we rarely get to see, and usually he’s an ass.

  “What?” Reid snaps, his eyes narrowing on my longtime friend.

  “Your Pre-op results. They should have tested you a few weeks after to see if everything was okay” Cash raises an eyebrow in his direction, the two of them now locked in a conversation I’m not a part of.

  “You never had one, did you?”

  “No” Reid hangs his head a little, his eyes glancing anywhere but at me.

  “Then there’s a high chance the whole procedure was unsuccessful. You can still get checked to see if your shooting blanks or not, but if Luna’s right and she hasn’t slept with anyone else, then that baby is yours asshole” Cash finishes before winking quickly at me and making his way back down the corridor.

  Reid has gone as white as a sheet, his eyes trained on one spot in front of him and nothing else. Now isn’t the time to push this, we have another six months at least before the baby is born and that’s plenty of time to hash this out. With concrete laden boots I make my way back to the car, watching as other happy couples walk hand in hand with their scan pictures clutched safely between their fingers, big smiles on their faces at the future ahead of them. I seem to be the only one here totally and utterly terrified on the inside, mixed with elation of a beautiful baby growing in my belly and the mind fuck that Reid doesn’t believe it’s his.

  I don’t know how we got back to the cabin but as soon as Reid pulls us onto the dirt road, my Chevy starts to bounce a little over the gravel until I’m flung forward a little too harshly when Reid slams the breaks on.

  Glancing out of the windscreen to see what had him emergency stopping, the only thing I see is a brand-new shiny Mercedes jeep parked outside the cabin, the same couple from the market leaning against the side. The woman stands with her arms wrapped around her, shielding herself from the cold sea breeze that’s blowing up from the promenade and the man has his hands shoved deeply into his black-slack trousers.

  Reid seems to gather himself quickly, his throat clearing has me glancing worriedly in his direction as we near the cabin. It’s then that the black hair flicking around in the wind catches my attention.

  Aurora.

  “It’s her parents” my voice is barely a whisper as Reid parks the Chevy.

  Memories & Apologies

  I COULDN’T GET OUT of my own head. Being in the scan room had felt like tiny butterflies hatching in my stomach whilst a thousand daggers stabbed my heart. I saw the tiny blob on the screen the second the nurse waved the wand over Luna’s belly. The tiny heart beat pumping on the screen only confirmed what I already knew. I didn’t believe that Luna had slept with someone else, of course I didn’t, but my own insecurities were screaming at me, telling me that all of this was too good to be true. I know vasectomies aren’t always one-hundred percent affective, but I was also naïve in thinking I wouldn’t be one of those failed cases.

  I was so god-damned relieved for all the other chicks I’d been with over the last year, I’d been careful enough to wear a rubber at least but with Luna it hot totally slipped my mind. It was all I’d thought about since Cash had smacked some sense into me at the hospital using just his words.

  Call it a reality check, I didn’t care. What I did care about was how Luna jumped out of the Chevy once we reached the cabin, a perfect smile plastered on her face as she greeted my dead girlfriends’ parents.

  I don’t know how long I sat in the truck, glaring at their retreating backs as they walked into the cabin. Our cabin. A thousand and one different scenarios run through my head whilst I sat there, watching the tall grass in the meadow blow in the fall air that had descended on Delia over the past few weeks that was quickly turning arctic.

  My legs were unsteady when I finally opened the door and headed for the front door. I had no real idea why George and Charlotte Walker had decided to visit me, or how they even knew where I lived. What I did know was that they knew I hadn’t visited their daughter’s grave since she was buried there, and right now that made me feel like a fucking awful human being.

  I put the scan photos into my pocket, the weight of them like a pebble in my pocket rather than the feather light paper it really was. I could never explain that to the Walkers, it wasn’t fair that I could be fathering another child when it had been my fault theirs was ripped away from them.

  My stomach rolled when I stepped over the threshold and into my living room. Guilt, nausea, sorrow all mixed with a slight tinge of happiness to see them again washed through me like a riptide, the feeling making me dizzy.

  “Reid” George is the first to greet me in my own home, his smile wide yet soft and kind.

  “Mr. Walker” I nod in his direction, shoving my hands into my denim jackets pockets to hide the trembling in them I know is visible.

  “Mrs. Walker” I nod around him to his wife who looks no different even all these years later.

  “Reid” she smiles, the same blue eyes that her beautiful daughter had sparkle a little when the sun streams through the window for the briefest of seconds.

  “You know you’re not supposed to call me that” she shakes her head from side to side, “It makes me feel old”

  “Sorry” I look at my boots to avoid looking at them, feeling like the naughty school boy I once was sneaking into their daughters’ room at night, or helping her climb down the drain pipe so we could run around the city together for a few hours.

  “I’ll make us all some tea” Luna’s sweet voice makes my gut clench. I hadn’t even thought about this whole scenario would be affecting her and yet here she is, her all round perfect self, making tea for my ex’s parents.

  I force my feet to move, shrugging out of jacket carefully so as not to spill the contents in my pocket before I guide them to the couch.

  “What...” I clear my throat before continuing.

  “What are you doing here?” I take a seat on the arm-chair Luna had brought up at some-point in the week, the bright yellow thing added a royal pop of color to my otherwise wood living room.

  When they remain silent I realize the tone of my voice was accusatory, when I wanted to be anything but.

  “Sorry” I hold my hands up, flicking my eyes up at the only two people I had left in the world who understood the pain I was going through. “I didn’t mean it that way”

  “We know” George offers in his deep, old-southern drawl.

  Luna sets a tray filled with mugs of tea down on the coffee table before she goes to take a seat on the floor when I stop her.

  “Sit here little dove” I move from the armchair and take the spot she was going to take on the floor beside the table.

  “It’s so good to see you Reid” Char
lotte smiles softly, shrugging out of her thick grey coat and leaving it on the couch behind her.

  “It’s great to meet you too Luna”

  “Likewise,” Luna smiles softly back at the couple. If she was feeling any awkwardness at all she sure as hell was ace at hiding it. I felt like someone had cut off my tongue and ripped out my vocal cords. I couldn’t find the right words to ask, the rights one to say.

  “So, what brings you to Delia?” Luna asks nonchalantly, grabbing her mug from the table. I swallow the acid in my lungs, waiting for the pair of them to lay into me about how I haven’t visited them in the last ten years, or how I haven’t ever apologized for taking Aurora from them.

  “We heard about your accident Reid” George announces forcing my eyes to meet with his old ones.

  “Came to check if I was dead?” I ask the question out loud, regretting it instantly when Charlotte sucks in a shaky breath and George’s eyes go wide. Luna licks his lips her lips and swallows awkwardly. If it wasn’t awkward before, it sure the hell is now.

  “Why would you think that?” Charlotte composes herself, spreading her hands across her dark denim jeans that she has paired with black leather boots.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” I huff, sticking my tongue into the corner of my mouth and twiddling with my thumbs.

  “Reid Archer you look at me right now” Charlotte snaps, her mothering tone that I still remember scolding Aurora for being out past curfew has me sitting up straighter and biting my tongue.

  “Don’t let your heart get any colder Reid, you don’t deserve this. Enough is enough”

  Finding & Forgiving

  “ENOUGH IS ENOUGH” CHARLOTTE scolded Reid as if he were her own son, and I didn’t blame her. The man could act like a fully-grown toddler at times and the words that had just come out of his mouth had made me flinch.

  “Why do you think we’d want you dead Reid? You’re all we have left” she blurts with such sadness in her voice that I find myself walking towards her and sitting next to her, holding her hand in mine. I don’t know, it’s a townie thing. We’re generally overly affectionate people.

  “I thought...” Reid starts before glaring at his guitar on the stand in the corner, right next to my surfboard, before he finally inhales deeply and looks between the three of us on the couch.

  “I thought you hated me” he shrugs, “I thought you blamed me”

  “We’ve never blamed you Reid” George adds, his big burly hands clasped in front of him, the age and hard work showing on his skin.

  “Aurora loved you Reid. We love you. You know you were like a son to us, as soon as we heard what happened we had no other choice but to come and find you” Charlotte wipes a stray tear from her cheek.

  “I’ll grab you some tissues Charlotte” I say quietly, going to stand but she pulls me back down with a sniffle and a smile.

  “I’m fine. Please call me Charlie”

  I smile softly back at her when she takes my hand in hers once more. It may seem weird to anyone else but to me it feels normal, accepting even.

  “We tried looking for you for months after the funerals Reid, but we could never find you” George starts back up again after taking a sip of his tea.

  “I had to leave”

  “You felt like you had to, but you didn’t. There was always a place in our home for you. There still is if you ever need it” he adds, breaking my heart a little more for the teenage boy who thought he had nothing left when in fact he had a ready-made family missing a child waiting for him to need them.

  “Why did you leave the city?” Charlie asks him, picking up her own mug from the table.

  “I just followed Gus, the guy who gave me a job at the bar in Bancroft”

  “And the graves? You’ve never been?” George adds, to which Reid only shakes his head.

  “That’s okay Reid. We just had to see you. I couldn’t have it on my conscience that you felt that we ever hated you, especially after we heard...” Charlie trails off, her words stuck in her throat and the guilt I know Reid’s been battling to overcome comes back with full force because he’s on his feet and pacing the wood floor.

  “Fuck” he hisses, raking his hands through his already messy hair. This couldn’t have come at a worse time, or a better time? I’m not sure. Maybe it’s a blessing to get all of this mess out in the open in one day instead of dragging it out.

  “We saw you that day at the market” Charlie changes the subject, glancing at me beside her.

  “You looked so happy Reid. We haven’t seen you that way since Aurora left”

  “She didn’t leave” he hisses, tugging on his hair now.

  “She died. Because of me”

  “Reid, son” George gets to his feet, his old man frame slightly slower as he storms over to the window that Reid is glaring out of.

  “Aurora didn’t die because you. It was an accident. The asshole who crashed into them died too. There’s no justice in any of it, but we never, ever blamed you” George claps his hand onto Reid’s shoulder, the move so touching my heart swells with love for these two strangers sat in our living room.

  “I’m so sorry” Reid’s voice cracks, his back shuddering as emotions rock through his body for the thousandth time today. Charlotte and George are by his side in an instance, holding him in their arms as they let all of their pent-up emotions from the last ten years break free.

  I feel like an intruder sat on the couch watching them have this moment, it’s a foreign feeling to me. I stand and collect our now empty mugs, busying myself in the kitchen tidying away. Reid needs this, someone other than me to tell him how much he is needed, how much he is loved.

  I finish up washing the dishes and wiping down the counters even though they were already spotless after I’d done them this morning before I put the kettle on the stove to boil again. I’m trying to keep myself busy whilst they talk it out but when I glance back at the living room the three of them are just pulling away from each other.

  “Luna” Reid glances up at me from between the two of them, a soft smile on his face even though his eyes are slightly red rimmed.

  I put the dish cloth I was twiddling with down on the island before I walk back to the living room.

  “Congratulations” Charlie wraps me in her arms and I can do nothing but wrap mine around her too.

  “Thank you for saving him” she mumbles into my ear, so quiet that I’m the only one to hear it. Reid moves around us, going to his jacket that he hung up after he finally walked in earlier. For a split second I panic that he’s going to bolt again, only when I see him pulling the scan photos from his pocket do I relax.

  “I know it hurts Reid but look at what you have now” George nods between me and the photos he’d just handed Charlie. A small smile braces his plump lips, the wrinkles around her mouth deepening, proving to me that at one point she too smiled every-day.

  “It’s a perfect little one already” Charlie hands the photos back to me and gives me another hug before hugging Reid.

  “Congratulations Luna” George wraps me in his big arms too, holding me for a second longer than necessary but I find myself liking it. These two have become a part of my family in the short time they’ve been in the cabin, they’ll forever be a part of Reid and because of that they’ll forever be a part of me too.

  We spent another hour drinking tea and catching up on their lives over the past ten years. Clearly the Walkers had done more than Reid owing to him living in his own misery and not being able to find his way in the dark, but they were really nice about it. We learnt that they were living in Lordell now, Bancroft became too big for them without much there to do at their age. I gathered it held a boatload of memories neither one of them wanted hanging over their heads too, but they didn’t say that. By the time they were leaving it was dark out and I was exhausted. I gathered Charlie had noticed in the way that other mothers do and had ushered her unknowing husband to his feet and into his coat in a second flat.

  “We love
you Reid. Please stop running from us” Charlie smiles tearfully with his cheeks between her palms, the skin there plumping up like a baby and I get a small glimpse of what the tiny seedling in my belly might grow up to look like. God, I hope it’s like its daddy, those too-green eyes would melt me, and I’d be shit at scolding the little tike.

  “You should go and visit them too. It might help” George adds as he gives me a peck on the cheek before they say their final goodbyes. I can’t tell if I’m physically or emotionally exhausted and I don’t really care by the time I fall onto my back on the bed.

  Reid falls silently next to me, flinging his arm over his eyes and attempting to hide from me again.

  “I’m sorry about today” I curl into his side, feeling his heart beat beneath my ear. I relish in the silence for a few minutes, remembering that time just a few weeks ago where I wanted nothing more than to hear this sound again.

  “What are you sorry about? I was the asshole” his rough, gravelly voice vibrates through his chest straight into my head turning my woman hormones up a few notches.

  “I get it Reid. It just hurt that you thought I’d do that to you” I start to twist my finger in circles across his covered, toned abdomen, mindlessly following the outline of the poppy I know lays beneath.

  “I never thought you did. I was just too damned scared to admit that I love you and I love this baby” his large hand reaches down to cover my belly as he flips me onto my back gently.

  “I’m sorry little dove, will you forgive me?” his tormented green eyes gaze down at me, the moon outside breaking through the clouds and giving me tiny shards of light to see him in his most vulnerable state.

  “I’ll always forgive you blackbird” my voice barley a whisper as I flick my eyes between his and his edible lips before he bends to meet me, his lips pressing against mine gently but full of so much meaning.

  Young & Beautiful