president. I grew up on
the compound, so whatever questions you wanna know about the place, I’m pretty
sure I can answer.” It all comes tumbling out, and I still, holding my breath,
waiting as the clock on the wall ticks its taunting tick, eating up the eerie silence
of the tension-fogged room.
Please don’t yell. Please don’t yell .
“Fuck,” Deke harshly blurts, smacking
his hand on the arm of the couch. A puff of dust floats into the air, and I
cough, covering my mouth.
“Fuck,” Deke repeats calmer. “ You’re the fuckin’ president’s old lady.”
A statement, not a question.
My face bunches up in disgust. “ Excuse me?” I throw out my attitude in
spades. Sitting I snap to gather eye contact.
What the fuck was that? His old lady?
I thought we covered this when I left.
“Yeah, Axel said somethin’ ‘bout the
club being a big fuckin’ mess when he first called to get you this job.
Somethin’ about the president’s old lady skippin’ town. You’re the old lady who
bailed, aren’t you?” He throws me a questioning look.
“Nuh—ooo,” my hands fly in the air
with emphasis, as I begin to talk animated with my hands. “Big Dick wanted me to be his old lady. I never agreed to it. I never wore a cut. I
never signed my life over to him. That is why I left. So yes, I guess you can
say I skipped out, but it wasn’t because I was his old lady, it was because I didn’t want
to be . There’s a huge difference.” I sure hope this sinks in; I do
not want to repeat myself.
“Okay….” Deke slowly glances down my
body.
Son of a bitch, please don’t ask the
question, nobody knows the truth.
“Is that his ?” he asks, staring straight into my soul.
Lie Bink, just fucking lie to the man. He won’t know the goddamned
difference. But shit, I am so tired of lying to everyone.
Enough is enough, my shoulders can’t hold any more of this load.
My attitude deflates, “Yes , she is his.” I rub my stomach, cradling
my baby bump, and my daughter who rests healthy inside.
Surprise!
Yeah, don’t scream at me, like Deke’s about to do. I
know I probably should have confessed. Remember that night I told you about
with the whole black out and me seeing Marshall in a new light…. Let’s
elaborate shall we? Before you want to strangle me too.
After the pizza and
the college talk, Brit got up and stomped back to her room, utterly pissed off
at her dad for being so nosy. Three minutes after she had left, my ‘stomach
flu’ reared its ugly head, and Marshall was the one to rub my back as my
stomach purged all of the delicious pizza into the porcelain throne.
Handing me a towel
to wipe my mouth, Marshall sat back onto the tiled bathroom floor, holding the
lantern as it casted an eerie glow in the small confined space. “You need to
see a doctor,” he suggested. “How long has this been going on?”
I tried to feign
indifference, but the truth was I had vomited every single day for over a week
and every other day for a few weeks prior. I hadn’t told a soul. Brit was the
only friend I had in the city, and most of the times I puked, she was gone, so
I kept it to myself. But I was exhausted, I had lost ten pounds, even though I
somehow felt fat, my clothes were starting to tighten, not loosen, like I had
suspected they should with my weight loss. I couldn’t handle the burden on my
own any longer.
“I’ve been puking
for about three weeks,” I honestly told Marshall.
A wash of
understanding came over his handsome face, and he reached out and took my hand
into his. “Eva, I think you’re pregnant,” he calmly voiced. For some odd reason
he wasn’t hurt or outraged, he was sweet and reassuring. His kindness melted my
heart, and shortly after that was when I knew I would be giving Marshall the
chance he deserved.
However, at the
time I pushed off that absurd notion of pregnancy with a scoff, yanked my hand
from his, and got up from the