Fumbled (Playbook #2)(14)
Every word coming out of Sadie’s pink-painted lips twists my insides tighter and causes the throbbing in my head to become so extreme I’m willing to do anything to make her stop talking.
“TK is Ace’s dad!” I blurt out the secret I’ve been keeping since my parents sent me packing.
“What?” she screeches, leaping off my couch like a jackrabbit. “You said you didn’t know who Ace’s dad is!”
She repeats the lie I told her.
“I lied.” I put my glass on the coaster next to hers and hug a yellow throw pillow next to me. “TK is Ace’s dad. He was the only person I’d ever slept with up until a couple of years after Ace was born.”
“Are you insane?” she asks, but seeing as I’m not quite sure, I don’t answer. “Your baby daddy is one of the highest-paid guys on the Mustangs and you’re dropping drinks to sleazy dudes in decent suits to pay your fucking bills? And then . . . he has the audacity to show up . . . after doing whatever he did with Rochelle and cause a scene at your job. And then, after all of that, you agreed to go out with him? I repeat . . .” She stops pacing, drags her hands through her long, wavy locks, and pulls them out so she looks like she stuck her finger in a light socket. “Are you insane!” She screams the words, but I don’t flinch, and in my reaction, she finds her answer. “You never told him,” she whispers.
“I couldn’t.”
“Poppy . . . what . . . why?” She picks up her wineglass and chugs what’s left, like this subject is mentally draining for her. “How could you not tell him?”
“I tried.”
She plops on the couch beside me and doesn’t say a word. She just purses her lips and aims her judgmental side-eye my way.
“I mean, I did tell him . . . initially.” I sit up straight, on the defensive even though she’s silent. “I sent him a text message saying I was pregnant. He didn’t respond so I took the bus all the way to his bougie-ass neighborhood, trekked my way past all the rude old people who looked at me like you’re looking at me now, and when I got there, his mom told me TK didn’t want a baby. She said he had a future to protect and it didn’t include being a teen father. Then she handed me a check for five hundred dollars to get an abortion.” I shrug, trying to downplay the exact moment my soul was crushed.
“What a bitch.” Sadie says the understatement of the century.
“That’s not even the end of it.” I pull the pillow closer, probably misshaping it for the rest of time. “I called him when I left, hoping to talk to him, hear his words. And a girl answered his phone. I was sixteen and pregnant and he already had another girl answering his phone. I didn’t call him again. I sent him a text saying I’d get the abortion, but when I got to the clinic, I panicked and ran. I just never told him I changed my mind.”
This is the first and last time I’ve told this story. I hate how weak it makes me look. How pathetic. Being a strong single mom is one thing. Being a broken, stupid girl, pregnant by a guy who she loved but didn’t love her back, is another.
“We need refills.” She points to my glass with a little bit left. “Drink.”
I do what she says, mainly because I was going to do it already but also because that’s Sadie for you. Always prepared for a glitter bombing, but not so much for ten years’ worth of mental baggage.
She nabs the glass out of my hand and hightails it to my kitchen and returns with bottles instead of glasses.
“Sades, I can’t get drunk before he gets here,” I protest . . . but still take the bottle from her hand.
“I know. But this is a lot, I might need to take your bottle after I finish mine.”
“So I guess I’m doing my own makeup?” I ask.
“You’re a big girl. You should’ve thought about this before you dropped a nuclear bomb on me.” She waves the bottle around like a magic wand. “You know I don’t have the coping abilities to deal with this.”
Touché. I did meet her in a club. I bet a therapist would have a field day with us.
We sit on my couch in silence, both lost in our thoughts, a dangerous place.
Sadie speaks first. “Did you really think he wouldn’t want to know?”
“I don’t know.” I want to say yes, continue the lie I’ve worked so hard to convince myself of. “TK was fun. Everyone knew it. Hell, from the look of things and what Rochelle told you, he still is. He told me his decision and I didn’t think it was fair to force mine on him.”
“But you didn’t even give him a chance to step up.” She raises her voice a bit. “You didn’t give Ace a chance to know him.”
I know who she’s getting mad at.
And I know it’s not me.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t have to close my eyes and count to ten before I respond to her.
“I am not your mom, Sadie.” My tone is gentle but firm enough that she snaps out of whatever flashback she was stuck in. “I was a sixteen-year-old girl. He didn’t want a baby and my parents kicked me out of the house without so much as a farewell. I did the best I could with what I had. And Ace is happy. He’s spent the last nine years of his life rooted in love and stability, something I couldn’t have guaranteed for him if TK was in our lives.”