Chapter Seventeen

Melinda

Every single day since I’d found out about the baby had seemed like a dream, or a nightmare depending on my mindset for the day. From the moment I woke up in the morning to the time I went to bed, and every nauseous feeling and hunger pain in between, I felt like I was walking around in someone else’s life. My chest fluttered every time I thought about the human being growing inside of my belly, and how that human was going to become my whole life very soon.

I knew that the world wasn’t going to stop just because I was having a life-changing event. I knew that the best thing for me was to try to find some balance of normalcy in this new life that I’d been abruptly thrust into. So I went through the motions at work, keeping up and ahead with my assignments, going to meetings, conversing with the VP and Mr. Cartucci, but in reality, I was completely unable to concentrate on anything for more than a few minutes.

Getting rid of the morning sickness had helped quite a bit, since I didn’t have at least that particular constant reminder of what was going on in my body.

I knew that it sounded horrible, like I wasn’t grateful for the opportunity to become a mother, something that many women desperately wanted and couldn’t make happen, but I just wanted all of it to go away. I wanted to go back to being a single, strong, and successful woman without the stresses and drama. I wanted to get back to my mindset of moving toward another promotion, to focusing completely on my work and nothing else. And there was no doubt that I deeply regretted getting involved with Troy in the first place. The pregnancy didn’t feel like a mistake. He definitely did. And that hurt, damn it. It made my chest ache, to go along with all the other physical crap I was having to deal with.

I leaned back in my office chair and rubbed my face, groaning at the constant dialogue going on in my head. I wished that I could just shut off my brain and move forward. I wished that I could block out everything like I had been able to do before, pushing my focus strictly onto my work. I leaned forward and started typing again, knowing that I was really close to being done with the report on my desk. As soon as my fingers finished, and the document was saved, I looked up to the sound of knocking on my door. I sighed and pushed back, realizing my secretary must have taken a break. Lucy would never have allowed someone to walk by the main desk without first letting me know.

I walked over to the door and opened it up, surprised to see the same delivery guy that had brought the initial flowers after I’d first met Troy. This time, though, he was holding a giant vase of lilies, my favorite flower, and a card. I waved him in and had him set the flowers down on my desk.

“Sign here,” he said just like last time, holding out the clipboard.

“Thank you,” I said, smiling as he handed me the envelope and walked out of the office.

I followed behind him and shut the door, leaning back against the wood and staring over at the flowers. I was almost afraid to go over and read the card, too nervous that it wouldn’t be from Troy, and I would be crushed. Then again, if they were from him, I might just throw them out the window. Flowers wouldn’t come close to making up for his dumping me.

I shook my head and walked over, taking the notecard out of the envelope and reading it out loud.

Melinda,

I have been a complete and total idiot. The fact that I left you all alone like that is indescribable and inexcusable. You are so beautiful, so kind, and so strong, and deserved to have me be just as strong by your side. There are no excuses, so I won’t make any.

I hope that this can be just the first step to you forgiving me for taking off, for being selfish, and for not thinking about you and the baby first, above my own personal fears.

Please call me. Give me a chance to make this right. The flowers aren’t even the first step.

Love,

Troy.

I read the card over and over again, unsure that I was reading it correctly. He really did sound sorry, and I knew that he had tried to call me earlier that day, but I’d been too scared to hear what he had to say. The flowers were beautiful, and the note said all the right things, but I’d always been the girl who felt that actions spoke a lot louder than words.

He could apologize all day long, but what would that do to make him be the man that I needed him to be? I didn’t know what to do. I was a complete and total loss. In my most vulnerable moment, he had left me all alone. That didn’t make me feel like he was the man I wanted to have by my side, helping me raise my baby. A man like that was likely to walk out, just like my father.

I put the letter back in the envelope and walked over to my chair, sitting down and staring at the computer. I printed out the report I was working on and put it away so that it didn’t get forgotten. Then, I pulled up my email and addressed a message to Troy. I was pretty sure, between what he had done and the emotions running through my body from being pregnant, that I would get my words out with more fluidity and less emotion if I chose to write to him instead of speaking to him.

I started out by writing without thought, getting everything in my head down in the message, no matter the emotion behind it or not. Then, once that was out, I deleted the whole message and started again, hopefully less emotionally this time.

Finally, after six different deletions, I sat there reading and re-reading the email that I had just written, thinking maybe this one was right. I shook my head and ended up deleting the message. I had gotten so much emotion out that I now sounded like a robot, or someone writing a business letter about a purchase. Though the depth of the emotion I had needed to stay absent, this particular event needed to include at least a little bit of emotional context. I deleted the whole letter and closed out the tab, sitting back in my office chair and shaking my head.

If I was going to give him a response it needed to be a good one, a well thought-out one, not something I wrote on a whim. I now had a child to think about, and this letter was no longer going to my new boyfriend, it was going to the father of my future child, and that meant it had to be perfect. It was Friday, so maybe if I took the weekend, I would know what to do by the end of it.

I opened up the next file on my computer and continued on with work, glancing up from time to time to stare at the lilies looming over me. They were beautiful, but they were also a reminder that at that moment, Troy was thinking about me, trying to reach out to me, trying to be part of my life. They also reminded me over and over again that when I’d needed him most, he’d split without so much as a ‘sorry.’

Who does that?

My dad…

I sighed and laid my head down on the desk, tapping my forehead harshly against the wood before running my hands through my hair. It was obvious that until I did something concrete, I wasn’t going to be able to move past it.

I reached over and grabbed my phone, knowing that this was something I needed a support system for. Chastity had been just as nervous as I was, waiting for Troy to surface again. I knew that she would have good advice for me, like she always did. She never told me something that was based on the initial emotional response, unless it came to bashing some stupid ex. And she’d done plenty of that lately, which I’d been grateful. It felt good to have someone on my side in a circumstance during which I otherwise felt totally abandoned.

I pressed call on my phone and held it to my ear, leaning back and closing my eyes.

“Hello, Momma,” Chastity said cheerfully. “How’s my little pregnant best friend?”

“Trying to ignore Troy,” I sighed. “He sent me flowers with a note apologizing for everything. I mean, this note covered every base from him being unfair and cruel, to hoping that his note would help open the door to our communication.”

“Wow,” she said. “About time.”

“No kidding. He also tried to call me this morning, but I was in a meeting and I was honestly afraid of what he would have to say,” I replied. “I’m guessing that is why he sent me flowers and a card.”

“Look, we’ve talked about all of your fears,” she said. “We talked about how no matter what, you’ll never be alone. We talked about how this isn’t the same situation as your mother and that you’re going to be one hell of a momma. We’ve talked about how amazing this opportunity is going to be, and that you’ll quickly find a balance, because you excel at that. I think that if you really love him, then you need to fight to have him in your life. If nothing else, then do it for the baby.”

I sat there listening intently to every word that Chastity said. She would take long pauses before continuing, really thinking about her words before saying them. I wanted so badly for her words to comfort me, but that was not what she was trying to do. She was talking to me to remind me of everything that we had discussed. I knew that it was really good advice and that I needed to listen to it and follow up on it. She had never steered me wrong before, and I knew she wasn’t going to start now. Angry as Chastity still was with Troy, she was putting that aside for the sake of my baby. Now I needed to do the same thing, at least until I figured out if he was man enough to deserve a place in my child’s life. Our child’s life.

When we were done talking, she told me she would be over later that night and reminded me how much she loved me. I sat there in the quiet of my office, the words on the card mixed with the words of my best friend echoing through my mind. I did love him, very much. There was no denying that, and I’d been pretty close to telling him before finding out I was pregnant. The hurt from his betrayal had only been magnified by how much I knew I loved him.

I needed to figure out a way to work things out with him. I couldn’t just walk up and tell him how I felt; this needed to be a two-way conversation. I’d freaked him out. I understood that, however much I’d been freaked out myself. And this conversation would make or break my future with him, along with the future of his involvement with our child.