HOLLY

HOLLY FELT LIKE CRAP AS SOON AS SHE woke. Unworthy, like nothing. Jake’s name flashed through her mind. Her phone hadn’t rung once, not that she’d bothered to take it out of her bag once they’d got back from the beach to charge it, anyway.

Their fight yesterday played through her mind like a movie. His anger at her for having kept the baby infuriated her. How adamant he’d been to know if it was his. She was so pissed at what lay ahead, having to make peace with Jake just so he wouldn’t sue her for custody, that she found herself grinding her teeth.

It didn’t matter anymore. The hurt vanished at finding Jamie’s sleeping body next to hers. Love for her child filled her heart. How would her life have turned out if she hadn’t gone through with the pregnancy? Yeah, she had to admit, it had been hard to get to where they were now. Jamie had been a sickly baby, but the older she got the stronger she became, and with the vitamins Holly fed her like candy daily, no one could tell she was born a preemie.

Holly had told her about Romalia, so Jamie had grown up knowing she’d had a sister who hadn’t survived. The one book Holly had read regarding the loss of twins urged parents to talk with the remaining sibling, at a young age, about the loss of their twin. It hadn’t resulted in a happy ending. Some grownups who’d never known they’d had a twin, turned out to have problems without anyone understanding why. When they finally found out that they’d had a twin who had died at a young age, everything they’d felt and gone through finally made sense.

Holly had decided not to do that to Jamie, considering she already had to grow up without a father 

She looked to the other side of her bed. Her mother was already up, and probably cooking up a storm for Julia, Rev, Bridge, and Rodney. She was used to taking care of doctors at the hospital, so taking care of doctors in training was nothing new. Breakfast was the most important meal of the day—at least that was her mother’s motto, and Jane made sure that was instilled in Holly as she grew up. She’d never skipped a breakfast in her life.

Jane’s phone buzzed on the nightstand and Holly glanced over, seeing Frank’s name flashing on the screen. Holly got up, and took the phone to the kitchen where her mother was serving breakfast. “It’s Frank.” Holly smiled, but Jane gave her a scolding look.

“It’s not what you think.” She took the phone from Holly and answered it.

“Uh huh,” Holly joked, and Rev and Julia giggled softly while the others just smiled.

“Hello, and to what do I owe the pleasure of this phone call so early in the morning?” 

Holly heard her mother flirting with Jamie’s pediatrician. The reason it hadn’t worked between them was all her mother’s fault. Frank was crazy about her, yet Jane thought he was another asshole like her father who hadn’t shown his true colors.

“Hang on, let me step out,” Jane said as Holly closed her bedroom door. She crawled under the covers with Jamie just as she woke up.

“Good morning, my angel,” Holly cooed softly and Jamie’s arms went up, over her head, stretching her little body just like she used to when she was a baby. She always wondered if that was a Jake trait, too; she didn’t stretch like that. If it was, she’d never seen it the mornings she woke up next to him. Then again, Jake was always awake before her during the times she had slept over.

“Morning, Mommy,” Jamie said, wrapping her tiny arms around Holly’s neck, giving her a soft kiss on the lips.

“Nanna is cooking up a storm. Are you hungry?”

“Will there be pancakes?”

“I don’t know. Why don’t you go and see?” 

Jamie scooted to the edge of the bed in three shuffles and slid down on her stomach until her feet touched the ground. Her hair bounced in the air as she ran to the door, then stood on her toes to open it. “Are you coming?” 

“I’ll be there in a minute.” Holly smiled and watched her little girl disappear to the kitchen. She got up and searched for her robe. As she shoved her feet into her slippers, Jane walked into the room and closed the door. 

Holly smiled, but it disappeared the minute she saw the expression Jane’s face.

“Who died?” Holly asked.

“No one died, sweetheart.” She held out the phone to Holly. “Speak to Frank, please,” she whispered shakily.

Holly took the phone as she watched her mother’s figure disappear into her bathroom.

“Frank, what is going on?”

“Holly, you should sit down, honey.”

She did as he asked and sat on the bed. “What happened? What did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything. Not this time.” He sighed loudly. Silence followed for a few seconds, and just as she was about to ask him why her mother was crying in her bathroom, he spoke again. “Who is Jamie’s father?”

Her heart rate increased dramatically. She hadn’t expected that question. He’d asked her that question so many times, and she always wondered if he didn’t know the Peterses personally. Now, she finally had her answer.

“Jake Peters.” She couldn’t believe she’d finally told him. “I know what you are going to say, but don’t, please.”

“Holly, can you tell me what happened? Please? I’ve known Jake his entire life. I can’t believe he would ever do that to anybody.”

“Frank, you are asking me to relive that horrible day. No, I won’t do that.”

“Holly, please. I’m begging you… I need to know what happened. Why did you run away if you ended up keeping both babies?”

“Fine, I’ll tell you why I ran,” she said, her tone bitter. “You might find yourself somewhat disappointed with Jake,” she snapped. She took a deep breath and went back in her head to one of the top ten worst days of her life. “I received a message from Jake early in the morning on the day I left, asking me to meet him at his mother’s house so we could make her understand how we felt about the baby.”

Holly continued, telling him how Jake hadn’t been there when she arrived, and how she’d had to deal with his mother alone. By then, he knew how scared she was of Mara as she’d promised the woman she wouldn’t fall pregnant, and then she did. Mara told her that Jake didn’t want the baby. When Holly refused to believe her, Mara went ballistic. Adamant that Mara was lying, Holly asked if she could phone Jake. She did, and that was when he said those awful nine words. She was on the verge of crying as she recounted the story. “That was it,” she said, sniffing. “No goodbye, no nothing. Mara told me that the entire family, including Amelia, felt as Jake did, and because I wasn’t going to get any more formula from Gus, I should abort the baby or I would die if I decided to continue with the pregnancy.”

Sniffing, she went on, speaking fast. “Amelia and I did a run against abortion, so her betrayal was the worst. I fled because I knew that if I stayed to face him, he would have found a way to make me see things his way, and I would have ended up doing as he asked and had the abortion. I couldn’t do it. I would have ended up hating myself for that, and ended up hating him, too.” She couldn’t have lived in a world where she hated Jake. But she never told him that… she would never tell anyone that.

Frank was silent, but Holly could hear him breathing on the other side. 

“I told you were going to be disappointed, so whatever shit he is spinning to you, he’s lying. I would never have run if I hadn’t spoken to him.”

“Thank you, Holly, and I’m so sorry that I made you relive that day. I know it wasn’t easy,” he said. After apologizing once again, Frank was gone.

Holly balled her hands into fists as she put down the phone. She couldn’t believe everyone thought Jake was such a brilliant, fantastic person, when in reality, he was an asshole. An asshole who preferred she had an abortion instead of stepping up and shouldering his responsibilities. She couldn’t believe Frank would believe Jake’s lies! Frank had seen how she’d struggled to support Jamie from the moment she was born. 

She crawled back into bed and pulled the covers over her head. Reliving that day filled her with sadness. It was one of her worst days ever, third after the day she had to say goodbye to Jamie, her number one being the day she’d had Romalia in her arms and kissed her tiny head goodbye. It was a day she would never relive again. It didn’t matter how much Jake begged her, if he got ten lawyers to force it out of her.  

Still, the day Jake had said he did not want them hurt just as much as the two top worst days of her life. She knew it sounded stupid as she hardly knew him, but it was how she felt at that moment. The betrayal of her trust was even worse. He’d just left her like she’d meant absolutely nothing to him. She was certain that the married woman had come back into his life, divorced her husband, and flung herself at Jake. It had always been her.

She heard the bathroom door creak open. The weight of her mother climbing onto the bed came next, and then her mother’s warm arms wrapped around her over the cover. “I’m so sorry, sweetheart,” she whispered. “He spun me such a crappy story of how he heard about what happened at the hospital, but that he wanted to the hear the details from me, and then he asked to speak to you, because he wanted to know what had happened between you and Jake…”

JAKE

Jake finally woke. His arms hurt like mad. He couldn’t believe that he’d gone through with what he’d done last night, or rather, early this morning. He knew it was cliché, but he’d had to do it. He hated tattoos. Not the ones he’d gotten, he’d never hate them. One was of his daughters’ birthdate, and the other of the death of one of them. 

He felt tired but he needed to speak to Frank, who’d promised he was going to phone Holly’s mom and tell her the truth. Getting out of bed, he went in search of his family, finding Amelia, his father, Robin, and Armand around the breakfast nook. Frank was missing.

“Where is Uncle Frankie?” he asked his family, who all kept staring at the deck outside. 

“Outside, speaking to one of them,” answered Amelia. Jake immediately wanted to go to him.

His father stopped him. “Jake… give him a minute.” 

Running his fingers through his hair in frustration, he dropped down onto the chair closest to the sliding door, his eyes on Frank. The phone to his ear, but he couldn’t see his face as his back was toward them. It wasn’t long before Frank was done with the call, but all he did was stand there staring at the waves. “He’s just standing there,” Jake said.

“Be patient,” his father reasoned.

Jake sighed resignedly, forcing his gaze to his father. “What if it’s not mom’s version, Dad?” He didn’t know why he asked that, but last night, between all the booze he’d had and during the art session that was now permanently inked on his arms, he thought about something Bernie had said a long time ago. It was during the vacation with Holly and Leo. Holly had seen a framed photo of a four-year-old Jake with long hair hanging on the wall. She’d thought it was Amelia and had laughed when she discovered that it was Jake; his mother had refused to cut his hair. Bernice had said something then that he’d refused to believe, which was that his mother turned psycho when it came to him.

His father finished chewing the spoonful of cereal in his mouth. “It won’t be.”

“Dad, what if—”

“What-ifs don’t exist, Jake. Your mother is not behind this.”

Jake nodded.

“What is this?” Amelia had noticed part of the ink on his arm and lifted up his shirt sleeve.

“Nothing.”

“That’s where you were this morning? You got a tattoo?”

“Amelia…” The sliding door opened and Frank walked in. He glanced at Jake, his expression sad.

“What did she say?” Everyone forgot about what Amelia had just asked, instead giving Frank their undivided attention.

Frank shook his head. “Did she speak to you the day she left?”

 “What? No, Uncle Frankie, she didn’t. She said I spoke to her?”

Frank nodded.

“She’s lying,” said Amelia.

“Amelia, I know Holly. She isn’t the kind of person who lies. It wasn’t easy for her to tell me what happened, either. I could hear it in her voice.”

Gus looked at Frank. “What did she say happened?”

“I have to admit that for a few short seconds I was disappointed, but I thought back to what you all went through and I refuse to believe that Jake would do something like that.”

“What did she say, Uncle Frankie?” Jake was adamant.

“She said that she got a message from you that morning saying that the two of you had to speak to your mother about the baby.”

“She’s lying, because we spoke to my mom a week before. I was there with Jake,” Amelia said. “Jake told her that.”

Jake looked at the table, thinking hard. 

“You did tell Holly we spoke to Mom, right?”

He shook his head. “She got so upset about it the first time, it was stressful, so I only said that we should go and speak Mom… sometime. I never told her I’d already done it.”

“Jake!”

“I knew she was going to ask questions. I wasn’t going to lie to her, Amelia, and I knew that Mom’s behavior would’ve stressed her out. I didn’t want that.”

“So, you didn’t tell her that Mom was okay with it? You could’ve just said that.”

“She would’ve wanted to know everything. I know how you women think.”

“Calm down, you two,” said Gus. “Frank, please, go on.”

“Holly said she knew the day would come when the two of you had to make Mara see reason about the baby, and she also said that you knew how scared she was of your mom.”

Jake nodded, feeling as if he was back in the ring, fighting Romanoff for the title. The title he’d lost and could never try for again, not if he’d wanted to live. Those punches he’d received in his gut. But this time, his opponent wasn’t Romanoff—it was his mother. 

“She also said that knowing that you would be there, she would be okay.” Frank gave him a concerned look, and swallowed hard. “When she arrived at your mom’s, you weren’t there, so she ended up speaking to your mother alone. She said Mara told her you had changed your mind about the baby, and that you didn’t want it anymore.”

Jake swallowed with difficulty. He struggled to breathe again. It? “That is why she ran?”

Frank shook his head. “She didn’t believe your mother. She told her she was crazy, and Mara lost it, yelled at her to call you if she didn’t believe her, and she did. She told me that at first it rang a couple of times, and then when you answered, you said, ‘It is what it is. I’ve got to go.’”

Jake felt the blood drain from his face. Amelia sucked in a breath and cupped her mouth with both hands. Jake’s entire body started to tremble out of anger.

Frank continued. “Mara then told her that the entire family stood with your decision. That Gus would not give her the formula to help her through the pregnancy, and that shockingly, even Amelia had supported your decision even though she was against abortion, because she respected her brother. Holly even tried to phone you.” He looked at Amelia. “She mentioned you did a run against abortion together.”

Amelia nodded.

“Mara told her that it would be best she get an abortion, otherwise she was going to die. That’s when she left, because she said that if she waited for you, you somehow would have convinced her that you didn’t want the baby and that she would have gone along with your wishes and had an abortion.”

Jake sat rooted to the chair, angry tears filling his eyes. He struggled to breathe, but managed to control himself as he’d lived with those feelings for a long time. His mother… his mother was behind all of this. He glared at his father, who was staring at the table. His look resembled Jake’s, as if someone had knocked the wind out of him. Gus got up, walked down the hall, and closed the bathroom door. He knew how his father was feeling. He’d felt it yesterday when he discovered he had a child. 

Then memories of his mother from five years back filled his mind. How she’d just sat by his bed when he hadn’t wanted to get up and face life again, he didn’t know. She’d just sat there while he suffered, saying absolutely nothing. He was fuming, and rubbing his face hard. Suddenly, he let out a scream and slid off the chair and fell to his knees. He cupped his head with his arms. He was not going to calm down easily today. 

A pair of burly arms, Frank’s, wrapped around his back and held Jake as he cried. “My mom was behind it all.”

“I’m so sorry, my boy,” Frank soothed. It wasn’t his fault, so why did he keep apologizing?

They sat there—how long, Jake didn’t know. He listened to Amelia’s crying, too. She argued with Armand about their mother; it wasn’t really an argument, more that she was putting the betrayal he felt into the words he couldn’t. When Jake finally got control of his anger, it seemed bearable, although he felt like he could breathe fire. Bile was stuck in his throat again, but he wasn’t going to barf like he had yesterday.

His father finally came back, still with the same look splayed on everyone’s faces. Robin was just as shocked, struggling to believe that her mother would do such a thing; she idolized her. They had a good mother-daughter relationship.

Jake understood why she felt the way she did. His mother had cried with all of them over what Holly had done, had sat with Jake so many times, getting his ass out of bed and caring for him for two whole years when all he was able to do was work, sleep, drink, and fuck strawberry blondes. 

“Your mother told me that my formula wasn’t working.” Gus was the first to speak after Amelia fought with Robin to make her see what their mother had done. Jake was glad that Amelia was in his corner again. “I’m struggling to believe that Mara would tell me that if it wasn’t the truth.”

“She did tell you not to give up on the formula, Dad,” Amelia said, “That maybe it just didn’t work for Holly.” She spat out the last sentence.

“All the signs were there,” Jake spoke softly, his voice hoarse and tired. “My own mother is the cause behind this.” 

“Jake, I can’t…”

“Well, I can, Dad. I said those words, but not to Holly.” He picked up his phone and dialed his mother’s number.

“What?” Gus asked.

“Jake said those words to Mom, when she wasn’t prepared to understand, Dad,” explained Amelia. “He told her he was going to keep the baby, that it was what it was, and that it was too late to do anything about it. He also told her that if she wasn’t on board, it was okay with him as he had enough people to help if necessary. Jake then said he had to go. I remember that so clearly,” Amelia said, crying again.

In Jake’s ear, his mother’s phone continued to ring. It eventually clicked over to voicemail. As soon the beep sounded, Jake lost it. “Answer your fucking phone, because I swear to you, you will lose a son if you don’t.” Disconnecting the call, he realized that Holly had been speaking the truth. It explained Holly’s reaction. It explained what she’d said to him: “You made your bed, now lie in it,” and it explained why she’d told Moira, and now Uncle Frankie, that he hadn’t wanted them.

He finally knew what happened all those years ago and now that he thought about of it, his mother was behind every little thing. She’d started to plan this the day he’d told her Holly was pregnant, when she’d begged him to go to the house to discuss the matter like adults. All she’d really wanted was to record that conversation and cut out what she needed from him. She must have taken his phone that night, knowing that Holly might call him the next day to confirm his mother’s crazy story. Putting those words on his message, she must have found a way to make it sound like a genuine phone call, or somehow redirected all his calls to her own phone. It hit him full-on; Holly had left him on the day that should’ve been one of his greatest, but turned into the worst one ever. Having searched for so long and not having found her didn’t compare to what he’d felt when his mom had lied. How he’d searched for her. Mara had found him fifteen miles from Seattle, fought with him to return home, yelled at him for being stupid, telling him that Holly didn’t want the baby, eventually making him see things her way. Mara was good at that. If Holly had died, the truth would’ve died with her. If she’d aborted the baby, her version would’ve never been believed. He chuckled and at that, he felt the eyes of his family on him, as if he was going to go crazy. The phone was still in hand. 

His mom’s plan had just backfired. He could guarantee that she’d never in a million years think Holly would live, that one of his babies would live, that she would be caught in her own lie. Mara Peters lied to her family, simply because of something she didn’t want. It also explained why she’d drilled it into Jake’s head, brainwashed him to never ask Holly about what had happened should he ever by chance cross her path. That all it would do to him was open old wounds. She knew… she knew that should they ever meet again, her lies would catch up with her. Well, Mom, that day has come.