Chapter Twenty-Eight

Matthew

“Is this what you meant?” I ask Karrie right as I slam into her. She’s on her knees in front of me, her head on the bed, her hands outstretched while she grabs the sheets. My hands grab her heart-shaped ass as I continue pounding into her. My hands move to her hips to grip her better while I continue.

As soon as we got home, I ripped her shirt off, literally in half. Going to my knees in front of her, I bit her nipple harder than I have before, her head thrashing back while she held my hair in her hands. I pushed her back on the step, taking off her jeans, and I buried my face in her pussy, making her drip all over the stairs.

Now here we are on round four, a thick layer of sweat covering us both while her pussy grips my cock so hard I can’t even go in and out.

“I’m coming,” she moans out while one of her hands slides between her legs, her fingers rubbing her clit. I plant myself in her one more time, roaring out my own release. Our pants fill the room. “That’s what I’m talking about,” she says, hitting my stomach after I fall beside her and turn on my side. “Knew you had it in you.” She rolls off the bed right before I’m about to catch her and bring her back to show her exactly what I have in me. I don’t have time because the doorbell rings.

“Shit,” I say, getting up to get my shorts on. “I forgot about Arnold.” I run out of the room while I hear the shower go on.

Opening the door, I see Arnold in his green uniform. “Hey, buddy.”

I reach out to shake his hand. “Thank you for coming out at night. With me traveling it’s hard to do this in the day.” I make him come in, bringing him to the stairs. “So this is what I was talking about.” I point to the wall leading upstairs. “If we need to expand the stairs I don’t have a problem doing that.”

Arnold takes out his measuring tape and starts measuring the steps, the width, and then from the top to the bottom. He takes out his pad and is writing down something when I see Karrie come downstairs in shorts and a tank top. When she sees Arnold her eyebrows pinch together, wondering who he is.

“Babe, this is Arnold. He will be installing the stair lift.”

She walks to me while I tell her.

“A stair lift?” she asks, looking between Arnold and me.

“It’s a chair that you sit on and it brings you upstairs so you won’t trip on the stairs.” I smile, thinking this is the best fucking thing I have ever done. I’m so proud of myself.

Arnold then starts talking, “What we are going to do is install it against the wall so we won’t have to touch the railing. We install it in one day, so we are out of your hair.” He smiles and then continues writing on the pad. “When is a good day for you?”

“Um, tomorrow would be good,” I say at the same time as Karrie says, “Never.”

I look at her and then back at Arnold, smiling.

“Matthew, can I have a word with you in the kitchen?” She walks to the fridge, taking out the orange juice. I can now see her little baby bump. “I’m going to say this once and only one time. If you install that fucking chair, I’m going to have you thrown out of this house and banned. I will call your mother, Cooper, and Allison if I have to for them to come and pack your stuff. You are getting me a senior citizen chair.” Her voice rises. “A SENIOR CITIZEN CHAIR, MATTHEW!” she yells out, my hands going to my hips.

“Babe, it’s dangerous going up and down the stairs. What if you slip walking up or down and I’m not here?” I ask her.

“What if I walk out of the house and a tree falls on me?” she counters. “What if I walk into the shower and slip?”

“We should get those non slip shower decals we saw on that infomercial.” I make a metal note to check online later.

She pours herself a glass of orange juice. “Matthew, thin ice. Get rid of that man, so help me God.”

“I can’t just get rid of him. He came on his day off,” I tell her, trying to convince her.

“I don’t care. That’s because you’re an idiot.” She turns to put her glass in the sink and then starts talking to herself. “Did he actually think I would be okay with that?” Her hands start going in the air. “He thinks I’m going to sit down and take a lift to get upstairs.” She puts the orange juice container in the fridge. “Your father is insane.” She grabs a bunch of grapes, bringing them to the sink, rinsing them off. “Why are you still here and not telling Arnold to leave?” she asks me and I’m almost tempted to ask another question, but she stands straight, daring me to so she can throw something at me.

“Okay, I’ll tell him we will discuss this and get back to him.” Her eyes glare at me, her lids half-mast. “Or that we changed our minds.” I don’t bother waiting for her answer. Instead, I go find Arnold, who is shaking his head trying not to laugh. “So change of plans.”

He nods, shaking my hand and telling me good luck.

When I walk back into the kitchen, I hear my mother’s voice fill the room. She FaceTimed my mother. Now it’s my turn to glare at her. “And then he had this man come over to put those senior chairs in the house.”

My mother shrieks while I hear Cooper in the background. “There’s nothing wrong with those chairs. It’s about safety.”

“See,” I tell her while I go to her, grabbing her shoulders in my hands, and looking into my mother’s face. “I knew Cooper would understand me. I didn’t want her to fall down the stairs. Shoot me for caring.”

I see Cooper come into the frame. “Karrie, I think you should give it some thought considering there are a lot of stairs to get to your bedroom.” He points out. “What if there was a power outage?” He continues while my mother shakes her head. “You have no windows going up the stairs. It’s a hazard.”

“See,” I tell Karrie, who looks at Cooper and then back at me. “He gets it.”

“It’s electric, so it won’t work if there’s no power,” she tells us both.

“It has a seven hour battery life,” Cooper and I say at the same time.

“He gets it because he’s a neurotic like you,” my mother says. “Karrie, when I was pregnant with the twins, he had a camera system installed in the house and he got live feeds on his phone every single time I would move.”

I laugh, thinking of the time he raced into the house because he thought she fell in the room, but she was in her closet looking for her other shoe and it was more comfortable lying down. “You also had the ambulance, fire department, and two police cars escorting you home.”

Mom looks up at Cooper. “You were over the top! He also tried to get the supermarket to only mop at night in case I walked in and slipped. He got contractors to come in and give an estimate to install an elevator.”

She stands there with her mouth open while Allison comes to the phone. “You're so lucky she loves you!!!” She smiles, then shrugs her shoulders. “I mean, I would wait till you got in the shower and turn off the hot water, but hey, that’s just me.”

“Yeah, yeah, don’t give her any ideas. You excited for tomorrow, squirt?” I ask her, hoping she is excited.

“So excited. I want to go to the Empire State Building, Times Square, Rockefeller Center, Central Park, oh, and Lego Land.” She is all excited while Mom frowns and Cooper groans.

“We will do all that,” Karrie says with a smile.

“With reason. She’s pregnant and shouldn't be on her feet for so long.” I put in my two cents while Karrie gives me the finger.

“Okay, I’ve got to get my girl fed. Talk to you later. Mom, text me when she takes off.” We blow kisses and hang up.

The next day Karrie and I are waiting at the bottom of the escalator for Allison, who runs to me, hugging me and then Karrie.

The weekend goes by so fast I don’t even see the time till she is packing on Sunday to go back home. We had to stop and buy her another piece of luggage to take back all the shit she bought. We hit up every single thing she had on her list and then some.

She comes downstairs after packing, finding me lying on the couch. “Hey, where is Karrie?” she asks, coming to sit down on the other side.

“In the shower,” I say while she leans over and picks up the second frame that we have with the new picture of the baby.

“I can’t believe you are going to be a dad.” Her finger touches the picture. “I mean, you’ve been practicing since I was born.”

I look over at her, seeing a tear coming out of the corner. She wipes it so fast it’s almost like it wasn’t there. I sit up, going to sit next to her, putting a hand around her shoulder.

“I can’t wait.” I look at the picture with her. “I was scared, you know.” I start off telling her, “The minute they said she was pregnant, my heart swelled. I got scared. Could I do this since I technically didn’t really have that great of a role model?”

“Did you tell Dad?” she asks me. It’s something we don’t bring up. I know she talks to him from time to time. I shake my head.

“He tried to call me after that whole bullshit with the rape charge, but I didn’t answer. He wasn’t there when I needed him or at least when I really needed him. You think he showed me how to shave? That was Cooper. You think he showed me what it was to be a real man? Again, that was Cooper. You think he showed me that when it gets tough you fight for it? Cooper taught me that also. You think he showed me to put your kids before your own selfish needs? Again, no. I was fucking terrified, but then guess what I did see when I looked up? Cooper stood there wiping away Mom’s tears. It was in that moment I knew I could not only do this dad thing, but I could do it like a motherfucking boss.” I look over at her. “Besides, if I wasn’t the best that I could be, Mom would kick my ass.”

“She totally would,” Allison agrees with me.

“Hey, you two,” Karrie says from the doorway while she holds a carton of strawberry ice cream with three spoons in it. “Wanna watch Naked Dating?”

Allison throws her head back, laughing. “You know that’s considered double dipping even if it’s ice cream.” She points to the carton that Karrie is eating from, who just shrugs her shoulders, coming to sit on the other side of me.

She turns on the television, flipping channels. She stops when she comes onto 90 Day Fiancé. “It’s my favorite show.” She shakes her spoon in the air. She scoops some more ice cream, offering us a spoon. I shake my head while Allison grimaces, refusing, too. “More for me,” she says, smiling.

I lean over to kiss her lips. The taste of ice cream on her lips is divine. I lick my lips, going in for another kiss.

“Hmmm,” she says, putting her hand around my neck, still holding the spoon.

“You guys are aware I’m right here, right?” Allison speaks up, making Karrie laugh. “Okay, love birds, before I throw up my dinner, I’ll go up to my room.”

“You don’t have to leave. We’ll stop kissing,” Karrie says, straining her neck to see Allison.

“Goodnight,” I tell her, going back to kissing Karrie. “We will never stop kissing,” I tell her, letting my tongue slide into her mouth, her tongue cold from the ice cream. “Ever.” I finish that with another kiss.