Chapter 20
Farrah
On Thursday morning, I woke up next to Lee and I knew I had made the right choice. He lay on his side, facing me. He wasn’t touching me, but his body was curled toward me like he was thinking about me even in his sleep.
I hadn’t been sure if being together was what he’d wanted. Since I had found out on Tuesday that the pregnancy was real and I was going to have this child if everything went well, I thought about Lee and how we could make it work. I had been worried that he wouldn’t want to be with me. When we’d slept together it had been a one-off thing, after all.
But it was very long-term now. Thankfully, Lee was on the same page I was. We both wanted to give it a try and I had a feeling it was going to work out. I would be open-minded because anything could happen. I liked Lee and I could see myself being in love with him.
He opened his eyes.
“Morning,” he said.
“Morning,” I whispered. “I need to drive back to Seattle today.”
Lee frowned. “For how long?”
I smiled. He liked having me around.
“Just for the morning. I need to grab a couple of things if I’m going to be here for a while. I need to work.”
“I was actually hoping you could come with me,” I said. I wanted him to have a glimpse into my life in Seattle. And I didn’t want to do the long trip alone. Today, I was a little unsure. Of us, of the baby, of everything.
“Sure,” he said.
“Don’t you have work?” I asked. “I mean, I don’t want to put you out.”
“I’ll fix that,” he said and rolled over, taking his phone from the nightstand. He lay in bed next to me with the phone pressed to his ear. I listened to the conversation he had with another ranger, talking about taking the day off. When he hung up, he turned his face to me and grinned.
“Done,” he said.
“Thank you,” I said, smiling. Lee rolled closer and kissed me, wrapping his arms around me and pulling my body against his. He was hard in his boxers, straining and eager. I laughed. I would have loved nothing more than to spend the day with Lee in the sheets, doing all kinds of things to cement our new relationship. But I had to get home to collect my things. Because I worked from home all my equipment was there and I needed to see what I could do for work over the next several months.
I jumped in the shower first while he put on the kettle for coffee. When I was done, I dressed and combed my hair while he showered. When we were both dressed and ready to leave, we drank coffee together, sitting down and talking about the trip. It was almost three hours back to Seattle and I had to pack a few things before we headed back to Packwood.
We climbed into Lee’s truck which was bigger than my car. On the way out of town, we stopped for gas and snacks before we hit the road.
The weather was beautiful. We wound down both windows and Lee cranked up the radio. The playlist for the day was perfect and the wind whipped my hair around my face and tugged at my clothes. When we were on the open road Lee sped up and it was like we were flying. Nothing mattered. Everything that had been bothering me, the constant knot in my stomach since I had found out about the baby, blew away. My troubled past and my uncertain future was something to worry about later. All that mattered was the two of us and the open road before us.
Lee reached for my hand and intertwined his fingers with mine, I looked at him with a smile. He pulled my hand toward his lips and kissed my knuckles. The sun beat down on my face when I turned my head toward the passenger window and I closed my eyes. We drove along, wrapped in the music and the wind and the freedom, and I knew that Lee and I were in this together. He wasn’t going to ditch me. He wasn’t going to ruin things for me.
My mind jumped to Jim, though I hadn’t thought about him in a while. I hadn’t ever gone this many days in a row without thinking about him. Everything about Lee was different than it had been with Jim. Nothing he did or said made me think about the past which was why it had been so easy to leave it all behind.
The thought of Jim made my stomach tighten again. What if Lee turned out to be the same as Jim? I had been crazy about him when I’d met him, too. And look at what he had done to me, look at how my life had turned out because of him.
I pushed the thoughts away and thought about Lee instead. Thinking about Jim and letting him ruin this moment even when he wasn’t here would only give him the power he didn’t deserve. It would only pull me back into the past when the only thing I should be focusing on now was my future with Lee and this baby that was growing inside of me.
This miracle. I put my hand on my stomach.
Who would have thought being bold would have brought me here? Nothing I could have done out on my own would have made me as happy as I was now. I knew the future would be difficult and there was a chance that things would crumble. But if I lived my life from one difficulty to the next I would never have the chance to be in a good space.
And I deserved to be happy.
We finally arrived at Seattle and drove through the city, weaving our way through the tall buildings. Lee was careful as he drove and he looked a little out of place. I could understand how strange it had to be to be in the city when his life was in the mountains.
I directed him to my home. After he parked, we climbed out together and I led him into my place. He looked around and I knew he was adding to his image of me, the same way I had done when he had taken me to his cabin. I tried to see my belongings through a stranger’s eyes and I wondered what he saw here that he hadn’t known about me.
Lee helped me collect my things. I packed up my camera equipment and Lee took it to his truck for me. I put my laptop in its bag and grabbed my external hard drive with my portfolios on it. We emptied the fridge of perishables. I had no idea when I would be back home, but I didn’t want to come here and find a fridge full of rotting food.
While Lee loaded the last things into the truck for me I walked to my bedroom and packed a bag with more clothes and toiletries than my overnight bag had contained. I packed warmer clothes as well in case the evenings were colder.
I stood in front of my closet with my hands on my hips when Lee came in.
“Are you almost ready?” he asked.
“Yeah. I was just thinking, it will be colder by the time I start to show and all my winter clothes are form fitting, so there is no point in bringing these for now..”
Lee walked to my bed and sat down. “So we’ll buy you maternity clothes when the time comes.”
He was right, of course. I was worried about something that would only be a problem, later. But it was crashing down on me a little. Sometimes, I was okay with being pregnant. It was what I’d always wanted. Other times it hit me like a freight train and I couldn’t believe this was where I was in my life. I had given up on having children and had banished all thoughts that related to being a mother. I even avoided the baby clothes section in department stores, and when mothers with children passed me I looked the other direction.
Now, I was going to be one of those mothers and I didn’t always know how to handle it. It hadn’t even been a week since I had found out and I was struggling to wrap my mind around all that was going on.
“What’s bothering you?” Lee asked.
“I don’t always know how I feel about being pregnant,” I said. “I want it but at the same time, I’m terrified.”
“It’s okay to want to be happy.”
I suddenly wanted to cry. How did he know that was what it was about? For so long I hadn’t felt like I was entitled to be happy if I couldn’t give Jim what he wanted. I had felt like a disappointment for so long. I turned back to my closet.
“Hey,” Lee said, and he threw a pillow at me. He did it so gently I was more caught off guard than shaken. I blinked at Lee and he smirked.
I picked up the pillow and walked toward him, playfully hitting him over the head with it. He laughed and grabbed another pillow and a pillow fight broke out in a way I hadn’t had in years. Lee was gentle with me, but he didn’t treat me like I was going to shatter either, as we laughed and threw pillows at each other. When Lee lifted his pillow, he dropped it instead of bringing it down on me and grabbed me around the waist instead, wrestling me to the bed. I squealed and laughed, squirming to get out of his arms.
His arms were pillars of strength and he held me in place without hurting me. When I couldn’t get out I stopped fighting it and looked up at him, panting. His dark eyes were drowning deep when he looked at me. He lowered his lips to mine and our playfulness turned into a tender moment as we lay together on my bed, kissing.
It wasn’t sexually charged. The moment was sweet and caring and we were together, a connection that wasn’t forged from sex or friendship. It was companionship and us being a team that was at the foundation of what we were doing and it felt amazing. We didn’t need to have sex to celebrate the moment, and there was no need for words. All we needed was each other, and we had that.
“We have to get going,” Lee finally said. “We still have the drive back.”
I nodded and he finally let me go. I rolled off the bed and finished my packing, not worried about maternity clothes or my happiness anymore. It would all sort itself out. And with Lee at my side, I was already happy.
I zipped up my bag and Lee took it to the truck for me. When I picked up my phone and handbag from the kitchen counter, I looked around the apartment one last time. I wasn’t leaving for good, I knew I would be back, but it felt like we were closing a chapter.
It wasn’t that I was sad about it. It was the best thing that could happen to me. The last couple of years were finally coming to a close. That was a good thing. But I was aware of the moment, aware of the shift in me and in the world all around me. Everything was changing now. I had a feeling that nothing would ever be the same again.
“Are you ready?” Lee asked, when I climbed into the truck.
I knew he was asking if I was ready to get going, but that question was so loaded. Was I ready for the future?
I took a deep breath. “Ready.”