Chapter 6
Tinley is completely dead on her feet as she opens the door to her apartment. Since it’s Saturday, she’s not the least bit surprised to find Dakota lounging on the couch, watching something on TV. Her lack of a laptop is surprising though. That thing has been attached to her side for the past few months and she refuses to go anywhere without it. Tinley isn’t awake enough to give her crap about it or even make a quick joke about it. Dakota pauses her show and looks up as Tinley makes her way into the living room. Her eyebrows crinkle together and she straightens her body up from her reclined position. “You’re home? Why didn’t you call me? I could have come to pick you up.”
“I had a ride home,” she nonchalantly offers with a slight grimace. She doesn’t want to make a big deal about the fact that Marek came to pick her up because she’s honestly not sure what Dakota will say. Especially with the awkwardness with how they left things the last time they spoke to each other.
“Did Clark leave your sister to drive you home? That’s a little weird.” She pauses and thinks about that for a minute and then laughs. “Unless of course he was hovering and Tara kicked him out. That sounds like something she would do.”
It would be weird if that were the case, but since it isn’t, she decides to just go ahead and tell her roommate what happened or else she’ll continue questioning her and make it into a bigger deal than it already is. “No, Marek was there waiting for me.”
Dakota’s mouth forms an O, and when she doesn’t say anything in response, the silence becomes awkward and uncomfortable.
Rather than let the silence stretch on longer, Tinley blurts out the first thing that pops into her head: “He pulled a Jake Ryan on me.”
Why did she say that? There were a million different things she could have said besides that. And it’s not like she’s suddenly going to convince Dakota that Marek is swoon-worthy or a good guy. There has to be a reason why she doesn’t like him. It’s very odd.
With a huff, Dakota gets up from her place on the couch and walks past Tinley. She’s not sure if she’s supposed to be following or not, but she stays rooted to her spot on the floor. The fridge door bangs open and there are all kinds of noises coming from the kitchen. Tinley contemplates leaving since obviously the conversation is done with when Dakota walks back out with two Red Bulls in her hand. Holding one out toward Tinley she shakes her head and her roommate takes both of them back to the couch with her.
With a pop, she opens one of the small cans and puts the other on the coffee table. She takes a long drink and then asks, “So, what the hell does that mean? He pulled a Jake Ryan?”
Tinley is still staring at the can in Dakota’s hand. Just thinking about the level of caffeine in one of those makes her eyes go a little wide. She used to down them like nobody’s business, but her daily caffeine amount is almost nonexistent now. Not that she plans on drinking caffeine anyway. She’d rather abstain from any of the bad stuff she used to ingest as much as possible. If she can at least. Dakota clears her throat and tilts her head to the side pulling Tinley from her thoughts. Oh, right she asked her a question.
“Like at the end of Sixteen Candles when Jake is waiting outside the church for Samantha. Marek was waiting outside the hospital for me with a freaking red Porsche and a sweater vest. It was actually kind of amazing.”
A sour expression crosses Dakota’s face and she asks, “So you’re talking to him again? What happened to you being pissed at him? I happen to remember you telling me that he lied to you. Does that not matter to you anymore?”
That’s not at all what she thought her roommate was going to say. She stammers out a response: “N-No…well, I don’t know. I didn’t ask him to pick me up, if that’s what you mean. Tara called him and told him I was there. Or at least that’s what he told me, I haven’t exactly confirmed that information with her yet.”
She can tell Dakota doesn’t believe her one bit, and Dakota suddenly changes the subject at the mention of Tara’s name. “How did everything go at the hospital? Are your sister and the baby okay? What did she end up having?”
“Oh, you know Tara, she screamed and yelled but pushed that baby out like a champ. She had a little boy. I still don’t know how she went her whole pregnancy without knowing. Both are doing amazing and even though Landon came earlier than expected, he’s perfectly healthy.”
Dakota shakes her head and says, “I don’t know how she can do it. The idea of a person growing inside of me, moving around like an alien just gives me anxiety and is so gross. Like, how does that not creep people out?” As if to demonstrate her whole body shakes with a chill.
Tinley instantly thinks about the child currently growing within her but offers up a fake laugh to placate her roommate. She may have told Dakota about Marek, but she doesn’t feel right telling her about the pregnancy before he even knows. And with how she’s still reacting at just the mention of his name, she’s not sure when she’ll feel like telling her everything. As of right now, the only person she has told is Tara and she plans on keeping it that way, at least for a while. “Yeah, I’m not sure. It’s weird, right?”
“So weird. Anyway, you look awful. Did you get any sleep last night?”
She can’t help but laugh at her roommate’s question. She spent the entire evening tossing and turning on a very hard window seat in her sister’s hospital room. Between that and the hourly checks from the nurses, sleep was pretty much nonexistent. If she had to guess, she’d say she’s running on about two or three hours’ worth of low-quality sleep. Maybe she should just get used to the zombie life, seeing as she won’t be sleeping once her own baby arrives, or at least that’s what she hears.
With a shrug, she responds, “Not so much. I think I’m going to take a long shower then crash. I think I’ve surpassed the feeling of exhaustion and fallen into a state of delirium.”
“Okay, well let me know if you need anything.”
Nodding her head, Tinley turns away and walks down the hallway toward the bathroom. The whole interaction was so completely awkward. She didn’t want to tell Dakota about Marek from the beginning because she knew she would be weird about it, but of course, her damn sister had to get in the way and meddle like she always does. It would have been better to tell Dakota about the relationship while things were going well, not now that Tinley doesn’t even know what’s going to happen. She’s just happy she decided to keep her pregnancy a secret for now. There’s no way Dakota would be able to understand that and not give Tinley shit about the situation between her and Marek, even if he doesn’t know she’s currently carrying his child.
With the bathroom door shut behind her, she allows herself to breathe out all of the stress currently sitting on her shoulders. It’s exhausting trying to please everyone and remember who she hasn’t told things to. She cranks the shower to hot and slowly strips her clothes from her body. As she takes her shirt off and lets it slip from her fingers to the floor, she can’t help but place both of her hands on her nonexistent bump. Looking in the mirror, she turns to the side. You can’t tell yet that she’s pregnant, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t still have a baby inside her, one she needs to start putting first in front of everybody else. If there’s one thing she knows for sure, it’s that it doesn’t matter who stays by her side. Ultimately, she’s going to be the best mother she can be, with or without help from Marek, Dakota, or even Tara.
The room is fully steamed up when she steps into the shower and sinks to the bathtub floor. The water flows over her tired body as she cries, letting her emotions wash away from her and flow down the drain. She’s terrified of her own body going through the same thing her sister just went through and of the uncertainty about the future between her and Marek and what that means for their child, but mostly she just feels more lost in her own life than anything else.
She stays sitting there until eventually the water runs cold and she shuts it off. If it’s possible, she feels even more drained than when she got into the shower in the first place. Her sob fest really took it out of her, and she can’t think of anything else besides getting into her bed. Slipping into a deep sleep coma sounds like heaven right about now.