Chapter Twenty-Seven
Sawyer
On our last day off, I sat on the bus with my organizer. That evening, we would hit the road for Salt Lake City. The next day, we’d set up for the next concert. It never seemed to stop. Thank goodness I had been ultra-organized prior to the tour and the pregnancy. That skill had allowed me to take the last few days and adjust.
My chart was open, and I searched for where we would fit in the doctor’s appointments. Kurt came up the steps to the bus, sweaty from his run with George. “Hey, it’s my two favorite guys. How’d it go?”
“Good. I think I wore him out.”
“Aw, you’re such a good boy, George. We need to start training him soon.”
There was a glimmer in Kurt’s eye. “Sounds good.”
I leaned over to pet George. “Such a good boy. Tonight, when we leave, we’ll work on sitting. Get prepared for sit, George.”
And then a miracle happened. Like that, George sat. I stood and clapped my hands in excitement. “Oh my gosh! Kurt! Did you see? He sat! He sat! You’re like the smartest dog ever, George! Wait until you learn to lie down!”
George lay down and looked up at me. I kneeled in front of him, stunned. “George! That’s amazing. I’m like a super dog parent! Kurt, did you see it?”
“Yeah, he’s a smart dog.” Kurt gave him a pat.
“He needs a treat. Lots and lots of treats.”
I went to the cabinet I’d organized for George’s food and pulled out a rawhide. “Come get your treat, buddy.”
Like a little rabbit, George jumped to me and took the bone. This was amazing. He’d learned so fast. With a happy smile, I sat back down in front of my calendar.
Kurt gave me a kiss. “What are you doing? This looks like a rainbow threw up on it.”
“You’re so funny, Mr. Rockstar. So funny. Maybe you should stop singing and be a comedian.” Before Kurt had a chance to respond, I continued. “I’ve been looking over the schedule. I need to see the doctor at twelve weeks and sixteen weeks in Orlando. Those times almost coincide with our weekends off, but one of those weekends you have plans with the guys.”
“I’m not missing the appointments. Cancel the plans with them.”
I looked at Kurt with my insides turned to mush. His face seemed more relaxed. Something had changed. “The run looks like it did you good. You seem less…I don’t know, stressed.”
He sat at the table with a towel and wiped the sweat from his face. “I am. I’m not going to say that being a father isn’t still freaking me out, but we’re going to do this together. Seeing my mom excited helped me see that this baby is going to bring joy. I know that sounds corny as shit.”
“No, it doesn’t. I was thinking the same thing this morning. It helped seeing your mom so excited.” I glanced at the calendar again. “I’m going to start showing around here. I want to tell Cameron and Knoah before anyone else finds out.”
There was so much to do. Kurt pointed to a Saturday. “We could take my jet to Orlando here. Visit Knoah and Cameron. Then go to your appointment on Monday. We’d fly out Tuesday morning and meet the bus at the next location. I had planned to do that anyway.”
I checked the schedule. “That’s not listed here.”
“No, it’s not. I hadn’t planned on saying anything.” A somber expression fell over his face while he appeared to debate saying anything further.
No pushing.
I penciled in a few notes. “I’ll make the arrangements. Any thoughts on how you want to handle the announcement? At some point, people will notice me carrying a basketball under my shirt.”
“Why aren’t you asking about my plans?”
I put the pencil down and turned to Kurt. “Just because we’re together and having a baby doesn’t mean that you have to tell me everything. I trust you. At some point, if you feel comfortable talking to me about it, you will. I think in some ways we know more about each other than probably anyone else. But when you’ve kept barriers up for so long, it takes time to break them down.”
Kurt took a deep breath as I continued. “For instance, Knoah and I were roommates for two years and I had no idea she’d been married, lost a husband and a baby, or…” I held up my index finger. “Knew you. I mean, I played your music all the time, and she said nothing. I think she owes me makeup cupcakes for that. Oh man, mint chocolate chip cupcakes sound so amazing right now.” I gasped and pointed at his face. “This baby is taking over me! It’s your fault! I forgot something, and now I want mint chocolate chip cupcakes!”
Kurt closed his eyes and shook his head. “Do you realize you went from insightful to craving to blaming me in the span of three sentences?”
“Yes! It’s my pregnancy brain! Gah!” I snorted. “But I seriously want those cupcakes.”
“I’ll make a call.”
“You are the best baby daddy ever! So…back to the announcement. How do you want to do it? You said you wanted to stay in control of it as much as possible.”
Conspiracy theories were not something the band liked for their image. And pregnancies brought out the nasty ones quickly.
“I think we need to do a photo shoot. Have it published in a magazine with an exclusive interview with us. Show pictures of us together. A statement alone is only going to cause rumors to fly. What do you think?”
Whoa. This seemed a little more intense than I’d expected. “What kind of photo shoot?” I asked skeptically.
“I don’t know. Some sweet shit. Just us being natural. Absolutely not you holding a baseball bat and going after the family jewels.”
“Okay…we’ll be in a magazine…together? Like, I’ll be in the pictures?” The thought seemed terrifying. Yes, there were pictures of Kurt and me on the internet, but those hadn’t been intentional. This would be putting something out there for people to pick apart.
“Yeah…why wouldn’t you be in the shoot?”
I shrugged. “Maybe I could just be the invisible girlfriend. Like, ‘Oh, he’s so handsome standing there holding the air.’ And ‘Oh, look at him lying on that couch, sharing a bowl of popcorn.’”
“You want me to do a photo shoot and pretend I have an invisible pregnant girlfriend where I’m announcing that fact?”
I scratched my chin. “Yeah, I think that’s an amazing idea. Unique.”
He stood and kissed my head. “Think about it. We won’t do anything you don’t want to, but this will allow us to control the story that’s being told. It’ll be planned, which tells people that we wanted this.”
And even if it was a surprise, it was no one else’s business. I got it. But a public life for our child wasn’t something I necessarily wanted. “Does this mean we’ll have to do a lot of photo shoots of the kid?”
“No. I won’t profit off our child. Yes, people will be curious, but when it’s time to decide, we can handle it in a way that we are comfortable with. If you don’t want pictures to be taken, they won’t. But we’ll want to dissuade the interest, if that makes sense.”
Behind this messy, cusses-like-a-sailor rock star was a brilliant business mind. “Okay, I’ll agree to the photo shoot as long as they paint me as a good person.”
“Of course. I’ll work with Waldo to get it set up. It’ll probably be right after we tell Knoah and Cameron.”
I chewed on my lip nervously. “Maybe we could get a pregnant blow-up doll for you to take pictures with.”
Kurt chuckled and gave me another kiss. “You’ll do great. I swear, I wouldn’t put you in danger.”
“I believe you. Go take you’re shower; you’re stinky. Do you want some breakfast?” The smell seemed stronger and turned my stomach.
“Yeah, pour me a big bowl of Cocoa Puffs.”
“That kind of defeats the point of the run, ya know.”
Kurt shucked off his shirt and flexed his abs. They were nice. Very nice. If he wasn’t stinky to the point of making me nauseated, I would be jumping his bones.
Like a game-show host, he ran his hands over his stomach. “This is perfectly sculpted with copious amounts of sugar.”
Throwing my pencil down, I snorted. “You are so full of it. I don’t know how you have a body like that. You eat like shit.”
“It’s the super genes.”
I threw my huge eraser at him, but he dodged it with ease. “Go shower. I’ll get your Cocoa Puffs.”
Turning toward our bedroom, Kurt called out, “Mail is on the counter. Waldo picked it up for us.”
“Thanks.”
After getting the dates we’d talked about penciled in, I stood and went over to the counter. Most were bills that I’d already paid online. Using my phone, I cross-referenced them to make sure. Some of it was junk, but there was an invitation to Chelsea’s wedding shower. Wow, it had been forever since I’d seen her. I wondered what she’d been up to. She’d been the receptionist at As You Wish, the event-planning place where I was working when I met Kurt. Hopefully, I would be in town to celebrate with her.
Next was an envelope with my name scribbled on it in black marker. Hearing the shower turn off, I put it down, made Kurt’s cereal, and gave George some food. He lifted his head, looked at the bowl, and laid his head back down to sleep some more. Wow, he’s worn out.
Kurt came in and grabbed his bowl. Around a mouthful of cereal, he said, “Thanks.”
“Anything for you.” I made a little kissy face as I went back to open the envelope. Kurt continued to shove the cereal in his mouth as though he hadn’t eaten in a year.
I pulled out a folded piece of paper. The words on the page were spelled out with letters cut out from the newspaper, and my blood chilled.
Walk away, bitch
Or you might end up in a ditch
I could only stare at the letters, blinking over and over again to wash them away. Sounds around me grew muffled. This is a threat. Someone is threatening me.
“Sawyer, did you hear me?”
“Wh-what?” I glanced up and blinked a few times as I tried to remember what he said.
Kurt put down the bowl and stood in front of me. “What’s wrong?”
I handed him the note, and he cursed, “Fuck!”
Carefully, he placed it on the counter and picked up the phone. “Waldo, get the police over here. Someone sent a threat to Sawyer. Yes, we’re going to need to do that, also.”
I blinked over and over. “How’d that get in the mail? There’s no return address.”
“I don’t know.”