Worth the Fall (24 page)

She noticed he didn
’t include her in that statement. He was probably just as anxious to get out of her house as she was to have him gone. For her, it was to reduce temptation. She didn’t want to think about his motivation.

Lizzie got out of her car and went to the backseat where she unbuckled Sam from his car seat base. Finn came over to her and took Sam in his carrier from Lizzie, who then reached in and grabbed a diaper bag.

“I’ll put on coffee,” Alison said, and ducked back into the house.

They all came in, and Lizzie and Finn rid themselves of their winter garb.

“Oh, I forgot the coffee cake,” Lizzie said and started to turn back, but Finn handed her Sam, said he’d go get it, and went back through the garage.

“
Best perk of being married, bar none,” Lizzie said. “The bringing in of groceries.”

“
God, please no more groceries,” Alison groaned. “There’s no room in the fridge as it is.”

“
There’s room now,” Petey remarked as he went to the cupboard and got out four mugs and brought them to the table. “I cleaned up the lasagna last night.” He came back by her and looked at her as he added, “It wasn’t nearly as good as the first night.” He winked at her. “But it was still pretty good.”

“
We didn’t bring more groceries. Clea made a coffee cake, and we brought some milk to wash it down, that’s all.”

“
Oooh, Clea’s coffee cake,” Alison said. She’d had Finn’s grandmother’s specialty on a couple of occasions at Lizzie and Finn’s.

The coffee was nearly done. She started to get out plates and forks, but Petey had beaten her to it.

“You should sit down,” she told him.

“
I need to be on it a little more today,” he said. “I was on my ass all day yesterday. No exercise at all. No exertion of any kind.”

She shot him a look while Lizzie got Sam out of his carrier and unwrapped the baby from his many layers of warmth.

Petey did sit down then, motioning to Lizzie to bring Sam to him.

“
Okay. Give me that kid. I didn’t get to hold him that day in the hospital.”

Lizzie handed Sam to Petey, nervously holding her hands out lest Petey drop the baby.
“I’ve got him, Lizard,” Petey told her, and the new mother took a step back. A reluctant step back, it seemed to Alison.

“
Hey, you’re not such a big guy at all,” Petey said to Sam, who just stared back at Petey in awe. “How can a guy with the big name of Samuel Ezekiel Robbins be such a little peanut?” His voice was soft and low, with a lilting quality.

Finn came back in and handed the still-warm pan and the gallon of milk to Alison, who placed them on the table while Finn took off his boots.

Lizzie and Finn sat at the table and watched Petey hold their son, broad smiles on their faces. Alison grabbed the coffee pot, brought it to the table, and sat with the rest of her friends.

“
And pretty soon we’ll get you on skates,” Petey cooed to Sam.

“
Oh, no,” Lizzie said. “No son of mine is going to be a hockey player. A hockey-playing stepson is bad enough.”

“
Don’t forget a stepdaughter.”

“
Seriously?” Petey said, looking up from the baby to Finn, who was nodding.

“
Annie started skating this year. She’s not ready for hockey yet, but she says she wants to play next year.”

“
Awesome,” Petey said. “As soon as I’m able, I’ll take her to the rink for a few laps on the ice.”

“
She’d love that,” Lizzie and Finn said at the same time.

Petey had bonded with Finn
’s kids two summers ago when Lizzie had planned a fundraiser to cover Finn’s daughter’s medical expenses for lumbar fusion surgery.

“
Wow, hockey. Skating even. That’s amazing,” Petey said, shaking his head. Alison agreed with him. Annie’s recovery had been nothing short of a miracle.

“
Hockey will be a long shot. We don’t want any chance of injury, but we decided to wait and see what the doctors think next year,” Lizzie said.

“
And just why wouldn’t you want Sam—and Stevie and Annie for that matter—to be hockey players?” Petey chided Lizzie. “Hockey players were your first clients when you put up your own shingle.”

“
Yes, I know, and I’m grateful to them. I love them as clients—lord knows they need PR help. But I know them a little too well to want that life for my boys.” She looked at Finn and smiled. “And for my girl.” Lizzie and Annie had started out pretty rocky, but were solid now.

The smile she gave Finn was small and intimate, and returned in kind. Alison felt like an intruder, so she turned her attention to Petey, who was holding Sam to his chest now, whispering in his ear.
“What are you telling him?” Alison asked and then wished she hadn’t. She covered it with, “Teaching him the F-bomb already? Sharing with him the maximum way to enjoy a good chew?”

Petey looked over at her. She was expecting some kind of comeback about her lack of maternal skills, but all she saw was hurt in his eyes.

Well, crap.

“
Actually, I was telling Sam here what a lucky boy he is.”

She had nothing to say to that, but Lizzie quickly jumped in with,
“No. We’re the lucky ones.” She looked at her husband again, and he slid a hand along the table to Lizzie’s.

They had overcome a lot to be together, and Alison was proud of her friend for putting her fears behind her and reaching for happiness. Right now, however, she wanted this freakin
’ marvel of familial bliss out of her house.

She took another glance at Petey and Sam as she sipped her coffee. The tiny baby looked miniscule in the giant
’s paws. Petey leaned his head down and smelled Sam’s head and smiled. A deep pain shot through Alison.

Yeah. Wasn
’t it time for Lizzie and Finn to hit the road?

I went to a fight the other night and a hockey game broke out.

~ Rodney Dangerfield

Eighteen years ago

Alison heard Petey come into the motel room but pretended she was asleep. It wasn’t hard to do because the pills they’d given her at the hospital had knocked her out for most of the day. It had to be nearly eight o’clock, but she was facing away from the nightstand and the clock.

Petey quietly moved around the room. She heard the rustle of a paper bag. Good, he
’d gone out to get some food. He must have been absolutely famished by now. The thought of food for her, on the other hand, turned her stomach.

This is what she
’d imagined this night would be—her resting in a motel room, Petey available if she needed him.

But it was Iron Mountain, not Green Bay. And the ultimate choice had not been hers but had been thrust upon her.

She tried to be honest with herself and poked around her raw feelings for a little relief that she hadn’t had to make the choice.

It was there.

But so was the relief that she wouldn’t have to tell her parents she was pregnant after all.

She
’d agonized over telling them originally, and of course Lizzie and Katie, but had decided not to. For one thing, she was deeply, deeply ashamed of what she’d let happen.

She was the smart one, the one who should have known better than to let this happen.

And her future. Degree, advanced degree, research, then something amazing like curing cancer.

Technically it could still be done, but it wasn
’t as realistic with a baby at eighteen.

Ultimately, she didn
’t want her parents to be disappointed in her. They were so proud of her academic achievements and of the full-ride Ivy League offers.

She did not want to tell them until she
’d decided with absolute certainty that she’d have the baby.

And that
’s when she knew she probably would have changed her mind in Green Bay.

No you wouldn
’t have. You’re just telling yourself that now to absolve yourself from the guilt of your decision.

Not able to stand the war her thoughts were waging, she turned over and opened her eyes. Petey sat at the little table in the room, watching her. He started to get up when he saw her look at him but then sat back down.

When she saw the unopened bags from McDonald’s she said, “Go ahead and eat. I don’t want anything yet.”

He hesitated, so she added,
“Just save me something for a little later, but go ahead and eat while it’s still warm.”

He nodded and started pulling burgers and fries out of the bags. She pointed to one of the large beverages.
“Is that a shake?”

He had it in his hand and was bringing it to her half a second later.

“Chocolate,” he said. Her favorite. Did he know that or was it just a happy coincidence?

It was cool and smooth and felt good going down her throat, which had been made raw from crying throughout the day.

“Thanks,” she whispered.

It seemed like he wanted to stay beside her, but couldn
’t make up his mind.

“
Go ahead and eat,” she said, motioning to the food on the table and making his choice for him.

And didn
’t that just seem to be the theme of their ill-fated, short-lived romance.

A sudden hatred directed at Petey swelled up in her. She knew it was irrational, but the feelings continued to rise like an imaginary tide coming in, and she couldn
’t move out of its way. It rose up in her body, chilling her and stifling all the feelings she’d had for him for the past year.

He could have pulled out of her right away, rather than waiting until he was half hard and the condom was sliding off.

No matter that she’d held him to her and told him to stay, loving the weight of him on top of her.

He could have demanded she keep the child.

No matter that she’d told him she wasn’t going to keep it moments after she’d told him about the pregnancy in the first place, not asking for his opinion or advice.

He could have told her that he loved her and wanted to marry her.

No matter that it wasn’t true.

He could have done something instead of letting her make all the hard decisions.

No matter that she would have hated him for trying to take control.

Oh, but part of her would have liked it—handing the control over.

God, what a tangled, jumbled mass of contradictions the human mind was.

His eyes sought hers while he ate his dinner, but she
’d look away when they met. She sipped the shake dry, then turned over and went back to sleep, willing the darkness to come and quiet her mind.

***

Petey watched as she slept on. He quietly cleaned up his wrappers, her empty cup, and the other garbage and threw it away. He put the food he’d saved for Alison back in the bag and put it on the side of the table. It’d probably be pretty gross by the time she woke up, but if she were hungry, at least there’d be something here for her.

Or maybe she
’d sleep through the night and be ready for some breakfast when she woke up.

They had planned on driving back home from Green Bay in the morning.

They’d both given different cover stories to their parents about being gone overnight. And it’d taken surprisingly little juggling to make sure their group of friends wasn’t aware that they both were out of town on the same night.

Summer jobs had everybody on different schedules anyway, so being out of the loop for two days and one night wasn
’t going to throw anybody into suspicion mode.

He
’d paid the hospital in cash. Cash he’d brought for Green Bay. They’d pooled their graduation money together and had eked out just enough to cover the trip and the…procedure.

They
’d drive home tomorrow, and the result would be the same as if they’d made it all the way to Green Bay.

Wouldn
’t it?

He wasn
’t sure, but it wasn’t something he thought he could talk to her about.

He kicked off his shoes but stayed dressed in case she needed him in the night or needed him to run out for something. Or, and he hated to even think it, if she needed to go back to the hospital.

He crawled under the covers and lay on his side so that he could watch Alison breathe.

At some point he must have fallen asleep because it was eight in the morning when he woke up. A sliver of light shone through where he hadn
’t shut the drapes the entire way.

He looked over his shoulder to see if Alison still slept or if the light had awakened her, too.

Her bed was empty and she sat fully dressed at the table.