Shame: A Stepbrother Romance (18 page)

I don’t even bother to be nice to the two vultures on my way out. I shoot them a half-smile and I’m out of there.

I can’t walk fast enough, the small bundle inside my jacket almost burning a hole through it, but then I remember the groceries and reluctantly slow down. If I don’t do it now, I’ll have to go out again, and I really want to lock myself inside for at least a few more days.

I’ve almost reached BeWitched when something I see makes me stop and jump out of the path, almost running into a huge tree trunk. A woman was walking straight towards me right before I hid and I know her. It’s Andrew’s girlfriend, the woman he was having coffee with and the one who dropped him off at Ashleigh’s wedding. I hope she hasn’t noticed my desperate move and I hide pathetically behind the tree until she passes by.

At that moment the door of the cafe flies open with a rattle and the ornaments in the Christmas wreath jingle merrily as a man comes rushing out.

Oh God! It’s him. It’s so unnatural to see him. On the one hand, he is the same and I can’t believe he is not actually walking towards me, preparing to scoop me up from the ground and twirl me around the way he used to do only last week. On the other hand, he is a stranger, a no one, an enemy. He is also the father of my unborn baby, who is running to catch up with a woman who is not me.

Her pin-thin heels sink in the freshly fallen snow as she tries to hurry away, but Andrew reaches her in a couple of long strides and catches her elbow to stop her. She turns around and I shuffle away to better conceal my presence.

She is more beautiful than I remember. Her hair is also up in a ponytail like mine, only in her case it’s not to conceal the grease, but to reveal a smooth high forehead, the perfectly shaped arches of her eyebrows and her tastefully made up eyes. She’s wearing red lipstick out in the daylight, something almost no one I know can pull off, but in her case it only draws the attention to the luscious contours of her lips. Her skin is glowing and her teeth are white, her cheekbones high and subtle and her chin tiny. In short, the woman is one of those people who’d look good even when covered in mud and she carries herself like she’s well aware of it.

I think back to the moment I checked myself in the mirror one last time before I’d ventured out this morning. I’d judged my appearance as passable, but now it feels like I’ve been completely delusional. What’s passable about dirty hair, enormous purple-blue bags under my eyes, white chapped lips, an oversized jacket from another era and jeans with stains on them?

By concentrating on my looks versus the other woman’s I’m clearly avoiding thinking about the obvious. Andrew is still seeing her and it hurts. The suspicion that he’s been seeing her all along while plotting against me crawls in uninvited. I can barely keep it together, but coming out of my hiding place is not an option. The worst that can happen now is for them to see me.

Then something changes.

The woman’s beautiful features contort into a snarl. She is no longer that attractive the way she bares her teeth and seemingly hisses something at Andrew. I can’t see his face, but his body language and the way his fingers are clenched around her elbow indicate he’s not that happy with her either. They are fighting.

It’s amazing how the human mind operates. In the middle of this grotesque situation, in which I’m holding all the losing cards, I find it in me to actually gloat over their little argument. In my books, he deserves every bit of misfortune that comes his way. I even feel a slight pang of affinity with the stranger woman. She must have found out just what piece of trash Andrew is and called him out on his bullshit. What if she’s even found out about me? Maybe she’s jealous of me. Maybe she’d thought she’d had him all to herself.

I toy with the idea a bit more, picturing the woman’s confidence crumble at the thought of a rival. Then I remember what her supposed rival, me, looks like and my theory doesn’t look as plausible any more.

At that moment, the woman finally breaks away from Andrew’s grasp and click-clacks away, her hips swaying seductively under the well fitted navy woolen coat. He is standing in his spot, frozen for a moment and when he turns around to face my direction, he looks devastated. I can’t risk him seeing him, so I retreat further. I no longer see him, until he emerges on the other side of my safe tree and walks away.

For a moment, I even feel sorry for him, looking at his hunched shoulders and hurried walk, but that’s mostly because when I see him I can’t believe he is the same man who made me scream in ecstasy and the man who ruined my life. It all seems surreal still.

After he ducks into a taxi, I finally come out and pat my secret possessions inside my coat. Everything is there. I’m determined to get though the shopping as quickly as I can, so I can eventually lock myself in the apartment and ask the cards the one question that’s constantly burning a hole in my heart.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

This time I’ll do it by the book. I spread a towel on the bathroom floor and collect all half-burned candles from around the apartment, then place them in a semi-circle around my little fortune-telling station. I light the candles one by one and inhale the myriad of smells that fly around and mix together. Blueberry, white cotton, lime and lavender. Cinnamon, lily of the valley, strawberry punch and ginger chai. I don’t seem to have ever bought two same-scented candles.

I switch off the lights, then sit down cross-legged and wait for my heartbeat to settle. I’ve run most of the way from the grocery store to my front door, constantly suspicious that someone’s following me. It took a lot of nerves to climb the six flights of stairs to the apartment as I feared there was someone at each turn of a corner.

Now that I’ve locked all my door locks as many times as the keys would turn, I finally feel safe, but not before I checked every room, closet and empty space for intruders. It’s amazing what paranoia does to a normally fearless person.

The rich multi-layered scent that wafts past my nostrils is intoxicating and I feel a bit dizzy, but that’s good for I assign it to a level of concentration that will help me read the tarot cards better.

It’s time.

I shuffle the deck for a while, channeling all my thoughts into what I’m doing with my hands, then I carefully draw three cards and place them face down on the towel. I need to ruminate on my question for a while.

Am I making a mistake? Is this baby undeniably a product of evil? Is he or she meant to ever come into this world? Can I terminate the pregnancy while it’s still safe and be able to live with myself? Will I regret it the minute it’s done?

My mind strays. What if my mother had thought the same things when she’d had me? I don’t know my father. I know he’d been just a fling. A nobody. Yet, she’d had me. She’d given me a chance.

Am I robbing my baby of a future life just because I feel guilty or because it’s a reminder of what’s happened to me? If I hate the baby’s father so much for taking advantage of my naivete, is it fair that the baby should pay for it? If it turns out to be a boy, won’t I believe it’s a smaller version of Andrew and be unable to love and care for him?

The too many questions in fact boil down to just one: Should I keep it?

I’m ready to know.

I turn the first card and study it for meaning before I’ve checked what the book says about it.

It’s an upright Knight of Wands and shows a knight in armor riding a horse. The picture doesn’t say much. Once again I have to admit I’m terrible at reading tarot. The book should have the answer though and I leaf through it to find the meaning of my past.

The card speaks of charging forward, of determination and excitement at a new prospect, but it also carries lust and impulsiveness with it. It’s so on point that I feel very optimistic the cards are working and are really speaking to me, guiding me to a decision.

I immediately connect the meaning with my regretful decision to abandon who I really was for the shiny new prospect of physical bliss. It was clearly impulsive and not coming from actual assessment of the situation. I also remember how incredibly hopeful and confident I used to feel thanks to my new relationship, how swept away I was and how devastatingly blind as a result.

Okay, that’s that. The past is over and the card was right, but what I really need to know is what the future holds. I can’t skip past the present, however, so I flip the second card and stare.

It’s the upside down Hanged Man.

I seem to remember that the card showing a man with his legs tied up and suspended from a tree is one of the worst cards that you can possibly draw, not to mention its reversed position, but consulting the book tells me that I’ve landed yet another hit with it. It perfectly describes my present and is perhaps a bit too optimistic about it.

Instead of the earth-shattering disaster or period of mourning I expect to read about, the explanation says that the Hanged Man represents a period of stalling, of standing still, of delaying the inevitable. I’m stuck, according to the card, and I choose to stay in this position, so I won’t have to make a hard decision.

How accurate is that? It tells me that I shouldn’t rush and that the resolution will eventually come, but not before I’ve had time to meditate on it.

On top of that, the reversed position of the card tells me that I’m the one who is responsible for the delay and that if I only choose to look at my circumstances from a different perspective, I’d no longer feel like I’m being restrained by them and I’d finally be able to move forward.

Yeah, right. What other perspective is there to choosing to sleep with your stepbrother whose only goal is to make you fall for him and strip you of everything you’ve ever cared about, leaving you pregnant and hopeless in the meantime? From where I stand, there’s only one perspective on things. Still, I accept that the card is telling me the truth, since it is a period of doing nothing, changing nothing and hoping for nothing. Yet.

I hold my breath as I slowly turn the last card.

An upright Ace of Wands.

Another mysterious card I know nothing about, but at least I sigh with relief at my first impression of it. No monsters, striking lightnings or dead people covered in blood. It’s a hand clutching a wand, emerging from a cloud. It looks like someone is celebrating victory or something. I can’t wait to check the meaning and I’ve almost forgotten to concentrate on my question, so I pause for a minute to bring my thoughts back on the baby.

It’s an action-packed card, the book says, a go-for-it card, a listen-to-your-gut-and-do-what-feels-right card. It encourages me to take the first step right away. It’s exactly the card that I needed. The universe is supporting me in this hardest of moments and tells me to proceed and I can’t be more grateful.

I don’t spend much more time sitting in silence and listening to my gut feelings. I’ve known what I had to do all along and was just looking for confirmation. I can’t feel guilty, or I can, but I should give in to the guilt, not fight it, let it take hold of me, ravish me completely and then release me, because deep down I know I cannot love this child. Not while knowing who the father is.

In accordance with the instructions, I blow out the candles and struggle to my feet. I rush into the hallway and head straight for the linens closet. My phone’s been buried there for days and I plug it in to charge before I turn the power on. It’s so odd that a few minutes ago I was so lost, and now, putting all my trust in a set of three cards, I’m plunging forward into action.

It’s the first time in a while that I’ve felt motivated to do anything. While I wait for the phone to load, I briefly wonder whether I’m still not living my present and should therefore concentrate on the second card, instead of the third. Should I be stalling more, waiting and struggling to look at the circumstances from a different perspective?

No, I’ve done that enough. It’s time for the future to come in.

“Hello,” I speak into the phone, “I’d like to make an appointment.”

Once this is over with, I’m suddenly inspired to take a shower, to pluck my eyebrows, to shave my legs and overall to jump into action. I might even consider going back into tarot. I might try to memorize all the meanings and consult the cards in the future if they are capable of delivering so much hope and a driving force I haven’t known in ages.

They can fit me in as early as tomorrow and in a way, I’m glad it’s happening so fast. I want it over with. I want to be rid of the burden and free to take the next step in my life. Once it’s done, I’ll tackle the problems one by one. I’ll move away, probably even to a different country, a cheaper one. I’ll learn the language and I’ll find new friends. I’ll work my ass off and one day I’ll have my own bookstore again.

This time, however, I will pay my way with my own hard-earned cash and won’t take an ounce of help from ‘well-wishers’. If my mom can live like that, let her. I can’t.

And I hope with time I will forget about the baby, I’ll forget about Andrew and how happy I used to be in his arms. They say time heals everything. Yes, in time I will move on.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

I can’t sit still. I’ve only been in the clinic’s waiting room for less than ten minutes and it already looks like I’ve studied every magazine and brochure I can find on the low side table by the comfortable couch.