Solid by Jettie Woodruff
Cool morning air filled my lungs as I waited for my tablet to power on, taking in the beautiful Sun, glowing off the dark water. I sipped hot tea, feeling rejuvenated, charged by the aspiring warm day. Heat touched my legs as I lifted them to the lounge chair, trying to remember where I’d left off. Oh yea, Drew was just about to take her away from her home.
“Take your pants off, Morgan,” Drew said with dark eyes that scared the hell out of me.
I didn’t know what to do. This was going to happen whether I wanted it to or not.
After not moving and staring at the two of them in shock, Drew finally squatted to my face, placing both of his hands on my knees. “We have a plane waiting on us, Morgan.” He smiled.
“I don’t want to go with you,” I claimed.
He grabbed both my ankles and pulled me flat on my back. I could only stare in total shock. He unbuttoned my jeans and slid them off with my panties in one swift move. I crossed my ankles and covered myself with my hands.
“Spread your legs, Morgan.” Drew spoke while the doctor or whatever he was removed a light and some sort of silver tool.
I couldn’t even cry. I didn’t know what emotions were transpiring as I lay there, trembling.
“NOW!” he demanded.
I hadn’t even realized my eyes had left the page, now staring past pink, painted toes, blankly, seeing—
Paxton?
I looked a lot younger, but so did Paxton. He had a thin, short beard, outlining his jaw, well-groomed, and sort of sexy. I felt the smile spread across my face, until I saw the look in his eyes, until I heard the tone in his voice. We were here, right where I laid in a daze with my tablet and the deep blue sea.
Even my voice sounded weaker and young. “Well, I mean. I feel like we should go slower. I don’t want to jump into marriage with you. I don’t even know you.” One step and he was directly in my face and his hand was in the back of my hair, fisting it and jerking my head to look at him. I saw the scared girl, the one barely eighteen, fear covering her face and eyes. “You didn’t seem too worried about that while you were spreading your legs for me and half the neighborhood. Did you, slut? I’m good enough to fuck you and let you suck my dick, but not good enough to be your husband. This isn’t even up for debate, sweetheart. You trapped me and now you’re going to marry me, or you’ll never see this baby. I promise you that. You got that, slut?”
My body jerked when he screamed and pulled harder on my hair.
“Answer me!”
The ocean’s view replaced the anger in Paxton’s voice, and the words came into focus on the page in front of me. Once again, I felt sick, and once again, I didn’t understand why. I guess feeling the emotions were a lot different than learning about them. Before it was like it happened to someone else. Now it felt real, like it happened to me. Afraid of what it would do to our family, I wanted them to stop. I didn’t want to remember.
I closed the book that caused the trigger and went about my day, starting with the laundry first. That was a never ending job. Having three kids was a lot of work, and Rowan went through enough clothes for three little girls. Her pile was always three times bigger than Vander and Phis’. Thoughts from the night Paxton proposed to me flooded my mind, and hurt my heart. Even though I didn’t get the whole story, I got enough. It was really stupid, I mean, I knew it. I knew how we had nothing more than a tradeoff. I’ll let you raise my children, clean my house, cook for me, and let you suck my dick, in exchange for my name.
“Yeah, give me that ultimatum now,” I audibly spoke as I stepped out the door to the patio with the broom. Stupid pine needles. A few short months ago I would have given anything to remember, and now I would give my right arm to keep from it.
By the time I did my wifely duties around the house, it was time to meet Mi for gyros and Hawaiian punch. I don’t know why the freaky combination. Sure she had a good reason, I avoided asking.
Mi was already seated at a little bistro table, waiting for me when I arrived, arm waving me her way while a bright white smile planted across her face. God, I loved that girl.
“Hey, I already ordered for us, you look amazing. Are you using new makeup or something? Ugh. I hate girls like you,” Mi complained as I sat across from her, wearing my own smile.
I sipped refreshing punch from a styrofoam cup while frowning her way. “You’re a dork. I’ve been cleaning house all day. I’m not even wearing makeup.” I wasn’t. I didn’t even change clothes.
“Hmm,” she hummed like she was amazed or something. Weird.
“Hey, before I forget, Rowan drew this for you. I was supposed to give it to you Saturday.”
Mi took the picture and turned it in all directions, head tilting to the side, and eyes narrowed as she tried like hell to figure it out.
I did the same thing when she gave it to me, only I’d learned a long time ago how to fake it, pretend like I knew what it was. I laughed, confessing the exact same reaction. “I couldn’t figure it out either.”
Mi laid the sheet of art paper on the table and looked from me to the paper. “No, I get it. It’s amazing. She’s only six, right? Did she learn this somewhere? I mean the abstracts and colors, the way she blended the sun into the water without a trace. I mean, there isn’t even a beginning and end. It’s like the sun is the sea, and the sea is the sun.”
I swallowed another drink, half choking on it with a frown. We both moved our arms for our order and nodded to the waiter. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Gabby, turn around. Hurry.”
My eyes narrowed and I turned to see our young waiter’s ass bent over, two tables down. I looked, shaking my head at her maturity, but agreed. Those jeans looked really, really good on him. “You’re horrible.”
Mi bit into her gyro before talking, speaking around the food in her mouth. “No, seriously. This kid has talent. You should see if she’s interested in pursuing it.”
“You really think so? I mean it’s not crazy to me at all. Rowan is effortlessly good at everything. She loves ballet and she’s so, I don’t even know what word to use to describe her. Like elegant, graceful,” I said as I recalled how she closed her little eyes and focused on the music, moving delicately, like a feather. And then I laughed. “Ophelia on the other hand, she barely made it through the three-day trial. She is way too clumsy for ballet, but she dribbles the basketball for hours. She’s definitely my little tomboy.”
Mi and I talked about the kids for a little while longer and then I told her about Tricia and Brant’s house.
“I would love that, but we’re not staying here. Nick’s uncle just opened up a new office close to his family. He wants to buy there. Connecticut.”
I choked down the bite that had lodged in my throat, beating myself in the chest with bug eyes. “You’re not leaving here. No way. I refuse. Nick will just have to go without you.”
“You can come and visit. Nick’s grandpa breeds racing horses. The kids would love it there. And Christmas. Oh, my God, Gabby. These people do Christmas.”
That news devastated me. What in the world would I do without Mi? “Fuck Christmas. You’re not going.”
Mi smiled, tilting her head to the side. “I can still talk to you every day.”
“No. Ugh, Mi. This sucks. What about your job?”
“They have babies in Connecticut, too.”
“I hate you. When?”
“Nick wants to be there by Christmas, but we’ll see.”
“Three months?”
“Closer to four.”
“This isn’t funny. I can’t survive without you. I need you in my life.”
“I’ll still be in your life.”
“But I won’t be meeting you for Hawaiian punch and gyros.”
Mi was the one to change the subject, and move onto more emotions I didn’t want to have. “How are things with you and Paxton?”
I snorted, biting into a potato chip. “Weird.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know, Mi. It’s hard to explain. I mean, I love the man like crazy stupid, but lately, I feel things. Like it’s not just being told to me anymore. I feel how that Gabriella felt, and it’s making things, I don’t know, difficult.”
“When was your last period?”
I kept an unwanted tear from sliding down my cheek with the back of my hand and frowned. Here I was, explaining the devastating wedding proposal, and she wanted to be my doctor. “What?”
“You’re so emotional lately, and that glow. I get it now. You’re pregnant.”
I shook my head from side to side, conveying my scrunched up expression. “You’re an idiot. I’m one hundred percent sure that I’m not pregnant.”
“Last period?”
“That doesn’t work with me. I have never been regular. Well, since my accident anyway. I’ve only had two periods since my wreck.”
“Let’s go.”
Again my head went from side to side, watching Mi gather our trash while ordering me around. I stood because she pulled me up by my hand. “Go where, Mi?”
“To my office.”
I stopped, causing her hand to slip out of mine. “Mi, stop. I don’t need to do that. I can’t have kids. I’m not pregnant.”
Mi pulled back, and I walked with her, exhaling a heavy sigh. “What do you mean, you can’t have kids? You had Phi. And we’ve already talked about that, I know everything. Remember?”
“Okay, fine. Paxton can’t have kids.”
Mi stopped and turned to me. “It only takes one little swimmer. I’ve seen a thousand or more pregnant women, and I am more in tune with my intuition than most people are. Will you just appease me and let me do this? All you have to do is pee in a cup.” Mi started walking again, totally blowing me off.
I tried to stop her, following close behind to no avail. “Mi!”
“What if you have twins? You already have the gene, and your age. Did you know the older you get, the more likely you are to have twins? Yeah, older woman produce more follicle stimulating hormone than younger women. I mean, you’re still a youngin, just not nineteen like when you had Ophelia. It would be nice to have another boy. You know, for Vander. That could be why you’re remembering things. Pregnancy hormones are amazing at healing the body. They’re designed to get your body up to code. It takes a lot to house a little person for forty weeks.”
I followed my obstinate friend without a choice. I didn’t have time for this. I had things to do. I needed to get to the grocery store. I was busy. Too busy for this nonsense.
Chapter Three
Paxton
I watched Gabriella peculiarly as she talked on her phone, pacing back and forth with her fingers moving through her hair. The frown on my face was instant, wondering who she could be talking to, and why she seemed so upset. I could hear Rowan’s dance instructor calling out French instructions, and then Vander saw me. He jumped from the church pew that is being used for a bench in the lobby to me.
“Uncle Paxton, are we going to work now?”
“In a minute buddy, Phi get down from there before you fall through the window,” I scolded while moving Vander to the side.
Gabriella looked up from her call, distraught expression changing to a smile. “I’ll call you later, Paxton’s here to get the kids.”
“Who was that?”
“Mi, you’re going to take them home to change before you let them work, right?”
“Yeah, what’s going on, Gabriella?”
The frown and the fake smile did little to ease my trepidation. Something was up. Gabriella was hiding something and I knew it. “What do you mean?”
“What were you talking about? You looked upset.”
“Yeah, I was. Nick is taking a job in Connecticut. Mi’s going to leave me.”
“Oh,” I said with only that. I’m not going to lie and say I wasn’t happy about that. That chick was weird as shit. I was more than okay with that.
“Oh? That’s it?”
“Well, I mean by the way you looked I thought something was wrong. We have two houses up for sale in our neighborhood, and two more about to be built. I’m sure you’ll find another friend.”
“Not like Mi.”
“Thank God. I’ll see you at home. I should be there by five.”
I gave her a quick kiss and gathered my little employees who would be more in the way than anything, and left. We may have celebrated a little with ice cream before supper. Mi moving out of state was definitely celebration worthy, just not with my wife. Of course, Phi was about to blow my cover. I should have got them ice cream after they changed clothes. Ophelia had a nice streak of pink down her chest and belly. All I did when I tried to clean it back at home was make it worse. I hid it in the washer, on the side, she wouldn’t see, and hoped it came out.
Nonetheless, that didn’t work. Gabriella went nuts over a lost sock. Thinking a missing shirt would slip past her was stupid on my part.
“Where did you take it off, Phi? It couldn’t have gone that far,” she complained while Phi half paid attention. She was busy with our own back yard project, too busy for mundane lost shirts.
“I dunno.”
“You don’t know? What do you mean you don’t know? It’s a shirt. Where did you take it off?”
“Uncle Pax put it in the washer because it got ice cream on it.”
“Oh,” she said in that tone.
My eyes snapped to Vander as I handed him a heavy piece of stone. One that didn’t allow talking while carrying. Big mouth.
“Paxton?”
“What, it was just a little snack. They’ll eat their supper or I’ll tie them up by their toes and feed them peanuts.”
The attempt to make her laugh failed, but my troops laughed. Then again it was their toes we were talking about.
“We had to celebrate,” Phi announced with an even bigger mouth than her cousins.
“Celebrate what?”
I didn’t tell them why we were celebrating for that exact reason, because they both had big mouths.
“The good news,” Vander spouted while stacking the stones where I directed him to.
“What good news Paxton?”
Great. I hated that tone. She knew. Gabriella knew exactly why I had taken them for ice cream. “Can’t a guy just want a scoop of ice cream once in a while? Maybe we were celebrating the first day of school.”
“No, you said mommy gave you good news.”
“Ophelia, you’re not helping child,” I assured her busy little body, and then turned back to Gabriella walking away. No, stomping away. She was pissed.
Supper was eaten on the patio with three motor-mouth little ones, all talking about school, trying to up the other one. Even Vander. He got to erase the chalkboard and Rowan and Phi didn’t. Gabriella talked as well, just not to me. All I got were dirty looks, and an angry scoop of mashed potatoes, plopped onto my plate with a scowl.
I even helped clean up, trying to get back on her good side while Rowan and Vander got baths, and Phi watched Sponge Bob. That didn’t work either.
“Gabriella, stop being mad at me. You’re mad over nothing.”
The glare would have killed me if at all possible. Gabriella jerked the broom from the closet and walked out of the kitchen. Not one word, just the mean, hateful stare my way, narrowed, evil eyes, and pursed lips.
“What are you doing? Stop cleaning and talk to me.”
“I can’t. I have to go sweep up all the sand that you and your kids left for me. Don’t you have work to do?”
“I always have work to do.”
“So do I,” she snapped while moving past me and to the more important, sand on the steps. That wasn’t even my fault. I didn’t tell them to dump the sand out of their shoes right there. Geesh.
I started to walk away before I got an
“You took them to eat ice cream to celebrate Mi leaving. That’s so fucked up, Paxton. She’s my friend. My only friend. You’re the most disrespectful man I have ever met in my life.”
I started to say something about meeting my dad, but refrained, knowing that wasn’t the right thing to say. It was the truth. That man didn’t care about anyone’s feelings, but now wasn’t the time to disclose that information. “I’m sorry, but I can’t lie and say I’m not happy.”
The look on her face and the pain in her eyes changed my tune. Jesus. Where the fuck did all the crying come from all of a sudden? Gabriella didn’t cry.
“She’s my only friend, Paxton. I need her in my life. Whether you want to admit it or not. Mi’s the only reason I’m here, the only reason we’re even still together. No other woman on this earth would put up with you and the things you’ve done.”
That pissed me off. I had bent over backwards for her for months, trying to make things right. Her throwing it in my face every time she got mad was ridiculous. I couldn’t change it. There was absolutely nothing I could do to take it back, and her bringing it up every chance she got didn’t help anything. “So now we’re talking about more than ice cream? You want to go there over something silly? It’s okay if I don’t like your friend, Gabriella. That’s my right, and you have no business acting like this over something so trivial.”
“Yeah, you’re right. Go work, or do whatever it is that you do in your office all night.”
“What the fuck does that mean? That door is always open, and I’m always working.”
“Yup, and you—”
The broom, sweeping in a frantic motion toward the street, suddenly stopped.
“Isn’t that Mr. Jandt? Rowan’s teacher?”
I stepped out, glancing toward the house, the young teacher, and the agent. Great. I didn’t like him either. Gabriella sat on the front step first, and I sat beside her, watching the agent walk around the house with Rowan’s second-grade teacher.