This Beautiful Thing (Young Love Series) (17 page)

A knock comes to my door and I cringe hoping someone isn’t going to try and cheer me up again. They have all been in here at least once. Well not Marie. I think in some way she gets that seeing her belly would kill me. I hate I’m missing out on her pregnancy but I just can’t do it. That’s something else no one in my family will speak of either. I don’t even know if it’s a boy or girl. I can’t bring myself to ask

“Honey are you awake?” Sarah asks from the door way.

“Yeah I’m awake, what do you need?” I ask her in a bored voice hoping she will go away.

“I need you to get up and put some clothes on. I have something I need to show you.” She puts her hands on her hips and puts on her stern face.

There’s no stopping her till she gets what she wants. “Okay I’ll be down in a minute.”

After she leaves my room I run through a shower and throw on some clean jeans and a plain white shirt and my university hoodie.

I meet her down in the living room and she ushers me out to her shiny white Mercedes. The ride is quite and if she’s not going to make me talk then I’m not going to. I start to recognize some of the scenery we are passing and my stomach drops. I know exactly where we are headed. I haven’t been out here in a couple of years and I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before. Seeing my mother’s grave will be good for me. She always listened to what I had to say and didn’t judge me for the mistakes I made.

When Sarah parks the car at the little parking lot next the graveyard I’m out the door and running to her grave before Sarah even shut off the car. I run through the little metal fence gate and head straight for her. She’s near the middle and I run behind the headstones on the row above hers. I have never liked to step on the places the bodies are actually at.

I stop short before I reach it and notice a new headstone to the side of hers. It’s small and very new. I walk right up to it and start sobbing my heart out. It says “Unborn baby boy or girl. You may never have seen the world but your mommy and daddy will always love you”. I can’t believe that my family did this. I feel a sense of closure after seeing it because I really did lose a child. It may not have ever been born but I still lost it.

I hear Sarah approach and kneel next to me. I didn’t even know I was kneeling. She pulls me into a comforting hug. I try to control my sobbing but I can’t. They just keep coming. I thought I was all cried out months ago.

“You placed it with my mother?” I finally say through my tears.

“Yeah sweetie with your mother. Your father and I couldn’t think of a better place.” She has tears leaking out of her eyes ruining her pretty makeup.

I hug her to me as tight as I can. “Thank you so much. You have no idea what this means to me.”

She rubs my back soothingly. “Actually I do. There’s a little headstone at my mother’s grave for a little baby who didn’t get to be.”

I pull back from her and look into her shiny blue eyes looking for the answers. “You had a miscarriage too?”

“Yeah sweetie I did. About ten years ago.” She sets me back so I can sit on the ground. She folds her legs behind her on the soft green grass and goes on with her story. “I was almost too old for another child then. But your father and I had decided to try for another since we had worked through our problems. He thought it was a mistake to try and have another baby but I wouldn’t listen. I wasn’t much further than you when I lost it. Even though it had been my idea I still blamed your father and we almost fell apart again. My children suffered for it this time. Before they were much too young to realize something was wrong, they were hurting this time along with us but only because your father and I were at each other’s throats.” She pauses wiping away more tears from her eyes and mine. “Then one day a little angel walked into my house. With the prettiest black hair just like her father and beautiful green eyes just like her mother. She didn’t take the place of the child but she did feel a hole I had inside of me because of that child.”

She pushes the hair out of my face and I feel a peace come over me. “But you always acted like you didn’t want me around. You were always criticizing me and stuff.”

“I didn’t treat you any differently than I did my own children. I might have been less affectionate but that’s because I didn’t want to take the place of your mother. Not that I could mind you, I just didn’t feel it was my place. I think she would have wanted this to be here, just a little gravestone for a little life that when on up to heaven to be with her. Other people might think we are crazy but that’s okay because we know we aren’t. We have to have our own sense of closure before we can move on. This will be yours like you were mine.” She places a soft kiss on my head and herds me back to the car.

I have a lot to think about. I know breaking up with Declan was a horrible idea but how do you say sorry to someone after four months of silence?

Declan

I run my fingers through my hair, which is done to my chin now. I stopped getting it cut months ago. I haven’t talked to Jaden in months but I see Caden every day. He’s the only thing keeping me together lately. I feel so empty inside without her. I thought this feeling would go away but it has only gotten worse. I don’t know what the hell she did to me. I have to be under a spell or some shit. My heart fucking hurts and there’s nothing I can do but live this cold harsh life in my empty shell. And I am a shell of my former self. She took everything with her the day she kicked me out of her hospital room.

Caden pops me upside the head getting my attention. “What?” I snap. I also snap a lot at everyone, even Marcus who I have never snapped at before.

“I said what do you want for dinner? I can call for pizza if you want.” He looks at me hoping that I’ll say something different then what I say every day.

I don’t, “I don’t fucking care.” I growl.

“Fine pizza it is. You got to let this shit go man. I’m starting to wonder if I need to take you to the psych ward.” He leans his elbows on the counter top in my kitchen scrubbing his hands down his face.

“I don’t need the fucking psych ward. I need for everyone to leave me the fuck alone.” I snarl.

“Chill the fuck out Declan. If it wasn’t for me then you would have starved to death by now,” he stops as his phone rings. “What the hell? Hello?” he asks the person on the phone sounding confused.

After a pause he answers the person. “Well you haven’t called me in months and I don’t really think I want to talk to you.” I lay my head on the table listening to him talk to the person on the other end. “I’m going to tell you this once and once only. You stay the fuck away from him? Do you hear me? You have no idea what I have had to fucking do to keep him alive. I realize that what happened to you was devastating but did you ever think it wasn’t to him too?” I get a sick feeling in my gut that I know who he is talking too. “I don’t give a fuck. It’s been months, months Teagan and you left him out to dry. He’s a mess and I’m still cleaning up after you.” He said her name and the tears start falling out of my eyes. I can’t take it when they say her name. “Do you want to know what he said to Jaden right before he went to see you in that room?” a pause and I don’t think I can take hearing him tell her but I can’t bring myself to leave. “He said he fucking loved you Teagan and then you put his heart through a blender for no god damn reason!” he yells at her and I flinch. He doesn’t say anything else and I realize that he hung up on her.

“Why did she want to know about me?” I say barley more than a whisper.

He comes over to the table and sits next to me. He lays his head next to mine so I can see him talk to me. “She wanted to know how you were doing. She also asked if it was a good idea to come talk to you. I told her to go fuck herself. Well I wish I had but she is my sister no matter what’s she done. She didn’t like that to much but I don’t really care.” He rolls his eyes and I actually make a laughing sound. “Did you just laugh?” he asks looking puzzled.

“Yeah I think I did.” I kind of smile and it feels foreign on my face.

“Who would have known being that close to talking to her and your already getting better?” He smiles faintly and I see the pity in his eyes. “Do you want to meet with her?”

“Fuck no. I can’t be with her again. I have to get over this funk and move on with my life. I know she might be my soul mate but I think I’m better off with a normal girl. One who picks up her own shit. One who doesn’t get mad at everything and throw hot little temper tantrums that turn me on. Or have wild ass beautiful raven hair and seductive emerald eyes that you sink into. Or an angels smile and a sirens voice. Most of all one with no emotions that won’t dumb me the second life gets too hard for her.”

“Fuck that is kind of harsh there buddy. I get what you’re saying though. If I could go back to the beginning of the school year I would never have said two words to Grace. Now look at me. I’m living with you so I can stay away from the happy couple that is Jaden and Grace. Makes me fucking sick.”

“And here I thought you were here for my winning personality.” I smirk and he laughs and the moment feels almost normal. But I still have this beautiful evil cruel girl that owns my heart.

I shouldn’t have ever given it to her. I don’t know how I got so fucking whipped to begin with. I guess it’s that invisible connection that drew me to her. I loved that girl with everything I had and what did she do? Throw me out like a fucking piece of garbage. Just like my parents. I wasn’t good enough for her just like I wasn’t good enough for them. Well they can all go screw themselves. I’m not going to be this depressed piece of crap anymore. I can get over her and I will. At least for the sake of the two most important people in my life right now, Marcus and Caden.

“You know what? Why don’t we go out to the bar tonight or something?” I probe him hoping he won’t make a huge deal out of it.

“You want to go to a bar and do what?” he probes right back.

“I want to go to a bar and get stupid drunk and have sex with a girl I don’t even know her name and wake up with the worst hangover ever. Then I’m going to pick my life back up off the ground.” I stare at him intently so he knows that I’m not kidding around.

“Going out, getting drunk, and having sex with random chicks is not going to help you get over her Dec.” he sighs.

“It has to work because I have tried everything else. Nothing else has worked. I’m not saying that I want to become an alcoholic or anything but one night where I don’t have to think about her is something I need more than anything.”

“I know you do buddy but you’re going to have to take it one day at a time. Let fun back into your life slowly. I don’t want you to overdose on it.”

“Ha that is the funniest thing you have ever said. I haven’t lived in months. All I have done is go to class and do my school work. Then I eat and sleep. What kind of living is that?”

“It’s not. Okay you’re right. Let’s go to the bar then.” He gets up from the table and heads upstairs.

I’m left alone for the first time since I got up this morning. I look out the window at the people outside living their normal lives and going on about their business. They don’t even know that my whole life fell about with the words spoken by a little angel turned demon. So that s what I need to do. Get out there and make my life my own again. Hopefully I don’t kill myself in the process.

Chapter 20

Teagan

I’m going to kill my brother. Which brother you ask? Caden Gabriel Harper. Grace and I are on our way to a local bar in which Caden and Declan are shit faced drunk. I only know this because Caden called Grace about thirty minutes ago. Apparently he was pouring his heart out to her and it took the whole phone conversation to get him to spill where they are. Our plan is to get in and get out. Yeah we shall see about that.

We borrowed Jaden’s car since I wrecked mine. I got it for graduation and it didn’t last long after that. We park on the curb right outside of the bar. Walking in through the door I crinkle my nose at the smell of sweat and alcohol. It looks like any other bar with its booths off to the sides and a dance floor in the middle. The bar sits off to the other side of the dance floor and it has nice leather seated stools. I scan the room for the familiar shaggy blonde head of my brother and the buzzed cut of Declan. It takes me a minute to realize I looked over them. Declan is facing the front door and I didn’t recognize him because he has grown his hair out to his chin. The blonde locks are straight and neat and my heart beats faster in the knowledge that he is sexier than ever.

“There they are.” I point at their booth for Grace to see them. She nods and we head over. Nervousness feels me as we get closer. I don’t know how he will react to seeing me. When we finally get there and he looks up all the color drains out of his face. I was afraid of that.

“Wa tha hewl Tea?” my drunken brother slurs. Caden’s eyes are glazed over from intoxication and he looks like he is going to try and get up when he notices Grace is with me. “Grace bab ya may itd.”

“Yeah Cade I made it. You both sounded really gone on the phone so we came to get y’all home so you don’t hurt yourselves.” She says to him soothingly.

“Otay.” He replies reaching for her hand. He of course misses and nearly falls out of the booth but Grace catches him.

“Whoa there big boy. Can you walk to the car? I’ll get you back to Declan’s house and Teagan will drive Declan’s truck over.” She pats him on the back.