Let Me Be the One (16 page)

The lab guy told me that in forty-eight
hours I’d know but I already knew.  James was mine.  I wished I had that same look that Luke had when he held Rebecca but I wasn’t there yet.  Sure, I wanted to protect James and keep him safe but I was also scared as shit about what this meant for my future.  Darcy, on the other hand, was maternal by nature.  In the one day she’d known James, she must have kissed him a hundred times.  She spoke to him with absolute love in her voice and she fed, bathed, and changed him like he was her own. 

My aunt Mary came over after Rob left.  She asked if we wanted her to stay but Darcy really had it under control.  I begged Mary not to tell my parents when they called.  I didn’t want to ruin their first real vacation without kids tagging along.  I
also wasn’t ready to break this to them.

That night we moved the cradle upstairs to my room and Darcy and I slept in my bed.  I crawled in behind her and slept with her body nestled into me.  I slept—no joke—like a baby that night.  When I woke up in the morning, Darcy was standing by the window holding James.  She looked so beautiful
that I smiled at the picture of them together but then this mournful feeling washed over me.  She should be having fun at school, not saddled with me and some other girl’s baby. Lord…that sounded so bizarre.  “Hey, my parents won’t be home for another two days.  Do you want me to bring you back to school?  I feel bad you’re missing everything.  Aunt Mary can help me with James.”

She looked crus
hed.  “You don’t want me here?”

“Da
rcy, I just feel bad about it.”

“You suggesting that I leave is…just please don’t.  I love you.  I know James is most likely yours and I love him too.  There’s nowhere else I want
to be.”

I smiled at her but my
heart felt heavy with sorrow. “You know you look so beautiful holding him.”

I thought about how happy the idea of her carrying my baby had once made me.  I wanted it to be five years later and I wanted James to be Darcy’s child.  Then t
his picture would be perfect. 

“I called
my parents this morning, Tom.”

“Oh shit.”

“They were okay, Tom.  They were surprised but ok. They told us we could drive down and stay there until your parents get home but I told them we were fine.”

“Your
dad probably wants to kill me.”

“Wh
y? You didn’t get me pregnant!”

“Darcy, don’t joke.”

“Tom, you have to get on with it.   Stop feeling sorry for yourself.  I know you hate when I say it will be ok, but it will.”

I forced a smile.  “I know you’re right.  Come here,
woman, and bring my son to me.”

With that, she smiled and climbed into bed placing James between the two of us.  I’m not gonna lie, I was still feeling sorry for myself and this was going
to take time to get used to.  My heart, though, felt like it would burst with the love I felt for Darcy and looking down at James, he was so small and helpless that I couldn’t help but start to feel a true sense of love for him too.

Darcy

Giving Tom the impression that my parents were just fine with this was misleading.  I told my dad first and he freaked me out because he didn’t say anything in response for a full minute.  You think a minute is a short time but when you’re anxiously waiting on someone to say something, a minute can feel like an eternity.

“Darcy. Wow.”

I guess I’d officially shocked him. 

One thing I loved about my dad is that, unlike other people who would go into full-on damage control mode, he was thoughtful.  He wouldn’t push me to make any rash decisions or r
ush to judge Tom’s character. 

“How is Tom doing?”

“I’m handling this better than he is.  He’s still kind of in a daze.  I think he’s seeing his entire future evaporate before his eyes.  And Dad, I really don’t see it that way.  I mean, was this in the plan? No, but plans change.”

“You sound like you are along for the ride, no mat
ter how bumpy.”

“I am.  Dad, I know it’s crazy but I’ve been with this little baby for only
forty-eight hours and I feel completely attached to him.”

“And Tom?”

“I don’t know.  He’s a mess and I know he feels so guilty.”

“Listen, I want you to lean on me and Mom.  I have a feeling you’re going to need to in the coming weeks.  There is a lot going on here and there will be a lot of emotions.  You know that you and Tom can bring James here un
til his folks get back, right?”

“Thanks
, Dad but they’re getting home tomorrow so we’re good here.  And Dad?”

“What, baby?”

“Thanks for not freaking out.”

He laughed.  “Believe me, it’s taking every bit of r
estraint I have.  I love you, Darcy.”

“Love you too.”

Tom

My Uncle Rob called.  No surprise, there was a ninety-nine-point-something-percent certainty that James was mine.  I was prepared for that, it had already sunken in.

I told
Darcy and she hugged me tight.  She was being so good to me.  I couldn’t take it.  I knew I wasn’t doing right by her.  How could this work? I was probably going to be living at home, like a kid reliant on my mommy and daddy for the foreseeable future.  What kind of life could we have together? 

If there was anyone in the world I could see myself married to, it was Darcy.  Now
, though, if I ever proposed, it would seem like I was doing it to trap her, to have her care for James.  And forget how it seemed, she hadn’t even turned twenty-two yet.  She deserved to live life and have fun, not be tied down because I’d made a careless mistake.  I was sending her back to school, whether she wanted to go or not.  I felt awful about what I knew I had to do but I was determined.

We were both lying in bed with James between us, each of us lost in our own thoughts.  Darcy got up and put a sleeping James back into the cradle.  When she came out of the bathroom, I could have wept knowing that she and I wouldn’t be together through this.  I couldn’t do it to her.  “Hey Darcy, if I told you I needed you right now, would you hate me?”

She smiled, of course my sweet Darcy smiled.  I felt sick. 
“No, I won’t hate you, I’ll love you.”

With that
, she crawled onto the foot my bed and moved up as she kissed me on my toes, my calves, my thighs, my hips, my torso, my chest, my neck, and my jaw. When she got to my lips, her body was lying along the length of mine and I inhaled sharply when I felt the soft skin of her abdomen against my erection.  She shifted up so that I was pressing into her entrance and she kissed me deeply.  As her hands moved gently in my hair I slid off what little she had on.  I let out a choked gasp as the thought of not being able to touch her again crept into my mind. Something desperate came over me.  I rolled her onto her back and looked away as I dug my hands into her shoulders and buried myself deep into her.  I couldn’t look at her.  I tried to take her slowly but I wasn’t thinking straight and my movements became more fierce and frenzied.  I plunged into her fully, over and over again, and didn’t slow even when I heard her gasp.  I was selfish, only caring about my own release.  I needed to leave myself inside of her.  I felt like this was it, the last time I’d be this close to her.  I cried out when I came and collapsed on her chest but I never looked at her.  After a moment, I just rolled off of her and looked at the ceiling.  Out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of her sad, confused expression as she lie quietly beside me.

It felt final, like a death.

Darcy

“Hey, Darcy?”

Here we go
, I thought.  Tom had been acting distant and lost in deep thought most of the day.  I could feel he was about to drop a bomb on me.  “I want you to drive back tonight.  I’m picking my parents up at noon tomorrow and I really need to do this alone, ok?”

“Ok.”

“It’s not that I don’t want you here—”

I was trying to swallow past the lump in my throat. 
“I know, you want to deal with your parents on your own, it’s alright, I understand.  But are you taking James to the airport with you?”

“No, Aunt Mary is coming over to s
tay with him while I get them.”

Ok, it’s all been sorted out then.  I wonder when he decid
ed he was sending me packing. 

“Darcy, I don’t want you to miss all of the sen
ior week events because of me.”

My eyes were burning with tears I was fighting to keep from falling. 
“Do you think I care about missing a clam bake?”

“I just don’t know how this is going to play out ri
ght now.  And Darcy, the trip—”

“I took care of that the night we came down
here.  I cancelled everything.”

“Aw, Darce, I wish you hadn’t done that.  You could have taken Jenna or on
e of the other girls with you.”

Why doesn’t he just tell me I could have taken another guy?  He’s pushing me away.  I shrugged to cover my hurt. “Don’t be silly,
Tom, I’ve been there already.  I was only into it because we were going together.  I’m not upset about cancelling it.”

“Alright.”

“Tom, I’m not leaving right now.  I’ll help you with James tonight and I’ll leave first thing in the morning.”

“I can manage, Darcy, if you want to get back to
night.”

“I know you can but
I’d rather stay if that’s ok.”

“Of course it’s ok.”

The vibe was odd, to say the least.  The way he—I can’t say made love—the way he
took
me this morning bordered on brutal.  I didn’t know the person I was sharing a bed with at that moment.  I choked back tears again thinking back to the callous, impersonal way he treated my body. What was going through his mind?

I left him downstairs early in the evening watching television, got James ready for bed and then crawled into bed
myself and pretended to sleep.  The day had been spent in awkward silence, where I could barely look at Tom and he barely made eye contact with me.  I’m sure he purposely waited until I turned off the lights to come upstairs so he didn’t have to face me.  He got into bed making as little movement or noise as possible and stayed far on the opposite side of the bed.  Once his breathing became deeper, I let the tears I’d been holding back flow.

Tom

I pretended I was asleep but I was wide awake as she got up, showered, got James out of his crib, changed him and fed him.  I knew she was broken up but you wouldn’t know it the way she spoke to James.  With him she was all love and happiness.  I waited until she took him downstairs before I got up and showered.  I was really being a coward about this.  When I went downstairs she had her stuff by the door and she was holding James, standing by the window looking out.

“Hey, thanks for getting James all set
tled.”

She didn’t turn to look at me. “Tom, you’re break
ing my heart.”

“Darcy, you’re acting like
…,” I was going to say acting like we were breaking up but I didn’t because truly, I knew we were.  “Darcy, I just need some time to work this out with my parents and plan for the next couple of months.”

“I know you.  Your plan for the next
couple of months is to push me away thinking it’s for my benefit.  I’m asking you not to do it.”

With that, she kissed James’s little head, handed him to me without making eye contact, walked out the door, and left in my truck.  As I watche
d her drive away I felt guilty and sad but oddly, more relieved than anything else.  I wanted her free of me. 

Mary came back over later that morning.  I had done pretty well taking care of James on my own.  I couldn’t get the snaps on the onesie thing done up right but otherwise, I’d done just fine. 

“Are you ready, Thomas? 

“Ready as I’ll ever be.”

“Are you going to tell them right aw
ay or wait until you get home?”

“I haven’t plan
ned that far ahead, Aunt Mary.”

“It will be ok, Tom.”

“Yeah, everyone keeps saying that.”

My parents were surprised to see me waiting outside in Uncle Rob’s car at the airport but I played it off.  I waited until we were about fifteen minutes from home until I dropped the bomb, or eased into dropping the bomb.  My parents were silent at first so I just started rambling.  I told them about Breanne, her grandmother, the visit to Mrs. McDaniels with Darcy, us bringing the baby home to Connecticut for the past few days, the paternity test—total diarrhea of the mouth.  My mom broke in, speaking as if she was in a daze. “I’m a grandmother.”

“I’m
sorry, Mom, I’m really sorry.”

Just then we pulled up outside the house.  Mary was there looking through the front window and when I gave her the thumbs up she opened the door with James in her arms.  My dad had tears in his eyes and I’m sure those were not the overjoyed tears of a grandpa who had been anxiously awaiting his first grandchild.  He was s
hell-shocked, like I had been.

My mom took James.  It must be something ingrained in women because, just like Darcy, she immediately snuggled him close and started whispering to him in a nurturing way.  “Oh my Lord, he’s so beautif
ul.”

My dad pulled me aside shaking his head
, clearly disappointed.  “Son, this is really something.  I hate that you have so much responsibility at this stage of your life but it is what it is.  You need to mature pretty quickly.”

“I know, Dad.  I brought this on myself and I’m going t
o shoulder the responsibility.”

“H
ow is Darcy dealing with this?”

“It’s crazy, Dad.  Much b
etter than me.  She was totally maternal with him from the second she picked him up.  I asked her to leave today and go back to school.  I just can’t put this on her.”