3: 3
When I got home, my phone buzzed.
Duncan had sent a screenshot. I opened it.
The conversation was timestamped the day of my buddy's wedding.
【Hahaha, I'm dying. Fifty grand down to five bucks. Amelia, you're brutal.】
【A bet's a bet.】
【You're not scared he'll find out?】
【If he finds out, he finds out. Worst case I make up the difference. But... don't let him know it was your idea. No point in him blaming you.】
I stared at that line for a long time. My lips twitched, wanting to smile, but nothing came out.
So that five dollars was because of him.
So she "didn't want me blaming him," and that was why she'd skipped the explanation altogether.
She'd rather I thought she was cold and heartless than let him carry the smallest bit of it.
I tapped into his social feed.
The latest post, a nine-photo grid.
The one in the middle was a close-up of him and Amelia clinking glasses, with a caption: 【Fake engagement party, hired actors, betting whether a certain someone would dare crash it. She didn't. But once she knew it was fake she got wasted on her own, no idea what she was so happy about.】
Someone had commented below: 【Duncan, you're playing with fire. Not scared the act turns real?】
He'd replied with a tongue-out emoji:
【I just wanted to see if she'd come stop the wedding. And? Not bad. Passing grade.】
I set the phone face-down on the couch.
Got up and headed for the bedroom to start packing.
When I pulled open the nightstand drawer, a property deed sat on top, and under it a stack of design blueprints.
Every style, every color, laid out by me, chosen to match what she liked.
I'd booked the restaurant, bought the cake, tucked the blueprints into the gift box, and planned to watch her face when she opened it.
Would she smile? Would she freeze? Would she throw her arms around me?
At the bottom of the drawer I found an ultrasound.
She was pregnant.
I held the paper, its edges already worn soft from all the times I'd folded and smoothed it.
A home for us, a child. Weren't those worth giving her one more chance?
Late that night, Amelia came home reeking of alcohol.
She stumbled through the bedroom door, saw me sitting on the edge of the bed, crossed the room and dropped to a half-kneel in front of me, forehead pressed to my knee.
"Brad," she slurred, "I'm sorry... I shouldn't have snapped at you today."
Her hand covered the back of mine, her palm burning hot.
"Don't be mad, okay? Tomorrow's our anniversary. I'll take you to that restaurant you've always wanted to try. We'll have a good day."
I looked down at the messy crown of her hair.
Then I took the blueprints and the ultrasound out of the drawer and held them out to her.
"Amelia, I bought that house. The one you said you wanted to live in. Designed every inch of it the way you like."
"And this—" I laid the ultrasound gently on top.
Her eyes dropped to the paper, her pupils shrinking.
"You went through my things?" Her voice went cold in an instant.
"Two months along. Why didn't you tell me?"
She stared at the ultrasound for several seconds, then looked up at me, a mocking smile forming at the corner of her mouth:
"Brad, what are you trying to pull, bringing this out? Force me to marry you? You're using a life and a house to blackmail me?"
"Blackmail you? I spent almost two years on that house. I just found out about this baby—"
"Enough." She cut me off, snatched the ultrasound, and with a sharp rip tore it in two, the pieces scattering across the sheets. Then she grabbed the stack of blueprints and shredded those too.
"I'll get rid of it," she said.
"What did you say?"
"I said I'm getting rid of it." She raised a hand and pressed at the space between her brows, her tone turning irritable.
"Brad, snap out of it. Can you stop being in such a rush to get married? Using a house and a baby to force a wedding, you'd actually do that."
In the second my eyes went red, I suddenly remembered sophomore year, out on the field, her gripping my hand and saying, "Brad, let's get married as soon as we graduate. I'm scared you'll run off."
Now, out of the same mouth, only eight years apart, it had become "in such a rush to get married."
She must have realized she'd gone too far. She softened her tone and pulled me into her arms.
"Tomorrow's our anniversary. Let me spend it with you properly. I already had my assistant book the restaurant, ordered the flowers too. I'll think about the house and the baby. We'll talk about the marriage slowly, all right?"
I let her hold me.
Her chin rested against the top of my head, her breathing slowly evening out, the smell of alcohol drifting up, and a few minutes later she went still.
She'd fallen asleep.
I eased myself out of her arms.
Stood up, picked the torn scraps off the bed one by one, and held them in my palm.
Then I opened the suitcase and started packing my clothes.
For her and me, there was no tomorrow, and no so-called marriage down the line.
