I shook my head and scrunched up my face, fighting back tears so I could respond without being a blabbing idiot. "I don"t know. I don"t know why I couldn"t tell you. After the first letter I wanted to. I even told myself that if a second one came I was going to tell you all about her. Then you wrote me back and when I got it all I could think about was being with you again. I knew if I told you about Bobby and B it would change everything and so I got scared. The longer it went, the more scared I became until finally the letters stopped coming. Brooks, you have to believe me. I wanted you to know. I"ve always wanted you to know."
He ran his hands through hair. "It doesn"t even matter now, does it? We can"t go back. What"s done is done."
I shrugged. "Yeah. I"m the devil and you wish you never grew up loving me, right?"
"I never said that. Don"t even make this about you."
"It is about me, though. It"s about me and my mistakes. It"s about me holding onto some kind of false hope that someday we could ride off into the sunset with our daughter and live happily ever after."
Brooks chuckled and shook his head. "That"s never going to happen, Kat, not anymore."
I brought my legs up to my chest and rested my face on my knees. "I know."
I figured he"d offer some kind of truce, being that he never wanted to argue with people, but Brooks had nothing to say. I don"t know whether he was even looking at me. I kept my eyes closed and sobbed at the mess I"d made out of all of our lives. I thought about Brooks, having to explain to his parents how I"d had his child and kept it from all them. I imagined their faces when they found out, and then having even more reasons to hate my guts.
No matter what else I focused on, my mind kept coming back to every single mistake that I"d ever made.
Finally, after a good five minutes pa.s.sed, he cleared his throat. "I better get going. I need to check in." He pulled his keys out of his pocket. "I"ve got a lot of figuring out to do, but I"m coming by here once a day to see Brooklyn. You can choose to be here, or arrange to meet me somewhere that I can spend time alone with her. The choice is up to you."
He started to walk out the door and I followed him. "Brooks, wait."
I watched him turn around and look at me. He was hurting. I knew him well enough to see it. "Kat, don"t ask me for anything right now. You can"t just throw all this on me and expect us to go back to being the way we were. I"m really biting my tongue from saying what"s on mind. The last thing I want to do is hurt you. I probably have every right to, but I"d like to think I"m better than that. Besides, I"d never want you to feel the betrayal that you"ve made me feel. So, let"s just call it a night and we"ll see if tomorrow it gets easier."
I closed my eyes. The thought of him hating me was like a million daggers being driven into my heart repeatedly. "For what it"s worth, I think she knows you"re important to her. I could see it when you were holding her. She"s young, Brooks. She"ll never be able to remember a time when you weren"t in her life."
He let out an air-filled laugh, like I wasn"t worth his time. "She may not remember, but I will. For nearly seven hundred days she"s been here on this earth and I never knew she existed."
I don"t know why, but I felt like I needed to defend myself. "You were in another country. Even if you knew, what were you going to do? Would you have escaped the country just to get court marshaled and ordered back? Think about it, Brooks. How hard would it have been for you knowing that I left town with only the clothes on my back? I didn"t know anyone here and then found out I was carrying the child of a man who wasn"t going to return for years. Even if I told you, what would it have changed? You missed contact with her since you got here, which has only been a couple of months, in which if I knew you were here, I would have come to you. So tell me, Brooks. Look at me and tell me how all of this is my fault. You left me too, you know. You left me before we even had a chance. No matter if I would have stayed in that hotel room with you, I would have still watched you leave for Afghanistan and that would have been even harder to do. You think I did all of this to spite you. I did it because I knew that either way I was going to lose you."
He got up in my face, like he did when were kids.
"Don"t go there. You kept the secret from me."
"We weren"t even talking!" I reiterated.
"Because you walked out on me, on us."
"Because you were too much of a p.u.s.s.y to admit that you were in love with me the whole time."
All of the sudden it got quiet. I could hear the crickets chirping as we stared right into each other"s eyes. "Katy, you knew how I felt," he whispered.
I shook my head. "No. I didn"t." I threw my hands up in the air. "We"ve both made mistakes and maybe mine were worse. I can"t change the past. I can"t change that I spent years with your brother. I can"t change the fact that I ran away from what we had, and I certainly can"t change having our daughter and finding someone to take care of us when you weren"t around. You didn"t have to join the military, Brooks. You could have fought for us too."
He tightened his lips. "I need to leave."
I watched him walking toward his truck. "You were always good at walking away."
He turned around and got right up in my face again. "I refuse to do this with you tonight, Kat. I"m mad and I need to take some time to calm down. I have a shift in the morning, but I can be here around three. Have my daughter dressed and ready to go."
"You"re not taking her without me."
He threw his hands up. "Great! Why don"t you invite your husband so we can be one big happy family?"
I was so frustrated with him. "I don"t know why I ever loved you!"
He laughed. "I feel the same way."
It didn"t sink in that I"d said it until he was all the way down the driveway. I sat down on the step and watched him brake. I was already crying, regretting saying something so horrible to him, especially knowing that I"d never felt that way about him.
All of the sudden he was backing up his truck and getting out. I stood up and prepared to be b.i.t.c.hed out again. We were face to face and he was furious. "Take it back."
I had to keep myself from laughing at his comment. "No!"
He scratched his head. "You see, I can"t go to bed mad, so I"m not leaving until you take it back."
I crossed my arms over my chest. "I guess you"re going to be standing here for a while then."
"You know, I could be a real d.i.c.k right now if I wanted to be."
"Who said you aren"t already?"
He laughed. "Some things never change I see."
"What"s that supposed to mean?" My hands went right to my hips.
"You can"t lie to my face. You never could."
I threw both hands in the air surrendering. "Fine! I don"t wish I never loved you. Are you happy now?"
He started walking away with a smile on his face, in the midst of still being angry with me. He never turned around when he spoke. Not that he needed to. I could hear him just fine. "Our daughter is beautiful, Kat, just like I always knew our kids would be. Have her ready tomorrow. I"ll be here at three thirty, and we"re going out, with or without you."
Chapter 30.
As anyone could have imagined, I didn"t get any sleep.
I tossed and turned until my head was going to explode. When I knew my frustrations and angst had gotten the best of me, I called Bobby, hoping he would pick up.
"h.e.l.lo?" He sounded awake.
"Please come home."
"Katy, it"s nearly three in the mornin", babe. I"ll be home in a few hours. Did somethin" happen? Are you alright?"
It made me cry more knowing that he was concerned about me, when I should have been asking him the same thing. "I don"t even know how I am. Are you okay?"
He sighed. "I"ve just been sittin" up thinkin" about things. It all still seems like it"s not real. One day he"s gone and then the next he"s at our front door. It don"t help that he appears to be a straight up nice guy. I still want to hate him, though."
I laughed through my tears. "I can understand why."
"It"s not just that he"s always been that one guy that you"ll never get over. I sat with him for a good bit and could see how torn up he was over all of this. I should have pushed you to tell him, because if I were in his shoes, I"d want to know my little girl, too."
I was quiet for a few minutes, already settled on the fact that I"d done all of this. Both of the men in my life were torn up and I was to blame. "Bobby, I want you to come home. You never should have left. Brooks didn"t even stay for more than an hour. He put B to sleep and said goodbye. Not that I blame him, I said some pretty s.h.i.tty to things him."
"Katy, you"re both goin" to need to sit down and straighten it all out, whether I"m there or not. You"ve got sixteen years left that you"ll have to share your daughter. If you think this is all goin" to get better on its own, you"re blindly mistaken, darlin"."
"I know. Brooks is hard to explain. Right now he hates me for what I did, but I know he"d never hurt me. I don"t know why and I"ve never asked him, but he doesn"t like to hold grudges when it comes to me. Brooks was always the one person who would protect me."
"You do realize that you kept his child from him. Somethin" like that can change a man, you know?"
"Yes, but even tonight, he started to walk away angry and didn"t leave until he had calmed down."
Bobby stopped talking. I half expected him to have fallen asleep, being that it was in the wee hours of the morning.
"Are you there?"
"Katy, I think I shouldn"t come home for a while. Maybe you need to get things figured out first."
"What? What are you talking about?"
"The reason that man can"t hurt you is because he loves you."
I shook my head even though I knew he couldn"t even see me. "No. He"s over feeling something like that for me. B was the last straw for him."
Bobby chuckled. "Katy, open your eyes. He"s back from the dead. Don"t tell me you haven"t thought about bein" with him. You forget sometimes how well I know you."
"It won"t happen. I"m married to you, Bobby."
The line was quiet again. "Yeah, you are. For now."
It hurt to hear him say that. My love for Brooks was forever, but it didn"t mean that I would ever want to hurt Bobby and end my marriage. Life didn"t work out the way we wanted it to. Mine had been filled with heartache for as long as I could remember. It wasn"t going to magically fix itself.
"I promise you that I"m not going anywhere. You may not believe me, but I love you, Bobby. I owe you so much and I want you to be able to come home knowing that we"re in this together."
I meant what I said. I wanted him home with me.
"Are you sure it"s what you want?" I hated that he couldn"t accept I was sincere.
"Yes. Come home to me and B. We need you."
After we"d hung up, I went and stood at the door, waiting for Bobby to pull down our long driveway. I think it pleased him to see me standing there watching out for him.
As soon as he took that last step onto the porch, I was outside wrapping my arms around him.
He pulled away and brushed the hair away from my face. "Let"s get you inside."
I held Bobby"s hand as we walked to the bedroom. We were both too exhausted to change into pajamas. I stripped down to my underwear and climbed under the covers, watching Bobby do the same thing. He pulled me close against his chest and ran his fingertips over the skin on my back. "I"m scared of losing you, Katy. It"s not even of question of if. It"s a question of when. I"m not a fool. No matter how much you love me, he"s still the one. He always will be. I can"t compete and I"m thinkin" that I"d rather pull myself out of the game before you yank it all away from me."
I sat up and looked into his pain stricken eyes. "Don"t talk like that. Please, Bobby. Close your eyes and hold me. It"s you that I wanted to be with tonight, not Brooks."
Bobby sighed, but right away I could hear him crying. It hurt me so much knowing that no matter how much I tried to deny it, my feelings for Brooks weren"t going to go away. It was important to be true to my husband, but if Brooks wanted me, I didn"t know if I"d be able to reject him. Knowing that killed me and I vowed to do whatever it took to spare my marriage. After all, B deserved to have both of her daddies in her life. That I was sure of.
She woke us up at about eight, after sleeping for only a few hours. I left Bobby in bed so that he could sleep in while taking her out into the kitchen to give her breakfast. She was such a happy little girl, always smiling and filling me with joy. It was good that she was still so young though, because I"d never want her to have to go through all of this while understanding the seriousness of it all. Besides, she"d end up hating me for it and I never would want that to happen.
I noticed she was looking all around the house and turned to look behind me, thinking Bobby had woken up. "What is it pretty girl?"
"Where man, Mama?"
My stomach twirled around hearing her asking where Brooks had gone. Of course, when she"d fallen asleep he was with her and now he"d vanished. In her eyes she probably a.s.sumed he was magic, like some of her cartoons.
"He went bye byes."
She turned and looked out the window.
"Sweetie, he"ll be back later. You"re going to be seeing him every day. How exciting is that? Mama"s so happy for you."
My daughter turned and her eyes were lit up with excitement. She"d only known him for several hours and already she was infatuated with him.
I heard Bobby cough and turned to see him standing there behind me. The sheer pain in his face brought me to the brink of emotional despair. He"d heard what I"d said to B and it had broken his heart even more than it already was and I didn"t know what to say or do to make it better.
Without a single word, he took his cup of coffee and walked out of the room, leaving me to sit there and regret ever talking about Brooks to his daughter.
After she was done shoveling eggs and bananas into her mouth, I washed B"s face and let her out of her chair. She went running into the room, looking for her dada. I heard him get excited when he saw her and I walked in to find him rolling on the floor with her. She was laughing and holding him as he playfully tickled her belly.
Then, all of the sudden he stopped. Bobby just lay there staring at B. He brushed her face with the back of his hand. "Dada loves B so much."
B giggled. "B lob Dada."
Her sentences were getting better, but her p.r.o.nunciation was still hard to decipher at times. Still, that was as clear as day.
She touched his whiskered face and he lost it.
His head fell onto her body and he sobbed like I"d never seen a man do. He turned and looked at me, his eyes soaked with anguish. "I don"t want to lose you. Dada loves you with all his heart."
Finally, when it became confusing for B, I had to literally pull him away from her. He seated himself down in a recliner, while she followed us and climbed on his lap. I sat on the chair next to them and watched her wiping away his tears. "No cry."
She was so confused and didn"t like seeing him in pain. Watching her responding to his emotions was heartbreaking. I wished I knew a way to make it all disappear, but I didn"t. To make matters ten times worse, Brooks was going to be showing up in the afternoon to take her somewhere and I hadn"t even told him that part yet.
He was at a breaking point, so fragile and yet so destructive bottled into one man. At any moment he was going to lose it and I feared the outcome.
I could deal with emotional Bobby, but I couldn"t deal with the side of him that filled with rage. If it peeked its ugly head out, it would change everything.
I had to keep him in the loop, and feeling like he was a part of all of this. Our happiness depended on it and I wasn"t going to take it lightly. The three of us adults had an opportunity to give our little girl the best life possible, if we could work together.