My foot hovers over the brake pedal, presses it lightly, and the pregnancy test – the positive pregnancy test – slides across the passenger seat. And then, just as I reach over to grab it, my brain clicks into place and I realize that it’s not Nicholas’s Tahoe that’s parked in the driveway, but Ford’s old pickup.
Which throws me into a different kind of panic. One that has me pressing down on the gas rather than the brake.
I’m still clutching the pregnancy test when I leap out of my Navigator, because holy shit what’s he doing here? It doesn’t take more than a glance to see that he’s not in the truck, and when I realize that, I immediately cast my gaze around for Randall, Randall, the stupid asshat Randall. Because surely he’s lurking somewhere, nosey piece of shit that he is.
Suddenly I’m worried less about the why of Ford’s surprise visit and far more concerned with how long he’s been here.
I round the truck and start up the walk, and there he is, sitting on the rustic log bench butting up against the house, a black smudge against the white siding. He’s bent over at the waist, forearms resting on his knees. His shoulders rise and fall with my approach, as if he’s taking a deep breath or an even deeper sigh. But he doesn’t look up, not at all, not even when I’m right in front of him, the toes of my sandals brushing the tips of his boots.
I carefully drop the pregnancy test in my bag, because something about this situation, about him, feels wrong. So very fucking wrong.
“Ford?” I whisper-whimper.
He doesn’t respond. Not right away. Minutes turn into hours turn into years before he finally raises his head. And the look in his eyes…the look he’s giving me right now…
Oh, God.
“Hello, Rebecca.”
• • •
There’s an ocean in my head.
Every nerve in my body is dry tinder, and Ford’s gaze is the spark that ignites the inferno. It’s as if I’m on fire, my cells are on fire, and I’m burning from the inside out.
“W-what?” I try to laugh like he’s joking, like he’s merely saying my full name because he’s angry I didn’t call him last night, didn’t respond to his texts. Sort of like a parent who reprimands his child by using its full name.
But that look, the one he’s giving me right now, isn’t of a concerned boyfriend. One whose relief upon discovering my safety sands away some of his anger, taking him from pissed to merely frustrated.
I can deal with frustrated. Please God let him just be frustrated.
Then I notice the box. Next to him on the bench.
Filled with my shit. Random shit I left at his place over the course of our nearly three-month relationship. Shampoo, conditioner, two t-shirts, a damn bra… And on the top, the very top of the pile, is a gift box dressed in silver wrapping and roughly the size of a ream of paper. “What’s that?” I point to it, desperate to get him talking.
Because silence, this weighted silence, isn’t good.
He doesn’t answer.
“I’m sorry about last night. And I know you were probably worried when I didn’t respond to your texts, but I have a good reason, I swear. And if you’ll just…”
“Stop.”
And I do, clamping my teeth together so sharply they click.
Ford’s expression is impassive, just as empty as his voice.
The heat that was coursing through me, burning through me, turns to ice.
“I know,” he says.
Two little words. Two little words that mean too much.
But the next two undo me completely.
“Mrs. Crane.”
No.
“Ford—”
He holds up a hand. “I don’t want to hear it. There’s nothing you can say to explain this away. No excuse in the world to,” he pauses, swallows, and huffs out the next words in a strangled gasp, “make this better.”
And then he breaks. His shoulders sag and his face cracks, crumbles, twists with so many emotions I can’t tell which one he’s reeling from when he says, “I loved you, Becca. Do you realize that? I was in love with you. And I trusted…”
He knows. Somehow, some way, he knows.
He fucking knows.
Something inside me sways, and my throat thickens so much I can barely swallow, and there’s a ringing in my ears that just won’t stop…it won’t stop, it won’t stop, it won’t stop.
I start to reach for him, reach down to him, but he slaps my hand away before my fingers even brush his shoulder. And his touch, the feel of his skin against mine, no matter how briefly, shocks me back to my senses.
“How?”
Ford looks up at me like he can’t quite believe what he’s hearing. “How? You,” he chuckles, shakes his head, “you want to know how? How I found out that you’re a lying, cheating bitch?”
I cringe, and then nod. Because, yes. Yes, I fucking want to know.
Because I’m going to kill whoever told him.
Fucking kill.
Too focused on him, on us, I hadn’t noticed the phone in his hand. But when he holds it up, I see it. And when he thumbs the volume as high as it will go, I hear the sounds, the moans of that night, the night that Randall-fucking-Randall filmed Ford and I having sex.
No, no. Filmed us making love. Making love.
Because that’s all we’ve ever done.
It’s never been mere sex between us. Never just sex. It’s always been more.
I clear my throat, try to sound normal. “What’s that?”
Ford just huffs, then chuckles, then throws his head back and laughs. “Jesus, look at you. Still acting, always fucking acting.” He drops the phone, looks at it, and I note the way his shoulders stiffen, the hurt that ripples across his face before he drags his finger across the screen, turning it black. The vulgar sounds stop, everything stops, the day dropping into silence so deep I can’t even make out the beat of my own heart.
“The email attached to it was very, uh, enlightening.” He glares up at me. “So what? Is your rich husband too busy for you? Are you some poor neglected housewife, huh? Just a victim to your circumstances, right?”
Tears spring, too many to stop. They well over, drip down my cheeks, smear the already smeared mascara that I’ve been wearing since yesterday morning.
I can still feel Hollis between my legs.
I’m still sticky with him, from him, and he’s still inside of me.
Up until now, I hadn’t thought much about how I looked. A mess, sure. Wild hair, wrinkled clothes, day old makeup. I can only imagine what Ford thinks.
No, wait. I don’t have to imagine. Because he tells me. Flings it at me.
“Where were you last night? Were you…Jesus…were you with someone else?” His eyes widen, understanding turning his features from anger to disgust.
And the disgust, the disgust…it’s so much worse. Infinitely worse.
I open my mouth, work my mouth, and when the words finally come, they fall from my lips with a jerky tremor. “L-let me ex-explain. Ford. P-please.”
I’m terrified. More terrified than I’ve ever been in my life. More than when my dad left, more than when I realized he wasn’t coming back. I’m even more terrified now than I was the first time my old landlord pulled down his pants and slapped my cheek with his short, stubby dick.