“Why do you say that?”
“I just don’t know how I’m going to make it through,” I said. “I mean, Tria’s just out of the first trimester. I’ve got months of this.”
“And each day brings you closer to the end,” Erin said.
“That’s what it feels like,” I agreed.
“That isn’t what I mean,” Erin clarified. “I mean it brings you closer to the end of the pregnancy—the beginning of fatherhood.”
“I don’t really think about that,” I admitted. “The whole ‘being a father’ thing. It’s too…too abstract.”
“Did you think about it when Aimee was pregnant?”
“Yeah. Look where that got me.”
“Liam”—Erin leaned forward in her seat like she always did when she was trying to make some monumental point that would end up lost on me—“everything happens for a reason.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“Everything that happened in your past brought you to where you are now. Would you ever have had the opportunity to meet Tria if it weren’t for the earlier tragedies in your life?”
“Are you saying Aimee had to die for Tria and me to be together?” I stood up and pointed a finger at her. “That’s the most fucked up thing I’ve ever heard in my life! Aimee and the baby had to die so I could be happy with another girl? Are you fucking serious?”
“I didn’t mean it that way, and you know it,” Erin said softly. “Please sit back down.”
I huffed through my nose as I slowly lowered myself back to the cliché couch.
“I’m asking you to consider the positive things in your life,” Erin clarified. “Your focus is often on the negative aspects, but there are many good things that have happened to you as well.”
“Tria.”
“Yes, Tria,” Erin agreed. “You also haven’t relapsed again.”
I nodded.
“What else?” she prompted.
“Um…I’m not on the street.”
“You have an uncle who cares for you quite a bit.”
I nodded again, noticed I was chewing on my lower lip the same way Tria did when she was deep in thought, and made myself stop it.
“Chelsea, too,” I said. “Chelsea has been awesome to me and to Tria, too. I don’t think Tria ever really had a woman in her life who did shit for her like Chelsea does. She’s been more like a mom than Tria’s real one ever was.”
“That’s your uncle’s wife, correct?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Ryan’s mom, too.”
“Have you talked to Ryan since you moved in with your uncle?”
“Nah,” I said. “He’s on some big business trip in China or something. He won’t be back until the end of the month.”
“Your relationship with him remained civil while you were out of touch with the rest of your family.”
“Mostly,” I agreed. “We had our moments.”
“You were close to him when you were younger?”
“When Michael married Chelsea,” I said, “Ryan came along with the deal. We were about the same age, and we got along right away. It was good to have someone to hang out with during family gatherings and shit—I hadn’t had that before.”
“What about now?”
“His wife is a bitch,” I said with a laugh.
“How so?”
“She just is. She was like that in high school, too. I think Ryan saw her as a beast to be tamed. They had an on-again, off-again relationship from about freshman year until three years ago. They got married last winter.”
“But you didn’t approve.”
I shrugged.
“I guess I don’t care, really,” I said. “Ryan loves her, so I guess that’s the part that matters. He says she loves him, too, and I guess that’s probably true. I still think she loves the money as much as anything.”
“You walked away from the money,” Erin noted.
“I made enough fighting,” I replied nonchalantly. “Well, I guess I’m making more now, but it’s not the same. Fighting was…”
“Was what?” she asked when I didn’t finish.
“Cathartic, I think. Yeah, that’s probably the best word for it. I liked fighting.”
“Why did you stop fighting?”
“Well, I kind of got kicked out, for one,” I reminded her.
“You were removed from cage fighting at one bar, Liam. There are plenty of gyms where you could practice boxing or other fighting arts. Have you looked into that?”
“I didn’t really think about it.”
“Fighting isn’t unhealthy,” Erin said. “It’s a good outlet for your aggressions.”
“Tria doesn’t like it.”
“Tria doesn’t like you making a living getting beat up,” Erin corrected. “This wouldn’t be the same. Why don’t you talk to her about it?”
“I don’t want to upset her.” I shrugged once. “She always freaked out when I came home beat up, and she’d get upset when I just had a black eye or a particularly nasty bruise.”
“Do you think fighting in a cage with random people who are trying to make a show of a blood sport is the same as putting on a pair of gloves and boxing with a trainer?”
“No.”
“Then why do you think Tria would see them the same way?”
“Fuck you,” I muttered.
Erin leaned forward in her chair.
“May I make an observation?” she asked.
“Since when do you ask for permission?” I countered.
She nodded.
“The first words out of your mouth every time I make a point you secretly agree with are ‘fuck you.’”
“Bullshit.”
“That’s your second response to the same thing.”
I crossed my arms over my chest, leaned back on the couch, and glared at her.
“And predictable number three,” Erin said with a smile, “silence.”
I was about to roll my eyes, but I had a pretty good idea that the number four was going to come into play if I did.
Four! Four ways of avoiding the truth! Ha! Ha! Ha!
I was never one to give up, but I finally admitted she was right.
Chapter 14—Release the Pressure
“Tria? Can I ask you something?”
It had been far too warm, cozy, and comfortable in the bed to ruin the moment as I was about to do. Then again, there was probably never a good time. I rubbed my forehead against her shoulder and pulled her closer to me. She smelled good.
“Of course,” she responded.
“Do I…?” I hesitated. Talking about it with Erin wasn’t easy, but it was more abstract. Saying it out loud to Tria made it real.
“Do you what?” Tria asked. She shifted around and lifted her shoulder slightly so I had to look up at her.
I glanced at her face once and then dropped my eyes. I dropped my hand as well and covered the slightly rounded bump at her abdomen. Sighing again, I glanced around the room and wondered why it didn’t occur to me to go with all the stall tactics before I opened my mouth instead of afterwards.
Tria poked me until I started talking again.
“Do you think I…?” More hesitation. I smashed my lips together, furrowed my brow, and tried to find the perfect phrasing. There wasn’t any, of course, so I chose the worst and blurted it out. “Just how big of an asshole am I?”
“What kind of question is that?”
I shrugged.
“I am an ass,” I stated.
“Sometimes.” She narrowed her eyes at me. “Why are you asking this?”
“Something Erin and I talked about,” I said. More hesitation from me caused Tria to give me a bit of a shove.
“Erin called you an asshole?” Disbelief colored Tria’s words.
“Not exactly.”
“What is this all about?” she asked as she turned a little to get me to look at her.
“Do you…do you think I…you know…hide from shit?”
“
What do you mean, ‘hide from shit’? Hide from what?”
“The truth,” I said with a shrug. I couldn’t look at her anymore, so I pressed my face into the side of her neck and looked out over her collarbones.
Tria trailed her index finger up the center of my back, across my neck, and up to my temple. She shifted a little, sighed, and turned her head toward mine.
“When someone says something you don’t want to hear, you like to avoid it, yes. When it’s something…big…and you can’t hit it, you run from it.”
“Like when you told me…told me about...about being pregnant?”
“Exactly like that.” I could hear the tension in her voice.
“I’m sorry,” I told her. I knew I had said it before, but I had the feeling in some ways, it would never be enough. There weren’t enough sorrys for what I did.
Hearing Erin say it was one thing, but having Tria confirm it had my head spinning to pinpoint times when I had avoided what was going on around me because of my own inability to cope. Avoidance started with Aimee’s death and resulted in turning straight to drugs. Heroin was the obvious and easy escape, but running from Tria on more than one occasion was another. Even telling Tria to think of me as her brother had been a way of avoiding how I was feeling about her early on.
I hid inside of a cage for a good chunk of my life to avoid the reality of what was outside of it. The type of hurt and pain inside the cage was one I knew how to handle, but the emotions I experienced outside the cage were too much.
So what was I supposed to do now?
“I don’t want to do that anymore,” I told Tria, “but I’m not really sure how.”
She tightened her grip on me.
“I’m glad to hear that,” she said. “The hows will come to you. I think it’s probably more important you realize you are doing it right now, and we’ll figure out the other shit as we get there.”
I chuckled softly and hugged her close.
“I love you,” I said.
“Love you, too,” she replied. “I’ll be here for you—whatever you need.”
I snuggled against her some more.
“Do you think…?” I paused again. Why the fuck was talking so fucking hard, anyway? “It’s just, Erin thought…fuck.”
“It’s okay, Liam,” Tria said. “Take your time.”
“There’s some shit I need to do,” I blurted out. “It’s shit that maybe if I had done it back then, I wouldn’t have to do it now, but if I had, I wouldn’t be here with you, so maybe it was okay after all. Or at least for a reason, you know?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re saying, Liam.”
“Fuck.”
“Just slow down a little and try again,” she suggested.
“I think…” I paused one last time. “I think I want to talk to my mother.”
Tria stared hard at me, and she stuck the tip of her tongue out over her bottom lip. I fought against the desire to lick her lips myself, and then maybe roll her around in the sheets for a while. The timing didn’t seem quite right, though.
“Are you ready to do that?” Tria asked.
“I think so,” I said, but then I thought about it again. “I’m not, really. I think if I wait until I feel ready, it’ll never happen, though.”
“Then I think you should do it,” she agreed. “Did you have some idea when or where?”
“Erin said it would be best to do it in a session,” I said. “I thought that made sense.”
“That does make sense.”
“She was going to call Mom and set it up.”
“Good.” Tria ran her hand through my lengthening hair. I still hadn’t gotten it cut, and it was starting to get shaggy and totally untamable. I just couldn’t justify the eight bucks to get it done—not when I should be saving the money for the doctor’s co-pay.
I rubbed the little bump on Tria’s stomach again.
We had talked so little about the baby. I could only assume that was because I was being an asshole about the whole thing. Talking about keeping Tria healthy was one thing—I would want to do that regardless—but I hadn’t really talked about the baby at all.
Why not?
Because all I could think about was the shit I bought that was never used for the last one. I had pretty much drained the savings account I had to buy all kinds of shit for a baby who never came. All the stuff that had value ended up at a pawn shop to feed my habit, while the rest ended up in a dumpster.
Tria isn’t Aimee, I reminded myself, and the baby isn’t Matthew.
Talking about it was going to make it all very, very real. The fear of something happening had been real the whole time, but the pending arrival of a child was the furthest thing from my mind. I remembered Tria quickly hiding baby and parenting magazines she had been looking through as I walked into the room, and I felt like a total shit.
I stroked the bump again.
“When is the sonogram?” I asked softly.
“Friday,” Tria responded. “I couldn’t get in except during your work hours, but it’s okay. Chelsea said she could drive me.”
“I’ll go,” I said.
“You don’t have to,” Tria said as her body tensed.
“I want to,” I told her. I turned my head and looked up into her face again. “I want to see our baby.”
Tria practically melted as I watched the tension slip away from her face and shoulders. A tear dripped from the corner of her eye. I reached up and quickly wiped it away.
“You mean that?” she asked.
“I do,” I said. “I want to know if Krazy Katie is right about it being a girl.”
Tria laughed and hugged me tightly. I rolled to my back, taking her with me, and kissed the top of her head. I inhaled deeply to bring the scent of her hair further into my mind. She smelled so good, like she always did, and for some reason, that made me start thinking about how good she was overall. Completely and totally good. Good for me.
And what did she get? An ex-junkie who couldn’t face his past. Nice trade there.
You’re getting better.
Yeah, maybe. Erin said so. Tria seemed okay with the progress I had made even if there were some things I still couldn’t do. I hoped going with her for the sonogram was a good move and I didn’t freak out or anything. The very idea of it was stressful though I couldn’t say exactly why. Seeing the…the baby…inside of her with a little machine that saw through her skin? It was just weird.
And kinda gross.
But still, I had to do those things—I had to show her I could be what she needed. I wasn’t really sure if she knew how much I thought about that, and telling her just sounded awkward.
If you don’t tell Tria how you’re feeling, how can you expect her to know? Osmosis?
Erin’s voice echoed in my head.
I licked my lips and took a long breath. I moved my hand up and down Tria’s back, but there was still a lot of tension just underneath my skin. The deep-seated desire to punch something was creeping up my spine and into my shoulders. I wanted to swing, make contact, and feel the jarring sensation through my arm. I wanted to feel the pain in my knuckles when I made a good hit.
I wanted to fight.
“You know I love you, don’t you?” I said. My voice sounded desperate, but I wasn’t sure why. I just knew it was important for her to know, just like Erin had told me.
“I know, Liam,” she replied. She pushed herself up, leaned across me, and crossed her arms over my chest before resting her chin on her forearms. “I love you, too.”
Her eyes smiled at me, but they didn’t offer comfort. If anything, the look distressed me more.
“I mean really, really love you,” I said with more earnest. I wrapped both my arms around her shoulders. When I hugged her, I brought her a little farther up my chest.
“I know,” she said again.
“I’d do anything for you.”
She reached up and touched the tip of my nose with the tip of her finger.
r /> “Liam, what are you getting at?”
“I…I want…” I stopped. I couldn’t say this. I didn’t want to upset her.
“What do you want?” she pressed.
I sighed heavily.
“I want to fight again,” I said, and I felt Tria tense. Before she could say anything, I quickly continued. “Not competitively or anything, just at a gym. You know—practicing…training…sparring. That kind of shit.”
“No cage?”
“No cage,” I confirmed.
Tria went quiet for a minute, and with each passing moment, I was more on edge. When she opened her mouth, I cringed and prepared for the worst.
“Then do it,” she said.
“Really?” My eyes went wide as I looked at her face to make sure I wasn’t imagining everything. “But you hate it.”
Tria’s lips pressed together for a moment.
“I hated you in the cage,” she whispered. “You were hurt all the time, and I never knew when you were going to end up in the hospital with another concussion or stitches. I was always afraid it was going to be worse. They paid you shit money, and since it was all under the table, you had no way of defending yourself when they cut you loose.
“But what you’re talking about…”—she waved a hand in the air—“that’s not the same thing. I know you like to…to do that. I’m not going to pretend I understand it, but I know it means a lot to you. I think having you go and fight with a trainer or whatever would be good for you.”
“You mean it?”
“Of course.”
There really wasn’t any way to say what I felt, so I just wrapped my arms around her as tightly as I could without actually hurting her and kissed her over and over again until she was squirming and laughing in my arms.
“I don’t deserve you,” I informed her.
Tria took my face in her hands, tilted her head, and did that “stare into my soul” thing that she does.
“Well, you are stuck with me anyway.”
“I can live with that.”
*****
Neutral ground.
That’s what Erin called it.
It didn’t feel neutral; it felt more like death row. I ate my “last meal” protein bar as the clock ticked, and Damon sat close enough to the door of the waiting room that he could catch me if I tried to make a break for it.