Page 28 of Beside the Rolling Waves
Actually, it was him repelling Becky. Becky was doing no such thing to him. He was just as attracted to her as he had always been. Just as intrigued, just as pulled. It was an effort to try to move away from her.
Still, before he knew it, Rita was gone, and he and Becky were standing awkwardly together in the hall.
“I’m sorry you missed the meeting on Wednesday.”
“Yeah,” Becky said. Sounding preoccupied, like she was still thinking about her sister. But maybe she felt his eyes on her because she seemed to shake herself out of it and was the back-to-business Becky that he knew. “All right. Rita gave me a list of the things that she had ready for the babies. It’s basically two car seats, and that’s it. She has a list of the things that she needs, and it’s pretty much everything. I tried to go over it withher this morning, and she really wasn’t thinking very well at all. I… I tried to look online in several different places to get this figured out. What we need immediately, and what can wait. I have no experience in this, and I’m assuming you don’t either?” She lifted her brows at him, although her eyes stopped about the height of his throat and didn’t quite meet his gaze.
If he wanted to start things out right, despite the fact that it would be a total subject change, it was the right time to tell her that he had a child. But he didn’t really know it for sure, and he couldn’t get the words to come out.
As though the very thought conjured it up, his phone chimed, and without answering Becky, he looked down. It was his lawyer. He didn’t read the whole text, just what came up on the notification.
Sorry to bother you this early, but it’s an emergency.
He didn’t need to read any more. It could be a business emergency, or it could be an emergency as in Stella’s lawyer reaching out and letting his lawyer know that he had a child and she was filing a paternity lawsuit.
“No. I have no experience,” he finally said. He didn’t need to make things harder. He would work on at least winning back her friendship before he confessed all the sins of his past.
There weren’t that many, but there was one big one. And that was enough.
“All right. I don’t either.” Was that relief on her face? Had she wondered if he was with someone else? How he wished he had a completely clean slate and he could tell her that he’d never loved anyone but her. It was the truth, but…love didn’t have anything to do with sex, at least that’s what he found out with Stella.
He was ashamed to say it. Ashamed to think it, and it was all he could do to try to focus on what she was saying as she went through the list and talked about things that they needed to buy.
“I was in the process of trying to price things out and figure out what would be an even split. I guess, I could buy the bottles for Marley, and you could buy the bottles for Kevin?—”
“Wait a second. Marley and Kevin?”
“That’s what Rita wants to name them. It’s a boy and a girl, and she wants to name them Marley and Kevin.”
Wow. He hadn’t even thought about names last night, and here was Becky, talking like she knew the babies already, and they hadn’t even been born yet.
“The doctors are ready. Rita is prepped.” The nurse appeared and motioned for them to go on down the hall. “You can stand here and look in the windows. You should be able to see the babies arrive and get some pics, but after they’re taken, the curtains are going to shut. Don’t panic. This is normal. That’s what they’re going to do, because they have more than just the babies to take care of.”
“Got it,” Becky said, and he murmured, “Thank you.”
The nurse disappeared behind a door that clicked shut behind her.
They looked through the window where Rita lay on a table. There was a sheet between her head and her stomach, and Rodney assumed that that was so she couldn’t see when they were cutting her open.
Then, he realized that her eyes were not open, and he wondered if they had put her out.
If he and Becky had a normal relationship, he might talk to her about it. As it was, he just stood, watching.
“Anyway. I was trying to figure out how to make it even. It seems silly for us to both go and buy the exact same things. But I want it to be fair.”
“I’ll buy everything. I’ll pay for it, you shop for it. That’s how we can split it.”
He didn’t mean to command it. He was just watching as the surgeon used some kind of sharp-looking things to pinch Rita’s stomach, which looked extremely painful to Rodney, but Rita didn’t move at all. Then, one of the assistants opened up a cloth-wrapped tray, and the surgeon picked up a scalpel.
“Does blood bother you?” he asked.
And then he realized that Becky hadn’t responded to him.
He glanced down, and she seemed mesmerized as well.
“No. It never has.”
He knew that about her. But the question had come out without him thinking about it. Blood did kind of bother him. He felt himself getting a little lightheaded.
