Page 23 of The Baby
Because she was more afraid than I could understand. More messed up about what happened with her dad then maybe I could ever realize. Because it seemed like she went through life so easily, so happy all the time. Like the stuff she’d been through—losing her mom, then her dad—never backed uponher.
Or maybe I wasn’t paying enough attention. I knew there was shit in her head since she found out she was pregnant. I naively thought it would go away. That she would work through it. Because that’s what Ellie did. She was atrooper.
I, of course, wasn’t the best at dealing with shit either. Hell, I almost lost her once becauseofit.
“She’s fine,” I said dully. Except she probably wasn’t. I came down on her like a ton of bricks. Fucking pregnant and I was shouting at her… but I was… damn, sofuckinghurt.
“You ever been inlove,Cody?”
He snorted and got out of bed, wearing sweat pants, socks, and a long sleeve T-shirt, which proved it wasn’t exactly comfortable out here at this late date in October. It made me question the whole privacy story, but I didn’t press him on it. As long as the work got done between the two of them, it wasn’t really my business. Still, I had a feeling that something was going on between those two. Although right now I had enough on my plate todealwith.
Cody shoved a piece of wood in the wood-burning stove, the only heat this place offered. “Not unless you count myhorse.”
I went over to sit on the couch. I guess he figured I wasn’t leaving any time soon so he sat in the chair adjacent to it. He’d grabbed something from near the stove and when he sat, he held it up toshowme.
A bottle ofsomethingdark.
I reached for it and took a slug. It burned in the good way down mythroat.
“I take it you’re having woman problems,” Codysuggested.
This time I snorted. I didn’t know about women problems. I only knew about Ellie problems. When she did shit like this, the behind my back shit… it was almost as if I could hate herforit.
Except I couldn’t because I loved her toodamnmuch.
“You couldsaythat.”
“Ellie is freaking out about the baby,” Codyoffered.
It was a statement, not a question. I handed him back the bottle. “Sheis.”
“I figured that’s why she wasn’t talking about it. It has to mess with a woman’s head. I mean, shit, can you imagine if we had to grow something inside of our bodies? Something that moves around and kicks us and makes us piss all the time? There is no way I would handle thatsituationwell.”
I looked over at him. “Yeah well… biology. I thinkyou’resafe.”
“I’m just saying I would probably give a woman a lot of slack if she was handling the burden of carrying my kid, because it’s not like I could ever put myself in hershoes.”
That pissed me off. Like I was the bad guy in this situation. I reached for the bottle again and clarified. “She fucked up. Bad.Reallybad.”
“She cheatonyou?”
I grimaced as I took another sip. “No. Don’t bestupid.”
“You going to divorce her over whatshedid?”
“No! I’m not going to divorce her. That’s not how marriage works. You fight… yes, but you stickitout.”
Cody nodded and held his hand out for the bottle. I supposed I was done anyway. It’s not like I could stay the night here with him. I was going to need todrivehome.
“So she fucked up something, but she didn’t cheat on you and it’s not something so bad that it’s going to end your marriage. You think she’s sorry for whatshedid?”
The look on her face at the end. Her pale cheeks, red eyes, hiccupping like she couldn’t catch her breath. She understood where my anger was coming from. She knew what her actions did to me. “Yeah. I think she’ssorry.”
“Then what are you doing out here? Why don’t you go to her and let her make things up with you? I hear pregnant women are hornyasshit.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. It was one thing for me to know my wife was horny all the time, I didn’t like Codysayingit.
“You trying to help me, or get me to leave you alone so you can go back tosleep?”
