Unexpected (32 page)

Suddenly, nothing else, not one bit of the rest of the conversation mattered.

“Britta?” I heard Mom ask.

I realized she must’ve followed me out of the kitchen.

Her voice snapped me out of my mental reverie. I turned and barreled back down the staircase, straight into her startled arms.

“I’m going to be a big sister,” I whispered.

And then I started to cry.

22

Krista had her face screwed up into a look I didn’t appreciate. “Aren’t they kind of old for that?
I mean, having a baby at their age?”

“My parents aren’t old,
” I nearly snapped at her.

Okay, maybe they were a
little bit
old. But I didn’t need her pointing that out. I suddenly realized how Jamie must feel quite often. She could think something about Tristan but no one else had better dare say it.

Willow had two younger siblings
. She was giving me a look of pure sympathy. Unlike Krista, she seemed to know I’d prefer it if she kept any negative comments to herself. Besides, with such a huge age-gap between us, I had a feeling I wasn’t going to have any of the same issues she had.

“I think it’s really exciting,” Jamie said sweetly.

It made me want to hug her. So I did. Never mind that we were at Gia’s, waiting for our order to arrive. It was Friday night. I’d told Willow and Jamie about the baby right away. And, of course, Tristan, too. Krista wasn’t as close of a friend so I’d just told her now.

I was still trying to get used to the idea but with every passing day, it was becoming more real. Mom had insisted on having Dad over for dinner
every night this past week, starting the night of the admission. And then the nights that followed.

My first impulse was to refuse to come out of my room.

Or to disappear by heading over to the Jacobs’s house.

In general, my first inclination was to act like a spoiled, pouty, bratty teen-ager.

Then I reminded myself I was about to become a big sister. And I should act like one. So I’d reluctantly wiggled into my big-girl panties. I’d done my best to be pleasant. That first night…it had been stressful. It was obvious that a cordial conversation had been a strain. It was also obvious that everyone was trying. And maybe that had been the problem. The three of us were trying too hard. It had been awkward. Through it all, I continued to tell myself a baby changed everything. We were going to be a family again whether I liked it or not. So why not make it easier on everyone and at least
try
to like it?

So I was.

Trying.

I wasn’t all the way there yet but I was making an effort.
My childhood had been happy. Before my parents had problems, I’d been happy. I wanted that, that kind of love and security, for my sibling. And if my parents thought they could recreate that? Then I needed to stand back and let them try.
Without
letting any negative feelings I may have cloud the way.

It was obvious it made my mom happy
that I was putting in an effort. And more than anything? I wanted my mom to be happy. She’d been through hell with the divorce. But she’d come to terms with it. I needed to do the same.

“I hope it’s not a boy,” Jamie muttered as I released her from my sideways hug. “Brothers are such a pain in the ass.”

I laughed at that. “I’m going to be eighteen by the time it’s born. I really don’t think it’s going to matter what the sex is. I’m just excited, either way!”

I realized then, that I was. Growing up I’d always wanted a sibling.
I’d pestered my parents relentlessly when I was younger. Before I was old enough to realize how desperately they wanted a baby, too. But over the years, when it had become apparent that it wasn’t going to happen, I’d convinced myself it really didn’t matter. But now? I was so freaking excited I could hardly contain myself. Eight more months seemed like a tortuous amount of time to wait. I could only imagine how my mom felt.

And
my dad.

Because
in all fairness, he was obviously excited, too.

“Britta?” Krista said. Her tone implied she’d been talking to me
. And that I had been so lost in my thoughts I hadn’t heard her.

“Sorry, what?” I asked. I shook my head to clear it
. Then I redirected my attention to Krista, who was sitting across from me.

“I asked when she’
s due?”

“Oh,” I felt a tiny frown take over. “September.”

“After we leave,” Willow filled in.

Jamie nudged me. “We’ll just have to make a lot of trips home. Or something.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Or something.”

“Here’s our pizza,” Willow said as she readjusted her glass to make room.

It was a large, plain pepperoni
. Krista was a picky eater, even when it came to pizza. We all got our food situated and then Willow beamed at me from across the table.

“Are you excited for tonight?” she wondered.

“Yeah,” I admitted. “I kind of am.” I turned to Jamie. “How about you?”

We were going to be heading to Pulse in a little while. Tristan’s band was playing. He was with them, getting ready. My friends had decided to make a girls’ night out of it. No boyfriends or dates allowed.

Jamie gave me a noncommittal shrug. I grinned at her. I knew her well enough to know she was trying to keep her expression impassive. She took a bite of her pizza and gazed off into the center of the restaurant.

“You know, it wouldn’t hurt anything if you actually admitted that you’re excited for him,” I said. I nudged her shoulder for good measure.

A small smile crept onto her face. “Fine. It’s kind of cool. My brother is in a freaking band! My nerdy little brother. Who would’ve thought?”

I shook my head
, smiling, but didn’t argue. Tristan and his expensive jeans and vintage shirts were about as far from nerdy as a guy could get. But who was I to argue with Jamie?

“I just can’t believe how cool our parents are being about this. I thought for sure they’d lock him in his room for life after they heard he’d joined a band,” she admitted.

Willow gasped theatrically. “What? And risk smothering him into a state of eternal rebellion?”

“Okay, okay,” Krista interrupted. “Enough
talking
about the band. Let’s get eating so we can get on over to Richmond. I want to actually
hear
this band!”

A little over an hour later, we were there. We
got to Pulse early; I had wanted to get a good seat. We needn’t have rushed because Tristan was able to save us a spot up front, right off of the dance floor.

Despite trying to pretend not to be, Jamie was obviously as excited as I was. She was smiling hugely by the time we arrived.

Tristan came out to chat with us for a bit. Jamie even got over herself and gave him a huge hug and wished him luck. I happened to know that Robert and Anna were disappointed that they couldn’t come. But it was a teen only club. Tristan had promised them they’d have the opportunity to hear them play sooner rather than later.

The other band me
mbers obviously had friends in the crowd, too. They came out to talk to them. The guys in the band stopped to say hi to me and were introduced to Jamie, Willow and Krista.

Jayde avoided us but I refused to let it bother me. She didn’t
as much as glance my way. I was quite okay with that. She didn’t like me. Maybe for the reason Tristan gave or maybe because she just simply wasn’t a friendly person. I didn’t know and I didn’t particularly care. I was pretty sure she had no idea about the misunderstanding Tristan and I had. And I was not going to be the one to enlighten her. So I just accepted it for what it was.

Tristan disappeared twenty minutes before they went on.

When the lights dimmed and music exploded into the air, Jamie pulled me onto my feet. The four of us piled onto the dance floor with a whole lot of other people. Tristan hadn’t wanted to tell me too much about the band. Or the music. He said he just wanted me to experience it.

I knew, almost immediately, why. The
band was playing cover songs. Almost every one of them was on the CD Tristan had given me the prior summer. Classic rock. It was no wonder he’d clicked so well with this group, given their taste in music.

Jayde, I was willing to admit, was an amazing lead singer. Maybe because his voice was familiar to me, I could make out Tristan’s back-up vocals over the rest of the music. In my opinion, he was even more amazing than Jayde.

As for the rest of the band, Tristan had told me Perry was the drummer. Nolan was on lead guitar and Cameron—whom I’d recently learned was Nolan’s brother—was on bass guitar. I wouldn’t have paid attention to any of them if Tristan hadn’t mentioned them. My eyes were more or less glued on him all night.

When their set ended nearly forty-five minutes later, we were told there would be a break in the music before the next band was up.

We found our way back to our table.

Jamie looked awed.

“Do you know what this means?” I asked her as I settled onto the seat next to her.

She slid her gaze my way. “What?”

“That whether you want to admit it or not, your brother is pretty damn awesome.” I grinned at her.

“Maybe,” Willow said in a teasing tone, “even more awesome than you.”

Jamie shook her head. She was fighting a smile, when Tristan appeared and threw his arm around her shoulder.

Yeah, it’s true,” he teased her. “I am
way
more awesome than you!”

*~*~*

The next day, Jamie and I traipsed up the stairs to my bedroom. Our dresses were in there, waiting for us. We’d had a minor change in our plans. Krista’s parents wanted pictures. Lots of pictures. So she and Willow had decided to get ready at her house. We’d decided this would actually work out to our advantage. It meant less people fighting over mirror space.

So after our afternoon at the spa, we’d separated with a plan to meet at Luca’s.

Jamie and I were freshly scrubbed, rubbed and primped. Our nails were filed to perfection and painted. All thanks to the wonderful team of women who had worked on us at Tranquility.

“Your dad is here?”
Jamie asked with a grin.

I nodded
as I shut my door behind us. Now that I was aware of their situation, he’d been at our house almost non-stop. Not just for dinners but late into the evenings. And he’d spent the night last night. I decided with Mom’s pregnancy it was probably easier if she could just be home. I’d realized belatedly, that all of the days she’d not been feeling well, it was probably morning sickness.

“How is that going?” she asked.

I shrugged. “Better than I thought it would. I mean, it’s strange. It’s like he’s company…but he’s not. I don’t even know how to explain it. They haven’t brought it up yet but I wouldn’t be surprised if he moved back in by the end of the month.”

He’d been living
in a condo. I’d never been there but I knew that he leased the place. He didn’t own it. But now, especially with the baby on the way and a wedding date set, it seemed a little silly, even to me, that he keep his own place.

“Are you okay with that?” she wondered.

“Getting there,” I admitted. “I mean, it’s only been a week. And if I think about it too long it’s still a little hard to comprehend. But I guess I realize it’s going to happen. Why fight it?”

Tristan had been right about that. The sooner my dad and I talked things out, the sooner we could maybe get our relationship back on track.
Thursday night, the night my mom taught her night class, Dad had stuck around after dinner. We’d talked. It had been hard and it had been awful at first. There were a lot of painful, raw emotions that I would’ve rather left alone. But by the end of the evening, I thought that maybe those scars would eventually heal.

I’d also realized something else. I’d always felt a bit traitorous even thinking about having a relationship with my dad. I
thought it felt like a betrayal. As though I would be disloyal to my mom if I became close to my dad again. It had taken them repairing their relationship for me to realize that wasn’t true.