AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Take me to a hotel, somewhere this guy won’t follow, and we can talk.” I gave in. “Okay?”
Sadie nodded at my demand, her eyelashes fluttering rapidly as she left me to speak with Matthew. I knew it wasn’t the last I’d see of his stupid face, so I made sure he caught my best I-hate-you expression once he bid me farewell, in his ridiculously well-articulated accent that I knew was the first thing Sadie fell for.
The cab ride to a hotel near some tourist attractions was quick and asphyxiating. Sadie was uncharacteristically quiet, not even a peep to distract me on the entire ride from Heathrow. She probably took the hint that discussing our brother or pretending she hadn’t thrown a tantrum that I impulsively reacted to would soften none of this.
The rational side of me wanted to question the credit card Sadie handed over to the concierge when we arrived at the hotel, but the vindictive side was fine spending Matthew’s money to book the four-star room we’d share for the night. I smiled politely at the nice employee walking us to the elevator, holding my grievances until Sadie and I were alone in the hotel room.
“Mom’s worried sick about you. She thinks I’m here to bring you home.”
“Yeah,” Sadie mumbled. She flew throughout the room, determined to get away from me before whatever she contained in her covered mouth fell elsewhere. She was panting when I met her in the bathroom, her quiet sobs filling what had been silence.
“Mia,” Sadie clung to the bathroom sink, her manicured fingernails tapping the vanity, “I’m pregnant.”
Stay calm.Sadie was intelligent, and I knew she understood biology, but I was fighting every cell in my body, trying not to explode.
“Have you seen a doctor?” I tried covering my cracking voice with a cough, grinding my teeth to keep the explosions to a minimum.
“Yeah,” she whimpered. “It’s Matthew’s. I was going to tell you everything when you got here, but I didn’t know he’d come to the airport. He freaked when I told him, when we found out. Breaking up was hard enough, but now—”
“He knew you were pregnant, and he slept with someone else? Sadie, this is so wrong. Come home with me. You can’t raise a child with someone who dumped you when he found out you were pregnant!”
“I broke up with him, Mia! I know you want to believe I’m an idiot who can’t ever solve her problems on her own—”
I waved around the hotel bathroom, my eyes wide with frustration. “Hello! I’m in the United Kingdom, not the United States, because you needed me!”
“I’m terrified, Mia! I met a guy, I fell in love, and we’re supposed to be together, but then this happened… I knew Matthew didn’t want a kid, and all I thought of was you and Caleb.”
“Please,” I raised my hands, “don’t compare yourself to us.” It was hard enough to imagine my little sister knocked up in another country by some foolish slime ball. Adding Caleb, and the fact we tried to get pregnant, just made my heart ache.
“I never wanted a kid,” she continued to rip me to pieces without realizing it, “and that’s all you two wanted.”
“It clearly wasn’t enough to keep us together when it didn’t work,” I snapped, “so please just tell me what I can do now to convince you to come home with me. Do I need to pay for your airfare? Do you need to move in with me? Would you prefer to live with Benji and Amelia? What is it, Sadie?”
“Mom’s going to kill me.”
My eyes widened after each blink, hoping I’d open them and not be exactly where I was, listening to the most frustrating rubbish I’d ever heard.
“Mom?” I pressed. “You’re about to be a mom, and you’re worried about what a senior citizen with no control over you will think?” Dropping my head into my hands, I resisted the urge to scream. “Why couldn’t I be Benji?”
“He doesn’t have a perfect life either, Mia,” Sadie groaned. “Besides, if you were Benji, who would be this kid’s godmother?”
It hurt to peek at my sister through my fingers. “Don’t guilt me into helping you.”
Sadie stepped away from the vanity and pulled my hands from my face. “I’m sorry this is how it happened, but I need you. I can’t do this alone.”
“Your child has a father,” I rebuked, “who, to me and everyone else in the airport, is clearly part of your life. You aren’t alone, Sadie.”
“I know it’s hard to understand what Matthew and I have, especially because I broke up with him—”
“And he cheated on you,” I added. Sadie shook her head and looked around the room for answers. I couldn’t believe what was happening, and there I was in rescue-mode. Looking at Sadie and her cheeks stained with mascara, I realized it wasn’t just my little sister and me in there.
Taking her hands in mine, I led us to a small sofa near the balcony doors. Sadie nestled into a corner, tucking a pillow against her stomach while I opened the doors.
“It rains here all the time,” she whispered, looking behind me at the balcony when I turned around. “Like this, usually, just a drizzle.”
Tucking into the other end of the couch, I watched my sister. Her platinum hair would have to return to its natural color and she’d need to stop tanning, as well as doing whatever the hell bad habits she had with Matthew.
“Tell me what happened,” I suggested, trying to smile at her.
