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After finishing at the salon, I don’t even think about it. I run past the pawn shop, throw myself into my car, and drive to the only place I can think of that will make me feel better. My new studio.
15
PEBBLES
All of My Friends Call Me Pebbles
The following week, I’m locking up my office and turning the lights off throughout the studio when my phone chimes with a text.
I’m out front.
I look through the glass door and find Trigger leaning against my SUV that's parked against the sidewalk.
After locking the main door, I take a few steps down the road towards the car.
“Ready?” he asks and smiles widely at me, looking me up and down.
“As I’ll ever be I guess.”
Ever since my appointment with Sohpia and my talk with Maria, I’ve been seeing Trigger in a new light. I haven’t said anything to him yet, but I really am trying.
He opens the passenger door for me and closes it softly behind me before rounding the front. He catches my eye through the windshield and winks at me. I smile softly back.
“We gotta pick Winnie up on our way, yeah?”
“I told her we would be there at 5:20.”
Trigger leans on the center console, his warm arm brushing against mine as he puts Winnie's address in the GPS.
A few minutes later, we’re pulling up to a cookie cutter Arizona style home. I’m shocked when I take in Winnie’s house for the first time and don’t find a single flower or plant in her yard or on her front porch. A giggle bubbles up my throat when the only type of vegetation I can see is a single palm tree in the front corner of her front yard.
Trigger honks the horn twice. A minute later, Winnie comes bouncing down the driveway towards us. She looks so cute in her bright floral wide legged pants with her baby bump sticking out against her tight yellow tank top.
I regret my clothing choice when she hops into the car and she sees what I’m wearing.
“Why are you hiding your bump! You need to embrace it girl!” she says after seeing my too-big Outlaws shirt and purple leggings.
Now that I think of it, I’m actually pretty sure the shirt I have on is Trigger’s, which could be why he smiled like a buffoon when he saw me coming out of the studio.
I look to the side and find him looking me up and down again. He smiles with a wink as he stops on the shirt. Yep, it's totally his shirt.
“I figured we’d be up and down, so I went with comfort.”
“You can be comfortable and still be cute,” Winnie says, rolling her eyes with a laugh.
“I think you look cute, Red,” Trigger says.
“Thank you,” I blush.
Winnie’s coos of approval from the back seat are followed by silence as Trigger guides the car out of town and towards the damn birth class that I’m so not looking forward to.
Once inside, my eyes trail over the half dozen couples surrounding Dr. Murphy in a circle. She notices us right away and waves toward an empty spot at the front. “Welcome! You three can all sit right here.”
I’m glad she doesn't make a comment about Winnie being alone and just groups her with us. It makes it less awkward for her and takes some of the pressure off of me being Trigger’s sole focus.
Forty-five minutes into the class, I am terrified. Dr. Murphy has talked all about dilation and pain and placentas and bleeding. I feel nauseous. The french dip sandwich Trigger dropped off for me for lunch is about twenty seconds from making itself known all over this table.
Winnie and Trigger are eating up every single word Dr. Murphy says as I fight the vomit urging to come up. Trigger is even taking notes! He brought a damn notebook! He’s taking his role here very seriously. Hopefully he takes legible notes so he can give me the cliff notes version later. I tuned Dr. Murphy out fifteen minutes ago when she started talking about mucusy discharge right before you go into labor.
