March 13th, 2005
Tacoma, Washington
It had taken several excuses for her to retreat back to Happy's room, away from the chatter and noise of the main level of the clubhouse. There was a lot of interest in new faces, it seemed, and everyone had questions about who she was and where she had come from. How had Tig kept her a secret for so long? Who was her mother? How was she still alive after spending the night with Happy?
She answered their questions carefully. She didn't know why Tig had kept her a secret for so long, and she guessed that it was to keep her safe and away from the lifestyle. Her mother was a stripper (that was a truth, of course) whom Tig had forgotten to use a condom with back in his younger years. And she survived the night because she wasn't stupid. If Happy was a sleeping bear, she did her best to not poke him, and gave him a wide berth wherever she could. She seemed to satisfy them, she hoped, and directed them to Tig and Happy if they had any more questions.
"I don't know how they think," she told them, to justify why she didn't have more answers. "How the hell am I supposed to know what's going through their minds?"
(Of course, Happy would tell them to fuck off, but she didn't share that she knew that, and she rather suspected that Tig would say something similar.)
She retreated upstairs, and had spread out on the floor in Happy's room, which she figured would have probably gotten her the boot if she had really been a stranger to him. Her classes were winding down, and she was due to graduate in June. She was in the final push, and really needed to buckle down and study, as her father would say, but her thoughts kept pulling her away from her work.
All of the shit that she had heard about what the Sons dabbled in, all of the danger, it was somehow becoming real. Well, it had been real in the past, back in 1994, when she had gotten the call that her mother had gotten shot at work. It had taken her six months to stop doing double-takes every time she saw someone wearing leather on the streets, but nothing further had happened. The danger had left just as soon as she had become aware of it. Or even when Happy came to her apartment with bloodstains on his clothes, and she washed them in the sink. She was aware of the danger then, but again, the most perilous time had passed, and she was left with the aftermath.
This time, she was in the thick of it. He had talked about bulletproof vests, and brought her into the clubhouse for a lockdown, for crying out loud, and then left, without describing what might happen. The terrible feeling of anxiety that had been welling up in her, starting from the pit of her stomach and slowly creeping outward to the tips of her fingers and toes, had dominated her consciousness to the point where she couldn't sit still and focus.
And so she began to pace. Her sweaty palms rubbed small circles on her jeans as she moved between the door and the window on the opposite wall, occasionally peeking out over the parking lot below. The sight of the few brothers left behind with shotguns did nothing to comfort her. After a bit, she began to gnaw on her fingernail, as she saw that the time was slowly slipping from the afternoon into the evening, and things had remained unchanged.
When the door opened, she jumped. He made his way into the room quietly, his eyes meeting hers from the moment he stepped in. As soon as the door was closed behind him, she launched herself at him, wrapping her arms around him and nearly knocking him back against the door. When he regained his balance, his arms slowly snaked around her as well. She inhaled deeply, catching his natural scent, which mixed with the odor of sweat, and the artificial smell of a kevlar vest.
"You're here," she whispered against his chest. "I was worried."
"You were?" he asked, his chest vibrating as he spoke.
She pulled away from him slightly to look up at him. "Of course I was worried," she replied with a frown. "Why wouldn't I be?"
"I told you I wasn't going to leave you here," he said.
"But you brought me in for a lockdown, talked about things getting ugly, wore a bulletproof vest…" she trailed off as he tilted his head. "What was I supposed to think, Hap? All you did was lead me down the rabbit hole of everything that could go wrong, and then just tell me that you'd be fine."
"And I was," he stressed. "We had a sit down, worked it all out without violence. Everyone's whole on both sides. It could have gone bad, but it didn't."
"Is that supposed to comfort me?" she asked, taking a step away from him to cross her arms. "I spent the whole day worried about you, thinking that you or someone else was going to come back in a goddamn body bag."
He frowned. "I told you that I would be fine," he repeated, and she sighed, rubbing her temples. "I don't get why you're making such a big deal out of this."
"Because you telling me that you would be fine didn't match up with the evidence that I was seeing with my own two eyes," she almost shouted, trying to keep her voice down. "Telling me that you'll be fine right after telling me that you would be wearing a fucking bulletproof vest doesn't exactly match up well."
She sighed again, and sat down on the bed, her elbows resting on her knees and her forehead resting on her palms. There was the sound of velcro ripping, and she assumed that he had stripped off his shirt and vest, and the clinking of a chain told her that his pants had followed. He was only in his boxers when he knelt in front of her, gently tugging on her arms so that she was forced to look at him. His eyes studied her face, taking in the absolute exhaustion that had overcome her.
"I'm sorry," he told her quietly, one of his hands reaching up to cup the side of her face. His thumb stroked her cheekbone softly. "I didn't know that the sit down would work. I thought preparing you for the worst was the best thing to do. I didn't know you would worry that much."
"It's okay if you want to prepare me for the worst, but prepare me for the best, too," she whispered. "You could have told me that the sit down was the first step." He nodded slowly. "And of course I'm going to worry about you, Hap. I worry because I love you."
"I'm not used to that," he said.
"I know," she told him, smiling slightly. "I'm not really used to it either. This isn't anything like the last time I was in love. But we're both learning, I guess, right?"
"Right," he affirmed. He rose to his feet, and pulled her along with him. "I gotta shower. You coming?"
"Of course," she smiled, pulling her shirt over her head. He grinned as she dropped her clothes on the floor one piece at a time, before he swept her off her feet and carried her into the bathroom.
June 11th, 2005
Seattle, Washington
He was there, at her graduation ceremony, which came as a bit of a shock to her, since he had told her a few days ago that he was due to be in California that day. By the weary look in his eyes, she guessed that he had ridden most of the night and day to get there on time, which was a little shocking. He stood out on the edge of the crowd, the only man wearing a leather kutte, which made her smile.
Her family couldn't be there, but she was okay with that. Her father had talked to her the night before, letting her know that he was out of the country on business, but that her graduation present was in the mail. Diana had cut off most contact with her, since she had decided to introduce Chase and Jo to the joys of Chinese takeout and greasy pizza. It hadn't been Sarah's fault that she didn't know they were on some kind of vegan-dairy-free-MSG-free-diet. It wasn't like they had told her, anyways.
He got quite a few strange looks for wearing the kutte, amongst the women in dresses and the men in button-down shirts, but Sarah wouldn't have him any other way. The man would have looked downright odd in a suit. Besides, they made for a much more interesting pairing, a woman with a graduate degree and a badass biker assassin.
After the ceremony, he had whisked her away on the back of his bike, still in her itchy, polyester gown, her diploma and mortarboard cap tucked firmly into his saddlebag. He revved his engine a couple of times, shocking some of the older adults who were making their way to their cars, and she swatted his shoulder playfully. Even though she couldn't see his face, she knew that he was grinning as they pulled out of the parking garage.
He took her on back roads along the coast, instead of the highway, since it was a surprisingly beautiful day. She had no problem pressing her cheek against his back, and watching the ocean roll by. It was one of the few things that she had never seen as a kid, and he knew that she loved just how vast and open it was. "A world of unexplored possibilities," she had called it once, instead of the desert that surrounded Vegas, which was just dry and devoid of life.
He took her to the beach, the same one he had taken her to a while ago. She recalled that it was one of his favorite places in the city, a place that he liked to go when he needed a moment of peace. When he cut the engine, she slid off the back of his bike and shrugged out of her gown, pulling the diploma cover out of his saddlebag so she could tuck the gown inside.
Happy slid the diploma cover from her hands and opened it up, frowning when he read the words on the placeholder that sat inside. "What the fuck is this?" he asked, showing her what he was looking at. "This ain't a diploma."
"No, it's the placeholder," she replied, laughing. "They don't hand the actual diplomas out at the ceremony. Do you know how bad it would be if they messed up just one alphabetization, or one person didn't show up to the ceremony?"
He was silent for a moment, but nodded in understanding. "Where's your actual one?"
She waved her hand. "I'll get it in the mail in a few weeks," she told him. "Then you can put it in whatever frame you want."
"Good," he said, pulling her to his side and pressing a kiss against her temple. "It's gonna match the other one real nicely."
"I wouldn't have it any other way," she hummed.
He slid the diploma cover into the saddlebag, nestled in the folds of her polyester gown, and then walked her down the beaten path, to the same picnic tables they had sat at before. Evening was creeping up on them, the sun sinking slowly into the horizon, as she sat next to him, her head resting on his shoulder. His thumb traced small, slow circles on her hip as she sighed, content to just be able to lean against him.
"I got the job, you know," she whispered, and his thumb froze. "I start in two weeks, with the Pierce County Health Department."
"So you're planning on staying in Tacoma for a while?" he asked.
She shrugged. "It's a starter job," she replied. "I'm not tied to Tacoma, per say. I'd probably be perfectly happy moving somewhere else, as long as it wasn't back to Vegas." She craned her neck to look up at him. "To be honest, I think I'm still here because you are."
He leaned away, so he could look down at her, his brow furrowed. "And if I told you I was planning to move back to California?"
Her heart sank at his words. "I'd guess we'd have to part ways then," she whispered, breaking eye contact with him. She chose to look out over the ocean instead, watching the waves crash against the shore.
"You think I'd move there without you?" he chuckled, wrapping his arm around her again and tucking her into his side. "My Ma would kill me."
"When were you thinking of moving?" she asked. Her spirit suddenly felt reinvigorated.
It was his turn to shrug. "When the time feels right," he said. "It doesn't feel right yet."
"Okay," she whispered, nodding her head. She let out a breath, and slipped out of his grip and settling on the table so she could face him. "There's one other thing that I wanted to talk to you about," she began, tapping her fingers nervously against her thigh. He tilted his head, which she had learned meant he was listening intently. "You asked me a couple of weeks ago about condoms, and, well, it got me thinking about birth control."
He frowned. "Thought you were on that… thing," he said, stumbling only as he tried to recall what she had told him a long time ago.
"The IUD," she supplied, and he nodded. "I've had it for almost twelve years now, though, which means it's pretty much expired, and I need to get a new one. A new one's too expensive, though, so I was thinking about starting the pill instead."
"Don't you have insurance at your new job?" he asked.
"Yeah, but it doesn't cover birth control," she laughed, shaking her head. "They'd rather pony up for prenatal care and childbirth costs. I figure the pill is probably the cheapest option out of pocket. I can't afford another IUD. It would be at least one thousand out of pocket, if not more."
"And the condoms?"
"I figure that after I start using a new, not expired birth control, and after we both get tested, I'd be okay with not using condoms, if you are," she told him. "As long as I'm still the only one, that is."
He nodded. "Okay," was all he had to say in response.
"Okay?" she echoed, her eyebrows raising. "I just offered to let you hit it raw, and you just are 'okay' with that?"
His nose crinkled. "Please don't ever say 'hit it raw' again," he mumbled with disgust, and she cracked a grin. "Of course I'm more than 'okay' with it, but I won't be able to tell you exactly how I feel about it until I, you know, feel it."
She frowned. "Have you never not used a condom before?" she whispered.
"Condoms are cheaper than child support," he deadpanned. "I've done it a couple of times, in a pinch, but I'm mindful of excessive spending. Paying up to support someone's brat I didn't ask for is excessive."
"You have such a way with words," she sighed, collapsing against his shoulder and pretending to be the lead in every sappy romantic comedy.
"Shut up and watch the sunset," he growled, pulling her closer. She laughed as he pressed a kiss to her temple. "Congratulations, graduate."
April 30th, 2006
Tacoma, Washington
Things had been going well, in the past few months, as she had adjusted to a life of working full time. She was three months shy of being a year on the job, and was enjoying every moment of it. With more free time in her schedule, she had been exploring up and down the coasts of Washington and Oregon, falling in love with all the small towns along the shore. One day, she told herself, she would move to one of the small towns in the woods, and drag Happy along with her.
Oh, Happy. They had fallen more into a regular routine, in terms of which nights he spent in the apartment, and which nights he spent at the clubhouse. The sex was still good, thankfully, but it seemed that they had it on a schedule now, with less spontaneity. Sarah was perfectly content with that, she was surprised to find, as it fit well into the rest of her carefully organized schedule. They even took regular trips down to Vegas, so Sarah could see her mom, and to Oakland, so Happy could see his, although the trips to Oakland were far more frequent.
He still hadn't called her his "Old Lady" yet, and when that thought crossed her mind, it sent a shock of sadness through her, before she was able to repress it. Sure, they were monogamous, she was certain, and they spent a lot of time together, but they still didn't have an official label. She had tried calling him her "boyfriend" once, and they had both quickly agreed that the term felt far too juvenile for them. They weren't engaged or married, so "fiance" or "husband" wouldn't apply. The best that she could come up with was "partner," but she often then found herself explaining that Happy was male, and not female (even though "partner," in her mind, was a perfectly acceptable gender-neutral term, and it shouldn't matter to people at all what gender her partner was).
It was after one of these times that she was explaining her relationship status to a man at the grocery store, who had cornered her in the dairy aisle to ask her out, that she noticed she had several missed calls from Lauren, and a text: Call me wen u get this
Frowning, she dialed Lauren's number, and held the phone up to her ear. "Thank god you called me back," Lauren hissed, when she picked up the phone. "Have you been watching the news?"
Sarah's heart sank. "No, I'm at the grocery store," she replied. "What's going on? Did something happen to the club?"
She began to spiral through the disaster scenarios in her head. Did the boys get arrested? Was she going to have to bail Happy out of jail, or watch him go to prison? Would Julia be growing up with her dad behind bars? Or maybe, if it wasn't club related, did her apartment burn to the ground in a stunning, news-worthy five alarm fire? Did her neighbors get busted, or take hostages, or something?
"No, the club's fine," Lauren told her.
"And my apartment?"
"Also fine," Lauren replied, and Sarah could almost hear her frowning over the phone. "But they just ran a story that you might be interested in. What birth control do you use? I've seen the packs in your bathroom."
Sarah shrugged. "It's generic, I think," she said. "I don't think it has a brand name, just a manufacturer. Why?"
"There's a recall on a couple thousand packs of pills," Lauren told her. "They forgot to put the active ingredients in them. The supply went out a couple of months ago. It was a small batch, but big enough to make an impact. Sare, if you have that birth control, you could be pregnant."
It felt like the floor dropped out from underneath her. Could she be pregnant? She tried to recall all of the signs of pregnancy she had been taught when she was younger, some of which lined up perfectly with what she had been experiencing for a month now. She had just blamed it on switching to the new generic brand of birth control, that there was something off in the ingredients, but now she had a sinking suspicion she was right: the missing ingredient was the fucking hormones.
She thanked Lauren quickly, and turned her cart down the pharmacy aisle, plucking the first box of pregnancy tests she could find and chucking them into her cart. It felt like she was in the checkout line for ages, before she finally was rung up for her groceries, and she seemed to hit every red light on the drive home to her apartment, as she tapped her fingers impatiently against the steering wheel.
Pregnant. Could she be? Was she ready to be? Was he ready? She groaned, pushing the thoughts out her head. She was letting that little hint of anxiety get the best of her. Lauren hadn't even remembered the name of the birth control. What were the chances, really, that she would be one out of a couple thousand women to get stuck with that brand? Pretty damn low, she thought, but not zero.
She managed to put all of her groceries away before she finally attempted to take the test, only to find that she didn't have to pee. With a frustrated sigh, she refrained from throwing the test across the room, pulled up her pants, and went to the kitchen to chug a couple of glasses of water.
"Niagara Falls," she whispered to herself, envisioning the waterfall. "Noah's Ark. A rainy day. That one waterfall in Africa. Victoria Falls? That's a big one."
Eventually, she gave up, and flopped on the couch. She'd pee when she was good and ready to, she guessed. And after an hour, she felt the familiar sensation, and ran impatiently to the bathroom. She placed the finished test face down on the edge of the sink, as the kitchen timer ticked on for the longest minutes of her life. Finally, it buzzed, and she flipped the test over.
Two little pink lines. Pregnant.