Chapter 114
Every morning started with medicine and meditation. Or M&M, as Clarke jokingly liked to call it. Neither one of those things was a joke, though. The meds were obviously important, and even Clarke felt like she was getting a lot out of the meditation. She downloaded an app called Headspace and splurged a little on a specific anti-anxiety meditation pack. The guy who led the meditations had such a calming voice, and he spoke a lot about not eliminating anxiety altogether, but rather changing your relationship with it. It was good advice even for someone like her who wasn't a diagnosed sufferer.
After M&M, their routine was always to make breakfast together. Sometimes it was just simple stuff like pancakes or waffles, but they did challenge themselves with eggs benedict one day, too. That breakfast didn't turn out so well, but thankfully, they had plenty of cereal.
Part of their routine involved setting aside designated family time, and unsurprisingly, most of that time revolved around Avery. Whether it was giving her a bath, playing with her, or taking a walk with her in her stroller, that always seemed like the best part of Bellamy's day. Sometimes, his days were a little busier than others. On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, he had therapy sessions with Dr. Wallace that usually lasted a little over an hour. Clarke accompanied him but always stayed out in the waiting room with Avery. On the days when he didn't have therapy, they went to the park, where Avery had taken a liking to crawling around the sandbox.
Oftentimes, Miller called Bellamy asking him to work out, too, and Bellamy pretty much always went. But Clarke couldn't help but notice that Miller always swung by and picked Bellamy up. In fact, it was pretty obvious that Bellamy never drove anywhere alone. Even though he had the capability to now that he had the device in his car, the only time he got behind the wheel was if she was in the seat next to him.
At the start of his third week of therapy, part of Bellamy's routine seemed to be bringing her and Avery along with him. "You about ready to go?" he asked her as he trundled down the stairs, car keys in hand.
"I don't think I can," she told him. "I just got off the phone with Madi's mom. We have to bump her piano lesson up a couple hours today."
His whole facial expression sort of just . . . dropped. "Oh."
"Sorry," she apologized. "You're okay going on your own, though, right?"
He thought for a moment, the nodded. "Yeah. In fact, I've been feeling like I need a little more exercise, so I think I could just walk."
That wasn't what he needed, though, and she knew it. He needed to overcome this fear. "It's across town," she pointed out.
"Clarke, it's Arkadia. We don't have a whole lot of town here."
"Yeah, but it's supposed to rain this afternoon. You don't wanna be walking in that. Plus, you won't get there in time." Knowing that she had all the logistics on her side, she calmly suggested, "You should just drive."
The keys in his hand started to rattle a bit, so he shoved his hand in his pocket, almost as if to conceal his nerves. "Okay."
"Just do me a favor: Text me when you get there," she told him. It made her nervous to think of him driving somewhere on his own, too, because even though she trusted him, there was always the possibility that he might drive somewhere he wasn't supposed to. She felt like, once he made just one drive on his own, though, his confidence in himself would pick up, and it'd be easier to do it next time.
During the ten minutes it took Bellamy to get to Dr. Wallace's office, Clarke checked her phone incessantly. At one point, Harper texted her something random, which just got her hopes up. After what seemed like thirty minutes—but really was just about ten—she got her long-awaited text from Bellamy. All it said was Here, but it produced a sigh of relief in Clarke. Half the drive down, one half to go.
About an hour and a half later, the front door opened, and in came her husband, jingling his keys in his hand.
"You're back," she said, setting her iPad down. It'd been a good distraction while he'd been gone.
"Yep," he said. "What're you looking up?"
"Oh, just stuff about formula." She rolled her eyes. "I hate to do it, but we're just gonna have to switch." Everything she'd read online made her feel reassured that formula would be fine, too. Plenty of babies didn't drink breastmilk at all. Hell, she hadn't, and she'd turned out just fine. "The well's dried up, Bellamy," she said dramatically, grabbing her breasts. "The well of my boobs is dry. I have dry boobs."
"I still like your boobs," he said, kicking off his shoes.
"Of course you do." She patted the empty cushion next to her and told him, "Sit down. Tell me how it went."
"Good. It went good." He flopped down on the couch, scrunched up his forehead, and corrected himself confusedly, "Well? It went well?"
"That one."
"It went well," he said. "I like Dr. Wallace. He's ancient, but wise. He thinks I'm ready to scale back to twice a week now, so I guess that's progress."
"Definitely," she agreed. He just kept heading in the right direction, and that made her feel so, so proud of him.
He shifted, lying down with his head in her lap, and looked up at her questioningly. "Can I ask you something?"
"What?" She stroked his hair, loving the simple intimacy of this moment. She felt like she could sit there with him forever.
"You didn't have a lesson with Madi today, did you?" he said.
Darn, he'd figured it out. "No," she confessed. "I told a white lie. Don't hate me, though. It was for your own good, and I was gonna own up to it."
"You wanted me to drive somewhere on my own again," he deduced.
"Yeah. Just to prove to yourself that you can."
"Well, I did," he said. "Drove past the bar and everything."
"And?"
He smiled. "I didn't feel like going inside."
That was exactly what she'd been hoping to hear. "See? Doesn't that make you feel proud of yourself?"
"Kind of," he admitted. "It's weird, though, too, because I feel like every small thing is some huge accomplishment."
"Well, it is." All her reading and all her research had suggested celebrating the little things, because they were all accumulating to a bigger, healthier lifestyle in the long run.
"I felt like a teenager driving somewhere for the first time," he said. "Gotta text, check in with Mom when I get there."
She cringed. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have made you do that."
"No, I'm glad you did. You're looking out for me." He took her hand in his, threading his fingers through her own. "My mom tried to implement that system when I started driving."
"I'm guessing it didn't work, though." She couldn't recall ever seeing Bellamy text his mom when he'd been out.
"No. I always forgot," he said. "That's gonna be a requirement for Avery, though. Whenever she's goin' somewhere, she has to text us when she gets there, and she has to text us when she's leaving. And we're gonna have a tracker on her phone."
"A tracker?" she resounded.
"Yeah, so we know where she is at all times."
That sounded a little excessive, but that was typical of Bellamy to be the overprotective dad. "What's her curfew gonna be?"
"When she's in high school? 9:00," he decided.
"9:00? She's gonna hate us."
"She's gonna learn to live with it; that's what she's gonna do."
Clarke laughed a little, sure that she'd be able to get him to ease up on that a little when the time came. "Maybe her freshman year. But we should bump it back as she gets older. If she's responsible," she said.
"Yeah." He sighed and groaned. "God, now that I'm a parent, I hate to say it, but I really do empathize with your mom more."
"Me, too." If Avery came home from a party, drunk and having to practically be carried by her boyfriend . . . hell, she might feel tempted to try to squash that relationship, too. "Funny how things change, isn't it?"
"Yep," he agreed.
She really hoped that their familial relationships were a little . . . a little smoother sailing than hers had been with her mom a dad, particularly in those high school years. Just living through that once had been enough; she had no desire to relive it from the parent perspective. "I was pretty harsh on my mom and dad sometimes," she reflected. "But looking back, I think they did the best they could."
...
The conversation between Clarke and her dad was sparse at dinner that night. Their silverware made more noise clanging and scraping against the plates than either one of them did.
"How are the potatoes?" he finally asked, breaking up about three straight minutes of silence. "Warm enough?"
"Yeah." Warm was about the only compliment she could give those mashed potatoes. She moved them around her plate, not having the heart to tell him that she knew they were just the microwavable kind and didn't taste very good.
"I know it's probably not as good of a meal as your mom could make," he acknowledged, "but . . . it's not too bad, right?"
"It's fine." She and her mom hadn't done many extravagant meals all summer. It just seemed pointless now that it was only the two of them. Most of the time, they both just fixed their own dinners and didn't even bother eating together.
Setting her silverware down, not sure she could stomach any more, she looked around her dad's apartment, wondering why all his moving boxes were still full and why there weren't any photos hanging on the wall yet. The place looked unlived in, not at all cozy, and she didn't know how he could stand it. "Why haven't you unpacked anything yet?" she asked him bluntly. "You've been living here for months."
"I know," he said, "but it's just a temporary place. I don't wanna live in an apartment."
"It's really nice, though," she pointed out. "It'd be even nicer if you made it look homey."
"I'd rather save that for an actual house."
He'd been talking about buying a house for almost half a year now, and that still hadn't happened. "Well, did you check out that one I emailed you about?" she questioned. "It's right up there by the high school, and it looks really spacious inside."
"It does," he agreed.
She didn't understand why he didn't have the same enthusiasm about it that she did. Sure, it didn't have a pool in the backyard, but her dad had hardly ever gone in their pool anyway. "I think some other people might be interested in it, so you might wanna put an offer down soon if you're interested, too," she suggested. Whether that was true or not, she had no idea, but she figured putting a little pressure on him wouldn't be such a bad idea. He needed a kick in the ass. "You are interested, right?" she said, expecting him to confirm that.
Instead, he set his silverware down, folded his hands over his mouth, and murmured, "Clarke . . . there's something I need to tell you."
Her stomach immediately started to twist just like it had when he and her mom had sat her down to reveal they were getting a divorce.
"I have a place in mind," he said. "It's just not here in Arkadia."
She frowned, picturing something at least close by then. "Well, where is it? Polis?"
"No," he said. "It's in Baltimore."
"Balt—Baltimore?" she sputtered. "Why so far away?"
"It's not that far," he denied. "We can still drive back and forth to see each other."
"But not like we do now." Even though their visits had pretty much been relegated to these Saturday night dinners, it was still comforting to know that, if she needed him, his apartment was only a six minute drive from her house. "I won't see you as much."
"I know," he said. "But it's not gonna change anything."
"What do you mean? Of course it's gonna change things," she fumed. "You won't even be part of my life anymore."
"No, I will. I always will," he insisted. "We can talk all the time and-"
"We don't talk all the time, though, not even now. You're always busy with work."
He sighed and admitted, "Work . . . does keep me busy. But living in a big city . . . it's just more conducive for my work, Clarke. You know I have to travel a lot. That's a lot more convenient for me if I'm there. Please, just try to understand."
She heard what he was saying, but all the words were just meaningless sounds to her. Excuses. He was making excuses. "I don't believe you," she grumbled, leaning back in her chair, crossing her arms over her chest stubbornly. "You just wanna be farther away from Mom."
"Do I think it'd be wise for us to put a little distance between us? Sure," he said. "It's awkward running into her at the store or the post office or . . . anywhere. We're both trying to move on."
"Mom's not moving on, though," she said, desperate to get him to change his mind and just stay. "You should see her; she misses you. Why can't you guys just try getting back together?"
He shook his head. "It's not gonna happen, sweetie."
She hated that he would tack on 'sweetie' to try to placate her. In fact, he and her mom took the same approach and the same tone whenever they discussed this with her. She was almost eighteen, and they talked to her about their divorce like she was a kid. "I'm gonna go," she decided, throwing her napkin down on the table as she stood up.
Her father, of course, tried to stop her. "Wait, Clarke, you're not done with your dinner."
"Yes, I am." She grabbed her purse and stormed out the door, sort of wishing now that the silence between them had continued. Would've been a hell of a lot better than this.
She felt miserable on the drive home, and unfortunately, when she got there, she didn't feel any better. There was a car in the driveway she didn't recognize, and when she walked in the front door, she heard two very distinct sounds of laughter: One was her mom's, and one was . . . somebody else's. A man's. It was the flirtatious, giddy kind of laughter, too.
When she walked into the living room, she saw something she never ever wanted to see. "Mom?!" she shrieked.
Her mother climbed off the semi-balding man underneath her and straightened out her clothes. "Clarke. Honey, hi," she said, clearly frazzled. "What're you doing home so early?"
Clarke just stared at her—them—with her mouth halfway open. Disgusting. Absolutely disgusting. She sat on that couch. Sometimes she ate on that couch.
When she didn't get an answer, her mom introduced, "Um, this is Ronald. He works with me."
Ronald stood up and tried to inconspicuously button up his shirt. "Hi, Clarke," he said pleasantly, as though she hadn't just walked in on the two of them about to bump uglies. "I've heard a lot about you."
"Uh-huh." It didn't look like they'd been doing much talking tonight, so when exactly had he heard anything about her, she wondered.
"Maybe you should go," her mom advised him quietly.
"Right. I'll see you tomorrow." He looked like he wanted to give her a kiss on the cheek or something, but he restrained himself, and on his way past Clarke, he said, "Nice to meet you."
Clarke didn't say anything in response, just waited until he was gone to shudder and said, "I feel like I need to spray disinfectant in my eyes."
"Oh, don't be so dramatic," her mom said, reaching up to smooth down her hair. "I told you I was gonna start dating again."
"Yeah, but I didn't think it'd be so soon."
"Soon?" her mom echoed. "It's been six months. What am I supposed to do, stay home and knit?"
"For starters."
Her mom gave her an annoyed look. "Really, Clarke? Can't you just be happy for me?"
"What, that you've found Ronald?" She huffed, already hating the guy. "What kind of name is that anyway? Ronald? He doesn't seem that interesting, and he's not cute, and he's not . . . he's not Dad!"
"Honey."
There it was, another placating term.
"I need to start over," her mom said. "I don't wanna be lonely. And I don't want that for you, either."
This was another tactic she'd noticed they liked to use, redirecting conversations back onto her and her life so they didn't have to talk about theirs. "No, you always do this," she said, throwing her hands up in the air frustratedly. "You try to make things about me."
"I'm just saying, you're gonna start your senior year in a couple weeks," her mom said. "Why not make it a great year? Meet someone new, go out on dates."
"Should I bring people back home and make out with them on the couch?" Clarke retorted. "Like you just were."
"I'm sorry," her mom apologized. "I thought you'd be at your dad's for a while. I will try to be more discreet. But sweetie . . ." She came around the couch, closed the distance between them and stroked Clarke's hair lovingly. "I mean it. Live your life. Don't let yourself be trapped in the past."
Clarke couldn't even stand to look at her, because she was so infuriated. How her parents could get over their marriage, their entire twenty-one year marriage, so quickly was just beyond her. She didn't know how it was possible. Unless . . . unless they'd never really been in true, true love after all. If that was the case, then sadly, maybe her once happy family had never really been that happy after all.
...
She must have had a dazed or contemplative look on her face, because Bellamy reached up to stroke her cheek and get her attention again. "What's on your mind?" he asked.
"Oh, I've just been thinking a lot about my parents lately," she said. "I'm glad we're not falling apart like they did."
"Me, too," he said.
"And . . . I was just remembering this time I walked in on my mom and this guy. Making out on the couch." She wrinkled up her nose, still sickened by that. Nobody needed to see a parent getting frisky.
"Oh, gross," Bellamy said. "Is that a hint, though? Do you want me to make out with you on the couch?"
"I mean, if you want to." She hadn't actually brought it up as a hint, but why not? Making out with him was fun.
With an open invitation, Bellamy shifted their positions so that he was lying on top and brought his mouth down to cover hers. He kissed her passionately, his tongue darting out to brush against hers, and she felt a feel-good tingle all the way from her belly down to her toes. One thing this self-imposed romantic slowdown had reminded her of was that her husband was the world's best kisser.
The thing about Bellamy was that his hands were never idle when they were intimate. He was always rubbing her all over or tickling her. Or, if her clothes were still on, undressing her. Almost sneakily, while she was distracted by the feel of his tongue swirling around hers, he unbuttoned her blouse and opened it up to expose her bra. He wasn't too brazen, though, and stopped himself, lifting himself up into a bit of a push-up position. "Can I?" he asked.
"Sure, why not?" she said, moving his dark curls out of his eyes. "They've been off limits to you for a while now. And Avery doesn't have much interest in them anymore."
"Oh, but I do," he said excitedly, putting one of his hands on one breast. "I'm very interested." He squeezed and massaged it gently, then pulled down on the cup of her bra, releasing it from its confines. Clarke did the same to the other and closed her eyes when she felt the warm cavern of his mouth come down on top of it. He tried to suck on as much of it as he could, holding it with one hand while his free hand teased her other nipple. He flicked it back and forth with his thumb while his tongue did the same on the other side.
"Oh my god," she whispered, feeling a little bit euphoric. It'd been so long since she'd allowed Bellamy to lavish attention on this particular part of her body. Even before Avery had been born, her boobs had been so huge and so sore that she'd asked him to try to stay away from them. But he had made her cum just by sucking on her tits before. In fact, he was the only person who had ever been able to do that to her. Wasn't an easy thing to do, but maybe he could do it again. Right here. Right now. She wanted it.
Suddenly, a shocked, "Sorry!" rang out, totally ruining the moment. She and Bellamy both sat up a bit and looked towards the front door, where Raven and Murphy were standing in the threshold. Clarke immediately pulled her bra back up, hoping Murphy hadn't seen anything.
"Door was unlocked," Raven said, "and we thought we were having game night."
Game night? she thought, trying to get her brain working again. Oh, yeah, they had planned game night, hadn't they?
Beside Raven, Murphy just grinned like an idiot and gave Bellamy a cheesy thumbs up.
Even though Clarke would have loved to keep playing around on the couch with Bellamy, she also wasn't about to be rude to their friends. So she buttoned her shirt back up, and she and Bellamy cleared off the kitchen table for some . . . wholesome fun. Raven brought Sweet Valley High, but the guys both refused to play it, so they started with Life instead. A classic game, one they'd played before, and one that would last a while. Clarke was happy, because she got the highest salary and one of the best jobs, so she knew halfway through that, unless something disastrous happened, she was probably going to win.
Bellamy's luck wasn't so great. He got one of the lower salaries and was just scraping by, but he didn't seem to mind. His little vehicle playing piece kept landing on spaces that let him have more children, and that seemed to be his whole objective. At one point, Murphy even remarked, "Jesus Christ, man, look at your car. It's overflowing with kids."
Locking eyes for a moment, she and Bellamy both smiled at each other. And the game continued on.
...
"So you'd like to have more children?" Dr. Wallace asked it as a question, but really, wasn't the answer obvious?
"Yeah," Bellamy confirmed. "I love being a dad." He'd also loved having a sibling growing up, even though she'd definitely known how to annoy him. He wanted Avery to have a sibling, too. At least one, but . . . more than that would be fine, too.
"And does your wife also want more kids?" Dr. Wallace inquired.
"Yeah. Someday." He didn't exactly know when that was, but 'someday' was the word that always got tacked on to this type of discussion. "I know it's different for her, 'cause she's the one who actually has to be pregnant and go through all of that again," he said. "But, confidentially, just between you and me . . ."
"It's all confidential," Dr. Wallace reminded him.
"Dads go through some shit, too, you know? I mean, the mood swings alone . . . it was a lot."
His doctor chuckled and said, "I remember those well."
"You've got kids?"
"Yep. Three of them," Dr. Wallace replied. "People used to say my oldest son was the spitting image of me."
Bellamy nodded, wondering if he looked a lot like his dad. Probably, right? He didn't have the same skin tone as his mom, and where had all his freckles come from? Were freckles at all hereditary? "Avery doesn't look like me," he said, lowering his head a bit. He kind of felt sorry for himself when he thought about that.
"Well, no, she wouldn't, would she?" Dr. Wallace said. "That doesn't mean she's not a part of you, though."
Back when he'd been drinking so heavily, he'd been almost reluctant to believe that, because wallowing in self-pity had somehow been easier. But now that he was getting his mind clear again, he could see the truth in that. Already, Avery was a lot like him. They laughed at the same things on TV, even though they had different levels of understanding of them. She liked the same bedtime stories his mom used to read to him as a kid. But still, even as much as he loved his little princess . . . even she couldn't completely override the dull ache of longing he sometimes felt inside. A longing for a part of him he'd never even known.
"I had another kid once," he blurted out, surprising himself by bringing it up. "But it didn't make it."
Dr. Wallace waited a moment, but when Bellamy didn't elaborate, he was left to guess. "Miscarriage?"
"No." That would've been painful, too, though, in a different way. "Clarke had an abortion about a month before she turned seventeen," he said. "It was mine." He looked down at his hands, wondering if that child would have had his skin tone, or freckles, or dark, curly hair.
"That must have been a very tough decision to make," Dr. Wallace said, not one trace of judgment in his voice.
"I wouldn't know. I didn't make it," Bellamy mumbled. He'd told his therapist in Baltimore about the abortion, but he'd refused to go in-depth on it at all. Now that he was back at home, though, and now that he was here, and now that he'd gone six weeks without a single drink . . . he felt ready to talk about it.
"That can be difficult for fathers," Dr. Wallace said. "Ultimately, we aren't the ones who decide."
"No, I mean, I didn't . . . I didn't even know she was pregnant," he explained. "I was already down at UCF, livin' the dream, supposedly." He snorted and shook his head, pissed that that college had lured him away from everything that actually mattered. "She had it done without telling me."
Dr. Wallace didn't say anything for a few seconds, just let that linger in the air. When he did ask another question, it was simply, "When did you find out?"
"Not too long before Avery was born," he answered. "That was rough." He'd done some drinking then, too, a precursor of what was to come. "I don't . . . I don't know if I ever truly dealt with all that," he admitted, mulling it over in his mind. "Because the night of my accident, when Clarke and I had that fight . . . I brought it up again. I told her she killed my kid." He gulped down the lump in his throat, wondering if she still thought about him saying that, if it still rang in her ears when they were lying together at night. "We've talked about a lot lately," he said, "but we still haven't talked about that." It was too hard to bring it up out of nowhere, too emotional.
"Do you feel like you're ready to?" Dr. Wallace asked him.
A month ago, he hadn't been. Even a week ago, he probably hadn't been. But now, he was starting to feel strong again, or at least stronger. So in a way, it wasn't a difficult question to answer: "Yeah."