Move the Stars (Something in the Way 3)

“Yes. With my mom. Do you think I’d call if I wasn’t sure?”

“Yeah, I do. Six fucking months ago, you were convinced you had skin cancer and let me think that until you admitted you hadn’t been to a dermatologist yet. Tell me, Tiffany—did you have cancer?”

“No, but—”

“You told me last year you were getting fired just so I’d come home early from a work trip.”

“We’ve been over this a hundred times,” she said. “I honestly thought I was getting fired! But this time, Manning, it’s true, and I’m sorry you’re so mad—” Her breath hitched. “I’m sorry you find it so awful.”

“I don’t find it awful.” My stomach churned, and I pulled the cig out of my mouth. Might’ve been the first time in history one made me want to puke. That was a sign. Stop smoking. I’d have to with a baby on the way. I watched it burn down. “Of course I’m not mad. I just don’t understand how it happened. We had a plan, and the timing is all off, so tell me—how did this happen?”

“I . . .” She stuttered, her voice breaking again. “I stopped taking birth control. You said we could start trying—”

“I didn’t say we could start—what I specifically said was that—” I took a drag of my cigarette. Even if it was making me ill, smoking was the thing that calmed me quickest, and I needed to get my fucking head right before Lake came out here. “I said after the remodel, next year, spring at the very absolute earliest.” I cursed. “I said we could once we were able to pad our nest egg.”

“But then there’d be some other expense or reason not to do it. We’re ready now. You know we are. And once it settles in, you’ll thank me, Manning. Who cares if it was a year or so early? Five, ten years down the line, you won’t care.”

It wasn’t one or five or ten years from now. There was only this moment, and it had come too early. For Lake, I had come too late. I’d never been able to get the timing right with her. If there was one thing about Lake and me that persisted, it was that—bad timing. It was this. Finding out I was going to be a father—and realizing Lake would never forgive me for it.

I got up and paced, beyond giving a fuck that it was a non-smoking room. Despite the cold coming in from the window, my hairline sweat. I thought about leaning outside and vomiting. The faucet ran in the bathroom. I needed to reverse my life to ten minutes ago, to Lake sleeping on my chest, trusting me. To when my life had finally been about to start. With that thought came a crushing guilt no man should bear. I was having a kid. How I could have just fucking wished that away? I grabbed my hair in a fist. “You should’ve told me you were stopping the birth control,” I said. “When was this?”

“I don’t know.”

“Yes you do. Spit it out.”

“A few months ago. September maybe.”

“September what?” I pushed. “When in September?”

She knew what I was getting at. With a contrite sigh, she said, “The beginning of the month.”

Of course. That was exactly when I’d submitted a formal request with Ainsley-Bushner to come to New York. Tiffany knew, deep down, what Lake meant to me. She’d done this on purpose. “Christ, Tiffany.”

“Are you pissed?” she asked.

The tremor in her voice stopped me from accusing her of going behind my back. She knew what she’d done. It was just like Tiffany to feel trapped and lash out however she could, not caring about who got hurt, as long as it wasn’t her. Regardless, she was carrying my baby. “I’m a lot of things,” I said. “But pissed isn’t the right word.”

The door opened and Lake poked her head out, quizzing me with her eyebrows as she leaned on the doorjamb. I forgot to breathe, noting how she’d washed her face pink and fresh, how her eyes were no longer puffy from crying last night.

“Get dressed,” I quietly choked out. This conversation would strip us both in lots of ways, and I needed her to be covered up. She came out to pick through her clothing, which was all over the place.

“I have to go,” I told Tiffany. “I’m getting in tonight, so I’ll just get a car. We can . . . I don’t know. We’ll talk when I get home.”

“I really was excited to tell you earlier in the week. I just got so worried when you didn’t pick up.” Her voice lightened. “Are you sure everything’s okay?”

“Yes.”

“Are you happy?”

I couldn’t speak. I wanted to be a father, just not this way. Saying I wasn’t happy about it wouldn’t be right, but I couldn’t think of anything worse in that moment than breaking the news to Lake. “Yeah.”