Just a Little Sequel (4 page)

Luke turned back to me and he couldn’t force his smile away no matter how hard he tried.

“Rebecca’s in labor. She’s on her way to the hospital right now—”

“She’s having the baby?” I shook my head. “
Now?
”

“Right now,” he said. “That was Dad. He said the contractions started just as Bruno picked up the microphone for his encore performance.”

“
Then why are we still standing here
?” I took his hand. I tried to pull him out of the room, but he kept himself planted right in place. “Stop dragging your feet, Luke!
Let’s go!
”

“Julie,” he pulled me back to him. Our chests brushed for just a second, and then he took a step back. “We were right in the middle of—”

“Luke,” I said, nearly jumping up and down, “it can wait, okay? Whatever it is, it can wait. We can talk about it later.
We have to get to the hospital
. You’re about to be an uncle again, and I’m about to be a… a… a…”

“Whatever it is, I don’t think there’s a name for it, Jules,” he smiled. “Come on.”

Chapter Four

Friday, October 24 | 10:00 p.m.

We pulled up to the hospital just as Grace and Lonnie arrived with Molly in tow. We’d missed Rebecca by seconds, they told us, and she was already in a wheelchair on her way up to the delivery room.

Despite their ability to relay all of the necessary details to me and Luke, neither Grace nor Lonnie really knew how to handle the sudden onset of their nerves; their feelings, though, were justifiable in every sense, and had
everything
to do with the fact that they were about to become grandparents again.

It’d only been a few months since Rebecca had sat Luke’s father and step-mother down to tell them the truth about who she was and why she’d come to Oakland, and her revelation had hit them like a ton of bricks. Rebecca knew she had no choice but to come clean and spill the beans, especially with another baby on the way. She couldn’t imagine bringing another child into the world without the family it deserved.

Rebecca’s admission to the Reibecks resulted in a huge wave of relief from Luke. He was finally off the hook—no more secrets, no more sneaking around, no more lying to his parents. While Luke reveled in his newfound freedom, Lonnie and Grace experienced emotions that were a little more traumatizing. Lonnie was in shock for days; I’m not sure he even uttered a single word to anyone for well over a week. And sadly, one person in particular really needed him to open up; the knowledge of Rebecca’s true identity struck feelings in Grace that were something akin to being stabbed in the heart. Lonnie had never told his wife that he’d been married twice before. As far as she knew,
she
was Lonnie’s second wife… only to find out that she was really number three, and that her husband had been lying about his past for a really long time.

It hadn’t been an easy pill to swallow for either of them. Maybe that’s why Luke had tried so hard to keep it a secret back when he learned the truth; had he known that Rebecca’s news would cause such an uproar in his family? Had he known that everything would come crashing down, and that Grace would take the brunt of the fall?

I think so. And maybe that’s why he’d put his heart, soul, and every ounce of his energy into making sure he kept his sister’s secret.

It took a month for Grace and Lonnie to talk through their problems, but they didn’t reach a successful solution without seeking some help from a couple’s counselor. In the end, Grace accepted it, and they worked through it, little by little. She didn’t see what other choice they had; Rebecca was Lonnie’s daughter, and that made her family. Since, they’d both made an effort to be an even bigger part of Rebecca and Molly’s lives. Despite the fact that neither of them knew how to act about it now, everyone knew they were bursting at the seams to meet their newest grandbaby.

“Anyone know how to get to the maternity ward?” Grace adjusted her Salt costume as she waddled up the parking lot.

“No clue,” Lonnie and I said in unison, but Luke was already darting for the farthest set of double doors.

We followed him, knowing he was probably headed in the right direction, and Lonnie put his arm around my shoulder.

“Diggin’ the dress,” he gave me a tight squeeze. “I didn’t get a chance to tell you before, but I like your audacity. You’re a real go-getter, there, Julie.”

“It’s just a joke—”

“Right,” he smiled bigger, “just a joke.”

We followed behind Luke as he threw open the hospital doors and exchanged a series of ‘hellos’ with the guards at the front desk. He didn’t linger long, and within a few short minutes, he’d directed us straight to the elevators, up to the third floor, and into the maternity wing.

The friendliest face in the world was ready and waiting to greet us the moment the doors bounced open.

“Derek!”

“
Oh, thank God
!” He opened his arms to invite a hug. “I couldn’t find you at the party. We had to rush straight to the hospital. I’ve been calling you for over an hour.
Where have you been
?”

“I’m sorry. Luke and I took a ride, and I left my phone at the house.” I looked down at my dress, “I don’t have pockets.”

Derek closed his eyes and pulled me close to his chest. “You’re here now, that’s all that matters,” he said so quietly that I’m not sure Luke, Lonnie, or Grace even heard him. “I’m freaking out, Julie. I don’t know what to do—”

“Hey,” I pulled far enough away to look him straight in the eye, “it’s going to be okay.
You’re
going to be okay. I promise.”

“I can’t believe this is happening—”

“Well, it is,” I nodded my head confidently.

“Ugh,” he blinked a few too many times, “God, I think I need to sit down.”

“Right,” I said, heading to the nearby chairs in the waiting room, “let’s sit.”

Grace, Lonnie, Luke, and Molly excused themselves to the corner of the waiting room, giving me and Derek some much-needed privacy.

“How are you?” I leaned forward to get a better look at him. He already looked different than he had when I’d seen him at the party just an hour earlier; at the party, he was relaxed, despite the fact that he was alone. At the hospital, he was frazzled and jittery.

“I should be a bigger part of this, Julie.”

“Hey, your part’s done,” I tried to look on the bright side. “There’s not really much you can do now,” I patted Derek’s leg. “You’re just gonna have to sit here and wait it out like the rest of us.”

“I wish she’d let me in there—”

“Oh yeah,” I said, wide-eyed, “that wouldn’t be awkward at all.
Hey Rebecca, I know we hooked up one time nine months ago, and now you can’t stand the sight of me, but how ’bout I come watch as you squeeze a baby out of your
—”

“I get it, Julie.”

“Good.”

Derek sulked lower in his chair and leaned his head on my shoulder. I dropped my head on top of his and took his hand.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered because I didn’t know what else to say.

I
was
sorry.

I couldn’t imagine what poor Derek was going through, and I knew that these last nine months were only the beginning of the hardest days of his life. He was about to become a father, and the mother of his unborn child didn’t care if she never saw him again. She blamed him for their unplanned pregnancy—him and him alone. She didn’t want to take the responsibility for it. For that, and
everyone
agreed with me, she was wrong.

Even Luke had tried to reason with her—
it takes two to tango
, he’d said—and that was saying something considering the fact that he wanted to murder Derek when he first found out about the pregnancy. But instead of killing my best friend, Luke simply took the high road. He invited him out for a guy’s night. They spent time together. They talked.

And then the weirdest thing of all happened…

Luke apologized to Derek for everything. They put the past behind them.

“You wanna go grab some coffee?” Derek asked, and he squeezed my fingers gently. “If she’s not going to let me in there, I need to focus my attention elsewhere, or I’m gonna go nuts.”

“Sure,” I turned back to the others, “can we bring anything back for you guys?”

Grace and Lonnie politely declined my offer. Luke, sitting only a few chairs away, didn’t even turn his head away from Molly as they sat flipping through a magazine.

“Luke?”

“Hmm?” He quirked an eyebrow and looked my way.

“Coffee?”

“Nah, you guys go ahead.” With a small smile and a quick wink, he turned his attention back to his niece.

Gone were the days of insane jealousy now that he and Derek were semi-related. And I couldn’t lie; it was nice that Luke finally trusted the both of us enough to walk away, grab coffee, and just spend time together without giving me the third degree. It was a
much
needed improvement from the way things used to be.

Leaving the others to wait together, Derek and I turned out of the waiting and room and walked down the hall.

“Oh, I forgot to show you,” he reached into his back pocket to retrieve his cell phone. “The nursery’s done.”

He flipped through his pictures until he found the ones he’d taken of his smallest bedroom. He’d been working on it for months, a little bit at a time—new carpet, new baseboards, and new paint. He’d really put everything he had into transforming Hannah’s old bedroom into a gorgeous nursery. It was sweet the way Derek was approaching the whole fatherhood thing. It wasn’t something he’d ever expected, and it wasn’t something any of us were ready for, but he was handling it like a pro. I worried, as did Luke and Charlie, that Derek was going to end up completely heartbroken after he realized that Rebecca was going to control every second of that baby’s time and how it was spent.

With the way she snubbed him on a daily basis, we all figured she’d rather be shot than to let Derek play an active role in her child’s life. I was honestly surprised that she’d even let him drive her to the hospital tonight.

“Green’s gender-neutral, right?” he asked, trying to fight a stupid grin.

I flipped through a few pictures and eventually nodded.

“Yeah,” I tried to disguise the sadness in my voice as I let him take his phone again, “green’s perfect.”

“You don’t seem excited—”

“I’m excited, Derek. I’m just... I’m trying to be realistic. You know how the last nine months have been. Rebecca won’t even look at you, let alone come within ten feet of you. What makes you think she’s going to let you anywhere near the baby?”

He looked at the picture still on the screen, and a small smile tugged at his lip.

“I’m taking the baby home,” he said, finally tucking his phone back in his pocket. “As soon as we leave the hospital, the baby’s coming home with me.”

“
Ha
! You’ve lost your mind, haven’t you? She’ll never stand for that—”

“She’s already agreed to it, Julie,” he said, and I stopped dead in my tracks. Derek walked a few extra feet before realizing that I hadn’t kept pace, and he turned back to meet my gaze. “
What?
”

“She’s already agreed to what, exactly?”

He pushed his glasses up, and his chest rose with a deep breath.

“I’m going to raise the baby alone, Julie.”

“No, you’re not—”

“Yes, I am—”

“No, you’re
not
—”

“See, this is why I didn’t tell you,” he dropped his shoulders. “I knew you’d react like this.”

“Like what?”

“Like you know what’s best,” he said, “like you think that I can’t… like you think that I can’t do it.”

I closed my eyes and counted to ten. I tried as hard as I could to steady my breathing before I opened my mouth again to say another word.

Derek was standing only inches away when I opened my eyes.

“I can do this, Julie,” he said, planting his hands on my shoulders, “and I’m
going
to do it.”

“I just think you need to consider—”

“She was going to put the baby up for adoption,” he said. “What choice did I have? I wasn’t about to let her give
my
baby to some stranger.”

“She wasn’t…?” I looked over my shoulder before turning back to Derek. “She wasn’t going to keep the baby?”

“No,” he sounded just as breathless as I felt. “She said that she’s been there. She’s done the ‘kid- thing’ once before, and Molly’s dad bailed the moment things got hard. She said she wouldn’t do it again. And when I assured her—
promised
her—that I’d be there, she nearly laughed in my face. She doesn’t want a life with me, and the last thing she wants is to raise another child alone. I was just some fling, and I get that. She doesn’t want me; she doesn’t want the baby. But
I
do. It’s
my
son or daughter that we’re talking about.
Mine
. It’s not even up for discussion, Julie. I’m doing this.”

I let another slow breath pass through my lips. Derek had been keeping it together pretty well over the last few weeks, but it was honestly the first time in nine months that I’d seen him so adamant, so composed, so… heroic.

But it just seemed odd to me. If Rebecca hadn’t planned to keep her child, what was with that speech that she gave Lonnie and Grace a few months ago about family and sticking together? Why did she even bother to tell them the truth if she wasn’t going to play an active role in her child’s life? Had she just used her pregnancy as a selfish attempt to break the ice with her father, knowing that she wasn’t even going to be there when the baby actually
needed
family? Would Rebecca do something that shallow? I just… I didn’t know. Even after all the time I’d known her, I didn’t know Luke’s sister well enough to guess one way or the other.

“Derek, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know,” I reached forward to take his hand. “I had no idea you felt so strongly.”

“Well, I do. It’s not that complicated, Julie,” he shrugged a shoulder. “I’m going to be a dad. What’s there to question?”

“Rebecca’s not going to be involved at all?” I asked just to make sure I’d heard him correctly. He nodded slowly. “Has she told anyone? Does Luke know? Lonnie or Grace? Has she said anything to any of them?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I can’t imagine so. Someone would’ve said something by now, right?”

Yeah. I figured that much was true. Luke was going to be heartbroken when he learned that his sister was giving up a child, even if she was only giving it up to someone he’d still see nearly every day.

“You’re not going to go through this alone, you know that right?” I asked, and without any indication from each other, we both started walking toward the coffee shop again. “Lonnie and Grace will be there for you. Luke and I… you’ll probably be sick of us by the time the kid’s one. You’ll never shake us—”