Chapter 14
Ariel's POV
After my date with Ian, things began to calm down. I wasn't seeing Luke, Ian and I were getting more involved, and most importantly, I was starting to feel happy again. Zoey and I started hanging out more, I continued going to my fittings with Piper and her friends, and Cam even invited me to come to his next ultrasound with Piper.
Of course I happily agreed.
On the morning of the ultrasound, I showered and dressed casually before calling Cam again. "Are you sure you and Piper want me to be there? Isn't it like a special thing for you two?" I ask.
"Ariel, for the fifth time, mom and dad have come and both of Piper's parents have come. You're the only one who hasn't seen a picture of the baby yet." he says, sounding exasperated. I sighed and told him okay before hanging up and going to my car. Truthfully, I was excited to see the baby. I wanted to see Cam and Piper's happiness when they heard the heartbeat of their child.
That wasn't what I was doubting. That wasn't what I was afraid of.
When I arrive at the hospital, I park in the visitor's parking lot and go to the front desk where Cam said he'd meet me. The kind secretary behind the desk must ask me five times if I need help, and each time she sounds sweeter and sweeter. She even offers me something to drink, but I quietly decline.
Finally, Cam and Piper come through the front doors and smile when they see me. Cam has his arm wrapped around Pipers back and waist, and Piper's hands are resting loosely on her stomach which hasn't grown a lot since the last time I saw her. She wraps me up in a tight hug, and I feel her stomach press against mine. Then Cam hugs me after, and whispers something in my ear that I don't quite catch.
I raise an eyebrow at him and he smiles. Obviously he thinks I heard him, but I'll have to talk to him later about it. Cam and Piper check in while I awkwardly stand to the side and wait to follow them to the room. When we get there, it's nicely decorated, with light purple walls and light wooden floors. The chair in the middle of the room is cushioned and leaned back, and the doctor leads Piper over to it. She relaxes back and Cam takes a seat next to her in the chair. He turns around and waves me towards them.
"Come over here. Why are you standing in the corner?" he asks. I smile and shake my head, pretending to brush everything off. I walk over to them and sit on the other side of Piper. She grabs my hand and nods knowingly, and I feel the knot in my stomach dissipate. "Thanks for coming. It means a lot to have the godmother of the baby here." she smiles and my eyes widen. "Wait, what?" I ask.
Piper looks over at Cameron and raises an eyebrow. "You didn't tell her?" she asks. "Oops," Cameron says and smiles at me. "We're asking you to be the godmother of our baby." Cam says and Piper smiles at me. "I'd be honored." I say, feeling a wide smile spread across my face as the doctor walks in.
"Good morning, how are you doing?" she asks. She's wearing pediatric scrubs, the ones with the little teddy bears all over them. Maybe it's supposed to make the patients feel calmer, but those button eyes are kind of freaking me out. I turn my attention away from the doctor and look at Piper. She's watching the woman in front of her speak, her eyes glistening. I don't think it's from tears, but perhaps excitement. She's going to get to see her baby again. She's going to get to hear the heartbeat. That must be so magical.
Cam is also watching the doctor and squeezing Pipers hand, like it might fall off if he lets go. He gets to see his child too, something he created with the love of his life. That must be just as magical, to feel something so strong like that.
The doctor, Dr. Strainford as she introduces herself, pulls on a pair of purple latex gloves as she explains to Piper what she's going to do. "This might be a little cold." she warns, squirting the blue gel onto Piper's stomach and dragging the probe across it. Piper winces ever so slightly, and then turns her head to see the monitor that's next to me.
After a few minutes, Dr. Strainford smiles and points to the screen, her gloved finger just barely touching the monitor. "There's your baby." she says. I look to Cam and Piper again. Piper's crying now, not a lot, but enough that a few tears slide down her cheek. Cameron's eyes are watering and he has this huge smile on his face, and I know that the day the baby is born the smile will be even bigger if that's possible.
Dr. Strainford starts to talk about something with the ultrasound, but I can't stop looking at the monitor above me. It's blurry, but I can still see the head and the general shape of the baby. The image is frozen, unlike it was when the doctor was moving the probe, and I hear a buzz and a beep and look down. The image is printed on a piece of paper, waiting for the doctor to take it and give it to Piper and Cam.
"We do know the gender, so we can tell you now or wait until the baby is born." she says, and I look up. Piper glances at Cam but tells the doctor they'd like to wait. I don't know if I could do that, wait another five months to find out if my baby was a boy or a girl. I think I'd want to know as soon as I could. But Dr. Strainford smiles and nods, tears off the picture, and hands it Piper and Cam. "I'll see you soon, then. Have a nice day." she says before getting up and exiting the room.
Piper and Cam pore over the picture for a little while before they're ready to leave, and I follow them out to my car in silence. "Do you want to see the picture?" Piper asks and I nod. She hands it to me and I look it over. They made a baby. Piper is carrying another human life inside of her. That's one of the most amazing things in the world, and I feel so happy for them.
After they leave, I get into my car and sit there, twiddling my thumbs and staring at the gas pedal. My head is full of different thoughts that seem to be racing one another, fighting one after the other so that my head starts to hurt. I want a coffee, but I know that the caffeine will only make it worse.
Right now I don't really care.
I drive the road to the coffee shop that Luke brought me to a while back, mostly because it has some of the best black coffee that I've ever had. No part of me seems to hope to see Luke there, but with me, I'd never know. When I arrive, my car is the only one in the parking lot besides a dark blue Sedan, which I know does not belong to Luke. A sigh of relief I didn't know I was holding escapes my mouth and I get out of the car.
I open the door and the little bell rings, alerting the person bustling around in the back of the café that I've entered. It's a girl with dark hair pulled up into a ponytail, not Josh who I was expecting to see. When she turns around, I have to clamp my jaw shut to keep from swearing.
In my head, I say "Nope. No fucking way."
But out loud, I utter the name "Aimee."
She smiles when I say her name, only to have that smile fall when she sees who I am. She doesn't have a reason to smile at me when she sees me, but she doesn't have a reason to frown either. "Ariel? That's your name right?" she asks and I nod.
"It's nice to see you again. Can I help you?" she asks. I nod again. She presses her lips together and leans against the counter, waiting for me to say something. All I can think about is watching her walk out of Luke's house the morning after the fair. Wearing the same clothes as the night before. All I can think about is the two of them together.
"I didn't know you worked here." I say. She steps back from the counter and resumes to the work she was doing before. "Yeah. I'm a friend of Josh's, which is how I met Luke. I started working here after we met. We're doing great, by the way. If you were wondering." she says and I'm a little taken aback. She was so nice at the fair, but now she seems... I don't know. Like she's shoving her relationship with him in my face.
Why does he pick such rude girls to go out with?
"That's great. I wasn't wondering, but thanks for the info." I'm rude right back to her, but she doesn't seem to notice or care. I take a seat at a table and she comes over to me when she's done wiping down the counter. "What can I get for you?" she asks, picking at her cuticles with a pen in one hand, her notepad clenched in the other. I don't see why she needs the notepad since this place isn't very busy, but she writes down my black coffee anyways.
"So is this place usually this empty?" I ask, trying and failing to strike up some neutral conversation with her. "No, not usually. Josh took the day off and Luke is out of town so I'm the only one working." she tells me. Luke is out of town? Since when?
Well why the hell would he tell you anyways, Ariel?
"Oh. Where did he go?" I ask, stirring my coffee with one of the little red straws at the table. Aimee looks up at me from the counter like I shouldn't have asked her that question. Like that's her business and her business only. "Luke and I are friends, you know. You can tell me where he went." I say.
"Yeah, I'm not so sure about that." she says.
"What do you mean?" I ask.
"I don't think you two are as close as you think you are."
"Again, what do you mean?" I'm getting frustrated with her, mostly because she's sticking her nose into our friendship. If you could even call it that. I felt sick every time I saw him. Well, almost every time.
"I mean that you two don't seem like friends. He never talks about you, I never see you hanging out with him. I'm just saying you two don't act like friends. You seemed really tense at the fair." she says.
"Oh." I'm not sure why, but when she says that he never talks about me, my stomach twists. I take a sip of my coffee, a long sip so that I don't have to talk for a few seconds. "So where did he go?" I ask, setting the green mug on the table. "He went to see his mom, in Seattle I think."
Seattle? I guess his parents moved after he left for college. "Is everything ok?" I ask, out of general curiosity. "I don't think so. He wouldn't tell me why he was leaving. Something tells me it wasn't a leisure trip." she says, and then disappears into the back room. I want to follow her in there and ask what she means by that. But I don't.
Instead I leave a five dollar bill on the table with my half-finished drink and leave the coffee shop before I can change my mind.