•❅──────✧❅✦❅✧──────❅•
my mind, my heart, my soul;
i want to change it all
•❅──────✧❅✦❅✧──────❅•
"Blue."
"Black."
"I like the red one too."
"I don't know, I am a little stuck on the black."
"Why don't you try the red one?" Roman asked, peaking into the closet from the bathroom.
Rihanna and I have exactly an hour to go before our first lecture on Shakespeare starts at Fordham University, a fifteen minute drive away which means I have spent the first quarter of my forty five minutes standing in front of a closet, trying to understand what would be an 'appropriate' outfit for the first day
Rome lost interest awhile back and chose to go about his day and peak in only when I asked him to. My current wardrobe is filled with blues and blacks except a few reds and whites that Maddie and Cara got me from their shopping trips. I have always been on the fence with those colors, blacks and blues are a reflex right now, a comfortable choice.
"Someday, you'll finally realise how depressing your wardrobe is, babe," Rome and I both turned back to see Rihanna standing on the doorframe of my closet.
"I can't believe I am agreeing with her, but yeah," Rome whispered, mostly to himself, closing the door behind him. "Pick your clothes, I'll be out of the shower soon," he yelled from behind the door.
"Ignore him," I told Rihanna, who was closely looking at my clothes.
"You know...if you allow me, I see the perfect outfit -"
"Go ahead," I shrugged. I have wasted enough time already. Rihanna had few talents, this was definitely one of them.
"Let's see, we need something perfect and just enough for a lecture or two but also something that can keep you warm till the evening after we get done with the shopping..." she said, lost in thought.
"We are going on a shopping trip?" I asked, confused.
"Well, yes, look at your wardrobe. It's screaming for more colors! Also, I am in desperate need of some stretchy clothes, I have pushed it far too long," she said, pointing to her stomach.
"Oh yeah, of course," I nodded.
"Scarlet, are you okay with me?" She asked, pouting a little.
"Trust me, Rihanna. What's in the past, is in the past," I shrugged. I wasn't going to waste my time blaming and punishing those who were forced to hurt me. I wasn't stooping that low, knowing I had other things to deal with right now. The faster we got over this, the faster I could shift my focus, because trust me, I need to.
She smiled at me first, then clapping her hands, turned to my closet. Her expert hands took out a few clothes, too fast for my eyes to see. She placed them on the loveseat right outside my closet doors.
"So, what do you think?" She asked me, her eyebrows cocking. I glanced at the outfit she had laid for me on the couch. Unexpectedly, she had kept it simple with the darkest blue jeans I had and a dark blue informal blazer with a white lace top under it, perfect for the autumn weather invading New York.
"I like it, but you'll have to help me with the shoe selection as well then," I said, opening the doors to the shoe rack which were placed lower in the shelves.
"I...I can't bend," Rihanna muttered. "Can you help me? I am not supposed to, um..." she said in a low whisper.
"Oh, I'm so sorry. Just point them out, I'll pick 'em up." I walked up to her and took out the brown boots she was pointing to.
"Here, this is the one, right?" I asked her to which she simply nodded in reply, her eyes a little moist. "Hey, are you okay?" I asked her, slowly placing my hands on her arm.
"I...no..." She shook her head furiously, as the tears escaped her eyes. "I don't know, Scarlet, I really don't." Not knowing what to say anymore, I asked her to sit on my bed, as I helped her. I had no idea what had triggered her this time, but I tried my best to try to listen because she was clearly overwhelmed.
"I can't force you to, but if you want to talk about it, I'm here. I can't understand what you're going through but the least I can do is listen."
I never thought I would be able to say those words to her. But I felt in that moment that I owed it to her. I shouldn't feel this way, but Adrian and I are family at the end of the day and in her womb, was a new addition to it. Even if I felt nothing towards her, for the sake of that child who had done nothing wrong, the least I could do was hear her.
"I don't know. It's been so exhausting...and every time I try to tell someone about it, all they say is that's how it's supposed to be, that at this age it's tough, mentally and physically but...no one tries to understand, no one understands the bouts of emotions that literally drown me. I...don't get me wrong, please, there are days I love everything about it but...I feel so lonely, so helpless when some days aren't better." I noticed the anger I had once seen reappear on her face as she wiped her tears before continuing. "You know what Adrian said, when I finally told him about the baby? His first reaction, Scarlet...he called our child a mistake!"
I took a second to take those words in. Had he seriously called his own doing a 'mistake'?
"How could he? I don't understand..." I really couldn't.
"I love him, Scarlet. But you have no idea how much I love this baby already. He...I know he loves me but ever since I told him about the baby, he has been so distant that I feel I am doing it all on my own. I...it's so pathetic but some days I literally beg him to hug me, kiss me, hold me when I sleep and even when he does, he's so distant." Her voice broke by end as she caught her hair in her fingers, shutting her eyes close to stop the tears from escaping. Can't say I didn't expect this out of Adrian but I thought he had really changed.
"I thought you were living together because he was okay with this," I pointed out. If Adrian did not want this, why was he living with her, making it tougher for her and him as well?
"It's not like he's not helping but, there is so much hesitancy. I want him to love our child as much as I love them, but he...he doesn't, Scarlet. I know he doesn't. Everytime he flinches from holding me by my stomach, everytime he goes to the appointments, I can feel the hesitancy. He doesn't want to be a father because he's scared," she said, getting up.
"Scared?"
"Don't you get it? He's scared of himself." The last of her tears were wiped off by the back of her hand as she tried to bring her breathing back to normal. "After everything that happened with you, he's scared of himself. Scared of fucking it up!"
"I..." I don't want to feel this way, I really don't.
This wasn't supposed to happen, any of this. But I know a lot of things have happened together. For some reason my Aunt flipped and forced Adrian to be that way towards me, somehow me leaving triggered his conscious and somehow that child in Rihanna's womb has to bear the brunt of a single mistake that began with my wretched aunt. She has no idea how many lives she ruined for a cheque, but she did.
But what I do know now is that I can break the cycle, for their child at least.
"Don't worry, Rihanna. I feel he'll be better when he knows about me. I'll talk to him soon, I will, okay?"
"Take your time, you deserve it. But please, even if you still hate me and hate him, please try and forgive us?" I only nodded in response as she exited my room.
"Wait for me downstairs. I'll be down in fifteen," I told her, running into the closet. "Don't leave without me!" In record time; two minutes short of the promised fifteen, and feeling every bit like Max Verstappen, I met her downstairs, all ready and the blazer and bag in hand.
"We're late," I told her as she swiftly stuffed a huge bite of pancake in her mouth.
"Good morning, muffin." I turned around to face the kitchen where...what the fuck?
"ROMAN!" I yelled, running towards him. I turned off the stove above which he stood, smiling goofily as if he had no idea what he had done wrong.
"What!? I was making nice pancakes!" he wailed as I pulled him away.
"You will do no such thing! Ryder!" I yelled as Ryder entered the kitchen, a little confused. "Please don't let him inside the kitchen," I told him and he nodded and turned away, walking as if a little confused at what he was doing.
"You...urgh! Here," Roman groaned before passing me a plate filled with two pancakes and chocolate sauce. "I did this for you!"
"Thank you, but you aren't going to cook anymore," I warned him, walking up to Rihanna with my plate.
A little later when the shock of it all disappeared, I internally laughed at this scene because a memory flashed in my mind where I had seen her only carrying around exotic salads and here she was, stuffing pancakes with a whole glass of OJ, smiling as the food melted in her mouth and finally content.
She was humming a tune, moving side to side with her legs hanging below and matching her torso movement, just utterly happy.
That baby is already changing her for good.
"What's wrong with Roman cooking -" I cut Ryder in between as he sat beside me on the table, grabbing a plate of pancakes for himself.
"See, Rome knows how to cook. He cooks well enough to feed a family but, he's also...very clumsy when it comes to cooking," I told him. "Last time he tried to bake a cake for my birthday, he set the timer wrong and the whole thing exploded. The other time, his gloves caught fire and then -"
"Okay, he got it, babe. Stuff your mouth with those pancakes and be grateful." Rome rolled his eyes, as he settled on the chair in front of us.
"Are you sure you guys aren't dating?" Rihanna asked, eyeing both of us as Ryder coughed up a little of this juice.
"Yes." Roman and I said in a unison.
"Hey, hurry up," I said as Rihanna and I finally finished our breakfast and she kept her plate down. She got up and followed me to my car which was parked right beside Ryder's silver brand-new, shiny convertible.
Damn, their father is surely loaded.
"Comfortable?" I asked her as she sat on the shotgun of my black, and definitely more comfortable and practical SUV.
"Yup," she nodded, adjusting the temperature to her liking. I pulled away from our driveway and began to drive along our street, when Rihanna spoke up again. "You never answered my question, you know."
"Huh?"
"I asked you this morning about where you went? We all know you never reached New York."
"I...umm..." I couldn't tell her the truth but I could tell her after hiding some aspects of it, right?
"I just want to know what happened to you, Scarlet. Whether you were kidnapped or hurt or -"
"No, no nothing like that," I told her as she turned to face me. I, however, kept my eyes on the road, trying to drive responsibly for her sake, as I answered. "I was meant to leave for New York initially that night but...I got a call from Marcus, Roman's father and my godfather that he was in Summerville and that he wanted to meet me."
"So, Roman's parents are your godparents? But we never saw them..." she mused.
"I had met them only once before and Amanda, my parent's lawyer told me about them a few years back. That night when I met him, he had come on a business trip along with Rome. I.. I don't what got into me, but...I told him everything and how I was planning to run off to New York."
"Oh, all of it?" I nodded so she squirmed a little in her seat out of guilt.
"Don't worry. Roman doesn't hate any of you. In fact, he wanted me to let this go so we could move on with life," I said, knowing the struggle it had been for Rome to not shoot Adrian's head the moment he saw him.
"So, I presume they asked you to go to Port Angeles with them and you have been there from the past three years?" she's a witty blonde, I see.
"Yes." I nodded as we pulled in the campus and I found a place to park my car in.
"Oh my, this is so boring already. I can't believe I have to do this in my first trimester," Rihanna groaned, grabbing her bag as we tried to figure out where our first lecture hall was.
"One day at a time, let's deal with Shakespeare first."
•❅──────✧❅✦❅✧──────❅•