Chapter 102

Her side of the story

Mom collapses in the chair after my admission. The heartbroken look in her eyes was undoing

me. The disappointed look she gave me nearly made me crumble on the spot.

Travis, who had been holding me, lets go as if I had burned him. He backs away from me slowly

until he’s a few feet away.

I know the rest had varying degrees of shock, but they didn’t matter to me right now. Not when

my family was looking at me like they didn’t know me. Like I was a stranger.

“Please tell me you’re playing a sick joke on me,” Mom pleads. “Tell me you didn’t have a child and

kept him hidden from us all these years.”

I want to lie to them just so the heartbroken and disappointed look in their eyes will disappear. I

know that I can no longer do that. There was no hiding from this. There was no more running from

the truth.

“I’m sorry. So sorry,” I cry as I stumble towards her. “I wanted to tell you, but I was so ashamed.”

I go to take her hand, but she flinches and pulls it away.

This is what I’ve been so afraid of. Ava was right. I was the perfect daughter. The one who never

made any mistakes.

The one that thought things through before, except for that one time. Now their image of me is

tarnished. Now they know that I am just like them. Human. The Ace card I had over Ava was gone. 2

I was in the same boat as Ava. I made mistakes that are now hunting me. Sleeping with Calvin

remains the greatest mistak

y life.

“H–How did this happen? When did it happen…did dad now?” Travis asks as he paces, frustration

clear in his steps.

“Dad didn’t know. No one except Calvin and Molly knew.” I look at the ground, unable to face the

look on my mom’s face.

“Start from the beginning and don’t leave a single thing out. I want to know why the hell you’ve

kept my grandson a secret from his family,” Mom growls, her eyes turning fierce.

I didn’t want to rehash the past, but at this point, I don’t think I had any choice. If I didn’t want

them to be even madder than they were right now, then I had to spill it.

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“When Rowan married Ava, I was broken I tried not to let it show. Tried to make you, dad, and

Travis believe I was okay because you were all so worried about me. I felt like I was drowning,

Mom. Like my world had exploded, and I’d been left with nothing. When I went back to school, I

didn’t tell any of you, but I fell into depression.

I sit down on the grass, feeling as small as I did back then when I learned that Rowan had slept

with Ava.

“I was fading away. I didn’t eat, I didn’t sleep, and I didn’t attend classes. In fact, I rarely left my

room. Molly noticed this. She started pushing, and when I refused to get better, she threatened to

call you guys to let you know. I didn’t want you to know how I was struggling. I didn’t want Ava to

find out how tough things were for me.”

I was lost in memory. I had so much bitterness and resentment towards Ava back then. I thought

if she ever found out how far I’d fallen, she would have been ecstatic. It was probably a year and a

half later that I discovered she had been going through her own kind of hell.

“Things were going well after that. Molly became my anchor. My grades were improving, and I

didn’t constantly cry or think about Rowan every second.” I take a deep breath “It was by

coincidence that I met Calvin again. It turns out we went to the same Uni and he was also Molly’s

assignment partner.” 2

“I didn’t really talk to him. After all, we weren’t friends. I tolerated him because he was Molly’s

friend, and when he didn’t show any remnants of the obsession he had for me in high school, I

stopped being weary of him. We co–existed. He stayed out of my way and I stayed out of his.”

Fuck. This was hard. I wanted to stop, but now more than ever, I knew they wouldn’t let me.

“Like I said, things were going well for some time. They weren’t perfect, but they were bearable.

That is, until the night m alled me to let me know that Ava had given birth to a baby boy and

that Rowan fell in love with his son at first sight. Everything around me crumbled, and all the pain

I’d been hiding came to the surface.” I try to breathe through the pain of the memories, but it was

so fucking hard.

“I was in pain, and I was really angry. Angry at myself for turning down Rowan’s proposal, angry at

Rowan for getting drunk and sleeping with Ava, angry at Ava for getting pregnant and marrying

the man I loved and angry at the baby for being born.”

I hear a sharp intake of air. I don’t need to turn to know that it is from Rowan. I still struggle with

being around Noah because if everything had gone the way I wanted it to, then he would have

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“I wanted to punish Rowan To hurt him like he hurt me I knew he always disliked Calvin for the way he

crushed on me, so that night I approached Calvin and seduced him I knew word would probably get back

to Rowan, and that would have hurt him. That’s why I slept with Calvin that night, because I counted on

Rowan’s friend telling him. He would have been so hurt, I would have gotten my revenge, and maybe

then it would no longer hurt as much.”

I don’t tell them, but it’s also how I lost my virginity. I was saving it for Rowan and in the end I gave it to

the guy who kept fighting for me to love him.

“I regretted it the next morning. It had been foolish of me to sleep with a guy I didn’t even like just to get

back at the man I loved. I told Calvin that it was a mistake and that he should forget about what

happened between us. I snuck out of his room, and I thought that was that. That it was a terrible one–

night stand and that would be the end of it.”

Fuck had I been wrong. I hadn’t planned for what was to come next. What destiny had planned for

us.“We went back to ignoring each other like the other didn’t exist, that is, until my period was late. A

cheap test. and later, a doctor’s appointment confirmed that I was pregnant.”

It had been the worst news I’ve ever received. Deep in my heart, I believed that one day Rowan and I

would get back together. I didn’t want an unwanted baby to hinder that. I didn’t want the

consequences of my mistake to always be in my face.

“Why didn’t you get an emergency pill the morning after?” mom asks, making me blush a little.

“Apart from being a complete mess, everything was new to me. To put it plainly, I was naive. It

was the–the first time I’ve ever h–had s–sex so I didn’t really know that I should have. It was one

time, so I assumed tha‘ n’t really enough to get me pregnant. Looking back, maybe if I’d told

Molly, she would have aused me to get one, but like I said, I was so ashamed, I didn’t want

anyone to know.”

“You want to tell me that during all the years you dated Rowan, you never slept together? You

were still a virgin?” Travis asks in disbelief.

I knew Rowan wasn’t. Before we started dating, which was at seventeen, he’d previously been

sleeping with anything that walked and had a vagina. When I’d told him I wasn’t ready, he

understood. We planned to wait till I was ready. My biggest regret was holding out on him.

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Rowan releases a groan uncomfortably “Can we not talk about this? It was years ago

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“To answer your question, yes I was still a virgin. Anyway,” 1 paused. “I told Calvin about the

baby. I didn’t want the child and I wanted to get rid of it, but he wouldn’t let me

“You wanted an abortion?” Mom asks, her voice ringing with horror and disappointment.

I couldn’t do anything, but nod my head. “Calvin threatened to tell you and dad if I went ahead

with my plans. I didn’t want you to know about my mistake, so I agreed to carry the baby to term

and he would keep his mouth shut. It was the worst period because I was forced to carry a baby I

didn’t want but had no other choice.”

“That was during the time you completely stayed away.” Travis whispers. “You wouldn’t even

allow us to come visit you.”

I’d made excuses during that time.

When I got bigger, Calvin took me to a house his grandfather owned, which he left to him when he

died. I didn’t want word to get back to Rowan. That’s where I stayed until I gave birth.

“I convinced the school to let me take online classes, and since I was actually doing well, there

wasn’t a need to call you or anything. I stayed with Calvin off campus until I gave birth.”

I see Mom’s eyes fill. I know that it hurts her that she wasn’t there when her grandson was born,

but it was my decision and I had decided I didn’t want the baby.

“When I gave birth, I told the nurses to give the baby to Calvin. I didn’t want anything to do with

him. To me, my job was done and now I could be free from the shackles Calvin tied around me

when he forced me to keep the baby”

“You didn’t even look at y

wn child?” Mom asks.

hild?”

“No. I didn’t want to. To me he was the symbol of my worst mistake. I didn’t want to see him, hold

him or be in his life” 1

I know it makes me look like an absolute bitch, but I honestly don’t care. It was my decision, and

it’s what I wanted. 1

I left the hospital the morning after. Calvin worked two jobs just so he could afford the bill for the

hospital. I didn’t care about how the baby was. How he was doing, what he was eating, and so on.

All I wanted to do was forget that I’d had another man’s baby.

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“And you continued living your life like he didn’t exist, right? Like he was nothing at all?” Mom asks,

standing up.

“Mom…”

“Just shut up!” she yells before repeating softly. “Just shut up. Today, you’ve managed to destroy the

remaining piece of my heart. As if losing your father and Ava wasn’t punishment enough, now I find out

what a cruel daughter I really have…I can’t even look at you right now; I just can’t.”

With that, she walks away. Leaving me sobbing on the floor.

I look at the rest, and one by one, they walk away too. Travis is the last to leave.

He shakes his head in what I think is disgust.

“Of all the people, I never expected this from you, Emma. Not you,” he says, and then he too walks away.

I stay on the ground, crying. Everything had been perfect before she walked here and ruined everything.

This was Ava’s fucking fault. Her and her big mouth. I will never forgive her for this.

Never.