SWOLLEN: A Secret Baby Sports Romance Page 6

  “Take as long as you need”, I say. “Fuck, I thought you were going to leave.”

  “I nearly did”, she says. “Fuck, Liam, this is serious.”

  “It’s under control”, I say. “I promise you. The end of this year it’ll be over.”

  She doesn’t look entirely convinced, but then again, what else can I do? I’ve been honest with her, probably more honest than I needed to be, and she’s still come back. If that’s not a good sign, I don’t know what is.

  Her eyes go to the table briefly and then back up to me.

  “My secret”, she says, pausing briefly to compose herself.

  “Don’t tell me you’re in debt to a mafia family as well”, I say, trying to be light-hearted.

  Jasmine shakes her head. When she looks back at me she’s biting her lip and trying not to cry.

  “Jasmine, what’s wrong?” I ask, closing the gap between us immediately.

  “I tried to tell you before”, she says. “I tried to find you after that night, I went to your apartment but you had already gone. I tried, Liam.”

  “Okay”, I say, unsure of what she’s about to tell me.

  “I-”, Jasmine begins.

  “Take your time”, I insist. “There’s no rush.”

  Jasmine wipes tears away from her cheeks with the heel of her palm. “You know”, she says. “She looks like you.”

  I watch a tear roll slowly down her cheek to gather in the crease of a smile, and it hits me like a haymaker to the temple.

  “Fuck”, I blurt out. “Holy fuck.”

  I’m on my feet before I realize it, the chair thrown behind me and tipped to the ground.

  Jasmine nods, and even before she says the words I know what’s coming.

  “We have a baby”, she says, looking at my reaction as though I’m a madman.

  I don’t know what to do. I spin around, I put my hands on my head, I laugh like a maniac and I want to scream at the top of my lungs.

  I have a child. A her. She looks like me. Fuck.

  “I don’t know what to say.”

  I really don’t know what to say. Jesus, talk about trumping my fucking story.

  “That’s what you mean by complicated?”

  Jasmine nods, the tears still rolling out of her cheek.

  “Why didn’t you tell me this the other day?” I ask, a little upset that this was her second chance to do so. “What if I hadn’t called you?”

  “Sit down, Liam, please”, she asks.

  I gather the chair but I can’t sit still on it. I’m a fucking dad with a capital D. Me. Liam Dougherty. Barefist boxer extraordinaire, in debt to the mafia, world’s worst dad.

  “I should have told you, but I didn’t, I’m sorry. I know it’s wrong, but I didn’t think it was fair on Maggie.”

  “Maggie?” I ask. “Oh, fuck, she has a name.”

  “Margaret Alice Cooke”, Jasmine says. “Maggie. Magpie. Maggers. Magson.”

  “Fuck.”

  “It’s real, Liam”, she says.

  “You should have told me before”, I say. “This is-. I can’t wrap my head around it.”

  “Do you want a drink?”

  “Yes. Fuck, yes.”

  Jasmine calls the waiter over and orders two more drinks.

  “Are you okay?” Jasmine asks, when the drinks are on the table and I haven't said anything for the whole time we’ve been waiting for them.

  “I don’t know”, I say finally. “I’m lost for words. It’s not every day you find out you're a father.”

  “No”, Jasmine says, her eyes going to the table again. “It’s hard for me too.”

  In what way?, I want to ask, but I don’t need to.

  “I’ve got to share her now, and I know that sounds like something stupid, but it means a lot to me. I’ve carried her for nine months, and looked after her for three, with hardly any help from anyone else. We obviously have a connection, and you are her biological father, but we don’t really know each other despite us sharing a child. Legally, maybe, she is yours as much as she is mine, but it’s hard for me to process that fact. For a long time I thought I’d never see you again and then when I saw you last week, out of the blue, I knew this moment would eventually come. And here it is. I didn’t tell you last week because you were still that stranger. Right now you are more than that.”

  My mind is blown. “Holding that information away from me was not your decision to make”, I say.

  Jasmine shrugs. “I know”, she says. “But you tell me you wouldn’t do the same after a year in my shoes.”

  There is a silence that falls between us for a moment while tears dry on Jasmine’s face and I try to process what I’ve just heard. I’m good at reading people but even so, I had absolutely no idea this was coming. I did not expect to hear this at all tonight, but, then again, maybe she didn’t expect my confession either.

  “You weren’t on the pill?”, I ask.

  Jasmine shakes her head. “I took the morning after pill, but, apparently, you have super strong semen.”

  “That why you made me wear a condom last week?”

  “One is enough for now. I can barely look after her without even thinking about another one.”

  “You told me you have two jobs”, I say, suddenly realizing just how complicated her life must be. Here was I thinking I led a tough life, Jasmine must be being pulled in a million directions at once.

  “Fifty hours a week, plus the writing. She’s with someone most of the day. It’s the only way I can do it to earn enough to look after her, and even then it’s a constant struggle.”

  I still can’t believe it. I have a daughter I have never met. I’ve missed out on a year of her life, nine months growing and three months out in the world for real. I feel like a complete and utter failure. If I’d known before I would have been there for here regardless of just how fucked up my situation is, but then again, maybe Jasmine wouldn’t have wanted me to.

  “Can I see her?” I ask, not entirely sure if I’m ready.

  Jasmine nods. “She looks way more like you than she does me”, she says, reaching for her cell phone. With it pressed against her chest she asks me, “Are you ready?”

  “Fuck, no”, I say, less ready than I ever have been for anything else in my life. If I’m this nervous to see her photo, how the fuck am I going to cope when I see her for real? If Jasmine lets me see her for real, that is, after the home truths that have come out tonight.

  Jasmine passes the cell to me and before I even look at the picture of her, I can feel myself welling up.

  Liam

  This is a fucking weird experience. I’ve had weird experiences before, but nothing like this.

  Seeing myself reflected in somebody else is a complete and utter head fuck. She’s only three months old, but she is unquestionably mine. I used to think all babies looked the same, and perhaps they always do to people who don’t have them, but this one, Maggie, Magpie, Margaret Alice Cooke is definitely a Dougherty too.

  I look at Jasmine, look back at the baby and then put her back in her crib.

  Fuck.

  A life.

  Something worth fighting for.

  “She’s beautiful”, I say, and she is. I’m not just saying that because she’s mine, I’m saying it because it’s true. A cute button nose, gorgeous big brown eyes, tufts and curls of strawberry blonde hair and skin color like Jasmine’s, fortunately, not anything like mine.

  “She’s not going to go away if you don’t look at her, I promise. She’s here for keeps.”

  The thing is, I do want to keep looking at her. Like a new tattoo, I can’t keep my eyes off her.

  This changes everything. This makes what Jasmine and I have together all that more important. I’m a fucking dad. I still can’t wrap my head around that. I have a two-month-old baby daughter with a girl I hardly know, and, what’s more, I want this more than anything else in the world.

  That may seem reactionary, spontaneous or ill-thought out, but i
f there is one thing that is screaming at me more than anything else it’s a voice that says, protect her. To the end of time and at all costs, protect her.

  This is the best thing I’ve ever made and up until about an hour ago, I didn’t know about her at all.

  Now, I want to know everything. I know nothing about babies beyond the fact that I used to be one. I want to know what Maggie eats, how long she sleeps, what she dreams about, how she smiles, what she does when she’s tired, how much she’s like her mom and dad, and how much she needs me in her world.

  I want to know how much Jasmine wants me in her world too, especially now she knows just how dangerous a person I am, especially with our baby to think about.

  I’m so happy she’s let me come here to see her, because she could have done a runner and not even told me.

  I sit down on the couch next to her, my mind a mess of questions and emotions and confusion.

  “You seem to be taking this pretty well”, Jasmine says. “It’s not every day that you find out you’ve got a two-month-old daughter.”

  “Maybe I’m in shock”, I say, “Which means you’ll have to take what I’m about to say with a pinch of salt, but I can’t describe to you how happy I feel right now.”

  “That might pass when you clean her diaper for the first time. It’s not easy being a parent.”

  “I bet”, I say. “I imagine it’s the hardest job in the world, especially doing it alone.”

  “I mean, waitressing is up there”, Jasmine says, “but no, you can’t even imagine the struggle. Being pregnant was hard enough, after that, I thought it would get easier. Did it? Did it fuck.”

  I take her hand in mine. “I want this”, I say.

  “Good, because you have it now. I’m not entirely sure what that means, but, at least you know.”

  “You just tell me what I have to do to make this work, and I’ll do it.”

  Jasmine sighs. “I don’t know, Liam, it wasn’t until a week ago that I thought this day would never come. I haven’t prepared a list of expectations. I don’t even know what I want. I like you. I think I really like you, I don’t know.”

  “What?” I ask.

  “It shouldn’t be this easy.”

  “A man who is a well known illegal bare fist fighter and the mother of his child who he happens to be falling for. What has been easy for us? We’ve spent a year apart, my world is nothing like the one you live in, we both have no money, and a baby to raise.”

  “When you put it like that.”

  “Slow”, I say. “As slow as you like. I need to adjust too.”

  “That’s just it. Maybe you’ll freak out a week down the line and decide this isn’t what you want at all, what then?”

  “One, I like you and two, I’m not that kind of person.”

  “You don’t know that or I don’t know that.”

  “I thought about you all year, you don’t know how happy I was to see you again.”

  “Ever tried to sleep with a baby screaming all night about something she can’t communicate to you?”

  “No”, I say. “But neither had you until the first time and here you are now. She’s our daughter, Jasmine. Fuck, that’s enough alone to make me want to do everything I can for her even if we didn’t have the amazing connection we do.”

  Jasmine smiles. “We do have a good connection, that part is true.”

  “I will fight for you, literally and metaphorically if I need to”, I say. “And we’ll take it slow, or fast, or whatever works for us to be together.”

  “It sounds like you’re proposing something more serious than a quick and dirty fuck every now and again. That’s not to be said lightly.”

  “I’m not saying it lightly”, I say.

  “Think about it”, she says. “Think about what this means to you and your life. Maggie is here to stay which means if you choose to, you have to as well, permanently. Not when you like but when you are needed.”

  “I’m telling you, Jasmine, I’ve never felt more sure about this than anything else in my life. I’ve never felt more sure about you, or her.”

  Jasmine gets to her feet “Take a week”, she says. “Think about it.”

  “A week?” I ask.

  “Call me then”, she says. “A week should be enough for it to sink in. Watch some videos, talk to some parents, maybe even your own. Find out what it’s really like and then we’ll talk again, I’ll be here for you, I’m not going anywhere. You have my number and you know where I live.”

  Jasmine holds out her hand and I take it to let her pull me to my feet.

  “I like you, Liam”, she says and lets me embrace her. “I’m saying this not because I don’t, but because I do. In the long run, you’ll understand, even if right now, it sounds a little harsh.”

  “I know”, I say. “I get it, don’t worry. One week from now I’ll be banging that door down to get at you both, just a warning.”

  I kiss her neck lightly before pressing my lips to hers.

  “You better go quickly before I change my mind”, she says. “And here I am trying to be all grown up about it.”

  It takes a superhuman amount of restraint to pull myself away from her. It’s already been a week and tonight I was hoping we’d fuck like animals again. It’ll have to wait because as much as I want to toss her around the bedroom like a doll, she’s right and I want to respect her decision.

  She allows me one last look at our baby daughter before I’m out on the street again, a smile across my face that shows no signs of leaving as I practically run all the way home.

  One week is going to fly by, I know it. After that Jasmine, Maggie and I can get on with some serious catching up.

  Jasmine

  I feel like a real grown up. Turning down a guaranteed offer of an incredible night of the kind of fucking that makes porn stars blush with a sex god like Liam because I’m thinking about the future of my family.

  It has to be done, though. I need to know whether Liam is going through the kind of feelings kids do when they get puppies at Christmas without realizing that for ninety-nine percent of the rest of the time they are not looking cute they are hard fucking work.

  Novelty wears off, no matter how cute the baby, and, don’t get me wrong, Maggie is a real cute baby, but she’s super hard work too. That doesn’t mean she isn’t worth it, there isn’t a day that passes that I’d want to change what happened, it’s just I have to make sure that Liam doesn’t think he can pop in and out whenever he feels like it.

  When I go to her room, she’s sleeping soundly, which based on her behavior lately, I have to say is a rare treat.

  I go to my own, lay down and think about what all this means.

  Liam is mixed up in a whole world of shit I had no idea about, but it’s clear that he wants out as soon as possible, while I grind out a lifestyle which must be taking several years off my life expectancy. I’m not one of these girls who hates waitressing but feels like there are no other options, and I’m not one of those other types of girls who are born to do it and die in the profession. I fall somewhere in the middle. The hours are flexible, the tips can be good and it fits around everything else I’ve got, as long as the restaurant and managers are decent. The thing is, I know I can’t do it forever.

  Telling Liam about Maggie was one of the hardest things I think I’ve ever done in my life, but I know for a fact that if he is actually serious about giving us a go, the real difficulties will have only just begun for us. Couples with kids argue all the time and for a couple that doesn’t even know each other that well, it could be impossible.

  If it weren’t Liam, I might be inclined to not even bother, but because it’s him, I will do everything in my power for us to succeed.

  It’s a two-way thing, though, and if Liam can’t put up his side, I’ll have invested everything and got out nothing.

  Five.

  Liam

  I want to tell everyone everywhere I go, that I’m a dad. Not only that I’m a dad, that I
have the best-looking daughter in the world, and that her mother, Jasmine, is the perfect woman for me.

  I see kids in the street and feel proud, look at their parents and feel an instant connection.

  I do as Jasmine says, I speak to parents that I know and parents that I don’t, if the situation allows it, and the overwhelming response I get from them is that although it’s the hardest job in the world, there isn’t a day goes by that they regret it. Dads grumble more than moms, but even the dads, beyond all the whingeing and whining think that what they have done to create the child they now have in front of them is clearly their best achievement.

  I’m well aware that things between Jasmine and I are in their very early stages. We are going to butt heads on certain things, have arguments down the line, there will be upset and disappointment and the inevitable crossed word but even with all of that thrown into the mix with a two-month-old baby that hasn’t even see its first tooth, I’m confident we can all make this work.

  Why am I so confident? It’s a hunch. Nothing more than that. I don’t know Jasmine all that well, but I feel her. I feel her when she’s with me and when she’s not it feels like there is a part of the world missing. A Jasmine shaped hole in my heart that can’t be filled by anything but the girl herself.

  And as for Maggie, Maggie will be difficult, there’s no avoiding that. Bringing up a child is not an easy task. She’ll be the center of attention to the extent that everything else that we want will go out of the window, but, do you know what? In my heart of hearts, I know she’ll be worth it, and I know Jasmine and I will get through it.

  My feelings for Jasmine have only increased in the year we spent absent from each other. I’ve been moving along aimlessly for so much of my life that now this has happened, I finally feel like I’ve got purpose. I was going to pay my debts and disappear without a plan, but right now I have the plan I was always looking for. When football was taken away from me, I didn’t have anything left to grip onto, which is why my life went spinning out of control in the way that it did. I’ve had the fighting circuit for the last few years but that’s coming to an end, and it was never really my scene anyway, despite the fact I’m so good at it. When my debt is paid off and I finally leave this world behind, what perfect gift but Jasmine and Maggie to spend the rest of my life with.