By Degrees (51 page)

He opens his mouth to respond, but his words are cut off by a very unhappy-sounding wail coming from behind the closed door.

“What the fuck is that?” I whisper, worried he actually has some sort of bobcat or leopard in his back bedroom.
 
Did he want to introduce me to his exotic pet collection?
 
Did I get this completely wrong?

“That’s her.
 
Way to go, waking her up,” he says, pushing past me and opening the door.

I stare into the room in shock as I watch Tarin walk over to a crib and lift out a tiny baby.

Chapter Fifty-Four

MY LOWER JAW IS HANGING down like it’s no longer attached.
 
Words are gone. I don’t have any that my mouth knows how to use right now.
 
I watch as Tarin pats a tiny bundle on the back and bounces up and down on his toes.

“Shhh, shhhh, shhhh, it’s okay.
 
Scarlett’s just having a little itty bitty breakdown and she needs a little more sleep before she’s allowed to come in your room and say hello, okay baby girl?
 
Shhh, shhhh…”

The cries slow to whimpers, and the volume goes down.
 
My lower jaw finally goes back up where it belongs.

“Shhh, shhh, shhh … Daddy’s here.
 
Daddy’s here.
 
Go back to sleep.
 
Don’t you want to sleep?
 
You’ve been awake all night and Daddy’s tired.
 
I know you’re not hungry because you just finished eating.”

I feel faint.
 
I take a few steps back until I hit the opposite wall in the hallway.
 
My knees give out and I slide down to the floor.

Tarin comes over, stopping in the doorway with a worried expression on his face.
 
“Are you okay, babe?
 
I know this is a shock.
 
I can explain, I swear.”

I nod, still unable to speak.
 
It’s taking all my brainpower to process what I’m seeing.

“This is Geneva.”
 
He turns her around so I can see her scrunched up bright red face.
 
He keeps bouncing as he cradles her in his arm.
 
“She’s Jelly’s daughter, and legally my daughter, even though biologically she’s not.
 
I’m on the birth certificate.”

“Did you…”
 
I try to get my thought out, but my throat’s too dry.
 
I struggle to stand, clearing my throat once I’m on my feet again.
 
I use the wall for support because I’m still feeling light headed.
 
“Did you marry Jelly?”

Tarin shakes his head, still rocking the baby back and forth while he responds.
 
“No.
 
But I told her she could put my name on the birth certificate before the baby was born.
 
I didn’t want her to be born without a father.”

“Where’s Jelly?”
 
I look around him as best I can from where I am, but the room looks empty save him, the baby, and about ten grand worth of baby stuff. There’s a fancy crib, a changing table, a rocking chair, decorations galore, and about a hundred stuffed animals.

“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.
 
This whole situation is beyond fu… fudged up.”
 
He glances at the baby as he puts her back on his shoulder and then he looks at me.
 
“Can you go sit down in the family room and I’ll be out in a minute?
 
We can talk as soon as I put her down again.”

“Yeah.
 
Sure.”
 
I’m too stunned to argue.
 
Retracing my steps back to the family room, I find a spot on the couch and sit down.
 
I can hear him whispering to the baby as I scan the space around me.
 
My brain moves into survival mode, shoving the whacked-out crap in the back room out of my mind in favor of casually observing my surroundings.
 
It’s a much less stressful exercise than trying to figure out how Tarin ended up rocking a baby to sleep in a secret bungalow in L.A.

The house is tastefully decorated for the most part.
 
There are no personal mementos around, but there are some hand-made blankets thrown over armchairs and the couch.
 
The television is the older kind, a big box.
 
There’s no cable box or remote in sight.
 
Everything is clean, but it’s kind of like the place has sat for a long time, unused.
 
There’s nothing very modern about anything in this room.

Tarin joins me a couple minutes into my nosing around.
 
He sits on other side of the couch and holds out his hand at me.
 
“Thanks for coming, and for not running out the door and all the way back to Chicago as soon as you saw the baby.”

“I still have my running shoes on, Tarin.
 
Don’t count any chickens just yet.
 
Tell me what the hell is going on.”
 
I’m relieved my voice is back in working order.
 
My heart hasn’t decided whether
it
is or not, though.

“About a week ago, Jelly went into the hospital.
 
She wasn’t due for another month or so, but she was having problems.
 
I’ve been paying for her medical care, as you know, and so they keep me updated on what’s going on.”
 
He plays absently with some yarn on the blanket lying over the back of the couch.
 
“She was supposed to be on bed rest, but she went out partying.”

“Who the hell parties with an eight-month-pregnant woman?”

“Plenty of people when I’m paying the bills.”

“Ew.”

“Yeah.
 
Tell me about it.
 
So anyway, she was using on and off while she was pregnant.
 
Not a lot, because I’ve had people kind of babysitting her, but this time, she went off the map.
 
Someone dropped her off at the hospital several days ago really out of it.
 
She went into pre-term labor and had the baby almost four weeks early.”

“Oh my god, Tarin.”
 
I reach out and put my hand on his.

He has a smile for the briefest moment and then it’s gone again.
 
“Thanks.
 
So they called me and I came out to just be there for her and mostly for the baby, but before I got to the hospital, she had more problems.”

“Who, the baby or Jelly?”

“Jelly.
 
The baby was fine.
 
She spent a couple days in the NICU but after that she was good enough to go home.
 
Jelly had issues with the drugs, though, and with eclampsia, and I don’t know what else.
 
Basically her organs just started shutting down.
 
She had a stroke and then her heart gave out and she went into a coma.”

My hand flies to my mouth as I picture that poor mess of a girl in such a horrible situation.
 
“Is she okay?” I whisper.

“No.”
 
Tarin’s voice gets rough.
 
“She died, Scarlett.
 
She died yesterday.”
 
Tears come to his eyes and fall down his cheeks.
 
“That’s why I’ve been so busy and out of touch.
 
I was dealing with her and then the funeral home.”

I scoot closer to him on the couch and pull him into my arms.
 
“Oh, babe … I’m so sorry.
 
I know she was your friend.”

He puts his arms loosely around me.
 
“Yeah, she was kind of a pain in the ass, but underneath it all, she was a good girl.
 
She just liked to party too much.
 
She wasn’t treated so well as a kid and it just followed her for her whole life.
 
She could never get away from it.”

I can’t stop crying now.
 
I said and thought awful things about her.
 
I tried to kick her out of Tarin’s life.
 
I feel responsible.
 
Another life lost due to my careless bad judgment.
 
“I’m so sorry, Tarin.
 
I’m so sorry.”

“I am too.
 
I feel like I didn’t try hard enough.”

“But you did!”
 
I pull away and hold his face in my hands.
 
“You were so good to her.
 
You paid for her care and for the baby, you put her in this nice house, you kept her in your life … you aren’t to blame.”

“I know that.
 
You taught me that.
 
I can only take responsibility for myself, but I still feel like maybe if I had done more, maybe it wouldn’t have happened. Now I know what you’ve gone through, at least on a small scale, with Austin.
 
I keep saying to myself that maybe she wouldn’t have needed to party so much if I’d taken over her life and forced her into rehab.
 
Maybe I should have canceled my tour.”

“Please don’t do that to yourself.
 
I did that to myself for over two years, and I’m still paying for it.
 
You’re not to blame.
 
Hell, maybe it’s my fault this happened.
 
Everything was fine between you two until I showed up.”

Tarin grabs my wrists and squeezes.
 
“No.
 
Don’t say that.
 
That’s ridiculous.
 
Neither of us is at fault.
 
Come on, we know this.
 
Jelly made her choices and she died because of them.”
 
He softens his voice and slows down the pace of his delivery.
 
“And we’re left to make our choices about where we go from here.”

He drops my wrists and looks me in the eyes, saying nothing.

“What does that mean?” I ask him softly.
 
My heart yearns for him, and it’s a physical pain.
 
I want to be closer to him, to feel his arms around me, but there’s something between us now.
 
Our lives will be forever changed because of the choices Jelly made for herself and, by default, for Tarin and me.

“I’m Geneva’s father.
 
She’s my daughter.
 
My life as a single guy living the rock-n-roll life is over.”

I don’t know what to say to that, so I just listen.

“Before I knew this was going to happen, I was just going to be the friend of the family who paid for Geneva’s needs and her school and her music and dance lessons.
 
But now I’m the guy who’s going to read her books every night before she goes to bed.
 
I’m the guy who’s going to drive her to ballet classes and gymnastics and play dates.
 
I’m the guy who will teach her how to walk and to drive and to say no to boys who want to kiss her.
 
I’m that guy.
 
I’m the dad.”

I nod, tears coursing down my cheeks.
 
Life is so crazy sometimes when it takes a person by the throat like this and just throws him to the mat.
 
No one can fight like Destiny.
 
Destiny wins every round, every match, every time.

“What I need to know is, what does it make you?”
 
Tarin asks.

“What do you mean?”
 
I swipe at my tears, but new ones are immediately there to replace them.
 
Both of us are a mess.

“Before all this you were my forever girl.
 
We were going to live in Chicago together happily ever after.
 
But there was no Geneva in the mix when we made those plans.
 
Now there is.
 
And as much as I love you, I can’t give her up.
 
I’m all she’s got, and even though she’s really, really tiny, I already love her.”
 
His voice cracks on the last words and his chin drops to his chest.
 
“I don’t know how all this shit happened, Scarlett.
 
I’m so sorry.”

“You’re sorry because you don’t want to be with me?”

He looks up, anguish making his face twist.
 
“No!
 
Jesus, I want to be with you more than anything!
 
But I just know … or I figured … the last thing you’d want to do is be around Jelly’s kid.
 
She wasn’t … she wasn’t the best person in the world and I know you didn’t approve of her.”

“You make me sound like a monster.”

He takes my hand in his and holds it tight.
 
“I didn’t mean it like that.
 
I really didn’t.
 
You were right to be angry with her.
 
She was a user and a loser in almost every way.”

“No, she wasn’t.
 
Don’t say that.
 
Like you said, she had a hard life and she was a survivor.
 
I can respect that, even if I didn’t agree with her methods.” I pull my hands back and put them in my lap.
 
I can’t look in his eyes anymore.
 
“I’m hurt, though, that you think I’m the kind of person that could hold a person’s parents against her.
 
That I’d not like a tiny baby because I didn’t like her mom much.”

“No one would blame you if you did.
 
It doesn’t make you a bad person, it just makes you human.”

“No.” I shake my head emphatically.
 
“That is bad person material, there.
 
Babies are innocent.
 
Anyone who dislikes a baby is an asshole.”

Tarin laughs softly.
 
“That’s good to know … that you feel that way.”

I look up and we stare at each other for a long time.
 
He reaches over and wipes the tears from my eyes, and then I do the same for him.