Raging Blue (6 page)

Chapter
11

Blue

Blue’s upper body
thrust upward, pulling her from her sleep. Her arms flailed about like she was drowning. With cheeks soaked with tears, she willed herself toward clarity. Slowly, she got her bearings and began to float back to reality, finding her way through the blackness that coated the room. The feeling of being pulled under gradually washed away.

Ragged breathing gave way to calmer, deeper breaths. Blue placed her hand on her chest to help gain control of her breathing. Once the fog cleared, her emotions took hold. Now that she was fully aware of herself, images from her nightmare scuttled across her mind. She cringed at the remembrance of Mia and Jay making love. But in her dream, both of them leered at her as their naked bodies merged on a huge screen, large enough for viewing at a drive-in movie. Grudgingly, tears spilled down her face again.

She shut her eyes hard and screamed, trying to force the images away. An ache thumped in her chest like angry drumming. She thought her heart would explode through her chest. Giving up her fight to stop the tears, she sat in the center of the bed, rocking. Suddenly, she thought about the fact that the betrayal had happened in the same bed where she now slept. She jumped out of the bed, stumbled through the covers, and curled up in the corner by the bedroom window.

Feeling her insides twist, she held her stomach and hunched over. The pain felt like someone had fastened weights to her shoulders and heart.
She sobbed until her eyes were drained and swollen.

“I don’t deserve this,” she cried into the night.

Blue looked at the clock. It was 3:10 in the morning. She continued to sit on the floor long enough to produce a fresh batch of tears. They flowed quietly this time, unaccompanied by outcries and haunting images. Despite the late hour, Blue lifted her body from the floor and searched for her cell phone. The carpet quietly received the tears leaking from her eyes. She dialed a number, then dropped her shoulders and put the phone down.

Blue went downstairs
to get a glass of water. Looking around the townhouse, which resonated with Mia’s personality, anger rose in her throat like bile. Placing her cup on the counter, she raced toward Mia’s self-portrait, snatched if from the wall, and put her foot through the canvas, leaving a gaping hole where Mia’s face used to be. She flung the remnants across the room, knocking a lamp to the floor with a crash. Next, she marched to the front closet and yanked Mia’s coats from the hangers. Taking two steps at time, she raced upstairs and pulled all of Mia’s remaining clothes from the closets and drawers, threw them into the circular whirlpool tub, and turned the water on. She looked around in search of something to stain the water and settled on a bottle of tile cleaner. After removing the spray top, she emptied the liquid into the tub and then walked away.

Blue sauntered back into the master bedroom, proud of her wickedness, but the pain hadn’t dissipated. The loneliness she felt was stifling, carrying the weight of abandonment. She reached for the phone when she felt like she couldn’t breathe anymore.

“Gavin,” she whispered in a soft cry, her voice saturated with distress.

“Blue?” Gavin croaked and cleared his throat. “What’s wrong?” he asked. His voice was clear,
yet quick with alarm. “What happened? Where are you? Are you hurt?” His questions flashed like the urgent blaze of lightning.

“Why?” Blue’s cry developed bravado. “Why did they have to do this to me?” Blue sniffed, sopping up her cries.

“Hold on.” After a few moments of silence, Gavin returned to the phone. “Where are you? Do you want me to come?” Gavin’s heart was in every word. “I’m getting dressed. Where’s Jay? Is he there?”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called you this late.”

“It’s not a problem. Just tell me if you’re hurt.”

For minutes
, soft cries were all the sound she could manage.

Gavin waited patiently for a response.

“I’m in Atlanta,” Blue finally said.

“Oh!” Gavin said, relief and surprise registering in his tone.

Blue suddenly found herself wondering who Gavin had in his company.

“When do you get back to New York?” he asked.

“Tomorrow night,” she replied, sniffling again as she sat on the bed and eased her body down. She stared blankly at the ceiling, listening to Gavin, noting his concern.

“Do you need me to pick you up at the airport?” Gavin asked.

“Would you?” She asked, already looking forward to being in the presence of someone who genuinely cared about her.

“Text me the info, and I’ll be there,
” he offered.

Silence fell between them again, but she no longer felt alone.

“Gavin,” she called gently.

“Yes?” he asked.

“Just stay on the line with me for a little while, please. I know it’s late, and I apologize for calling you at this time of the morning, but I just needed to talk.”

Blue took a deep breath and let her head sink into the plush pillow. The remaining tears slid from the sides of her eyes. Blue wiped them away before they could pool in the crevices of her ears.

“No problem,” Gavin said.

Blue tried to think of lighter subjects, but thoughts of Jay wouldn’t relent. Jay had siphoned love, trust, help, and support from his friends and her. All he gave in return was grief and heartache. She decided it was time for Jay to get back some of the anguish he'd so often imparted.

“You know what, Gavin? I feel a little better now. Try and get some rest. I’ll see you tomorrow night,” Blue said as her mind spun with possibilities. “And thanks for being here for me—like always.”

By the time Gavin could say goodbye, Blue had already hung up the phone. Her mind was made up. Instead of moping and crying, she needed to plan and plot. Mia and Jay were going to pay for what they had done to her.

She packed her things and checked for earlier flights leaving for New York. Blue had plans for Gavin, too.

Chapter
12

Mia

Mia sat in Princeton’s luxury rental, eyeing her front door from a few houses down. Blue finally emerged from the townhouse just after the break of day. Mia watched as she locked the door and then tossed an overnight bag into the backseat of her rented Sebring. While gnawing on her bottom lip, she charted every move Blue made through tight eyes. She knew Blue had her DVDs in that bag.

She wished Blue would go back inside. Mia was willing to take a chance and snatch the bag from the back of the car to recover her home movies. She sucked air and flung her hand in a dismissive wave. The thought of her escapades being out of her possession made Mia uncomfortable, but then she surmised Blue was no threat.

What is she going to do with those DVDs besides get mad about the one Jay starred in?
She thought.

Mia had nothing to lose. She wasn’t the one cheating. It was the husbands who had to worry, not her. She may end up running into a bitter wife somewhere, but other than that, what would happen? Their homes would be broken, not hers.

Mia snapped back to focus on spying when she heard the revving of the engine as Blue started the car. Finally, Blue pulled out and sped right past Mia without as much as a sideways glance. Mia had succeeded in keeping her presence low key. She was about to push the ignition button, but decided to wait in case Blue came back. So, she sat back and scouted the place for another half hour.

When she was convinced Blue wouldn’t return anytime soon, she eased to the front of the house, looking over her shoulder with every step. Mia hurried to the front door and fumbled with the keys until she was able to get the door open. She had never been afraid to fight, but Mia simply didn’t have the emotional, mental, or physical capacity to deal with another encounter with Blue. Now pregnant, she had to proactively avoid potential confrontations since she couldn’t physically defend herself anymore.

It took several attempts to get the door open because of Mia’s clumsy hands as she kept looking over her shoulder in case Blue returned. Once she finally flipped the locks, Mia pushed the door open to suspiciously look around, not knowing what awaited her on the inside. Mia stepped in and then became stuck in her tracks. Heat tingled at the surface of her skin, generating from the inside out. Her mouth fell open as she surveyed the damage. Picking up her broken lamp, she noticed her busted portrait. The rest of the destruction seemed diminished compared to the assault on the prized painting.

“You bitch!” Mia yelled and tossed the canvas bearing her torn image across the room, knocking down a tall vase filled with an earthy spray of dried flowers. “This is how you want to play this game. You’ll never win!”
She screamed as if Blue were there to receive her threats.

She stomped up the steps, huffing as her mind raced. Her mouth dropped again at the sight of her clothes strewn across the room in a heaping trail towards the connecting bath.

“Ahhhh!” Mia grappled at her discolored wears, and then gagged at the release of the strong odor wafting through the tight space.

The harsh cleaners had turned her expensive garments into spotted scraps. She held her belly with one hand and her mouth with the other as she tried to keep the contents of her stomach down.
With fumes overwhelming her, she threw the dress she had in her hand back into the tub and ran out of the bathroom. Mia raced to the bedroom window, opened it wide, and desperately sucked in fresh air. When her breathing returned close to a normal rhythm, she held her nose, tiptoed back to the bathroom, pulled up the window in there, and dashed out.

The air upstairs was too
toxic, so she went back downstairs and plopped on the couch. Rocking back and forth, stewing in her anger, Mia contemplated getting back at Blue. At a glance, she counted at least ten thousand dollars in damage to her belongings, including fur jackets and couture dresses. She knew once she took her time going through everything, that her assessment would be much higher.

Mia hated to feel like someone had gotten the best of her, and she felt like Blue had gotten the final word. Even though she was wrong initially, Mia had a hard time accepting any semblance of defeat. She had been that way since childhood, harboring a need to at least appear like she came out on top in every situation. Even when her biological father walked out on her family, she refused to give him the satisfaction of knowing how much his absence hurt. She claimed to be happy when he stopped showing up, while her mother, sister, and brother openly mourned the breakdown of their family. When her mother remarried, she tried to act unmoved, refusing to acknowledge her stepfather’s good qualities. She preferred to focus on what she presumed was his flaw—his frugality.

She despised feeling like she was the underdog. It made her feel weak, and she despised weakness even more than she despised defeat. Somehow, she was going to make Blue pay for her soiled wardrobe.

Mia shot up from her position on the couch and marched back upstairs. She loaded everything she could salvage into the trunk of the car and headed to a nearby hotel. The whole time, her thoughts were entangled with vindictive acts of retaliation, such as breaking out all of the windows of the townhouse or flooding it. She shook those thoughts out of her head.

Her relationship with Blue was ruined, with nothing left to salvage. Mia’s emotions were bound into a gang of twisted knots. Feelings of empathy gave way to anger, hurt, resentment, and somehow reverted to guilt. She felt like crying, but sulking wasn’t her style. She would have to get used to the fact that Blue would no longer be considered a friend, and after this episode, it would make it a little easier to put Blue out of her life.

Jay was another story, though. In addition to paying for her things, someone was going to take care of this baby. She didn’t work so hard and risk so much to get pregnant for nothing.

Mia pulled over, grabbed her cell phone, and dialed Jay’s number. The first two attempts went to voicemail. She called again and planned to continue calling until she got an answer. Jay picked up the third time.

“Who is this?” Jay snapped.

“You know who this is. You never answer unknown calls,” Mia snapped back.

“What’s so important that you had to call me so early in the morning?”

“This baby, that’s what. We need to talk, Jay! How are we going to work this situation out?” she asked.

“That’s your problem. You figure it out.”

Mia’s ears grew hot, and she could almost feel the steam seeping, ready to blow.

“Jay, this baby is yours! You hear me? I didn’t want this to happen any more than you did.” She choked back the unexpected surge of emotion that caused the end of her sentence to waver.

“Why do you want to try and pin this one on me?” he asked.

“You are an arrogant bastard. We both know what we did was wrong. Don’t try to lay all the blame on me. You crawled into my bed while
knowing your wife was my best friend.” Mia sucked her teeth. “And to think I’ve been trying to protect you from this since the day I found out.” Mia paused. “Either we work together to deal with this, or I’ll have to become the bitch you know I’m capable of being, and you will really have problems.”

Silence.

“Yeah, I thought so. I’m not Blue. I was never that nice!” Mia paused and thought about the bathtub filled with her speckled belongings. “So what’s the plan?”

Jay remained silent, and Mia allowed him to wallow in the depth of the uncomfortable moment.

“Damn!” Jay said.

Mia could hear the rustle of the covers and pictured Jay getting out of bed naked. He was never an early riser, and he refused to cover his taut body with pajamas. His self-admiration was fanatical. Admittedly, his physique was a work of art; Mia had to give him credit for that. The vision of his dark chocolate skin poured over his muscular frame flashed
before her eyes. She pictured his deep-set eyes sparkling like black pearls. Jay was a lot of man, and both he and Mia knew it.

“What makes you so sure this kid is mine?” he asked, broaching the subject again.

“Because I know, Jay!”

“So just because you say it is, I’m supposed to believe that? What’s your angle?” He lowered his voice. “Is it that you want me for yourself?” he asked rhetorically.

“Please, Jay. Don’t flatter yourself,” Mia lied, knowing she always believed she was a better match for Jay. His personality was far too big for Blue. “You would’ve been mine a long time ago if I'd wanted you. Right now, it’s about this baby.”

“I don’t even want kids. I think you should get rid of it,” he stated casually.

“I’m not getting an abortion!” Mia shouted, surprised he even made the suggestion.             

“Well, I’m not doing shit until I know if the kid is really mine,” he retorted.

“Well, it’s yours, so now what? Are you going to be there for this kid or just throw money at me to take care of it? I need to know.”

“That’s all you want—money. Well, guess what? All the money I have is with me right now. So, if you’re looking to get paid, you’ve got the wrong man!”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” she asked.

“You know.” Jay chuckled. “I’m no longer on the team, so that fat paycheck you were looking to get your hungry hands on won’t be coming my way. Now do you still want me to be your baby’s daddy?” Jay’s laugh was riotous.

It was Mia’s turn to be silent. She always knew what was going on behind the sports scene down to the exact figures of an athlete’s salary in his contract. That was how she picked her prospects. Now Jay was cut, and she was pregnant with his child. What had she missed?

“That’s not funny. Stop playing games with me, you cheap bastard. You just don’t want to pay. I’ll prove this baby is yours, and you will take care of it,
” she threatened.

Jay laughed harder.

“How? You can’t get money from a rock! With no contract and Blue out of the picture, where’s the money coming from, genius? Oh, I’m sorry. You messed around and picked the wrong baby daddy.” Jay cackled uncontrollably. “You still want to put this one on me?”

Mia jabbed the cell phone, ending the call, and then threw it down on the passenger side floor. Jay was broke! After all she had done, she'd ended up getting pregnant by her best friend’s broke, unemployed husband!

Then she thought about her situation. Jay didn’t have anything, but Blue did! Mia retrieved the phone and called Jay back. Jay’s greeting was more laughter.

“What d—”

“I’ll be in New York in a few days. We can talk then. I have a plan,” Mia said and ended the call before he could respond.