Riley Mackenzie - Beautifully Done

“Oh, I have no doubt.”

I kissed the top of her head, because that’s what friends do. Friends were what we needed to be. And I was going to be the best damn friend she could ever have. Then I squeezed her tight little frame harder and inhaled her smell again. Just because.

Three hours later my ass was back on a plane.

Thank fuck it was over. Longest hour and a half of my life. Monday morning hospital board meetings sucked. Don’t get me wrong, I loved supporting the hospital in any way I could, I owed them. But nothing was worse than sitting around listening to crotchety old men bitch about policies and procedures and ways to save the hospital money at six fucking AM.

Hitting the trails

Thought of you :)

Girl after my own heart. If it weren’t freezing out, I would’ve been on my mountain bike too. That, and I didn’t want to miss out on a chance to ride behind my friend’s ass. Someone needed to appreciate it, might as well be me.

“Whatcha smiling about, asshole?”

I raised my eyes from my screen to a fast approaching Chase. I shoved my phone in my suit pocket. My Cali excursion was last week and I hadn’t exactly shared yet. And there it was again. Guilt.

Chase and Tal had a history that stemmed back to the night of his sister’s accident. And it wasn’t until three years after Kimi died, that I learned the whole story. For some insanely stupid reason, Kim was crushing on a total loser. Chase, being the overprotective twin brother, was pissed about it. I wasn’t too thrilled either. That night they drank a little too much, fought, and Kimi threw a bitchy I’ll show you storm-off that ultimately put her in the passenger seat of a death trap. Chase retaliated with sleeping with her best friend. Our best friend. Talia. Yeah, that part of the story I knew. Witnessed that shit go down with my own eyes. Stung like a bitch, too. But it didn’t end there.

Six years after the fact and a six pack in, Chase and I were shooting pool when I mentioned that I’d heard—through our loosely woven grapevine—that Tal’s dad passed away. He winced at the mention of her name, like he always did. Enough was enough. It had been six long years and we all lost Kimi that night, we all let her down. Hell, I saw Chase and Talia disappear upstairs together and I wallowed in my own private bong hit pity-party, too self-absorbed to consider watching out for Kim either. Yeah, guilt sucked. But Chase didn’t have a monopoly on it. So I let my alcohol-induced loud mouth ask what I was probably better off not knowing. Sick and tired of pretending Talia didn’t exist—even if that was more true than not—I called him out on it. His answer sucked-ass, but that was just how it was with us. Any one of us asked each other a question, we gave the truth. End of. Don’t want to know, don’t ask.

Turned out Talia got pregnant. And when she told Chase, who was barely holding his shit together at the time, he tossed her a few hundred bucks and told her to get rid of it. Not my best friend’s finest hour, far from, and one I knew he regretted to this day. But he still did it.

Talia never said a word to me about any of it. The note she left with my doorman the day she took off read:

I’m so sorry. It just doesn’t feel right without Kimi. Live the dream for all of us. xo, TP She never looked back. Not once. Not even for her girl’s funeral.

“C. What’s up? Looking good. Three weeks off improved your complexion.” Damn now I was saying shit like her, too. Who the hell used the word complexion in a sentence if dermatologist or female wasn’t somehow associated with your name?

His brow creased. “Thanks. I think. Why are you here, everything okay?” I hated hospitals, and he knew it.

“Fine. Just finished a long ass board meeting is all. You have a case?”

“I do, but had to push it back a couple of hours. Shit came up.”

“Okay, what’s up with this new fucking line…?”

“Typical. Always pining for gossip.”

He turned and attempted to stalk away in typical Chase fashion before I cut in with, “You don’t want to talk, that’s fine. But quit blowing me off and leaving me to wonder what the hell is going on. We’re hitting the bags tonight, right? Or are you bailing again with that shit too?”

He stopped mid-stride and glanced down at his watch. “I’ve got ten minutes. You have to be anywhere or can you come to my office? I’m sure as hell not talking about this shit in the hallway.”

“Sure, I have time.” Extracting information from Chase was like pulling teeth. So if he needed to spill something that sounded important, it didn’t matter where or what I was supposed to be doing, I had nowhere else to be.

I stopped by the floor to ceiling glass wall and watched the clouds twist through the gusty wind. This view was the same from my apartment. And one you never got sick of. Chase shuffled papers behind me, only confirming the fact that he was stewing on something. His tension radiated off my back.

“It’s the needles, man.” My stomach churned. “Every fucking day she grimaces in pain. Her stomach is so black and indurated it’s starting to look like the skin of a goddamn avocado.”

Lili. I knew it. They still couldn’t get pregnant. And you didn’t have to be a shrink to see that Chase blamed himself. When Lili was lying comatose, Chase had a decision to make. To use KimCore, his own equipment, would reduce brain swelling and give her the best odds of intact survival, but the near freezing body temperature was contraindicated in pregnancy. Chase made the call and Lili survived. The baby didn’t.

“When the hell did she start injecting herself? I thought she was just taking a pill and you were keeping track and shit.” Fertility and ovulation were definitely not what I thought I’d be talking about before my second cup of coffee, or ever.

“Yeah, well, several months of just Clomid weren’t working. She’s been doing the injections for a couple months now.” Typical, he rattled off meds and I just nodded, having no clue what he was talking about. “I wanted her to take a month off, enjoy our honeymoon. The wedding was stressful enough. But nope, she insisted on continuing.”

“Shit, C. I don’t know what to say. Sucks, man.” I sat down in the chair on the other side of his desk. I threaded my fingers through my hair and leaned back.

“And don’t get me started on her fieldwork. I know she’s a social worker and it’s part of her job, but they have her working with some serious lowlifes. I hate it. But I can’t say jack shit. She’s pumped with so many hormones, she’d go ballistic on me.”

“Man, I think you could take her on.” I wasn’t making light of the situation, just trying to calm him down. Chase took a deep breath. “Seriously, anything I can do?”

“Nothing. We’re doing what we have to do. Means I’ve got an appointment with a cup and some porn.”

I smirked, knowing exactly what he was talking about it. “Ha. Porn. Nothing wrong with a little self-satisfaction, but can’t Lil help you out with that? Just saying.” From his lethal expression I could tell he wasn’t feeling my humor. I held my hands up in surrender. “I’m just wondering. And listen, no need to jerk off in a cup. I’ve got that shit frozen already. Just take mine. I’m sure my swimmers would kick the shit out of yours any day of the week.” I kept trying to break him.

Unfortunately I remembered that day like it was yesterday. Not sure what was more embarrassing—knowing my mother was in the waiting room or the brunette nurse with a nice rack nonchalantly asking if I wanted a magazine or the binder to pick a video. No joke. The act, as I knew it, was supposed to be private and fun, not a job. Sure felt like it that day. Definitely the last thing a horny teenager thought he’d be forced into doing. The nurse tossed me a plastic wrapped sterile cup and my sweat drenched slimy-assed hands bobbled it. Shaking my head in pure mortification, I reached down and grabbed it off the floor. I came back up to a huge ass smile. ‘I think you’ll find everything you need, cup goes in the fridge when you’re done,’ she said, pointing to a room twice the size of a closet. Classy. I must have been the color of a tomato. Only saving grace was she was at lunch when I was done.

“You competitive dickhead, now you’re taking bets on the speed of our sperm. What the hell is the matter with you?” He half smiled. Yup, my job here was almost done. “My kid would be half you, just what I fucking need, another you running around.”

He was definitely spot on. I would never want to jeopardize an offspring with my shitty genetic history. But instead of going down that road, I continued on my mission to lighten him up. “Oh come on, C, when I look in the mirror I see … tall, good-looking, successful, fit, all-around great guy, a perfect catch. I’m sure Lili would be happy with my sperm.”

“You’re fucking crazy, and obviously in my absence your already big head has quadrupled … who’s the new chick stroking your ego?” I probably could have laughed at his joke, if guilt hadn’t pierced my gut. “But that’s not my point, I was just saying I wouldn’t be surprised if you haven’t already fathered several kids.”

“Whoa.” I held up my hand. “I practice safe sex.” Chase busted out laughing. I couldn’t help but join in. “I have five nieces. If that isn’t a reason to glove, I don’t know what the hell is.” I should’ve patted myself on my own goddamn back. I knew how to crack this intense mo-fo every time. Now I was definitely done. And since it was so far from an appropriate time to bring up Talia, I needed to leave. “So you gonna go jerk-off or what? Oh and say hi to the hot nurse who’s gonna give you your cup … I think her name is Jane.”