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“Nothing you said about Joey changed anything for me,” I heard myself say. “I know your son is worth loving, worth saving, even if the rest of the world can’t see it.” Even if he can’t see it himself. “I know who he is, Marie—the kind of man he is—and I know his worth, so you can rest assured that nothing you”—I paused to cast a look of disgust in the direction of their car before continuing—“your husband, or anyone else, for that matter, have ever said or done has come close to making a dent in my feelings for him.”
“I told you that I want to forget about it.” “And I told you that I’d do whatever you wanted me to do.” A vein throbbed in his neck as he watched me watch him. “But that doesn’t mean that my silence isn’t eating me alive.” “Joey, don’t let him do this to us.” I took a step toward him and reached for his hand. “Don’t let him win.” “Don’t you get it, Molloy?” Joey pulled his hand free from mine and backed away. “He always wins.”
“Are you going to send me away again?” he asked in an achingly vulnerable tone, sinking deep inside of me. “Tell me now so I can be ready for it.” My heart skipped. “No, Joe.” Cupping his stubbly cheek, I leaned in close and brushed my lips against his. “I won’t ever send you away again.”
“This hurts me, Joey.” Another pained groan escaped his lips. “No, no, no, I would never hurt you.” “You hurt yourself and that’s the same thing,” I choked out. “Because when you hurt, I hurt. When you burn, I go down in flames with you. We’re entwined, Joe. We’re mirrors. Don’t you get that by now?” “Ah fuck.” Trembling violently, he pulled me closer. “I’m sorry for hurting ya, Molloy.”
“Listen to me, Joe. I really need you to sort your shit out, okay?” Shivering when I felt his lips brush against my ear, I clenched my eyes shut and tried to steady my nerves. “Because remember when I said I didn’t need you before?” I clenched my eyes shut and squeezed out, “Well, I definitely need you now, okay?”
“So will you, Molloy.” His arms tightened around my body, and even in his altered state of mind, he somehow managed to say the right thing. “Because I’ll look after the both of you.” My breath hitched. “You promise?” He nodded. “I promise.”
I let my eyelids flutter shut and nuzzled into her warm lap, feeling safer than I had in years. Maybe ever. “You make me feel safe.” “Oh, Joe.” “I love you so fucking much it hurts.” “I know, baby. I love you, too.” “Don’t send me away again, Molloy.” “I won’t, Joe.” Her hand was on my hair again. “Shh, now. Just sleep it off, baby.”
“Congratulations, Sister,” he continued to sneer. “You just let that asshole turn you into another teenage pregnancy statistic. Well done. You can kiss your future goodbye now that you’ve joined the long list of hopeless girls from our school that were thick enough to open their legs to fellas like that.”
“Jesus, I always knew you weren’t the brightest crayon in the box, but this?” my brother accused, eyes narrowed in challenge. “Getting pregnant while you’re still in school? Off a fucking scumbag like Joey Lynch? Wow, talk about scraping the barrel by mixing your genes with his. That poor fucking kid’s going to come out with a cocaine habit and the IQ of a gummy bear!”
“Are you crazy? This is Aoife we’re talking about. She’s never going to be ready to have a baby,” my brother said, pointing out one of my biggest fears. “She can’t even clean up after Spud, and she’s the one who begged you guys for him. How do you suppose she’s going to look after an actual living, breathing human?” He looked to me and said, “You should do yourself a favor and get an abortion. Fix this mess while you still can.” “Fuck you!” With tears streaming down my cheeks, I shoved my brother out of my way and ran for the stairs. “You know I’m right,” Kev called after me. “You won’t last a
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“But you’re so much more than a pretty face. You are warm, Aoife. That poor boy never stood a chance with you, did he? Not when everything he’s never been given flows from you like a waterfall.”
“Good looks aside, you’re a fucking train wreck to deal with,” he argued. “And I should know. I’ve spent the last fourteen years watching you derail, but I’ve stuck around for the same reason she has. Because she sees the same thing I do: a good fucking person underneath all of the bullshit. But you’re blurring those lines, Joe. You crossed a line today and you need to make it right,” he said, holding a finger up. “I love you like a brother, I always have, but one of these days you’re going to slip so far off the tracks that none of us will be able to reach you.”
You are the love of my life,” I bit out, catching his chin and forcing him to look at me. “What I feel for you? How deeply I love you? It’s fucking insane, Joe. So, yeah, I’m going to do the right thing for you every time, whether that pisses you off or not, because I want you here with me. On planet earth. For a long time.” “I’m not going anywhere,” he whispered, snatching my hand up in his. “I’m never leaving you, Molloy.” “See, I know you believe that,” I replied, my tone thick with emotion. “But every time you snort a line or pop a pill, you’re playing Russian roulette with your life and
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“I’m pregnant.” “Pregnant.” How I got the word out, I would never know, but I said it, and I managed to keep my tone level in the process. “You’re pregnant.”
“Oh, my fucking god.” My stomach heaved and I had to press a hand to my chest to steady myself. “He did that to you while you were pregnant with my baby?” “Joe, it’s—” “He did that to you.” Heart hammering wildly in my chest, I squeezed out, “He hurt you when you were…are. Jesus Christ, you are.”
Pregnant. She was pregnant. With a baby. With my baby. Get the fuck up and take care of her. Stop thinking about yourself, you fucking pussy. Don’t even think about pretending that you don’t care. It’s yours and you care. She’s yours and you care. It does matter and you do care.
“I’m here and I’m going nowhere.” “Yeah?” “Yeah.” He nodded slowly, eyes locked on mine. “I won’t run.” “You swear?” “I swear,” Joey replied, tone laced with sincerity. “I won’t leave you alone in this.” “Then that’s all you need to say,” I sobbed, nuzzling his cheek with mine. “Because that’s all I need to know.”
Having had a grand total of seventy-three minutes to get my head around the fact that my girlfriend was housing an atomic fucking bomb inside her belly, with fifty percent of my genes, I held her in my arms and tried to comfort her, while my brain freewheeled into overdrive.
“Well, you’re here for a start,” she said, offering me a small smile. “And you haven’t hit the roof.” “Molloy, you didn’t climb on top of yourself and get pregnant,” I bit out. “I’m the asshole who did that. I’m not going to hit any damn roof. This is on me a hell of a lot more than it’s on you, okay?” I shook my head, feeling lost and frustrated. “I didn’t realize your birth control mightn’t work. I didn’t even think about it when you were throwing up that weekend. I should’ve put a condom on. I should’ve taken better care of you.”
“I would’ve been there for the doctor’s appointment, too, you know. If I had known. I’m a lot of things, Aoife , but I’m not a coward, and I don’t run.”
Because, for me, it wasn’t my future I was mourning. It was hers. Because I loved her. I loved her so fucking much that I let myself get reckless and ruin her.
I didn’t meet her on a whim, stick my dick in her after two or three weeks of messing around, and become a makeshift family overnight. I had six years of friendship racked up with Molloy. I knew the girl inside and out, and she knew me.
“Mam said I can stay at home,” she offered, like it was something I wanted to hear. “We don’t have to worry about where to go when the baby’s born.” I balked. “I’m not living apart from you and my baby.” Her eyes widened. “You’re not?” “Fuck no.” I shook my head. “I’ll get us a flat, Aoife.”
“There’s too much at stake now, and I can’t do this without you,” she admitted, nuzzling my shoulder affectionately. “Don’t lose yourself again, Joe.” Shoulders weighted heavily with shame, I dropped my head to rest against hers. “I won’t.” “I need you to be done with it,” she pushed. “Like the way you were after Christmas. That determination and willpower? I need you to find it again, Joe. I need that guy.”
“There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you in this life, Molloy. Nothing.” “Then be done with the drugs and the bullshit,” she pleaded. “Do that for me.” “I will.” “You’re not supposed to say you will,” she whispered sadly. “You’re supposed to say that you already are.” “I’ll fix it,” I heard myself offer up weakly, trying to give this girl everything that she needed from me, but it felt like I was pouring from an empty cup. I could taste the lie on my tongue, and apparently so could she. “I’ll sort it.”
“I’m fucking terrified of my inability to control my own actions, and what’s worse is knowing that, at any point, I could end up going too far and driving you away. I could push away the one person, the only fucking person who has ever given a shit about me.” I exhaled a ragged breath, feeling torn and exposed to this girl. “I don’t want to go back to how it was—to how I was. I know what’s at stake. I see you. I fucking see you standing right here in front of me, and my heart is screaming at me to cop the hell on and get my shit together. And I want to. I want to so fucking bad, but it’s like
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“You’re worth believing in, Joe. You are so incredibly worth it all.”
When my words failed to reach him, I grabbed his hand and pressed it to my stomach. “Feel this?” I demanded, eyes locked on his. “This is ours.” “Molloy.” “This baby is yours,” I urged, shivering when I felt his fingers splay across my belly. “But this baby is not you, the same way that you are not him. So, we’re going in there, and we’re going to take all of the shit our parents throw at us on the chin, because we both know that nothing they say or do could ever change a damn thing for us. Because I’ve got your back and you’ve got mine.” Leaning up on my tiptoes, I caught hold of his chin and
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“He’s the best person I know,” I added, keeping my eyes locked on his as I spoke. “And I trust him with my life.”
“I’ve loved your daughter for six years,” Joey finally broke his silence by saying. “I can easily love her for another eighteen.”
“Upstairs?” Dad muttered. “Really, Trish?” “What are they going to do, Tony?” Mam sighed. “Get pregnant again? They have to get this one out to put another one in.” “Jesus, don’t give them any notions.”
“Don’t ever lose it, Molloy.” “Lose what?” “That spark of fire that makes you so incredibly you,” he replied, tightening his arm around me. “It doesn’t matter how your body changes, because I’m always going to keep coming back to you. Because I might enjoy touching all of this,” he explained, fingers trailing over my body until he reached my face and gently tapped my temple. “But I’m hooked on this.” “My mind?” I asked, tone incredulous. “Bullshit.” “It’s true,” he coaxed. “Nobody else can fuck with my head quite like you can, and that has nothing to do with your body, Molloy.”
“If he wants me out, I’ll go.” “I don’t want you out.” “But I’m not leaving Shan or the boys here,” I continued, ignoring her words. “If I go, they go with me.”
“I need more than one, Mam,” I replied, trailing after her. “Please. One won’t do shit for me.” “These are very strong.” Sniffling, she unscrewed the cap on her prescription bottle and tipped two C2s into my outstretched hand. “Don’t ever ask me to do this again.” “I won’t,” I replied, even though we both knew it was a lie.
I didn’t come down in the last shower. I know how much easier it is for the school board when pregnant girls disappear from the roll book. Difference is, those girls had to do it alone.” I paused to point at Molloy before adding, “Aoife has me, and I have no intention of going quietly.” If I could do nothing else for her, then I could stand in front of her and take the pressure, the disappointment, the pain. I could take the blows for her, and I would.
“Aoife’s pregnant. I’m the father. She’s due after we finish school, so I really don’t understand the need for this bullshit meeting.”
I shot back, flicking on the car stereo and nodding my approval when No Doubt’s “Underneath It All” drifted from the speakers. “This one’s you, Joe.”
“So, are you ready for this?” he asked, attention flicking between my face and the road ahead of us. “To see the baby?” “No,” I admitted quietly. “Are you?” “No.” He squeezed my hand. “But we’ve got this, Molloy.”
“There’s nothing to break, Joe,” I replied, stroking his hair. “You are not him, and I am not her.” “Please listen to me. I don’t want you to give him my name,” he repeated quietly. “Not my first name and definitely not my last name. I don’t want that kid to have a single thing passed down to him that came from me.”
“Joey.” My heart sped up. “You’re this baby’s father, and I’m proud of that.” I reached up to stroke his bruised cheek. “I’m proud of you. I have never been ashamed of who you are or where you come from, and neither will our baby.”
“I’ll never hurt you.” “I know.” “I mean it.” He snatched my hand up and held it to his bruised cheek. “I will never put a finger on you, Aoife Molloy. Never. Not on you or our kid.” “I know,” I repeated, leaning in close to press my forehead to his. “I’ll do right by you,” he vowed gruffly. “I swear I will.”
“Can I keep one of these?” he asked, holding up the long strip of sonogram images. “Of course,” I replied, my heart bucking wildly in my chest as I watched him carefully tear one off the strip and place it in his wallet. “It’s your baby, Joe.” “Yeah.” Nodding to himself, he placed the sonogram in the picture slot in his wallet and smiled. “He is.”
“As long as it aligns with what your daughter wants.” “You’re going to stick by her?” “I am.” “Are you going to marry her?” “If that’s what she wants.” “What do you want?” “Her.” He stared hard at me for a long moment before blowing out a frustrated breath. “Goddammit, Joey, this would be so much easier if I didn’t like you.”
“She might be having your baby, but she’s still my baby,” he snapped. “She will always be my baby. I would die for her. I would kill for her. I know you’re a good lad, but I’m telling you now, man to man, if you ever consider laying so much as a finger on my daughter or that child—” “You wouldn’t have to kill me, Tony,” I cut him off and said. “I’d do it myself.”
“I’m not saying that I think you’d do it,” he offered. “But you’re—” “I’m my father’s son,” I filled in flatly. “I get it.”
“Joey, come home. Come home quick!” Ollie screamed down the line. “Please, come home. Daddy’s going to kill her!”
“Who, Ollie?” I demanded as my legs broke into a run in the direction of my house. “Is it Mam?” My heart jackknifed in my chest. “Is he hurting Mam?” “Shannon!” Ollie screamed down the line. “He’s killing Shannon!”
It took a moment for my brain to absorb what my eyes were seeing. Blood smeared on the kitchen tiles. Shannon limp on the floor. Tadhg covering her body with his. Blood on his face. Mam standing in the kitchen screaming. And him. Him. Standing in the middle of the carnage was our father.
losing my fucking mind when she tried to speak to me. My sister was lying in a heap on the floor, and instead of going to her, Mam was trying to protect him.
Only when the smaller children were out of sight could I focus on my sister. I didn’t want to. I wanted to run away and hide, but I forced myself to take in the sight of her mangled body.
