Chapter 34

 

We didn’t do anything right away with our knowledge of how much a custom nude of Gwen was worth. She did send Rick an inquiry about the purchase and if he needed her to pose again.

Then I foolishly checked Facebook. Nothing ever good came out of that website.

Gwen found me staring at Lissa’s page not saying or doing anything. Looking over my shoulder, she saw the announcement that Lissa had made to the world.

For the second time in less than a day we were both stunned into silence.

“What are we going to do about this?” Gwen asked me.

“Is there anything to be done about it?” I replied. “What’s done is done.”

“Oh holy fucking shit,” she babbled, on the verge of tears. “I’m worried about a porn video getting out and you’re worried about your ex-girlfriend’s pregnancy.”

“She’s your ex-girlfriend as well,” I pointed out.

“I didn’t possibly get her pregnant,” Gwen snapped. “My life is turning into a fucking disaster.”

I didn’t immediately disagree with her, partly because my life was heading down the same path because Gwen and I were inexorably tied together through children and marriage.

“We should ask her,” I blurted out.

“Ask her what?”

I gave Gwen an even stare. “Who the father is.”

“Could…could it be you?” Gwen asked the obvious question.

“Maybe. I mean, I don’t know when she got pregnant and it’s either me or Marshall.”

“Or some other guy she’s fucking,” Gwen added.

I gave my wife a warning look. “That’s unkind.”

“Who knows what she’s doing in her free time? She fucked you. She’d fuck other men too.”

“I’m just going to point out that you have sex with other men besides me.”

Gwen literally bit her lip and looked at the screen where I had discovered Lissa’s news. “Does it say anything else?”

We read it together. She was vague on details. I thought she was being intentionally vague, but I supposed that it would be unusual for her to put, “Just got knocked up by Marshall. Lucky timing too because I’ve been boinking Shane on the regular. Don’t tell Marshall!” That would be the sort of Facebook post that would have a bunch of heart and celebration emojis in it.

Under the initial post were a bunch of congratulations and well-wishes.

“Should we say something to her?” asked Gwen, indicating the large number of comments.

“Probably.” I gave it a moment’s thought. “I’m going to call her.”

“Why?”

“Because I need to know if I’m the father.” I thought that was self-evident.

“You got the vasectomy…”.

“Yeah. I know. I was there. But there’s always a chance.” I paused. “Should I not?”

Gwen’s fingers were trembling. “No. Call her. Find out what she says. We need to deal with this, right?”

“Right.”

A hundred scenarios popped into my head. Some of them were terrible and some of them were wishful thinking. I kept quiet from my wife that I had the distinct impression that Lissa was trying to get pregnant when she and I were fucking.

I wondered what Marshall thought and how he figured into her calculations.

It would have been safer and easier to text, but I called. The only way to deal with a situation like this is head on.

I hoped she wouldn’t answer and I could just leave a voicemail.

No joy.

“Hi Shane!” she said brightly upon answering. She picked up on the second ring. Was she hoping that I would call?

“Hi, Lissa. Hi. Uh…congratulations?”

Gwen smacked me for sounding like I was making it a question.

“I was wondering when you would call.”

I wondered if that was true. Lissa's mental health wasn’t the best and she was probably manipulating everyone around her. Maybe she wasn't just bipolar, but psychopathic as well. Possibly borderline personality disorder.

“Yeah. Well. Gwen and I saw your post on Facebook and well…”

I let the implied question hang there for a long time.

Too long. I glanced at my wife and realized she was going to say something if I didn’t.

Lissa was saying nothing.

“Is it mine?” I blurted out.

Gwen and I shared anxious looks and waited. It would have been easier if Lissa was right in front of us. I could have read her face and body language.

“Why do you ask?” Lissa said, avoiding the question.

“Because if I’m the father I want to take some responsibility,” I said, trying not to sound like I was being a dick.

“Do you want to be responsible?” Right from that question I knew that Lissa was on the edge of having another mental breakdown. Fucking hell!

“I want to do the right thing.”

“It could be Marshall’s,” she hinted, almost teasing. It was obvious she liked playing this game.

“Lis, this is Gwen,” my wife interrupted, pulling the phone from my hand and putting it on speaker. She wasn’t angry. She was controlling her emotions, unlike me. We had gone from her having trembling fingers to me gripping the cell phone so hard I was certain I was going to crush it like the Hulk creating diamonds from coal. “We just want to know how involved Shane and I need to be. We don’t want you all out there by yourself again.”

It was a gentle reminder that Lissa’s first child’s father was an abusive dickhead who was barely involved in the girl’s life. I told myself I wasn’t going to be that sort of father, if I was the father of Lissa’s baby.

The pause this time was telling.

Just as I was about to speak, I heard a sob from Lissa. “I…I don’t know,” she gasped. “Shane could be the father.” I could hear tears starting on her end of the conversation.

“But Marshall could be as well?” Gwen asked.

“Y-y-yes.”

“Any idea who is more likely?”

There was some sound I couldn’t identify and Lissa seemed to get control of herself. “No. No. Not really. I…I was…they both could be.”

“How do you want to handle this, hon?” Gwen asked as I walked away. I started to feel faint. My head was dizzy. I didn’t need this. I didn’t want this.

I should have been a lot more fucking responsible.

It was easier to just let Gwen handle it.

I hated being a fucking coward.

I wandered between the bedroom and the bathroom and up and down the hallway trying to keep myself under control. I wished I was anywhere else. I wished I was anyone else.

Odd to think that years back I would have been thrilled to get Lissa pregnant. Getting another woman pregnant while married to Gwen wasn’t ideal.

I heard Gwen end the call and rushed back into the bedroom.

“Well?”

“She honestly doesn’t know. She does know, however, that it’s one of you two. No third mystery man.”

I winced. “Well, that’s something. She has no idea.”

Gwen shook her head. “Not as of yet. She’s been on the edge with her mental health for a few months now and—”

“And I wasn’t helping,” I interjected.

“Yeah, well, yes. But I wasn’t going to say that.” She took a breath. “An amniocentesis is too risky when it’s not needed for medical reasons. There’s a way to do a blood test that’s minimally safe, but again, it’s not medically necessary.”

“So we have to wait until the baby is born and do a blood test or DNA analysis and figure it out then.”

That was frustrating.

“Yes. She’s gone back in her messages and times…” Gwen took a breath. “And times that you and her had met up. But it’s all inconclusive.”

“Great.”

“Maybe if you had kept it in your pants,” Gwen snapped at me. “Or gotten the goddamn vasectomy earlier!”

I sat down next to her on the bed and wrapped my arms around her. “I know, I know. I’m to blame and it’s all my fault and I have no excuse.”

Gwen sobbed a little but managed to keep her tears under control. “You know what the sad part is?”

“You mean besides everything?”

She laughed. “Yeah. That.”

“No. What’s the sad part?”

“That when Lissa was in our little threesome, I thought it would be wonderful if you could get the both of us pregnant at the same time and…and it was a stupid dream but she and I talked about it a few times. Just a stupid fantasy. But I put the idea in her head. I know I did.”

I held my wife and willed the rest of the world away.