The Girl

FIFTY-THREE: THE END

"I just wanna hold you, take you by your hand and tell you that you're good enough. Tell you that it's gonna be tough..."

SONG: THE END
ARTIST: KINGS OF LEON

Calum exhaled and stared at all of the car seats in front of us. Brianna was due any day now, and according to her daughter, she could be a couple days early. I knew my best friend wanted to talk about the girl he was so desperately trying to win back.

"Fine," I huffed and turned to him. "Tell me about her. Tell me how fucking pathetic you are over the fact she still won't take you back."

"I'm not--We're talking," Calum mumbled and then nodded his head over to a high-tech looking chair. "How about that one?"

"Too many fucking buttons," I muttered and then pushed my fingers through my hair. "She's just really busy with med school, Cal and she's still stuck in New York with nobody. We're all over here starting families and she's still there trying to forget what you did to her."

Calum frowned. "I really want to fix everything. I want to marry her."

"You should really know that I hate you for breaking her heart," I told Calum and watched him swallow nervously. "You know how much she loved you and as soon as she asks for some time to get her life together, just like you had, you go and cheat on her."

"I've had to live with her hating me for the past year. I missed her nineteenth birthday because I'm just a royal dumbass," Calum whispered. "I just want to be with her because being with her meant that I had finally found someone who proves that there's someone far better than me."

I managed a smile and sighed heavily. "Good. Move back to New York. Stop being here and go be with her."

*

I sat with my dad, watching as he moved around the pieces on the chessboard until all of them were in place. I pressed my lips together, expecting him to say something, but he didn't. He hadn't said much to me since I had officially gotten with Brianna.

"Dad, you haven't officially spoken to me in over a year," I managed and watched him lift his head, giving me a confused look. "Are you mad at me?"

He raised an eyebrow at me. "What? No. I'm just--You boys have grown up too fast and you're all I had left of your mother. It feels odd know that I'll soon have two grandchildren and your mother would be crying right now about the fact that her youngest is married with a little girl on the way."

I grimaced at the mention of my mother. Hearing my dad talk about her was weird, especially when he had avoided her for the past seven years. Never once had he brought her up, not even on their anniversary, not even when we told him that were going to her grave did he want to join, not even when her sisters would visit for the holidays.

"She wouldn't have cried," I told him and forced my vibrating phone out of my pocket. "She would have probably given me a dozen middle names."

I answered Bryana's call, smiling at my dad as he shook his head at me.

"Luke, Brianna's water broke about two hours ago, but her contractions have just gotten to the point where they're making her insult me at hyperspeed," Bryana panicked and I pushed myself to my feet. "I suggest you get to the hospital soon."

"Holy shit, okay," I exhaled and hung up the call, looking down at my dad. "Brianna's in labor and I've got to go."

Again, he didn't say anything.

*

By the time I had gotten to the hospital, I had forgotten what it meant to breathe. Bryana was sitting in a chair adjacent to the room where my wife was screaming in complete pain.