True to You

So Hard

2019

Brian stared blankly at the pool and the pool house beyond. There was no sign of Laine but then that wasn't so unusual. He hadn't seen much of her since the shit fight that had been their trip to Seattle. She'd been sticking close to McKenna, not that he could blame her, and while he knew that Steph had seen her a couple of times and she was still showing up to help out at Zacky's and at Matt's it felt as though she was avoiding him. He was left with the sick feeling that she blamed him for his stupid words to her mother all those years back.

He picked up his acoustic guitar and began to strum moodily. Was it really his fault that Elliot and Jimmy had broken up? No one had come straight out and said it to him but he already knew that they thought he'd been a dick to say what he had to Elliot. He couldn't help but wonder if someone had let something slip to her. Or maybe Elliot had left something in that box that let her daughter know exactly what Brian had done. Or maybe he was just being paranoid. Paranoia seemed like the least likely scenario.

The events of that afternoon in Seattle had played through his mind on an almost continuous loop. He'd never forget the way his stomach had swooped out from under him when, on a mission to dig up any dirt on him that Elliot might have stashed away, he'd pulled that box out from the far reaches of the hall closet.

He'd been so certain that it must be full of all manner of embarrassing photos and stories of him and his friends. He'd gleefully lifted the lid ready to dive in and have a good laugh at the expense of his friends. His plan had been to extract anything incriminating on him before turning the box over to the others and letting loose. The contents had been unexpected to say the least. Initially he hadn't been disturbed by what he'd found – a couple of photos of Elliot holding a new born baby, he assumed was Laine. He'd smirked at the idea that Elliot had covered Laine's baby box with a poster of his band. He'd felt like a nosy bastard poking around in a box that clearly had nothing to do with him but he'd shrugged it off with the justification that everyone else was enthusiastically digging through boxes filled with photographs that could just have easily been none of their business. He hadn't expected the gut punch he'd received when he lifted up the baby photos and the sonogram beneath them to see a photo of Elliot and Jimmy with the Seattle Space needle in the background.

Adrenaline had rushed through him as he tried to make sense of what he was seeing. As far as he knew Jimmy had never met Elliot before she'd come to Huntington Beach for the summer and they'd spent the entire summer there. Brian was certain of it – after all Elliot had occupied his brother's room at his dad's house and it wasn't as though Jimmy and Elliot could have snuck away to Seattle for an afternoon of sightseeing.

Jimmy had been devastated when Elliot had left to go back to Seattle before she flew to England, but by the time Elliot had returned to the USA almost two years later they'd lost contact. Brian could tell though that even if Jimmy had visited her on her return the photograph he was looking at wasn't from that time, Jimmy's hair was different. Jimmy was different. He looked younger, sweeter. Brian couldn't understand how the photograph he was looking at was possible.

Then like a puzzle all the pieces clicked into place. Brian remembered the trip Jimmy had made to his Great-Aunt Elaine a couple of weeks after Elliot had left. He'd been far more cheerful after that.

Fuck.

Elaine. Laine.

Brian had resisted the urge to pull out his phone and navigate to a due date calculator. He already knew what the answer would be. When they'd all freaked out and calculated backwards from Laine's birthday in the hope that Jimmy was her father the dates hadn't worked. He didn't need an app to tell him that this time they would.