The Brightest Stars ✨

Chapter 21

"I never thought I'd ever be bailing you out of jail."

"It's just lock-up, I didn't go to jail and you didn't post bail."

"Whatever, same difference. How are you? Well, I hope. You weren't in there long enough to become a prison wife,"  Natalia quipped with a raised eyebrow.

Gabe ignored her inflammatory remark as he filled out some paperwork at the front desk.

There had been a football game earlier that evening, a home game that Natalia had missed because morning sickness (read: all day sickness) was kicking her ass and she was always exhausted. She had gone home early after her classes, with Gabe's blessing to rest. Luckily, he was laid back and didn't have any superstitions about her presence at his games.

It meant that she had gotten a phone call from him from their local police station, explaining that he had been arrested for disorderly conduct at the game.

She had received a similar update from the teacher's group chat and Porsha who had also been at the game.

Natalia had been more amused than anything else. As a white man in America she knew that Gabe would get a slap on the wrist if even that and so had set off to pick him up from the police station anticipating the good natured ribbing that she was going to give him.

Their school's football team, in which the majority of the students were Black had been playing a rival school, which happened to be majority white. Their coach had made some comments, which Gabe had refused to repeat to her.

But she could surmise that they weren't words of appreciation from Gabe's reaction. He had beaten the other team's coach to a near pulp (Porsha's words). The police had been called and here Natalia was picking up her felon fiancé from the station.

He looked unharmed. There was barely a speck of dirt or a bruise maring his appearance. He looked bored and wholly unimpressed.

Natalia yawned as they walked to the truck. "I'm sorry I should have gotten an Uber, I didn't mean to drag you out of bed," Gabe apologised.

"I wouldn't miss this for the world, this is unbelievable leverage."

"Blackmail is beneath you, Nat."

"I know. It sucks being the moral compass of this relationship."

"Hey, I have morals..." Gabe said indignantly.

Natalia laughed and rolled her eyes. "Of course you do." She patted his arm, the waves of condescension in her tone making a scowl appear on Gabe's handsome face.

In the car in a much more sober tone she asked why he did it. Gabe sighed, rubbing at his face roughly with his hands. She could hear the rustle of the short bristles of his beard against the palm of his hands.

"He deserved an ass whooping and I rather it was me than one of my boys."

"What did he say?" Natalia was curious.

"I already told you I don't want to repeat it," he asserted again to Natalia's annoyance .

"You're forgetting that I'm Black. I've heard it all before, you don't need to sanitise racism for me. Are you gonna fight someone every time you hear a racist remark?"

Gabe sighed. "I just...it was the look in their eyes, they weren't surprised or even disappointed. I couldn't let it go and let them think that it was okay that it went unpunished. One day that's going to be..." He let the words hang.

"...One day that's going to be our child?" Natalia finished for him.

It kind of bothered her a little that he didn't finish the sentence. He just let the implication colour the air. It kind of bothered her that he would invoke their unborn child and it kind of bothered her that he had probably heard racist remarks his whole life but it wasn't until today that he had felt personally responsible for discouraging it from happening again.