Night, Forgotten

Original Edition - Chapter 31: Then

"Thank god it finally stopped raining," Liza moaned, collapsing onto a deck chair with her glass of chilled beet juice. "I don't think I could stand another week of this."

My own glass of freshly pressed beet juice, courtesy of the Dolans' new vegetable mastication apparatus, was balanced on my engorged belly. I'd accepted it from Liza to be polite, but I wasn't interested in making small talk about the weather.

I'd made the walk through the woods that afternoon to find out what Liza knew about the night I was raped.

Since the first ultrasound appointment, when we'd learned the baby was going to be a boy, my feelings had started to shift regarding the identification of the fetus's biological father. Until now, I hadn't wanted to even think about performing a DNA test on the baby once it was born. It would set off a chain of events that was just too much to process. Once I knew who had raped me, I'd have to decide whether or not to press charges. I'd need to find legal representation to prove that I'd been raped and that I hadn't gotten pregnant while cheating on Owen consensually, as Diana seemed to suspect.

Since I hadn't gone to the hospital for a rape kit, as Officer Bose had reminded me, I'd need to find airtight evidence somewhere. If the case even went to trial, it would require me to somehow force myself to remember more details about the night I'd forgotten.

Or collect them from other witnesses.

So here I was, sipping beet juice with Liza on her back deck, waiting for a chance to ask her what she knew.

A group of men emerged from the garage on the far side of the Dolans' home. Some of them carried shovels over their shoulders, others lugged duffel bags into the back of Marcus's truck. Rob waved to us from the truck's bed, where he was rearranging the materials they would need for whichever landscaping project they were working on that week.

Liza watched them, smiling. "I've been going insane, cooped up inside with Marcus and Donny. And Eddie whenever he feels like it."

As if on cue, Eddie hollered instructions to the crew from the driver's seat, which could barely contain his massive shoulders. He reached his arm out the window and slapped his hand against the side of the truck impatiently.

"It will be nice to have your husband back," I said without thinking.

"What do you mean, have my husband back?" she repeated my words back to me in a way that made them sound threatening.

"I just meant... Donny's been crashing here for a while."

"Right?!" Liza exclaimed, relieved at my confirmation that she deserved to complain. And relieved about something else, maybe, but I couldn't put my finger on what.

She sighed and stretched her bare legs out in front of her. The wispy fabric of her thin skirt settled around her calves. She rotated her ankles, flexed and pointed her toes mindlessly, the way dancers do. "Marcus and I..." she trailed off, watching her feet as she moved them in slow, deliberate circles. "It's not even that he's working so much right now, or that we don't have privacy with Donny around. It's just still not happening."

A spurt of resentment caught me off guard. I knew that the whole process of trying to conceive a baby was incredibly stressful and despite my impatience with the direction of this conversation, I wanted to be there for Liza while she went through it.

But at the same time, I hated her for getting to make the decision at all. Didn't she know that I would trade places with her in a heartbeat?

I swallowed my discomfort, reached over, and squeezed her shoulder. "It must be so difficult," I said, infusing my voice with empathy. "It will happen. And when it does, you are going to be such a great mom." The last word – "mom" – broke in my throat.