𝐫𝐢𝐩𝐩𝐥𝐞 𝐞𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐜𝐭 || baxter radic

63.

"How long have her and her new thing been a thing?" I try not to show any jealousy but I am jealous. Not that he has her, but that she had someone to love. I couldn't move on. I couldn't even think about moving on. I still wanted her. I just knew I couldn't have her. Because if I did have her, we'd burn each other alive. Until we grew up, we'd never work.

"Don't ask questions you don't truly want the answer to Bax. Just enjoy Maxy." She holds her hand out to him and he wraps his little fingers around one of hers. "This is the calmest he's been ever. Take it while you can get it."

"What do you mean?" I stare at Max, running the back of my forefinger along his cheek. I was still in shock. I came down here to take my sister on a date and the next thing I know I have a child. How is this even real life? Someone pinch me so I know I'm awake.

"Kids got a set of lungs on him. He's always crying. He's an extremely fussy baby. The only time he's not crying is: bath time, feeding time—though when you hand him food you will end up covered in it but at least he's not screaming, sleepy time, yeah that's about it. We've all learned to live with it." Summer frees her finger and sits down on the couch. I follow.

"I sleep with ear plugs." Summer's Mom comments. "He can be a bit unbearable." Summer instantly agrees.

"He just wanted me." I hold him up so he's standing in my lap. He's chewing on his hand and I fight him to stop, but he wins the battle. I can't fight a baby. If he wants to chew his own hand off, more power to him.

"What's funny is, she wore your clothes for the first like idk six months of her pregnancy. She wouldn't wear anything else. Seems like he could sense you around. It's like he knows he's half you or something." Summer's words hurt. She held onto me for so long. I don't know if she was hoping I would come back. But if she was waiting—though it shouldn't make me feel bad—it does.

"Crazier than this though," Summer's mom alludes to my calm child, "he's got the exact same birthmark, Max had. Like same exact one."

"You think...?" I look between the two Torres' and they both just shrug. "There's no way right? That's not a thing."

"I've got tons of baby photos of Max and May, and it's so visibly the same. I'll grab them give me a minute." She leaves the room, leaving Summer and I alone.

"How long has it been Summer?" I question her again on the topic of May's new boyfriend, or what I assume to be her boyfriend. The way he held her, definitely felt boyfriend like.

"Right around Max's birth." She sighs, giving in because she knew I would continue to push if she didn't tell me. "But he's not involved in Max's life at all. She won't let anyone around him beside our close knit friend group."

"That long..." I feel a lump forming in my throat but I swallow it down because at least she didn't bring my son around him. I didn't want another man raising what was supposed to be mine. She robbed me of enough.

"He's a good guy Bax." Summer tries to comfort me but it doesn't work. I don't know why she thought it would. I got bashed for moving on, why did she get a pass?

"Good for him." I scoff as Max collapses with a thud against my thighs, curling up into a ball in my lap. I think someone might be a little tired. I let him close his eyes as I run my fingers up and down his back to soothe him to sleep.

"Let that jealousy bloom more." Summer side eyes me.

"I should just go before they get back. Tell your mom I'm sorry that I have to go. She can text me the photos." I slowly slide Max into Summer's lap. At least I'm leaving them with a sleeping, slobbery child. It's better than a screaming one.

"Bax..." her voice trails as I head toward the door. But before I give myself a second to rethink leaving I'm opening the door and headed for the beach without second thought.

The moment my feet hit the sand I'm knocked with a feeling of nostalgia. I wonder if she's brought Max down here. I wonder if she's told him stories of how we met. Or just stories about me in general. I wonder if she even thought of me. Truly thought of me more than just as the guy who got her pregnant. I wonder if my presence still mattered like it once did.

"Going to make a girl wait forever?" The voice startles me. It's dark out and the nearly blacked out sky makes visibility horrendous. I don't even hear a scuffle at all before the voice breaks. Right away, I know it's hers.

"Shouldn't you be on a date right now with my sister?" I look over my shoulder toward the direction I hear her voice in. She steps slowly out of her hiding place to be illuminated by the moon. The reflection of the light bounces off her features and it takes every ounce in me to not reach out to see if she's real.

"I'm not feeling well." She takes another step toward me, and another, until we're so close I can feel her breath on my skin.

"Still a liar then?" The words fall so quickly it's a stab into my own heart. So I can only assume it's a stab into hers as well.

"No." She's direct in her word. Her features not flicking to a lie. "I feel sick." Her hands wrap around her stomach.

"Pregnant with his child now?" My words are like venom and I wish I could stop them before they escape. But I don't. This one was going to sting her in the way it stung me.

She turns away, running her hands through her hair. "I haven't even slept with him Bax. I've been with him for almost a year and I can't find it in me to even crawl into bed with him. Even his touch is like ice. But he loves me. He cares. He's there for me. He listens. He's not run off to break up with me over a text." She's back facing me again by the time she finishes speaking. I can tell from the moonlights glimmer on her cheek that a tear has fallen. And it's further confirmed when she wipes it quickly away.

"You kept my child from me." Forget what she said there were bigger things to talk about. Fuck this guy and what he did for her. I didn't want to hear about it.

"You act like you gave me any way to tell you." She scoffs. "You blocked all of us. You give up on every friendship you made because I lied to you. You run when things get a little hard it's what you Radic's do best." She takes a staggered breath in, and I know she's fighting more tears from falling but she's losing the battle.

"You gave me no choice." This time I turn away. "You proved that you'd do anything to get what you wanted Maybelle. Did you even take the Plan B pill? Did you try and trap me here with a baby?" There's so much anger and sadness boiled up in my every word I don't know what's reading, and I don't care what is either.

There's a thick, heavy silence. We were both up to bat. Both trying for home runs. The only problem was only one of us could win.

"I did take it and it failed. It didn't work. My never ending stream of bad luck continued." Her voice breaks. A hoarseness eating away at her every word. 

"Two parents or four." I turn to face her. "Two parents never met you and I did it?"

Her head drops. There's a slight shake but nothing more. The only answer I receive is one I could have missed if I as much as blinked.