WORK IN PROGRESS: Dinner Disasters: Sebastian and Layana

Chapter 10 (Layana): Took Her Away

***Trigger warning for self-harm***

Pressing my hand to my stomach, I wondered if it was the stress of everything going on with Sebastian that was causing my nausea or if it was possible to start feeling gross this early in the pregnancy. I rested the garden rake up against the house, afraid to keep raking out the leaves from the beds in the front yard because I felt like I was going to lose my breakfast. I hated to lose time because weekday mornings, our neighborhood was dead with everyone at work so I wasn't stopped every two minutes with neighbors wanting to chat.

Thinking maybe some ginger tea would help, as soon as the wave of nausea subsided a bit, I walked in my house and heated up the water in the copper kettle. While I was waiting, I Googled when does morning sickness start and discovered it was possible to feel sick as early as four weeks into the pregnancy, but I still decided to blame Sebastian. 

And think of the devil...my phone buzzed and it was my husband.

"She's fucking insane," he started in without a greeting as I poured my water over the tea bag.

"Renee?"

"Yes. She was waiting for me this morning when I got into the office, and she is seriously fucked in the head. I called the police and she took off before they arrived. But, Layana, she said she went into a psychiatric hospital after I broke up with her. She was saying all sorts of crazy shit about how I ruined her life back then and how she'd been saving herself for me all of these years only to find out I cheated on her by marrying you."

"That's definitely the opposite of normal." I blew on my tea.

"Damn straight it's not. My lawyer's calling her company right now to get us out of the deal with no penalties because dealing with a certifiable stalker was not part of the agreement."

"Well, I'm all for that. Can the police arrest her or something? See if she has some creepy shrines to you in her apartment?"

"Since she left before they arrived, no. But I'm concerned that she's going to pop back up. She waited all these years, tracked me down, had a plan...it's a fucking shit show, Layana."

"Can you do anything about her?" Like maybe hire Rip from Yellowstone to drive her to the train station?

"I talked to the lawyer, and between the phone she planted, the altercation at the office this morning and a look into her past, he thinks we might be able to get a restraining order for harassment."

"That's it? Only might?"

"I know fuck all about the law with stalkers, but I'm going to get busy figuring that shit out with Dale. I also filed a police report as soon as they got here, so that's on record now. I'm going to put out a memo to all the employees about not letting Renee on site and to not let anyone else in when they walk in with their keycard."

"I'm not happy about this at all, Sebastian. Her behavior is escalating."

"I know, baby. I'm not happy either, and I just want you to know I'm sorry I brought this shit into our lives."

"You forgot the anniversary you made up for this woman."

"I forgot our anniversary because of the deal, Layana, not her. It wasn't supposed to be a one-on-one dinner. There was supposed to be a group of us, right up until the last minute, and in hindsight, I know I should have canceled when the lawyers said they couldn't make it, but one-on-one dinners had never been an issue before. But I get it now. I won't do anymore of those. This whole Renee situation has made me re-think a lot of things I did that I didn't think about, and I'll be better going forward to make sure I don't give you any reason to doubt me ever again."

"Mmmhmmm." Whoa! Settle down there stomach!

"You are the only woman I see, Layana. I'm sorry I made it so you doubted me, sorry I fought with you about this situation so hard, but I'm going to work at it until you know that it's true. I don't bust my ass to make this business successful for me. I do it for us because our dream was to have you stay home with the babies, and it's my goal to give you that."

"We'll keep talking about this, Sebastian." But maybe later when my stomach doesn't feel so iffy?

"You feeling OK, Layana? You don't sound right."

"Maybe just a little morning sickness?"

"You want me to bring you something?"

"No, thanks. I just made some ginger tea, so I'm going to try that."

"Well, go sit down and drink your tea, baby. Call me if you need anything. I love you."

I was still feeling salty about Renee, and combined with the morning sickness, I simply told him I wouldn't be needing anything and I'd talk to him later.

After about fifteen minutes on the couch, I heard a loud noise in the driveway, metal on metal, then something shattering, like glass. It happened a couple more times in the time it took me to get off the couch to see what was going on. Peeking out the sidelight by the front door, I saw Renee in the driveway, smashing her car with the garden rake I'd left out there. I watched her smash her headlights, the hood and then the windshield. Grabbing the bat from the front-hall closet, I opened the front door and she turned to me, her face raw and bloody, her nose streaming blood.

What the fuck?

"Stop it!" she screamed. "You're hurting me!"

Then she propelled herself straight into the corner of our brick house, scraping her face, causing a wide cut to open up on her face.

"She's going to kill me!" She was screaming hysterically now as she smashed her forehead into our house repeatedly. "Layana! Stop it! Stop it! Oh my, God! You're crazy!"

Oh, fuck. The crazy had been completely unleashed.

I had just come out of my stupor and started to dial 911 when two police cars pulled up in front of our house, lights flashing. Maybe there'd been a neighbor home who'd heard the commotion and had called the police. I'd been stunned watching her, too stunned to move right away because the sight had been so unbelievable, so shocking.

Two of the officers went straight to Renee, who was now draped on our front porch steps and the other two came to my door and immediately took in the baseball bat I was holding. Shit.

"Ma'am," the one officer said to me, "I'm going to need you to set the bat down and step outside, please. We had a call about a disturbance."

I put the bat down slowly, and stepped onto the porch to talk to the officers. As they talked with me and verified who I was, I heard the officers with Renee calling for an ambulance.

"I think I might be pregnant," she said as she sobbed. "I don't know for sure."

That bitch.

"Mrs. Varon, can you tell us what happened?" My officers turned my focus back to them.

"I heard some noises and yelling, and came out and saw her using my garden rake to smash her car. Her face was already beat to hell, but then I saw her run into the side of my house and then she started pounding her forehead into the house."

The officers looked at each other, then back at me.

"Her husband and I have been having an affair," I heard Renee saying, "so she called me over to talk it out like adults, I thought, and then she just went crazy and took her rake to my car and then she hit me in the face with the rake before she grabbed my hair and smashed my face into the bricks over and over. I was afraid to fight back in case I'm pregnant. But she assaulted me, and I want her arrested!"

"She's lying," I said flatly.

"You can look at my phone and see the messages between her husband and me." With a shaking hand, she held out her phone to them.

"She's lying about everything," I said, trying to stay calm. "She's mentally ill, she's been stalking my husband and he had to call the police on her this morning because she wouldn't leave his office."

The ambulance arrived and they bundled up Renee and took her away.

And since the nice officers arrested me, I ended up needing something from Sebastian.

Bail.