Farm Girl Has Bad Boy (#3)

Chapter Twenty-Seven

“River?”

I’m just flipping the envelope over in my hands to open it when there’s a knock at the door. When I don’t respond to my dad, he gently pushes open the door and steps in. He looks me over sympathetically as I stare down at the letter. It’s mocking me, just sitting there waiting for me to open it.

“I’d wait until you’ve calmed down to open that,” my dad suggests, giving me a serious look. “You’ll understand it better when you’re calmer.” I give my dad a look and he shrugs, folding his arms across his chest. “Your mother and I want to talk to you about the baby.”

“Do you really think that now is the time?” I snap, angry.

“River, it’s important.” His tone suggests that there’s no room for arguing so with a sigh, I throw the letter onto my nightstand and rise to my feet.

“I’ll change and then I’ll be downstairs.”

A few minutes later, I trudge down the wooden steps in a pair of my fluffy pajama bottoms and a baggy sweater. My parents wait in the living room, seated in their usual lecturing spots. Not meeting their eyes, I sit on my half of the couch, moving a pillow over to the empty space to not make it seem so bare without Emery by my side.

“Have you decided on a name?” My mother asks, jumping into the conversation so there’s no time for it to be awkward and quiet.

“Yes,” I mumble back, staring at the floor. I feel my parent’s eyes on me, waiting for me to tell them. “Emery and I are keeping it a secret until we sign the birth certificate.”

I hear my mom sigh in annoyance, clearly unhappy that she’s out of the loop. My dad quickly clears his throat to cover up my mother’s disappointment and waits for me to meet his eyes.

“Your mother and I have been talking,” my dad starts, leaning against one of the chairs with his hands in his jean pockets. “And we’ve decided that this house is much too small for a baby, plus with the bedrooms being so close, when it’s crying in the middle of the night it will wake us up.”

My hands clench into fists at my sides and I look between my parents in disbelief. “So you’re kicking me and the baby out of the house?” My voice starts to rise uncontrollably. All the things that happened today and now this; I just can’t handle this much drama. “Where do you expect us to go? How can you even-“

“River,” my dad cuts me off, giving me a stern look. “I wasn’t finished.” I open my mouth to say more but he narrows his eyes, telling me to keep my mouth shut. “Since you can’t afford to get a job right now or after the baby is born, we’ve come up with an idea.” I raise my eyebrows as I sink back into the couch. “As you know, the property next to us is for sale. So far it hasn’t been bought because the only clear land is in the middle of the forest and there isn’t access to it from the road.”

My heart starts to pound in my chest as my mom gives me a small smile. “If we bought it for you, we can make a path from the house to the clearing. There, your father and some of his friends can start building a small house for you.”

I start to get excited but calm myself down. “What’s the catch?” I ask nervously, knowing there must be something that I have to do.

“The only catch for you is that you keep doing your daily chores here at the farm,” my dad smiles, seeing the relief on my face. “And your mother will watch the baby.”

A grin spreads across my face as I rise to my feet. I run to my dad and wrap him in a hug, telling him how much this means to me. I haven’t had any idea of what to do when the baby was born, but now it seems like this is a huge step in the right direction for everything to fall into the place.