Many thanks for those of you who sent me kind words during this long hiatus. I apologize for taking so long, but my life has kept me busy. Hopefully I can get back to writing this story. Thank you all for your patience.
Karla didn't schedule another affair with me for the rest of the month. This didn't, of course, pause my friendship with her son during this time. He still invited me from time to time to have what little enjoyment I could get from his company. Not that I had grown distant from him at all. On the contrary, I was trying very hard to be as nice to him as possible, probably in the hopes of coping with my guilt. The reason I couldn't enjoy his company much was because I was always terrified of having his mother lurking nearby.
From the simplest chess game to movies and videogames, I couldn't rest easy whenever Karla walked into the living room, which she started doing suspiciously often. It got so bad at one point I could smell my own nervous sweat just because she chose to hum for a while that day.
His father was also around, enjoying the last of his vacations. I didn't pity the man himself, probably because of how much I disliked him. It was, however, more than obvious that him and Karla were still getting into fights, which never made the atmosphere any easier. My consistent worry was that Karla would, in a miraculous turn of events, lose her cool and expose our affair. Irrational of me to fear this, I know. That woman never felt legitimate anger. When the whole family opted to leave town for an extended weekend at the beach, I must say I felt some relief.
Karla didn't say a word during this time. Perhaps foolishly, I had hoped for a picture or two of her in a bikini, maybe even a nude. That wasn't her style, now that I think of it. The last thing she would want would be for me to enjoy her body without actively taking a risk.
My first two days without her went by quite smoothly. You may be happy (or disgusted) to know I managed to maintain the guiltlessness I had been feeling since my last chat with Karla. This didn't mean I wasn't furious with her, though. There was hardly a moment I didn't think about her, despite her absence, and the thoughts were not happy.
I hated how she made me feel like I was the worse person between the two of us just because I had
cared
about our infractions. I hated how I could never make myself argue better when the time to face her came. I still hated how she'd acknowledged how much I cared for her, only to completely discard it. And above all, I hated that I felt so understood by her.
It was during my third day that I received a call from an unknown number. The stupid, gullible half of me immediately hoped, with glee, that Karla was playing another of her lewd games; calling me from an unknown phone, maybe even her husband's? The smarter half of me was unable to dissuade me from fostering this hope. I answered quickly enough for my inner self to immediately regret it.
"Hello?"
Silence was my first and only reply. The phone line died right away. I feel incredibly stupid for assuming this was Karla's doing, but like an idiot I got thrilled as I imagined what she had in store for me.
When the phone rang again, I opted to let it ring for a little while. I feel fucking pathetic just by remembering myself, eagerly watching my cell ring. I finally answered, granting my voice a lot more confidence this time.
"Yes?"
Again, silence. I spoke again.
"Hello?"
"Peter?"
The voice wasn't Karla's. Not even close to her cocky, abrasive tone. This was a shy voice, one that wasn't sure if this mistake was worth committing. Her sister's voice.
My heart sank as I felt the world's consequences catching up to me.
Betty's pregnant,
I thought.
This is fucking it. She is fucking pregnant and there's no way it's her husband's and Karla is not even here for me to strangle her for roping me into this mess.
"B-Betty?" I tried not to let my voice break.
"Yes, it's me," she spoke timidly.
"Is... everything okay?" I winced as I ran through all the possible ways this question could be answered.
"Yeah... everything is... fine."
That hesitation did nothing to tranquilize my paranoid little brain, now running loops to find out what kind of problem I was about to get hit by. The hand that was holding my phone was already shaking.
"I know I owe you an apology," I ran a hand through my hair.
Had she told the police? Did it qualify as rape? Were the cops tracking the call as we spoke? As much as I hated and loved her, I fervently wished Karla was there. She would have, at the very least, punched me to calm my stress-addled self down. I deserved no less for losing control so fucking easily.
"A huge apology..."
"Karla gave me your number..." she kept going, seemingly oblivious to my insanity.
"I'm really sorry for... for taking advantage," I kept talking, my thoughts strapped to a locomotive of panic and deafness.
"I was wondering if... you'd like to go get a cup of coffee with me sometime."
I had to freeze for a moment. My brain rewound her words over and over again, trying to figure if I had made out her sentence to be more amicable than it had really been.
"Peter? Are you there?"
"Yes, yes! I... Coffee?"
"Yes!" I heard her chuckle on her end of the phone.
"Are you sure you know what 'Peter' you're speaking to...?" I asked hazily.
"Of course!" Betty giggled. "I begged for your... uhm..."
"Coffee?" I stopped her right there.
"Yes! How about a couple of hours from now?"
"Sure..."
It was as if time had stopped. I wasn't entirely certain if I hadn't had a heart attack, and all of this was just my own mind hallucinating. It sure as hell didn't make any sense to me. I was so buried in my own thoughts that I didn't hear much of what Betty said next. Thankfully, I was able to just barely hang on to the word 'typical', before she hung up.
This would usually be construed as an aggressively sarcastic statement. In my hometown, however, that word had another meaning. Typical was actually the name of a café near our high school. Back when I studied there, it was common to see the cool kids smoking inside during break time, and even more common for every other kid to go there purchase packets of crisps after school was done.
It was a surprisingly clean place, now that I looked at it as an adult. I could only imagine the work the employees had to put in just to undo all of the mess created by the teenagers that were their primary source of income. In the summer, Typical enjoyed quiet days with few, if any, customers.
Having been a fairly boring teenager, I only now thought about how ironically atypical the café's name was too. It wasn't a franchise, as far as I know. A single café in a random town with its name like that, and nothing more.
You may be surprised to know that all of these thoughts happily raced through my mind as I walked there. Must have been the stress. My mind always runs aimlessly when my worries get the best of me. I hadn't fully ruled out any of the worst-case scenarios I had imagined. To me, this could still very much be a trip to a café to find out I was about to father my friend's first cousin.
