Page 200 of Carnal Wagers

“Maeve,” I mouthed and gestured at the phone, then I hitched my thumb over my shoulder to tell him I was taking this outside.

He pressed a kiss to my temple and squeezed me briefly against his chest. “See?” he whispered. “I told you this day would come. Go talk to her. I’ll close the tab. Smiles, Paulie, go with her.”

“Al…A-are you there?” Maeve asked sheepishly as I picked up my winter coat and made my way through the bar with an excitement that bordered on frantic. “I understand if you don’t want to talk.”

“No, I do.”

I tugged the door open to the street, and a rush of snowflakes and brisk wind smacked my exposed skin. The chill burrowed below the layers of my clothing and prickled at the wetness clinging to my eyes. My breath fogged in front of me.

“Sorry about that. Hi. It’s…” I pressed my back against the dive bar’s exposed brick exterior and tipped my head up. “It’s good to hear from you. Happy belated birthday. Did you…get my gift?”

The door clanked shut behind my guards and me and dulled the music from inside to a murmur. Smiles lit a cigarette. The flame from his lighter danced with the icy breeze in tune with my eagerness to finally break the barrier she’d set up between us.

“Yes, the spa self-care kit is lovely. You didn’t have to.”

“Of course I did.”

She made a soft grunt. “So…you’re pregnant?”

The baby kicked right then, and I smiled. “Yes, due in four months. It’s a little girl. You’ll be an aunt.”

“Right.”

I twisted my mouth side to side with unease at the awkwardness in her tone.

“Is he with you?” she asked.

Beyond the glass door, Cillian treaded through the bar toward me with firm steps. “He’s inside.”

She released a shaky sigh. “I should let you go. It…was good to hear your voice.”

“Yours too. Call me whenever.” I fiddled with the faux-fur trim of my coat collar. “I…I miss you, Maeve.”

After a short beat of silence, the line disconnected with a chipper beat that clashed with my disappointment. My hand holding the phone flopped to my side as I gnawed on the inside of my lip. Beside me, the door clunk-swished open, followed by a heavy waft of stale beer and old leather, and Cillian walked out.

“Done already?”

I nodded, absently rubbing where our baby girl had kicked earlier.

“Then what’s with the sad face?” He thumbed my lip loose from my teeth.

“It felt…unnatural. Not at all like us.”

“First steps, love. You’ll get back to how you were. Just give it time.” He wrapped his arm around my shoulders and tugged me into him. “Come on. We can still make the last showing of the new movie you wanted to see.”

“Do you think she’ll call again?”

“Not a doubt.”

He was right. Two weeks later, she reached out again. Her hesitation lingered, but the conversation lasted longer than two minutes. Two weeks after that, I got another call. We managed a full five minutes of continuous dialogue about current events and a few books she recently read. It only got better.

From then on, calls came every week, sometimes twice a week, and each time, we maxed out her allotted phone time. At first, most of our discussions revolved around details of my life since she’d shut down whenever I brought the conversation back to her, but slowly she opened up, like the notes of a perfume unfolding one by one with time and patience. It was beautiful to experience. Within another two months, she began sharing about the garden she helped maintain, the hairstyles she tried out on some of the other calmer patients, the group movies they watched, the occasional letter she received with news from Erel, etc. She still refused to meet, but it was a huge step forward.

With her calls always coming in at the same time every three days, Cillian, Liam, Brody, and I decided to meet up for each one, whether for a poker night, dinner, or a simple hangout over a few drinks. While I only gave the brothers small details after each call, we toasted every progress she made as a family. By the time I gave birth to my baby girl, she made the leap forward to exchange a few words with Liam and Brody at the end of each call, with a simple “Hi” and “Bye” from Brody at first and a cheesy joke as an icebreaker from Liam that became his trademark greeting. Cillian didn’t get that honor, though. Just the mention of him in a call continued to send her into a tailspin. He took it in stride with his typical aloofness, but I could tell it weighed on him from how he’d occasionally zone out during or after those calls. Unfortunately, there was nothing for it but to wait and hope.

It took a couple more weeks before she finally accepted my request for a visit. The four-week wait between her consent and the facility’s approval frazzled my nerves into a chaotic swirl of postpartum mood swings, bundled with excitement and nervousness. Cillian did his best to help calm me down and take care of our very active six-week-old daughter, Vianne, whenever my emotions and fatigue got the best of me, but until the day of the first visit, I was practically bouncing off the walls.

When I entered the plain beige visitation room, Maeve stood facing the window with her back to me, dressed in a lavender top I’d sent her a few months back that matched the scent permeating the air, compared to the potent smell of disinfectant in the hallway. The top half of her hair was pulled up in a thick beehive style while the rest draped down her back with thick curls. Then she turned to face me, and it was like I was seeing someone else entirely.