Chapter 3: Consequences
1534 Words
“He was just so different to what I was expecting," Aude said later that night on the phone.
I curled up on my single bed with my takeout sushi. From the supermarket down the road. Sushi, pure, fresh sushi, was my absolute favourite. It was also my treat food, the thing I gave myself when I accomplished something particularly hard. Supermarket sushi was nowhere near as good as the sushi place, but the sushi place was far, far out of my meagre budget.
“You know how he's normally so friendly on talk shows and interviews?" Aude asked, not really waiting for a response. “He wasn't like that at all. He was all business, asking very specific questions and everything, so robotic. I don't even think he smiled once. Now I kind of feel glad I can't bear the child for him."
I pushed my feet further under my comforter, looking for my hot water bottle. The autumn winds blew wildly outside, and I pulled the blanket closer around myself. The apartment manager hadn't fixed the thermostat yet, and I had no faith it would be fixed come winter.
“He was so specific, too," Aude went on her complaining tangent. “The baby had to be blonde, the biological mother had to be twenty-four, like, my God. He wanted to screen each and every one's entire medical history! We don't even keep the entire medical history!"
I frowned, “Was he so specific about the surrogate, too?"
“Thank God, no!" Aude answered, and I breathed a sigh of relief. If he was so specific for the surrogate, I might not have gotten my chance at an interview and the whole adventure yesterday would have been for nothing. “But there was no real need to be. The surrogate just needs to be healthy, and child-bearing age. Everything else we can do. Genetics we don't really have much say in."
I could hear Aude breathe a sigh of relief. “He chose one, at least," Aude finally announced. “Didn't even want to meet her. Not that he'd need to, of course. We take the egg and she never comes by again. He'll choose the surrogate next, and she he wants to meet, which is understandable. He'll have to live with her for a year."
I kept my tongue and simply listened.
-
“Hey little one," I whispered, dragging my fingers over the stone. I came here every week, once a week for the past three years.
“I know you're sleeping little angel, but I have some good news," I said excitedly, softly. “I'm going to get him back for what he did to you. I'm going to get them all back. I think that I finally have a way to do it."
I sat on the grass right in front of the tombstone. The grave had been so small, the body so little, the entire body had fit beneath the gravestone. They'd dug up the sand around it just for show. Even a casket hadn't been ordered, not worth the cost and time it would take.
Little Blaire's body was buried under the ground in just a white dress.
“I met him, yesterday," I went on. “I don't know what to think of him. Aude told me about him, but he was so different to what I'd met. I can't wait for my interview with him. I have to be civil, at first. I have to get him to like me. Enough so that when I request an interview for the newspaper, he doesn't get suspicious. One interview, and he'll be exposed, my darling little sweetheart."
I fought back tears, like I always did when I came here, every week, like clockwork. And every week I lost that battle. I wiped at my eyes as the tears flowed, I could still see Blaire's tiny body in the bed, the IV bag with the little teddy dripping poison into her body.
No one believed me when I'd protested the damn bag of liquids, everyone had called me insane when I'd tried to rip it off myself. But I'd known, I'd always known that the liquid in those bags would kill Blaire, I just hadn't been strong enough to protect her.
I would avenge her, though. And I would make sure he never hurt anyone else ever again.
“This will be over soon, sweet angel, I promise," I held on to the stone tightly, not caring that it cut into my skin. “And then you can rest properly. I promise you."
-
I went straight home from the graveyard, and buried myself under my blankets. It was Thursday evening, and I had the next day off from work. I would have to wait till Monday to be told what was happening with Jacob Greyson, though Aude would keep me updated, my friend wouldn't have much access to any new information.
For the next part of the process, Jacob Greyson would have to call me himself.
I blinked, barely getting my thoughts in order. I hadn't been this exhausted by a visit to the graveyard in months. But meeting the CEO had taken a toll out of me. I had the strength to climb under my blankets, all three, piled high on top of me to fight off the cold in my apartment, and scroll through my phone mindlessly.
I spent three days a nervous wreck. Waiting for a phone call.
-
“Jacob Greyson chose you as his surrogate!" Aude screamed over the phone. “I didn't even know you signed up! When did you even sign up?"
I was so shocked for a moment I couldn't even comprehend what Aude was saying to me. I almost thought my friend must have been speaking in French. Or gotten the number to call very confused.
It had always been a possibility. Sooner or later, Aude was going to mix up calling a client with calling her friend.
I shook my head. This couldn't be right. It just couldn't be. There was no way that I was understand properly what Aude was saying to me.
“What?" I asked, dumbstruck. Where was my interview? I was supposed to meet him before he made any decisions. Did he meet anyone else?
Aude had said he'd been so strict about everything, that he was supposed to definitely interview the surrogate. How could he choose to live with someone for a year when he'd never even met them?
'But he did meet you.' A small voice in my head whispered. 'Don't you remember?'
At the fertility clinic. When I'd been trying to avoid Aude. It had been Jacob Greyson that I'd hid behind, and it had been him that I'd spoken to.
But how could he base his entire decision on one interaction like that? There were no questions, no comparisons. He knew nothing about me other than that I ducked behind a stranger to avoid being seen by my friend! I could be a crazy person for all he knew! And he was just letting me carry his child?
Was that little interaction really enough for him?
“Oh my god, thank you!" Aude exclaimed over the line. “Thank you so much for using my referral code. I got a five percent of your contract amount. I have no idea how to thank you."
“But," I protested.
My thoughts ran a mile a minute, I couldn't even voice my objections properly. I couldn't live at his house, I had to live here. This place would be broken into if I stayed away from it for so long. My stuff would be stolen in a week. Not to mention my cat. And its not like it wouldn't be broken into if I stayed, but still. Then I could at least fend off the thief!
“Its nothing compared to what you'll get of course, but its still so much!" Aude kept going. “And now I'm being promoted and everything!"
I honestly thought I blacked out for a few parts there because there was just no way that I was understanding Aude right now. There was no way that I was even following the conversation properly.
“But," I tried again. “My interview."
“He decided not to interview anyone, and just asked us to forward your details to him. Technically, we're not supposed to know who he chose, but since he's only asking for your file, we know by default!" Aude continued. “And since you signed the premature contract, and he waved the concealment from the agency clause, your contract is already a done deal. Basically legally binding!"
“Oh my God," I whispered.
Realization dawned on me, as the consequences of my actions caught up with me. I had been so intent on taking him down, on making sure he could never hurt anyone else again, I hadn't considered what I was possibly being a party to. But the exact reality of my actions and what I had agreed to hit me with full force now.
I was going to carry Jacob Greyson's baby.
- Writer
