The Bookstore on the Beach - Brenda Novak Page 0,108

up with Tammy. She didn’t want to argue with the Skinners’ daughter or try to convince her. That was exactly the type of thing she’d been trying to avoid by staying away.

But when she checked her phone to see if she’d heard from Autumn just before leaving to pick up lunch, she saw that Tammy had written her again.

I hope I didn’t scare you away. I’m not in touch with my mother. You don’t have to worry.

Okay, she wrote back. But the fact that Tammy would make any excuses for Nora led Mary to believe future contact wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities.

And that wasn’t a good sign.

* * *

Taylor and Sierra were lying on Sierra’s bed, talking, while Taylor was trying to gather the nerve to call Oliver. He’d been blowing up her phone for the past several days and the last text he’d sent her read, Really? You won’t even respond? Uncool.

He was right, and she knew it. Although the pregnancy wouldn’t affect him nearly as much as it would affect her, he had a stake in what was happening, too, and deserved to know one way or the other.

“So...have you scrapped the tattoo idea?” Sierra asked as she tossed a small, spongy football into the air and caught it, over and over.

Taylor lifted her head to be able to gather all her hair into a knot before falling back onto the pillow. “For now. I think I’ve done enough to piss off my mom, don’t you?”

“Yeah. Probably smarter to wait.” She put the football on the nightstand and rolled off the bed. “You can get a tattoo later, if you’re still interested,” she said as she removed the Queen album they’d been listening to and put on the Beatles. “You’ll be eighteen before you give birth.”

Give birth. Those words freaked Taylor out. But turning eighteen was just as scary. A baby and adulthood. She wasn’t prepared for either.

“Have you heard back on any of your job applications?” she asked, trying to steer the conversation away from those two subjects.

“Not yet. I won’t be able to get anything until fall.”

“Is that okay with your dad?”

“It’ll have to be. There’s nothing out there. Did you ask your grandma if I might be able to work at the store?”

“I did. She said it’s a possibility. But like I told you, it’ll be Christmastime before the coffee shop is finished.”

“That’s better than next summer.”

“What about the nanny idea?”

“I don’t have any experience, so I don’t think anyone’s going to hire me, especially because I’ll be going back to school soon and won’t be able to babysit until after three.”

“I’d ask Quinn if you could maybe hostess at The Daily Catch, but with what his mother’s going through, I don’t think it would be fair to put him under any more pressure.”

“Yeah. Don’t worry about it. My dad gets pissed and starts harping on me to find work, but he forgets about it for long stretches. I’ll tell him that I might have something at Christmas. It’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. How’re things going with Quinn, by the way? Have you seen him since Sunday?”

“No.”

“Do you think your mother has?”

“I know she has.”

“How do you feel about that?”

“I’ll think about it later. For right now, I’m just glad she’s distracted.”

Sierra flopped back down on the bed. “So...”

“So what?” she said.

“Are you going to call Oliver or not?”

Taylor groaned. “Do I have to?”

Sierra leaned up on one elbow. “You’ve been dreading it long enough. You might as well get it over with.”

“I know.” Sighing, she sat up, leaned against the wall and scrolled through her contacts. “Maybe he won’t answer,” she said, holding out hope that she could procrastinate just a little longer.

But he picked up almost as soon as she sent the call. “Is it what I think?” he said without so much as a hello.

She squeezed her eyes shut, fighting the inevitable emotion that welled up whenever she talked about the pregnancy. “Yes.”

“Shit. Are you kidding me? You’re pregnant? What are we going to do? What am I going to tell my folks?”

So much for the way he’d behaved when there was still some hope. She swallowed hard. “The same thing I’m going to tell my mother.”

“Which is...”

“That I’m going to have a baby.”

“You’re having it? You’re keeping it?”

She could hear the panic in his voice. “I think so. I don’t know what else to do.”

“You have options,” he insisted.

“But would you like to be responsible for making the decision