Chapter 10: Broken Glass Confession
The sound of the shattering glass was terribly final. A sharp, wet explosion that left red wine dripping like a wound from the edge of the coffee table, soaking into the ultrasound photo, beading on the glossy surface of their secret.
Riley was on her feet. She wasn’t crying. She was vibrating.
Lucas’s hand was still extended, having missed her wrist by a fraction. He slowly lowered it, his palm facing up, a useless gesture of surrender.
Ava didn’t flinch. She watched the wine darken the image of her child’s profile, her own hand splayed over her stomach, a protective cage of fingers. Her chin was lifted, but her eyes were fixed on her sister, waiting.
“You…” Riley breathed the word out, a puff of air with no sound behind it. She tried again. “You. And you.” She looked from Lucas to Ava and back again, as if scanning a faulty equation. “Since when? How?”
“It just… happened,” Lucas said, his voice sandpaper-rough. The lamplight caught the lines of tension around his mouth. “A few months ago. After the fundraiser at the park.”
“The fundraiser.” Riley repeated it flatly. “The one where you helped her set up the tents. Where I had a migraine and went home early.” A horrible, understanding dawned in her eyes. “Oh my god. You were supposed to give her a ride home.”
“It’s not like we planned it,” Ava said, finally finding her voice. It was steadier than she felt. “It just… progressed.”
“Progressed?” Riley let out a wild, brittle laugh that hit the walls of the small apartment like thrown stones. “You don’t progress into fucking your sister’s… into fucking Lucas!” She whirled on him, all the softness he’d ever known in her gone, replaced by a white-hot fury. “You were her babysitter, Lucas! You helped her with her science fair project on fungus!”
“I’m not a kid anymore, Riley,” Ava snapped, standing now too. The space between them was a minefield of broken glass and spilled wine.
“You’re nineteen! He’s practically a family friend! He’s… he’s…” She couldn’t say what he was to her. The history was too long, too tangled. The near-misses, the almosts, the comfort of his constant, quiet presence. The unspoken assumption that someday, when they were both ready, the pieces might finally click into place. She looked at him, and the betrayal there was a physical thing, a fracture in the foundation of her past. “You were supposed to be my happy ending.”
The whisper was worse than a scream. It hung in the wine-scented air, frail and devastating.
Lucas flinched as if she’d struck him. “Riley, I never promised you that. We never… it was never the right time.”
“But it was the right time for her?” Her gaze swept over Ava’s body, lingering on the hand on her stomach, and the full, crushing reality seemed to hit her all at once. The ultrasound wasn’t a prank. It wasn’t a mistake. It was a consequence. A future. Her little sister was pregnant. With Lucas’s baby. The math of it was obscene.
She took a stumbling step backward, away from the table, away from them.
“You’re having a baby,” she said, not to them, but to the universe, incredulous.
“We are,” Lucas said, forcing the words out. He took a step toward her, one hand rising slightly. “Riley, please. Sit down. Let us explain.”
“Explain what?” she cried, her composure shattering. “Explain how you looked at my baby sister and decided to… to plant your flag? Explain how you’re in love with her? She’s a child, Lucas!”
“Stop calling me that!” Ava’s defiance finally cracked, revealing the raw fear beneath. “You don’t get to define me! You don’t get to decide what I’m ready for! I’m having this baby. With him. And you can either be a part of that or you can stand there and judge us, but you don’t get to act like this is some betrayal of you.”
The room went dead silent.
Riley stared at her sister. She saw the woman she was becoming—fierce, determined, fearless in a way Riley had never been. She also saw the ghost of the little girl who used to sneak into her bed during thunderstorms. The collision was dizzying.
“A part of it?” Riley’s voice was hollow. “You hid this from me for months. You let me talk about my dating disasters, about school, about my life, while you were…” She waved a hand at them, at the intimate space of the apartment, at the couch that now seemed to tell its own story. “You lied to my face. Every day.”
“We were trying to find the right way,” Lucas said, but it sounded feeble, even to him.
“There is no right way for this.” Riley wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand, a sharp, angry motion. She looked at the ultrasound photo again, the wine-stained future. Her shoulders slumped, the fight draining out of her, leaving behind a profound, weary hurt. “I need to go.”
“Riley, wait—” Lucas started.
“Don’t.” She held up a hand, her eyes finally meeting his directly. The affection, the familiarity, it was all still there, but it was buried under layers of shock and a deep, personal grief. “Just don’t. I can’t… I can’t look at you right now.”
She turned, fumbling for her purse on the floor by the door. Her movements were clumsy, uncoordinated.
Ava watched her go, the bravado melting into a cold dread. “Riley…”
Riley paused at the door, her hand on the knob. She didn’t turn around. Her voice, when it came, was small and broken. “Are you okay? Is… is the baby okay?”
The question, so unexpected, so quintessentially Riley, landed like a punch in Ava’s chest. Even now, scorched by betrayal, her sister’s first concern was for her well-being. It was worse than any anger.
“We’re fine,” Ava managed, her own eyes filling. “The doctor said everything is perfect.”
Riley gave a single, tight nod. Then she opened the door and walked out into the hall. The click of the latch settling into place was the loudest sound Lucas had ever heard.
The apartment seemed to exhale, collapsing into the aftermath. The only signs of the storm were the shattered glass, the staining wine, the poignant, ruined photograph on the table.
Lucas stood frozen, staring at the closed door. Ava sank back onto the couch, pulling her knees up to her chest. She felt hollowed out, scraped raw.
After a long minute, Lucas moved. He went to the kitchen, returning with a dish towel and the small dustpan. He knelt, not on the rug, but in the puddle of wine on the hardwood. He began to pick up the shards, one by one, the clink of glass against metal the only noise. He worked meticulously, silently, gathering every sliver.
He was cleaning up the mess. It was all he knew how to do.
Ava watched him, the broad line of his shoulders, the focused tilt of his head. The man who loved watersheds and ecosystems, now tending to this tiny, domestic catastrophe. Her heart ached for him, for her sister, for the impossible triangle they’d created.
“She’s never going to forgive us,” Ava said quietly into the stillness.
Lucas dumped the glass fragments into the trash. He came back, sat beside her, but didn’t touch her. He stared at his own hands, resting on his knees. “I don’t know.” He took a deep, shuddering breath. “But that’s not the point anymore. The point is that we told her. The point is that this,” he gestured between them, then to her stomach, “is real. And it’s happening.”
He finally looked at her, his eyes reflecting the dim lamplight, full of a tired, unwavering resolve. “We’re having a baby. That’s the only thing we have to get right now.”
Outside, a car door slammed. An engine started, then faded down the street. They both listened to the sound of Riley leaving, until there was nothing left but the echo, and the long, quiet night ahead.