Jake said this but Neal was staring at Conner and he wasn’t exactly furious anymore (or at least, not entirely). However, I knew him not at all. Therefore, I didn’t know what he was.
Then he looked to his daughter and his face gentled. “Just take the test, honey.”
It was then I knew what he was. He was a man who was simply a man therefore was once a teenaged boy so he knew how he’d feel if a girl’s father showed up at his doorstep with this news.
Her back shot straight as her face started to pale and she snapped, “I’m not takin’ another test.”
“It’ll take no time at all and—” Neal began.
She leaned into her father, her face twisting. “I’m not takin’ another test, Dad.”
“Mia—”
Her eyes shifted around the room and she interrupted her father to announce, “I’ll take it at home.”
“I must insist you take it here,” I stated.
“Don’t know how you can insist on anything. It’s my pee. It’s my body. And you aren’t even family,” Mia fired back.
I held her eyes and, unperturbed, replied quietly, “You know why I can insist.”
“Respect, Josie, but I’m not real big on you standin’ there callin’ my daughter a liar,” Neal said with forced calm.
Before I could say anything, Conner did.
“She’s pregnant, she shouldn’t have any problem takin’ a test. Why do you have a problem with it, Mia?”
“Because you’re a dick and I can barely stand bein’ in the same room with you. I’m not gonna hang around for twenty minutes doin’ it,” she retorted.
“Now, Neal, I’m gonna have to ask you to ask your daughter to be careful,” Jake said in his quiet, angry voice.
Neal turned to his daughter. “This isn’t easy for any of us, honey. Don’t make it harder.”
“It’s hardest for me.” She leaned toward her father and jerked her thumb to herself at her last two words.
“Actually, it’s hardest for me,” Conner stated firmly and angrily and I looked to him to see his eyes slice to Mia’s father. “Mr. Earhart, I have not had sex with your daughter. I broke things off with her and she wasn’t happy about it. Josie saw her make a scene at the game and so did my sister and her friends and probably a bunch of other people. Pretty much anyone will tell you she’s made threats to the girl I’m seein’ and made more scenes than just the one at the game. But bottom line, no lie, if she’s pregnant, it’s absolutely not mine.”
After this rather well delivered speech (I thought), I turned back to Neal and saw him again studying Conner.
He did this but moments before he looked down at his daughter.
“You’re takin’ the test, Mia. Here.”
“Am not,” she spat.
His tone was deadly when he decreed, “You absolutely are.”
And when he did, Mia’s face went ashen.
Her father didn’t miss it and I knew this when he whispered, “Please tell me you did not lie to me about Conner Spear gettin’ you pregnant.”
She said nothing but visibly swallowed and her body language changed from extremely cross to exceptionally nervous.
Her father didn’t miss that either.
“You lied to me,” Neal stated, still in a whisper.
She rubbed her lips together as she rubbed her palms on her jeans.
“You’re not pregnant?” her father asked, his voice now sounding choked.
She stared into his eyes for some time before she finally jerked her head in a negative.
“What were you gonna do when that shit was found out?” her father asked incredulously, a question he probably didn’t want the answer to, but asked it anyway.
She shifted on her feet.
“Mia,” he started, his voice awful and I didn’t know him, but I felt for him. “What were you gonna do?”
“Get pregnant in the meantime, but pin it on Conner,” she whispered, voice trembling, eyes glued to her dad.
“Jesus,” Neal bit out, staring at her like he’d never seen before.
Her face screwed up and she threw out a hand Conner’s way. “We dated for three months and he just blew me off.”
Good goodness.
All of this for three months?
I was aghast.
“Go to the car.” Neal was again whispering.
She looked to Conner. “You can’t be with a girl and just blow her off.”
“Mia, go to the car,” Neal demanded, a lot louder this time.
She looked to her father. “He humiliated me. I was the second one cut!”
“Swear to Christ, Mia, you don’t go to the car right now…” Neal trailed off.
She looked to Conner and hissed, “You’re still a dick and you’ll always be a dick.”
That was when Jake was done.
“Not sure your girl is welcome in my home, Neal,” Jake said low.
“Mia—” Neal started but her bravado disintegrated as her face crumbled.
I felt no pity for her.
Lying about a pregnancy and conniving to become that way?
Unacceptable.
“You hurt me,” she whispered to Conner.
Conner said nothing.
“Car, Mia,” her father ordered but his voice was gentler, thus giving some understanding of why Mia was as Mia was. What she’d done was not suitable by any stretch of the imagination, but she showed some emotion, and her father gentled to it.
She stared at Conner with wet eyes then looked to her father and without a word or another look at anyone, she rushed by Jake, by me, by Conner and out the door.
Neal lifted a hand and ran it through his hair before he looked to Jake.
“Jake, don’t know what to say,” he murmured.
“Nothin’ to say,” Jake replied. “Kids do crazy shit. It’s done.” Jake paused as he held the man’s eyes before he finished, “Though, would appreciate it you have a word with your girl about shit she’s pullin’ with Conner’s girl, Ellie. She’s pissed at Conner, I get. Her doin’ this, I don’t get, but we’re past that. Her messin’ with Ellie, that shit isn’t right.”
Neal stared at him a moment before doing the only thing he could do at that juncture, nodding and moving. He gave a curt jerk of the chin to me and looked to Conner.
“Conner, son. Sorry.”
Conner said nothing.
Even without a response, Neal nodded to him too and walked out the door.