Chapter 17

Brynley

Being shoulder checked by the door frame during my storming inside the breakroom area of The Institute instantly pulls a loud, high-pitched, screeching sound out of me.

“Rough morning?” Calen cautiously questions from the round table he’s stationed at.

“ Fuck this day. ”

“Ouch.”

“ Fuck this day right in the ass. ”

“Hm.” He pauses all fork movement. “Without or without lube?”

“ Without. ”

“Painful.”

“Fuck this day right in the ass without lube and may a great white feast on its dangling nut sack.”

“Flat brain coral colorful as always, Bryn.” This time he stabs a piece of melon in his mixture. “But fucking brutal.” Calen keeps his attention planted on me. “Wanna talk about it?”

“No.”

“Wanna scream about it?”

“Yes.” Another heavy huff escapes blowing a piece of damp hair away from my eyes. “But that is inappropriate conduct in the workplace.”

“Is it really any more inappropriate than you chanting at the giant otters to ‘get some’ during copulation yesterday?”

“First off, be professional.”

“I am being professional.”

“Professionals would use their names.”

“Fine.” Humoring me occurs between bites of his honey dew. “Is screaming your human frustrations any more inappropriate than you cheering on Peanut Butter and Jelly during their copulation time yesterday?”

“Why can’t you just say during their bang time?”

“How is that professional?”

“It’s not, but every time you say copulation, I basically get PTSD style flashbacks of Intro to Marine Biology with Professor Stojan and wanna start dry heaving from the inexplicable wafts of tuna and term papers that seemed to seep from the pores of that Cardassian looking bitch.”

“You had a professor that looked like a Kardashian?”

“ Cardassian. ” Dropping my bag near my locker space proceeds me glaring. “ Star Trek not reality star.”

“But you hear how confusing that is, right?”

“What I hear is you need more time binging and less time booging.”

“We both know I prefer surfing.”

“We both know you prefer surfing when the bikini bottoms are low, and the waves are high.”

Calen chuckles to himself at the same time I shove my key into my work locker. Almost immediately after opening, I release another unhappy huff over the sight inside.

“We also both know you don’t have a spare shirt in there, so you’re going to need to grab one out of mine.”

He’s immediately tossed a tiny glare to which he responds to by smugly shoving the last bite on his fork into his mouth.

Asshole.

But like the good kind.

The kind I actually need in my life unlike the bad kind I’m engaged to.

Though, I’m not sure for how long at the rate he keeps disappointing me.

And fucking ignoring me.

I didn’t think it was fucking possible to be ghosted by your own fucking fiancé yet here we are.

Calen waits until I shift over a step to open his locker with the spare key, he gave me to claim, “You’re pissed off about more than just the unexpected rainstorm here to usher away your man in style.”

There’s no stopping my shoulders from dropping as I meet his gaze. “Palaemon is literally fucking weeping for him, bro.”

“Greek God of Sharks?”

“And harbors and sailors in danger and ships with fucking problems and really just shit in that category.”

“Isn’t that Poseidon?”

“That’s the big dick of all of water.” Grabbing a spare work shirt from his locker is effortlessly executed. “Palaemon is just the big dick of marine shit.”

“Won’t literally scream at work due to the handbook’s ruling about appropriate voice volumes yet has no problem saying the word dick with impunity every chance provided.”

“What can I say?” The ripping off of my damp tank top is swift. “ I’m gifted. ”

“ You’re exhausting. ”

“I’m exhausted ,” I chomp during an adjustment of my gray sports bra that’s wedged on top of my regular bra for extra support. “I honestly don’t know if we were interviewing wedding vendors or future possible vice presidents.”

Hope hops into my best friend’s expression. “Wilcox finally came out of hiding?”

“ No. ” Carelessly throwing the wet article into the bottom of my open locker is followed by me yanking on the dry one. “And the only thing worse than wedding planning for ‘the wedding of the century’ is doing said wedding planning alone .” I slam his locker closed. “Not that I’m even sure there is going to be a wedding at this fucking point.”

“You don’t wanna marry him anymore?”

“I don’t even know if I wanna be with him anymore.”

Calen’s mouth drops to retort when Raquel unexpectedly interjects, “Connelly, Winters, transport is about an hour out.”

Her surprise appearance forces a more professional demeanor to appear during my step back away from the lockers to make eye contact. “Understood.”

The fact she’s barely put more than her head in the room indicates this was simply an unplanned pitstop on her way to destroy other people’s happiness.

Lucky us.

“Winters due to your…current status you are on verbal prep, evaluation, and paperwork transferring only. You may not drive the escort vehicle. You may not be in the transport vehicle with the creature. And you may not have any direct contact in which you are required to be in unsafe surface areas.”

Forfuckssake, slipping once during your whole career shouldn’t you get banned for life from wet territories.

“Connelly, you’ll be hands-on overseeing each portion of the transition as well as responsible for driving the escort vehicle for you and Winters. The transition of care from us to K therefore, I went ahead and had a room booked for the two at the usual hotel.”

“Yes ma’am,” Calen politely acknowledges only to instantly receive a girlish grin.

“You know better than to ma’am me,” she practically coos. “I’m not that much older than you.”

Older enough.

He’s damn near the exact halfway mark between her and her preteen daughter.

A much less kind expression is abruptly presented to me. “I expect your pre-evals in my inbox in the next twenty minutes.”

Rather than wait for me to respond, she slips back into the hallway with the same ease she poked into the room with leaving me the perfect opportunity to grumble, “It’s like Picard having to report to Armus every day.”

“That doesn’t sound good.”

My face shoots him a sardonic smirk, “That’s because it’s not, Spock.”

“Yeah, well, neither is you ending your relationship with The Billionaire Kahuna because he skipped out on a couple scheduled wedding planning dates and a few social cal events.”

“How about because he missed the OB/GYN appointment?” Securing his lock in place occurs prior to me sliding back in front of my own locker. “How about because for the past two weeks I’ve been talking to his voicemail more than him?” I squat down to rummage around in my bag for my blue eyeliner. “How about because I’ve been having a more intimate relationship with our text thread than him?”

“Intimate relationship?” Calen promptly teases, warranting my glare. “Being preggers is seriously making you more chicklike.”

“And more irrational.” The snatching up of the object precedes me pointing at him. “So, be careful before I use this tube to create a different type of blue balls than you’re used to.”

“They rarely get that blue.”

“But it has happened.”

“And thanks to you being the wing woman you are, it probably won’t happen again.” His compliment receives a crooked grin that he encourages me to stick around with bribery. “Lock up your shit and come eat my pineapple.”

“God, I love it when you talk fruity to me.”

My theatrical winking gets him snickering and shaking his head in amusement. “It’s like you want your Bruce Wayne wannabe to have to shell out for a sexual harassment lawsuit.”

“It’s like I no longer care what my Bruce Wayne willneverbe does in general.”

Calen waits for me to complete the task of stuffing my bag away and locking up to counter, “Except that you do.”

“Okay, but I don’t want to.”

“Yeah, but it doesn’t change the fact that you do. ”

“Don’t training mission test me right now,” I grouse during my crossing over to the table. “I need more cheat codes, less no-win scenarios.”

He pushes the container of fruit to the shared space between us. “You’re gonna name my god kid after something from that show, aren’t you?”

“ Franchise. ”

“Fuck you,” Calen lightly laughs on a shake of the head.

“Only if you promise to hold me afterwards.”

My best friend’s grin slightly fades prior to him inquiring, “Wilcox really hasn’t been around?”

Shaking my head occurs before viciously chomping down on the yellow cube.

“You haven’t had dinner together?”

The action is repeated.

“Lunch?”

Yet again I execute the movement.

“Breakfast?”

“I have been on more dates with Nes at this point than him.”

“ Fuckten ,” grumbles the man beside me as I stuff another piece of food into my starving mouth. “Although, her Fed boyfriend doesn’t strike me like the type of dude who would object to her dating other women.”

“Dating? Yes. Occasionally banging? No.”

“ Really? ” Curiosity creeps into his gaze. “ No shit? ”

“Can we not talk about my other best friend’s thriving sex life and maybe focus on the demise of mine? How I haven’t been fucked in weeks? Or touched?” I shove more fruit into my mouth. “Who doesn’t hug their pregnant fiancée?!” Another square finds its way inside despite the fact that I haven’t even chewed the other. “Who doesn’t hold them when they’re crying?!”

Additional chunks are jammed against the others

“ Whodoesnttellthemotheroftheirchildtheylovethem?! ”

The jumbled mess of the last claim is what prompts Calen to stand and wind his arms around me.

To no surprise, there’s no hesitation for the tears I had previously banished to begin pouring from my eyes, coating his work shirt in wetness, whatever flakes of mascara haven’t rubbed off yet, and tiny specs of fruit littered spit. Through incoherent sobbing, I thoughtlessly confess everything that’s been eating away at me since I physically lost sight of the man I love.

I cry angrily over the media.

Their latest lies.

Their latest highlights of our notable failures as a couple.

I bawl about them blowing this possible sibling thing out to the Andromeda Galaxy.

Turning Monica’s well-planned ambush into a war with no possible winner.

Destroying Wes to the point he’ll miss his chance to be a father because trying to defend the one he had is all he can fathom.

And it’s that blubbering that leads me to the ugliest, scariest fear I actually have.

The one that’s festering on my ocean floor.

Being. A. Single. Parent.

How and when I go from basically using my partner in crime’s shirt as a tissue, to clinging onto it with two hands like that bitch does that door in the movie Titanic, is a mystery, much like the exact amount of time that passes during my whispered confession about not wanting to be alone.

To go through any of this alone.

To wanting my child to have what it is I didn’t.

Two present parents.

Eventually, Calen pulls back just enough to use the pads of his thumbs to gingerly brush away the tears that he can. “ You are not a great hammerhead, Bryn. ”

“Because I won’t eat my own baby?”

“Because you are not a solitary creature.” More swipes at my cheeks are delivered. “You are the largest and most fit and most fierce shark that has formed her own school that consists of others who will play and love and protect you as much as your little pup.” An undeniably soft smile slides into place on his face. “You may hunt alone. You may occasionally separate and swim alone. But you are never actually alone.” His hands gently plop onto my shoulders. “We’re all here for you, babe. You just gotta move your body to communicate that you need us.”

It's impossible not to tease, “Pretty sure that’s against the rules in the handbook.”

“You make me wanna migrate to another group.”

“And you make me grateful that you can’t.”

A small chuckle precedes a gentle kiss to the middle of my forehead. “I love you too, Amphitrite.”

“I so would be the head bitch of the sea.”

“How about you be the head bitch of the tank and get Steven’s pre-evals over to Raquel before she returns to hang ten on another wave of ass chewing?”

Seeing his point – his very valid point – is what pushes me to give my face a quick wash in the sink, reapply some mascara, and hustle to the office area to send our boss the requested documentation while he begins his portion of the transition process.

As much as I tend to hate paperwork – and I really fucking do – today is different.

Today it provides me with a much-needed distraction.

Allows me to focus on Steven’s safety versus his sorrow.

My sorrow.

It forces me to keep my attention on the crucial protocols regarding the transport tank, the forklift, and the transfer trailer rather than my heart wrenching horror of losing my favorite creature.

In a way…my first born.

I mean he was the first being in this building I bonded with, and according to many of the aquatics in The Institute, I was the first one he developed any sort of relationship with.

Yet instead of obsessing over the ache of having to let go, having to let him grow up, and move on, I oversee our team along with K&T’s to insure he becomes properly sedated.

Secured in the netting.

That the harnesses are tight, and the safety straps are latched as well as reinforced once he’s in the exhibit tank.

Triple checking paperwork and lists prevents me from acknowledging the lump of grief lingering in my throat and gathering signatures from various employees that have to sign off on having done what’s requested of them aid in distracting me from the hopelessness heavily weighing on my shoulders, threating to crumple me to my knees.

Unlike the father of my child, I can’t simply crumble under this pressure.

I have to keep going.

I have to keep moving.

I have to get my gear and my ass in that transport vehicle to finish escorting Steven to his new home because it’s my job.

Because he’s counting on me.

The same way I know I can no longer count on Wes.