Her Swedish Billionaire’s Baby

Samara thought about the answer, how it would only lead to more questions. Anyway, thinking of Dad and Alison stabbed her in the heart. She wasn’t sure she’d be able to talk about it at this point without crying, so she said quickly, “I don’t want to talk about my family, but … tell me about yours.”

“Oh, I have to tell you about mine and you don’t?!”

“No, I … sorry. I have no social skills.” She shrugged apologetically. “It seems like most people like talking about themselves and don’t really care about what anyone else has to say, so I thought that would make you happy.”

She smiled. Somehow she only seemed to find all her awkwardness charming. Samara was beginning to gather that the girl’s tough persona hid a fear of people. Maybe her awkwardness made her seem appealingly unintimidating. “I am interested. Okay, no talking about them, but … short-answer questions, one for one. How ’bout that?”

She shrugged amiably. Just getting to talk to another person and put the agonizing loneliness at bay for one evening was bliss. She’d probably say yes to anything she proposed, at this point.

She smiled, squirming slightly closer to her on the bed. “Were you poor?”

“Yes,” she said without hesitation, and without expression. Actually, the answer to that question was complicated, but that was why this short-answer format was good. “Were you?”

“Nope. Rich. Disgustingly rich.”

She grinned at the thought and rolled to face her, to see her expression. She was grinning, too. “What’s that like?” she asked eagerly.

“It was awesome. That was two questions; now I get to ask you two.”

She subsided. “Oh. Sorry ….”

She squirmed still closer. Their arms were touching. “What are your siblings’ names?”

“I just have one. Her name is Alison.”

“Older or younger?”

“Older by four years.”

“Were you close?”

“That’s three questions.”

“No, I was catching up on the two questions you asked me, then asking my question.”

“I think your math is off ….”

“Just answer!”

Samara thought about Alison, and a lump appeared in her throat. She had to breathe and get a handle on herself a long few seconds before she could answer. “Yeah, we were close.”

She seemed to realize she’d hit a nerve. She touched her arm with a finger. “Sorry,” she said softly.

“It’s okay,” she said quickly, unable to stand the idea of making her feel bad when she was so nice to her. “It’s just … I wasn’t supposed to go to college; they see it as a betrayal, like I abandoned them. I expected my dad to disown me for it, but … but not Alison.”

Her face was only a few inches away. She stroked her cheek. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“It’s okay. It’s just … hard to talk about.”

“I know. I’m sorry for asking. I’m sorry for making you talk when you didn’t want to.”

“Please don’t apologize; you didn’t know. I’m just happy to be here with you right now. After everything, it feels so good–”

Her grinning face was revealed once it was gone, beautiful and fragile and vulnerable. It stopped her short. She hung her head, trying to catch her breath. “I don’t even know your name,” she said finally.

“Amy,” she said, looking confused. The mask was beginning to return.

“I’m Samara,” she said, rolling off her.

“What–what happened? Why–?”

“Amy. This isn’t a good idea.”

“Why not?” she said, beginning to sound offended.

“I, uh … am a mess, as you’ve seen. I don’t know what you were hoping for, but … you know, I’m not sure I’m even friend material. And … I’m not really a … good person.”

“Well, neither am I!” she retorted, as if her minor infractions of the rules of etiquette somehow made her really bad news.

“Yes, you are,” she said softly. Her hopeful, vulnerable face was all she could see, even with her eyes closed and her head in her hands.

“How can you say stuff like that and expect me not to want to be your friend?” she demanded, and Samara couldn’t help but laugh a little.

“Amy, I want to be your friend too. It’s been a while since I had a friend; it would be nice.”

Amy was on her instantly, hugging her feverishly. “We’ll be friends,” she murmured. “Best friends. Friends with benefits. Friends with the full package of benefits: dental, vision ….”

Samara grinned against her hug feeling happier than she’d been in all the time since she left home. “You do realize,” she murmured softly as she fished around for another piece of pizza, “you’re my first friend here.”

Amy tittered gleefully. “You’re such a fu*king liar!”

“No …. I’ve done a lot of stuff, but … I didn’t really want to. Moving around a lot because we were trying to stay one step ahead of the creditors meant that we couldn’t really form deep connections y’know? This is the first time I’ve known where I’ll be a year from now.” It pierced her heart to know it; especially with the hole of Alison’s absence in her life.

“Well in that case, I’m glad to have the honor,” Amy said.

She couldn’t resist her anymore. Even if she hadn’t been so lonely and fragile about her family, the tenderness of her touch would have overwhelmed her, as would her echoes of her loneliness. Her whole life had been brutality. This was a sweetness she’d never expected to experience in this world. She wasn’t even sure it existed. Alison had had their mom, at least for a little while; she’d known the gentleness of a mother who loved her. Samara had only had Dad and Alison, rough and tumble and afraid of their feelings. Samara hadn’t realized she’d been starving for simple affection all her life until she got her very first taste. They fell into a food coma soon after.

She and Amy were still all wrapped up together, asleep, when Samara’s phone rang the next morning. She fought her way out from under the covers (this must be why hustlers generally shunned them) and grabbed madly for her pants, managing to get to her phone out of her pocket before it stopped ringing, but she didn’t have time to see who was on the caller ID. first. “Hello?” she gasped.

A pause, then Alison’s voice: Guarded. Cool. “Samara.”

“Alison?!”

There was a long moment when neither of them said anything. All Samara could think about was how happy she was to know her sister was on the other end of the line, whatever she might say to Samara in a few seconds. “Yeah,” Alison said carefully at last.

“How–how are you? How’s Dad?”

“Dad’s … well, you know. And me, I’m … fine.” Samara’s face creased. That didn’t sound good, but she couldn’t be sure exactly what it meant; Alison had never talked like that before. “What about you?” Her voice sounded strained. “How’s college girl? You there with some frat boy ass?”

Maybe Amy could hear what Alison was saying; she smirked where she still lay on the bed. Samara made an irritated noise and turned away slightly. “That’s an offensive term, Alison,” she said, lowering her voice.

Alison snickered, but her heart wasn’t in it. “You really are. Now I know why you left. I guess.”

Samara was all the more irritated. “I didn’t go to college so I could get laid.”

“Yeah? Then why the fu*k did you? Why, Samara? All of a sudden, I find you climbing out our bedroom window, no warning, no nothing?”

Samara got out of the bed and tried to stand in the far corner for some privacy, but it was a dorm room, so this was only about three feet away from where she’d been before. She lowered her voice further, also knowing this would accomplish nothing, but she couldn’t very well go out into the hall of the girls’ dorm naked. “Alison, you know I’ve wanted to get away forever. And you knew I wanted to go to college!”

“So, what, you don’t even tell us? What if I hadn’t caught you, Samara? You were gonna ditch out and that was it, no note, no explanation, you’re just gone?!”