So I continued, “At the pharmacy. I was being weird and sending you off to get drinks because I was buying a pregnancy test, and I was scared to tell you.”
That time I got a reaction.
His hands dropped from their spot on my stomach, and he moved to lean on the bar beside me. His eyes searched my face, and I thought the silence would kill me, tie my windpipe into a pretty little bow, and suffocate my brain.
“Say something.”
He opened his mouth, but nothing came out for several long seconds until, “You’re pregnant?”
Okay. Correction. Say something that actually gives me a clue as to how you’re going to react.
“I don’t know. I’m late. I think. It could be nothing. ”
“Or it could be something.”
Damn it, why couldn’t I read his inflection?
“It could be. Because . . . well . . . I forgot to refill my prescription. For the Pill. Things got busy, and it slipped my mind. It’s still so new to me, and I—”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
I was going to go crazy if he didn’t say something more definitive soon. I sighed and looked out at the city. We’d just reached the peak of the wheel, and the pod gave a panorama view of the city. I gripped the bar that kept people back from the glass and said, “I was scared. The thought of having a kid is scary. I still feel like a kid myself sometimes. And we both work so much, our apartment is tiny, we live in this huge, sometimes dangerous city that we can barely afford already, and we’ve not really talked about having kids. When they do get mentioned it’s this vague, far-off thing in the future, and I didn’t know how you would feel. So I was going to wait until I knew for sure. Or until I could get home to look at my calendar.”
“But?”
My breathing was too loud in my ears, almost deafening. “But I didn’t want to be scared alone.”
His hands cradled my face, and he touched his forehead to mine. My breath hitched. He said, “You don’t ever have to be.”
I let out a small sob and held tight to him. He lowered one hand to my waist, his thumb brushing over my belly.
“Do you think . . . Do you feel like you are?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “I can’t tell. I’m exhausted, but that could just be jet lag. I’m emotional, but that could be because I’m a social cripple who breaks expensive vases as a first impression. And I did get sick yesterday, but only once, so that could have just been the fatigue and shock.”
He nodded, this time slipping his hand beneath my shirt to touch my stomach.
“If I am . . .”
“Then everything will be okay. All of those things you said are true, but we’ll be okay. You will be an extraordinary mother, and we’ll do whatever it takes to take care of our child.” He smiled and shook his head, “Our child. Wow. That’s what’s was bothering you yesterday?”
I nodded, and he exhaled in relief. That was a good thing, right?
“Does that mean you’re okay with this?” My heart was skipping.
“It means I love you and want to marry you and call you the mother of my child. It doesn’t matter to me what order it happens in.”
I leaned my head down against his chest, and suddenly the weight of my body felt like too much. His hand slid around to my back, and he pulled me in until my stomach pressed against his. I let him support more of my weight and said, “We do have a tendency to do things out of order.”
“The world has given us plenty of surprises, but each one has turned out better than the last. I have no doubt that this will be the same.”
He lifted my head up and caught my lips in a kiss.
We spent the rest of the ride ignoring the skyline for each other, and by the time the pod let us off back on solid earth, a really small part of me was actually beginning to hope for that plus sign.
11
Garrick
“THANK YOU FOR squeezing me in today, Mr. Woods. I really appreciate your time.” He stood from behind his massive black desk, and came around to meet me.
“Nonsense. Anything for the Taylors. I’m just glad you decided to reconsider. You’ll call me after you’ve talked to your fiancée?”
“Yes sir. I’ll talk to her tonight.”
“Fantastic. I think this could be a really good match, Garrick.”
“Thank you, sir. I’ll give you a call tomorrow.”
A knot sat heavy in my stomach as I entered the elevator, and rode down the thirty-seven floors back down to the lobby. It had started yesterday when I’d called to set up the interview, and now it felt like it took up my entire midsection. Maybe it had actually started on the Eye. Or when Bliss took that first test, which had been negative. I’d almost canceled the appointment, but the instructions on the pregnancy test box suggested taking multiple tests, so I’d gone out to get another one.
That one had been positive.
Bliss took two more this morning, both negative, and we eventually decided that we were just testing too early. She wasn’t sure exactly how many days she was late, but she guessed just a few, and everything we saw on the Internet suggested testing after a week.
So we decided to wait.
That seemed to be a staple in our relationship.
But whether she was pregnant or not, that didn’t change the facts.
She was about to be my wife. We didn’t have the money for a child any more than we had the money for a big wedding or a honeymoon. Neither of us had health insurance.