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I, on the other hand, still need to wrap my mind around the idea of being pregnant, especially the part about Blake Bourgeois being a doting father and fake boyfriend.
He drives away, and I stumble back to bed and lie face-down. (He struts, I stumble. That’s how this goes.) I’m going to be late for work, but I need a minute to collect my thoughts.
Because I’m pregnant. Me—Loren Agnes Reed—with child. Knocked up. Pregananant.Pregnanté.
I am literally growing a whole-ass baby inside of me, as we speak.
It’s already both the most terrifying and exciting thing I’ve ever experienced. I’m responsible for another human forever, and at the same time, I don’t have to be alone anymore. I’m pretty sure I already love him or her more than anything in the world too. It’s the strangest feeling, to love someone I don’t even know yet to such a great extent, but it’s absolutely real.
I roll over and wipe the tears from my cheeks, then I allow my hands to travel down and cup my stomach. The thought occurs that I’m going to have to buy maternity clothes and go on leave from work, not to mention all of the other expenses, like diapers and car seats and medical bills.
But I suppose I’m lucky Blake will want to help financially.
I shake off the negative stuff and go back to the fun parts. “Are you a little prince or a little princess?” I whisper, cradling my belly again. My face softens as I picture a toddler version of myself, and then a blond-haired, blue-eyed miniature Blake pops into my mind.
My chest constricts. At least there’s a good chance that my baby will be gorgeous, given that half of the gene pool. Not to mention smart, talented, and athletically inclined.
“Blake. Freaking. Bourgeois. Let that sink in,” I murmur to myself.
Never, not in a million-billion years, could I have imagined this reality. There are so many layers to this scenario that seem impossible: Blake and I hooking up, me getting pregnant, Blake reacting calmly and supportively, and, finally, Blake hinting around that he wants more from me than just an address for a child-support check.
Am I crazy for thinking he sounded disappointed about us not being an actual couple this morning?
It may have taken me a while to fill in the blanks about the night we slept together, but I don’t think I could forget any of it now. The memory of his attempt to convey he’d wanted more than a single night in bed had been hazy at first. But I felt like the world’s biggest jerk once I finally remembered the moment he turned to me with his chest still heaving and hope in his eyes to ask, “Now what? Where do we go from here?” And when I’d brushed him off, he made me promise we would talk about it in the morning. But I’d broken that promise by asking to leave as soon as we woke up and telling him that he didn’t have to pretend he had any feelings for me.
I cringe as I revisit the expression on his face while I failed miserably to be self-deprecating and funny that next morning. But it’s not like I could believe Blake’s been harboring some long-term crush on me or that physical intimacy means anything to him, not with his track record. And even if either of those were true, he’s had every opportunity to prove me wrong since then. Besides, we’re too old for silly crushes, making each other jealous, or thinking about first kisses.
None of that even matters anymore, because now we’re having a freaking baby together.
And I know the ground rules are stupid, but I panicked. I needsomeform of protection. The man is ridiculously gorgeous, intelligent, funny,andnow the father of my child. Plus, he’s secretly sensitive, sweet, and wants to take care of me?
My face falls again when I realize what this all means. I’ve doomed myself to a lifetime of being stuck in don’t-fall-for-him mode. And as daunting as single motherhood seems, I can’t imagine it’ll be as difficult as not getting my heart broken by Mr. Golden Ratio.
That’s why I decided this morning: I cannot allow myself to enjoy any “benefits” with Blake. I’ll have to keep my distance, because pining over him at our kid’s birthday parties and when we meet up to swap custody for the weekend would be the worst way for this to end, aside from guilting him into a relationship and eventually growing to detest one another once he gets bored with me.
I’m not going to let us turn into my parents, who were coerced into a trip to the altar while they were still in high school when my mom got pregnant with Lilley, only to become trapped in a marriage filled with more resentment than love. Years later, by the time they got around to having Landry and me, they’d already started blaming one another for their unhappiness, my mom self-medicating with alcohol and my dad living vicariously through whichever one of his football players showed the most promise at the time. I’d rather live alone than risk raising my own child in that environment.
I think back on the first time I asked my mother why she drank so much. I was ten. She’d told me she was sad about all the mistakes she had made and that the drinking helped her sleep better at night. I’d walked away, thinking about what she meant and eventually settling on the notion that I was one of those mistakes.
One day I asked her again, this time in the middle of an angry rant. Well, actually, I’d screamed a rhetorical, “Why can’t you just stop being a freaking drunk and be normal for once?” as I helped her to bed after a particularly bad binge. In hindsight, I think she’d started adding prescription meds to her cocktails by then.
“Because I can’t make him love me,” she’d murmured before passing out. My dad hadn’t even come home that night. I bet he’d slept in his office at school.
I just wish she could have seen that I felt the same way, that I only needed her to be present to feel loved.
I sniffle and turn to dry my face on the blankets, and for the first time, I have an inkling of understanding and even sympathy for my mother. It’s also a bittersweet confirmation that keeping things platonic with Blake is my only option. Now, as a mother, I recognize that my greatest obligation is to be there for my kid. I’m not willing to jeopardize my ability to be a supportive parent, no matter the cost. And there’s nothing I won’t sacrifice to be among the crowd, cheering on my son on the day of his graduation, or to be the one holding my daughter’s hand when she finds out she’s pregnant.
If that means I’m relegating myself to spend the second half of my life as lonely as the first, so be it. At least I’ll have one kid, which is more than I expected. And I’ll have a friend in Blake.
CHAPTER 10
Loren
THIRTEEN YEARS AGO
“Hey, Reed,”I hear a deep voice drawl when I open the front door.
I groan at the way Blake Bourgeois’ large form takes up most of the opening. He’s wearing a pair of athletic shorts and a Camellia High football T-shirt that’s just tight enough to show off his muscles. His dirty blond hair is still damp as if he’s come straight from the shower. He smirks, revealing just a sliver of his perfect teeth, and I want to slam the door in his face for being so darn attractive.
