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Lola snapped her fingers. “Hello, space cadet.”
“Sorry,” I said. “Just trying to think.”
“Well, what’s that about two heads being better than one? Tell me what’s happening. We’ll figure it out.”
I stood up, then sat down, with nowhere to go. I shuffled my feet on the carpet to vent my frustration. It didn’t work very well, and I huffed a harsh breath.
“I don’t know what happened,” I said at last. “It started so simple, just this fun fling. We’d go and play squash, then go home and make out. Try and sneak in a quick one before our roommate got home. It felt like a game until somehow it wasn’t.”
“You caught feelings,” said Lola.
I shook my head. “More than that. I think the feelings were always there, at least on my end. Ever since I met Spencer, he made me feel safe. I always felt good with him, like I could be myself. You wouldn’t think he’d be funny, but he makes me laugh. He’s so warm, good-natured. He never gets mean. He’d be such a good father, but…”
“A father?” Lola gasped. “Izzy? Are you pregnant?”
I couldn’t look at her. I stared at my feet. “I don’t know what happened. We used protection every time.”
“Yeah, but nothing’s one hundred percent.”
I chuckled without humor. She could say that again. I’d taken three more tests in case that applied to them too, but they’d all come back with the same result: two lines. Plus signs. I was one hundred percent pregnant, no doubt about that.
“Have you told him?”
I bit my lip. “No.”
“Well, why not?”
I felt like an idiot telling her the truth. “Because I’ve fallen hard for him. I’ve been having these dreams. We’re together, a family, me and him and our kid, and everything’s perfect. Everything’s great. As long as I don’t tell him, that could still happen. He could still sweep me up when I tell him the news, and ask me to marry him, and swear he’s all in. That could all still be real till the moment I tell him. Then he’ll say something back to me, and it might not be that. It might be something awful, like ‘are you sure it’s mine?’ Or he might walk away from me, or pull out his checkbook.”
“Or he might not.” Lola got up from her vanity and edged around the sofa bed. She sat down beside me and set her hand on my shoulder. “I haven’t met Spencer, but I know you pretty well. You know a jerk when you see one. You wouldn’t fall for some loser.”
“I don’t know,” I said. I buried my face in my hands. “He said things the other night, when we broke up. Things I’d never have thought would come out of his mouth. He practically blamed me for his game going south.”
“That’s different,” said Lola. “That was a breakup. People get hurt, they say all kinds of things. But a baby is different. A baby’s good news.”
“To you and me, maybe. But what if he doesn’t want one? Or what if he does, but not with me?”
Lola rubbed circles high on my back. “What’s the absolute worst he could say if you told him?”
I bit my lip. “I don’t know. The possibilities are endless. Every time I think I’ve come to the worst, I find a whole worse worst buried under that.”
“That’s the thing with these rabbit holes. They go on forever. Once you tell him, you’ll know, and you can move on from there. Until you do that, you’re stuck with all of those worsts.”
I wanted to argue, but I knew she was right. Spencer did need to know, and sooner was better. But if he did let me down, my heart would just break.
“He might surprise you,” said Lola. “Or, hell, not surprise you. You’ve known him what now, going on ten years?”
“Yeah, around that. We met back in college.”
“So think of the man you’ve known that whole time. The one who’s been your friend, who’s been there through so much. Would he want to hurt you? Has he ever before?”
I let my hands drop into my lap. “No, not on purpose. I mean, we’ve had our moments. We’ve disagreed here and there, sometimes quite loudly, but we've always cooled down and figured it out.”
Lola nudged me in the arm. “And how about now? Your head feeling cooler?”
I started to say it wasn’t — I was still pissed — but the truth was, my anger had mostly burned out. What I felt now was sadness and hurt and confusion. Why had Spencer, of all people, pushed me away? It felt weird not talking, not having him around. Not shooting him a text when I heard something funny. Maybe Spencer was the same by now, feeling my absence. Feeling stupid and dickish for the things he’d said.
Or maybe he wasn’t.
