Netta held the pregnancy test up. ‘Nope.’
‘Oh.’
Pete came and sat beside her on the couch, taking the test from her hand, inspecting the lonely blue line that had all but leapt off the stick and punched Netta in the heart two hours earlier. He said nothing, but pulled her in and held her close, and the intimacy of the gesture cracked something open in Netta. She leaned into him as another torrent of hot tears came, seeping into Pete’s shoulder. Surely it shouldn’t still hurt this much the sixth time around? A callus should’ve grown, shouldn’t it, protecting her from repeated injury? But every time it happened, she shattered into smaller and smaller pieces, the disappointment and fear just as raw every time.
‘It’s okay.’ Pete stroked her hair away from her face and thumbed a tear from her cheek. ‘If it’s meant to be, it’ll happen. This just wasn’t our month.’
‘It’s never our month, though, is it?’ Netta shook her head sadly, fidgeting with the fabric of her sleeve. ‘Maybe I’m just too old. I’m forty in a couple of months. I should go and get tests done. You too. Just to see what’s going on.’
‘We didn’t wait too long. It’ll be okay.’ He grabbed a cushion and leaned it against his leg, motioning for Netta to place her head on it, then pulled a blanket from the back of the couch. He arranged it over her, tucking her in with care. They sat together like that until the room was dim, Netta curled into a ball.
‘I need a shower,’ Pete said eventually, gesturing at his gym clothes. ‘Will you be alright for a few minutes? I can wait if you want.’
Netta shook her head and offered him a watery smile. ‘It’s fine. Go.’
Pete flicked the lamp on, bathing the room in a warm glow, and put the television remote within her reach. ‘Won’t be long.’
As she watched him leave the room, Netta took a deep, shuddery breath and clutched the blanket to her chest, her toes curling beneath it against the anguish coursing through her body. It wasn’t fair. Freya had gotten pregnant by accident the first time. By contrast, Netta had been diligent to the point of scientific about conception and itstillhadn’t happened.
It was another sign, she thought, that she’d made the right decision about not going to England to return the diary. Her life was complicated enough; if she was ever going to have a baby, getting pregnant needed her undivided focus. Going back there and stirring up the past would be idiotically stressful, and acute stress was something she knew could affect conception.
She sat and pulled her knees up, making herself as small as she could, and picked up the remote. She took a deep, grounding breath, her lungs barely emptied when Pete’s phone chirped from the couch, where it had slid, undetected, from the pocket of his gym shorts.
A message lit up the screen.
I’ve been thinking about you too, gorgeous.
What? Netta snatched the phone up and read it again before the screen faded to black. Who the hell was Tracey?
A second message chimed through.
And I’ve been thinking about our chat a lot. If you’re not sure you still want a baby, you need to tell her.
Netta’s stomach nose-dived as her body swarmed with adrenalin, her skin suddenly covered in goosebumps. She sat stock still, the phone balanced on her now limp hand. Pete was having an affair. She stood abruptly, went to the kitchen and dumped his phone on the dining table.
She wasn’t pregnant.
Pete was being unfaithful.
Thiswas why he’d been so nice lately. To counter his guilt.
She wrenched open the fridge door and reflexively pulled out an opened bottle of wine, desperate for any kind of buffer.
‘Wanna watch something before we go to bed?’ Pete asked, appearing at the kitchen door. ‘Ooh, I’ll have a wine if you’re pouring.’
Turning, Netta looked him dead in the eye and pushed his phone across the table with her forefinger. ‘You got a message,’ she said flatly. ‘Two, actually.’
‘They can wait. C’mon, bring the wine. Let’s watch anotherBreaking Bad.’
Netta replaced the wine and let the fridge door swing shut. ‘They’re from Tracey.’
A brief flash of terror commandeered Pete’s face before he regained composure. He swiped the phone from the table and punched in his code. His belly contracted with a sudden exhale as he read the messages. ‘I can explain.’
‘Please do.’ It seemed ludicrous that earlier that same evening, Netta had been waiting on the results of a pregnancy test, and now she was bracing to hear an affair confession. ‘Who’s Tracey?’
‘She’s from work. Nothing’s happened,’ he said, miserably. ‘I can promise you I haven’t touched her.’
‘But you want to?’
