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Standing outside of the bathroom door while she peed on two sticks, on what would change our future no matter how they responded, was almost unbearable. I didn’t know if I wanted to puke, but it sure felt like I did. Like my stomach was trying to crawl down my intestines and then back up through my throat.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Mandy opened the door.
Mandy
“Negative,” I informed Brett as I pulled open the bathroom door and held out the sticks for him to see.
I watched the emotions I was feeling play out on his face. First it was relief, then it was confusion… and was that a hint of disappointment? It couldn’t be.
The results should have been a huge relief, but it felt far from it. The tests read negative, but I still didn’t have a period. I knew until I started bleeding I wouldn’t feel an ounce of relief.
The not knowing was going to be another dark cloud hanging over me. Until I knew for sure that I wasn’t pregnant, I was going to be stuck in a what if I am pregnant type of purgatory
. My eyes ached from reading over the directions what must have been a million times. I couldn’t have felt more frustrated if the tests had come back reading: maybe.
Inwardly, I was willing my uterus to just fucking do something. I never thought I’d want to cramp so bad in my life. I was practically willing myself to bleed.
“So you’re not pregnant?” Brett asked, frowning as he looked down at the sticks but not taking them from me.
“I don’t know,” I answered him honestly. “I guess we’ll just have to wait some more and see.”
Brett stepped forward, grabbing the sticks out of my hand. He glanced down at them as if he too had to double check them then he tossed them into the trash bin. A moment later he was pulling me close, his arms enveloping me, wrapping me up in his strength.
“We’ll get through this,” he tried to reassure me and settled his chin on top of my head.
I wrapped my arms around his waist and pressed my face into his chest.
I wanted to believe him, I did. But I think something inside me just knew it was the beginning of our end.
Chapter Fifteen
Mandy
Two days. It took two more days for me to get my period, and I was so happy, so relieved, I almost threw a party to celebrate. It was after school when I started. I was actually in my room when the first cramp hit me. Once I confirmed what was happening and cleaned myself up, I immediately called Brett.
“Hey?” he answered.
“I just wanted to let you know I got my period!” I told him enthusiastically. I was so happy, I was dancing around my room while I was on the phone with him.
There was a long pause before he sighed with relief. “That’s great.”
“Fuck yeah, it is!”
My life wasn’t over. I wasn’t going to have to just give up all my dreams. I still had choices, I still got to prioritize me.
If I was pregnant, I’d love my baby, I would. I’d love them more than I loved myself, and I wouldn’t want them to ever grow up thinking they were a mistake. But when I had children, I wanted to be ready. I wanted to have my shit together. I wanted to actually know how to take care of them. And I wanted to be settled down and happily married to their daddy.
I guess I was just selfish like that.
Over the past couple of days, I spent the majority of my time thinking. What would I do if I was pregnant? Would I have to get a job right after graduation? Would Brett? Would he have to give up all his scholarships, or would we mooch off of our parents while he finished his degree? None of the options seemed appealing.
And as much as I tried, I just couldn’t think up a bright side of being teen parents, except for the awesome kid.
I knew any baby Brett and I had together would be awesome. I would love them to death. If I was pregnant for sure, I couldn’t even consider for a fraction of a second of trying to change it. But it made me sad to think Brett and I wouldn’t necessarily be the best parents because, by starting off with nothing, we would both be struggling for some time until we could comfortably support our child.
And don’t get me wrong, I knew Brett would be a good dad. If he was half as good to our baby as he was good to me, he would be the best dad ever. But he would have to sacrifice a great deal in the process. And it pained me deeply to think he would have to give up so much because I fucked up and put him in that position. Because of me.
There was also this deeply buried fear inside me that kept boiling up to the surface. I knew becoming a mother would change me, and that necessarily wasn’t a bad thing. Grace, she seemed to be handling her situation… well, gracefully. She glowed with her pregnancy, and now that she had fully accepted she was going to have a baby, she was trying to change her dreams and incorporate Carson into them. I was so fucking proud of her. But what if I wasn’t like Grace?
