Page 76 of The Virgin Playboy

#1. Because you’re you

#2. Your wakeup voice

#3. Your laugh

#4. You love Autumn above all else

#5. You scrunch your nose when something’s too sweet

As they went on, they got more complex…

#204. I’m the man I want to be when I’m with you

#381. You don’t make me feel less than for not being the loudest man in the room

#420. Even when you’re not sure about the future, you still picture me in it

That one had me in my emotions a bit. I did like seeing in my future. I just wasn’t sure we could make room for each other. Even though he was actively loving me despite being a work in progress. If I didn’t stop reading these, I was going to bawl out for sure. My sinuses were already closing up and I didn’t want my parents to know I’d been crying.

Meeting my folks downstairs, I wiped away the show of tears, but it was easier to keep my face dry with a window open or two. Something did smell a little funky.

“You okay, baby? We've already got the fan going⁠—”

“Maybe it’s your trash, but it just smells a little sour in here, I’ll just take it—” but in my attempt to take out the trash, all I’d found was a freshly placed bag. If it wasn’t the trash, where was the rotting smell coming from?

“Your mother already set the table. If you want, you can pour up the—” but dad hadn’t even finished the sentence before I was heaving into the empty trash. Mom rushed over to me, even if just to assist with keeping my hair back, but I was mortified.

“Don't take this the wrong way, Dad, but you must have changed something up in your recipe, because it smells awful,” the smell intensifying when he lifted the lid to check on it.

“I know you're not talking about my pepper pot stew? Only thing I did different was add seafood,” he admitted.

“It had to be something,” I said, rinsing my mouth out with tap water. “But I could just have food poisoning.”

“Either that, or you're pregnant,” my mother took a guess. The both of us just looked at her like she was crazy. “What? I wasn't gonna say anything, but had a dream about fishes the other day,” she admitted.

"Darling, are you okay?” My dad went over to comfort me.

“I was until mom said I could be pregnant,” I whined.

“I didn't say anything. Just a guess and a dream about fishes,” her attempt to dismiss.

“It might explain why every room you've been in, has been cold as ice. Morning sickness will make all your favorite smells smell like waste.”

“This can't be happening!” I yelled to no one in particular.

“Well, you won't know until you take a test.” And that was exactly what I planned to do. I just wasn't sure I could do it by myself.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Jaq

All it took was a four-word statement in our group chat to have my friends fired up and lining up at my door the minute I got back from my parents.

I might be pregnant…

I had never seen bitches move so fast, arriving at my house with so many damn tests, that the options just overwhelmed me. Once I took it, I would know, and I'd have to contemplate my options. Knowing for sure made it real.

“Honestly, I've never even been with a guy long enough to make a mistake like this,” I admitted.