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I get up and make my way to the bathroom, paper bag in hand and an over-eager Heather in tow. It’s a path I’ve walked hundreds of times, but it feels decidedly longer today.
A part of me feels bad for taking this pregnancy test without Peter, but there’s a bigger part that knows it’s better to save the drama, whatever it might be, until I know exactly what I’m dealing with.
If it’s negative, then all this anxiety and terrifying anticipation will have been for nothing. Better to have it be just me freak out than have it all doubled by including Peter.
And if it’s positive...well, I haven’t really thought that far. I do know that I want Peter’s baby. Nothing would make me happier than to have a family with him. We both come from various versions of dysfunction and it would be amazing to get the chance to be the kind of family to our kids that we’d dreamed of having ourselves.
But there’s my mom and his dad, who still have no clue that we’re a couple, let alone living together. And of course, there’s the small matter of my crazed stalker who’s still out there somewhere. So, if the test is positive, it’ll be the worst timing ever. Would Peter even want to venture through this whole new dynamic with me?
“Wish me luck,” I say, going into the bathroom.
“Sure. What are we wishing for?”
I sigh heavily. “That an asteroid hits the planet and blows all of humanity to smithereens before I can finish peeing on this stick.”
Heather crosses the fingers on both her hands and says, “Asteroids ahoy, baby!”
I’m lying in bed watching TV whe
n I hear the key in the front door. I quickly grab the remote and turn off the show that I wasn’t really watching in the first place. If Peter came in and asked what it was, I seriously wouldn’t be able to tell him.
It was merely background noise for the gamut of emotions storming through me. My first choice was Crichton’s Andromeda Evolution, but I couldn’t get myself to focus. So, after spending ten minutes trying to read a single paragraph, I gave up.
Now I pick up the book again and open it to a random page. Peter’s muffled footsteps are getting closer, and my heart feels like it’s about to pound its way clean out of my chest.
“There you are,” he says, as he appears in the doorway of our bedroom.
I sit up and ,out of habit, lay the book face down on the bed beside me. That’s how much I’m freaking out; I’m careful to save my place in a book I’m not even reading.
“Here I am. How was your day?”
He bends over to kiss me. Once on the mouth, and once on my forehead.
“It was a good one,” he says, sitting on the edge of the bed where he starts to kick out of his shoes. “Let me grab a beer, and I’ll come back to tell you how good of a day it was.” He bounces up off the bed and turns to me, unbuttoning his shirt. “Do you want anything?”
I look up at him and shake my head. It’s like all my words have been used up.
“You okay?” Peter studies me with narrow eyes. I shrug, and plaster a smile on my face to sell it. “You sure?” I nod.
He doesn’t seem very convinced and looks at me a second longer. Thankfully, the dull snap of a button popping off distracts him.
“Crap,” he says, holding the disc between his fingers. “They don’t make things the way they used to. Ah, well, nothing lasts forever, I guess.”
Peter tosses the button onto my bedside table and then turns to leave. He makes it all the way to the door before he freezes in place. Then he starts to turn back, slowly, and his face is scrunched in pure confusion.
“What’s that?” He points to the pregnancy test lying on my bedside table. His button had landed right next to it.
Here we go.
I take a deep breath. “It’s a pregnancy test.”
His eyes grow wide, and he starts approaching the test with the kind of trepidation you’d expect if it were a real live snake. His gaze is fixed on it, while I can’t tear my eyes away from his face, while I desperately try to get a handle on what he’s thinking and feeling.
“Is it—what are those—what do the lines mean?”
“It’s positive,” I say. My voice is barely above a whisper.
Peter rakes his fingers through his hair and blows out a long, heavy breath. “Wow,” he says, and hundreds of emotions play across his face at the same time.
