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CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Melody
Lena and Gabrielle stood just outside the bathroom door. I could hear them talking, but I couldn’t make out anything they were saying. I rinsed out my mouth and washed my face and hands then stared at the pale, pasty face in the mirror. Damn flu. God, I hated being sick. This would make leaving now really difficult. I didn’t want to sit in the truck for three or four hours. I felt bad for Ash. Brodie hadn’t been very receptive at all. Well, he had softened up a bit after Ash mentioned his mom dying, so I guess the guy wasn’t a total ass.
I flinched at the faint knock on the door.
I wasn’t sure I was ready to leave the bathroom just yet. I opened it slightly to see Lena and Gabrielle standing there.
“Um…can we come in?” Lena asked.
I opened the door the rest of the way, and they came in. Lena had an oblong shaped box in her hand. “We think you should use this.” I glanced at the box again. It was a pregnancy test. My heart skipped a beat.
I shook my head. “I can’t be pregnant. I’m on the pill,” I said defiantly.
“Well, sometimes things just happen. Pills get skipped or taken late. It can happen,” Gabrielle said.
“No. It can’t. Not to me, Gabrielle.”
“Just call me Gabby.”
“Okay.”
“Have you skipped any periods?”
“Um…it’s hard to tell since I don’t have regular periods. That’s why I was on the pill in the first place. But I can’t be pregnant. I’ve only just started having sex…” I thought about all the times over the past couple of days. We had done it about a month ago, but only once, well, three times that night. But I’d been sick on our way up here. “The first time was about four weeks ago. But I would know, right? I’d feel something.”
“That could be what this is all about,” Lena said, gesturing toward the toilet and I knew she meant the vomiting. “Are your breasts tender?”
I gave her a blank look and nodded. Remembering that I’d read that somewhere, but I thought mine were tender just from being touched so much recently, or from PMS. I searched my memory, thinking about the pills. Then it dawned on me. That night with Asher, I’d been so excited about doing it with him. And then after feeling so good and euphoric, I’d completely forgotten. Shit, shit, shit. I did skip one. Damnit, and it had been right after Ash and I had sex. Oh no!
“Oh, crap…I may have skipped a pill,” I said. “Can it happen that easily?” I had no clue about these things. I’d never had to worry about them before. I hadn’t considered that this would happen. I’d always thought I was safe with taking the pill. The nurse had told me that if I skipped one to just take it as soon as I remembered. But she didn’t mention not to have intercourse with anyone right around that time.
“Yeah, it can,” Lena said. “Here. Just stick this end under the stream of pee and then call us when you finish.”
They left me alone. I did need to pee, so that was lucky. If there wasanythinglucky about any of this. Maybe lucky was the wrong word. I pulled my jeans down and sat on the toilet, holding the stick under me as I tinkled on it. God, I wanted to cry.
After I had finished, I placed the stick on the counter and pulled up my pants. I opened the door and let the two women back in. I was grateful they were there, actually. I’d never had girlfriends, except for Erica. It was nice that they seemed so concerned for me and were willing to stand by me while I waited the three excruciatingly long minutes to see a plus or minus sign. I said a quick prayer for the negative one.
Lena stared at her cell phone’s timer. I watched the stick. When the little window showed a plus sign, my knees wobbled and I sank down on the closed toilet seat and cried. This was not supposed to happen.
Gabby put her hand on my shoulder. “It will be okay. First thing you need to do is tell Ash.”
I looked up at her and shook my head. “No. I can’t. I…I told him I was on the pill. He trusted me. I can’t tell him.”
“You need to tell him. He would want to know. Once you tell him, then we’ll all be able to figure out what to do,” Lena said.
I look at her through blurry tears. “All?”
“You’re family,” she said.
“But, you all just now found out that Asher is Brodie and Jackson’s brother.”
“I know my husband,” Lena said. “There is no way in hell he is going to let you and Asher just walk away now that he knows. Believe me, it’s not in his DNA.” She laughed.
“And Brodie is coming around. He’s not the big oaf he sometimes appears to be,” Gabby added. “You can trust us, Melody. We’re practically sisters.”
“But Asher and I aren’t married or anything.” I honestly didn’t know what we were anymore. Best friends, boyfriend and girlfriend, lovers, fuck buddies? What were we? I looked at my hands holding the stick with the looming plus sign. “Hell, we were only just best friends up until this week.”
