AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“We need to talk.”
“No.” I turned to her, callous and disgusted. “We don’t.” I walked away from her, wondering who I had to kill first for letting my cheating ex-girlfriend into the damn locker room. My fingers wrapped around the doorframe, balancing my weight as I spun out of the doorway.
“I’m pregnant,” she called after me. Her voice was an acid curdled in my throat, something I couldn’t cough to clear.
The last five minutes included my boss telling me there’d been a mistake with the Reserves schedule, me getting ready to tell Lizzie we weren’t getting out of bed for a week the moment I got home, and now this. I had to be hallucinating.
“It’s yours, Noah,” she announced, as though it was something to celebrate. I turned from the doorway, finding it difficult to take my hand off the doorframe, as if the future was telling me to step the hell away from Callie.
“Callie,” I clenched my jaw, her name sickening me, “I haven’t seen you in months. The last time we slept together, we used protection because you switched pills. I’m not a fucking idiot. Get the hell out of here.” I started to sweat beyond the response to my workout, while she stared at me. Her eyes widened, examining my body before narrowing onto the calla lily and roses on my stomach.
“Go back to your boyfriend, Callie,” I admonished, turning once more. Her cold fingers wrapped around my forearm, burning the mermaid Lizzie loved.
“Please, Noah. Can we talk about this? I’m terrified.” I peeled her fingers from my arm, stepping within an inch of her. She smelled the same, like the alcohol of perfume and no fragrance. I didn’t know what I even saw in her or what I hoped to have found in her.
“There’s no way your baby is mine, Callie. You sleep with anyone under the sun,” I reminded her, winking like an asshole. She took my hand from my side and held it to her stomach, fanning my fingers along the small bump. I studied my hand against her, its tattooed enormity entirely out of place against the body of another woman.
“It’s yours,” she repeated, unfolding her cold hand over mine. “It’s almost five months along.”
My hand to her stomach, I rolled my eyes up to hers. “Five months? What the hell, Callie? How could you not have known?”
“I’ve never been regular.” She shrugged. “I didn’t think anything of it until two months ago.”
“Have you been to a doctor?” She shook her head in response, and I pulled my hand away, almost flinching at the idea she could be carrying my child. There’s no way.What the hell do I tell Lizzie? How do I explain this? What do I even say? What do I do?
“Come on.” I nodded my head to the doorway, leading Callie down the hallway and into an exam room. I wasn’t a tech, but I could read an ultrasound, and I needed proof. She stood next to the bed, her fingers twisting at her waist.
“Now you’re being shy?” I mocked, hating her even more for ruining my life. “Lay down. Lift your shirt. I’m sure you’ve done that plenty in the last year.”
“Please,” she whimpered while climbing onto the bed, “do you have any idea how horrible I feel? I’m bringing a child into the world with a man who hates me, a man I hurt.”
“Just lay down, Callie,” I groaned, trying to treat her more like a patient than my nemesis. The baby was a baby, a harmless thing brought into this world through biology. It wasn’t the baby’s fault. The baby was innocent. I needed a mantra to keep my cool while rolling the wand over the small bump below her belly button. She muttered something about her apologies, playing the victim in all of it, and I ignored her, focused only on the small flutter of a fetus in my ex-girlfriend’s belly.
“You’re pregnant.” I gaped, overwhelmed with nausea.
“I told you,” she groaned. “Can we talk about this now?” I couldn’t focus my stare on anything, as my eyes were blurry and crossing, but I managed to hand Callie a tissue so she could wipe the jelly from her stomach before she pulled her shirt over the bump.
“Callie, I’m in love with someone,” I declared, backing away from her. I didn’t stop moving until my ass slammed into the cabinets against a wall behind me. “This is not happening.”
