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“Okay? And am I going to drop dead in the next six months or something?”
She lets out a nervous chuckle, which in turn makes me more than a bit nervous. Something is wrong. I can hear it in her voice. Tendrils of ice crawl up my back and I shudder, wondering what in the hell is wrong with me.
“Tell me,” I say.
“Maybe we should get together –”
“We will,” I promise. “But I need to know what you've found, Olivia.”
“Emily, I don't think we should talk about this on the phone.”
“You can't just drop something like that and not tell me,” I protest. “I need to know. Tell me, Olivia.”
There's a long pause on the other end of the line. My imagination fills in the void, convincing me I have anything from MS to cancer to any number of other horrible, deadly diseases. My stomach is churning, and I feel like I'm standing on the edge of a panic attack with the slightest nudge toppling me down into that abyss.
I hear her sigh before she speaks. “Emily, you're pregnant.”
My stomach, which had been merely churning, lurches. I almost throw up right then and there. I taste the bile in the back of my throat, but manage to hold it in. My head is spinning, and I stand there, staring at my phone in a state of utter disbelief.
Surely, I had to have heard her wrong. Right? There's no way I can be pregnant. Aaron and I have only had sex what, a few times? And we've been safe. I use the pill! I know it only takes once, as the old saying goes, but come on. The odds of me getting pregnant while having had sex so few times, combined with the fact that I always take my contraception would have to be astronomical. I think I'd have better odds of getting hit by lightning while being eaten by a shark while I have the winning lottery ticket in my hand.
But I guess another astronomical chance happened, too, when Aaron and I found our way back into each other’s lives in the first place.
“That can't be right, Olivia,” I beg. “Seriously, that can't possibly be right.”
“The test is definitive, honey,” she tells me, her voice filled with compassion. “We ran it twice, just to be sure.”
I put my hand to my head in a lame effort to keep it from spinning. Fearing I might just pass out and topple over, I drop down into a chair at the patio table, setting my phone down in front of me. I stare at it for a long moment, trying to wrap my head around the news. I can't believe it. I just can't fucking believe it.
“Emily, I have to run, but let's get together soon – very soon – so we can talk options.”
Olivia is speaking quickly, but I'm barely hearing her anyway. My mind is still caught up in those three completely life-altering, world-shattering words –Emily, you're pregnant. The implications and ramifications are enormous. I have never felt so overwhelmed in my entire life.
“Options?” I mutter numbly.
“Yeah, options. We'll talk, honey,” she tells me. “Until then, just keep your chin up, Emily. Everything is going to be okay. I promise you.”
“Yeah, thanks,” I croak and disconnect the call.
How in the hell will everything be okay? My entire life is in flaming pieces. I can't see how anything will ever be okay again. As if I didn't have enough problems on my plate right now, adding an unexpected and unplanned pregnancy takes the shitshow that is my life to an entirely different level.
All my thoughts, hopes, and dreams of being able to return to law school, of being able to finish what I started, and reclaim the life I'd been denied because of my father's issues are now gone. Dead. And I'll never be able to resuscitate them again.
While what I'm earning at Frontline would have given me enough to go back to school, adding a kid and all of the expenses that go with it to the mix makes that plan dead on arrival. Fuck. What in the hell am I going to do? How can my life possibly get any more screwed up than it is right now?
It's then I hear the crunch of broken glass beneath his foot and turn around to find myself staring into Aaron's bottomless blue eyes. My first thought was to question how much he'd heard. My second thought was that given the expression on his face, he'd heard plenty. Probably all of it. And as that realization sinks into my head, I feel a surge of panic like nothing I've ever felt before.
Clearly, the universe was answering my question by showing me that it can be even more screwed up than ever before.
“Aaron, I –”
“Pregnant,” he whispers.
I wasn't sure my heart could sink any lower, but as it descends further, I see that it obviously can. I don't know what to say. Hell, I don't even know what to think right now. The expression on Aaron's face is one of shock and horror, to say the least. Clearly, he needs this unplanned pregnancy even less than I do right now.
“Jesus,” he says, running a hand through his hair.
I sit back in the chair and look at him as his face goes through the various stages of shock, fear, and grief. He knows his life is about to change every bit as much as mine is – and he's clearly not handling it any better than I am.
