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“Earth to Jenna,” Meg interrupts.
“Sorry, what were you saying?”
“I was asking why you’d give up a chance like this, but you were all starry-eyed, probably thinking of your little high school boyfriend.”
“He wasn’t my boyfriend, ever. Technically.”
She rolls her eyes. “That’s weird. You guys never banged. You haven’t seen his dick and yet you’re ready to promise your life to him.”
“Maybe, I am. If—no,whenhe moves here and you meet him, you’ll see what I’m talking about. You’ll see why he’s better than any doctor you could scrounge up in this city.”
She shakes her headno. “I'd rather spend my weekends working hot surgeons.”
I stack the now neatly folded sheet on the pile and she tucks them into the cupboard. “And what if I don't go on this double date this weekend? Which eligible bachelor are you going to choose?”
Meg opens the next set of cabinet doors. “Who says I'm going to choose one?” She winks, trying to play it off as a joke but from what I've learned about Meg over the course of the last eight or so weeks, is she probably isn't kidding.
Meg continues to rattle but the vibration of my phone in my pocket steals my attention.
Emmett: I know you’re at work, but can we talk?
My stomach sinks, not liking the tone of his words. He never needs to talk “right now,” never sends such a cryptic text, and it has my mind racing. Is he hurt? Did he get injured at work? Is his family okay? Is someone sick?
I mumble to Meg that I have to make a call as I’m already halfway off the unit.
I peek in the locker room to find it empty, then pull up his name to dial as the door slams shut behind me and the overhead lights flicker on.
He answers on the first ring. “Hey.”
That voice. Normally calm, never scared. The voice of my rock sounds rushed and something else I can't quite place.
“What’s going on? Everything okay? Are you hurt?”
“No, I'm not hurt,” he says.
I wait for a few more seconds for him to continue and tell me everything's okay, but the words never come.
“Are your parents okay? Savannah?”
I pace the pattern of the tile in the flooring, focusing on the sound of my heels squeaking along the linoleum as I wait for his words.
He exhales, then releases some sort of sound mixed with frustration. “Everyone is healthy, they're okay. I just . . . I have some news. And I want you to hear it first.”
Judging by how this conversation is starting out, it's not good news, so I race through the options in my head: His assignment got delayed, he has to go on another long-distance job, he lost his license. I need to guess the hurt before he can get the words out.
“Are you messing with me? Is this your way of telling me that you’re done with your apprenticeship early and moving back to Chicago to see me?”
“I’m getting married.”
His words run through one ear and out the other, exploding into the silence of the breakroom. My feet come to a stop a few seconds later.
I close my eyes briefly, shake my head a few times and wonder if delirium has taken over. Pulling the phone from my ear, I look at the screen, and with shaking fingers tap it twice to make sure it’s Emmett’s name written across the front.
My feet take on a mind of their own, slowly pacing backwards until my back is pressed up against the cool cinder block wall and I let myself sink to the floor. I can hear Emmett call out to me, mumbling a series of apologies I don’t care to hear.
I put the phone back up to my ear in time to catch the tail end of his words: “And we have a baby on the way.”
The room around me spins, everything becoming a blur as the tears build. This can't be happening.
