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Figure This Out
“Ivy,” Lily said a month later. “If you’ve got time, can you come into my office?”
Ivy looked at her watch. It was nine on a Monday morning. Normally she met with Lily in the afternoon. “Sure,” she said. “Do I need anything to be prepared?”
“No,” Lily said, smiling. “This won’t take too long. I just want to talk to you and then you can go about your day.”
She stood up and followed Lily to her office. The smile said it should be fine, but the other part of her brain was wondering what she could have messed up.
When they got in Lily’s office, she asked. “Did I do something wrong?”
“What?” Lily asked. “No. Why would you ask that?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
She took a seat and Lily did the same behind her desk. “You do know. You’re always so worried someone is waiting for you to make a mistake that you don’t think people will say something nice.”
“Am I getting a raise?” she asked, laughing. She had to make a joke about this since she was still trying to slow her racing heart down.
“Not yet,” Lily said. “When your review comes up for sure.”
“I’m just kidding. I love it here. You’ve already given me more responsibility and money. More than I’ve ever had anywhere else. I just love feeling needed. And appreciated.”
“I think we all love feeling that way,” Lily said. “It’s human nature. But I wanted to talk to you one-on-one first. I’m pregnant.”
“Yay,” Ivy said, jumping up. “Can I hug you?”
“You most certainly can.”
Ivy ran to the other side of Lily’s desk and gave her boss a big hug. “Give me the details. I think we all thought it’d be soon.”
“I’m not getting any younger. I wanted to keep the kids somewhat close together, but my sisters needed time to start their families. And these things can’t always be planned either.”
“No,” she said. “Jasmine will be the first to tell you that. I’m going to assume your sisters know.”
“Yes,” Lily said. “We told them this weekend. I’ll be telling everyone else today. I wanted to talk to you first as this is all going to come into play.”
“Give me the important things first. When are you due? How do you feel?”
“I’m due August thirteenth,” Lily said. “Close to Ryder’s second birthday. Hopefully not the same day. Each child should have their own special day.”
“That’s wonderful,” she said. “We are all two years apart in my family. Except for Chase. He was the oops. My mother says no, but I think so. Why wait five years when all the rest were only two years apart?”
She’d often wondered that, but her parents would never say Chase wasn’t planned. The truth was, she didn’t think her parents planned much in life other than her father often had several months' notice of when he’d be leaving. Most of his assignments were a few years and they did try to not move when her mother might be due.
So maybe they did plan more than she thought.
It didn’t matter at this point and she wasn’t sure why she was holding onto things that she needed to let go of.
“Only your parents know the answer to that,” Lily said.
“You’re right. And you’ve got to be out of the first trimester now, right?”
“I am,” Lily said. “We wanted to wait to let everyone know at that point. And this brings me to work.”
“You’ll be out again,” she said. “I know.”
“Of course,” she said. “And you are far more experienced now than ever before. And I want you to know we think you’re doing a great job in the store. The Valentine's decorations are wonderful. Poppy loved your Easter ideas planned in a few months. You’ve got a knack for designing the space.”
