“What the heck was that?” Lisa asked, her eyes wide.
Emily shook her head and sipped water from her hands. As it slid down her throat, easing the fiery burn, she shook her head again. “I have no idea,” she breathed. “I came in, and the smell of the ham made me sick.”
Lisa leaned against the wall, her arms crossed. “This isn’t the first time you’ve felt sick recently.”
Reaching for a hand towel, Emily dried her face. “Right. I’ve been under a lot of stress, Lisa.” She tossed the hand towel onto the vanity and whipped open the medicine cabinet. “Do you have an unused toothbrush?”
“Not in there. Underneath the sink.”
Ducking, Emily pulled open the cabinet. After rummaging through a small basket, she found the pack. Quickly opening it, she stood, snatched the toothpaste, and squirted some onto the bristles. She shoved it into her mouth and plowed the brush over her teeth, wanting to remove the nasty taste.
“I know you’ve been under a lot of stress, Emily, but did it ever occur to you,” Lisa paused, placing her hand on Emily’s shoulder, “that you might be pregnant?”
Staring at her sister’s reflection, Emily immediately stopped brushing. She pulled the brush from her mouth and turned around. “No. Why would I even think that? I’m on the pill.”
“Have you kept up with it?”
Emily sighed, rinsed her mouth, and shut off the water. “Yeah, I think I have.”
“You think you have?” Lisa scoffed. “The pill only works when you take it on a regular basis. When’s the last time you had your period?”
“Jesus,” she puffed out. “It’s just my nerves. Everything that happened with Dillon while we were engaged, not to mention everything with Gavin between the engagement and after. I’m not pregnant.”
Lisa’s green eyes softened with concern. “Answer the question, Emily. When’s the last time you had your period?”
Trying hard to remember the last time she did receive a visit from “Aunt Flo,” Emily rushed her hand through her hair. “I’m not sure. The second week of October, maybe.”
“Right. The second week of October.” Lisa reached past Emily and opened the medicine cabinet. She plucked out a box and handed it to her. “Michael and I are still trying for our own. There’re two tests in there. Get peeing.”
Emily opened the box and pulled out both pregnancy tests. “I can’t believe this.”
“My thoughts exactly. What can’t you believe?” Placing her hands on her hips, Lisa gaped at her. “You haven’t had a period since the middle of October. Every time I’ve spoken to you since I left New York, you told me you were fighting some kind of nausea. You pawned it off as nerves. I get it. But everything’s fine now. There’s no reason for you to be nervous. If it’s as simple as nerves, sit down and take the test. No biggie.”
On a sigh, Emily slid down her sweatpants and popped a squat over the toilet. Waiting on Mother Nature, she tore open both tests. “Can you stop watching me? You’re making me feel like a child getting a potty training lesson.”
“Oh give me a break.” Lisa rolled her eyes and messed with her hair as she stared at her reflection. Throwing the dark curls into a messy bun, she shot Emily a sideways glance, a smile lifting the corner of her mouth. “I did potty train you. Let’s not forget I’m ten years older. I’ve wiped your ass one too many times for either of our own good.”
With way too much information pelting through her head, Emily didn’t dare keep the conversation going. But it was all good because Mother Nature finally showed up. Holding both tests, Emily slipped them under the flow, making sure both were saturated. Once finished, she placed them on the toilet paper Lisa had neatly squared up on the vanity.
Emily washed and dried her hands, her head starting to become fuzzy as the sisters hovered above the tiny sticks that, in that moment, scared the shit out of Emily. Through the past few weeks, she’d dismissed her nausea as nerves, but all of a sudden, that no longer seemed plausible. The words denial, fear, and plain out stupidity came to mind. With sweat gathering just above her lip, she yanked up the empty pregnancy test box, flipping it over to read what a positive and negative would look like. Making note that one line represented a future void of diapers, and two lines initiated her straight into motherhood, Emily started nibbling nervously at her thumb nail. “How long do these take?”
The question had barely escaped Emily’s mouth when a single line on one of the tests started turning a light shade of pink. With a sigh of relief perched in the back of her throat, a tiny smile crept across Emily face. However, that tiny smile quickly fell when the line’s twin screamed for a little attention as it, too, started blushing. Emily flicked her eyes to the other test, already beaming two bright red lines.
Standing above two plastic sticks signifying her life was about to change in more ways than she could even begin to understand, Emily tried to breathe.
Breathe…
Numbers.
Dates.
Times.
Calculations of every sort pounded through her head. A mental calendar, wicked in all it was, flashed in Emily’s mind. Its pictures reminded her that the first time she’d made love to Gavin, the night of his mother’s benefit, was within days of her and Dillon breaking up. Within days of her and Dillon making love.
Breathe…
Days.
Hours.
Minutes.
Memories of every kind arrowed through her heart. Each second she and Gavin had spent together over the last few weeks, slowly mending what was once close to broken, felt as though it was about to be ripped from her. Gone. There was no denying the child she was carrying might not be his. The chances were slim to none. In the two glorious nights they shared, she’d slept with Gavin a handful of times. In the weeks leading up to and after that night, she’d been with Dillon many times. Arms open wide, forgiving every confused indecision she’d made, Gavin had taken her back, but he’d never signed up for this. A stand-in father to the child of a man he hated. A man he loathed with every fiber of his being. This could surely break them. What they were, and what they had yet to become, would be nothing but an almost that… never was. A mirage.