Charlotte’s lips lifted into a half smile. “It’s going to be fine. Everything is going to be fine.”
It had to be.
Addison carried on about the surrogacy, finding new ways to nitpick while they walked around a little more. When Charlotte steered Addison in the direction of Mason’s consultancy firm, Addison was a lot calmer, and she wasn’t gesturing as much. Charlotte walked home, drenched in sweat and with a strange taste in her mouth.
With her roommates out for the evening, Charlotte settled in with a bowl of popcorn, a glass of white wine, and a blanket draped over her legs. But when she couldn’t settle on somethingto watch, she got up and went into her room. She kept glancing over her shoulders and listening for the door. Then, she took the surrogacy brochures out of her desk drawer and took them to the living room.
Both cats were sound asleep on top of the couch when she sat back down.
The pictures on the brochure were of happy-looking women with bulging baby bellies and a beaming couple next to them. Charlotte traced the outer edges of the brochures, her fingers trembling with anticipation.
She couldn’t believe she was seriously considering this.
But she’d spent the past two weeks thinking about it.
And the more she did, the more she liked the idea of being the key to someone else’s happiness. Having spent the past few years on autopilot, alternating between throwing herself at work and looking out for her mom and sister, it felt good to be back in the driver’s seat again. It made her feel like her old self, the one who was fearless and brave and unafraid of the world.
The piece of Charlotte that had died when her father did.
Was it really coming back to life?
Or was she latching on to someone else’s dream to give her life purpose?
With her mom dating someone new, Savannah preparing for med school, and Addison eager to welcome a baby in her life, Charlotte couldn’t help but glance at her own life and feel like something was missing.
Or someone.
Everyone else was moving on with their lives and finding new dreams, but Charlotte worried that a part of her was considering this for the wrong reasons.
This is crazy. You don’t even get to keep the baby, remember? And besides, you don’t even want kids of your own.
Still, as Charlotte sat there, skimming through the brochures and stroking her stomach, she couldn’t deny the thrill that coursed through her.
When she stood to glance at herself in the full-length mirror by the front door, she ran a hand over her smooth and flat stomach. Then, she glanced around the gray-colored living room, taking in the mismatched couch set that overlooked an old fireplace that didn’t work and the TV propped on the mantel. She’d been in this living room hundreds of times throughout her life, and she liked that it was the exact same, a testament to the stability and predictability of the life around her.
Much like her own life, very little had changed in her great-grandparents’ house.
Yet, she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was different.
Why was this room, of all places, making her think of the choice she had to make?
As Charlotte let her thoughts wander, she realizedshewas the different one. Like a jagged piece of the puzzle, she was on the precipice of something great, something that meant she was outgrowing her old self.
Maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing.
Change was inevitable; it was constant—one of the few things she could count on.
A moment later, the doorbell rang, startling her out of her reprieve. She tossed the brochure onto the couch and peeked through the peephole, her heart skipping a beat when she saw Patrick in the doorway, carrying containers of food.
Her stomach grumbled as she threw the door open. “I didn’t know you moonlighted as a Chinese delivery guy.”
Patrick chuckled. “I don’t, but I ran into the guy on the way over and offered to bring it up.”
She raised an eyebrow and took a step to the side, allowing him to pass and offering her a whiff of his woodsy cologne, like sage and cedarwood. Charlotte sucked in a deep breath and slammed the door shut a little harder than she intended. With a wince, she twisted to face Patrick, who had peeled off his jacket and draped it over the back of the couch.
“You were just in the neighborhood?”
Patrick began to take out the containers of food. “Yeah, and I wanted to talk to you about a joint project between the science and drama department.”
