Janie’s eyes narrowed. “So did he,” she pointed out.
“Yeah, yeah.” I waved dismissively. “In theory, it takes two to tangle and all that. In practice, women suffer the consequences, financially and physically, so in the end it’s our responsibility.”
Essie snorted. “Oh, honey. My husband is a lawyer and I’m unhinged. We can make him suffer consequences both financially and physically if that’s what you want.”
I laughed even though I knew she was completely serious. Fuck around with Essie Price or someone she loved, and you would find out. “He’s not a bad guy. I appreciate the offer, but I don’t want him to suffer. I just wish I knew what he wanted.”
James shook her head. “He doesn’t decide what you do with your body. Let him worry about what he wants. What doyouwant?”
A baby. Thisbaby. The answer unfurled in my chest with feather-light softness. It felt like hope. Fragile, furtive hope.
I rolled my lips together, afraid to say it out loud, like if I admitted I wanted it, it would be taken away from me in some cruel cosmic reckoning.
“I never let myself hope for this.” I looked down at my stomach. My hand pressed against my lower belly like I could make it stay. “And now that it’s happening, it still doesn’t seem real, that I could actually have this. Part of me feels like I shouldn’t even consider it because it’s not really mine to keep. But I want—” My voice cracked, and I pushed the words out in a rush. “I want it.”
No one at our booth said a damn word. I could hear the low hum of indecipherable words from the tables around us, and somewhere in the distance a fork clattered against a china plate. And then?—
“We’re going to be aunts!” Essie crowed. She leaped to her feet and lunged across the table at me. She couldn’t quite reach for a hug, so instead she grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me.
“Don’t shake me!” I wheezed. “I can barely keep anything down as it is.” That made everyone lean away from me real quick. “And holy shit, keep your voice down. I haven’t told my parents or my brothers.”
Janie’s mouth hooked upward. “Don’t worry. I can keep a secret.”
I believed her. She wasn’t the one I was worried about.
“I won’t even tell Zack,” Hannah promised. “I love him, but if he knows, then everyone in Aspen Springs knows.”
Essie bobbed her head in agreement while sipping down her mimosa. “Brax, too. I swear the Hale brothers are thirteen-year-old girls in hot cowboy bodies.”
“Not Adam,” James said. “He’s like a vault. Me, on the other hand…I’m a terrible liar. How am I supposed to pretend I don’t know you’re pregnant?”
I did a quick mental calculation. “It’s only another five weeks until I’m in the second trimester.”If it’s real. If it stays.
James’s big brown eyes got even bigger. “Five weeks?” she squeaked. “You’re cooked, Chloe. Why is that a rule, anyway? It seems arbitrary.”
“Most miscarriages happen in the first trimester,” Hannah said, fiddling with the string of her teabag. “It’s not that youcan’ttell anyone. It’s just a guideline to share your joy with the same people you would tell if you miscarried.”
“Oh,” James said softly. She looked at me. “So…us?”
“You,” I agreed, and damn those pregnancy hormones because my eyes got misty.
She nodded firmly, like she was making an oath. “I’ll keep my mouth shut even if I have to use duct tape.”
Janie cocked her head, studying me. “You’re not going to tell your family yet?”
Hell no!my brain shouted.
“I wouldn’t want to trouble them if it doesn’t work out.” I said it as lightly as I could, but the thought of telling my mom I had miscarried the only grandbaby my body might be able to conceive sat like a lead brick on my chest.
Back when we were making the rounds from doctor to doctor, trying to get an answer as to why my periods were so wretched, Mom had taken the news about my fertility—or lack thereof—much harder than I had. I had locked the information away in a dark corner of my mind where it couldn’t hurt me. My mom couldn’t do that.
Mom had always wanted a daughter, and she was so damn glad to have had me first. So of course she’d also dreamed of being a grandmother to her daughter’s daughter. Sure, her sons might one day have children of their own, but it wouldn’t be the same, in her mind. She had cried when the doctor told us I probably couldn’t have kids. Not just for my sake, but for her own. For the loss ofherdream.
If I told her that dream might actually come true after all, only to snatch it back later, she would be devastated.
And then there was this, too: My mother would tell my grandmother, and my grandmother would say nothing. That would be bad enough, but it would be even worse if I then lost the baby. My mother would weep, I would comfort her, and my grandmother would still say nothing.
Our family would never recover from that, and we had already been through so much.Toomuch.
