I gnawed my lower lip. “I’m scared.”
“That it might be positive, honey?”
“Yes. And no.” I clutched her hands tighter. “I don’t know. I hope it’s negative, because—shit, am I ready? I’m not ready. I don’t think I’m ready. I can’t even remember to take a damn pill every morning. But then I imagined it’s a negative…” I shook my head. “That makes me a little bit sad. Or maybe… a lot sad, actually.” I looked up at her. “But how can it be negative? I’mthree weeks late.”
“Breathe, baby, breathe,” Yvonne said. “You want me to look?”
I looked up at her. “Would you?”
“I’m a nurse, honey. I give news like this all the time. I’ll be extremely professional no matter the results. Okay?”
I nodded and gnawed my thumb as Yvonne went into the bathroom. She came back out holding the three pregnancy tests, their results windows obscured under her hand. Her face was unreadable as stone.
She stood over me. “Kacey Dawson…”
“Oh, God, what…?”
“You…”
Yvonne dropped one test in my lap.
“Are…”
She dropped another.
“Pregnant.”
She dropped the last one and then let out a loud cry and began jumping up and down. “Oh my God, girl, you’re pregnant!”
“Yvonne,” I half cried, half laughed, pregnancy tests rolling around my lap. “That’s professional? Ipeedon these.”
She crowded onto the couch next to me and we examined the tests: one had a plus sign, the other had two lines, and one flat-out said ‘pregnant’ on the screen.
“Oh my God.” I grabbed at my friend to keep from sliding off the couch from the bizarre concoction of utter fear and complete euphoria that stole my strength. “I’m going to have a baby. I’m going to have Teddy’s baby.”
“You sure are, sweetheart. How do you think he’s going to react?” She made a stern face, laughter in her eyes. “If he’s not overjoyed, I can reintroduce him to my baseball bat.”
“I don’t know, but I think…I think he’s going to be exactly that. Overjoyed.”
Yvonne gave me a hug. “I think so too.”
She and I hugged a little more, cried a little more, and after she went home, I curled up on the couch, running my hand in a circle over my stomach. I thought about Teddy and me, and how our universe just got a little bit bigger.
I said goodbye to everyone two days later. Grant and Phoebe, Big E and Yvonne took me to the airport.
“I feel like Dorothy going back to Oz,” I said, pulling the Olsens in close.
“You can’t get rid of us that easily,” Grant said, his eyes a little misty.
“Yeah, you’re contractually bonded to us,” Phoebe said, hugging me so tight my nose was squashed against her bony shoulder. “For life.For life.”
“God, you make it sound like a prison sentence,” Grant muttered at her.
I laughed and fell into Big E’s warm embrace. “Thank you,” I whispered against his shirt. “I know your manly man pride can’t hear that but I’m saying it anyway. None of this…noneof it would have happened if not for you. No recording contract, no friends, no Teddy…Hell, I might not have made it.”
“You’d have made it,” Big E said. “You’re tougher than you think. Hey.” He tipped my chin. “Don’t be a stranger now. You or Theo.”
I nodded, my tears threatening.
