Page 21 of Riley
I grabbed my purse and my car keys and rushed out to my car. Instead of going to our local pharmacy, I drove two towns over. Everyone in Millerstown knew my family or me, and god forbid someone saw me buy a pregnancy test! It would be all over town before I could even take it!
I was home forty minutes later, staring at the back of the stick, praying that this was a waste of money. I peed on it and let it sit on the counter. The whole time, I told myself that I had just wasted an hour. It was going to be negative, and I was getting sick instead.
When the time was up, I lifted the stick, said a small prayer, and turned it over. I stared at it, my knees going weak as I slithered to the floor in front of my sink. Oh, my god! I was pregnant. I put my head back against the cabinet and closed my eyes. What in the hell was I going to do?
I thought back to dinner and how I thought Joe was such an amazing father. Sadly, I knew without a doubt that this child wasn’t his.
I dropped the stick and put my face to my hands. There was no way I could tell Ethan. Wait, if I told him, would he stay here?
It didn’t matter if he left or stayed. I needed to tell him. I just didn’t know if I could.
* * *
Saturday night,I knew that he was having dinner with his family. Coral had mentioned it when I stopped to get coffee this morning. I told her that I wanted to surprise him with a going away gift and asked her to let me know when he had gone home after dinner.
My hands started shaking the minute that I had received the text from her, and as I stood outside his door, I could barely control the quiver in them. What was he going to say?
It turns out that he had a lot to say, but not about the pregnancy. I couldn’t even get those words out of my mouth. Not with how angry he was. It was all I could do to get out of there before I broke down. The minute the door closed, I started to sob and ran to my car. I pulled out of his driveaway and drove away as quickly as I could. When I was far enough away that I knew he wouldn’t see me, I pulled over and bawled like a baby.
I wasn’t sure what I was crying for, but I knew that I had messed things up badly, and I wasn’t sure how to fix them.
